The Top 11 Cities for Technology Careers

Is your particular skill-set saturated in your current location? Are you thinking about taking your tech talents to a new locale, possibly one with more IT career opportunities? If so, here are some cities you may want to consider before choosing a new home..

The Cities that Offer IT Professionals the Most Bang for the Buck
What makes a city one of the best in regards to technology careers? A couple key factors quickly bubble to the top including: how much does the average IT worker make in that city; how many opportunities are there; and what is the cost of living? On first glance, that great tech job out in LA or NYC might pay you more than your current position, but after you factor in the cost of living, it quickly becomes obvious that all things are not equal.

So come along for this country-wide tour of the U.S. as CIO.com countdowns what, according to Dice data, are the best U.S. cities for IT jobs.

How We Got Here
Who doesn't want more bang for their buck? To some where they live isn't a major factor in their job hunt, and if there are more opportunities somewhere else, why not head there? For those individuals CIO.com worked with Dice, a major career site, to gather data on the best U.S. cities in regards to technology jobs and average IT salaries. We then cross referenced that data with cost of living index data provided by Dean Frutinger, Project Manager at the Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness. By weighing these three factors together, IT professionals can more accurately assess whether it's time for a change in location.

1. Austin Texas
The capital of Texas, Austin, comes in at number one on our list. While it may not have the gravitas of NYC or Silicon Valley, there is a lot to be said for this growing technology hub. This bike friendly metropolis sports over eighty miles of bike paths, and it's rapidly expanding market offers great opportunities with a low cost of living. Austin regularly shows up on the list of best cities for tech startups.

Professional Sports Teams: The Austin area isn't known for its sports cache but there are NBA, NHL and MBA farm teams here along with several universities.

2. Houston, Texas
The Houston area continues to grow. "Oil and Gas, of course, ranked the highest in terms of needing highly skilled and educated employees, but let's not lose sight of medical, technology, engineering, retail, education and financial fields-all large sectors in West Houston. There is a scramble for highly educated and skilled employees," says Jeannie Bollinger, President and CEO of the Houston West Chamber of Commerce. According to Dice numbers Texas actually ranked as the fourth fastest growing technology employment state in the U.S., which explains how three of The Lone Star states cities made it onto this list.

Professional Sports Teams: The Texans, the Astros, the Rockets, the Dynamo, and the Dash.

3. Atlanta, Georgia
A low cost of living and high average IT salaries are making life in 'the ATL' sweet. 'The Big Peach' sports good universities, a major airport hub and a thriving music scene.

According to reports from Dice, mobile is driving the job growth in this region. The metro area of Atlanta recently saw a 66 percent increase in the amount of online job postings. This was across all industries but tech accounts for the lion's share of the jobs created.

Professional Sports Teams: The Falcons, the Braves, the Hawks, the Silverbacks (MSL).

4. Phoenix, Arizona
If living in the dry desert weather appeals to you then our next city could be your next home. Phoenix, also known as 'The Valley of the Sun,' is a little gem in the southwest that has managed to struggle back from a crushing foreclosure crisis. Recently ranked as the fourth fastest growing city for technology job postings and fourth fastest in the country in regards to tech salary growth, Phoenix has had average tech salaries increase by an impressive 12 percent year over year.

Professional Sports Teams: The Cardinals, the Diamondbacks, the Rattlers, Coyotes, Mercury (WNBA) and the Suns.

5. Denver, Colorado
Are you a fan of winter? Well then the city of Denver in the snowy mountains of Colorado should definitely be in consideration. Colorado has several tech biggies in their backyard including IBM, Oracle, Lockheed Martin and Avaya, as well as a thriving tech startup scene.

More than 53 percent of Downtown Denver's population holds a bachelor's degree, making it one of the smartest cities in America. It ranks as one of the top relocation destinations among highly-skilled workers between 25 and 44. The relatively low cost of living compared to Silicon Valley or NYC combined with the slower pace of living attracts many tech workers fleeing the coasts.

Professional Sports Teams: The Broncos, the Rockies, the Nuggets, the...

6. Dallas, Texas
The Dallas-Fort Worth area is a sprawling city situated in the plains of Texas. It ranked as the number three spot for total number of high-tech jobs last year. This region employs over 136,000 tech workers and has had 6.6 percent annual growth, making Dallas an emerging market and one to watch. Everything is bigger in Texas and the area is known for its big steaks, BBQ, Mexican and Tex-Mex foods. Combine all of this with a great set of sports teams, a high standard of living and low cost of living and it becomes easy to see why your next job may be deep in the heart of Texas.

