Gartner Business Intelligence Summit to be held in The Hague, Netherlands

With the theme of "The BIg Discrepancy: How can we do better with BI?", the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit will be held in The Hague, Netherlands on the coming 20-22 January 2009.

The conference, consists of more than 80 conference sessions and exhibition with more than 25 leading BI technology and service providers, will focus on the following key Business Intelligence issues:

• Key steps to making Business Intelligence strategic
• Creating a BI and performance management strategy to widen the use of BI
• The evolving role of corporate performance management
• Role, structure and organization of the BI Competency Center
• Identifying the right metrics to measure performance
• The Data Warehouse in a time of data explosion
• New delivery models: Open Source and BI "as a service"
• The impact of SOA on BI
• Trends in Enterprise Information Management (EIM) and Master Data Management
• Difficult choices in the Data Quality tools market
• Portal strategies for BI integration
• Business Activity Monitoring and the rise of process-driven BI
• Determining the "return on BI"
• Performance management and compliance
• BI market trends and the increasing impact of the mega-vendors
• Best practices in budgeting, planning & forecasting

Some key benefits to attend this Summit are:

• Understanding the business forces that will affect IT leaders of BIIM initiatives
• Insight into the future scenarios facing BI leaders
• Techniques in making the right innovation choices at the right time
• Improved decision-making responsibilities for BI investment
• Evaluation of the market dynamics when making investment decisions
• Approaches for melding emerging technologies with existing tools and infrastructure
• Development of ROI and cost allocation models that impact the business case
• Linking of CPM to strategic planning, budgets and operational activities to aid strategy execution
• Improved decision-making through BI initiatives and techniques

Click here for more information about the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit and its online registration.

Serious security flaw found in Internet Explorer

You might be awared that recently, there is a serious security flaw found in Internet Explorer versions 5.01, 6 and 7. The security bug is related to the way Internet Explorer handles XML (Extensible Markup Language), which allows hackers to put and run trojan horse program in your computer without your knowledge, when you visit infected website with unpatched Internet Explorer.

In fact, this exploits have already been rigged into many hacked Chinese language websites. Later, launching of massive SQL injection attacks to thousands of legitimate websites to serve this exploit were also found and over 100,000 websites were affected.

In simple words, if you are using Internet Explorer to browse websites, and you haven't patch up this security flaw via Windows' Automatic Updates service or manually download and install the patch, your computer is vulnerable to the attack, and your password and other information could be exposed and stolen by the hackers. Your computer can also be made use by hackers to launch further attacks to other computers.

This security issue is discussed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS08-078 (KB-960714) published on 17 December 2008, and rated as Critical by Microsoft. Microsoft has responded quickly and come out with an out-of-band patch. Links to download the security patch for various version of Internet Explorer is available in that article.

Therefore, you should immediately patch up your Internet Explorer, or use other browsers such as Firefox to surf the Internet. However, Firefox has also just released a new version 3.0.5 which fixed up several security issues (which were not as critical as the Internet Explorer's security flaw). Even though you use Firefox (or SeaMonkey suite), it is also advisable for you to update the browser to the latest version.

You may click here to go to the download page of Firefox.

How do you know the security patch has been applied to your computer?

For Windows XP, run the "Add or Remove Programs" in the Control Panel, and ensure the "Show updates" option is selected. You should be able to find the installed patch in the listing under Internet Explorer 7 as "Security Update for Windows Internet Explorer 7 (KB960714)" as shown in the diagram below. You should also ensure that other earlier security patches also installed for your browser.

How to get rid of termite

People are afraid of termites because its infestation could bring damages and losses, it is hard to detect, and it's colony is hard to eliminate.

To get rid of termite, you must firstly know your enemy. Here are some of the characteristics of termites:

• Termites consume fibrous plant matter, such as wood, paper, etc.
• Termites love mud and don't like sand, because it is hard for them to burrow through sand.
• Termites love moisture and stay in the dark.
• Termites might come from soil, and also from sky. During reproductive seasons, they have wings and will swarm around. They'll shed off the wings once they found place to settle down.
• Termites may move to another location when disturbed. Therefore, if you find them, don't disturb them before getting the pest control service.

Knowing about these, you should avoid a termite-friendly environment found around your house.

There are generally 2 methods of termites treatment:

• Method 1 is to create a chemical barrier underneath the building structure. Normally it is done to the land before the building is developed. After the building is developed, this treatment requires drilling of holes all over the house in order to inject the chemical into the land underneath. The chemical will either repel the termites, or kill them off. However, its effectively wear off after time, and can probably last for 3 years only. In addition, if there is untreated gap in between, termites can still find their way into the house.
• Method 2 is to use a colony elimination baiting system, such as the Sentricon system. Stations are placed around the house to look for the presence of termites. If found, chemical which can retard the termites' moulting process will be put into the bait, and the termites who eat the chemical will infect each other when they return to the colony. Eventually, the colony will be eliminated. This method also require to drill holes in order to place the station inside the house. Normally only 2 stations are placed in the middle of the house, and the rest are placed in the garden area outside the house building.

Method 2 is generally more expensive than Method 1, and the baiting stations need regular inspection for presence of termites. However, it is a more effective way, and unlike Method 1 which only function to create barrier to hinder termites from entering the building, Method 2 will try to eliminate the termites colony by killing them off.

Anyhow, it is a good practice to regularly inspect your house for signs of termite infectations. And I would recommend the inspection to be done with thermal imaging technology.