Friday, February 12, 2010
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Google's experiment: leapfrogging ISPs to deliver ultra-high-speed Web | Between the Lines
February 10th, 2010
Google's experiment: leapfrogging ISPs to deliver ultra-high-speed Web
Posted by Sam Diaz @ 8:53 am
Categories: Google, ISPs, Web Technology
Tags: Google Inc., Web, Network, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), Networking..., Internet, Sam Diaz
Google, eager to take the Internet to the next level, isn’t waiting around for the telecoms or wireless providers to kick those connections into ultra-high-speed mode. In a blog post this morning, the company said it planning to build and test ultra-high speed networks in a small number of regions across the U.S.
The experimental fiber network will deliver speeds more than 100 times faster than most consumer connections today - a 1-gigabit-per-second fiber-to-the-home connection. The company said it plans to provide competitively-priced services to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people.
So why does Google think we need faster connections to the cloud? Here’s its list of some examples of what a faster connection could bring:
- Next generation apps: We want to see what developers and users can do with ultra high-speeds, whether it’s creating new bandwidth-intensive “killer apps” and services, or other uses we can’t yet imagine.
- New deployment techniques: We’ll test new ways to build fiber networks, and to help inform and support deployments elsewhere, we’ll share key lessons learned with the world.
- Openness and choice: We’ll operate an “open access” network, giving users the choice of multiple service providers. And consistent with our past advocacy, we’ll manage our network in an open, non-discriminatory and transparent way.
With any other post, I might argue that Google is taking things too far by putting its paws into too many baskets. I already commented this week on how I thought it was a bad idea for Google to act as retailer of the new Nexus One mobile phones. Now, I’d be inclined to ask why they want to be an ISP.
But Google has been very clear that this is an experimental project. From the post:
Like our WiFi network in Mountain View, the purpose of this project is to experiment and learn. Network providers are making real progress to expand and improve high-speed Internet access, but there’s still more to be done. We don’t think we have all the answers – but through our trial, we hope to make a meaningful contribution to the shared goal of delivering faster and better Internet for everyone.
The first step is to reach out to cities that might be interested in being test locations for Google’s ISP efforts. The company is issuing an open Request for Information to identify communities that are interested. To help bring it all together, Google has put information on this page. And, of course, there’s a YouTube explainer video, too.
Sam Diaz is a senior editor at ZDNet. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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via blogs.zdnet.com
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
January auto sales: Many automakers up, Toyota down
After a rough 2009, automakers are counting on sales in 2010 to recover. Now the results are in for the first full month of the year. Some automakers are rallying, while the numbers dash the hopes of others.
Toyota’s sales were adversely affected by a Stop-Sale order on the eight models which account for more than 60 percent of its sales. It ended the month down 8.7 percent over the previous year.
On the other hand, Ford, Hyundai, and Subaru all started 2010 with over 20 percent sales increases over January 2009. Here are the details:
Ford continued its sales surge with a 24 percent increase over last January and an increase in overall market share. Ford’s car models were the big sellers with the Focus, Fusion, and Taurus posting strong increases over last January.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
CBC News - Politics - Breakthrough made on 'Buy American'
Canadian companies will get access to funding from U.S. economic stimulus projects in 37 U.S. states under a deal to circumvent the protectionist "Buy American" clause, CBC News has learned.
The breakthrough in negotiations between Washington and Ottawa might not be announced until tomorrow, the CBC's Chris Hall said.
During an afternoon press conference, Industry Minister Tony Clement would not confirm details of the deal but said Trade Minister Peter Van Loan and Prime Minister Stephen Harper were working hard on the file.
"There is nothing to be announced now," Clement told reporters at Parliament.
The agreement applies only to U.S. funding delivered under the current stimulus program, not future legislation that might include "Buy American"-type provisions.
The U.S. money is allocated for roads, public housing and other infrastructure projects, the drawback being that most of the money has already been spent.
Hall said the Canadian government is arguing the deal sets a precedent for future stimulus spending in the U.S.
In return, Canadian provinces are to sign on to a World Trade Organization general procurement agreement, which will give the U.S. and other countries access to projects underway in Canada with federal stimulus spending.
