Dell Software Reinforces Commitment to SQL Server Market Leadership with Upgraded Monitoring, Management and Backup Offerings

Dell Software today announced a host of enhancements that further demonstrate its ongoing commitment to the SQL Server database market, including the release ofSpotlight on SQL Server Enterprise 11.0. The new solutions, which will be on display next week atPASS Summit, the industry’s leading conference for SQL Server professionals, build on Dell’s 18-year legacy of providing robust, affordable, and easy-to-use database tools to monitor, manage, protect, and improve the performance of SQL Server environments.

News Facts:

Dell Software’s complete set of end-to-end SQL Server solutions enables customers to get the most from their database investments. Along with Spotlight on SQL Server Enterprise 11.0, newly upgraded solutions include Foglight for SQL Server 5.7, Toad for SQL Server 6.5, LiteSpeed for SQL Server 8.0, and SharePlex 8.6.

• Spotlight on SQL Server Enterprise 11.0, a SQL Server database monitoring tool, continues to break new ground when it comes to providing customers with the ultimate in flexibility to suit their specific usage needs.
  • Building on the success of the Wait Stat analysis workflow, Spotlight 11 introduces a multi-dimensional workload analysis to provide maximum insight into performance issues.
  • The new release also features a mobile capability that allows SQL Server DBAs to remotely diagnose issues directly from their mobile phones. Spotlight mobile is implemented as a native mobile app (IOS, Android and Windows Mobile), delivering the user experience customers have come to expect from mobile apps.
  • In addition, version 11 features a new SCOM management pack, enabling SCOM users to leverage Spotlight on SQL Server for SQL Server monitoring and diagnostic needs.
• The newly released Foglight for SQL Server 5.7, for real-time and historical database performance monitoring of both virtualized and non-virtualized databases, introduces the new SQL Performance Investigator that provides fast, accurate and detailed SQL workload analytics within its flexible deep dive monitoring platform. Foglight for SQL Server can monitor thousands of instances within a single download-and-go installation, while offering deep dive operational and workload data collection and retention. Designed specifically to help ease the workload of the DBA, additional new features include:
  • Multi-Dimensional Data Cube for fast workload analytics, with historical session data that allows for easy navigation through performance metrics and ability to gather more granular metric data
  • Lock analysis to show who is locking a table and causing degradation for other users. Forensic level analysis shows both real-time and historical data to determine who is holding the lock, what object is being locked, and for how long, and provides the ability end the locker’s session
  • Change Tracking to track changes to database configuration, objects, execution plan and system configuration to quickly see the impact changes have on database performance
• Dell Software’s popular line of Toad data and data management solutions has been updated to support the latest versions of SQL Server 2014 Enterprise and Express. Dell’s Toad solutions support SQL Server databases running on Amazon EC, as well as other Microsoft platforms including SQL Server Analysis Services, SQL Azure, Azure data market, Azure table services and SharePoint.
  • Toad for SQL Server 6.5 now also integrates with Spotlight Essentials to deliver system health checks and performance analytics to DBAs and developers.
• LiteSpeed for SQL Server 8.0, the latest release of Dell Software’s leading SQL Server backup and recovery solution, offers a host of new features, including:
  • A new cloud backup option to Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service), allowing customers to bypass local disk and backup and restore directly to the cloud from either on-premises SQL Servers, or those running on Amazon EC2. Data is fully encrypted for transport, and optionally encrypted on S3. LiteSpeed also supports the S3 GovCloud, for use by U.S. government agencies and customers
  • An updated user interface, a new multi-database restore feature, and full support for SQL Server 2014
• Lastly, planned for later this year, the release of version 8.6 of SharePlex, a leading database replication and near real-time integration solution, increases Dell’s expanding footprint of heterogeneous database support. The updated solution enables IT staff to offload reporting, migrate data, and provide immediate data integration services from Oracle databases to Microsoft SQL Server for better business insight.
  • The new release brings the number of certified target platforms for replication support to eight, including: Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Hadoop, SAP ASE, ODBC, JMS, SQL flat files, and XML files.

