Biz-Tech

Iowa Network Services using Oracle Solaris

Iowa Network Services is using Oracle Solaris, the #1 enterprise operating system, on Oracle's SPARC T-Series servers, to provide superior application performance and reliability, improve services uptime and create virtual servers to help consolidate its datacenter and phase out older hardware. Iowa Network Services began offering Internet services starting from 1993, and is one of the largest independent Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Iowa, supporting nearly 80,000 subscribers, hosting more than 1,000 web sites and providing service for 150 telecommunication companies. With Oracle Solaris, Iowa Network Services has substantially improved the availability and reliability of their services, achieving close to 99.999% uptime. "Oracle Solaris on SPARC servers is a key component of our infrastructure. With Oracle Solaris Containers, we can create multiple private execution environments within a single instance of Oracle Solaris. With each environment having its own identity, it behaves as if it's running on its own system, making consolidation both easy and secure," said Iowa Network Services Inc. Systems Administration Manager Steve Guntly, "We are looking forward to testing Oracle Solaris 11 technologies and features on the SPARC T3-1 server and leveraging the improved software and hardware integration and expanded virtualization capabilities, with hopefully even better performance and reliability."

Using the built-in virtualization capabilities of Oracle Solaris Containers, Iowa Network Services initially ran 130 virtual servers housed on 36 physical servers, reducing hardware management needs, equipment costs and space requirements, increasing the flexibility of server resources and providing a 25% performance improvement from consolidation of services.

Consolidating the number of physical servers enabled Iowa Network Services to reduce support costs, decrease power and cooling requirements and improve personnel efficiency, resulting in a 15% reduction in operational costs. Iowa Network Services is using Oracle Solaris Containers to establish isolation mechanisms that help improve resource use and provide all workloads with access to the appropriate amount of computing resources. The Oracle Solaris Legacy Containers capability allows Iowa Network Services to run their Solaris 8 and 9 Oracle Solaris applications within multiple Oracle Solaris environments on a single system, immediately gaining scalability and performance benefits, without modifying existing applications.

Iowa Network Services has consolidated 36 servers onto four SPARC T-series servers, reducing its footprint by more than 85 percent. Iowa Network Services is also evaluating Oracle Solaris 11 Express and expects to migrate to Oracle Solaris 11 in the future.

EPSON Manchester winners of monthly draw

Debug Computer Peripherals, the Authorized Distributor for EPSON Printers in Sri Lanka held its monthly draw to select the winners for Manchester United Merchandise for the months of October & November.

The lucky winners were Thargalingam from Colombo 11 and Pathirana from Veyangoda. Here they are seen receiving their Manchester United Merchandise from Harishankar from Epson India and EPSON SBU Assistant General Manager Mazaar Moseth with the winner. The Printers were purchased from Debug Head office showroom and Epson Reseller Partner for Fort "Inshaf CD".

The Grand draw for the main prize will be held in January 2012, where one winner will be selected for an all expense paid trip to watch Manchester United Play in Old Trafford - England.

Hemas Travels in Sri Lanka along with Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) launched an exclusive train for the Sri Lankan pilgrims covering all Buddhist sites in India. A press conference to introduce this service was held at the Grand Orient Hotel recently. Indian and Sri Lankan officials addressing the gathering. Indian High Commission Counsellor Birender Singh, IRCTC Joint General Manager Ravi Kumar, Hemas Travels Prime Destinations Head Jackie Weeraratne, Chamila Sooriyapperuma, Chamila Dharmasiri, Nadishika Prathapasinghe, Madusha Warusawitharana and Travel Executive Senaka Wijesekera at the event.

Samsung, Sharp in LCD price-fixing settlement

South Korea's Samsung, Japan's Sharp and five other Asian firms have agreed to a $553 million settlement for illegally fixing liquid crystal display prices, New York state's attorney general said Tuesday.

The settlement stems from antitrust claims brought by the attorneys general of eight US states and private class action suits, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said in a statement.

It was the latest development in an ongoing price-fixing case over LCD screens that has already seen firms from Japan, South Korea and Taiwan agree to pay US fines totaling more than $890 million.

LCD screens are used in computer monitors, television sets and other devices. According to Schneiderman, the seven companies Samsung, Sharp, Chimei Innolux, Chunghwa Picture Tubes, Epson Imaging Devices, HannStar Display and Hitachi Displays agreed to pay over $538 million to settle antitrust claims brought on behalf of consumers and government entities. NEW YORK, AFP