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| IN THIS ISSUE |
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Will the Daylight Saving Time Shift Impact Your Equipment? |
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Appro Introduces HPC Workstation |
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Other Bio-IT Stories of Interest |
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Will the Daylight Saving Time Shift Impact Your Equipment?
By Salvatore Salamone
It's no Y2K problem, but there are similarities. Daylight Saving Time (DST) kicks in about three weeks earlier than normal due to provisions in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 that take effect this year.
So instead of setting our clocks ahead the first weekend in April, this year the change will be made on March 11. Trouble is, many computers, applications, and lab equipment with embedded clocks will not automatically adjust to the date shift.
As was the case with the Year 2000 (Y2K) problem, companies will need to check computer and lab equipment to ensure the devices take the earlier arrival into account. One saving grace is that the impact will not likely be as severe as Y2K. Times would be off by one hour instead of a century.
However, this does not minimize the potential problems uncooperative equipment could pose for life science companies. E-mail messages, lab notebook entries, sequenced workflows and other applications that use time stamps could potentially record or use an incorrect time. This might become an issue in patent claims, legal cases that subpoena e-mail, or processes that require operations to be performed in a particular sequence.
Many IT and lab equipment vendors are addressing the problem either through software patches or firmware updates. To aid their customers, many vendors have created dedicated DST Web sites. For example, click these links to reach the DST pages for IBM, HP, Sun, Microsoft, and Cisco.
Some newer software and equipment may already take the DST shift into account. For instance, Microsoft's Windows Vista, Exchange Server 2007, and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 do not need updates.
If you are just now addressing the DST shift issue, industry experts suggest starting with your operating systems on your servers, computers, and lab equipment. If these are all updated to accommodate the change, you will likely be safe in others areas. For example, many applications use a device's operating system time for time stamps, so once a fix has been made to the OS, the applications will automatically pick up the correct time.
Similar to Y2K, the biggest problem may come from equipment with embedded operating systems that cannot easily be changed. So companies will simply have to be vigilant on the days after March 11 to make sure everything is working properly.
How are you dealing with the Daylight Saving Time shift? Are you using any special tools to test your systems? Are you relying on your vendors to help you with this issue? Drop me a note at s.salamone@att.net and share your thoughts on the topic.
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Appro Introduces HPC Workstation
By Salvatore Salamone
Appro this week announced the Appro XtremeWorkstation, a high-performance workstation with 128 GB of memory and two or four AMD Opteron 8000 series processors.
The new workstation is aimed at compute- and memory-intensive applications as well as high-performance visualization applications. Specifically, the Appro XtremeWorkstation is targeted at a number of life science applications that include modeling, simulation, data analysis, and visualization.
The Appro XtremeWorkstation introduction is part of the continuing trend to use x86-based systems in place RISC-based systems, which have been called on to do many of these tasks in the past.
"The workstation market for x86-based systems continues to show healthy growth, and many users are moving to larger memory sizes and high processor counts to support their growing application requirements," says Earl Joseph, program vice president of IDC High-Performance Computing. He notes that the Appro workstation is an example of new workstations that enable customers to perform application intensive projects "in less time for faster results."
In addition to being used as stand-alone computing systems, such high-performance workstations are seen by some industry experts as increasingly being used in conjunction with high-performance computing clusters. In such a scenario, the workstation is incorporated into a workflow and performs, for example, analysis or visualization of the data derived from a simulation done on the cluster.
Complementing the memory and processing power, the XtremeWorkstation offers up to two PCI-Express x16 slots for high-end graphics cards such as the NVIDIA Quadro FX4500 X2 or the NVIDIA Quadro FX5500.
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Bio-IT World Conference & Expo
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April 30 - May 2, 2007 - Boston, MA
TRACK 1 - IT Infrastructure program includes:
- New Technologies in Life Sciences Informatics - Christopher Dwan, Principal Investigator, The BioTeam
- Enabling Information Sharing through Oracle Streams - Henri B. Tuthill, MS, Computer Science, OCP 8i, 9i, and 10g, Principal Technical Architect, AstraZeneca Discovery Information, Boston, MA
- Steps for Building an Effective IT Infrastructure in a Regulated Environment - Shalom Rubdi, IT Business Analyst, Nastech Pharmaceutical Company, Inc.
- Informatics Infrastructure for Next-Generation Sequencing Technologies - Toby Bloom, Ph.D., Director, Sequencing Informatics, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
- Making the Transition to the Electronic Grant Development and Submission - Scott McNeal, Director, Research Enterprise Applications, Partners Healthcare System
For complete program information and to register, click here. Register by March 16 and save up to $200.
