Communications Technology

IT pros looking to make their workplaces greener might want to check out a new CompTIA exam.

CompTIA, or the Computer Technology Industry Association, is now offering a Green IT exam to certify IT professionals in the use of environmentally-friendly technologies and policies. CompTIA is a nonprofit trade group that offers certification, research, and other services to IT professionals. The new exam is geared toward IT supervisors, data center managers, and other IT admins who need to ensure that their operations and resources are green, said CompTIA.

More specifically, the exam covers key environmental topics such as waste disposal, preserving power, lowering your company’s carbon footprint, recognizing green IT standards, setting up virtual machines, and determining your return on investment in setting up green IT projects.

The exam offers 30 questions that have to be answered in an hour, and test takers must get 70 percent of the answers right to pass. To bone up for the exam, CompTIA advises people to have at least 18-24 months of technical experience under their belts and to already have CompTIA A+ and CompTIA Server+ certification.

The exams are given through Pearson VUE and Prometric test centers, while the courseware is available from Axzo Press and Element K, said CompTIA.

“Green IT is at the heart of virtually every aspect of sustainability, from the power grid, smart buildings, and environmental control systems to telepresence, telecommuting, and virtualization,” said Terry Erdle, CompTIA’s senior vice president for skills certifications, in a statement.

A survey in late 2009 conducted by CompTIA found that technology companies are focusing more on green IT initiatives. Among those polled, 72 percent said they were running audits to measure their energy use and power management, 78 percent now consider environmental friendliness when buying new monitors, 77 percent do the same when purchasing computers, and 20 percent have a budget specifically geared toward green IT projects.

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Microsoft is hoping to let Word do better in Chemistry class.

The software maker said that it is releasing an add-on for the word processor that makes it easier to include labels, formulas, and chemical images into documents. Chem4Word, as the add-on is known, was introduced on Wednesday at the spring meeting of the American Chemical Society.

Chem4Word is designed to make Word a more useful tool for those in the Chemistry field who want to include chemical formulas, labels, and images.

It’s available as a free download from Microsoft’s Education Labs Web site. Microsoft also said it plans to release the code under the Apache open-source license later this year.

Chem4Word, which works with both Office 2007 and the forthcoming Office 2010, was developed through a partnership of Microsoft Research and three professors at the University of Cambridge, the company said in a blog posting. The feature builds on the example Microsoft set by including a math equation editor into Word 2007.

Microsoft Research worked closely with key individuals in the field of chemistry to develop this tool, but Microsoft Office provides the tools and resources to enable other domains to develop on top of Office applications,” Alex Wade, Microsoft Research’s director for Scholarly Communication, said in the blog.

The company said the tool taps into Chemical Markup Language (an XML for chemistry), which lets one include both chemical structures and the underlying data into their documents.

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As PC makers flood the market with new laptops based on the Intel Core i processors, anticipation of a refresh of the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air builds every week. Here’s a short MacBook wish list that may serve as a temporary salve to soothe the anxious Apple crowd.

The truism nothing succeeds like success applies in spades to the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air lineups. Apple has redefined laptop computing and spawned me-too designs from just about every major laptop manufacturer. And it’s easy to see why: Apple pioneered the sleek but sturdy all-aluminum laptop equipped with stunning LED displays and powerful standard graphics silicon.

So, how can Apple top this? Here’s five ways.

• Powerful processors: no surprise here, but this after all is what everyone is waiting for. The Intel Core i7 and Core i5 processors provide plenty of power while their 32-nanometer technology goes easy on power consumption.
• Greater graphics: Either ATI or Nvidia will do. Intel is offering better integrated graphics, but let’s presume that Apple will continue to shun Intel integrated graphics in favor of standalone, or “discrete,” graphics from ATI and Nvidia. The key: adequate pixel-pushing power but not so much that it melts the aluminum.
• Cooler Connections: USB 3.0 would be nice since it’s backward compatible and a lot faster than 2.0. Then there’s the razor’s edge of cutting-edge technologies called Light Peak. Intel and Apple have both been working on this. Light Peak can carry data at 10 gigabits per second in both directions simultaneously and Intel expects it will reach 100 gigabits per second in the next decade.
• Wider wireless: 3G/4G built in. This is a longstanding item on the MacBook wish-list. Alas, Apple appears determined not to include 3G as an internal option. Maybe Apple is waiting for 4G or maybe Steve Jobs thinks Apple laptops are not suited to the 3G world of the iPhone and iPad.
• Slicker storage: Hybrid drives are already standard fare on gaming machines, why not laptops? Put the operating system and apps on a relatively small (and inexpensive) solid-state drive and the rest on a larger hard disk drive. Also: an option for 1 terabyte of storage would be nice.

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