InformationWeek: The Business Value of Technology

12 Hot Mobile Medical Apps
Mobile medicine is everywhere. There's the iPhone app that lets you cut away images of muscle layers to see what lies beneath, an e-health record system for the iPad, and a smartphone-based blood pressure monitor. Here are a dozen innovative ones.
View the Slideshow

10 Crowdsourcing Success Stories
We looked at 10 applications of the crowdsourcing concept for business. They cover the broad disciplines of marketing, advertising, product development, customer service, public relations, human resources, outsourcing, project management, Web development, coding, social media, and quality assurance. In some cases, crowdsourcing is the business. Some companies, such as Netflix, have put a mighty fine price tag on their crowdsourced efforts. Others, like Dell and Starbucks, utilize the concept on a continuous basis to solicit new ideas for how they can push their businesses forward. And lest the brainstormers think they're putting suggestions into an empty void, the companies back up the proposition, publishing stats and updates when and how the best ideas are implemented.
View the Slideshow

Filemaker Go 1.2 Expands iOS Feature Set
The latest version of Filemaker Go--the database software provider's iOS-based mobile application for business users--adds charts and graphs, digital signature capture, enhanced PDF tools, and wireless printing while allowing users to develop custom applications for the iPhone or iPad without heavy-duty development work.
View the Slideshow

Lookout Mobile Security Protects Android Smartphones
For a while now, it seems as if malware that targets smartphones has been more of a theoretical exercise as opposed to a real threat. And mobile security software is one of the last things that many people and businesses think they need. But the recent outbreak of Android-based malware, which has led to reportedly tens of thousands of people becoming infected by malware found in more than fifty apps in the Android Market, could be the first sign of the new age of mobile threats.
View the Slideshow

Best Of Interop 2011 Finalists
The Best of Interop Awards recognize exhibitors that have made significant technological advancements in specific category areas. The winners in each category represent the products that the judges believe have the most significant technical impact on their segment, and are helping to move business technology forward. This year, more than 100 candidates were under consideration for Best of Interop and here we present the 2011 finalists in each category.
View the Slideshow

RIM BlackBerry PlayBook Teardown
UBM TechInsights takes a look under the hood at yet another tablet. Inside RIM's new BlackBerry tablet is the TI OMAP 4 processor, a six-axis gyro and some other fun hardware goodies.
View the Slideshow

Top 10 Mobile Apps For Business Collaboration
Collaboration is one of today's strongest business trends, fueled in part by advances in (and employees' experiences with) social media. The ability to exchange ideas and communicate about activities has proven wildly popular in the social sphere -- why not in the business one as well? And recognizing this demand, vendors are making tools available that enable teams to keep track of each others' progress on a group project, exchange information about tasks and contacts, and otherwise work together more smoothly and conveniently. At the same time, though, the trend toward worker mobility continues to grow. More and more workers find themselves working out of the office, on the road or telecommuting, and keeping in touch via their smartphone. These 10 mobile apps will keep the collaborative momentum going no matter where you are.
View the Slideshow

Top 20 Enterprise Laser Printers
Demand for networked color laser printers continues to grow. They offer high-resolution, crisp text, and vivid colors, and are playing a greater role in businesses. But they face challenges: high-performance and lower cost inkjet printers and a weak economy that caused companies to look for ways to cut print costs or allocate those costs to departments. And there's still a big market for black and white printers. Most printers now meet Energy Star standards, which means energy efficiency isn't an effective sales pitch. So vendors have turned to features such as faster first page printing, better management tools, automated two-sided printing, and software that automatically turns the printer off after a pre-determined idle time.
View the Slideshow

Firefox 4 Is Faster, Cleaner, More Secure
The latest version of the open-source Mozilla Web browser has finally arrived and it is a welcome upgrade. Firefox 4 includes a revamped look and feel, faster performance, strong standards support, and enhanced privacy controls. As far as features go, Firefox 4 compares well with browsers such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 and Google's Chrome, and the large library of extensions and add-ons for Firefox make it the most extendable and customizable of modern Web browsers. With all other major browsers having recently released new versions, this also means that the current generation of browsers all represent the latest in cutting edge Web technologies, including support for the emerging HTML 5 standard.
View the Slideshow

Top 15 Cloud Collaboration Apps
Judging by the investments that developers -- both well-established and start-ups -- are making in the collaboration market, software vendors are paying more than lip service to the adage that no man is an island. Certainly, businesses are investigating -- and investing in -- tools that help employees brainstorm, locate each other, schedule meetings, and communicate via social networks. Collaboration technology itself covers a broad spectrum of devices, from instant messaging and email, to cell phones and videoconferencing equipment. The cloud empowers individuals to use these tools practically anywhere, further boosting corporate productivity and spurring investment. Here's 15 of the leading cloud collaboration applications.
View the Slideshow