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FEATURED EVENTS
MIT PROFESSIONAL INSTITUTE � SUMMER SESSION 2007
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is currently accepting registrations for 36 intensive programs designed especially for professionals. Courses are from 1 to 5 days long and are taught on campus by MIT faculty from June through August. Earn a certificate and CEUs. Offerings include biotechnology, chemical engineering, energy, data modeling and analysis, IT, lean fundamentals, mechanical engineering, nanotechnology, nuclear systems, lasers & optics, technology policy,system architecture and other topics of vital interest to today�s engineers and scientists. Visit our website to register and view course descriptions. http://web.mit.edu/mitpep/go/pi07-bioit.html
IT Infrastructure Qualification and Application Conference - March 19 - 22, San Diego, CA
The newly refreshed 9th IT Infrastructure Qualification & Application Validation Conference bridges the gap between the IT, QA and software development departments. This program was developed in response to research with your industry peers regarding the greatest challenges facing pharmaceutical professionals involved in IT Infrastructure qualification and application validation. Join Us March 19-22, 2007 in San Diego to learn more at
http://www.iqpc.com/NA-10517-002/1010
Post Approval Summit - April 30 - May 1, Boston, MA
Don�t miss the industry�s premier conference on post-approval research. The Post-Approval Summit at Harvard is a two day conference mapping strategies for demonstrating science, safety, and value through patient registries, phase IV studies, risk management programs, and quality initiatives.
For more information, or to register, go to www.postapproval.org
SBS Annual Meeting - April 15 - 19, Montreal, Canada
This inaugural spring meeting will highlight the significant and exciting recent advances in the cutting-edge science that underpins the discovery and development of new therapeutics. We invite you to join us at the Palais Des Congr�s de Montr�al in April to actively participate in what will surely be one of the most enlightening and memorable SBS conferences to date! www.sbsonline.org
BIO International Convention - May 6 - 9, Boston, MA
Tap into the biotechnology innovations that will benefit all aspects of life on earth at the BIO International Convention at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center May 6 9, 2007. Join 19,000 global professionals and 1,700 exhibiting companies as they converge for the most important scientific breakthroughs, trends, business opportunities, energy, agriculture, and more. http://www.bio2007.org
The 4th Annual World Health Care Congress - April 22 - 24, Washington, DC
www.whcc2007.com
The 4th Annual World Health Care Congress, co-sponsored by The Wall Street Journal, is the most prestigious meeting of chief and senior executives from all sectors of health care. The conference will convene over 1,800 CEOs, senior executives and government officials from the nation's largest employers, hospitals, health systems, health plans, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, and leading government agencies. Join other senior executives in creating a new healthcare model based on value, quality and consumer choice.
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| BRIEFS |
Cisco Systems announced the move to acquire Five Across, a vendor that sells software to enable websites to support social networking. The Five Across software, called Connect Community Builder, lets companies enhance their websites to support full-featured communities and user-generated content such as blogs, podcasts, profiles, and allows audio, video, and photo sharing. The social networking functions of the software are aimed at consumer sites that want to increase customer interaction. However, many companies are eying the same technology to provide a way for researchers and knowledge workers to more easily share information within an organization. The acquisition is expected to close in April.
FileNet, an IBM company, announced IBM FileNet P8 4.0, software that lets companies capture, manage access to, and consolidate all forms of content. The software is designed to help automate records and document management and meet compliance requirements. According to IBM, the new software features a highly scalable J2EE content engine that offers a rich compound document model for managing complex documents, streamlining the authoring, translation, review, and publishing processes. Additionally, FileNet P8 4.0 now supports Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN), a standardized graphical notation to document and describe business processes. This is the first major product release since IBM acquired FileNet last year.
Bio and IT were strongly represented in the class of 2007 inductees to the National Inventors Hall of Fame. The new class, which was announced this month, includes Leroy Hood for his work on the DNA sequencer, Paul Lauterbur and Peter Mansfield for their work on MRI, Godfrey Hounsfield for his CAT scanner work, William Goddard and John Lynott for their work on magnetic disk storage, Donald Davies and Paul Baran for their work on digital packet switching, and Robert Metcalfe for his work on Ethernet. All told, 10 of the 16 newly announced inductees made contributions to the IT infrastructure and laboratory equipment routinely used today in drug discovery and research.
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| FEATURED CONTENT |
HP Revitalizes multi-specialty clinic�s IT environment - Free White Paper
Physicians� Clinic of Iowa P.C. (PCI) is a multi-site, physician - owned medical group and needed to function as though they were in the same building. Today - after an infusion of specialized  expertise, products and services from HP and HP Partner EnCompass � the group�s technology environment is stronger, faster and more stable than ever. Download Now.
Baptist Healthcare improves security, manageability, with Consolidated Client infrastructure - Free White Paper
When Baptist Healthcare System decided to consolidate five business offices across the state into one, the IT department needed to provide a secure, easily manageable fix and chose HP�s Consolidated Client Infrastructure (CCI) solution. Download Now.
How Beverly Enterprises realized a $6 million dollar ROI with new technology including HP Thin Clients - Free White Paper
Beverly Enterprises, Inc�s success is due in part to a focus on continual process improvement � always looking at ways of optimizing operations and making administrative functions more efficient. With  that goal in mind Beverly set out to streamline their technology platform. The result is a return-on-investment exceeding six million dollars while creating new technology efficiencies in relationship stability, customer service and reliability through the effective replacement of client and server equipment with solutions that included HP Thin Client. Download Now.
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| Contact the Editor |
We invite your comments and feedback for this edition of Inside IT.
Salvatore Salamone is Bio-IT World's senior contributing editor for information technology. He has over 16 years' experience writing about networking technology and is the author of three books, including The Complete Guide to VPNs (published by InternetWeek, 1999), LAN Times Guide to Managing Remote Connectivity (Osborne McGraw-Hill, 1997), and Reducing the Cost of LAN Ownership (Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1995, co-written with Greg Gianforte).
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