Leading the way in solutions for SQL Server

Dell’s collective expertise and the breadth and depth of its SQL Server solutions span the entire IT infrastructure, from hardware to software and services. Dell is one of the largest resellers of Microsoft SQL Server licenses worldwide, and a leading worldwide Microsoft SQL Server deployment partner. Recipient of six 2014 Microsoft Partner of the Year awards, Dell has 17 Microsoft-certified Masters on-staff, more than 20 advanced Microsoft competencies, and more than 38,000 SQL Server databases managed worldwide.

Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/2014/10/28/6465015/dell-software-reinforces-commitment.html?sp=/100/773/385/#storylink=cpy

How to Install Java in OS X Yosemite

Mac users who require Java and who have installed OS X Yosemite may have discovered that a prior version of Java is no longer functioning under OS X 10.10, and that older installers don’t work to install Java in Yosemite. Additionally, a fresh install of Yosemite does not include Java at all. If your Mac running OS X Yosemite needs Java for application compatibility, online banking, or any of the myriad of other reasons, you can manually install one of two versions of Java that are compatible with OS X 10.10, either the latest version of JRE 8, or an older version from Apple which remains compatible with the newest version of OS X.

Keep in mind that many Mac users do not need Java anymore, so if you’re not sure whether you need Java in OS X, you probably don’t, and you’re probably better off just avoiding this.

1: Grab a Yosemite Compatible Java Version from Apple

Apple offers an (older) Yosemite compatible version of Java on their website:

While this version installs in OS X Yosemite just fine (despite having the Lion icon shown on the Apple support page, just ignore that as there are no lions in Yosemite) it’s actually JRE 6, which is not the most recent version. If you want a more recent version of the JDK or JRE, you can get that directly from Oracle.

2: Get the Yosemite Compatible Java 8 Installer from the Command Line

Launch the Terminal in OS X Yosemite and type the following command:

java -version

If you do not currently have Java installed, you’ll get a message that says “No Java runtime present, requesting install.” soon followed by a popup message that says “To use the ‘java’ command-line tool you need to install a JDK. Click “More Info” to visit the Java Developer Kit download website.”

As you may have guessed, click on “More Info” to launch the Java site in your default web browser, don’t click on OK it just closes the alert box.

That just takes you to this Oracle website where you can download the latest installer for either the Java 8 JRE (the runtime, for most users) or the Java 8 JDK (the Java development kit, for developers).

That’s all there is to it, enjoy your Java in OS X Yosemite.

How computers change the way we learn

Can technology improve the way we learn and think? Google’s head of research argues we're headed into a new era of education.

“This discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners' souls, because they will not use their memories,” a concerned commentator once spoke of a new technology. “[People] will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality.”
Two thousand years later, the technology has changed but the dialogue remains the same. Facebook, smartphones, and video games are all supposedly bad for us: damaging our concentration, or leading to falling grades.
While there’s no doubt that information technology can have its downsides for our day-to-day behaviour, there is very little evidence that computers are damaging our brains – any more than writing made us more forgetful. In fact, computers might just make us a bit smarter.
This potential for technology to enhance the mind was explored by Google’s vice-president of research Alfred Spector at the World-Changing Ideas Summit in New York on 21 October. He outlined the ways that even simple apps could improve the way we think and learn. “Since I was a freshman in college, almost every piece of information technology is a million times better than when I started,” he said. “And there are reasons to believe that this will affect education.”

iOS 8.1 Compatible Jailbreak Tweaks On Cydia For iPhone 6, 6 Plus And Other iOS 8 Devices

A new iOS 8 – 8.1 jailbreak by Pangu Team has been released and now people are wondering which tweaks are compatible with their devices. While Mobile Substrate has recently been updated by Saurik, still, most popular tweaks are yet inaccessible to jailbreak users as the require updates by the developers.

For those who are willing to hunt around a bit, you can search Cydia for iOS 8 – 8.1 compatible tweaks, however, I wouldn't personally recommend it. It’s safer just to go with an established list of tweaks that are known to be compatible.

