I was a DB2 beta tester in a previous life. The product that you're referring to is the DB2 Image Extender, and I was fortunate enough to be able to try it out as part of their beta program. Seemed to be really cool tech, but of course IBM was in OS/2 marketing mode...meaning that they couldn't find a customer for it, even if it promised to end world hunger, find a cure for cancer/AIDS, or clean up our polluted ecosystem.
I'm not sure about the current incarnation, but at the time there was a demo that included a small sketch-pad frame where you could draw what it was that you were looking for. I drew a vertical rectangle, pointed at the top, and requested a search. It came back with images of picket fences, the Washington monument, and several other similar images that were well-classified and fit with the image I provided. Drawing a half-circle with the diameter line at the bottom yielded sunrise/sunset scenes. All in all, it seemed to have a lot of potential.
There are other extenders, as well: the sound extenders (sounds like...), text extenders (extended fuzzy searching, above and beyond SQL 'like' queries), and video extenders, the last of which is an extension of the image extender: key frames are generated of the video stream, which are points of transition in the video content. From there, you do an image search for a particular key frame, resulting in the video segment(s) of interest.
I would've really liked to have seen this hit mainstream, but in typical IBM fashion, I don't think they perceived that much of a demand for it. You suppose the fact that no one knew it was there might have had something to do with that?
Or how about taking electromagnetic torque into account, from such exotic, highly electromagnetically charged, spinning interstellar plasma sources like...oh...I dunno...stars, for example...
Might consider a review of plasma cosmology, which attempts to cover the observed behaviors of stellar and galactic phenomena without resorting to Big Bang theories or the presence of dark matter at all...
Greetings: I've read a couple of reviews and checked out the jacket for "I'm Working on That", but haven't bought the book yet...will surely do so soon.
My question is: since writing the book, have you given much thought to what things, originally thought of in Star Trek, you would like to see in everyday society? What's your number-one 'to do/build'?
I've been able to set up my Win2K desktop at work to log in to our AIX servers, via AIX's display manager. Seems to work great. Couple of spots where refresh seems to slow down, but overall (considering it's a free product), I'm much happier with it than Hummingbird/eXceed.
One question, though: there are a number of font errors that I've received, apparently in conjunction with AIX's CDE font support. Anyone know where to obtain missing CDE fonts for Win2K and how to correctly configure their use (XFree86 XFS)?
Being in an 'force reduction' imposed by a previous software engineering company, with non-compete clause thrown into the separation agreement, I tend to look on the positive side.
So I don't get to work in CRM for a year. Okay. There's always financials, real estate, bond trading, etc...server software engineering always finds a market...
Now, if I were an OS designer, that would be a very different story...
There's also MetEdit, which lets you create your own CASE definitions. Has support for E-R and UML diagramming out of the box, as well as multi-platform (Linux) support.
Oh, please. Open Source wasn't intended to be a get-rich scheme. If you're in the software industry, you should know that the money's not in the code, it's in the services.
If you're relying (aka 'betting the bank') on being the first on the block to provide feature 'x' through software, you can bet your retirement portfolio that you will face immediate competition from another company or four that are able to provide features 'x', 'y', and 'z' better, faster, and cheaper.
Where you will make bank is on keeping your customers happy: having a responsive and proficient support staff, site services, and whatever else your customers might need to successfully use your products. How do you think IBM stays in business? Operating system sales? Hah!
Open Source's advantage in this regard is that the box is open: if you have the expertise to improve the product, you have the opportunity to do so.
Don't mix licensing issues in with the availability of products. And stop confusing product-based with service-based companies like S.u.S.E., RedHat, and other 'value-added' (God, I hate that phrase) Linux distro providers.
*US* positions, not *UK* positions (which was where your link was directed). We also have positions listed, even though we've just been bought by another company. Incidentally, the Oakland branch has job postings listed, as well.
Layoffs and buyouts are generally kept very quiet, even (or especially) within the organization itself...it's a practice that tends (tries) to keep from disrupting morale. Situation normal, and all...
