I'm waiting for the Xserve Cluster (Beowulf?)edition - it comes with a special connector to tie the Xserve to the one above or below it with multi-gigabit fiber. You'll be able to purchase a "rack spanner" for an extra $50.
This would be the first step in creating a Cluster Computer - imagine a web server made of 42 Xserves, sharing traffic, distributing updates between each other with Rendevous, capable of dealing with down or failed servers, automatically re-distributing traffic to servers with more resources...
The difference with Apple and consoles is huge. Consoles have huge cash reserves from previous successes. Also, the money they lose in selling boxes is quickly recouped in the income from license fees on titles. Apple doesn't get $10 when you buy Photoshop.
Additionally, if you start selling at lower prices, get a bigger market share while making a loss (or a very slim profit) and then raise prices when you have market share, you become everything that Wal*Mart is.
For my last point, you should also take note that Apple's hardware sales support not only production, but the OS and all the iApps you could ever hope for. Think about where the $1,799 goes for the 15" flat panel iMac with SuperDrive:
15" LCD screen 800 Mhz G4 60 gig HD GeForce 2 Ethernet, modem DVD-R (RW, though not well advertised) Mac OS X AppleWorks iMovie iDVD iPhoto iTunes iCal iSync Sherlock Mail Plenty More...
All the bits Apple's been putting into the OS would go wuite nicely into a tablet or PDA. I think a "sub-tablet" would be good.
Bluetooth - sync Address Book, iCal, etc. or use your Bluetooth enabled cellphone to connect to the internet.
802.11 - Communicate with devices that have removable media and access the internet.
iSync - easily update your tablet/PDA to your mac..Mac - online storage/addresses/calendar for a web-enabled PDA/tablet with limited internal storage.
Inkwell - why the hell else would they put handwriting recognition on desktops? So grpahic designers don't have to switch away from the tablet when they take down project details? Right.
Quartz Extreme - this makes desktops faster but also frees up processing power on portables, making them zippier.
Sherlock 3 - a simple interface for all sorts of web-based information is a great addition to the desktop, but think how convenient it is to have stocks, movies, flight info, phone numbers, eBay, a dictionary and translation services in a single application that requires very little typing
QuickTime 6 - support for MPEG-4; perfect for moderate-to-low bandwidth video applications.
Universal Access - All sorts of access functions for disabled individuals translate well to tablets... Modifier key lock is a great example.
All right, I'll stop. I'm not saying that we will see a tablet or PDA tomorrow, but the Magic 8-ball says: Outlook Promising.
If (big if, sadly) I get one of these cards, I'll probably cap the framerate in games that support it and play with everything as cranked as it'll handle. It seems better to me to have 60 FPS with incredible detail than just 200 FPS.
My monitor refreshes at 72Hz. What am I getting out of 100+ FPS? Sure, the raw power is impressive, but we dont use it.
While HFS has a number of drawbacks, it seems better to change or replace the FS instead of abstract its failures.
We still have to deal with file systems on some level. What happens to your abstracted layer when you want to copy something to a disk or burn a CD? You can't perform a file copy without breaking the abstraction, so the abstraction is broken before you begin to use it.
When you insert a Drivers CD in Windows, it may auto-run, sheilding you from the (often arcane) filing of the drivers. But unless there is an agreed format for the meta-data, your computer may not understand what is on the disc.
The system he proposes also breaks down on anything that is not new and made by the user. Document storage. Do we then only abstract the Documents folder?
While document management is a good idea, it needs to be subtle. It may take a user some time to learn the system, but that is better than crippling it to ensure first-time user ease. Macs used to come with several Tutorials on how to use the mouse and interact with the OS. We will probably need tutorials of that type again, soon.
Document management needs to spend very little time taking the user away from work. It must be integrated with the file system to work adequately, or the "switching" people will have to do to move from managed to unmanaged filing will aggravate and confuse them.
IEEE 1394 is a standard, with no licensing fees. The license was for the FireWire name, which Apple now lets anyone use for their IEEE 1394 product. This is why there are i.Link devices - Sony didn't wanted a brand for it and didn't like the fees on FireWire (at the time).
