Apple Developer Center is back online

Apple Developer Center is back online
After a week long outage, Apple's Developer Center is back up and running

After an outage that lasted about a week, it appears that Apple's Developer Center is now back up and running, with developers now being able to access the site. If you recall, the Developer Center went down last Thursday after an intruder, who has since claimed he was doing security research, potentially nabbed personal contact info from Apple's developer database.

In any event, Apple's satus page now indicates that many of the Developer Center subsections are up and running, though a few still remain offline, including technical support, videos, and the developer forums.

Apple notes:
We appreciate your patience as we work to bring our developer services back online. Certificates, Identifiers & Profiles, software downloads, and other developer services are now available. If you would like to know the availability of a particular system, visit our status page.

If your program membership expired or is set to expire during this downtime, it will be extended and your app will remain on the App Store. If you have any other concerns about your account, please contact us.

Thank you for bearing with us while we bring these important systems back online. We will continue to update you on our progress.

Well, that's a start.

---

Microsoft MCTS Certification, MCITP Certification and over 3000+
Exams with Life Time Access Membership at http://www.actualkey.com

Bloodiest tech industry layoffs of 2013 so far

HP, Google/Motorola Mobility continue their downsizing, Zynga layoffs are no game

Computer and network company layoffs so far this year look relatively light vs. those in recent years, when the numbers of those losing their jobs at individual companies frequently rose into the multiple thousands, sometimes hitting five figures.

This has taken place against a backdrop of an overall improving job market, with positions being added and unemployment holding steady, according to the June Department of Labor numbers. What’s more, market watchers such as Dice have found that tech-focused hiring managers expect to hire more people in the second half of the year than they did in the first half.

[Biggest tech industry layoffs of 2012]

This isn’t all to say that significant numbers of people at the companies Network World tracks, in addition to IT staff at all sorts of organizations (much harder to track these layoffs in aggregate), haven’t lost their jobs this year or will in the months to come based on corporate restructuring plans.

HP has been among the most aggressive in making cuts over the past couple of years under CEO Meg Whitman, who has outlined a $3.5 billion cost reduction plan that is being achieved in large part through layoffs and early retirements across what had been a 350,000-person staff last year. HP has also been cutting costs by adopting more cloud computing services. Whitman said in March that the company had reached the halfway mark in its restructuring, with 15,000 cuts to go between then and the end of next year.

HP rival IBM has also been trimming its workforce, though it’s always difficult to put a finger on just how many cuts IBM is making. An employee organization called Alliance@IBM said 1,600 employees have lost their jobs this year, with more cuts possibly on the way. Computerworld reported in June that IBM is believed to have more employees in India (112,000 as of last fall) than in the United States, where the number is said to be below 100,000.

Another big computing player, EMC, has said it will lay off more than 1,000 people this year as part of a restructuring designed to slash $80 million in spending (though the company has also said it is hiring people to focus on growth areas).

EMC subsidiary VMware announced in January it would zap some 900 jobs from its nearly 14,000-person workforce, though it is also adding about as many jobs CEO Pat Gelsinger at the time called the move a "realignment of resources" as the company sharpens its focus on software-defined data centers and hybrid cloud services.

"This includes shifting talent to new roles that support our growth opportunities as well as some targeted head count reductions," he said, according to an IDG News Service report.

Traditional networking companies have also whacked jobs this year. This includes market leader Cisco, which cut its workforce by about 500 people in May. Cisco at the time said: "We routinely review our business to determine where we need to align investments based on growth opportunities. Yesterday, Cisco performed a limited restructuring that will impact less than 1 percent of our population globally.”

Separately, Extreme Networks revealed in a January financial filing that it was cutting 13% of its workforce (about 90 jobs) as part of an effort to slash spending by $7 million per quarter. Extreme, which has struggled to grow its market share in Ethernet switching, had a similar-sized layoff 18 months before.

The year began very roughly for Nokia’s IT professionals, as more than 800 were transferred to outsourcing firms and another 300 lost their jobs. Nokia said at the time: The goal is to reduce operating costs and create an IT organization "appropriate for Nokia's current size and scope."

Motorola Mobility employees have been feeling the results of the company’s buyout by Google in 2011. Motorola Mobility said in March it was cutting 1,200 staff, in addition to 4,000 axed last year as the company refocuses on high-end devices. Earlier this month, Google acknowledged in a financial report cutting more than 5,000 jobs at Motorola Mobility last quarter. Most of the job cuts last quarter were the result of a deal between manufacturing company Flextronics and Motorola.

