A thorough reading of this issue will take more than a few minutes, as it is our largest ever. Please take some time to read to read through it. I think you will find the content hits the target of four important trends in data center exceptionally well. I’d like to share some highlights.

1. Regulatory. Columnists Doug Sandberg and Peter Funk used their platforms to call attention to new local regulations that could affect the national market. Sandberg analyzes the west coast’s new CalGreen initiative, while Funk examines PlaNYC, which will change New York City’s building codes in general but also its data centers.

2. Market. Read about new data centers built by 1&1 Internet and the Bank of Montreal. These two case histories examine how a hosting provider and trading operation manage their data centers for good efficiency and high reliability. Colos and finance firms increasingly tend to dominate new construction announcements, so their strategies have an outsized effect on other operators.

3. Technology. Two other features examine dual voltage distribution and instrumentation strategies.

4. Financial. In a story entitled Five Practical Tips to Cut Structured Cabling Costs, Bob Eskew examines how poor procurement processes can add costs to projects.

Sure, the issue covers more than these four topic, witness Peter Curtis’s examination of externalities and the smart grid, Dennis Cronin’s predictions for 2011, and Andy Lane’s look at the job market.

All these contributors made this issue possible. And yet, there is one more thing I want to point out. The new issue contains an editorial written by Caroline Fritz, our new managing editor, in which she introduces herself and takes a “An Outsiders View” of our industry.