As for chipsets, they aren't as available as USB, but there are a few of them out there. All of Shuttle's XPC line incldues FireWire. Almost everything Sony makes; nVidia's nForce chipsets support it. Two of the three South Bridges Sis offers have it. I can't say about AMD or Intel, as AMD's site is worthless and, strangely, I can't get intel.com to load.
It's really too bad that so much effort was put into USB 2.0 when FireWire was available.
They have virtually identical practical transfer rates, so the additional capabilities of USB 2.0 go to waste - unless, I suppose, you find yourself doing huge amounts of simultaneous data transfer to multiple USB 2.0 devices on the same bus.
FireWire also sports two great benefits: more power (requires the 6-pin verion that is sadly not found on many smaller devices and x86 laptops) and no host-specific controller. People talk about putting Linux on a PDA and using USB to control devices from it, but until USB On-the-Go becomes pervasive, this cannot be a reality. On the other hand, Any FireWire device can communicate with any other.
FireWire is a more flexible standard, and with planned upgrades to 800 Mbps and higher, there's no shortage to it's possibilities.
If someone would just make a drive that doesn't use an IDE/FireWire bridge but actually has an on-drive FireWire interface, the benefits could be substantial.
I think in addition to the side effects, perhaps there should be percentages of those affected. This could be a bad thing, but it would also give doctors a tool against patients who say things like "See, it says rare cases of bleeding eye sockets, and after inspecting my eyes for nine hours yesterday, they started bleeding!"
There shouldn't be any problems as long as the system remains anonymous - hell, they may even be able to inform the police which areas and times have the highest incidence of speeding to improve their ability to ticket people - nothing a radar gun sitting on the side of the road can't do...
At any rate, I would keep an eye on the anonymity of the whole thing - I wouldn't want a ticket showing up form my highway driving.
You could start a series of desks with a round cut-out on it to comfortably place the PC in, taking away the need for the stand.
Though it's a completely worthless addition, it would be better to me if it glowed lightly. Perhaps a series of sub-surface indicator lights (like panels that are dark and completely indecipherable until the light behind them comes on) would be a good addition.
I don't think it would work well with a traditional interface, but you could use a laptop system, put a battery inside with only a few plugs (power and an external port bar, maybe) and put LCD screens on the outside - it would have to be relatively light still.
You know, it's somewhat sad to think of right now, but we will probably see cell phones with nVidia chipsets rivaling our currently mid/high range graphics cards in the next five years.
Hopefully not too soon, mind you, but as we integrate more functions into a cell phone, we will probably find a few of them used as a video-conferencing device (use your headset and set/hold the phone in front of you) as well as representational 3D models of urban areas for the ultra-expensive GPS navigation systems.
PDA's will get there sooner, and PocketPC computers should be there any time now (all that advanced business modeling...) - wouldn't it be interesting to be an architect oe engineer and take fully editable designs with you in your pocket?
What we need now is to establish a pay-service for downloading games for eMAME so bored phone owners can peruse a selection of games, buy one, download it and use it immediately.
You are right. There's no useful purpose for TLDs. Even though you could use them to easily distinguish your business between a kids site, a movie, and a store, they really have no practical point.
We could abolish all TLDs! That way we wouldn't have to remember if it was w3.org or w3.com; we could just go to "w3"
But lets go a step further. Domains are just a way to concentrate power in the hands of a few people (corporate boards get many of them - a person here or there can buy a domain for $35 and sell it for $100,000) so we should get rid of them.
Of course, then it becomes hard to go anywhere, if you keep the same browsing methods. Many places might still be vying for the same name.
So how about a system where everyone who wants can sign up for a "site" under a particular name. So when you type the name in, it brings up a list of results that match the search you entered, with the most popular results being first.
Or...
How about to don't complain about TLDs being worthless and instead come up with a plan to replace ICANN?
Broadband isn't making money because the bandwidth to support high-speed connections is expensive.
