72 inches...

LG is bringing their 72 inch plasma display to the US (it’s been out in Korea for a year and a half)…

 

 

And it’s only $28,000.00

 

(info thanks to Engadget)

4/6/2006 3:48:06 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  technology

Boy, that was fast

Yesterday, Apple announced Boot Camp, their soon to be released system to allow dual booting of Intel-Macs between Windows XP and OS X. I commented to someone that while this was good news for Mac users who want/need to run Windows applications, a virtual machine solution would be better, so they could run both OS’s at the same time (We’re using VMware now to do this, and it’s great).

Today Parallels, a VM producer, announced Parallels Workstation 2.1, that supports Intel-based OS X as the host OS and allows other Intel based OS’s as guest OS’s. So, there you go: Windows XP running as a guest OS on top of Mac OS X. Just what the doctor ordered. And it only took a day … 

4/6/2006 9:48:43 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  technology

A new category

It seems that I need a new category: technology. Now I can tag entries that deal with tech that might not deal with development. One less thing to throw into "general" :)

 

4/6/2006 9:33:13 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  technology

Now, here's a switch

I spent the weekend hearing various folks talk about the latest (illegal) immigration flap. It was a little disconcerting to hear the left against helping poor people (e.g. “these people are stealing jobs from honest americans”) and the right for helping poor people (e.g. temporary work visas and some program to “legalize” those already here).

Frankly, I think there’s an ugly racist subtext to the whole debate. Almost everyone is talking about aliens crossing the Mexican border and almost no one is talking about: 1. The fact that potential terrorists have crossed the Canadian border and 2. The fact that a significant chunk of illegal immigrants (that is, aliens without a valid visa or work permit) come from Europe. So far, the only person I’ve heard talk about that is John McCain.

So here’s an intellectual puzzle for you: Why is it okay for trade to cross the borders without restriction (i.e. NAFTA), but not workers? Discuss amongst yourselves

 

4/3/2006 9:44:30 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  politics

Alistair Cockburn has an interesting article at his site...

Alistair Cockburn has an interesting article at his site: Are Iterations Hazardous to Your Project?

Hmm. It turns out that this article isn’t particularly new (from 9/9/2005), but still, very interesting (I found out about this from Sam Gentle’s site).

I took away, two bits of information from this article:

First, it shows how people can go wrong when trying to implement an agile development strategy, and (in fact) how they could succeed without doing agile development per se. It helps to underscore the important distinctions between “how to success” and “how to fail” beyond just “do agile” (what bad grammar!).

The second bit of information was more intriguing: The article is essentially a “fine tuning” of agile development. Instead of talking about “why agile development is good / better than waterfalling”, it talks specifically about how to be successful within agile development. This shows just how much agile development is moving to be mainstream.

A recent SDTimes article said that of surveyed companies, 19% were doing agile development. It sounds pretty low, but I wonder what other categories people answered with. How many were doing RUP-style I/I development, how many were doing Waterfall-style development, and how many were not really following any formal development strategy (I suspect the last category was the largest)? I think that the next 5 years are going to see a dramatic change in how mainstream software is developed.

3/27/2006 4:25:44 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  development

Interesting legacies

I just finished listening to Leo Laporte’s This Week in Tech (TWIT) and Scott Hanselman’s Hanselminutes. I think its interesting that both of these “cutting edge” “technology shows” include theme music. This is sort of a hold over from radio shows, and now television (though some television shows play with the format, placing the theme music later and later in the program. The theme music doesn’t really add anything to the program, since its self contained anyway. It’s not like we need something to inform us that the show is coming. And yet, the programs would seem less professional if they were missing.

As an aside: yes, this is one of the ways I get my tech news. I think its fantastic that I can simply download these shows to my Palm LifeDrive without the hassle of dealing with TV or radio networks.

3/24/2006 4:43:09 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [1]  general

Open Source

Scott Hanselman has an interesting post, commenting on the Economist’s article on Open Source. One interesting quote is

“The contributors are typically motivated less by altruism than by self-interest.”

Well, duh.

Sure, the Open Source marketing guys (and they do exist) want to world to think that participants in Open Source are all selfless saints, but the ugly fact is that we all participate in Open Source development to get something out of it. Whether its a working system or experience or even the good feeling you get when you see your name in an About box, its all about self interest.

The “beauty” of Open Source isn’t altruism, its the high degree of collaboration that’s possible. There’s no worries from the sponsors about the secrecy of the intellectual property; it all open for gosh sake! That’s the idea.

