One man. Closing, all the windows.
I guess the sell-out was time-limited or ASUS has finally seen the light. Either way Ubuntu is back on the eeePC. This is new. They still have not updated their website. Perhaps that other OS was holding down growth of sales.
see Lawrence Latif – The Inquirer – Asus will preload Ubuntu Linux on three Eee PCs
Richard Chapman sent me a link to a log of activity for the International Space Station.
When I think back to my last experience with Lose ’95 out-of-the-box, I am shocked that ISS did not fall out of the sky. Lose ’95 shipped with no security and 50K bugs. ISS is only a decade or more behind the times. They are actually scheduling anti-virus activity up there.
Intuit, whose software is supposed by some to be a reason for the existence of M$ OS on desktop PCs provides lots of services to business including accounting and payroll software. Its direct deposit payroll system went on the blink today and some people have payrolls due Friday, tomorrow. Considering that many thousands of businesses and their millions of employees depend on the service, this will cause major disruption with anyone on a tight budget suffering bouncing cheques/payments. Continue reading ‘Intuit is Out of IT’
Michael Horowitz has published a list of reasons why the bad guys are winning in IT from the viewpoint of security. He spares no one.
see Computerworld – Michael Horowitz Why the bad guys are winning
Some of my “favourite” items from his list include:
Of course all kinds of human frailty are included in the list and as systems become more complex, human frailty finds more ways to mess up security. My most amazing encounters with human frailty includes ordinary users of that other OS who have collected around 100 random “must have” applications from the web, many of them spyware, spamware or worse. Things like insects to replace the pointer in the GUI, or various “security alert” fixes… I have even been called to a GNU/Linux desktop to help install one of these things. Where is the logic in peoples’ brains which determines that because a PC can run any software it must run all software? That kind of defeats the argument that users seek the best software for the job when there is no job.
IDC reports that in Czechoslovakia, “PC” sales plummeted in Q1 of 2011.
“The causes are threefold: high levels of stock at the end of 2010, decline in consumer confidence and household budgetary constraints, and choice – not only between various PC form factors, but also of multimedia tablets and other devices. These factors manifested most strongly on the mini-notebook market, where shipments fell by two thirds year on year, with a simultaneous and significant price drop.”
Let’s see. Choices:
Hmmm. Maybe it’s not the hardware platform people are choosing but the software. I’ll bet smart thingies are doing really well in CZ.
Netcraft has produced their monthly rating of reliability of hosting companies. Out of 41 listed, only 5 run that other OS while 24 run GNU/Linux. That shows what happens when people actually have a choice in supplier of software. The best tool for the job gets chosen. Further, IDC reports that M$ makes way more revenue than anyone else for server software so the folks getting the third-best software on servers are actually paying a premium for it… Sad.
The angst around tablet makers is just the beginning. M$ wants to tell the world how to make PCs. They even plan to make “activation” easier for end-users… To do that, no doubt they will try to insert some M$-only signature into the hardware. Fat chance…
“This is a digital product-key technology that’s going to streamline the configuration and development process for building PCs,” he said. “For end users it means a seamless activation experience, and for partners it will streamline their supply chain operations when we’re building PCs together.” Continue reading ‘Power Grab By M$’
So, not only is fragmentation of the Android ecosystem under control, apps are being ported to MIPS. That means the universe of folks running anything but that other OS just keeps getting larger.
“In the Android ecosystem there is a big push to make sure that any app that runs on Android runs on any platform that is able to run Android – x86 to ARM to MIPS – the application should just work. Vij added that MIPS is also working with developers of apps that use native code to port their applications to the MIPS platform and that the process can be as simple as an eight minute recompile.”
see MIPS: More than 90% of Android apps can run on any processor architecture
The reason MIPS is huge is that China is growing a MIPS-like hardware locally and can be totally independent of Wintel from start to finish. That is freedom and it is welcome in China as anywhere else. China is large enough to be its own market for any technology.
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