The Database Warriors
Over the next few weeks I will be covering the major databases contenders (read Warriors) in a series of articles as an analysis proceeds to conclusion. Right now in the IT development arena, one of the hottest arenas beyond AJAX/Web 2.0 vs RIA(Rich Interface Application like Flash, Adobe PDF, Java J2ME/Swing/ vs Microsofts Smart Clients […]
ISVs Revolution
Michael Vizard is picking up a major theme we have been arguing – that Microsoft does not deserve the loyalty of often bullied “partner” ISVs. Look at countless sectors of the software market that Microsoft is attacking often with all guns blazing: 1)buyout of one or more key players in a market; 2)establish key links […]
“People Ready”
Microsoft has a new campaign on TV called “PeopleReady” – in which the competitive advantage of a company is discovered to be the fact that with Microsoft apps and desktop software, companies and organizations are “People Ready”. The people and staff know MS Office and XP in and out such that they will be very […]
Linux on the TabletTop
There is a battle going on for the the PDA/Tablet/Phonetop – among Microsoft/Samsung/HP/Dell/Palm and Palm and Ericsson/Motorola/Nokia. Of course, Palm is trying to play both sides using Windows Mobile as well as its own PalmOS. But what is even more intriguing is the stealth use of Linux and Java on the many different mobile combos. […]
Update:Microsoft “Mea Culpa”
Bill Gates said “mea culpa” at the Mix06 conference in March 2006 . This mea culpa was for: 1)Stopping all development on IE since 2000(code base was done in 2000); 2)Only resuming security updates to IE in late 2001 when the worm and virus attacks became rampant; 3)Reneging on promises for complete implementation of HTML, […]
Microsoft Fixes Its Security Problems for a Fee
Rightfully, this issue of Microsoft charging for its security protection, has got a lot of press play. Wrong-headed and repeating the Microsoft company line has been the offering of so called “expert pundits”. They are way off the mark. Microsoft should embrace Open Source to help rid itself of its open wound – chronically defective […]
To co-opt, verb
to co-opt – neutralize or win over dissenting opinions or nominally independent observer through assimilation into the established group. For example, Larry Seltzer of eWeek has been co-opted by Microsoft as more and more of his columns appear to be apologies for Redmonds continuing stream of security shortcomings. Compare, for example, Larrys remarks about the […]
Universal I/O Box Software
AJAX is not over-rated, but it is just a transition stage – a long overdue transition from the stultified full-webpage refresh dynamics of many websites to computings Holy Grail – Universal I/O Box software . UI/OB is device agnostic, it runs anywhere with not only the same look and feel but the same core programming […]
Atlas Shrugged…
Here is a typical Microsoft, “we rule the Web roost despite our inferior IE offering and get to decide who wins and who loses.” statement Check out Darryl Tafts report on the arrogance of Microsoft. Now – let me be careful, this is Jeff Prosise of Wintellect, so Microsoft can claim plausible deniability. Anything that […]
Break the Microsoft Monopoly on the Web
Break the Microsoft Monopoly on the Web Browser and Everything else will follow. Now why would IT users and vendors want to a)take on Microsoft and b)try to break the Microsoft monopoly on the Web? Lets examine the latter issue first. What monopoly ? LAMP owns 70% of the Web Servers worldwide. Java owns 60%++ […]
IBM Throwing Software Strikes
Did I get that headline right ? IBM throwing strikes ?? In software ??? Well, two precisely. IBM announced delivery of DB2 Viper and the first reception has been pretty enthusiatic among DB pundits. This reviewer has been impressed with the steady improvement of DB2 since 7.x and that will be covered in more detail […]
Suns CTO joins Adobe
This is one of those out of the frying pan into the fire stories. John Loiacono leaves the post of executive vice president of software at Sun (which he held since 2004) and becomes senior vice president of Creative Solutions at Adobe. If I read the Adobe site right, this means that John will have […]
Google Fun!
