Kevin Mullins

Predictions for 2007

Wikipedia describes a prediction as a forecast that is a statement or claim that a particular event will occur in the future . My predictions are closer to my opinions than statements of fact. My opinions are formed from reading and listening to many technical and managerial blogs and podcasts.

Here are my predictions - opinions for 2007:

1) Web 2.0 adoption will continue to grow especially on customer facing sites. Established companies will start to incorporate functionality for feedback and community support around their products.

2) Web 2.0 companies are creating opportunities and not a Dot-Com bubble.

The Wall Street Journal Online invited two technology venture capitalists, who were active in the dot-com days and have invested in the current crop of startups, to debate the topic. Todd Dagres spent nearly a decade at Battery Ventures before starting Spark Capital last year. David Hornik, a partner at August Capital and a former Silicon Valley attorney, writes the popular VentureBlog. Todd Dagres supports that theory that the current Web 2.0 activity is another dot-com bubble and David Hornik opposes Todd stating that this new Internet Web 2.0 activity is an opportunity for progress.

Some Web 2.0 companies may not make it in 2007 however this surge in Technology and surge in spending is good of the economy and good for the Technology Industry.

3) Industry adoption of Web 3.0 functionality or whatever it will be called will not happen until sometime after 2007.

Ken Rutkowski from Ken Radio calls Second Life a Web 3.0 application, however given the complexity defining Web 2.0 and the debate surrounding adoption, I think it's too early to define a company or an application as Web 3.0. My guess is that there will be a lot of discussion surrounding this topic in 2007.

4) Virtualization will continue to grow in 2007

In my opinion, server Virtualization is already mainstream. We will see continued growth in the software applications space, the software testing space and in the storage space. I also think that competition between Vmware and Microsoft will heat up in this space.

5) Continued growth in Voice Over IP (VOIP)

VOIP works great in a nice controlled environment where folks can monitor usage and network performance, however I am still skeptical about Global-Enterprise level VOIP over the INTERNET. Sure Skye works and is very useful on a Business trip, however I would be very skeptical delivering Skye to the CEO of a large global company. I see more development in this space before VOIP is ready for the global enterprise.

6) Email is not dead.

Email may change, however I see it growing in 2007 before plateauing in 2008. Web 2.0 adoption and the Internet usage is still growing, which drives email requests and requirements. In the coming years we may move to more of a voice, video, IM or SMS means of communication, however that is far in the future.

Also, email is embedded in the fabric of all support organizations. We receive hundreds of alerts and events every day. The consumer experience may change, but email will remain at the heart of all support organizations.

7) The convergence of Video, Movies, TV Shows, and Podcasts onto the Internet will continue. The Internet is another delivery mechanism for Content suppliers and they have finally realized that fact.

8) Adoption of Web Based OS's and applications will grow. Products like goowy, youOS, and eyeOS offer community based services that can be useful to many SBM's.

Your comments are welcome .....

Happy New Year

Practice of Leadership

Lately I have been reading a lot about management and leadership strategies on the Manager Tools blog and the Practice of Leadership blog. I have often commented on Manager Tools, however I have not commented on The Practice of Leadership blog.

Practice of Leadership blog is managed by George Ambler, an IT Strategist from Johannesburg, South Africa. George reads a lot of books on management and leadership and often comments on his readings and provides excerpts and quotes from his readings. There is a real wealth on knowledge here written clearly and concisely from Georges point of view.

Here is a sample of some of his posts :

11 Qualities of Leaders

10 signs of an unsafe leader

Peter Drucker on Leadership

Leaders Focus on Creating, Not Problem Solving

How to build a great team

Five Steps to engage your employees

How to become and expert at anything

7 Ways to Ensure that your E-mail gets read

If you are looking to improve your Managerial and Leadership skills, check out both Practice of Leadership and the Manager Tools blog.

Microsoft Virtual Hard Disks (VHD)

Last month I wrote about Microsoft's Virtual Lab Express which is a great tool for previewing and testing software.

As I have investigated further, I think I prefer the Microsoft Virtual Hard Disks (VHD), which are very similar, however the advantage is that you can download the VHD's to your environment, share them with your end users and then test the functionality in a very secure environment.

I feel that this is the new paradigm for software testing. You can create and entire virtual network within a VHD, along with the Active Directory, DNS, Front-End Application environment and Back End database server environment. You can use this environment for development, user acceptance testing or even offer this environment as a demo or testing environment to your customers.

If you are an IT professional with Microsoft based responsibilities, you should check out both the Microsoft's Virtual Lab Express and Microsoft Virtual Hard Disks.

WEB 2.0

Over the last month I have been reading a lot about WEB 2.0 and in particular references to WEB 2.0 in the enterprise. I first started reading about this because I questioned the adoption of WEB 2.0 technologies in the enterprise and I wanted to see if there was a trend to enterprise adoption. As a technology manager responsible for infrastructure resources, understanding these technologies and where they can be applied is critical to my success.

The O'Rielly site and Wikipedia are good starting points for those folks trying to understand WEB 2.0. Dion Hinchcliffe's WEB 2.0 blog and his Enterprise Web 2.0 blog at ZDnet goes beyond the concepts of WEB 2.0 to how it will impact the business.

Here is my meager definition of Web 2.0......

Web 2.0 is a architecture and a shift in how individuals, companies, and enterprises communicate and share knowledge and resources on intra-nets and on the INTERNET. It is more user and community centric with more feedback built into the apps and has a richer dynamic web interface with robust features like tagging and dynamic data gathering.

There are a number of companies experimenting with and deploying Web 2.0 technologies today, however it's adoption appears to be geared to the customer level of applications as opposed to a across the board architectural deployment.

If your business rely heavily on Internet based traffic then it makes a lot of sense to look at these technologies, however inside the firewall at the enterprise level, your Customer Service and Intra-net applications are good choices, however your Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable and Claims Processing applications are not good choices. Applications with tight data and security requirements are not good candidates, as WEB 2.0 technologies are much more open then typical WEB 1.0 or Client Server based applications.

To answer my original question, I do see a trend in the adoption of WEB 2.0 technologies in the Enterprise, however in my opinion, a full adoption will not happen until we can integrate enterprise level security into the openness of WEB 2.0.