"...made widely available at low/no cost the tools to stitch all this stuff together as easily and transparently as Microsoft does."
As WHO?!? Who's paying your MSDN subscription for you? How about your DevStudio subscription? BackOffice SDK subscription?
I'm sorry but I have to flat out disagree with that statement: I have yet to see a Microsoft development tool or technology that didn't involve deep pockets and restrictive licensing.
And then there's the various Java IDE products...pick a winner and run with it. The biggest liability I see in that market is that good client application development tools don't make for good server application development tools and vice-versa.
I do agree with your assessment that Java's failing on the client side, though, and if Microsoft plans to focus on data- rather than API-delivery as the route to.NET nirvana, I think the Java contingent really needs to get its act together and provide some meaningful competition...or claim no contest and get out of the pool. alphaWorks and java.apache.org notwithstanding, widgets != useful applications.
Sorry, but we've done some quite healthy EJB development that's accessible via servlets, COM clients, and XML front-ends. If you do it right, it doesn't matter what language or platform you use, it just works...to the tune of brisk coinage.
As far as using Java to write monolithic applications, that's just the wrong model. I suspect that quite a few of these monolithic development (dot-com) organizations wound up feeling the 'Big Crunch' last April.
These would be the thumbnails that originally made an appearance in the OS/2 Warp Multimedia Extensions, right? You know, Image Folder, Audio Folder, etc.:-)
Sorry, couldn't resist. You're absolutely right, though: Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, and a slew of others will hopefully, stomp this embarrassment into the dust.
I don't see how this is sufficiently different from what IBM delivered quite a number of years ago as DB2 Image Extenders.
Essentially, they're a means of querying a database (potentially, distributed among a plurality of sites in the case of parallel DB's) for image content, presenting the results as thumbnails and permitting links back to the original images. They also provided the capability to query by drawing/doodle and by color distribution in the image.
Be sure to send e-Bay feedback about any other prior art that would definitely turn their application into an organizational embarrassment. Stuff like Oracle interMedia or any given imaging product library from Xerox PARC.
It's only fair, I should think...I mean, they probably have no clue how open they are to a world-class stomping by the largest organizations in the industry...
Depends on what part you're talking about. I'm running it under Linux, and I definitely have some issues.
Import utility is definitely not finished: you get a choice of importing from Text or Eudora (how about Netscape? Anyone?).
I'm also unable to access 'certified' SSL sites with any kind of consistency. One case in point is our company's web-mail site (Exchange-based).
Browsing experience is quite brisk, compared to previous versions of Netscape, and it seems to interact well with banner-blocking proxies like Guidescope.
News reader is decent, but I've noticed some image corruption between the browser and reader on an intermittent basis.
Overall, it looks better and responds more quickly than previous incarnations of Netscape, but it still has a few warts that preclude it from being pronounced 'finished'...hence the '0.6' designation.
I received a reply from Kimberly Taylor at CRC Press, in response to mail criticizing the lawsuit against Wolfram & Weisstein. The response included reference to the decision of the court (Acrobat document) regarding the nature of the lawsuit, and why CRC is choosing to pursue it. In short, the decision of the court is to permit CRC to continue the suit against Wolfram, on the basis of copyright infringement once the MathWorld site was transferred from the original site to the WRI MathWorld site. They're also suing Weisstein for breach of contract.
IBM even had the decency to make the first page of the survey a fill-in. Put what you want in, instead of picking the least of the multi-choice evils...
I work for a company that builds products which use AI technologies to assist web and e-mail customers in getting around a company's web site. Rather than use standard pattern-matching and vocabulary databases, we use natural language processing components to determine the intent (or intents) of a message, then use the intent(s) to select a case in a case base.
Definitely have the online manuals available in a portable (HTML/PDF) format. Now that Adobe's released a Java PDF viewer, you can even view on PDAs (I'm using a Clio for now, until DayTrippers hit the streets...).
As pointed out in other responses, O'Reilly, IBM (ref. VAJava and DB2) and other organizations have bundled compact search tools for their online documentation as part of their online documents. YMMV, of course, but at least they're available...