I think it's a little of both. If they light up the fiber, they can make more money on it for a short while, but as bandwidth is more available, the prices most likely would go down. Then they have higher maintenance costs on the same income they had several years before.
As it stands, they can stretch it out for years to come - only lighting fiber as they start hurting for bandwidth - and they can factor out fiber-laying costs from future operations.
Thanks to some over-zealous fiber-laying before the bubble burst, there was plenty of "worthless" fiber, which was scooped up - almost free money.
One of the biggest problems is that the specifications provided to make everything the same are filled with optional components.
There are several different border styles, but only a few work because most are optional. While this provides freedom to the person following the spec, it doesn't provide a consistent experience.
It would be bad for the company reputation. Imagine, your support is so worthless that the few good technicians have to give advice to people while not at work because they can't on the job?
This is essentially what it's saying to the people in charge. Whether it's true or not is what they should be worried about.
It also a liability issue. What if a less-than-stellar tech goes online and starts spewing bad information - then people are angry at your company, and you've done nothing wrong.
As a former Prodigy Internet tech (it was acquired by Bell South...) I recall this was an issue for our call center. Tech support is practically a scripted job and while it attracts a variety of intelligent people, it gets plenty of random ones, too. We had plenty of people who would spin wild tales for people as to why they couldn't connect, and believe them themselves.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm waiting for the Xserve Cluster (Beowulf?)edition - it comes with a special connector to tie the Xserve to the one above or below it with multi-gigabit fiber. You'll be able to purchase a "rack spanner" for an extra $50.
This would be the first step in creating a Cluster Computer - imagine a web server made of 42 Xserves, sharing traffic, distributing updates between each other with Rendevous, capable of dealing with down or failed servers, automatically re-distributing traffic to servers with more resources...
Ok, so I'm crazy. Aren't you?
The difference with Apple and consoles is huge. Consoles have huge cash reserves from previous successes. Also, the money they lose in selling boxes is quickly recouped in the income from license fees on titles. Apple doesn't get $10 when you buy Photoshop.
Additionally, if you start selling at lower prices, get a bigger market share while making a loss (or a very slim profit) and then raise prices when you have market share, you become everything that Wal*Mart is.
For my last point, you should also take note that Apple's hardware sales support not only production, but the OS and all the iApps you could ever hope for. Think about where the $1,799 goes for the 15" flat panel iMac with SuperDrive:
15" LCD screen
800 Mhz G4
60 gig HD
GeForce 2
Ethernet, modem
DVD-R (RW, though not well advertised)
Mac OS X
AppleWorks
iMovie
iDVD
iPhoto
iTunes
iCal
iSync
Sherlock
Mail
Plenty More...
All the bits Apple's been putting into the OS would go wuite nicely into a tablet or PDA. I think a "sub-tablet" would be good.
.Mac - online storage/addresses/calendar for a web-enabled PDA/tablet with limited internal storage.
Bluetooth - sync Address Book, iCal, etc. or use your Bluetooth enabled cellphone to connect to the internet.
802.11 - Communicate with devices that have removable media and access the internet.
iSync - easily update your tablet/PDA to your mac.
Inkwell - why the hell else would they put handwriting recognition on desktops? So grpahic designers don't have to switch away from the tablet when they take down project details? Right.
Quartz Extreme - this makes desktops faster but also frees up processing power on portables, making them zippier.
Sherlock 3 - a simple interface for all sorts of web-based information is a great addition to the desktop, but think how convenient it is to have stocks, movies, flight info, phone numbers, eBay, a dictionary and translation services in a single application that requires very little typing
QuickTime 6 - support for MPEG-4; perfect for moderate-to-low bandwidth video applications.
Universal Access - All sorts of access functions for disabled individuals translate well to tablets... Modifier key lock is a great example.
All right, I'll stop. I'm not saying that we will see a tablet or PDA tomorrow, but the Magic 8-ball says: Outlook Promising.
If (big if, sadly) I get one of these cards, I'll probably cap the framerate in games that support it and play with everything as cranked as it'll handle. It seems better to me to have 60 FPS with incredible detail than just 200 FPS.
