TechBait

I agree with Google that the outlook for Android is VERY good since they are doing with mobile phones what Microsoft did with PC operating systems.  It’s funny that Microsoft was there first and failed horribly at the PDA/mobile phone OS market.  Android is one OS that is running on the devices from multiple manufacturers, and in time there will be so many more Android devices than iPhones.  It’s just the Law of Averages at work.  The article mentions that Microsoft is entering the fray by attacking HTC over patent violations, but another story states that HTC cut a deal with Microsoft, which would mean Microsoft sticking it to Apple by giving HTC a pass of sorts through a royalty agreement.  The software business is once again looking like a soap opera script.  It’s fun though.  :)

HTC is licensing Microsoft patents as they are facing patent lawsuits and possible injunctions by Apple, who wants the HTC phones banned from the US market.  Sorry, but IMO this is just another illustration how these micro patented features are just a bad idea.  It hobbles creative freedom and results in less choice for consumers.  If Apple’s iPhone is so great, then let it compete for the hearts and mind of consumers based on the whole Apple aura that surrounds it, rather than Apple using these patented features to force HTC to stop selling what seems like great phones in the US market.  This is just Apple afraid of Android, IMO.

The article also proposes a fun conspiracy angle claiming that maybe Microsoft is “throwing HTC a life preserver” in it’s pending battle with Apple.  i.e. Microsoft sticking it to Apple.  That is funny, and very possible.

I guess that you never know, but I think that i4i is going after Microsoft because they are a deep pockets company, and frankly if I had a patent that I thought was being unfairly taken advantage of by a behemoth like Microsoft then I might sue as well.  Maybe the company founder(s) want to lure Microsoft into a lucrative acquisition deal and spend the rest of their days checking email via satellite wireless from some private island somewhere?   It would be a shame if they went after OpenOffice, especially since OpenOffice has a small market share and couldn’t possibly be threatening this i4i’s business.  I wonder how valid their patent claim really is?  There is not a great track record of for profit software companies suing open source software providers.  I recall the famous SCO vs Linux debacle.   Anyone even hear of SCO lately?

There are reports that Google is spending over $100. million to open source a video codec by ON2 in order to leapfrog a web video standards impasse.  As it stands today, much of the web’s video is encoded in proprietary formats like Adobe Flash, for example YouTube’s .flv video files, and that various browsers are set to use the Ogg Theora codecs while Apple refuses to use it due to an “uncertain patent landscape”.    Netscape accuses Google of sabotaging the standard because they use the Adobe formats for YouTube, etc.  Lots of infighting.  If you want to play the videos you need a third party proprietary plugin like Adobe Flash.  While this is free for the end user of an approved Operating System, it is very hard for device and software makers to create software and products around this without facing potentially huge licensing/royalty or lawsuit issues.  Having an open source alternative that is backed by such a standards setting monster like Google would take a huge step towards making this problem go away.

Ogg Theora is actually based upon an earlier open sourced version of the On2 codec, but it’s performance can’t match the newer versions or the non open sourced competitors.  The Register article explains the whole situation very well.  I’m linking to it in order to comment on it.  Google has become this 8000 lb gorilla on many technology fronts.  They wield enormous power due to their sheer size and domination of the Internet search and advertising markets.  One little change in their search algorithm or standard can shut down many people’s profitable Internet properties overnight, with no recourse.  They have become evil, ironic for a company who’s motto is or was, “Do No Evil.”

So, if they open source this video codec and make web video seemless and ubiquitous without the worries of patent issues, they would take a small step away from being evil.

Windows 7 is going to be the first Windows OS to treat the GPU more as an equal to the CPU, according to Nvidia product manager Chris Daniel.  He also says that with Windows 7, Microsoft is “really opening up the immense parallel computing horsepower of the GPU natively right in the operating system.”

This is obviously great news for graphics ungry users like engineers and digital artists.  We already know that this will be great for gamers.

Windows 7 introduces a new API called DirectX Compute, which enables the system to fully use the parallel processing in modern graphics cards from Nvidia, ATI, and others.

In ye olden days of PC lore, when computer processors didn’t include the math coprocessor for cost purposes, anything requiring floating point math calculation took FOREVER to complete.  I know this because I had an old Packard Bell 486SX laptop with the old CPU which did not have the coprocessor built in.  A 486DX would have had the floating point instructions built into the main CPU.

