For many VARs, cloud-based computing is a worrisome prospect.

The notion of functions served up direct to users from a vendor-owned-and-operated cloud poses a huge disintermediation threat to partners, as Richard Warren, of North Carolina Technologies told SearchITChannel.com, earlier this week.

 But the cloud vendors still need to prove themselves able to fully compete in a world where 99.9% of users need remote or offline capabilities. They need to work on their data and apps even if they’re not (gasp) connected to the Web.

Google execs say they will prove their technology worthy of the enterprise, blazing the trail with the Google Appliance. Google Gears is starting to bring offline capability to the company’s consumer and business services — Google Reader is “Gears enabled” as is Google Docs. (The spreadsheet and presentations so far  support just view-only offline access.) Read more »

Spreadsheet pioneer Dan Bricklin is at it again. The father of VisiCalc is now working to bring the spreadsheet’s productivity to workgroups.

Bricklin, in his trademark flannel shirt (it’s nearly 100 degrees out!) said hello before heading into Ross Mayfield’s Enterprise 2.0 keynote. Mayfield is chairman, prez and co-founder of Socialtext– the company working on Bricklin’s “Social Spreadsheet.” Read more »

Bill Gates just finished what Microsoft has billed as his last public speech as a company full timer. Gates is stepping down from day-to-day involvement as of July 1.

At TechEd 2008 part one (for developers) Gates hit on some familiar themes and presided over demos of upcoming modeling, database, and development technologies. Read more »

Microsoft partners now have a new service they can offer to their SharePoint customers.

The company yesterday announced SharePoint Deployment Planning Services (SDPS). Partners can become certified in SDPS and then help customers plan their Office SharePoint Server 2007 deployments. Microsoft will reimburse partners for the consultation they provide.

Customers enrolled in Volume Licensing Software Assurance are eligible to take advantage of SDPS. Partners must have a Microsoft competency in information worker portals and collaboration, enterprise content management or search to participate.

IBM is making a new push to attract SharePoint users to its Lotus Quickr platform. One of the selling points, according to IBM and its partners, is that SharePoint can quickly become unmanageable without proper planning. If it catches on, SDPS could go a long way toward fixing that. 

Colin Steele’s story this week on IBM taking on Microsoft’s SharePoint dominance with Quickr depicts just the latest skirmish in the continual war between two companies going way back to Microsoft Excel vs. Lotus 1-2-3.

It started when Microsoft challenged Lotus’ 1-2-3 spreadsheet dominance with the aforementioned Excel. Then it went after Lotus’ Notes email-and-collaboration success.

Since then much has changed: IBM bought Lotus for big money, for example, but the rivalry continued.

Microsoft took on Lotus Notes in mail-and-collaboration with Exchange Server. Then it switched strategy, deciding to enlist SharePoint its proxy warrior in collaboration, irritating partners that had been encouraged to write tools for Exchange. Anyone remember XSOs?Or Office Designer? Didn’t think so.

A common parlor game each January before Lotusphere was anticipating what Notes-to-Exchange migration tool would be announce that week.

Now IBM says that Quickr can uproot SharePoint in portals/collab. That’s a big statement given how SharePoint has spread like kudzu — largely because Sharepoint licenses are included in volume license agreements.

Anyway, with this Sharepoint-to-Quickr push, what’s old is new again. But somehow it seems desultory. The big question is whether, in this economy and with stressed IT budgets, anyone outside the vendors and their partner partisans care any more about these melees.

Barbara Darrow can be reached at bdarrow@techtarget.com.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t report in this week from the Cisco Partner Summit, where I’m helping the company’s Industry Solutions Partner Network team with some breakout panels and communications activities.

The themes I’m about to recount were plucked from the main keynote address hosted by Worldwide Channel Muckety-Muck Keith Goodwin and featuring Goodwin’s ultimate boss, Cisco CEO and Chairman John Chambers. For those of you who aren’t/weren’t here, some highlights:

1. Partner to Partner Collaboration: This topic gets a big-time boost with the introduction of something called the Cisco Partner Exchange. Basically, this is a social network where approximately 8,500 Cisco Certified Partners, managed services providers, distributors and application partners can search for other partners that might be able to extend their reach on a particular project. Cisco is backing up this introduction with a channel survey it conducted with Illuminas Research that found collaborative projects between Cisco partners accounted for approximately 31 percent of revenue within the partner ecosystem. Another very compelling case for collaboration: 78 percent of the resellers who responded to the survey (about 500 in call) reported that collaboration helped them increase deal/project sizes. Partner Exchange is meant to support collaboration in cyberspace by letting partners create skills profiles that include not only info about their Cisco specializations but about other technologies they might support.

2. Data Centers: Cisco is upping the ante with both a new set of Nexus switches (developed by Nuova Systems) as well as incentives for VARs investing in a data center practice.

The Nexus 5000 Series are meant for consolidation projects. It supports 10 Gigabit Ethernet PLUS Fibre Channel over Ethernet Data Center Ethernet and virtualization. The new switches are supposed to start shipping in May starting at $36,000 for a fixed configuration, 40-port 10 Gigabit Ethernet switch. Cisco also evolved its Value Incentive Program and will start rewarding VARs that invest in a data center practice starting in August.

3. Software: This one is a bit of a surprise, given how other vendors are supporting and selling their software as a service (Saas) offerings. That is, by selling them direct. But, Keith Goodwin says Cisco is creating a referral program for its WebEx offerings that will not only reward partners for the initial deal but for recurring activity on the service. You can expect this program to emerge in the next two to three quarters. What’s more, WebEx will continue to morph to allow for more and more different types of connections (and collaborative settings) that are independent of device. Hmmm. Is Cisco becoming a software company?

