This high-energy consumer show attracts a diverse audience that includes IT professionals, technology enthusiasts, students and consumers as well as regional traders.

Cisco Systems to are participating in GITEX Technology Week Under the theme ‘Within, between and beyond the Cloud’, Cisco will be showcasing its innovations with a main focus on Cloud, that will increase value to customers, create new business opportunities for partners and drive technology advances in the region. Cisco will examine the most current and critical trends and issues facing the Cloud and Virtualization landscape, and how Cisco is different with utilizing the network as the fundamental foundation that interconnects the world of many clouds while focusing on Data Center, Virtualization, Collaboration and Borderless Networks.

“Cisco’s ability to innovate is why customers rely on us as a strategic business partner rather than merely a product technology vendor,” said Wayne Hull, director and general manager, Cisco UAE. “Our aim is to leverage GITEX Technology Week as a platform to showcase our product innovation, whereby customers and partners will have the opportunity to explore how the network has become the most strategic IT asset today. Furthermore, GITEX is also an important event to connect with key business decision makers and continue to build relationships with customers and partners.”

Cisco’s stand will be located at the Zabeel Hall, GulfComms, stand number Z-B, 30. So if you happens to be in this part of the world its worth attending this exhibition

According industry experts the first ever Mango powered phone is expected to hit the selves later this year; however an official timescale for release has not yet been disclosed.

Terry Myerson, Corporate Vice President of Windows Phone Engineering said, “This marks the point in the development process where we hand code to our handset and mobile operator partners to optimize Mango for their specific phone and network configurations. Here on the Windows Phone team, we now turn to preparing for the update process. The Mango update for current Windows Phone handsets will be ready this fall, and of course will come pre-installed on new Windows Phones.”

The new Windows Phone Mango update will bring close to 500 new features to the OS. Some of these include integration with Internet Explorer 9 and app multi-tasking. I am waiting eagerly to see how Microsoft will try impact the smartphone market with its new OS.

I thought Blade servers that Cisco Systems, they must be joking; honestly I thought it was a crazy move from Cisco Systems. But they outperformed many of their competitors. In just two years, sales of the Unified Computing System are outpacing market growth for x86 blades, and Cisco has become the #3 player worldwide in x86 blade server factory revenue

Blades are forecast to be the fastest growing segment of the x86 server market and market data illustrates the impact of UCS innovation: businesses worldwide shifted over 10% of the x86 blade market to UCS, and in the U.S. nearly 20%. Cisco’s rapid growth underscores their leadership in the industry transition to fabric computing and converged infrastructure. Cisco reported 5,400 UCS customers and an annualized order run rate of $900M for UCS product orders.

According to IDC press release HP maintained the number 1 spot in the server blade market in 1Q11 with 50.0% revenue share, while IBM finished with 20.2% revenue share. Cisco and Dell rounded out the top 4 with 9.4% and 8.4% factory revenue share, respectively.

The newly announced Toner Cartridge Authentication software is comprised of three components working together. The smart chip technology contains authentication information which is collected by the Authentication software and transmitted to the authentication web service. That service then checks the data and once it is validated, it is sent back to the software, which shows the result in a pop-up box on a users’ screen. Guess what the whole process takes about a minute, amazing!

The software can be downloaded from HP for LaserJet printers, Inkjet printers already have the software embedded within the firmware. Currently  the 1000, 2000 and 3000 series LaserJet printers are supported and by 2012 HP hoping support all the HP products that comes under the ink segment.

“Either you get a message saying no risk detected, all packages are original or you get a big, bold risk detected message. If you get the risk detected message, we suggest you also click the link directly to the anti-counterfeit page,” said Andrea Gebhard, LaserJet Supplies, Imaging and Printing Group, Middle East, Mediterranean and Africa.

According to HP in the span of four years they discovered more than 30 million counterfeit products worldwide.

In addition to the Cartridge Authentication Software, HP advises that there are three basic steps that every user of HP supplies can take to identify the authenticity of an HP product, including checking for holographic security labels on the packaging tabs, checking the quality of the packaging and checking the quality and finish of the cartridge itself.

According Reuters the next version of iPhone will go on sale in September 2011, citing three sources with direct knowledge of Apple’s supply chain, the news agency said that production of the iPhone 5 is likely to start in July or August.

The Apple’s next-generation iPhone will have a faster processor but it will be similar in appearance to the iPhone 4, Reuters identified a number of components suppliers for the new phone, namely camera module maker Largan Precision for camera, Wintek to supply the touchscreen, and Foxconn Technology to supply the casing, but none of the vendors would confirm the reports.

Some market observers have suggested that the new phone will be unveiled at an as-yet unscheduled Apple event in September, as Apple has normally held a music-related product launch event in that month. It’s too early to predict the move Apple is going to take; at least I would love to see some restrictions pertained to flash and additional memory expansion  are overcome in the new version of iPhone. Not to forget Android is doing an amazing job and its market share is increasing day by day.

