Category: Quotes

Live Software or Web 2.0?

~ rbonini

I just read this by Tim O’Reilly over at the O’Reilly Radar ( aggregated by Planet Intertwingly and via Scoble’s Link Blog – thats Web 2.0 for you)

It strikes me that one of the big differences between the 1.0 class of data aggregators and the 2.0 class is the difference between “back office” and “live” applications. The credit card company mines its database to select you for direct mail offers; it may even get close to real time in monitoring your card activity for fraud or credit limit detection. But Google or Amazon mines its database in real time and builds the results right into its customer-facing applications.

If Google or Amazon were your bank or credit card, they’d let you know which merchants had the best prices for the same products, so you’d be a smarter shopper next time. They’d let merchants know what products were popular with people who also bought related products. They’d help merchants stock the right products by zip code. They’d let you know when you were spending more on dining out than you have set in your family budget. They’d let you know when you were approaching your credit limit, with a real-time fuel gauge, not just a “Sorry, your card has been declined.”

If Google or Amazon were your phone company, they’d give you access to your entire call history, not just your last ten phone calls. They’d build a dynamic address book for you based on everyone you’d ever talked to — and they’d build p2p phone number lookup from your friends right into that address book. They’d get rid of 411, and just help you search for what you need, and then make the connection for you.

This is one reason I think that Microsoft’s term, “Live Software” is so right on. (I thought of naming this piece “Why Live Software is a better name than Web 2.0.”) It’s unfortunate that Microsoft has chosen that name for its own products only, because it goes right to the heart of what makes Web 2.0 applications so interesting: they are alive, or as close to it as you can get with a computer. They learn from and interact directly with their users (and more specifically, provide services to individual users that benefit from the aggregate interaction of the system with all of its users.)

Tim is right on as usual. This is the whole idea of Web 2.0. It shows how Google is becomming much more than a search engine (not that it’ll be buying banks next).

In the past, computers really were dumb terminals connected to a mainframe. Then we got he Personel Computer revolution that mved the mainfraom into a beige box that you plugged your screen into directly. Now our Desktops are turing into terminals again. The avaliability of Software as a Service over the web is essential to using our computers. The enxt Google will take all this one step further and render our pricy desktops using without a highspeed broadband connection (or Verizion Fiber-Optic for you guys in the States – we still have our broadband in Europe 🙂 ).

Soon, Banks and the like will realise the power of the Google Way of handling data. The ways of aggregating this infomation over the web makes it even better to savour the possibilities.

Just to highlight Tim:

It’s unfortunate that Microsoft has chosen that name for its own products only, because it goes right to the heart of what makes Web 2.0 applications so interesting: they are alive

Reminds me of Frankinstien:

It’s Alive!!! <Evil Laugh/>

On Programming

~ rbonini

Jeff Atwood just posted his Favorite Programming Quote:

My all-time favorite programming quote has to be this Nathaniel Borenstein bon mot:

It should be noted that no ethically-trained software engineer would ever consent to write a DestroyBaghdad procedure. Basic professional ethics would instead require him to write a DestroyCity procedure, to which Baghdad could be given as a parameter.

It’s too perfect. Never have programmers been more neatly summarized.

And he also gave a list of great quotes sites:

Here are a few of my favorites:

Theory is when you know something, but it doesn’t work. Practice is when something works, but you don’t know why. Programmers combine theory and practice: Nothing works and they don’t know why.

Most of you are familiar with the virtues of a programmer. There are three, of course: laziness, impatience, and hubris.

Larry Wall

One of the main causes of the fall of the Roman Empire was that, lacking zero, they had no way to indicate successful termination of their C programs.

Robert Firth

Anyone who considers arithmetical methods of producing random numbers is, of course, in a state of sin.

John von Neumann

There is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new…

Niccolo Macchiavelli, The Prince

As an aside, Bill Clinton quotes this in his Autobiography

Writing code has a place in the human hierarchy worth somewhere above grave robbing and beneath managing. (Gerald Weinberg)

Writing code has a place in the human hierarchy worth somewhere above grave robbing and beneath managing. (Gerald Weinberg)

Rich Internet Application: Defined

~ rbonini

Part of the appeal of Rich Internet Applications is that they are about delivering the next generation of software. They’re about supporting the convergence of the web and the desktop and giving developers the freedom to choose the best platform for their needs. In some cases, having access to the desktop will be the requirement. In other cases, browser based applications will be perfect. RIAs span both categories. In the end, it’s about the experience, the richness, and the power of building real software. RIAs provide a way to do that that hasn’t existed before, and that’s why they’re so exiting. They change the game in so many ways.

from The Universal Desktop by Ryan Stewart

I agree. At first we were desktop-oriented. Then Web 2.0 came along and moved all our data to Google Servers. Now we move into the world in between these two extremes.

This move will prove to be very interesting. The Google of this next generation Web will be the company that get the best data synchrony between platforms. The technical details will prove to be even more interesting. Not everyone has a local SQL or MySQL server to use as a temporary data store. What are you going to use? Xml? In other words, the data storage solution will have to work across multiple scenarios and Operating Systems. In fact, come to think of it, how do you solve the browser sandbox problem without affecting security (while still providing ease-of-use: I.e no local software to install to run outwidth the browser sandbox).

I’m writing this using Windows Live Writer (no plugins installed yet), which I prefer to the WordPress write page. This can be described as a hybrid application. Although its installed locally, its working with Web data at its core. It downloads the blog theme, the Categories, the Recent Posts and also publishes the posts. Although its not Flash, AJAX, Flex or goodness knows what other platform out there or running in a browser, it is a Rich Internet Application. In other words, I’m suggesting that the definition of a RIA be extended beyond a Platform-Centric definition to a Functionality-Centric definition.

So  and RIA should be defined as an Application that functionally brings together the Web and the Desktop.