Professional Sports Teams: The Cowboys, the Rangers, the Mavericks, the Stars and FC Dallas.

7. Charlotte, North Carolina
Another state managing to grab multiple positions on our list is North Carolina. Charlotte itself comes in at number four on the list of cities offering the most bang for the buck. Beautiful weather, low cost of living, proximity to the tri-state area and a growing market all come together to make Charlotte a consideration for those looking to leave the fevered pace of areas such as NYC, New Jersey and Baltimore behind.

Professional Sports Teams: The Panthers, NASCAR and the Bobcats.

8. Raleigh, North Carolina
Recently Forbes named Raleigh number two on its fastest growing cities list. Cisco, IBM, GlaxoSmithKline and many others have set up shop here to take advantage of the economic benefits as well as the talent pool.

Close proximity to several universities make this town one of the more highly-educated populations. In January it was declared that "The (research) triangle has the nation's most 'educated' center cities." In fact Raleigh regularly rates as one of the best places to live in the U.S. Great weather, reasonable housing prices and lots of jobs make Raleigh an attractive place to call home.

9. Chicago, Illinois
Sweet Home Chicago. Whether you're renting a building for your new startup or looking for your new home, prices here are rock-bottom when compared to Silicon Valley, San Francisco, New York City or LA.

The city was designed in such a way that most places are in walking distance to several parks. Not many people think beaches when they think Chicago, but it is actually home to 29 miles of beaches located on Lake Michigan. Combine all this with no personal income taxes and a sports team in virtually every professional sport, suddenly Chicago as a destination for tech pros starts to make a lot of sense.

Professional Sports Teams: The White Sox, the Cubs, the Blackhawks, the Bulls, the Fire, Da Bears, the Wolves and the...

10. Portland, Oregon
We start our list in Portland, Oregon or 'The City of Roses' as it's known due to its perfect rose-growing climate. Regularly noted as a bike-friendly and green city, Portland has much to offer those that love the outdoors. Other reasons to consider Portland your home include a robust music scene and a strong job market among other things. "In my opinion, if you are a software engineer graduating from college right now, there is no better city you can move to than Portland," says Sam Blackman, CEO and Co-founder of Elemental, a Portland tech startup.

Professional Sports Teams: The Trail Blazers, the Thorns and the Timber.

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How far are you willing to go to spy on your employees' smartphones?

mSpy monitoring service/app tracks lots of data, but is it too snoopy?

The scoop: Mspy mobile phone monitoring service/app, starting at $40 per month (as tested, features would cost $70 per month)
mspy 620

What is it? The ultimate eavesdropping solution for people who want to see what their employees, kids or spouse are doing on their Android (or jailbroken iPhone) smartphone. The service can track what phone numbers are being called, the recipient and contents of text messages, what photos, videos and audio recordings they’re taking, what web sites they’re visiting, and emails they’re making. You can also block the smartphone from visiting specific web sites,block specific applications, monitor other apps (Skype, WhatsApp, Facebook and Viber).

Why it’s cool: The vast amount of things that the app/service can monitor is quite impressive, if not totally complete (for example, you can’t see any incoming MMS message, so the off-color photo your daughter receives from the boyfriend won’t be detected). Features that the service offers — including device wipe, app/site blocking and incoming phone call blocking — are usually only seen on enterprise-level mobile device management (MDM) products/services. Seeing a service like this target consumers and (more likely), small-to-midsize businesses is an interesting trend.

Here’s a video that mSpy produced touting its service:

Some caveats: We had difficulty hearing our recorded phone calls (all we got was static rather than a recording); the location tracker seemed to utilize the cell phone towers for location, not the device’s GPS function (it took some time for the system to discover where the phone was located). The folks at mSpy said the likely culprit was an older version of the software on our test Android phone - but instead of an over-the-Internet firmware/app update, they said they’d have to update the phone in person (a paying user would likely have to physically update the app on the phone as well).

