Once in a while an enterprise class product mutates to become even more efficient at what it delivers. This has been the case with mySQL which has seen quite a few developments in the past few years.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Monday, October 17, 2011
the Oneiric Ocelot is here
It's been a while since I blogged. I have been down with a bout of fever and catching up on my health. After I got back on the WWW, it was nice to hear that the latest version of Ubuntu is now out. It has this weird name - Oneiric Ocelot. I think Canonical is going overboard in trying to be unique in their naming conventions, to the point that not only are they unpronounceable, but they do not register in an average human's mind too. So much for all the marketing research that's been carried out till now.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
an open source photography toolkit
I look curiously at an agenda at a photography workshop in Pune. An hour devoted to the powers of Adobe's software suite for manipulating photographs. Photoshop. Lightroom. And what not. Being the perennial pauper that I am and with my faith in open source, I decide. I need to explore what my open source toolkit needs to be to work with my photographs.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
an open crowd sourced constitution
This is unique. This is amazing. This is Open Constitution.
Truly, by the people, of the people, for the people.
Iceland, after suffering a huge setback in the financial crisis of 2008, embarked on change. A fundamental change was engineered on its constitution. It was rewritten. What is more amazing is the way they decided to go about it. A group of 950 people were randomly selected to brainstorm on what the constitution of Iceland should be. The earlier constitution was inherited from Denmark in 1944.
Truly, by the people, of the people, for the people.
Iceland, after suffering a huge setback in the financial crisis of 2008, embarked on change. A fundamental change was engineered on its constitution. It was rewritten. What is more amazing is the way they decided to go about it. A group of 950 people were randomly selected to brainstorm on what the constitution of Iceland should be. The earlier constitution was inherited from Denmark in 1944.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
20 years of open innovation in linux
20 long years. Of innovating a system so fundamental, it has changed our lives.
For the better. It has powered servers, desktops, mobiles and all sorts of embedded devices.
Happy 20th Birthday Linux!
I do not want to write much. I am so much in awe. In awe of this remarkable history.
Please watch it...whether you are a techno geek or not. And introspect. On how the model of open innovation has changed your life.
For the better. It has powered servers, desktops, mobiles and all sorts of embedded devices.
Happy 20th Birthday Linux!
I do not want to write much. I am so much in awe. In awe of this remarkable history.
Please watch it...whether you are a techno geek or not. And introspect. On how the model of open innovation has changed your life.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
being open about corruption
Open Up! Or, can we really? Are we really that brave? That pure. In our hearts.
Well, some of us are. But, go back in time and recollect if you encountered that moment when -
Corruption is not just about misusing power for personal gains. It's about honesty and integrity.
Is to corrupt more vile than being corrupt? It's the usual chicken-egg problem. Is this problem solvable just by a top-down approach by introducing legislation, or is there something more fundamental that must change?
A change within us.
Can we completely embrace this change.? This revolution. Can we change our own selves?
Well, some of us are. But, go back in time and recollect if you encountered that moment when -
- you wanted to bribe the traffic policeman to not take your vehicle away, or you opted for a lesser payment without receipt
- you purchased a property and the real estate agent took you to the property office and you by passed the line and got your work done in a jiffy
- you hired a passport agent who had his mysterious ways of making things happen in the passport office which left you knowing well why he was charging so high
- you booked 8 hours of time in your office when you actually worked for 7
- you lied to your parents about completing your homework so you could run out to play
Corruption is not just about misusing power for personal gains. It's about honesty and integrity.
Is to corrupt more vile than being corrupt? It's the usual chicken-egg problem. Is this problem solvable just by a top-down approach by introducing legislation, or is there something more fundamental that must change?
A change within us.
Can we completely embrace this change.? This revolution. Can we change our own selves?
Friday, August 12, 2011
opening a galaxy of possibilities
Let me be unabashed about this. I am in love with my Android. And, I have been quite vociferous about it. I have two of my office pals who have joined me. To explore a new world - a world of possibilities. I have been musing over what gains can be had by investing in a tablet, now that I have an Android phone. What is it that a tablet will enable? The recent launch of the Honeycomb based tablet (canvassed for openly in a previous post) from Samsung prompted me to research and introspect on this topic. A bit more seriously.