Google has injected what many cannot do – fun back into computing. No – not the new online Google Spreadsheet. No, fun in this case comes by way of Google Maps API and what a clever firm in England has done with that. Checkout Pin-in-the-Map and see what Don Quixote you can pin the tail […]
Desktop Watchers Take Heed: Linux Moving-up
Desktop watchers who smell problems with Vista (see what Computerworld and eWeek are saying) need to keep tabs on what is coming down the pike from Linux – there are three desktop distributions that are really moving up. Checkout our personal favorite, Suse Linux 10.1 here. Developer colleagues say Ubuntu is just too darn good […]
Blasts from the Past: Symantecs Visual Cafe
Executive Summary- we use a blast from the past, Visual Cafe, to argue that Java is more suited to a wide range of development tasks than the LAMP scripts (PHP, Perl, Python, Ruby) and AJAX/JavaScript. I was going through my software books and guides and ran across a blast from the past- Symantecs Visual Cafe […]
Blast from The Past 2 : Borland IntraBuilder
Executive Summary – Missed opportunity to set a JavaScript IDE standard means AJAX/JavaScript is even more fragmented I was going through my software books and guides and ran across a blast from the past- Borland IntraBuilder Users Manual from 1997-98 era. This was one very well designed JavaScript IDE that was clearly ahead of its […]
McNealy Step Aside
Sun Microsystems under Scott McNealy has been a visionary provider that has fallen victim to the unrelenting pace of change and their own allegiance to past business models in the computing market. Sun seems to be case of that awkward proof that good guys finish second best. Look at the Accidental Empire builders of the […]
JPEG2000 Done in by Microsoft??
Microsoft is trying to proprietize/control the next level of digital photo storage format with their new WMP/WDP format. Now for at least 3 years JPEG2000 has been available and Microsoft has taken a raincheck on JPEG2000, no reasons given.We have raised the issue of Redmonds bypassing JPEG2000 many times here. Maybe its too slow as […]
Ever had a ProblemFinding a Domain Name ?
Anybody who has looked up a Web name for registration knows how frustrating that task can be. Even with the new .us, .eu, .info domain groups available, its hard to find good web names. And here is one reason why – a few privileged registrars are tying close to 32 million names per month to […]
Imagining a day without Microsoft
I have been praising Infoworlds Ephraim Schwartz, and then he does “Imagining a day without Microsoft”. At first I thought this was done tongue in-cheek because the consequences were bizarre – Star Office being inundated with downloads ; but Word such a great thing because at least it was a standard everybody could rely on. […]
Why on Earth …
Information Weeks Larry Greene-Meier raises a fundamental question – Why on Earth Would Big Companies With Lots of Choices Use Open Source. Lets highlight the clearly qualifying phrase “with lots of choices”. According to many pundits, the IT industry is cooling down, commoditizing, and consolidating. More than less, the argument is being made that in […]
LAMP Limping?
