iClouds on the Horizon?

"Enduring Genius"
Jobs left plans for more Apple products
Thomas Grillo, Boston Herald (October 10, 2011)

"The Apple genius stockpiled fours years worth of blueprints for fresh products to ensure his company's success, according to reports.

"Despite his illness, Jobs, the co-founder and CEO of Apple who died last week at the age of 56, had been masterminding updated versions of the iPod, iPad, iPhone and MacBooks, and overseeing the development of the delayed iCloud project, which will allow Apple users to store music, photos and other documents remotely, according to a report in the Daily Mail.

"Carl Howe, director of Yankee Group's Consumer Research group, said he's not surprised that Jobs was at work on future Apple products, noting that the design registration for the iPad was completed in 2004 but not introduced to the marketplace until last year.

" 'It's not like these guys plan only a quarter or two in advance,' he said. 'Jobs anticipated new products years ahead.'..."

We'll probably be hearing about Steve Jobs for quite a while. As the Lemming opined last week, Mr. Jobs had quite a bit to do with developing the interconnected world we have today.

That said, the "future Apple products" sound a whole lot like current Apple products:

• Probably with new features
• Possibly with better performance
• Maybe with some number of bugs fixed
  • And a lower number introduced

Even the "delayed iCloud project" isn't all that new: at least, "cloud computing" has been around for years. This blog's first post about cloud computing was in January, 2009, as the Lemming recalls.

Back then, cloud computing would cause the death of the PC. The Lemming sounded off on "death of" articles last month. (September 28, 2011)

The Lemming thinks "cloud computing" makes sense for some functions. In a way, this blog is an example of cloud computing. The Lemming uses a desktop computer in central Minnesota to connect via the Internet with servers run by blogger.com: and it's those servers that store the posts.

Until some millennial day, when Internet connections never fail and data stored online is absolutely, positively, failsafe secure - the Lemming thinks that quite a few business and personal data storage and management will be done on-site.

How hard is it to make "failsafe" systems? Let's look at a definition for the term:

"failsafe- A process that uses controls and logic to stop an improper operation or transaction before it occurs and creates an error condition or defect. ex.- an entry program for distributing a single charge to several departments by percent that will not update if the individual entries don't add up to 100%."
(Bridgefield Group)

The example Brigefield Group gives shouldn't be too hard to get right: says the blogger who doesn't have to write the code; and get it approved by a gaggle of managers. More complex operations, like an online database? The Lemming suspects that making something like that "failsafe" when it comes to security will be somewhere between extremely difficult and flat-out impossible.

But the Lemming's been wrong before.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Steve Jobs, 1955-2011: Computers and Hyperbole"
  (October 7, 2011)
• "Cloud Computing, Dropbox, and the Postcard Principle"
  (May 13, 2011)
• "Cloud Computing: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?"
  (April 22, 2011)
• ""Flail the Rude Fresco?!" - It's Not the Technology"
  (February 14, 2011)
• " 'Manage - - - Like It's the 1800's!' "
  (December 5, 2010)

Cloud Computing, Dropbox, and the Postcard Principle

"Dropbox Lied to Users About Data Security, Complaint to FTC Alleges"
Ryan Singel, Threat Level, Wired (May 13, 2011)

"Dropbox, the wildly popular online storage system, deceived users about the security and encryption of its services, putting it at a competitive advantage, according to an FTC complaint filed Thursday by a prominent security researcher.

"The FTC complaint charges Dropbox (.pdf) with telling users that their files were totally encrypted and even Dropbox employees could not see the contents of the file. Ph.D. student Christopher Soghoian published data last month showing that Dropbox could indeed see the contents of files, putting users at risk of government searches, rogue Dropbox employees, and even companies trying to bring mass copyright-infringement suits.

"Soghoian, who spent a year working at the FTC, charges that Dropbox 'has and continues to make deceptive statements to consumers regarding the extent to which it protects and encrypts therir data,' which amounts to a deceptive trade practice that can be investigated by the FTC.