The tablet has been around for quite a long time. Ancient civilizations in the geographic region of Mesopotamia used a clay tablet to record and catalog data. These tablets were typically arm length in size and had inscriptions that were built of angles and edges. The wedge like nature of this script has led archaeologists to call the clay tablets as cuneiform (from cunei in Latin).
Tablets were used by the Sumerians due to ample supply of clay. This was in contrast to the Egyptian civilization where papyrus was used. Clay tablets continued to be used by the successors - the Babylonians and the Assyrians.
The tablet as a form factor has been in vogue since quite a while!
More important is the fact that these early attempts at writing as a means of communication led to the development of language. With sounds attached to words and symbols. In a recent TED talk, Mark Pagel describes how language has been the discriminator, the crucial factor that allowed humans to develop and nurture technology. Language and by extension any form of communication allows collaborative learning and cooperation. Learning from each others experiences. That is what separates us.
That has been the principal force behind mobile technologies and platforms.
Communication. Collaboration. Cooperation.
Even the history of PC tablets is quite interesting. Not many know that in 1989, Samsung manufactured a tablet for a company named Grid Systems Corporation. The tablet was called Gridpad and was derived from Samsung's Penmaster. It was a novel concept then and introduced us to touch screen interfaces operated by a pen/stylus.
Samsung's tryst with the tablet too has been for quite a while!
The PC tablet evolution subsequently fell into the hands of various companies, including GO, Fujitsu, Microsoft and of course Apple. The new revolution has now begun with Samsung and Google. An important difference between then and now has been the Internet. While there might not be much use for a stand alone tablet beyond cataloging, the possibilities are endless when a tablet is linked with the Internet. It becomes an unsurpassed innovation.
A disruption. Of behaviours. Of interactions. Of our lives.
It becomes the ultimate disruptive innovation.
But wasn't the Netbook supposed to be the great enabler. Well, yes, but the netbook did not provide a different user experience. It became a low end laptop with the same nuances that people wanted to get rid of. Like reading in cramped spaces. Inability to browse the web without a keyboard. Portability. Rather than adding value it took away from users what they were accustomed to with a laptop. This is amply evident in sales figures for Netbooks vs touchscreen devices. In 2010 there was a decline in netbook sales. And it was not small. 40%.
The Netbook is dead. Long live the Tablet.
Fast forward. August 2011. Today. It's a battle of giants. It's a bipolar world again. The philosophies of the approaches are different. One has embodied open innovation. The other continues to innovate within closed doors defying theories of innovation. Is it an aberration? Resting on one man's vision, not sustainable in the long run. Well, only time will tell. For me, I believe that open innovation will succeed. And this is evident at the pace the Android has evolved. From Froyo (Frozen Yoghurt) to Gingerbread to the recent version named Honeycomb.
What happens when two disruptive innovations combine? It becomes a galactic scale super nova.
It becomes a Galaxy Tab.
The recently launched 10.1 which is marketed as the 750 in India is the latest innovation from the Samsung stable. The specifications are very enticing. Enough muscle. Enough grey cells. Enough storage. Enough, actually more than enough to enable you - to collaborate and communicate and innovate.
From hardware and design the slimness of the device is both functionally as well as aesthetically valuable. It is truly a tablet - a tablet the Sumerians would envy. A tablet that would hold their entire library of clay tablets. On one machine. In my opinion, from the portability perspective 500 odd grams and the extreme slimness is a definite win for the user. The primary purpose why I would like to own a tablet is portability. And, I don't want to lug around some heavy fat piece of hardware, do I?
I concur with other opinions in the blogosphere. The design of the Galaxy Tab 750 is an engineering marvel. Like I mentioned before, the tablet's success is deeply tied to the Internet. And, with this model comes a browser with support for flash enabled sites.
From the view of technical specifications, the 750 is powered by a dual core Tegra 2 processor. Well, basically what it translates into is better video and web performance and also enables better multi tasking. I see that the NVIDIA processor will be standard specs for all Android tablets today - as it helps take the user experience to the next level. The network specs are all state of the art - what one would expect from a state-of-the-art device. I still however would have loved to see a few USB slots though.