Does this graph of PHP usage tell the story for LAMP-Linux Apache MySQL Perl/PHP/Python in general ? Some would argue that Open Source and Linux in particular are ascendant and any small kinks like the one above for PHP are just small aberrations. They would rightly point to the latest IDC reports on the Worldwide […]
Interoperability: Microsoft Style
Mohammed Akif was representing Microsoft Interoperability with Java at Java One. He has a blog documenting his “Interoperability peace efforts” and the not surprising hostile reaction to his company at the conference. Here is the bottom line on Interoperability, Mohammed, Steve, Bill or any body else from Microsoft. Until the following gets changed: 1)Java with […]
SaaS: Jotspot Tracker
We have been talking about SaaS-Software as a Service; however we have not yet shown some examples. But they are beginning to appear very rapidly so a few examples are in order. Here is Jotspot (who also offer a Wiki as SaaS) with their spreadsheet based (or in JotSpot speak “Tracker”) personal or workgroup space […]
Microsoft Bloat on Vista
Microsoft is in denial on the bloat caused by Vista. Information Week covered the new programs that help estimate a computers capability for running Vista along with the new published guidelines. What was most interesting was the commentary from the Directions on Microsoft analysts who are generally sympathetic to Redmonds offerings: Microsoft also released a […]
SaaS: Thinkfree Office 3
Depending on the situation I love or hate moving. Some times moving provides me with an opportunity to get rid of the barnacles, re-organize and refocus on a new surrounding and set of tasks. There are often compelling ROI arguments to make the move to a new place, new job or new software. Other times […]
Mystery Solved
In a weblog posting called the Future of Lock-In, Dave Rosenberg and Matt Asay discuss the new nature of lock-in at Microsoft. Lockin at Microsoft in the past has been the often proprietary couplings between file formats and popular apps – Office, Visio, Outlook, even InfoPath with its relatively open XML data exchange but then […]
Oracle and Sleepycat
Lisa Vaas in eWeeks March 2006 issue asks why did Oracle buy Sleepycat software. Then, with the help of Oracle staffers she got the “answer”. It sounds like one of those cliche filled sports stars interviews. LV-“Well Bronko why did you guys buy Sleepycat, famous for the Berkley DB Open Source database?” Bronko – “Well, […]
Maximal Software: The Rest of the Story
Maximal Software makes the MPL Modeling System. MPL allows analysts to develp linear, mixed integer and nonlinear programming models with a great deal more ease than in classic solver systems like CPLEX, Excels Solver, and a whole host of optimization systems. What makes MPL atractive is that its simple declarative format is intuitive and yet […]
Apple Follows the Money
Ephraim Schwartz at Infoworld is writing the free thinking, wide ranging but largely fact-based columns that one has thirsted for in the major IT media. Ephraim is making the case that Apple is moving towards an IBM strategy . Be the facilitator, the infrastructure/middleware provider and essential glue that makes things work – but on […]
SaaS: Krugle
One of the mirages that has been on the horizon in application development for too long to recall is a good repository of all the coding assets available to programmers and developers within and, Heavens to Mergatroid, outside the organization. I know, I know. All you IBM SAA, Microsoft Repository, and Unisys Object Repository users, […]
AMD Emergent
AMD Emergent is really also the story of Intel Divergent. In the past 3-5 years, AMD has been able to gain consistent technological advantages over the overwhelming market leader Intel in the race for computer chip supremacy. Now this is no mean deed. Intel dominates the CPU chip market despite the entry and fierce competition […]
“IE7 has No Soul”
Scott Finnie at Computerworld has got it right – “IE7 has no soul”. And why should it have any. Bill Gates introduces it at Mix06 with a one line “mea culpa” for not just not updating IE for close to seven years but also for stalling all other desktop Web development as well. “Ooops I […]
Java versus JavaScript
Java and JavaScript have had a Jekyll and Hyde mixed relationship from their very beginnings. In order to catch some of the ballyhoo of the early emerging Java, Netscape decided to change the name LiveScript to JavaScript even though Brendan Eich, creator of JavaScript, though influenced by C and C++ and some Java ideas – […]
After the IE 10- patch, a new Flaw …
I have just settled down to test IE7 when I get the following warning from eWeek – Microsoft Rocked by New IE Zero-Day Flaw Warning. It is critical and sinister … and so off again to update IE, time-wasted and never to be recorded in the annals of Microsofts Get the Facts spin website. However, […]
10 IE patches took 20 minutes …
The patch for 10 critical IE errors took 20 minutes to download on a DSL WIFI connection (free) at the Port Hope ON public library. Applying the patches got a little screwy (read several hours) because I had not done all the Windows updates required. But I need IE to test my software – so […]
Linux Installs
I am in the process of doing a series of reviews of popular Linux versions books and the associated distributions. The goal is to rate the books as a)an Installation Manual for Linux including the amenities of the enclosed CD or DVD; and b)to rate the book as a Starting Guide to Linux and this […]
Larry Seltzers Warning to Windows Users
Larry Seltzer has issued a warning to Windows users – your support will be terminated in early July 2006. Oh that is all Windows 9X and ME users. Here is Larrys take on the situation: “Expecting Microsoft to still patch Win9x (by which I mean Windows 98, Windows 98SE and Windows ME) is like expecting […]
Apple Launches Virtualization?
