CompTIA Blog

A computer enthusiast and Japanese Anime buff as a teen, George Kalfas debated whether to pursue business or web graphics design in college. But a summer job working as an assistant to his high school's IT director piqued his interest in IT itself as a career.

This morning we kicked off day two of the TechVoice D.C. Fly-In with a Tech Summit that included exceptional panel members from the private sector and federal government diving into IT workforce, Internet governance and other important issues for the tech entrepreneur.Ernest McDuffe, lead of the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education, started the morning with discussion of an initiative called NICE, which defines a framework to improve online behavior skills to enable a safer cyberspace ...

We heard from some great folks on a panel talk this morning at the TechVoice Fly-In in Washington, D.C., including Rep. Richard Hanna (R-NY) who discussed the importance of education and STEM including the introduction of bill called the STEM Education Opportunity Act.We also heard from Brian Forde, senior advisor to the Chief Technology Officer for The White House, who talked about the White House tech summit with the mission to broaden the STEM talent pool.Rep. Sam Graves (R-MO) talked about c ...

We're not moving to the cloud just to move to the cloud. The cloud is a tool to reduce cost and make collaboration easier. Brian Glick, vice president of global information services, Vandegrift Forwarding Company Cloud is becoming a mainstream platform for IT solutions. Are you ready to take advantage of the opportunity for your company and your career? Moving processes and systems to cloud-based solutions requires IT personnel to gain not only new tech expertise, but also savvy critical t ...

Demand for cloud computing-based solutions continues to climb, with Gartner Research predicting that trend to continue for the next several years, taking an even larger share of the total IT market. Gartner expects annual revenue for the Web delivery model to top $207 billion by 2016, as detailed in CompTIA’s Third Annual Trends in Cloud Computing study, which equates to almost 10 percent of overall IT spending. While cloud experts continue to focus on the benefits from mainstreaming Web-based a ...

With CompTIA A+, the foundation is there to know how to troubleshoot and know about all the components. What you study and everything you are taught are things that we use every day. Steven Geha, technical support manager, Dell Need your technicians to become more technical? Want your employees invested in internal career paths? Looking to please your customers and supervisors as well? Dell Support Services in Australia and New Zealand has a single solution for those time-worn workplac ...

Students work through through CCNA 2 curriculum involving basic router and switch configuration at the CompTIA/Cisco Networking Academy classroom/lab at Burnaby South Secondary in Burnaby, BC, Canada. The Computer Networking Technician (CNT) program at Burnaby South Secondary School, located in a Vancouver suburb, is creating student pathways to IT-related jobs and higher education, thanks to great local partnerships, an exceptional instructor and strong district support. For Burnaby South ...

In early 2012, Congress enacted the 2012 Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act, which included a provision that authorized the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to conduct incentive auctions to maximize the utility and efficiency of the nation’s radio spectrum frequency bands.Consequently, on October 2, the FCC released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) seeking comments on several aspects of an FCC proposed “reverse auction” process aimed at incentivizing television broadcaster ...

It was only a decade ago that many of my friends who owned businesses carried two cell phones and rarely travelled without a laptop weighing at least seven pounds. The inconvenience of using multiple devices, especially those without web-connectivity, was assumed to be balanced by the separation of their business and personal communications. Professional acquaintances were typically given the company phone number and email contact information, while their friends and family were granted access t ...

“The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable,” cracked economist John Kenneth Galbraith. Although said in jest (sort of), Galbraith accurately captures the sometimes questionable track record of prognostications. Yes, this applies to tech sector forecasting as well – I know, hard to believe! Nonetheless, no business can avoid thinking about the future. Even if imperfect, economic and industry forecasting serves a useful purpose in fram ...

Let your customer vent their frustrations first, advises Sharon Nielsen, account manager at One Prospect Technologies. "Most people, once they have vented their frustrations and felt heard, calm down on their own and become more willing to listen to your suggested resolutions, or provide feedback with suggestions of their own," she says. Your customer is screaming, or worse, quietly seething. What is the best way for you to respond? Several seasoned IT professionals recently shared their best ...

The human body is quite miraculous. Consider how an assortment of bones, tissues and organs can come together in a machine capable of performing such intricate operations. On top of that, the body employs its own defense systems to protect itself from pathogens and other dangers, from multiple layers of skin to a variety of protective antibodies. While not quite as miraculous as the human anatomy, a business computer system is similarly complex and also employs several layers of defense to pro ...

More money may be coming your way if you're an IT pro. The average annual salary for technology professionals jumped more than 5 percent, from $81,327 in 2011 to $85,619 in 2012, according to the Dice annual salary survey released this week. This is the biggest wage increase in the profession since the early 2000s. And it's not just seasoned professionals who are getting a bigger paycheck. Salaries for IT pros with two years or less experience reported an increase of 8 percent, bringing the ...

In an increasingly digital, interconnected world, cyber security affects organizations on more levels than ever before. Given the criticality of information security, it comes as no surprise that four out of five companies responding to CompTIA’s 10th Annual Information Security Trends study expect to focus on security going forward. The continued focus on information security has made it a unique field in which demand exceeds supply. According to the job board aggregator Indeed.com, the number ...

We may have stepped back from the fiscal cliff – as Congress negotiated an 11th hour deal on taxes at the start of 2013 – but the threat of sequestration still looms. Congress has until March 2, 2013, to work out a deal to avoid automatic across the board budget cuts. If these cuts take place, career and technical education funding could be at risk for a $92 million cut in fiscal year 2013 alone.The Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Improvement Act of 2006 provides federal funds for ...