With 1 GB RAM and multiple ROM sizes, it's quite sufficient to say that you wont be wanting for memory for now. But as the tablet evolves in future this would seem very much frugal. The same that we see now for Laptops which are equipped with 8 GB RAM.
What this tablet provides you additionally is the TouchWiz UX. It is difficult to provide an opinion without experiencing one. But a rather descriptive review I found from the Android Community speaks well of the new interface. The new interface is very important for the Tab and for telling the hyper-loyal Apple community, there are far better alternatives ;-)
The Honeycomb comes with a lot of new features including resizable widgets, USB support, support for pointer devices via Bluetooth! All in all, I think the theme here is better usability. A better end-user experience.
What else do I like? It is difficult to be more particular without having your hands on one :-) There are the Samsung hubs. I particularly dig the thought of integrating all my messaging in a single interface. So the social hub is a big win for me. That is the communication enabler. And with the extensibility provided by the apps functionality would not be impeded. For me watching videos (YouTube, TED), reading ebooks in either epub or pdf format, writing books/articles and video chatting is what I would use it for. And of course the occasional games and last but the most important, get on the WWW.
Devices such as the Samsung Tab 10.1 enable. They have the potential to disrupt the way we have been accustomed to interact with mobile computing. They free us from constraints. And provide us - a galaxy of possibilities.
To doctors, they enable patient review, medical history at their fingertips. To lawyers, they provide easy access to legal information and their cases. To children, it becomes their schoolbag that contains their textbooks and notebooks and their games. To businessmen they enable collaboration and communication. To creative artists they provide a digital canvas. At home the television is personal again. To writers and avid readers a plethora of books...and so on the list goes on.
The possibilities are endless. An impact similar in magnitude to early writing on clay tablets and the development of language. The electronic tablet marks the second revolution.
Next is what?
The tablet has been around for quite a long time. Ancient civilizations in the geographic region of Mesopotamia used a clay tablet to record and catalog data. These tablets were typically arm length in size and had inscriptions that were built of angles and edges. The wedge like nature of this script has led archaeologists to call the clay tablets as cuneiform (from cunei in Latin).
Tablets were used by the Sumerians due to ample supply of clay. This was in contrast to the Egyptian civilization where papyrus was used. Clay tablets continued to be used by the successors - the Babylonians and the Assyrians.
The tablet as a form factor has been in vogue since quite a while!
More important is the fact that these early attempts at writing as a means of communication led to the development of language. With sounds attached to words and symbols. In a recent TED talk, Mark Pagel describes how language has been the discriminator, the crucial factor that allowed humans to develop and nurture technology. Language and by extension any form of communication allows collaborative learning and cooperation. Learning from each others experiences. That is what separates us.
That has been the principal force behind mobile technologies and platforms.
Communication. Collaboration. Cooperation.
Even the history of PC tablets is quite interesting. Not many know that in 1989, Samsung manufactured a tablet for a company named Grid Systems Corporation. The tablet was called Gridpad and was derived from Samsung's Penmaster. It was a novel concept then and introduced us to touch screen interfaces operated by a pen/stylus.
Samsung's tryst with the tablet too has been for quite a while!
The PC tablet evolution subsequently fell into the hands of various companies, including GO, Fujitsu, Microsoft and of course Apple. The new revolution has now begun with Samsung and Google. An important difference between then and now has been the Internet. While there might not be much use for a stand alone tablet beyond cataloging, the possibilities are endless when a tablet is linked with the Internet. It becomes an unsurpassed innovation.
A disruption. Of behaviours. Of interactions. Of our lives.
It becomes the ultimate disruptive innovation.
But wasn't the Netbook supposed to be the great enabler. Well, yes, but the netbook did not provide a different user experience. It became a low end laptop with the same nuances that people wanted to get rid of. Like reading in cramped spaces. Inability to browse the web without a keyboard. Portability. Rather than adding value it took away from users what they were accustomed to with a laptop. This is amply evident in sales figures for Netbooks vs touchscreen devices. In 2010 there was a decline in netbook sales. And it was not small. 40%.
The Netbook is dead. Long live the Tablet.