The "Buy American" provision gives priority to U.S. iron, steel and other manufactured goods for use in state-level and municipal public works and building projects funded with stimulus tax revenue.
The provision was put into the $787-billion US American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — the U.S. government's economic stimulus package — by the U.S. Congress.
Canada has been trying to get an exemption from the provisions since last fall.
In October, reports of progress between the U.S and Canada over the controversial provision prompted the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to withdraw a resolution to block U.S. companies from bidding on city contracts in this country.
via cbc.ca
Wow...
Apple's mac os x is less secure than windows - The Inquirer
IF YOU BELIEVE Apple's marketing then you would think that the expensive fruity machines are more secure than PCs.
After all, most of the viruses out there are designed for the PC and Apple users hardly suffer from the problem. But this line of reasoning does not influence corporate IT managers who, were it true, would be trying to stave off hackers by installing shedloads of Apple gear.
However that's not the case. Most tell us that even if Apple gear was half the price it's just security by obscurity. A determined hacker who wanted to get into corporate systems would be though it like a knife through butter.
Tyler Reguly, a senior security research engineer with Ncircle told the newnewinternet that if you take a look at the two platforms, and the mindsets of the companies behind them, then the Windows PC wins hands down. He said that the Mac ships with more exploitable vulnerabilities already on a system when it is delivered. Further, Eric Johanson, a security researcher pointed out that the Mac OS X has far more published vulnerabilities per user than Windows.
However Apple is also actually more insecure because of the attitude of its customers. A computer's security, if it exists, is only as good as the user. Unfortunately in the case of the Mac the user is a smug, technologically illiterate person who believes they are invulnerable because they use a Mac. Such people randomly press buttons, visit sites that sensible people don't and download things carelessly because Apple's marketing tells them they are safe.
A recent Eset survey last year showed that when Apple users fell for phishing crime they tended to lose a lot more cash than a Windows PC user. The cynic in me thinks that if you spend a third more than you need to for your PC and think that the Ipad is a pretty neat idea then you are exactly the sort of mark that a phishing campaign is designed to reach.
The Eset survey said that the only safer Mac user was one who used both a Windows PC and an Apple Mac because they tended to be a bit more clever than your average fanboy.
Another reason why Apple PCs are so insecure is that it is incredibly slow at responding to news that flaws exist in its software. Microsoft has long ago realised that sitting on vulnerabilities without patching them is dead stupid. Most patches from Microsoft arrive comparatively quickly.
The cappuccino company's mindset, however, while reinforcing the myth of indestructibility of OS X, means that Apple users will be exposed much longer than Microsoft. A hacker can go to the web and find a list of vulnerabilities which are months old and be secure in the knowledge that they are less likely to be patched.
Unfortunately for Apple this philosophy is fast coming unstuck following the success of the Iphone. The gizmo is popular enough to become a target of hackers and malware distributors. It also can be used to store data worth stealing.
Alas for most Apple users, Jobs Mob is more keen on working out ways to stop people jailbreaking its Iphone than it is on protecting them from malware on the gear. However the Iphone is a toy computer and has all the vulnerabilities of a computer.
So what will it take for Apple to pull its socks up? One enterprising malware writer to pen an interesting bit of code that installs itself on a Mac, sniffs address books for friends with other Macs and works out the way to distribute itself to them too. It is not a huge technology challenge and when it is designed then Macs will fall over all over the world.
Only when this happens will Apple reach the same epiphany that Microsoft did over security and follow the Vole into more secure computing. ยต
via theinquirer.net
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Windows 7 Running on the Apple iPad via Citrix - citrix - Gizmodo
This content is restricted.Windows 7 Running on the Apple iPad via Citrix
Trumpets playing, bloody moons, seas of fire, cats cohabiting with dogs, and Windows 7 running on the Apple iPad right on the day it launches. That's how the Universe ends, my dearly beloved, and you can blame Citrix for it:
It turns out the 9.7 inch display on the iPad with a 1024x768 screen resolution works great for a full VDI XenDesktop. Windows applications run unmodified and securely in the data center, and even multiple applications at once.
The iPhone restrictions of screen size and small keyboards are overcome with the iPad. The iPad looks to be an ideal end-point device that can empower users to be productive wherever they are and IT will be able to safely deliver company-hosted virtual desktops and apps without worry.
