...more recent posts
A couple of super geeky video related links. Super technical but I thought Mark might be interested at least:
From the Diary of an x264 Developer: Flash, Google, VP8, and the future of internet video which is of course dealing with the HTML5 video codec debate.
Objections to the Ogg container format
Microsoft unveiled their new mobile OS, Windows Phone 7 Series. Outside of the classically bad microsoft naming, pretty much everybody who saw it was impressed. I haven't seen such positive buzz about a Microsoft product ever. This is good for everyone, as competition drives innovation. Three competitors is better for consumers than only two.
On the mobile browser front it will be the only OS that matters that isn't using a WebKit based browser. And in addition, like both WebKit and mobile FireFox, the mobile Windows Phone 7 Series browser (based on Internet Explorer) won't have Flash support at launch. It's just too resource intensive for mobile devices. Adobe is in danger of losing their incredible advantage with Flash as we move from a desktop to mobile computing world.
Surprised I've never stumbled on this before. JetProfiler for monitoring MySQL. Looks very cool. Can't afford the $395 price, but the free version seems helpful enough. Kind of cool that you run it remotely. I have it on my laptop now collecting data from the server.
Google announces plans to build experimental fiber to the home networks in select communities:
We're planning to build and test ultra high-speed broadband networks in a small number of trial locations across the United States. We'll deliver Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today with 1 gigabit per second, fiber-to-the-home connections. We plan to offer service at a competitive price to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people.1Gb/s? Sign me up.
Amazon buys Touchco a New York based start up that specializes in touch screen technology. They will be merged with Amazon's Kindle group.
FaceBook releases the HipHop PHP to C++ cross compiler as open source
HipHop for PHP isn't technically a compiler itself. Rather it is a source code transformer. HipHop programmatically transforms your PHP source code into highly optimized C++ and then uses g++ to compile it. HipHop executes the source code in a semantically equivalent manner and sacrifices some rarely used features — such as eval() — in exchange for improved performance. HipHop includes a code transformer, a reimplementation of PHP's runtime system, and a rewrite of many common PHP Extensions to take advantage of these performance optimizations.Wow. At first I thought this was just another opcode cache like APC or eAccelerator but it looks like this is much more. It will be very interesting to see real world numbers on speed improvements, but if FaceBook is happy with the results that is a pretty strong endorsement.
Couple quick thoughts on the iPad:
It's pretty much what I expected. I thought there might be a camera (front facing, for video chat,) but I'm not so surprised there isn't. I didn't expect there to be a keyboard, so I'm a little surprised at that external option.
The price is a little lower than I expected. Apple is clearly gunning to dominate this space in a way they never tried with personal computers.
People are complaining that it's just a big iPhone, but I think John Gruber has it right that the truth is the other way around: the iPhone is a small iPad. This is the product Apple has been trying to make for many years, but it wasn't possible until now. A few years ago they took a lot of the ideas from the then still incubating tablet and made what they could at the time: the iPhone. But this is what they wanted to make, and they just had to wait for the reality of what is possible to catch up with their ideas.
As I predicted, lots of people seem to be enraged by this device (and all the hype around it). They point out, with some accuracy, that there isn't anything new here. Or worse, that there is even less here than lots of other devices that have been on the market for far longer. But this misses the point. The iPod was arguably worse (certainly had less features) than the Creative Jukebox when the iPod debuted. And there was this same sort of "Apple is doomed" talk at the time. How'd that work out for Creative?
The Apple branded CPU ("Apple A4") is interesting for how little Apple will say about it. This isn't to keep things secret, but just because this isn't a product for people who care about the hardware details. But for people who do care, like me, it looks like it's basically an ARM Cortex A9 that Apple tweaked and mated with a GPU (again, pretty much what we thought.) I'm hoping more details come up, but I doubt they'll be from Apple.
And finally, yes, I still think it will be a winner. But remember, it's not the tablet (I think iPad is a bad name, but I absolutely don't think it will matter) that is key. It's the whole hardware / software ecosystem they are building. Nobody else is even thinking on this scale. And that's why it's interesting.
