Chicago Computer Guide This Week
For February March 13 - 20, 2002

CONTENTS:
I.    This Week's Calendar of Events
II.   CoTalent Refines The Hiring Process
III.  Odds and Ends - Part 2
IV.   Becoming An Entrepreneur (Part 2)
V.    Chicago Computer Company News
VI.   Chicago Computer Dealers

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I. This Week's Chicago Computer Events

Event: Never Without A Net
Purpose: A gathering of Chicago business people for drinks, 
networking, and NCAA basketball, hosted by ANET Internet 
Solutions
Date: Thursday, March 14
Time:  2:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m
Place: Blackie's, south of the Loop on Clark St. 755 South Clark,
Chicago, IL. (2 blocks south of Congress Pkwy. at Clark and Polk. 
Validated parking is available across the street.
Door Prizes awarded: NCAA tickets, DSL service for a year, and more!
Information: Please RSVP with Ryan Stone of Figel Murphy Public 
Relations, 312.223.9536 ext. 3 or rstone@figelmurphy-pr.com.


Event: Women In Technology International (WITI) Networking Tea**
Date: 03/14/2002
Time: 3:00pm - 5:00pm
Place: The Russian Tea Room, 77 East Adams (Adams/Michigan
Ave), Chicago, IL
Cost: members $20.00 / non-members $25.00
Information: http://www.witi.com or contact Jennifer Tiller at 
jtiller@centrax.com

Event: MIT Enterprise Forum Marketing and Sales for 
Emerging Companies: Session II
Date: March 18, 2002
Time: 5:00:00 PM - 8:00:00 PM
Place: Loyola University Chicago, 25 East Pearson, Rubloff
Auditorium and Reception Room
Information: Go to http://www.mitefchicago.org or contact 
Laurel Tinker at 312-915-6223 or via email: ltinker@luc.edu
This panel discussion will focus on execution issues for
Emerging Companies: Sales processes, sales management, 
support to sales force, marketing program construction, the 
use of trade shows.

Event: Technology Executives Club Security & Risk Reduction SIG
Topic: Cyber Security Issues in Today's Rapidly Changing Environment"
Date: Thursday, March 28th, 2002
Place: Deloitte & Touche, 180 N. Stetson Ave., 20th Floor
Chicago, IL  60601
Time: 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM 
Fees:  Member - $10; Non-Member - $25
For complete information, and to pre-register for this event please 
visit our website at http://www.internetexecutivesclub.com/


** Courtesy of http://www.techvenue.com

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THIS WEEK'S ARTICLES

II. CoTalent Refines The Hiring Process
Edited By Scott Brown

    With unemployment at a six-year high, it would seem that 
companies should have easy access to talent pools, and 
that recruiting and hiring the most skilled workers would be 
a simple process. However, this is not exactly the case, 
according to Patrick Schuerer, vice president of strategy at 
CoTalent, an Oakbrook, Ill.-based provider of human capital 
management (HCM) solutions.
Click here for more: http://www.chicago-computer.com/marbrown.htm.


III. Odds and Ends - Part 2
by Wayne M. Krakau

Here are some more odds and ends products that aren't 
appropriate for their own, individual columns. We are getting 
a bit more mainstream as we go.
For more go to, http://www.chicago-computer.com/markrak.htm


IV.  Becoming An Entrepreneur (Part 2)
© Larry M. Zanger, 2002, all rights reserved.

In the current business environment, many people find themselves 
out of work, laid off by a previous employer, disillusioned by their 
position or just excited to try something new on their own. This is 
the second installment of a two-part article has been written to 
help individuals seeking to become entrepreneurs to separate 
from their employer with a minimum of problems
http://www.chicago-computer.com/marzang.htm for more.


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V. Chicago Computer Company News


World Organization Of Webmasters Leads Talk On Web 
Security Standards At Comdex Chicago 2002

    CHICAGO, IL -- (INTERNET WIRE) -- The World Organization 
of Webmasters hosted an elite panel discussion designed to 
establish Web security certification standards for organizations' 
IT and Web professionals this week in conjunction with Comdex 
Chicago. 
    Held during the Comdex Chicago 2002 event at McCormick 
Place, the panel focused on the need for organizations to create 
a basic security plan that would protect company Web sites and
networks against both external and often overlooked internal threats. 

The panel included: 

- Bob Shields - FBI agent from the Chicago office of the National 
Infrastructure Protection Center 

- Shimon Gruper - Vice president of Internet security at Aladdin
Knowledge Systems based in Arlington Heights, IL 

- Gregory Lebovitz - Netscreen Technologies 

- Russell Vines - Author, and president of The RDV Group, a 
computer security consulting firm 