My monitor refreshes at 72Hz. What am I getting out of 100+ FPS? Sure, the raw power is impressive, but we dont use it.
While HFS has a number of drawbacks, it seems better to change or replace the FS instead of abstract its failures.
We still have to deal with file systems on some level. What happens to your abstracted layer when you want to copy something to a disk or burn a CD? You can't perform a file copy without breaking the abstraction, so the abstraction is broken before you begin to use it.
When you insert a Drivers CD in Windows, it may auto-run, sheilding you from the (often arcane) filing of the drivers. But unless there is an agreed format for the meta-data, your computer may not understand what is on the disc.
The system he proposes also breaks down on anything that is not new and made by the user. Document storage. Do we then only abstract the Documents folder?
While document management is a good idea, it needs to be subtle. It may take a user some time to learn the system, but that is better than crippling it to ensure first-time user ease. Macs used to come with several Tutorials on how to use the mouse and interact with the OS. We will probably need tutorials of that type again, soon.
Document management needs to spend very little time taking the user away from work. It must be integrated with the file system to work adequately, or the "switching" people will have to do to move from managed to unmanaged filing will aggravate and confuse them.
IEEE 1394 is a standard, with no licensing fees. The license was for the FireWire name, which Apple now lets anyone use for their IEEE 1394 product. This is why there are i.Link devices - Sony didn't wanted a brand for it and didn't like the fees on FireWire (at the time).
As for chipsets, they aren't as available as USB, but there are a few of them out there. All of Shuttle's XPC line incldues FireWire. Almost everything Sony makes; nVidia's nForce chipsets support it. Two of the three South Bridges Sis offers have it. I can't say about AMD or Intel, as AMD's site is worthless and, strangely, I can't get intel.com to load.
No, it's OK. It's at mac.com It's the first step in Apple's color-changing patent
Like trite?
That's the answer Mr. Spock!
damn the scanners and printers should be a link. It goes to CD-RW/DVD-RW drive from Sony.
Sorry for the mixup
It's really too bad that so much effort was put into USB 2.0 when FireWire was available.
They have virtually identical practical transfer rates, so the additional capabilities of USB 2.0 go to waste - unless, I suppose, you find yourself doing huge amounts of simultaneous data transfer to multiple USB 2.0 devices on the same bus.
FireWire also sports two great benefits: more power (requires the 6-pin verion that is sadly not found on many smaller devices and x86 laptops) and no host-specific controller. People talk about putting Linux on a PDA and using USB to control devices from it, but until USB On-the-Go becomes pervasive, this cannot be a reality. On the other hand, Any FireWire device can communicate with any other.
FireWire is a more flexible standard, and with planned upgrades to 800 Mbps and higher, there's no shortage to it's possibilities.
If someone would just make a drive that doesn't use an IDE/FireWire bridge but actually has an on-drive FireWire interface, the benefits could be substantial.
*sigh*
As a note, you can get FireWire hard drives, , scanners, printers, and the Kodak DCS Pro 14n 14 megapixel camera will use FireWire
In fairness, Linux allows you to do something that fwe other current operating systems do: install the newest OS on FRIGGIN OLD hardware.
That's a plus in many people's books.
You become and accomplice to a crime! :)
Any computer they put out with that capability probably won't fair well in warm or hot water, either. ;)
But they don't change color by sampling an area and adjusting the color output of the tree to match?
Granted, a chameleon Christmas tree wouldn't be so exciting.
I think in addition to the side effects, perhaps there should be percentages of those affected. This could be a bad thing, but it would also give doctors a tool against patients who say things like "See, it says rare cases of bleeding eye sockets, and after inspecting my eyes for nine hours yesterday, they started bleeding!"
There shouldn't be any problems as long as the system remains anonymous - hell, they may even be able to inform the police which areas and times have the highest incidence of speeding to improve their ability to ticket people - nothing a radar gun sitting on the side of the road can't do...