Perhaps Apple can come out with a new version of iPad by testing the success of it’s new version of iPhone. Especially when the tablet market is growing exponentially.

As I am working with Nexus 7000, Nexus 5000 and 2000 Series Switches, I discovered by default  Telnet Server is disabled in a NX-OS devices such as Nexus 7000, Nexus 5000 and 2000 Series Switches.

We all know Telnet protocol enables TCP/IP connections to a host. Telnet allows a user at one site to establish a TCP connection to a login server at another site and then passes the keystrokes from one device to the other. Telnet can accept either an IP address or a domain name as the remote device address.

I will show you how to enable the Telnet Server in NX-OS devices

VDC-Admin(config)# feature telnet

VDC-Admin(config)# show telnet server

telnet service enabled

VDC-Admin(config)#

 The newly  designed SDK kit will  give developers access to audio, programming interfaces, system application, and direct control of the Kinect sensors, so that they can create new applications based around the motion sensing device.

Microsoft plans to release a commercial version at later date , but the SDK will be a starter kit designed to make it simpler for the academic research and enthusiast communities to create rich natural user interfaces using Kinect technology.

  ”Microsoft’s investments in natural user interfaces are vital to our long-term vision of creating computers that are intuitive to use and able to do far more for us,” said Mundie. “The fruits of these research investments are manifesting across many of our products, Kinect for Xbox 360 among them.”

Microsoft is continuing to make developments and investments in natural user interfaces and its developments are appearing in Microsoft products such as Kinect for Xbox 360, Windows Phone 7, Microsoft Surface 2.0, Bing for mobile and Office 2010 Mini Translator

Hay Group has identified top 20 best companies for Leadership. General Electric tops the list, followed by Procter and Gamble and Intel Corporation Accenture is at no 8, Microsoft at no 12, Hewlett-Packard at no 15 and the leading Networking Company Cisco Systems at number 17. It’s 6^th Year in a row; Hay Group has identified which organizations have the best leadership practices and what we can learn from them

The 2010 featured some new faces among top 20 are include Microsoft, FedEx, PepsiCo and Pfizer while Infosys, IKEA, Zappos, UPS and General Mills have dropped out of the front-runners’ listing. To see how the top 20 ranking has changed over the last five years, click here.

The top 20 Best Companies for Leadership

Fortify Software is company which creates software for security testing of application through all stages of the development process through development, Fortify is a privately held software security assurance company based in San Mateo, Calif.

Already HP and Fortify software  have collaborated on an advanced security analysis technology, ‘Hybrid 2.0′, and will HP says that it will now be able to accelerate development of this technology to give clients the accuracy and prioritization they need around security vulnerabilities to build scalable enterprise application security programs.

With the acquisition of Fortify Software, HP will offer a complete, market-leading solution that helps organizations reduce business risk, meet compliance regulations and protect against malicious application attacks by integrating security assurance seamlessly across the application life cycle.

“Businesses operate in a world of increasing security and compliance challenges, and the applications and services that they rely on are core to the problem and the solution,” said Bill Veghte, executive vice president, Software and Solutions, HP. “With Fortify’s leadership in static application security analysis combined with HP’s expertise in dynamic application security analysis, organizations will have a best-in-class solution to improve the security of their applications and services.”

For further info do read the new release from HP,

As technology is evolving the importance of Unified Communications is growing, yet until now I thought Cisco is a leader when it comes to Unified Communication especially after the introductions of Tele presence and WebEX, but others vendors too are competing hard. Avaya took over Nortel when it was in crises, to enhance its product line. Now its Microsoft and Polycom are entering into an alliance, which provides an opportunity for them to jointly develop, sell and market Unified Communication products based Polycom endpoints and Microsoft Communication Server 14.

Polycom’s solutions for Microsoft Communications Server 14  will span markets ranging from the enterprise, to small and medium-sized businesses, to governments, the statement said. The promised integration aims to help bring Microsoft’s UC product together with Polycom’s conferencing tools, which the companies said over time will make the two systems easier for IT and telecommunications staff to manage.

 ”Microsoft and Polycom solutions play a critical role within our current and future unified communications strategy,” said Martin Smale, IT director at NDS, a News Corp. company. “We’re already benefiting from improved collaboration, increased productivity, and significant ROI based on our existing UC network, and we’re looking forward to leveraging the expanded offerings from two of our most valued vendors in the UC space.”

“Our research shows that nearly 70 percent of the companies considering a unified communications solution are thinking of deploying Microsoft Office Communications Server,” said Brent Kelly, senior analyst and partner at Wainhouse Research. “These enterprises need seamless integration and interoperability between Office Communicator on the desktop and personal, group, and telepresence video solutions like those offered by Polycom for executive offices, meeting suites, and conference rooms. By working together, Microsoft and Polycom are making it easier for organizations to have a true end-to-end unified communications environment, which includes high definition video.”

For further details on the alliance have a look at the press release from Microsoft.