The paper manuals need to be accessible, but optional. Have them be a separate order, don't charge for them, and have much fewer units in stock. Only ship as many as you get responses for. Save trees. Onward the green revolution!:-)
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I was a DB2 beta tester in a previous life. The product that you're referring to is the DB2 Image Extender, and I was fortunate enough to be able to try it out as part of their beta program. Seemed to be really cool tech, but of course IBM was in OS/2 marketing mode...meaning that they couldn't find a customer for it, even if it promised to end world hunger, find a cure for cancer/AIDS, or clean up our polluted ecosystem.
I'm not sure about the current incarnation, but at the time there was a demo that included a small sketch-pad frame where you could draw what it was that you were looking for. I drew a vertical rectangle, pointed at the top, and requested a search. It came back with images of picket fences, the Washington monument, and several other similar images that were well-classified and fit with the image I provided. Drawing a half-circle with the diameter line at the bottom yielded sunrise/sunset scenes. All in all, it seemed to have a lot of potential.
There are other extenders, as well: the sound extenders (sounds like...), text extenders (extended fuzzy searching, above and beyond SQL 'like' queries), and video extenders, the last of which is an extension of the image extender: key frames are generated of the video stream, which are points of transition in the video content. From there, you do an image search for a particular key frame, resulting in the video segment(s) of interest.
I would've really liked to have seen this hit mainstream, but in typical IBM fashion, I don't think they perceived that much of a demand for it. You suppose the fact that no one knew it was there might have had something to do with that?
Or how about taking electromagnetic torque into account, from such exotic, highly electromagnetically charged, spinning interstellar plasma sources like...oh...I dunno...stars, for example...
Might consider a review of plasma cosmology, which attempts to cover the observed behaviors of stellar and galactic phenomena without resorting to Big Bang theories or the presence of dark matter at all...
My question is: since writing the book, have you given much thought to what things, originally thought of in Star Trek, you would like to see in everyday society? What's your number-one 'to do/build'?
So, you've got to burn your hands on the keyboard to use the thing? It's only radiating a little while it's churning bits...
Big clue: docking station would definitely be a worthwhile accessory...
I've been able to set up my Win2K desktop at work to log in to our AIX servers, via AIX's display manager. Seems to work great. Couple of spots where refresh seems to slow down, but overall (considering it's a free product), I'm much happier with it than Hummingbird/eXceed.
One question, though: there are a number of font errors that I've received, apparently in conjunction with AIX's CDE font support. Anyone know where to obtain missing CDE fonts for Win2K and how to correctly configure their use (XFree86 XFS)?
So I don't get to work in CRM for a year. Okay. There's always financials, real estate, bond trading, etc...server software engineering always finds a market...
Now, if I were an OS designer, that would be a very different story...
There's also MetEdit, which lets you create your own CASE definitions. Has support for E-R and UML diagramming out of the box, as well as multi-platform (Linux) support.
If you're relying (aka 'betting the bank') on being the first on the block to provide feature 'x' through software, you can bet your retirement portfolio that you will face immediate competition from another company or four that are able to provide features 'x', 'y', and 'z' better, faster, and cheaper.
Where you will make bank is on keeping your customers happy: having a responsive and proficient support staff, site services, and whatever else your customers might need to successfully use your products. How do you think IBM stays in business? Operating system sales? Hah!
Open Source's advantage in this regard is that the box is open: if you have the expertise to improve the product, you have the opportunity to do so.
Don't mix licensing issues in with the availability of products. And stop confusing product-based with service-based companies like S.u.S.E., RedHat, and other 'value-added' (God, I hate that phrase) Linux distro providers.
Layoffs and buyouts are generally kept very quiet, even (or especially) within the organization itself...it's a practice that tends (tries) to keep from disrupting morale. Situation normal, and all...
GEV, for 'Ground-Effect Vehicle'...
As WHO?!? Who's paying your MSDN subscription for you? How about your DevStudio subscription? BackOffice SDK subscription?