The bigger issue/problem for users is whether you want or need this amount of monitoring of your mobile devices. This is major spying / monitoring territory that you’re entering here - being able to see exactly what the smartphone user is doing with their phone. Whether it’s your employee, your child or your spouse/partner, the issue of trust comes up with software like this. Even though mSpy says on its site that “My Spy (mSpy) is designed for monitoring your employees or underage children on a smartphone or mobile device that you own or have proper consent to monitor,” and “You are required to notify users of the device that they are being monitored,” there’s a big chance that the user will forget about this at some point, and the boss/parent/spouse/partner will end up seeing something that they might not want to see. It’s a level of privacy invasion that I’m not comfortable doing with my wife and kids (maybe I’ll feel different when my kids get older), and I’d have doubts about having IT staff doing this with employees. If you have any doubts about what the app/service can do or is aimed at, type in mSpy in YouTube search and see that the second video is called “How I caught my boyfriend cheating using mSpy”.

The second issue is the cost. At $40 per month (the starting level, the features we tested would cost $70 per month), this service is cost prohibitive for a large majority of consumers, as it approaches (or even exceeds) the cost of a monthly phone service plan. However, mSpy does offer a 10-day refund policy, so maybe you can use the service for nine days to see what your spouse/child/employee is doing, and then cancel the service.

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Microsoft XP is in the queue of erasing

Microsoft has ended up encouraging users to stop using windows XP for very long.

Microsoft's choice to remove its support team in the sand has sowed uncertainty and will likely encourage bad manners by several clients, analysts said at present.

"If next month someone finds another zero-day like this one, Microsoft might just shift the line once more," said John Pescatore, director of emerging security trends at the SANS Institute, a security training company.

"In a method, this encourages awful manners. There's a risk that people will look at it that way," said Michael Silver, an analyst with Gartner, referring to those who will now question Microsoft's determination to end XP maintain, and thus slow or even suspend their resettlement to newer editions of Windows.

The specialist were discussion about Microsoft's shift on May 1 to problem fixes for a serious susceptibility in Internet Explorer (IE) that had been disclosed the week before and used by cyber criminals for an anonymous span of time before that to take control Windows PCs. Patching the bug was not strange; what was out of the normal was Microsoft's choice to push the join to Windows XP equipment.

At First, Microsoft had set the finish of support for Windows XP as April 8, a date it had broadcast for years. When Microsoft software reaches its support departure time, it's our business policy to stop public patching.

Just days after the limit, Microsoft fundamentally said, "Never mind," and patched the IE helplessness on Windows XP. What had been sure -- the support line in the sand -- became irresolute?

Microsoft stand-by the decision, proverb it had bent to what it called "overblown" media exposure and explanation that it did so only because XP had only newly been retired.

"I don't think the coverage was overblown," said Pescatore.

Wes Miller, an analyst with commands on Microsoft, decided. "It was a extremely bad weakness," he keen out.

Even so, the analysts were surprised at the let go of a fix for XP, not only because of the line Microsoft had so firmly drawn but because of the ramifications of erasing that line.

The precedent was what worried the experts. "totally, the standard matters to Microsoft," said Miller. "It's not a question of if, but when, this issue will come up yet again. Until key organizations are off of XP, every major vulnerability becomes a important chance for exploitation."

Some consumers still having Windows XP may view Microsoft's patching decision as a pass to carry on organization the 13-year-old operating system which, as Microsoft has repeatedly hammered home, lacks many of the higher security and anti-exploit features and technologies in newer editions, including Windows 7 and Windows 8.1.

Even further in the future, customers running Windows 7 may recall this XP patch and conclude that Microsoft is not serious about retiring that OS when its January 2020 support deadline nears.

"There is now a difference between what Microsoft thinks they mean and what [customers] think they mean," said Miller. "Everyone is playing chicken. Which means [years from now] people may say, 'I can keep running Windows 7.'"

Microsoft was in a "lose-lose" situation with XP, according to Silver, because of the operating system's large user base. At the end of April, XP powered about 26% of the world's personal computers, analytics company Net Applications revealed last week.

Although Microsoft didn't talk about XP's stubborn confrontation to retirement, and the huge numbers of PCs that still run the OS, the decision was clearly based on its continued prominence. Which makes one wonder, analysts said, what Microsoft may do in the weeks and months to come.

"May be Microsoft thought hard about this one. But if the same thing happened in a year, you wouldn't see it. So that [patch last week] may have been the real line," contended Silver.

"6 months from now, an XP vulnerability may get the same [media] coverage," said Pescatore. "But then Microsoft has a much stronger legend. They might say, 'XP's dropped in half since April, so we're sticking to the plan.'"

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