Sitting here reading a news item that reports that Oracle and SAP plan to release new analytic capabilities for their respective enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications (Oracle Financials and SAP R/3), the first question that comes to my mind is: Where have they been?

As we all know, achieving IT and business alignment is not easy. We must tie business strategy, technology, and people into a comprehensive and synergistic package that, as Paul Strassmann says, will demonstrate a positive relationship between IT and accepted financial measures of performance. However, as my mother used to say, you need to be careful for what you wish for, because you just might get it.

I read an interesting interview with Brian Arthur, a Santa Fe Institute theorist who studies technology revolutions. He argues that we had a big bash in the late 1990s and are now in the doldrums. But he also says he expects that 2003 is the year we start a new expansion.

More hours worked doesn't mean more work accomplished, especially in information work. Get tired enough, and you'll actually remove value from a project because of increased defects, missed opportunities for design improvement, and snappish or withdrawn behavior that strains the social fabric of the team.

Cutter launched its Enterprise Architecture Advisory Service in 1999. It seems appropriate to begin the new year with a brief survey of where this field has come in the last four years.

The most common method of software estimation, according to a recent survey by Cutter Consortium of more than 100 software development organizations of varied sizes, is the very basic technique of using the rough judgment of experienced developers -- the "guru" method.

The management of risk is like driving a car -- everyone believes they do it really well, but very few people actually do so.

Recently, while driving, my windshield wipers failed. I would turn them on, but they wouldn't move. After several minutes of trying, they would eventually work, but they had failed in the "off" state.

If you are facing upgrades to existing packaged applications and planning the implementation of an enterprise application integration (EAI) solution, you are not alone. The new world is here, and it involves woolly mammoth-size IT scenarios. So, how do you begin to tackle such a scenario -- one that involves enterprise application upgrades and deploying an EAI solution?

When a new conference is being launched, it often has to take whatever dates it can get, since major cities and venues are often booked years in advance. The Object Management Group (OMG) is in the process of launching a new conference, Integrate, which is designed to be the place for managers to come to learn about new enterprise integration strategies.

I've been working with a company that wants to apply analytics to its customer service operations. As a result, I thought it would be interesting to readers to read about how and where organizations are applying customer service analytics.