John Chambers was his usual prophetic, evangelistic self, focusing on developments that are drivin where he is asking Cisco to place its bets. The company now has 22 priorities, which range from very broad initiatives such as mobility to very specific ideas, such as “routers in space.” Talk about an emerging market! Collaboration and Community are the two big themes underlying most of Chambers’ thinking. Focus on markets in transition, Chambers advises partners, if you want to increase revenues. “If you focus on your competition, you are already behind,” he said.

I buy most of this, certainly, but the one thing that niggles at me as I write this is the big push that Cisco is putting on collaboration through tools such as social networks, video conferencing, instant chats and so forth. It’s not that I don’t believe this is the way to go, it’s just that I think many people are overwhelmed about how to handle many of these services – many of which currently reside in different silos. I believe in the power of the individuals, but collaboration in chaos could actually result in a decrease in productivity. My two cents.

More later this week from (poor me) Hawaii.

Are you a citizen of Second Life? Does it make sense to build a business establishment in a fake world?
Unclear, but some VARs, including Ira Chandler, president of Curbstone Corp.,  are aboard. Here he is. Or rather, here his avatar  is:

IBM and Cisco have built their own virtual online presences, IBM on Second Life and Cisco with its own “PartnerSpace.”  Here’s what that looks like:

And here:

For more on VARs in (virtual) space, see Alice LaPlante’s story on SearchITChannel.

Microsoft Office Live Workspace and Google Docs are going mano a mano over on ReadWriteWeb, where a comparison of the two online services has sparked quite the debate among users.

Microsoft released a public beta of Office Live Workspace yesterday, the same day I covered a Google Enterprise exec’s speech in Boston. The exec, Matthew Glotzbach, gave a demo of Google Apps — the enterprise version of Google Docs.

His basic premise: Google is easy to use but still offers the vast majority of features that the vast majority of business users need to do their jobs. He didn’t come out and say it, but the implication was that Microsoft can be confusing and overwhelming, much like last week’s episode of “Lost.”

Anyway, ReadWriteWeb’s Sarah Perez evaluated Microsoft Office Live Workspace and Google Docs and came to this conclusion: “Although it’s very close when it comes to basic features of the two services, each stands out in its own way.” But proponents of each service don’t see a close battle at all.

Pro-Google reader “Jrome,” for example, commented that “Google Docs is far better than Office Live, especially thanks to its real-time collaboration and mobile access.” He also pointed out that Office Live Workspace requires users to have Microsoft Office installed on their computers, which goes against the very premise of “cloud computing.”

Meanwhile, a reader named “Brian” defended Microsoft: “In the real-world, Google Docs, Open Office and Ubuntu, etc. are so far behind it’s pathetic. Who uses this stuff for actual work? Absolutely no one that I know of, and MS Office works so well there’s minimal incentive to change.”

That last sentence is key. Before I covered Glotzbach yesterday at the Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM) International Exposition and Conference, I got to see a speech by The New York Times‘ David Pogue. He also talked about the trend toward simpler technology, but he made it a point to say that simplicity alone will not guarantee a product’s success.

Pogue said the iPod sacrificed several features of other portable music players, like a radio tuner, when it debuted. The iPhone similarly gave up on traditional phone features, such as a keypad. Both succeeded. But in a lot of other cases, Pogue said users aren’t willing to give up extra features — even features that they rarely if ever use.

Google Docs gets rid of some of those features. It also adds a lot of features that were pretty impressive to see during Glotzbach’s demo. We’ll just have to wait and see if those features, and Google Docs’ easy-to-use interface, can push Google to do for enterprise applications what the iPod did for MP3 players.

Bill Gates is Linked In.

And on Thursday you too could be connected to the Microsoft maestro

This according to email from the LinkedIn spokespeeps:

“This Thursday, Bill Gates, Chairman of Microsoft, will post a question on LinkedIn. His objective is to communicate with LinkedIn’s base of over 19 million professional members, in order to expand his own expertise on how technology can be better utilized for charitable causes. All LinkedIn members will be able to post answers/suggestions to Bill’s question in real time.”

Here’s BillG’s LinkedIn page.

Note: Bill and Melinda only have two connections.

Barbara Darrow can be reached at bdarrow@techtarget.com.

Yahoo’s board, convinced that Microsoft is lowballing, has reportedly nixed Microsoft’s $44.6 billion buyout offer.  The Wall Street Journal reported the news over the weekend. 

Yahoo,  despite its recent woes, has great assets. The Yahoo portal still is the window to the Web for many. And its purchase of Zimbra last year gives it a slick, modern collab-and-mail combo that runs rings around competitors. Yes, even competitors with names that start with G and end with oogle.

It would be interesting to see what Microsoft, if ultimately successful, would do with Zimbra and its talent pool.

 But back to the proposed deal itself. It has painted this as a last-ditch effort by Microsoft to get in the search-Web-ad-game with Google.  After it’s already spent billions of dollars trying to get there.  And the price–while it may be low by Yahoo’s standards–is astounding.

“It’s likely we’re actually going to borrow for the first time,” Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell told analysts last week. “It’s going to be a mixture of the cash we have on hand plus debt.”

And for some, Microsoft might be better off looking ahead for the next battle rather than continuing this one. 

Some longtime Microsoft partners–both “classic” and MBS–worry that with this move shows that Microsoft’s priorities have moved far beyond them and the products they sell and support now.

One business solutions partner who works with several of the company’s ERP lines, said he thinks the company has relegated business apps for SMBs to the bottom of the heap.
He hopes that at the Microsoft Convergence confab next month he will be convinced otherwise.