A lot is being made of Boot Camp – that is the free boot loader on the new Intel-based Apple computers that will allow MacBook and other Intel Apple machines to boot up into either MacOS or Windows XP (but not the Media Center edition nor the new upcoming Vista, for now). But this requires […]
Shoot the Bastards
One of the endearing characteristics of Denny Crain, senior partner in TVs Boston Legal, is that even as a caricature of an elite lawyers he is right on Denmark and true to form – aristocratic and arch conservative. Sure there are one or two carefully cultivated liberal notions but otherwise Dennys red-necked from cranium to […]
SaaS Entree to SMB
Whenever I hear a software vendor talking about the SMB market place – and lately many are and with big ambitions, I always ask what have they to offer in the SaaS category to SMB users. That quickly separates the real players from the Wannabees. SaaS as an entree into SMB market place has the […]
SaaS Broadens Its Reach
This is the theme of an article by Ephraim Schwartz on SaaS. Ephraim and I agree on an essential point: “My biggest rap against SaaS has been that the multi-tenant architecture demands a great deal of standardization in business processes. It does not allow a company to address processes specific to its industry segment. In […]
SaaS : Limits to Growth
Back in 1972 and then again in 1992 and 2002, Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers and Dennis Meadows have published a book cautioning about the Limits to Growth – the ecological footprint of mankind exceeding the amount of resources available without intensive (and certainly not currently practiced) reuse, recycling and renewal. Its in that spirit that […]
Union Coders ?
Given the circumstances surrounding programming these days: 1)Outsourcing of jobs to India, China and elsewhere in the World; 2)Continuing complexification of development: most Web 2.0 system development requires knowledge of HTML, XML, JavaScript, UML, SQL, WSDL, and one programming language out of PHP, Perl, ActionScript/Flash, Java, C/C++, C#, or Pythonese. Plus all three programming layers […]
Do No Evil
Can you hear the laugh out loud humor arising out of a Googles ethical slogan of “do no evil”? One can imagine really baaaad quips like the one about the new Google Desktop error message: “Oops the program has apparently bombed again … the devil made me do it”. But think again. By going up […]
Free Lunches
There is a homestead rush, a stake-your-claim-in-the-ground in the Free Lunch market. Be the first entrant in an Open Source or Linux free software market and you have the advantage of setting the “standards” or business model of how “free” software will be distributed in Linux or broader platform segments. RedHat has that advantage in […]
Software Refuges
Software developers are being hammered. At one end, the Microsofts, Oracles, IBMs, BEAs and other software behemoths are engaged in free giveaway wars as each Brobadingnang seeks to establish breacheads in the others markets. Thus the 5 year “free” giveaway of an increasingly complete BI Stack by Microsoft while it charged for its database (also […]
The Thrill is Gone
I suspect the Thrill is Gone out of Redmond. Microsofts announcement that its new Vista OS would not be launched in late 2006 in time for Christmas shopping is a watermark. Like the levels of water advancement that hit New Orleans during Katrinas breech of the levees and left their mark on all the flooded […]
Why I Hate Rebates
Here is the reason why I hate computing hardware and software rebates: Now this looks innocent enough – but I bought the software and sent in the rebate request back in September of 2005. So you can imagine what reception the current Adobe software offers with rebates are going to get. And Dell is upping […]
Google Passes Do No Evil in a Blind Blink
Google has won a lot of adherents and customers based on its ability to marshall thousands of CPUs and huge sums of diskspace to make ordinary tasks better – search, email, mapping, local busines look-up, etc. And Google is able to keep Microsoft at Bay primarily because Get the Facts on Linux is a big […]