Healthcare IT Vendor Directory
As money flows into efforts to modernize healthcare IT systems, a wide variety of tech vendors -- from traditional healthcare systems providers to newcomers seeking a piece of the action -- are offering new systems, products, and services to assist caregivers in doing a better job of helping patients.
View the Slideshow

Broadvision's Clearvale Express Offers Free Social Media Capabilities
Broadvision has introduced Clearvale Express, a SaaS-based social networking/enterprise 2.0 application that makes it possible for a company to provide workers with a Twitter-like activity stream that lets you know what your colleagues are working on, collaborate on files and tasks, and build collaborative communities. Workers can follow other users and view a simple Facebook-like profile wall on each user of the company network within Clearvale Express. The application is a stripped down version of Broadvision's full enterprise-class Clearvale. For small businesses or departments looking for a way to add a social element to business interactions, it can be an effective tool. Businesses and organizations using Clearvale Express that want to invite users with different email domains to collaborate with their employees need to make sure at sign-up that they use the link for membership organizations, as the default sign-up for Clearvale Express works only if all member of the network have the same email domain.
View the Slideshow

Internet Explorer 9 Fast, Powerful, Intuitive
The browser wars are back and bigger than ever. Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, and Opera are all providing innovative, fast, and streamlined experiences for surfing the Web. And now, with the release of Internet Explorer 9, Microsoft joins in with arguably the best Web browser the company has ever released. With a revamped interface, improved security and privacy options, and much better performance, IE 9 compares well with competing browsers. Traditionally a laggard in performance tests, IE 9's new Web and JavaScript engines put it back among the pack in general performance tests and even slightly in the lead for JavaScript performance. IE 9 has also added many long missing features, such as a download manager and integrated search.
View the Slideshow

Enterprise 2.0 Launch Pad: 2010 Elite 8
Innovation is at the heart of software development, and it's the name of the game in the Enterprise 2.0 Launch Pad competition. Held in conjunction with both the Santa Clara and Boston editions of the 2010 Enterprise 2.0 Conference, Launch Pad produced four finalists at each site -- the best of the best applications produced and submitted to the competition that year. Best of all? Entering Launch Pad was free, and open to all software developers -- large and small -- who were building, launching, or had recently launched an application. Companies first submitted their pitch via Twitter. In round two, entrants submitted a video of no more than three minutes highlighting the product or service's most compelling features and functionality. Quarterfinalists were selected by a jury of Enterprise 2.0 experts.
View the Slideshow

Google Chrome 10 Boosts Performance, Management
Google releases a new version of its Web browser every six weeks, so a new release of the Chrome browser is usually light on new features. That's true for Chrome 10, but the improvements in the new version of the browser are welcome. Probably the biggest new feature is the new Crankshaft V8 engine for JavaScript. Along with other performance improvements, the JavaScript engine clearly puts Chrome right at the top of browser performance, based on a variety of benchmarks. Chrome 10 has also added a new interface for configuring browser options, improved the ability to sync settings across browser installations, and has added additional security layers for Flash content running in the browser.
View the Slideshow

Apotheker Takes The Stage, Paints An HP Cloud Vision
Hewlett-Packard crafted a media and analyst summit where it envisioned the company at the center of cloud, connectivity and software, providing the enabling technology and services on top. New company captain Leo Apotheker, who has been traveling the globe talking to business customers and employees, was expected to talk about bringing HP back to its roots: Innovation, R&D, and engineering, perhaps with a misguided desire for the company to be as hip as Apple. Despite a reliance on buzz words (one more time with the "seamless, secure, context aware," sometimes with no context?), Apotheker provided a bit of a surprise, namely that HP would take a dramatic new direction in the cloud, providing Infrastructure as a Service today, and, soon, Platform as a Service. HP will, he said, also provide other services in the cloud, like analytics through its Vertica acquisition.
View the Slideshow

iPad 2 A5 Chip Teardown Reveals Samsung Fab, Advanced Power Management
The new dual core A5 chip inside the iPad 2 is very fast, but as always, Apple isn't very forthcoming on its origin. UBM TechInsights dissected the chip and found it to be a Samsung fab. TechInsights also provided a cost breakdown of all the iPad 2 components.
View the Slideshow

10 Massive Security Breaches
They make the news on a regular basis: incidents in which a company or government agency's security is breached, leading to a loss of information, personal records, or other data. There are many ways to measure the size or cost of a security breach. Some result in the loss of millions of data records, some affect millions of people, and some wind up costing the affected businesses a lot of money. Not to mention, the questions of you calculate the value of personal medical information vs. credit card numbers. Here are ten security breaches of epic scale, plus one "bonus" incident that ranks among the boneheaded moves of all time.
View the Slideshow