On the consumer side, social games maker Zynga in June said it was eliminating 18% of its workforce, or about 500 jobs, in an effort to reduce costs and hone its focus on mobile. Zynga has struggled mightily since going public in 2011 and despite its high profile relationship with Facebook.

According to the latest numbers from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, employers announced 8.5% fewer job cuts through the first half of 2013 vs. the year-ago six-month period. The financial and retail industries have been particularly hard hit, and cuts surged in the computer industry in June. Spending cuts by the feds related to sequestration and concerns by others related to rising healthcare costs, are among some of the broader workforce reduction drivers, according to the outplacement firm. But here’s the bright side of things:

“Right now, job cuts are on track to the have the second lowest annual total since 2000,” according to Challenger, which notes the third quarter is typically the slowest period for downsizing. “Unless there is a major shock to the economy in the second half of 2013, we could see layoff activity decline continue toward pre-2000 levels.”

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Windows 8 Update: Microsoft Surface RT price slashed $150

Also: New Surface accessories slated, kickbacks for Windows 8 device sales

Microsoft is authorizing a $150 discount off its Surface RT tablet for a week, which represents a 30% discount off the list price of $499, according to an ad on the upcoming-sales page of Staples Web site.

This is the least attractive of the Surface tablets because, among other things, it runs only Windows 8 applications – not traditional Windows applications - and has only 15GB of the 32GB disk available to the user. It does come with an abbreviated version of Office.

MICROSOFT SHAKEUP: Purges, personalities, ‘pursuing other opportunities’

MEMO: Ballmer to Microsoft Employees: Let's go!

Those who want to buy the device at the sale price still have to pay either $119 or $129 extra if they want a keyboard to go with it.
New Surface accessories

Microsoft will be coming out with new accessories for its Surface tablets over the next 12 months, according to information it revealed at its international partners conference last week.

While it didn’t detail what they’d be, the new add-ons were mentioned in a slide during a presentation by Microsoft COO Kevin Turner and noticed by eagle-eyed Mary Jo Foley, the author of the All About Microsoft blog.

The slide consisted of 48 squares – not unlike the tiles that display apps on the Windows 8 Start screen – that represented innovations coming in 2014. That seems to mean the company’s fiscal 2014 because among the tiles was one for Windows 8.1 which is scheduled to be finalized for manufacturing in August.

(Prediction: one accessory will be a keyboard that contains a battery that will extend the overall battery life of the device. Surface keyboard ports are already wired with the electrical connection needed to carry this off.)

The slide promises new colors for Surface accessories, which probably means keyboards. So far they’re available in five hues, and they haven’t even used up the primary colors. The slide also makes mention of new Windows 8.1 devices, which likely means devices made by hardware partners, but could mean another, perhaps smaller, Surface.

The other Windows 8/Surface-related innovations from the slide: an unspecified update to Surface RT, an unspecified update to Surface Pro, third-party application updates for Windows 8 and first-party application updates for Windows 8.
Kickbacks for resellers

Microsoft is offering up to $10 per Windows 8 Pro touch device sold by resellers in a new program called TouchWins. The idea is to get more Windows 8 devices in the hands of users with the hope they’ll prompt others to buy.

Microsoft is being pretty picky about which models it’s offering the bounties on – a total of 27 devices from these vendors: Acer, Asus, Dell, Fujitsu, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba.

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Social-networking content ownership can end in company vs. employee tussles

Legal battles erupting over LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter

Using social-networking sites to reach out to the public ismore important than ever for business, but one pitfall in all this is that employees and their companies can end up battling over who owns the social-site’s content or accounts. These battles even end up in the courtroom, and sometimes employees win, at least in part.

That’s what happened in the recently decided case of Eagle v. Morgan in which Dr. Linda Eagle, the former CEO of the banking education company Edcomm, was terminated but then fought to take back control of the LinkedIn account under her name she had used extensively for business purposes. It had been based on her business e-mail address, and Edcomm, which tussled with her to control that LinkedIn account, wanted to “mine” it for the traffic. It ended up being a legal fight in a Pennsylvania court which just this March ruled the LinkedIn account had been misappropriated from Dr. Eagle, reasoning that her name had “commercial value” because of her publically-known expertise.

There are plenty of these sorts of “who owns it” fights breaking out in the U.S. and across the world as companies encourage employees to dive into social-networking to do business, but neglect to prepare for many kinds of ownership questions, say observers.

“Most companies do not have any proactive programs around this,” says Alan Brill, senior managing director at the cybersecurity unit of Kroll Advisory Solutions. The first place to start in all this, he says, is to have a detailed social-networking policy on every facet of
ownership of content and accounts set up by current employees who may, of
course, become former employees.

