BYOD or should that be BYOP?

JPCT 150713 Alan Stainer. Photo by Derek Martin

BYOD is an acronym some of you may be familiar with. For those that don't know, it stands for Bring Your Own Device, which is a term used in the business world when people use their own computers, smartphones and tablets to do their work, rather than the company's machines.

It is a blessing in a lot of ways, because it means less expenditure on equipment, but it is also a curse for IT administrators. The days are gone when an IT department could roll out one set of applications for one operating system. Now they have to cater to all manner of systems with varying screen sizes and capabilities.

One solution I have spoken about before is the emergence of web apps, which by virtue of their nature are inherently platform independent. If the thought of all your stuff being somewhere up in the clouds doesn’t sit well with you, there may be an alternative.