Browser and Operating System Market Share White Paper
Firefox - IE - Opera - Mozilla - Safari - Google Chrome
The Browser Market Share and Operating System Market Share White Paper data is by month starting in September 1997 through the August 2009. The data sampled is internationally based (Just under 50% of the data points sampled are outside of the United States).
August 2009 White PaperIn the last several months Microsoft has stabilized its browser market after losing over 12% of the Market in the last 36 months. Firefox and Google (Desktop and Chrome) are still forces that could eat away at the Microsoft browser monopoly. User acceptance of Vista stalled with the pending release of Windows 7. Live update did not help in accelerating the acceptance of IE, plus with the slow acceptance of Vista individuals and enterprises are not moving to the new version as rapidly as Microsoft would like. An added kicker is those who moved to Vista (and Windows 7) could more readily have multiple browsers on their systems or switch from one to the other quickly and with little pain. The cost of doing that is minimal. Google is a challenge for Microsoft to face -- so far Microsoft continues to outpace Google and beats its Chrome offering. Based on our test results current versions of IE and Firefox are significantly more robust than prior versions. In addition, IE 8 is feature rich and a step ahead of the other browsers. Chrome has major defects which limits its usefulness on all sites. Several of these defects are highlighted in this White Paper. |
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Microsoft IE Market Share History
Trends in Browser and OS Market Share
August 2009 - August 2008
Browser Twelve Year Historical Trend
The full study was produced with data through August 2009. See a full copy of the press release here.
Browser and Operating System Infomation
Obama administration to ask for more 1984 Big Brother powers
Everyone knows that police can peek inside an email account it if they have a paper search warrant
But cybercrime investigators are frustrated by the speed of traditional methods of faxing, mailing, or e-mailing companies these documents. They're pushing for the creation of a national Web interface linking police computers with those of Internet and e-mail providers so requests can be sent and received electronically.
A federal task force (soon to be released) study says that law enforcement agencies are virtually unanimous in calling for such an interface to be created. Eighty-nine percent of police surveyed, it says, want to be able to "exchange legal process requests and responses to legal process" through an encrypted, police-only "nationwide computer network."
The study also says: "89 percent of investigators agreed that a nationwide computer network should be established for the purpose of linking ISPs with law enforcement agencies so that they may exchange legal process requests and responses to legal process. Authorized users would communicate through encrypted virtual private networks in order to maintain the security of the data."
But the most controversial element is probably the private Web interface, which raises novel security and privacy concerns, especially in the wake of a recent inspector general's report from the Justice Department. The 289-page report detailed how the FBI obtained Americans' telephone records by citing nonexistent emergencies and simply asking for the data or writing phone numbers on a sticky note rather than following procedures required by law.
- more infoOursouring continues
U.S. defense contractors growing use of offshore (outsource) subsidiaries from 2003 to 2008 allowed the Defense Department to save money on contracts but also resulted in the loss of U.S. tax revenue and unemployment benefits for some U.S. workers, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office.
Practical Guide for IT Outsourcing a HandiGuide
The 29 largest publicly traded defense contractors increased their use of offshore subsidiaries by 26 percent from 2003 to 2008, the report states.
Those subsidiaries helped the contractors reduce taxes, in part by avoiding Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes for U.S. workers hired at the foreign subsidiaries, GAO auditors said.
About a third of the contractors also decreased their effective U.S. corporate tax rates in 2008 in part through the use of foreign affiliates, lower foreign tax rates and indefinite reinvestment of foreign income outside the United States.
- more infoAlmost 200,000 jobs lost in IT during this recession
Job cuts in technology were
fierce in 2009, but 2010 is expected to see modest growth in a number of
subsectors. The last time layoffs were this bad was in 2005.
Job cuts in technology were fierce in 2009. Last year saw 174,629 jobs lost in the sector, catapulting up 12.3 percent from the 2008 cuts of 155,570 jobs, according to an outplacement company which tracks industry numbers on announced layoffs. Technology - still considered by the Department of Labor to be one of the most promising industries for future job creation - has not seen that many layoffs since 2005.
