Welcome to a new era of IT in 2005

This year, IT Professional have chosen the following pattern of themes and topics for issues to address. The first issue focuses on what is one of the hottest real-world topics of the day: IT operations during crisis situations. These articles provide you with architectural insights as well as experienced-based knowledge of how IT operations are changing to accommodate the threat of emergencies and wartime situations. An excellent overview of the architectural issues and interoperability concerns associated with public-safety wireless communications leads off this issue. In addition, a topical article related to the crisis communications theme describes the benefits of commercially available satellite communications to augment military needs in the military environment in Iraq. Other articles in this first issue will continue the pattern of mixing themes and topics as appropriate. Hopefully many will benefit from this choices.