Fast forward. August 2011. Today. It's a battle of giants. It's a bipolar world again. The philosophies of the approaches are different. One has embodied open innovation. The other continues to innovate within closed doors defying theories of innovation. Is it an aberration? Resting on one man's vision, not sustainable in the long run. Well, only time will tell. For me, I believe that open innovation will succeed. And this is evident at the pace the Android has evolved. From Froyo (Frozen Yoghurt) to Gingerbread to the recent version named Honeycomb.
What happens when two disruptive innovations combine? It becomes a galactic scale super nova.
It becomes a Galaxy Tab.
The recently launched 10.1 which is marketed as the 750 in India is the latest innovation from the Samsung stable. The specifications are very enticing. Enough muscle. Enough grey cells. Enough storage. Enough, actually more than enough to enable you - to collaborate and communicate and innovate.
From hardware and design the slimness of the device is both functionally as well as aesthetically valuable. It is truly a tablet - a tablet the Sumerians would envy. A tablet that would hold their entire library of clay tablets. On one machine. In my opinion, from the portability perspective 500 odd grams and the extreme slimness is a definite win for the user. The primary purpose why I would like to own a tablet is portability. And, I don't want to lug around some heavy fat piece of hardware, do I?
I concur with other opinions in the blogosphere. The design of the Galaxy Tab 750 is an engineering marvel. Like I mentioned before, the tablet's success is deeply tied to the Internet. And, with this model comes a browser with support for flash enabled sites.
From the view of technical specifications, the 750 is powered by a dual core Tegra 2 processor. Well, basically what it translates into is better video and web performance and also enables better multi tasking. I see that the NVIDIA processor will be standard specs for all Android tablets today - as it helps take the user experience to the next level. The network specs are all state of the art - what one would expect from a state-of-the-art device. I still however would have loved to see a few USB slots though.
With 1 GB RAM and multiple ROM sizes, it's quite sufficient to say that you wont be wanting for memory for now. But as the tablet evolves in future this would seem very much frugal. The same that we see now for Laptops which are equipped with 8 GB RAM.
What this tablet provides you additionally is the TouchWiz UX. It is difficult to provide an opinion without experiencing one. But a rather descriptive review I found from the Android Community speaks well of the new interface. The new interface is very important for the Tab and for telling the hyper-loyal Apple community, there are far better alternatives ;-)
The Honeycomb comes with a lot of new features including resizable widgets, USB support, support for pointer devices via Bluetooth! All in all, I think the theme here is better usability. A better end-user experience.
What else do I like? It is difficult to be more particular without having your hands on one :-) There are the Samsung hubs. I particularly dig the thought of integrating all my messaging in a single interface. So the social hub is a big win for me. That is the communication enabler. And with the extensibility provided by the apps functionality would not be impeded. For me watching videos (YouTube, TED), reading ebooks in either epub or pdf format, writing books/articles and video chatting is what I would use it for. And of course the occasional games and last but the most important, get on the WWW.
Devices such as the Samsung Tab 10.1 enable. They have the potential to disrupt the way we have been accustomed to interact with mobile computing. They free us from constraints. And provide us - a galaxy of possibilities.
To doctors, they enable patient review, medical history at their fingertips. To lawyers, they provide easy access to legal information and their cases. To children, it becomes their schoolbag that contains their textbooks and notebooks and their games. To businessmen they enable collaboration and communication. To creative artists they provide a digital canvas. At home the television is personal again. To writers and avid readers a plethora of books...and so on the list goes on.
The possibilities are endless. An impact similar in magnitude to early writing on clay tablets and the development of language. The electronic tablet marks the second revolution.
Next is what?
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
open canvassing
I'll be pretty frank about what I'm doing now. I'm advertising for Samsung. I've been using an Android phone from Samsung and it has been a decent experience till now. There have been minor annoyances with Wifi network detection not working with only a cryptic Error message coming up, but on the whole I have been happy with Samsung's hardware.
News about the launch will be through this webcast. Happy tracking!
News about the launch will be through this webcast. Happy tracking!
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Free software, free beer and free speech - opening up
This is a series of articles that will allow the non-specialist reader to understand the meaning of open source. There is frequent confusion at large about the differences between free software and open source software. I hope to resolve this too. For the novice this series of articles will also educate on open source's history, it's impact on consumers and the philosophy and economics of open source and community software. The name of the article reflects the two dominating philosophies that cover community software development - the first that is professed by the Free Software Foundation is stricter and advocates that all software be open source and free, while the latter reflects realities of the day and separates ownership from availability.