I guess there is some interest in the question of openness. Clearly this isn't an open device. That's the point, Apple wants to completely control the experience because they think they know better than "most people". And while I don't personally like that aspect of it (for instance, I don't think I'll be buying one) that doesn't really have much to do with anything. When it comes to computers most people are not like me. But still, in the abstract, there's nothing ethically wrong with closed computing systems. Nobody complains that they can't load their own software onto a remote control; or that they can't reprogram their refrigerators. If Apple was somehow pushing to make general purpose computers illegal - then there would be a problem. But they're not, and they won't be. Personal computers will continue to exist, with a variety of open and closed architectures and operating systems. The iPad is something different. If someone doesn't like the closed nature, then they shouldn't buy it. But I think a ton of people are going to.
What will the entry level price for the iPad be by Christmas? $399 seems like a not too extravagant guess. $349 maybe? $299 possibly? Probably that's too low too soon, but you get the idea. Can anyone catch up? Does anyone else control the whole stack (from CPU through the OS and all applications? Does anyone else have the volume (iPad + iPod + iPhone - all sharing a ton of components) to drive prices down? I don't think so.
Derek Powazek lays out his hopes for the Jesus Tablet Apple tablet. Basically similar to what I'm thinking, except I don't sell media so I'm not really "hoping" in the same way he is. But I think what he outlines is going to happen. We'll know (some) tomorrow.
YouTube launches a beta of a Flash-less HTML5 version of their site which uses the new HTML5 <video> tag and h.264 encoded videos. They bill it as working in "Chrome, Safari, and ChromeFrame on Internet Explorer" where "ChromeFrame" is Google's Internet Explorer plugin that basically swaps out the IE rendering engine for Apple's open source WebKit (which also powers Google's desktop - Chrome - and mobile - Android - browsers). From the Chromium blog:
Recent JavaScript performance improvements and the emergence of HTML5 have enabled web applications to do things that could previously only be done by desktop software. One challenge developers face in using these new technologies is that they are not yet supported by Internet Explorer. Developers can't afford to ignore IE — most people use some version of IE — so they end up spending lots of time implementing work-arounds or limiting the functionality of their apps.
With Google Chrome Frame, developers can now take advantage of the latest open web technologies, even in Internet Explorer. From a faster Javascript engine, to support for current web technologies like HTML5's offline capabilities and <canvas>, to modern CSS/Layout handling, Google Chrome Frame enables these features within IE with no additional coding or testing for different browser versions.
To start using Google Chrome Frame, all developers need to do is to add a single tag:
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="chrome=1">
When Google Chrome Frame detects this tag it switches automatically to using Google Chrome's speedy WebKit-based rendering engine. It's that easy. For users, installing Google Chrome Frame will allow them to seamlessly enjoy modern web apps at blazing speeds, through the familiar interface of the version of IE that they are currently using.
It's still going to take a while (several years at least) but the end is drawing inexorably closer for both Flash and Internet Explorer. IE just doesn't work correctly and Microsoft seems unable to fix it, and Flash is too resource hungry for low powered mobile devices (plus it gives Adobe way too much leverage in a future where they just are not needed by Google and Apple.)
Amazon announces an SDK for the Kindle:
Amazon, displaying a sense of urgency, perhaps driven by the pending launch of Apple’s tablet style computer is turning its Kindle device into a platform. The Seattle-based company today announced that it will allow software developers to “build and upload active content” and distribute it through the “Kindle Store later this year.” Amazon will be giving out a Kindle Development Kit that will give “developers access to programming interfaces, tools and documentation to build active content for Kindle.” The company will launch a limited beta effort next month.The Kindle is going nowhere with the current screen technology (which is just okay for reading, but clearly no good for anything "active", or even anything with color for that matter.) But they could evolve the device's hardware (and design) in future generations, and certainly Amazon has a lot of experience creating a good ecommerce experience. So I think they could be an important player, but they've got a lot of work to do on their device first.
And also on the Kindle front, Amazon announced earlier this week that they are sweetening the split on ebooks with publishers, now offering to take only 30% in some situations (i.e., 30%, but with a bunch of strings attached.) This matches Apple's across the board split with developers in it's App Store (and the rumored split Apple is offering content publishers for it's new Tablet.)
Amazon: "Hey, over here! Don't forget about me!"