"Dropbox dismissed the Soghoian's allegations...."

The Lemming isn't surprised that Dropbox says the allegations should be ignored.

If Dropbox really does encrypt data - and Soghoian is wrong - Dropbox would naturally want to get past a false accusation and get back to business-as-usual.

On the other hand, if Dropbox decided that it was easier to be creatively accurate ("lying" is such a harsh term) when describing their service - and got caught - Dropbox would naturally want to get past a true accusation and get back to business-as-usual.

Back to that article:

"encrypted (AES256) and are inaccessible without your account password

"...Dropbox, which has more than 25 million users, revised its website claims about its data security April 13, from:

"All files stored on Dropbox servers are encrypted (AES256) and are inaccessible without your account password.

"to:

"All files stored on Dropbox servers are encrypted (AES 256).

"The difference, Soghoian charges, is very important. (If his name sounds familiar, you might remember him as the one who exposed Facebook's attempt to place anti-Google stories in the press this week.)

"Dropbox saves storage space by analyzing users' files before they are uploaded, using what's known as a hash — which is basically a short signature of the file based on its contents. If another Dropbox user has already stored that file, Dropbox doesn't actually upload the file, and simply 'adds' the file to the user's Dropbox.

"The keys used to encrypt and decrypt files also are in the hands of Dropbox, not stored on each user's machines.

"Those architecture choices mean that Dropbox employees can see the contents of a user's storage, and can turn over the nonencrypted files to the government or outside organizations when presented with a subpoena...."
(Threat Level, Wired)

The Lemming suspects that Dropbox and Soghoian may be right. It looks like Dropbox, while not quite telling customers that their files could be read under some circumstances - gave the impression that they were offering air-tight security.

That sort of 'clever' marketing can, in the Lemming's opinion, hurt a company. Big time.

It's also a reason why the Lemming reads manifests, contracts, whatever, before signing them. Caveat Emptor, and all that.

There's more in the Threat Level article, including before-and-after quotes from the Dropbox website. Quite interesting stuff, and a major reason why the Lemming isn't likely to use 'cloud computing' any time soon. Not for data that's at all sensitive.

The Postcard Principle

The Lemming thinks that the best mental picture for online security is the old-fashioned postcard: that old-fashioned rectangle of heavy paper with the address - and message written where anybody who sees the card may read its contents.

Nothing wrong with postcards, by the way, in the Lemming's opinion: they offer a lower-cost alternative to sheets-in-an-envelope letters for traditional mail; and picture postcards are arguably a sort of art form.

Still, the Lemming thinks sensible folks don't write sensitive information on postcards. Like Social Security Numbers - you get the idea.

The Lemming's discussed - or ranted about - cloud computing before.

Related posts:

• "Cloud Computing: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?"
  (April 22, 2011)
• "GMail, Google, Backup, and the Lizard People"
  (March 1, 2011)
• "New Google OS, Cloud Storage: Spiffy"
  (December 9, 2010)
• "Cloud Computing: Still Now, Still Wow"
  (July 13, 2010)
• " 'Cloud Computing?' Sounds Familiar"
  (January 26, 2009)

Cloud Computing: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

"Why Amazon's cloud Titanic went down"
David Goldman, CNNMoney.com (April 22, 2011)

"This was never supposed to happen.

"Amazon Web Services is the Titanic of cloud hosting, designed with backups to the backups' backups that prevent hosted websites and applications from failing.

"Yet, like the famous ocean liner, Amazon's cloud crashed this week, taking with it Reddit, Quora, FourSquare, Hootsuite, parts of the New York Times, ProPublica and about 70 other sites. The massive outage raised questions about the reliability of AWS and the cloud itself.

"It was supposed to work like this: Thousands of companies use AWS to run their websites through a service called Elastic Compute Cloud, or EC2. Rather than hosting their sites on their own servers, these customers turn to Amazon, which essentially rents out its unused -- and highly intricate -- server capacity.