At this time the compatible list of iOS 8.1 jailbreak tweaks is pretty small but guaranteed it’ll grow as the days pass. Below is a complete list of what has been tested and found compatible so far. As the list is updated, we’ll be sure to post updates as well. Twitter user@iAdam1n, who is extremely diligent about making and updating lists of compatible tweaks for new jailbreaks, has shared that he will be providing a regularly updated listing of compatible iOS 8.1 jailbreak tweaks once Cydia is officially packaged with Pangu. Be sure to follow his account for the most up-to-date tweak compatibility listings. In addition,  

www.reddit.com/r/jailbreak is a great subreddit to visit for anyone asking questions or needing help with anything Jailbreak-related, from troubleshooting problems with your device to using and creating themes for iPhones, iPads and iPods.

eBay open sources a big, fast SQL-on-Hadoop database

eBay has open sourced a database technology, called Kylin, that takes advantage of distributed processing and the HBase data store in order to return faster results for SQL queries over Hadoop data.

Online auction site eBay has open sourced a database technology called Kylin that the company says enables fast queries over even petabytes of data stored in Hadoop. eBay isn’t a big data user on par with companies like Google and Facebook, but it does run technologies such as Hadoop at a fairly large scale and Kylin seems a good example of the type of innovation it’s doing on top of them.

Citing among other features its REST APIs, ANSI-SQL compatibility, connections to analysis tools Tableau and Excel, and sub-second latency on some queries. However, the most unique features of Kylin involve how it deals with scale. eBay says it can query billions of rows of data — on datasets more that 14 terabytes in size — at speeds much faster than using the traditional Apache Hive tool.

The way Kylin works, at a high level, is to take data from Hive; pre-process large queries using MapReduce; and then store those results as key-value “cuboids” in HBase. When a user runs a Kylin query using a particular set of variables, the values are ready to go without requiring them to be processed again. It’s not entirely dissimilar from the cubes than analytic databases have been utilizing for years, but Kylin’s cuboids are designed with HBase’s preferred data structure in mind.

US Army's Laser Gun Can Blast Enemy Drones: How It Works

or the U.S. military, laser guns aren't sci-fi tech; they're a reality.

In its most recent test, a 10-kilowatt laser gun developed by Boeing for the U.S. Army shot down more than 150 drones, rockets and other mock enemy targets, according to Boeing officials. Known as the High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator (HEL MD), the weapon uses directed beams of energy to destroy its targets in midair.

To destroy an incoming small bomb or mortar round, the laser shoots it with a beam of energy that measures less than an inch (2.5 centimeters) across, according to Barry Crow, a Boeing engineer who works on the HEL MD project. This dime-size beam can hit a target that is miles away.

Zuckerberg's Chinese speech gets mixed reviews

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's attempt to woo a Chinese audience by speaking Mandarin has had mixed reviews from Chinese speakers.

News outlet Quartz described his 30-minute chat as making him sound "like someone was stepping on his face".

Others were kinder. "This CEO is so cool, I want to cry," wrote one.

Fellow chief executive - Apple's Tim Cook - was also in China, questioning officials about an alleged hack of its iCloud service.

Articulate seven-year-old

Mr Zuckerberg was in Beijing as a newly appointed member of the advisory board for Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management.

As part of that role, he met students for a 30-minute chat, which he conducted in Mandarin.

There was plenty of reaction to his attempts to communicate in Chinese.

One blogger wrote: "It's hard to describe in English what Zuckerberg's Mandarin sounded like but I'd put it roughly at the level of someone who studied for two years in college, which means he can communicate like an articulate seven-year-old with a mouth full of marbles."

Others commented: "Oh my god... this is terrible... but apart from the tones, he seems to have learnt the vocabulary and grammar pretty well."

One tonal slip-up led Mr Zuckerberg to claim that Facebook had just 11 mobile users instead of one billion.

While most agreed that his pronunciation was far from fluent, most were also impressed that he had attempted it at all.

Mr Zuckerberg, who is married to Chinese-American Priscilla Chan, set himself the goal of learning Mandarin in 2010, in part so that he could communicate with his Chinese relatives.

But Facebook as a company is also keen to improve relationships with China. There is currently a ban on the use of the social media site, which dates back to 2009.

There was no explicit chat about the ban and Mr Zuckerberg described China as a "great country".

"The Chinese language is difficult, and I speak English, but I like challenges," he said.

iCloud hack

On Facebook's future in the country, he was diplomatic: "We are already in China. We help Chinese companies gain customers abroad. We want to help the rest of the world connect to China," he said.

Fellow chief executive Tim Cook is also in China and will attend a meeting at Beijing's Tsinghua University with Mr Zuckerberg later in the week.