Commonly open source software is developed for the Linux operating system, but in no way is restricted to it. Open source software is available for all operating systems. In fact, quite a few software are available ('ported') to Windows family as well.
Are you touched by open source? Has open source added value to your life?
Yes. In many ways than one.
If you use the Firefox Browser. If you use websites that provide services that are powered by all or some of Apache, PHP, Linux, MySQL. For example, Indiblogger.in is developed in PHP and so is Facebook. Google uses the Python programming language, which too is open source. The mobile smartphone that is powered by Android or the Bada operating system from Samsung, or HP's webOS - it all runs Linux. In a recent announcement, an unlikely corporate house became a member of the Linux foundation. You would never guess who! Toyota. Which means your car in the future or perhaps now itself is powered by open source software. Many stock exchanges are now powered by huge swarms of Linux servers that are interlinked to form a super computing grid which ensures that the system that allows you to trade stock is always up and running.
The attractiveness of the open source philosophy is such that it has been used beyond software. A recent initiative by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), India has adopted this model for drug discovery and development. Movements like the Creative Commons allow books, literature and articles (yes, it could apply even to this blog entry) to be released under the same license. This now also extends to computer hardware development - with the recent announcement by Facebook to create an open source hardware platform through the opencompute project. A similar project has recently been announced by CERN - the institute running the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) experiment. CERN has been extensively leveraging open source software for scientific computation and have packaged a distribution of Linux called Scientific Linux.
The open source philosphy is one that allows extension, redistribution and improvement. A philosophy that fosters innovation. A philosophy that creates value. For Humanity.
An area where open source software makes a lot of sense is in education. There are numerous solutions that aid in learning, from primary schooling to advanced mathematical computations to learning management. And these solutions are highly useful. I remember very fondly how my son learned his primary skills very fast using the excellent education suite Gcompris. Next I provided him a geographical software that gave him information on countries, their capitals and flags. I did not coax him into using it. He just adopted it and within a month knew each and every country and their capitals of Europe, Asia and South America. E learning suites such as Moodle are used even by corporates such as Cisco for powering their self learning platforms.
How and why does open source work? Is open source just about providing the source code along with the 'binary' or compiled software? It is not. It is a culture and a philosophy. It usually begins with someone's desire to solve an 'itch'. The itch then catapults into a movement leading to the community development of an amazing piece of innovation. Where do corporates fit in this picture? For corporates its harnessing engines of innovation. It's like throwing in a brick and in return you get a wall.
Take for example the Apache web server. Over 70% of the web is powered by the Apache web server. Facebook uses it. Google uses it. Yahoo uses it. IBM uses it. And lots of smaller and medium size businesses use it. Everyone contributes to it. Some contribute to it by using it and providing feedback on the software. Some help in testing the software. Some contribute to developing the software. And, some contribute in forums - providing extensive support for the software.
Take another example. It began with the short email that a young college student from Helsinki sent across -
From: torvalds@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
Summary: small poll for my new operating system
Message-ID: <1991Aug25.205708.9541@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki
Hello everybody out there using minix -
I’m doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won’t be big and
professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
since april, and is starting to get ready. I’d like any feedback on
things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
(same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
among other things).
I’ve currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
This implies that I’ll get something practical within a few months, and
I’d like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
are welcome, but I won’t promise I’ll implement them :-)
Linus (torvalds@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
PS. Yes – it’s free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that’s all I have :-(.
The person was Linus Torvalds. And the software was an operating system that has come to be known as Linux.
Today the open source world has matured with enterprises using open source up the value chain. In the early days open source software was used to power the physical servers. This gradually shifted towards running a database or a web server running on top of the operating system. Gradually with time several open source languages became popular such as PHP, Python and solutions started being developed using open source technologies. Today we have end-to-end solutions that work out of the box covering several areas of enterprise software. That in my opinion is the top of the value chain.
The next article will dwell on the definition and history of open source. Keep reading!
Commonly open source software is developed for the Linux operating system, but in no way is restricted to it. Open source software is available for all operating systems. In fact, quite a few software are available ('ported') to Windows family as well.
Are you touched by open source? Has open source added value to your life?