Those are the wet words of Chris Fleck, the vicepresident of virtualization and remote software company Citrix. And what you are seeing above is Windows 7 running on the iPad SDK simulator, thanks to Citrix Receiver and XenDesktop 4—running meaning that it's executed on a server and remotely displayed on the iPad at full resolution.
Fleck sounds excited on his blog, and points out that the software will be ready for the launch of Apple's JesusTablet. Personally, I can't wait for other remote desktop applications to be adapted for the iPad full resolution. [Citrix via PC World]
Send an email to Jesus Diaz, the author of this post, at jesus@gizmodo.com.
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Hey Jesus, I feel your pain but no matter how many mockups you make with a small bezzel, the real iPad will always have one big enough you can rest your coffee on it. Keep the dream alive my small bezzel loving friend ReplyEdited by TonyWonder at 02/02/10 12:39 PMJesus,Just curious. What is with Gizmodo's novel use of the word "wet" lately? From Joel, we get "It's taken me a couple of days for me to understand the wet sickness I felt" and yours, above.
I checked with UD, to see if it is some new kind of slang, but no luck. I am genuinely curious.
Is it from a movie? Reply
Jesus, I hate to complain, but this is misleading. Citrix sends out, basically, a video signal to a client display. The client isn't "running" anything other than the Citrix client software.Saying Windows 7 is "running" on the iPad here is no more accurate than saying that I currently have Windows 7 running on my Dell monitor. I don't. The software is running on the computer; the monitor is a display. Windows 7 is NOT running on this device. The fact that the iPad can effectively run a Citrix client is definitely newsworthy on its own, and there's no need to mislead by claiming something that isn't true. Reply
I was honestly looking at the JesusTablet, but I can't wait three days for it to restart every time it dies... ReplyThis is non-news for consumer users, but for all of us lawyers out there, this could be the difference between lugging our crappy Dell office laptops with us on vacations and weekend trips and tossing an iPad into a carryon. I had no intention of buying one until I heard about this on Sunday; now I think it's 60/40 that I will. Reply@Astigmatism: Or just getting any of those many tablets that can do this naively since they are running Win 7 on the actual device. Just one less hoop to jump through that way. Reply@Xeno: There's no "native" here, though - it's always just a presentation screen on your computer, with the actual apps running remotely on the (Windows-based) server. I use Citrix from home both on my iMac and my Vaio, and the experience is pretty much identical. The only thing that really puts me off this device, honestly, is the Flash thing, as Xeraphim notes. ReplyThere is a VNC client for iPhone; sure there will be one for iPad. No need for Citrix.
ReplyNathan Obbards promoted this commentRemote access of full-fledged computers via terminals? Input and output on a basic shell, with a sort of... of... main frame doing the heavy lifting? Why, it's so crazy it'll never work! I mean, for starters you'd have to have some kind of completely wireless persistent network available all over the world. Reply"running meaning that it's executed on a server and remotely displayed on the iPad at full resolution."It will be interesting to see if Citrix codes their client software for the iPad to allow HDX, which takes advantage of client-side hardware for graphics and computing power. Seeing a demo of this working with 3D Studio MAX is a sight to behold.
For those who are concerned about the cost of such a system, yes, this is a business oriented total virtualization solution that Citrix offers which means the overall cost is out of reach of an individual. From what I gathered at a Citrix sales pitch last week, the lowest buy in price of the software is roughly $225 per seat (individual client license). At my company, we're looking to buy 170 of theses licenses, which is rather cheap for a company, but crazy for an individual.