"EC2 is hosted in five regions across the globe: Northern Virginia, Northern California, Ireland, Tokyo and Singapore....

Spread out that way, with facilities on three different continents (two, if you count Eurasia as one continent), Amazon's EC2 looks pretty safe: with five-way redundancy. A big question, as CNNMoney.com's article pointed out, is - - -

Cloud Computing Meets Murphy's Law

"...So what went wrong exactly?

"Amazon (AMZN, Fortune 500) has been tight-lipped about the incident, and the company said it won't be able to fully comment on the situation until it does a 'post-mortem.' So it's not clear yet exactly how the problem occurred.

"But bits and pieces of information from Amazon, its customers and cloud experts help to explain what happened.

"Thursday's crash happened at Amazon's northern Virginia data center, located in one of its East Coast availability zones. In its status log, Amazon said that a 'networking event' caused a domino effect across other availability zones in that region, in which many of its storage volumes created new backups of themselves. That filled up Amazon's available storage capacity and prevented some sites from accessing their data.

"Amazon didn't say what that 'networking event' was....

The Lemming doesn't blame Amazon for not saying what the "networking event" was. It's possible that the techs who keep EC2 working (most of the time) don't know themselves. With a SNAFU this big, whoever's in charge of EC2 would reasonably want to be really certain of facts before publicly stating anything.

Then, there's the possibility that the "networking event" was something trivial-sounding, like the possible "wiring problem" cited in the article.

Whatever the explanation, the Lemming's glad to be well clear of having to explain what happened. As well-known as Murphy's law is, "...anything that can go wrong will go wrong" (Princeton's WordNet), folks often seem surprised when it crops up in something they're using.

The Usual Anonymous Experts

"...EC2 is so simple to use -- a credit card and a few keystrokes literally gets your business into the cloud -- that some experts say can give a false sense of security. They see in Amazon customers a certain level of naivety that nothing could possibly go wrong.

"Of course, things go wrong and systems fail. Other cloud-hosted products like Google's (GOOG, Fortune 500) Gmail have gone down from time to time...."

The Lemming's gotten a bit tired of the anonymous "experts" that pop up in the news. It's one thing to have a reputation, and make a statement based on that reputation: and something else to come up with this sort of 'false sense of security' proclamations.

In contrast, there's this non-anonymous chap quoted in the article:

"...'Amazon's products are only as good as the people putting the architecture up,' said Michael Kirven, co-founder of cloud services provider Bluewolf. 'If you put all of your eggs in one basket, you put yourself at risk.'..."

True enough - and fairly obvious, when you think about it.

Which brings up what the Lemming sees as a serious problem with cloud computing.

The idea of getting access to (relatively) low-cost storage and computing power, over (generally) reliable connections, that (usually) don't stay down for long - looks good. And, in the Lemming's opinion, might make sense: if a company's data is backed up through an independent system - and it doesn't matter if operations stop dead in their tracks on occasion.

It's one of those things, in the Lemming's opinion, that looks good on paper; may be practical in some cases; and isn't going to solve all our problems

Cloud Computing and Dilbert

There's been an interesting evolution - maybe - in Dilbert's attitude toward cloud computing:

November 19, 2009


January 7, 2011


Related posts:

• "GMail, Google, Backup, and the Lizard People"
  (March 1, 2011)
• "New Google OS, Cloud Storage: Spiffy"
  (December 9, 2010)
• "Cloud Computing: Still Now, Still Wow"
  (July 13, 2010)
• " 'Cloud Computing?' Sounds Familiar"
  (January 26, 2009)

GMail, Google, Backup, and the Lizard People

"Google Gmail Snafu Lesson: Backup, Backup, Backup"
Ian Paul, PCWorld (March 1, 2011)

"Gmail is hard at work restoring service to about 40,000 Gmail users after a software bug deleted their e-mail messages, folders, labels and filters. So, while things are looking good for those users affected by the bug, this episode proves, once again, that while Web-based services may be robust, you still have to take responsibility for your own data.