Yes. In many ways than one.
If you use the Firefox Browser. If you use websites that provide services that are powered by all or some of Apache, PHP, Linux, MySQL. For example, Indiblogger.in is developed in PHP and so is Facebook. Google uses the Python programming language, which too is open source. The mobile smartphone that is powered by Android or the Bada operating system from Samsung, or HP's webOS - it all runs Linux. In a recent announcement, an unlikely corporate house became a member of the Linux foundation. You would never guess who! Toyota. Which means your car in the future or perhaps now itself is powered by open source software. Many stock exchanges are now powered by huge swarms of Linux servers that are interlinked to form a super computing grid which ensures that the system that allows you to trade stock is always up and running.
The attractiveness of the open source philosophy is such that it has been used beyond software. A recent initiative by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), India has adopted this model for drug discovery and development. Movements like the Creative Commons allow books, literature and articles (yes, it could apply even to this blog entry) to be released under the same license. This now also extends to computer hardware development - with the recent announcement by Facebook to create an open source hardware platform through the opencompute project. A similar project has recently been announced by CERN - the institute running the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) experiment. CERN has been extensively leveraging open source software for scientific computation and have packaged a distribution of Linux called Scientific Linux.
The open source philosphy is one that allows extension, redistribution and improvement. A philosophy that fosters innovation. A philosophy that creates value. For Humanity.
An area where open source software makes a lot of sense is in education. There are numerous solutions that aid in learning, from primary schooling to advanced mathematical computations to learning management. And these solutions are highly useful. I remember very fondly how my son learned his primary skills very fast using the excellent education suite Gcompris. Next I provided him a geographical software that gave him information on countries, their capitals and flags. I did not coax him into using it. He just adopted it and within a month knew each and every country and their capitals of Europe, Asia and South America. E learning suites such as Moodle are used even by corporates such as Cisco for powering their self learning platforms.
How and why does open source work? Is open source just about providing the source code along with the 'binary' or compiled software? It is not. It is a culture and a philosophy. It usually begins with someone's desire to solve an 'itch'. The itch then catapults into a movement leading to the community development of an amazing piece of innovation. Where do corporates fit in this picture? For corporates its harnessing engines of innovation. It's like throwing in a brick and in return you get a wall.
Take for example the Apache web server. Over 70% of the web is powered by the Apache web server. Facebook uses it. Google uses it. Yahoo uses it. IBM uses it. And lots of smaller and medium size businesses use it. Everyone contributes to it. Some contribute to it by using it and providing feedback on the software. Some help in testing the software. Some contribute to developing the software. And, some contribute in forums - providing extensive support for the software.
Take another example. It began with the short email that a young college student from Helsinki sent across -
From: torvalds@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
Summary: small poll for my new operating system
Message-ID: <1991Aug25.205708.9541@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki
Hello everybody out there using minix -
I’m doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won’t be big and
professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
since april, and is starting to get ready. I’d like any feedback on
things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
(same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
among other things).
I’ve currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
This implies that I’ll get something practical within a few months, and
I’d like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
are welcome, but I won’t promise I’ll implement them :-)
Linus (torvalds@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
PS. Yes – it’s free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that’s all I have :-(.
The person was Linus Torvalds. And the software was an operating system that has come to be known as Linux.
Today the open source world has matured with enterprises using open source up the value chain. In the early days open source software was used to power the physical servers. This gradually shifted towards running a database or a web server running on top of the operating system. Gradually with time several open source languages became popular such as PHP, Python and solutions started being developed using open source technologies. Today we have end-to-end solutions that work out of the box covering several areas of enterprise software. That in my opinion is the top of the value chain.
The next article will dwell on the definition and history of open source. Keep reading!
Thursday, July 21, 2011
the human-android touch
A debate so long it left my wife disgusted at my indecisiveness. To buy or not to buy was the question. I have always been like that. A life spent too much in thought, weighing options and analysis. It boomerangs on you.
To the point, I almost gave up on buying my dream phone. The search began in earnest reviewing all the phones at physical stores, virtual stores, phone review sites. After one week of incessant research I finally narrowed it down to either a Blackberry or an Android based phone. With Nokia's decision to partner with the Redmond folks, that was definitely a big no-no. And I did not have the greens for an i-something. So, that pretty much narrowed my options.