Again, contrary to what the Open Source marketers like to say, Open Source software isn’t intrinsically better than non-Open Source software, its just cheaper (and I don’t mean free, though it can be that too). Therefore the price/performance curve can be radically different. If I have to pay $400 for a piece of software, it darn well better work satisfactorily. However, if the software just costs $25, I can live with some glitches while the folks that produce it learn from their mistakes. This is what Open Source is really all about. Okay, so, technically, I could dig through the source code, find the “problem area” and fix it (then submit the fix back to the community), but (as any experienced developer should be able to tell you) this a lot easier to say than to do!

I think Open Source is here to stay, and continues to have an impact on how software is developed today, just as Borland’s low price models in the ‘80s changed the way software pricing is done. However, the thing I don’t know is what form Open Source development will take in the future. I sure had no idea that it would be where it is today when I was playing in the sandbox fifteen years ago.

3/23/2006 4:06:06 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  development

I've made the change

Well, I’ve gone and done it.

I’ve installed Comcast’s DVR. I haven’t retired my ReplayTV units, instead I’ve added the Comcast unit. While not as good as ReplayTV in some ways, it’s much better in others (like, being available for instance  ). It handles conflicts much more rationally than the ReplayTV software does. And, as an extra bonus, I can watch both HD channels and OnDemand again (for some reason, they wouldn’t work with my ReplayTV plugged in to the cable box).

As soon as I get my new 8 way amplified splitter, I’ll be in hog heaven with a total of 5 (five!) recorders hooked up (the Comcast unit can actually record 2 shows at the same time!) I’m not missing anything now!

3/22/2006 7:20:10 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  TV | general

So, what's smaller than monogamy?

I’m reading a lot of “chatter” about polygamy on the internet, in large part thanks to HBO’s new show, “Big Love”. I think its interesting that a lot of the “anti-polygamy” sites are connecting legalized polygamy to legalized gay marriage. Now, to be fair, I’m all for gay marriage; but I’ve mentioned the same argument. After all, if you’re for gay marriage based on the “privacy” issue (what consenting adults do in the privacy of their own home is their business, and the government should stay out of it) or the “religious” issue (separation of church and state prohibits the government from criminalizing something simply because one or more religions consider it sinful), then what about polygamy or (consensual) incest? Why should it be legal for two unrelated guys to be married but not a brother and a sister? Or, for that matter, two brothers (no “genetic” problem there)?

That’s not really related to the title of this piece.

What is related, is the (supposed) fact that (as of 2000), 16% of all households (in America, I assume) are single parent ones. Over the years, single parenthood has become more mainstream. In fact, we consider single parent families “legitimate” today. So, what kind of marriage is this? It’s not monogamy, and certainly not polygamy. Just where do these families fall in the taxonomy? And is it relevant?

As for me, I’m all for heterosexual marriage, gay marriage, polygamy, etc. The issue is about stable families, not who’s hopping into bed with whom. What about you?

3/22/2006 4:26:05 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [1]  general

Microsoft: changing direction without changing direction

In Computerworld today, Bill Gates is quoted as saying that MS waited too long for a new browser release. Yeah, I guess it’s “too long” when you start working on the next release after you’ve announced that there will be no new versions of the browser  . Okay, okay. They said “stand alone versions” of the browser. Of course, IE 7 will be available for XP. That sounds pretty stand-alone to me.

Anyway.

I think it’s interesting that this time MS is spinning this as a late, but intended change rather than a huge shift in strategy, like their move to the internet was in the ‘90s. This is a company that spent two years trying to convince the development community that web development was dead, and their “one click” technology would replace it. Of course, they changed their tune when the community started beating the AJAX drum. They quickly announced their own “AJAX product”: Atlas.

More and more, I’m thinking that Microsoft’s 15 minutes of technological leadership are over. However, I’m more than a little nervous about what/who comes next.

3/21/2006 9:29:01 AM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  development | general

Daria sighting

Okay, maybe sighting isn’t the right word, since she was heard, not seen, but…

I just got a voice message from Alan. He thought that he’d heard Daria O’Neal on 105.1. I just checked out their web site, and sure enough, Daria’s back on the radio! Bravo to The Buzz for recognizing real talent.

3/18/2006 7:23:43 PM (Pacific Daylight Time, UTC-07:00)      Comments [0]  general