Meanwhile he has had talks with the vice premier of China to discuss protecting user data in the wake of recent alleged hack attacks targeting iCloud users.

The attacks were revealed by Chinese activist group GreatFire.org, which accused the Chinese government of being involved.

iCloud user data was collected by creating a spoof icloud.com website.

Mr Cook also used the trip to China to visit Foxconn's iPhone factory and said that the company would open 25 retail stores in China in the next two years.

Apple currently earns about 15% of its revenue in China.

Google offers new email app dubbed Inbox

Google is revamping its email service with a new mobile app it is simply calling Inbox.

It is an attempt to reorganise overcrowded inboxes and ensure important emails are not overlooked.

Currently the tech giant has invited a select group of Gmail users to try out the new service. Some experts believe it will eventually replace Gmail.

"Our biggest rethink of email since Gmail, really excited about Inbox," wrote one Google executive on Google+.

Among the main changes, Inbox will:

• highlight key information from important messages, such as flight itineraries, event information and photographs
• let users add their own reminders - to pick up dry-cleaning or give parents a call, for example
• categorise messages - clustering together receipts or bank statements for instance

"We get more email now than ever, important information is buried inside messages, and our most important tasks can slip through the cracks - especially when we're working on our phones," wrote Sundar Pichai, senior vice-president of Android, Chrome and apps.

"For many of us, dealing with email has become a daily chore that distracts from what we really need to do - rather than helping us get those things done," he added.

Reaction from the technology press appeared to be mixed.

The Verge described it as the future of email. "It's perfectly happy to have you use your email as a to-do list," it said.

But Mashable pointed out that other apps such as Mailbox and Box do similar things, and Engadget questioned whether it would really signal the end of Gmail.

Attack On Apple's iCloud Service In China

China's firewall blocks access to iCloud, which stores information including documents, iMessages, photos and emails.

Attempts to log in to Apple's iCloud in China sees users directed to a spoof website which may be an attempt by the state to harvest passwords.

The country's firewall is blocking all connections to Apple's login page and instead directing them to a dummy site that looks virtually identical.

Those using Chrome and Firefox browsers are automatically notified that they are no longer on Apple's website, but users of Chinese browser Qihoo will see no indication of the issue.

iCloud stores information including documents, iMessages, photos, emails and contact information.

If the perpetrator of the attack is confirmed to be Chinese state, it would be the first time it has directly targeted an Apple service.

However, web censorship watchdog Great Fire said: "Apple has a long history of working with the Chinese authorities to self-censor content in China.

"While we worry for Chinese users who may have their accounts compromised, we are shedding no tears for the Apple executives."

The site pointed out that similar attacks using the man-in-the-middle technique have hit Google and Microsoft this year.

Apple recently added disk encryption by default to its mobile operating system, a move which drew complaints from the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.

OS 8.1 is available for download now

Apple's new iPhone and iPad update, iOS 8.1, is officially out. The biggest addition is support for Apple Pay on the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus models.

Apple Pay is a new feature that allows you to make payments with your iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus. Because the new phones have near-field communication built in, you can simply tap your phone to purchase items at Walgreens, McDonald's, and other retailers. You can also use Apple Pay to make in-app purchases as well.

Other than Apple Pay support, iOS 8.1 fixes a handful of bugs that pertain to Wi-Fi connectivity among other issues. The update also allows iPhones and iPads to communicate with your Mac through a feature known as Handoff, which is new to iOS 8.1 and OS X Yosemite.

Here's the full list of changes:

Adds an option to select between 2G, 3G, or LTE networks for cellular data

Fixes an issue in Safari where videos would sometimes not play

Adds AirDrop support for Passbook passes

Adds an option to enable Dictation in Settings for Keyboards, separate from Siri

Enables HealthKit apps to access data in the background

Accessibility improvements and fixes

oFixes an issue that prevented Guided Access from working properly

oFixes a bug where VoiceOver would not work with 3rd partykeyboards

oImproves stability and audio quality when using MFi HearingAids with iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus

oFixes an issue with VoiceOver where tone dialing would get stuck on a tone until dialing another number

oImproves reliability when using handwriting, Bluetooth keyboards and Braille displays with VoiceOver

Fixes an issue that was preventing the use of OS X Caching Server for iOS updates 

Some features may not be available for all countries or all areas.