What was I looking for in a mobile phone. Well, for starters, I wanted it to assist me in ways many - beyond telephonic conversation. In what ways you may ask? To list a few, I wanted it to show me where I stand (literally, not figuratively; for that I have....), I wanted to be able to relinquish my laptop for checking out Facebook or my email or read something over my Wifi connection. And, I wanted to be productive in my bus journey to office, so that it could allow me to plan ahead, read newspapers or books or blog feeds.
See, my needs are frugal.
To draw a long story short, I narrowed down to a wonderful piece of hardware - the Samsung Galaxy Fit, powered by the Android operating system version 2.2. Code Name Froyo (from Frozen Yoghurt I gather).
The moment of truth finally arrived. It was a unique event. Like the touch in the Creation of Adam, immortalized on the ceilings of the Sistine Chapel.
The Touch. My first ethereal experience with the Android.
The experience has been very surrealistic for me. An addiction that has reduced due to social compulsions. It has transformed me into a recluse. I eat, drink and live with my Android. Marveling at its innovation which now stands scathed by the litigation between Google and Oracle. My enthusiasm is viral. I have now a fan following eager to dump their antiquated devices in favor of an android.
I see a career in sales beckoning!
After the initial fascination faded, I reached out for more. The MarketPlace did not disappoint. Apps for everything. So, what do I now have on my Android? Here's the list:
The Human-Android touch is complete. The Human has been Androidized!
To the point, I almost gave up on buying my dream phone. The search began in earnest reviewing all the phones at physical stores, virtual stores, phone review sites. After one week of incessant research I finally narrowed it down to either a Blackberry or an Android based phone. With Nokia's decision to partner with the Redmond folks, that was definitely a big no-no. And I did not have the greens for an i-something. So, that pretty much narrowed my options.
What was I looking for in a mobile phone. Well, for starters, I wanted it to assist me in ways many - beyond telephonic conversation. In what ways you may ask? To list a few, I wanted it to show me where I stand (literally, not figuratively; for that I have....), I wanted to be able to relinquish my laptop for checking out Facebook or my email or read something over my Wifi connection. And, I wanted to be productive in my bus journey to office, so that it could allow me to plan ahead, read newspapers or books or blog feeds.
See, my needs are frugal.
To draw a long story short, I narrowed down to a wonderful piece of hardware - the Samsung Galaxy Fit, powered by the Android operating system version 2.2. Code Name Froyo (from Frozen Yoghurt I gather).
The moment of truth finally arrived. It was a unique event. Like the touch in the Creation of Adam, immortalized on the ceilings of the Sistine Chapel.
The Touch. My first ethereal experience with the Android.
The experience has been very surrealistic for me. An addiction that has reduced due to social compulsions. It has transformed me into a recluse. I eat, drink and live with my Android. Marveling at its innovation which now stands scathed by the litigation between Google and Oracle. My enthusiasm is viral. I have now a fan following eager to dump their antiquated devices in favor of an android.
I see a career in sales beckoning!
After the initial fascination faded, I reached out for more. The MarketPlace did not disappoint. Apps for everything. So, what do I now have on my Android? Here's the list:
- Shuffle - a GTD tool from Google
- TOI - The Times of India news reader
- Pulse - a unique RSS feed reader
- Aldiko - an ebook reader
- Angry Birds - at last
- Google gesture search - one of the best things that happened for the Android
The Human-Android touch is complete. The Human has been Androidized!
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
to opine or opinionate is the question
An interesting discussion on the way to office. I boldly announce that I have a new blog amidst all the clamor inside. Curiosity envelopes the air inside. What's the name of the blog, some ask? The enthusiastic few appeared to have actually followed the post on my Facebook wall.
I proudly say - Openionate.
They boldly say - what does it mean.
And. I stand puzzled. Hey don't they get it? Pun intended. Opinionate. Openionate. Get the picture!
No. They don't get it. A search on a colleague's dictionary on an antiquated Nokia E series mobile (hey, sarcasm is in the water I drink, they say for Puneites) verifies the ignorance of the masses. Which in turn got me thinking. Whatever happened to 'opinionated'? Did it lose out to 'opined'? And yes, by the way I do not get a squiggly red line below the word 'opinionated' as I type this post, but I get it for 'opinionate' :-)
So there, an easy way to verify I'm right. And, I'm well read. And I know more words than you do. So there!