However, given the fact that Apple's iPad has the attention of Citrix, who's to say they won't come out with a consumer version of the solution to provide individuals full computing power on their Jesus tablet? Reply
I've been in shock since the 90's that Citrix still exists. They basically sold their best technology to MS in the 90's and have been using the cash to try and come up with something profitable ever since.Am I completely wrong? Do they actually have a decent product that stands on its own or are you still better off just running a plain Jane 2Kx box running TS? Last I knew their main product is nothing more than Hummingbird (Virtual Apps). Reply
@UnderLoK: The difference, at least that I see, is that you can't push an application on TS, so someone could have Word, and only Word, on demand, without having to have a new desktop. ReplyUnderLoK promoted this comment@Greg Lloyd: That's all I know of which was a failure long before Citrix did it (Hummingbird would allow you to send specific X apps as well back in the 90's). I can see it working well for POS, but beyond that I don't really see the point.This coming from a guy who uses Fusion on a daily basis... ;) Reply
Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 8:27 AM@UnderLoK: Citrix makes tons of money in the corporate space, allowing virtual sessions when you don't trust people to access your network (think offshoring). ReplyUnderLoK promoted this commentI'm a little confused. So Citrix is essentially running a custom Virtual Machine over a desktop onto an Ipad? Seems kinda silly but hell if I hear Windows 7 is running on an Ipad... That's pretty cool. Reply@armendni: Windows 7 isn't running on the iPad. The iPad is connecting via terminal services to a VM running on a server off in the cloud somewhere. You could do this for MacOS, Linux, anything that has a VNC or RDP server. The iPad is only running a little program that connects to a VNC/RDP server and displays it's screen, and passes keyboard/mouse events back. You can already do this, today, on the iPhone. Replyarmendni promoted this comment@SewerShark: No he won't, but this would be the only way I'd buy one of the damn things. ReplySewerShark promoted this commentI already do this on my iphone via RDP, it's ok and lets me listen to music over flash from my server thatsits in a FAST data center but it isn't a real solution. The UI is no suited to the device and its really hard to navigate. Either the ipad will support flash, via jailbreak or other mean, or I'm not buying one.Hey adobe! release a flash client via cydia and make everyone happy.
Give a nice 1 finger salut to apple at the same time. Reply
Benguin approved this comment@Cy Cyril: You actually raise a pretty interesting point. I wonder what would happen if Adobe did release a flash plugin via Cydia. Their stance of "Apple maintains a closed ecosystem and won't allow open development" always read to me more as "Why bother fixing anything when we have a perfectly good scapegoat right here."If they were to undermine Apple like that, I see one of two things happening:
1) They prove that Apple are just being giant dicks and flash isn't as horrid as they make it out to be
2) They prove Apple right and everyone on the internet can stop whining.We as consumers could not lose. Reply
Did the author just name a product he doesn't own after himself? ReplyCovertghost promoted this commentis it possible to hack the iPad then install a free new OS on it? Apple sais iPhone OS is a stripped down Leopard ReplyUnderLoK promoted this comment@UnderLoK: Not reallty, there are loads of Linux based OS's, the problem is drivers for the OS's. ReplyUnderLoK promoted this comment@Mr_Bishop: Linux dists you mean... Linux is the OS, Debian, Suse, RH, Slack, and the rest are dists.So as I said you are extremely limited. You can run Linux or FreeBSD or? That leaves a pretty big gap as far as usability goes. You know, since most people need OSX or Windows. Reply
Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 8:43 AM@UnderLoK: Yeah I guess if your hell bent on running a closed source OS. Personally i like Ubuntu,Debian,Android and the rest. If only they would combine Android and chrome OS... Reply@Mr_Bishop: Ubuntu has done one thing right, get the masses to see Linux and try it for themselves. Problem is that Linux IMO is still only good as a server and still fails on the desktop like it always has.The draw used to be a fancy desktop which brought people in the droves to Linux. Enlightenment alone was responsible for most of the influx of users in the late 90's. Now Gnome and KDE are bloated, XFCE isn't bad, but E it is not. Hell they don't even look as good! OSX's dock that people go on and on and on about? Looks just like E's did, that brushed aluminum look? Again a default E theme... The list goes on.
I would just like to add that if you are hardcore OSS you should be running Fedora. Ubuntu supports more hardware for a reason. Reply
Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 9:19 AM@UnderLoK: Im not hard core by any means, i mean sure i use Ubuntu Almost exclusively instead of windows but im learning. Excluding available software and one issue with my old nvidia GPU ive yet to have any issues compared to XP. I also like Gnome more then Explorer (im assuming thats what you meant by E?) Ubuntu runs smoother, longer, and cooler on my PC then XP did. ReplySubscribe to: Posts (Atom)
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