I had a 3D architectural program that would let you build houses and rooms in 2D, then it would render them in 3D for a walkthrough.  The 3D rendering required floating point math, and it took a long time to render on the non floating point CPU.  This old laptop did, however, have a spot for a math coprocessor.  I purchased and installed it, and the 3D rendering phase of that program took off.   Not long after that, math coprocessing instructions were built into the main CPU as a standard feature.  This was before the days of these 3D graphics cards with their unreal floating point performance.  These cards’ instructions are utilized by many games’ routines which are specifically built for accessing these features.  In DOS and some older Windows versions like Windows 95, the games (like DOOM) would basically create their own operating environment which the OS would shell out to, in order to have access to 32 bit and graphics functions.  Later on, Microsoft introduced the DirectX API for direct access to the graphics features via the OS itself.  Now it seems that they are taking it one step further.  I am not totally clear on how the games, which are essentially Windows apps, could access the graphics features via regular DirectX, but regular apps require this new API?  I probably am missing a step somewhere in there.   I’m sure that there are new GPU features that they allow access to, or improve the access.  Maybe this new API merely makes it easier to access for regular (non games) applications programmers.  I really do not know at this time.  I have not studied the API.

Chris Daniel further claims that Directx Compute will “enable use of advanced technologies like SLI-based, multi-GPU gaming, 3D Vision, and PhysX real-time physics.”  So, this will bring parallel computing to the masses.

Well, that’s great news for graphics hungry Windows users who have top shelf graphics hardware.  I guess that that $6000 Alienware gaming laptop is again calling my name.

According to many articles, including this one, Apple tried to have Microsoft stop running ads touting how expensive it is to buy an Apple notebook.  The ads showed a frustrating shopping trip of a twenty something who wanted a laptop for under $1000.  She was frustrated at the Apple Store, and ended up buying an HP Pavilion running Windows for $699 at a local electronics store.  Well, I have to back that up.  Apple’s products are expensive.  Now, many Apple fans will say that there are good reasons for that, and there are.  This doesn’t alter the fact that the average consumer sees things in dollars and cents, pounds and pence, euros and whatever.  I really can’t believe the nerve of Apple, though.  After running those commercials where the pudgy facsimile of Bill Gates, representing the PC, was constantly bested by that pretty boy who was in Galaxy Quest, they had the gall to complain about Microsoft running ads that were ACCURATE vis a vie pricing?  Give me a break, Apple!  Apple should be touting WHY their machines are priced higher.  You know, their OS is tailor made for the hardware and that there are less driver issues and incompatibilities because they have a closed system and control all that stuff.  If Apple freed up the hardware and just marketed the OS, then Macs would be on the shelves for PC prices, but Apple is not MS and would never be viable enough without their hardware business.  It is a slightly different business model.  It has worked for them and I do not begrudge them this.  I do begrudge them crying “No fair!” to what amounted to accurate Microsoft advertising.

Apple, you are better than that.

Microsoft’s COO, Kevin Turner, is claiming that Microsoft is going to open a chain of retail stores right next to Apple stores in the Fall.   Turner also claims that Microsoft has hired a retail team to implement the plan.

Wow.  I smell a big flop coming.  Why does Microsoft need it’s own retail stores?  I can understand the sporting spirit in taking on Apple (as if they didn’t already have their hands full of Google and the Chrome OS and browser, not to mention search, and advertising, and…), but all I foresee in these stores is overpriced Windows and XBOX stuff.  It will be fun though, and I welcome this move by Microsoft because you know, they keep this industry entertaining.  I also endorse vigorous competition between technology behemoths.  The consumer usually wins when they duke it out like this.  I just hope that the stockholders don’t get left holding the bag.

The Internet online version of the Office 2010 apps will be available at no cost ala Google Docs.  Windows Live account users, Microsoft hosted Office Web apps, and customer hosted Office Web apps for Microsoft Software Assurance enterprise customers will all be free.  SMBs who decide on Office 2010 web apps instead of purchasing regular packaged (non online) Microsoft Office will have to pay  Estimate is perhaps a $50 price. We don’t know the price but like I said that is a guesstimate.