Enough wit. It appears the word 'opinionate' which was around 1600 AD was subjugated to irrelevance quite a long time ago. After some amount of researching I discovered that someone in 2006 had already researched this topic in - a matter of opinionating. To quote from the article -
"And 400 years ago, opinionate was standard English, though writers in need of a verb meaning ``believe, express an opinion about" could also choose opine or opinion. ``Pythagoras opinionated [the soul] a Number moving of it selfe," says a 1643 tract cited in the Oxford English Dictionary. Opine has since pulled far ahead in the popularity contest, but that doesn't mean opinionate is dead."
The conclusion of this article is in fact quite interesting -
"it's not, usually, a mere synonym for opine, but a word for habitual or professional opinion-mongering."
So I'll let my blog name stand. And be taken in this context. Habitual or professional 'openion'- mongering.
I proudly say - Openionate.
They boldly say - what does it mean.
And. I stand puzzled. Hey don't they get it? Pun intended. Opinionate. Openionate. Get the picture!
No. They don't get it. A search on a colleague's dictionary on an antiquated Nokia E series mobile (hey, sarcasm is in the water I drink, they say for Puneites) verifies the ignorance of the masses. Which in turn got me thinking. Whatever happened to 'opinionated'? Did it lose out to 'opined'? And yes, by the way I do not get a squiggly red line below the word 'opinionated' as I type this post, but I get it for 'opinionate' :-)
So there, an easy way to verify I'm right. And, I'm well read. And I know more words than you do. So there!
Enough wit. It appears the word 'opinionate' which was around 1600 AD was subjugated to irrelevance quite a long time ago. After some amount of researching I discovered that someone in 2006 had already researched this topic in - a matter of opinionating. To quote from the article -
"And 400 years ago, opinionate was standard English, though writers in need of a verb meaning ``believe, express an opinion about" could also choose opine or opinion. ``Pythagoras opinionated [the soul] a Number moving of it selfe," says a 1643 tract cited in the Oxford English Dictionary. Opine has since pulled far ahead in the popularity contest, but that doesn't mean opinionate is dead."
The conclusion of this article is in fact quite interesting -
"it's not, usually, a mere synonym for opine, but a word for habitual or professional opinion-mongering."
So I'll let my blog name stand. And be taken in this context. Habitual or professional 'openion'- mongering.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
open up, openionate
I think it's time I speak out. Speak my mind. Voice my opinion.
That's the reason, I set up this blog. Openionate. Pun intended. On this blog you'll find my opinion on all things open. From open innovation to open data to open source to open business models. The common theme for the blog is simple.
Being OPEN. In kind and spirit.
It helps that professionally now I'm devoting my entire effort to open source technologies. Towards understanding them, consuming them, but not yet really contributing to them. Actually, I do contribute. By consuming them. An open source product survives because of it's popularity and usefulness. Because it solves an itch, not just of one programmer, but of several.
I have always been working with open source technologies. Be it the Debian laptop at home or the enterprise Linux servers at office. Or the beautiful RAW photo editing tools that help me pursue my photography interests. Or the various types of databases - noSQL or SQL and programming languages such as Python.
One muses at what does OPEN really mean. What does it take to truly open up? But, more on that later, in the next posts. Keep reading!
That's the reason, I set up this blog. Openionate. Pun intended. On this blog you'll find my opinion on all things open. From open innovation to open data to open source to open business models. The common theme for the blog is simple.
Being OPEN. In kind and spirit.
It helps that professionally now I'm devoting my entire effort to open source technologies. Towards understanding them, consuming them, but not yet really contributing to them. Actually, I do contribute. By consuming them. An open source product survives because of it's popularity and usefulness. Because it solves an itch, not just of one programmer, but of several.
I have always been working with open source technologies. Be it the Debian laptop at home or the enterprise Linux servers at office. Or the beautiful RAW photo editing tools that help me pursue my photography interests. Or the various types of databases - noSQL or SQL and programming languages such as Python.
One muses at what does OPEN really mean. What does it take to truly open up? But, more on that later, in the next posts. Keep reading!
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