"Google also takes responsibility. Ben Treynor, Google's VP Engineering and Site Reliability Czar, said on Google's Gmail blog that Google backs up all Gmail to tape. 'Since the tapes are offline, they're protected from such software bugs,' he blogged. 'But restoring data from them also takes longer than transferring your requests to another data center, which is why it's taken us hours to get the e-mail back instead of milliseconds.'

"Treynor said a storage software update introduced the unexpected bug, which caused 0.02% of Gmail users to temporarily lose access to their e-mail.

"It's Not Just Google Services You Need to Worry About

"However, it's not just Gmail and other Webmail services that are the problem; we're increasingly using cloud-based tools for work and communication such as Twitter, Facebook, Google Docs, Microsoft Office Live, Tumblr, Wordpress, Blogger, Posterous, Flickr, Picasa, and on and on.

"But that doesn't mean you should forego a solid back-up plan for all your online data. If the worst ever does happen, and a free Web service dumps your stuff permanently, the only response you can reasonably expect from these companies is: "oops, sorry."..."

There are quite a few lessons one could learn from the recent GMail SNAFU. Among them are:

1. Google can't be trusted
2. Microsoft is evil
3. All of the above
   
4. Space-alien, shape-shifting lizard people are behind it all
5. Trust, but do backup anyway

Answers A. B, and C have, in the Lemming's experience, some earnest and enthusiastic proponents. Still, 'if three hundred million people really believe in a stupid idea: it's still a stupid idea.' The Lemming suspects that one reason that Google and Microsoft are so roundly reviled is that both are highly successful outfits. And that's another topic.

Answer D, weird as it is, reflects a minority opinion (the Lemming trusts) that lizard people from outer space are the 'real' rulers of Earth. (Another War-on-Terror Blog, footnote 1, (January 14, 2009)) And that's not quite another topic.

Answer E reflects the Lemming's approach to email services, cloud computing, and municipal sewage plants.

Trust, in the Lemming's opinion, is necessary when dealing with other folks.

Warning! Old Coot Reminiscing

When the Lemming was getting a weekly paycheck, the Lemming trusted the boss to sign checks.

The boss trusted the Lemming to get things done.

Sometimes the boss didn't sign the check. Sometimes the Lemming didn't get things done. That's because there were weeks, now and again when cash flow in the company simply wouldn't cover paychecks; and some weeks, now and again, the Lemming simply couldn't keep up with the tasks. We both caught up, but there were a few awkward moments.

Big Companies Never Make Mistakes, Right?

The Lemming suspects that there's a tacit assumption that big companies, like Google, never make mistakes: That when something goes wrong with one of their services: THEY DID IT ON PURPOSE!!!

Frustrating as finding one's account deleted is: That's not likely.

It's not that the Lemming thinks Google, Microsoft, Big Cheese, and all the rest are run by paragons of virtue. The Lemming's assumption is that, occasional debacles like the big three automakers meltdown notwithstanding, the folks who run large companies are:

• Not particularly stupid
• Moderately selfish
• Aware of where their money comes from

The 'moderately selfish' part of that list is a whole different set of topics: probably for another blog.

The point is that, again with notable and spectacular exceptions, the Lemming has noticed that the folks in charge of outfits like Google - and GMail - act as if they know that if they fail to provide the services the rest of us depend on them for: we'll find someone else who will.

And there goes their job, their pension, their house in Hyannis Port, and all.

Golden parachutes, corporate greed, and mind-boggling stupidity are yet more topics.

Backing Up Data: Good Idea

Back to the PCWorld article. Op-ed, actually.

Ian Paul has, in the Lemming's opinion, pretty good observations and advice about how to be sensible with personal data and:

• Gmail and Friends
• Facebook
• Blogging
• Twitter

The Lemming doesn't follow all of Mr. Paul's advice: but the Lemming doesn't have the same needs and preferences.

It's like so many other things: The specific advice is pretty good; but the best part is the set of principles involved.