Office 2010 web apps will be a bit stripped down as compared to their full software versions, but they will be useful for many.  Let’s face it, honestly, how many of the features of full blown MS Office to you actually use?  I thought so.  One great feature of the Office web apps is their integration with SharePoint 2010, providing it with a full backend data store to organize and access Office files, and a SharePoint portal to boot!  Office web apps give SharePoint a clear edge when compared to many other competing Wiki solutions which rely on basic forms submittal and lacking in the rich applications interface.

Microsoft is offering a robust set of installed apps with web versions, SharePoint integration, a free Windows Live version.  Customers can even shoode a Microsoft hosted option or choose to host it internally themselves. Google’s office apps can only be hosted with Google, and they do not offer a SharePoint equivalent.  Microsoft’s web office will work under Firefox and Safari, in addition to IE, but NOT Google’s Chrome. (unsupported)

This is heating up to be an all out multi front war betweeen Microsoft and Google.

I like this!

This week there was news that Google is coming out with a Linux based operating system to challenge Windows on certain devices, like low cost netbooks.  This is a good thing.  Linux itself could never pose much of a challenge to Microsoft because the various Linux distributions were way too small and lacked the money and resources to pour into things like device driver development, device support, or even partnerships which would bring so called “killer apps” to Linux.  Linux was more successful on the server side since it is a fabulous server operating system.  Windows Server has gotten better over the years, and it is a much more robust platform than it once was.  It is also very easy to administer.  Linux is more powerful and just more of a multiuser operating system.

Back to the desktop.  As an IT guy and UNIX devotee, I tried Linux as my desktop for several years.  It was good fun, but I grew frustrated with the lack of things like video codecs and device driver support.  I eventually went back to Windows as my desktop OS as windows became more stable.   To go off on a minor tangent, Windows NT 3.51 was very robust.  Then to make it better for gaming and to succeed Windows 9x on the desktop, they took devices like graphics and moved them to Ring zero of the kernel, thus making the whole thing more crash prone.  They also were careless with their service pack updates.  The infamous Windows NT 4 Service Pack 2 broke many systems so bad that you couldn’t log in, and in many cases cause the more infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD).  I swore off Windows for several years after that.  I worked in a software company where we got all of the Microsoft OS’s in prerelease versions, and could see it improving after Microsoft was forced into some internal reorganizations when Bill Gates had to eat crow too many times in public due to Windows crashes and all of the bad PR they were getting.  It slowly came back.  They started testing service packs more, having limited releases to certain customers and external testers before releasing them out for general consumption.  Windows XP was very good.  I like Vista, but many people still feel that Windows XP is just a better workstation/desktop OS.  Windows 7 is supposed to fix Vista’s perceived flaws.

So, here comes Google.  Google is taking the rock solid and fast Linux OS and combining it with their own technology.  Will it unseat Windows?  I’m sure that many Microsoft execs are not sleeping well at night these days.  Google owns the Internet, and they are now poised to make great strides on the desktop.  They have the deep pockets to augment Linux and fix it’s desktop flaws, as well as make it “sexy” enough for mass consumption.  They have to be careful though since if they mess up, it will damage their brand.

I am impressed with the Google web browser, Chrome.  It is light weight and nice for quick browsing.  I am interested in the form that this Google-Linux will take.  I can hardly wait to load it on an old PC and take it for a test run.  That being said, Google has proven that it can be very evil in the realm of search engine based Internet domination.  They have the power to ruin Internet based business overnight, on a whim.  Since they are the biggest web search player, and Internet traffic is king to many online ventures, a simple change up in their search algorithms can literally ruin many people’s hard work in an instant, if they, say, vanish from hard won search rankings.  Their constantly changing Adwords keyword charges and page rankings have also become somewhat burdensome.  They defend this by saying that they are only looking out for the web surfers and minimizing SPAM, but this is not always the case.  They are so huge, and frankly I don’t like any one player being too huge.

So, I am glad that Google is challenging Microsoft, which will make Windows better and keep Microsoft honest, and I am equally glad that Microsoft has introduced their Bing search engine to at least try to challenge Google.  I do think that Google is far more of a threat to Windows dominance than Bing is to the Google search engine.

Only time will tell how all of this will play out, but you never know.  When Google was new you could have never convinced me that they would be what they are today.  You never know who is thinking up the next big thing in their garage startup company.