We have much to be thankful for in 2009. While the economic downturn affected nearly every industry and profession, technology companies continued to persevere and even innovate. For this, we recognize some of the technologies that have made us pause to reflect from the past year.
- iPhone Competitors
We won’t go as far as to say there are any killers in the bunch, but a new range of devices have smartphone users excited about new apps and better answers to mobility. True, the iPhone still remains dominant, but continued innovation by Palm’s webOS, Google’s Droid and better RIM devices are bringing new ideas to a larger mobile dinner table. - Windows 7
No need to utter the words of Microsoft’s last OS, Windows 7 sheds a new light on the possibilities for desktops and laptops present in this new OS. With touch, cleaner operating system, better performance and the largest beta testing ever, Windows 7 trumps its predecessor. We can be appreciative that we finally have an operating system that provides new functionality without sacrificing stability. - Virtualization
Perhaps a perfect storm for actualization partners in 2009, this year with companies looking to cut costs and gain better redundancy, both VMware and Microsoft are building better, less expensive ways to implement virtualization. Let’s be fair, part of what has allowed VMware to implement more virtualization over the last year is the fact that Microsoft now extensively supports virtualization on nearly all server platforms including Exchange and Domain Controllers. Whether a business looking for better disaster recovery, less hardware expense or more redundancy, we have reason to give thanks. Even hardware vendors have brought costly SAN storage into small business price ranges. - The Rise of the Netbook
Lowering the cost for remote devices, Netbooks continue to allow for a successful end-user experience while keeping the processing in the cloud. This important step allows many people to be grateful for greater processing and mobility per dollar. - The Cloud Gets Clearer
More has been developed for cloud-computing in the last year. It’s hard to avoid the barrage of news about the future of cloud-computing. While still young, businesses are beginning to trust some computing elements in the cloud. Both Microsoft and Google have announced and are rolling out extensive cloud-computing models and Amazon’s elastic cloud expands. Businesses owe much thanks to the companies who are extending their computing infrastructures to support our processing and storage needs.