CompTIA Blog

A look at the week of November 1, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channel A new health IT grant program aims to build insurance exchange systems between states.  Government workers have been scouting hacker conventions in search of new employees.  Cloud computing technology raises questions about data ownership and security. HIT Grants Help States Build Insurance Exchange — The Obama administration has launched a new grant program designed to help states establish the onli ...

It’s been a tough football game. Your team is down by four points but has the ball on your own twenty-yard line with less than two minutes to go and no time outs remaining. The coach has given the quarterback several plays that he believes will accomplish the short-term goal: to get the ball in the end zone and allow the team to win the game. After several well-executed plays, the quarterback is faced with what could be the last chance to score; third down and eight yards to go. He takes a time ...

Last week the CompTIA Educational Foundation contributed $100K to the newly formed Year Up Chicago, the local branch of a highly successful workforce development non-profit now in eight cities. As with our grant to the Chicago Academy of Advanced Technology (CAAT) in the spring, this grant is intended to keep the Chicago location moving forward and to challenge other local foundations and corporations to step to the table and support this effort to get people sustainable jobs.The first Year Up c ...

by Ray Barber, guest blogger from KaseyaServices providers (SPs) traditionally provided clients with a mixture of the break-fix model, point solutions and out-of-the-box products that tied clients down to vendors for extended periods of time, even when those products didn’t necessarily work. But, the days of single-minded inflexible quick IT fixes are fast coming to an end.During the last five years, there has been a dramatic shift in the way people consume IT products and services, and the SP i ...

In the past few months, I have had the privilege of working on CompTIA’s strategy for developing cybersecurity credentials to meet the unprecedented challenges to securing technology networks at home and abroad. I have been to meetings, talkfests, lobbying sessions; I’ve had meals and meetings with 3- and 4-stars and civilian leadership at the highest levels in our government.It’s been a privilege to sit down with C-level leaders of companies who are providing the talent and the tools to secure ...

With Halloween rapidly approaching and increased reported sightings of vampires, werewolves, zombies and other creatures from the netherworld; I can’t help but note the similarities between these creatures and a business transformation gone awry. While no one would intentionally transform their organization with visions of ghoulish, brain eating zombies as a potential outcome; a company reminiscent of the walking dead could be the unintended result of poor planning and execution. Despite the ris ...

A look at the week of October 26, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channel This week, the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security have developed new procedures to address a domestic cyberattack.  Tech companies are being heavily affected by immigration policy in their ability to recruit and maintain the talent they need.  The Obama Administration has slowed in implementing the privacy provisions for medical data in the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment ...

After a short discussion on the definition of cloud and SaaS (Software as a Service), leading panelists at the CompTIA EMEA Member Conference took to discussing the guidelines and best practices companies can engage in to help educate customers when implementing SaaS.Vlad Mazek, CEO of Own Web Now, shared that building a cloud service offering should be done, ironically enough, brick by brick. As service providers must build their authentication model over the cloud – so they must ask customers, ...

Finally, Microsoft has something to celebrate: Windows 7. More than 240 million licenses have sold since its release a year ago. It’s an amazing accomplishment considering the beleaguered Windows Vista only sold 300 million copies over its lifetime and most of those became shelfware collecting dust.But is Windows 7 the last hurrah for Microsoft and the desktop operating system? Outgoing Microsoft chief architect Ray Ozzie seems to think so. In a farewell memo sent to Microsoft employees that som ...

One of the big stories coming out of last week’s Interop show in New York was the number of vendors offering IPv6 enabled and compatible devices. The word on the street: IPv6 is not just coming to market, but an imperative for adoption.For solution providers who have suffered through the steady decline in networking gear margin erosion and commoditization, IPv6 may be a godsend. Nearly the entire IT infrastructure is standardized on IPv4 – the standard that reconciles numeric IP addresses with o ...

Once upon a time in the quiet, Windows-dominated Channel-Lands, we would hear a whisper about Apple and its consumer-oriented products. Oh, sure, they were fine for musicians and graphic artists, but hardly suitable for corporate power users. That’s changing, as evidence in this past week’s channel news, which saw a teeter-totter between the rivals in Silicon Valley and the great Pacific Northwest.Apple Hardly FallingHow successful is Apple in its strategy to take over the world? It’s not just r ...

A look at the week of October 18, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channelThis week, Politico examines Obama’s record on technology policy and what it could mean for mid-term elections.  The Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security finally reached an agreement on how to manage cybersecurity responsibilities. A tax reporting requirement attached to the healthcare bill has small IT businesses up in arms.Tech Industry Has Mixed Feelings on Obama — Two years after rallying be ...

CompTIA senior vice president, skills certification, Terry Erdle, spoke at the CompTIA EMEA Member Conference. His presentation covered how CompTIA positions its offerings in the context of a global IT workforce.The impacts of recent economics, the establishment of global standards, and new partnerships all play into the bigger picture that can impact both the hiring company as well as the individual.It’s what any entrant or convert to the IT career path may need, as we see the recent economic c ...

New research presented today at CompTIA’s EMEA conference highlights the many ways employers use and value IT training and certification, while uncovering some of the challenges organization face in measuring ROI. The CompTIA survey of 1,371 IT managers, located in the UK, South Africa and the US, who recently made an IT staff hire reveals that IT certifications play an important role in screening candidates and confirming expertise.“Despite a virtual buyers market for hiring companies, many org ...

A United Kingdom native may have said it similarly when he called, literally, one day, “Watson, come here! I want to see you!” Today’s panel discussion at the CompTIA EMEA Member Conference had local IT academia asking how do I help newly learned IT certified students prepare and present their most hirable abilities to today’s employers large and small. How do they get seen? Specific case studies provided UK Academia examples to increase the credibility and hire-ability of their young students w ...