The worst of the downsizing occurred in the first quarter, which is when the overall economy hit rock bottom. The recession's impact on the tech sector was inescapable.
The technology-focused blog TechCrunch developed its own "layoff tracker" Web application, which has been documenting layoffs in the sector since October 2008. For comparison, as of its last update in November 2009, TechCrunch had reported a total of 350,299 employees laid off - roughly 20,000 more, but certainly in the same ballpark.
The tech sector accounted for about 13.2 percent of the total 1.3 million announced job cuts in the United States in 2009, said Challenger, Gray & Christmas. By subsector, electronics fared the worst with 65,000 jobs cut - up 55 percent from 2008 - while telecommunications lost 9.4 percent fewer jobs in 2009. The computer industry was unchanged.
It's going to be a slow climb out of this recession, but computer and electronics firms should be among the first to see the turnaround, as companies try to postpone hiring by achieving productivity gains through technology. Even with the economy showing some nascent signs of recovery beginning the second half of the year, many companies are holding off on investments in new technology. And, with it still [being] difficult for small businesses and startups to obtain loans, there are few opportunities for tech firms to expand their customer base.
Despite the potential for improved hiring in the new year, there are a lot people competing for every opening and many employers are very particular about what skills and experience they want new workers to have. It is critical that technology workers continually update their skills in order to remain competitive. It is necessary to maintain a balance between having specialized skills and having the flexibility of a generalist. It may also be necessary to expand one's search to more industries or geographically.
We'll see a radically transforming marketplace - driven by surging demand in emerging markets, growing impact from the cloud services model, an explosion of mobile devices and applications, and the continuing rollout of higher-speed networks. These transformational forces will drive key players to redefine themselves and their offerings and will spark lots of M&A activity.
- more infoIT Job Descriptions HandiGuide 2010 Version Released by Janco
The
IT job descriptions
contained within the Internet and Information Technology Position
Descriptions HandiGuide® was updated in 2010 and contains over 650 pages; which
includes sample organization charts, a job progression matrix, over 231 job
descriptions, best practices for resume screening and best practices for phone
screening.
The author of this book has extensive experience in job content definition and analysis. He personally is recognized by the courts as an "expert" and has been used by a number of firms as an expert in age and job discrimination cases. The HandiGuide includes some of the tools that he uses in that process.
The book also addresses Fair Labor Standards and the ADA, and is in a new easier to read format. Each job description meets ADA standards and the position description is delivered in electronic format - word which is editable and PDF which is printed. Also included are tools to help you expand, evaluate and define your enterprise's unique additional required. Those tools include:
- Job Evaluation Questionnaire
- Position Description Questionnaire
- Job Progression Matrix (Job Family Classifications)
- Best Practices for
- Screening Resumes
- Phone Screening
- Hiring employees
- Motivating employees
- Mandated Requirements
- American with Disabilities Act (ADA)
- Health and Safety Requirements (Federal and State)
- Fair Labor Standards Act
- Sexual Harassement
- Other Labor Laws
Google personal lead sensitive data in error
It was reported in Computerworld that Google apologized after it
mistakenly e-mailed potentially sensitive business data last week to other users
of its business listings service.
The company's Local
Business Center allows businesses to create a listing for Google's search engine
and Maps application, as well as add videos, coupons or photos.
Google then provides data on how customers found the listing, showing search terms people used before clicking the listing and other data such as the geographic location of someone who looked up driving directions to the business.
Google will send reports to those who are signed up. Early last week, Google sent the reports to third parties by mistake. The mistake affected several thousands businesses registered with Local Business Center, of which there are more than a million.
"Shortly after sending the newsletter to a portion of our users last night, we discovered that some e-mails included statistics for the wrong business," Google said in a written statement. "We promptly stopped sending any further e-mails and investigated the cause, which we found to be a human error while pulling together the newsletter content. We'd like to apologize to all the business owners impacted and assure them that we're fixing the process that led to this mistake."
People who received the data then began to publicize the incident, realizing the privacy implications. Chicago-based Internet consultant David Dalka wrote on his blog that he received information regarding the listing for Boscos, a restaurant in Tennessee that brews its own beer.
- more info