- Bill Cullifer - Executive Director, World Organization of Webmasters 

    "These security standards summits are critical steps toward 
more effectively safeguarding the nation's electronic infrastructure. 
Business, industry and government are clamoring for trained 
information security specialists because so much is at stake," 
said Sunand Bhattacharya, national director of corporate 
curriculum development for ITT Educational Services, Inc., a 
national technology education company that this fall will launch 
an information systems security degree program for IT professionals. 
    This week’s panel discussion was the second of a series of 
Security Summits hosted by WOW.  Initiated during Comdex Fall 
2001 in Las Vegas, the series brings together diverse participants
from government, industry and academia to begin development of 
a framework for security certification standards for Web professionals. 
    The non-profit World Organization of Webmasters was founded 
in 1996 to support and enhance the role of individuals and 
organizations who create, manage and market Web sites. For 
more information about WOW visit http://www.joinwow.org or 
contact Bill Cullifer at bill@joinwow.org 

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OCF Announces CAVERNsoft G2, Breakthrough 3-D App 
for Collaborative Problem Solving, at Comdex

Chicago, IL- Most virtual reality developers would be satisfied 
if an advanced design team at one of the Big 3 automakers 
or a global oil exploration company used their software to 
solve complex problems. But Jason Leigh, one of three of 
CAVERNsoft G2 developers, knows that the right technology 
transfer relationship can help this incredible software do even 
more. Downloadable at 
http://www.openchannelfoundation.org/projects/CAVERNsoft_G2, 
the software is available to non-commercial users free of 
charge through tech transfer specialists Open Channel 
Foundation (OCF), nonprofit arm of Open Channel Software (OCS).
    Collaborative workgroups now only need to spend between
$10,000 and $20,000 for standard PC hardware, instead of the 
millions it used to cost to implement VR on expensive workstations. 
Which means that this technology is becoming affordable to 
nearly anyone, including budget-strapped educational and 
scientific institutions, according to Leigh, who is a research 
scientist at the Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) at the 
University of IL/Chicago. 
    CAVERNsoft G2 is an open source, cross-platform,C++ 
ready2ware toolkit for building 'Tele-Immersion' (collaborative 
virtual reality) applications. Its main strength, according to 
developer Leigh, is in transmitting  high-throughput data that 
converts to visual images in a 'CAVE' environment," he adds. 
CAVE, which used to require a Silicon Graphics or comparable 
workstation to operate, was also originally developed at EVL. 
Today, user applications need not be CAVE-based in order to 
run CAVERNsoft G2. CAVERNsoft's networking software works 
across SGI, Linux, Solaris, and Windows 9x, NT, and 2000.
    Which also means that CAVERNsoft G2 not only can be 
used for high-level geo-science and product engineering 
applications but also that biomedical and aerospace VR 
developers can enjoy and employ this new technology. For 
example: imagine a recreational therapy environment for 
mobility-impaired individuals wherein they play can play team 
sports such as baseball - all in a virtual environment. Or 
envision a group of surgeons in several different locations, 
being able to 'travel' through the human blood stream, as in 
the movie "Fantastic Voyage," viewing live, real-time, 3-D 
projections of a real-life patient using a micro-miniature video 
camera and CAVERNsoft G2. Such applications are possible 
in the near future, according to Leigh.                                       

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First Open Source C++ FIX Engine Now Available 
from ThoughtWorks, Inc.

    CHICAGO, IL /PRNewswire/ -- Leading application and 
development firm ThoughtWorks, Inc., in conjunction with 
Connamara Systems, Inc., has announced the availability of 
QuickFIX -- the securities industry's first open source C++ FIX 
engine that saves trading firms time and money by providing 
easy and reliable Financial Information eXchange (FIX) 
protocol connectivity.
    QuickFIX enables fund managers, brokers, exchanges, 
and vendors to realize the benefits of FIX connectivity without 
incurring time and cost associated with commercially available, 
or custom-developed FIX engines. The open source application 
is compatible with FIX 4.0, 4.1, and 4.2 specifications and runs 
on Windows, Solaris and Linux operating systems. QuickFIX is 
OSI Certified open source software. (OSI certified is a 
certification mark of the Open Source Initiative.)
    The FIX protocol is a messaging standard developed specifically 
for real- time electronic exchange of securities transactions. FIX is 
a public domain specification owned and maintained by FIX 
Protocol, Ltd. It serves as an open standard for sharing
financial information electronically in a secure, but nonproprietary 
way.
   QuickFIX is specially designed to help trading firms overcome 
the obstacles that prevent many companies from realizing the 
advantages of FIX connectivity. Specifically, a large number of 
firms are hesitant to incur the licensing fees and royalties 
associated with commercially available products. Still others lack 
the in-house capabilities to build their own proprietary 
implementations. QuickFIX provides an easy and reliable 
alternative that speeds progress toward FIX connectivity, which 
in turn, allows companies to capitalize on the protocol's 
tremendous benefits.
    QuickFIX was built in conjunction with an automated testing 
suite to verify the integrity of the engine. The tests were run 
against the code base using a continuous integration tool known 
as CruiseControl ( http://cruisecontrol.sourceforge.net/ ). Originally 
developed by ThoughtWorks and released under an open-source 
license, CruiseControl provides a set of tasks to automate the 
checkout/build/test cycle. QuickFIX, as well as the testing framework, 
can be found at http://quickfix.sourceforge.net/download.html .

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VI. Chicago Computer Dealers

Click here at http://www.chicago-computer.com/deals.htm for our list 
of computer dealers and some of the lowest prices in town!


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