Emerging Technologies

A wide array of emerging technologies have the potential to effect changes on the role of IT professionals. Social networks are becoming increasingly important in everyday life and work, although their closed nature restricts their effectiveness; fortunately, opportunities for linking multiple social networks are increasing thanks to innovations such as the OpenSocial platform and the OpenID digital identity standard. Advanced Web-based applications that function in a similar manner to desktop applications, enabled through technologies such as Asynchronous JavaScript and XML and JavaScript Object Notation, are another emerging technology with a lot of potential. Next-generation smart phones equipped with Web and Internet capabilities hold substantial promise for bringing us nearer to a PC-like phone, as does constant, low-power Web connections. Practical applications of the semantic Web began to arrive in 2007, as many vendors started offering products to help businesses implement semantic Web technologies that facilitated the construction of actual sites and solutions. Applications and sites that comprehend and connect to data across the Internet are already possible through the semantic Web, which is expected to radically transform the linkage of businesses, applications, and people across the Web. The delivery and consumption of hardware and software are finally starting to be shaped by green technologies, which represent attempts to make the entire IT infrastructure more environmentally friendly and energy-efficient. Looking ahead, businesses and users will expect future laptops to consume less power while also delivering wireless connectivity and other capabilities found in the small and cheap machines developed for the One Laptop Per Child project.