At any rate, I would keep an eye on the anonymity of the whole thing - I wouldn't want a ticket showing up form my highway driving.
You could start a series of desks with a round cut-out on it to comfortably place the PC in, taking away the need for the stand.
Though it's a completely worthless addition, it would be better to me if it glowed lightly. Perhaps a series of sub-surface indicator lights (like panels that are dark and completely indecipherable until the light behind them comes on) would be a good addition.
I don't think it would work well with a traditional interface, but you could use a laptop system, put a battery inside with only a few plugs (power and an external port bar, maybe) and put LCD screens on the outside - it would have to be relatively light still.
Anyway, I'm babbling now.
You know, it's somewhat sad to think of right now, but we will probably see cell phones with nVidia chipsets rivaling our currently mid/high range graphics cards in the next five years.
Hopefully not too soon, mind you, but as we integrate more functions into a cell phone, we will probably find a few of them used as a video-conferencing device (use your headset and set/hold the phone in front of you) as well as representational 3D models of urban areas for the ultra-expensive GPS navigation systems.
PDA's will get there sooner, and PocketPC computers should be there any time now (all that advanced business modeling...) - wouldn't it be interesting to be an architect oe engineer and take fully editable designs with you in your pocket?
Maybe I'm just crazy.
What we need now is to establish a pay-service for downloading games for eMAME so bored phone owners can peruse a selection of games, buy one, download it and use it immediately.
What do you think, $0.75 per download?
In this time of technological advancement, we must ask ourselves....
Have we gone too far??
You are right. There's no useful purpose for TLDs. Even though you could use them to easily distinguish your business between a kids site, a movie, and a store, they really have no practical point.
We could abolish all TLDs! That way we wouldn't have to remember if it was w3.org or w3.com; we could just go to "w3"
But lets go a step further. Domains are just a way to concentrate power in the hands of a few people (corporate boards get many of them - a person here or there can buy a domain for $35 and sell it for $100,000) so we should get rid of them.
Of course, then it becomes hard to go anywhere, if you keep the same browsing methods. Many places might still be vying for the same name.
So how about a system where everyone who wants can sign up for a "site" under a particular name. So when you type the name in, it brings up a list of results that match the search you entered, with the most popular results being first.
Or...
How about to don't complain about TLDs being worthless and instead come up with a plan to replace ICANN?
What would be truly nice would be a .hotel (or some other TLD - .room? .board? .lodging? Ah, well)
.hotel domains that wished to be listed.
.movie, .store, .bank, a few hundred others...
you could regsiter with the providor and www.hotel could have a search by location, bringing up all the
This would be a great system for a many domains...
Now we just need to get people to think it's a good idea.
Broadband isn't making money because the bandwidth to support high-speed connections is expensive.
I think it's a little of both. If they light up the fiber, they can make more money on it for a short while, but as bandwidth is more available, the prices most likely would go down. Then they have higher maintenance costs on the same income they had several years before.
As it stands, they can stretch it out for years to come - only lighting fiber as they start hurting for bandwidth - and they can factor out fiber-laying costs from future operations.
Thanks to some over-zealous fiber-laying before the bubble burst, there was plenty of "worthless" fiber, which was scooped up - almost free money.
One of the biggest problems is that the specifications provided to make everything the same are filled with optional components. There are several different border styles, but only a few work because most are optional. While this provides freedom to the person following the spec, it doesn't provide a consistent experience.
It would be bad for the company reputation. Imagine, your support is so worthless that the few good technicians have to give advice to people while not at work because they can't on the job?
This is essentially what it's saying to the people in charge. Whether it's true or not is what they should be worried about.
It also a liability issue. What if a less-than-stellar tech goes online and starts spewing bad information - then people are angry at your company, and you've done nothing wrong.
As a former Prodigy Internet tech (it was acquired by Bell South...) I recall this was an issue for our call center. Tech support is practically a scripted job and while it attracts a variety of intelligent people, it gets plenty of random ones, too. We had plenty of people who would spin wild tales for people as to why they couldn't connect, and believe them themselves.