Cases like Eagle v. Morgan are openly fought in court, but much more happens behind the scenes as companies and employees (and former employees) battle over social-networking ownership, with Kroll sometimes pulled in to come up with forensics data.

According to court documents, Edcomm, though it had some policies related to social
networking, did not have a detailed, signed policy to inform employees that
their LinkedIn accounts were the property of the employer. This would have
buttressed Edcomm’s arguments, though the court might still have possibly
weighed against the company on other grounds.

 

When Dr. Eagle and Edcomm tussled over control of the LinkedIn account back in mid-2011, LinkedIn itself seized control over the account, eventually returning full control of it to Dr. Eagle a few months later.

During the time Edcomm had control of Dr. Eagle’s LinkedIn account back in mid-2011, anyone typing in “Linda Eagle” would have been directed to a web page showing the name and affiliation of the newly appointed interim CEO, Sandi Morgan, according to the Pennsylvania court’s document summarizing the facts of the case.

Edcomm, co-founded by Dr. Eagle, had been acquired by another firm, Sawabeh Information Services Company. Prior to her involuntary termination, Dr. Eagle had shared her password to the LinkedIn account with some Edcomm employees, according to court documents, for purposes said to include handling invitations and updating. After her departure, Edcomm employees accessed her account and changed its password, effectively locking her out.

In March of this year, the court ended up backing Dr. Eagle’s claim of “misappropriation” of the LinkedIn account. But the court did not agree with Dr. Eagle’s claim that the defendant Edcomm had committed identity theft, nor that the account was hijacked, nor that she has satisfactorily established facts about monetary damages. But the court agreed she had standing for punitive damages from Edcomm.

It’s cases like this that have law firms riveted and trying to figure out where
courts are liable to side on these issues. This isn’t the only kind of battle
going on between employees and companies over social-networking sites, says
Brill.

 

Companies are encouraging employees to set up Facebook pages and Twitter feeds, and are finding the content goes far outside the bounds of what they would have hoped.

“They may be releasing stuff the company doesn’t want released,” says Brill. This has become a global issue for corporations that aren’t keeping track of what happens in far-flung locales in which they operate. Sometimes individuals simply take it upon themselves to handle business-related social-networking without their employers being aware of what’s going on, setting sites up under their personal name. The problems arise when employers try to take control of these sites. There are so many complicating legal issues, such as the myriad prohibitions in state law,
including California, Delaware, Maryland, Michigan and New Jersey, about getting social media passwords from employees, Brill points out.

And there are questions as to whether an individual with a Twitter account used for business has some kind of ownership over all those Twitter followers, if there was no agreement about this to begin with. There was a long-running court battle on this issue called PhoneDog LLC v. Kravitz , but it ultimately offered no clear guidance because
it was settled out of court earlier this year.
 

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

70-413: Designing and Implementing a Server Infrastructure

QUESTION 1
You need to enable the deployment of domain controllers using virtual machine cloning.
Which of the following would need to be done first?

A. The domain controller running the Schema Master role needs to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.
B. The domain controller running the Domain Naming Master role needs to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.
C. All domain controllers running the Infrastructure Master role need to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.
D. The functional level of the forest needs to be raised to Windows Server 2012.
E. All domain controllers running the PDC Emulator role need to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.

Answer: E

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 2
You need to enable Active Directory Recycle Bin in the domains.
Which of the following would need to be done first?

A. The functional level of the forest needs to be raised to Windows Server 2008 R2 or later.
B. The domain controller running the Schema Master role needs to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.
C. All domain controllers need to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.
D. All domain controllers running the Infrastructure Master role need to be upgraded to Windows Server 2012.

Answer: A

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 3
Which of the following technologies should you implement to meet the technical requirement of
distributing virtual machines between Hyper-V hosts automatically according to server load?

A. Windows Network Load Balancing.
B. Microsoft System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager (VMM).
C. Microsoft System Center 2012 Data Protection Manager (DPM).
D. Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization (MED-V)

Answer: B

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 4
You have created a Windows Server 2012 virtual machine configured as a domain controller.
You want to clone the virtual domain controller to create another virtual domain controller.
Which two of the following steps should you perform first? (Choose two).

A. Run the Install-ADDSDomainController PowerShell cmdlet.
B. Run the New-ADDCCloneConfigFile PowerShell cmdlet.
C. Run sysprep.exe /oobe.
D. Run dcpromo.exe /adv.
E. Place a DCCloneConfig.xml file in the %Systemroot%\NTDS folder.
F. Place an Unattend.xml file in the %Systemroot%\SYSVOL folder.

Answer: B,E

Explanation:

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com