I'm sorry but I have to flat out disagree with that statement: I have yet to see a Microsoft development tool or technology that didn't involve deep pockets and restrictive licensing.
And then there's the various Java IDE products...pick a winner and run with it. The biggest liability I see in that market is that good client application development tools don't make for good server application development tools and vice-versa.
I do agree with your assessment that Java's failing on the client side, though, and if Microsoft plans to focus on data- rather than API-delivery as the route to .NET nirvana, I think the Java contingent really needs to get its act together and provide some meaningful competition...or claim no contest and get out of the pool. alphaWorks and java.apache.org notwithstanding, widgets != useful applications.
Sorry, but we've done some quite healthy EJB development that's accessible via servlets, COM clients, and XML front-ends. If you do it right, it doesn't matter what language or platform you use, it just works...to the tune of brisk coinage.
As far as using Java to write monolithic applications, that's just the wrong model. I suspect that quite a few of these monolithic development (dot-com) organizations wound up feeling the 'Big Crunch' last April.
Sorry, couldn't resist. You're absolutely right, though: Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, and a slew of others will hopefully, stomp this embarrassment into the dust.
Essentially, they're a means of querying a database (potentially, distributed among a plurality of sites in the case of parallel DB's) for image content, presenting the results as thumbnails and permitting links back to the original images. They also provided the capability to query by drawing/doodle and by color distribution in the image.
Be sure to send e-Bay feedback about any other prior art that would definitely turn their application into an organizational embarrassment. Stuff like Oracle interMedia or any given imaging product library from Xerox PARC.
It's only fair, I should think...I mean, they probably have no clue how open they are to a world-class stomping by the largest organizations in the industry...
Import utility is definitely not finished: you get a choice of importing from Text or Eudora (how about Netscape? Anyone?).
I'm also unable to access 'certified' SSL sites with any kind of consistency. One case in point is our company's web-mail site (Exchange-based).
Browsing experience is quite brisk, compared to previous versions of Netscape, and it seems to interact well with banner-blocking proxies like Guidescope.
News reader is decent, but I've noticed some image corruption between the browser and reader on an intermittent basis.
Overall, it looks better and responds more quickly than previous incarnations of Netscape, but it still has a few warts that preclude it from being pronounced 'finished'...hence the '0.6' designation.
I'm using a 3D Blaster (nVidia GeForce 2Mx, 32MB DDR) with XFree86 4.0.2. Works great, uses generic NVIDIA card support.
I received a reply from Kimberly Taylor at CRC Press, in response to mail criticizing the lawsuit against Wolfram & Weisstein. The response included reference to the decision of the court (Acrobat document) regarding the nature of the lawsuit, and why CRC is choosing to pursue it. In short, the decision of the court is to permit CRC to continue the suit against Wolfram, on the basis of copyright infringement once the MathWorld site was transferred from the original site to the WRI MathWorld site. They're also suing Weisstein for breach of contract.
IBM even had the decency to make the first page of the survey a fill-in. Put what you want in, instead of picking the least of the multi-choice evils...
I work for a company that builds products which use AI technologies to assist web and e-mail customers in getting around a company's web site. Rather than use standard pattern-matching and vocabulary databases, we use natural language processing components to determine the intent (or intents) of a message, then use the intent(s) to select a case in a case base.
Definitely have the online manuals available in a portable (HTML/PDF) format. Now that Adobe's released a Java PDF viewer, you can even view on PDAs (I'm using a Clio for now, until DayTrippers hit the streets...).
As pointed out in other responses, O'Reilly, IBM (ref. VAJava and DB2) and other organizations have bundled compact search tools for their online documentation as part of their online documents. YMMV, of course, but at least they're available...
The paper manuals need to be accessible, but optional. Have them be a separate order, don't charge for them, and have much fewer units in stock. Only ship as many as you get responses for. Save trees. Onward the green revolution! :-)
char('H') + 1 = 'I'; char('A') + 1 = 'B'; char('L') + 1 = 'M'; ...Rot-1, anyone?