IT changes daily

Back in the day, there was a popular daytime soap opera called “As The World Turns.” I remember it as being all the rage in daytime television viewing and seeing my family, friends and everyone else spend an incredible amount of time discussing the events that took place on the show, each and every day.
I did catch the show, on occasion, during those days that I stayed home from school with a cold or the flu. I could never make the connection between it and the world. Yet, it was a hot topic and everyone had to know what was going on, with the show, each and every day.
But information technology and its rapid-fire changes does make the “world turn.” So I thought it would be cool to give you a rundown on the hot news coming out of the IT realm.
Let’s start at the top and look at our government and what it’s doing on the IT front. The White House is actively involved in seeking to increase its information technology budget by $1 billion, regardless of the fact that there is a national referendum to decrease government spending.
The aspect of asking for this new money is rooted in the area of net neutrality as well as national security on both the domestic and foreign side.
The government spent $77.9 billion on information technology in the 2010 fiscal year and will spend $78.5 billion in 2011. The expected 2012 budget on information technology will be $79.5 billion.
In case you didn’t know it, Microsoft has recently released its new Web browser, Internet Explorer 9, which has increased speed and performance along with increased functionalities.
The new browser has added some new things which cannot be found on other browsers and is being said to make it the best Internet Explorer to date. The new browser does run faster and has smoother transition features to include a definite improvement in its JavaScript engine when running Java content, which now loads its enhanced content extremely fast.
You will find that Internet Explorer 9, when activated and the search mode initiated, will allow you to have a top of the page tool bar with a list of tabs indicating your open sites. This allows the user to have more space dedicated to showing the website being looked for. IE 9’s lines are much nicer, cleaner and overall user friendly. IE 9 also allows the user to have complete access to what add-ons they may want to attach to the browser.
Internet Explorer 9 has another great feature, in that it integrates seamlessly with Microsoft’s current operating system, Windows 7. One of the benefits is that if you have Windows 7 and IE 9, you can tag a website as pinned and that site will then be added to the bottom of your screen task bar. This will give you a one-click ability to immediately launch your most used sites no matter what other programs you may have open.
AT&T has been in the news a lot lately as a result of its possible purchase of T-Mobile, but there is something else going on with AT&T that I think you will find more interesting and that, if you are using AT&T, will have a definite effect on your use of their service. AT&T is going to begin capping data use for all of its DSL and U-Verse customers.
This cap is expected to begin on May 2 and will affect those users that exceed a 150 GB data cap. If you do, you can expect to be charged $10 for every additional 50 GB of data used.
It is estimated that most AT&T DSL users consume roughly 18 GB a month, meaning that only 2 percent of its Internet users will feel the effects. Currently, U-Verse Internet users have a 250 GB cap on their data use.
The good news is that if you are affected by the data cap, AT&T has a plan in place to notify its customers when they exceed their monthly thresholds.
This is not the first time a broadband provider has put a data usage cap in place. Comcast did this several years ago and never even let its customers know, which is what brought about the whole issue of net neutrality and the FCC stepping in and that fight is still being waged in Congress and the courts.
We’ll take a look at the new iPad, iPhone, iFusion and more hot topics in the world of information technology next.

Andino Ward is vice president of marketing and operations of Bardissi Enterprises in Hatfield. Bardissi Enterprises welcomes your questions or comments. Questions you would like answered or topics you would like discussed should be sent to Andino R. Ward at award@bardissi.net. You can also visit www.bardissi.net, or call (215) 853-2266.