Principles For Backups

For the Lemming, there's a whole lot of data that can go away and not be missed. For that, backups are a waste of time. What the Lemming thinks is important, and what you do, won't be quite the same.

But the Lemming thinks that it's a good idea to decide what's important, what's not: and then set up a routine, preferably automated, for backing up the important data.

And storing it someplace that's a good distance from where the primary servers are.

Which reminds the Lemming: This nifty new computer doesn't have backup routines established yet.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "New Google OS, Cloud Storage: Spiffy"
  (December 9, 2010)
• "Cloud Computing: Still Now, Still Wow"
  (July 13, 2010)
• "Google Gmail Hack: a Followup"
  (January 19, 2010)
• "Google Gmail Accounts Vulnerable, China Hack Went Public"
  (January 18, 2010)
• "Computers, Ignorance, Paranoia, Tech Support, and Humor"
  (May 18, 2009)

New Google OS, Cloud Storage: Spiffy

"The Death of the Hard Drive"
Jeremy A. Kaplan, FoxNews.com (December 9, 2010)

"Stop worrying about when the hard drive in your computer will die. Google wants to kill it permanently anyway.

"The new Google Chrome operating system, which was unveiled Tuesday, as well as hints and suggestions from Apple and Microsoft, offers us a preview of the PC of the future. And it will come without that familiar whirring disk that has been the data heart of the PC for the past 25 years.

"The Chrome OS will at first be available on all-black laptops from Samsung and Acer. And because the new platform stores everything -- files, applications, data bits and bytes, literally everything -- on online servers rather than on your home or office PC, those new PCs running it won't require gobs of storage. In fact, they won't require any storage at all...."

Reality check, please.

"...In fact, they won't require any storage at all...." isn't - quite - accurate. The new 'Google laptops' won't have much data stored in the device you have.

A bit deeper in the article is a look at what "won't require any storage at all" means:

"...It's all about 'the cloud,' the generic term for storing data online and off your computer. E-mail apps from Yahoo and G-mail and Hotmail kicked off cloud computing, since the e-mail application you're running and the data you're accessing is all stored online. It's reliable, easy to access and convenient ... so for data in general, why store it on your desktop PC at all?

"Google's Chrome operating system takes that idea and runs with it -- down the street, up the next block, and straight on into the sunset. The Chrome OS assumes you're always in your browser -- which is the access point for most of your files anyway, right? Web pages, e-mails, documents on Google Docs, photos stored at Flickr, video chats, streaming music from Pandora and on and on. Think about it: Most of what you do is online, isn't it?

" 'Today's operating systems were designed in an era where there was no web,' Google spokesman Eitan Bencuya told FoxNews.com. 'Google Chrome OS is designed for people who spend most of their time on the web. It's our attempt to re-think what operating systems should be.'..."

All Your Date Stored in a Server - Somewhere: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

The Lemming spends a great deal of time online: researching and writing these posts, doing the same for other blogs, handling email and occasionally goofing off. The Lemming likes the Internet.

The Lemming thinks that storing data off-site is a good idea. Sometimes. Off-site storage is a fail-safe way to archive data, for example: if your office burns, the business could recover, using data stored somewhere else.

But: store all data out there, somewhere: on the assumption that Internet connections always work, and DNS servers never fail, and storms don't happen?

Warning! Old Coot Reminiscing

The Lemming remembers when Japanese manufacturers saved a whole lot of money, by not dedicating floor space to keeping 'extra' inventory on hand. Instead, they had enough stock on hand to keep making cars, robots, or whatever the factory made, for maybe a day or so. New stock was constantly shipped in, to keep the factory going.

It was a great system. As long as everything worked perfectly. Even Japanese manufacturers have their bad days, it seems: like the Aisin Fire in 1997. MIT/Sloan pointed out how brilliantly Toyota handled that little setback. Still, with a larger inventory on hand: well, that's not how they worked.

Information Technology Always Works, Right?

The Lemming has a webcam, looking at an intersection in the small town where I live. The webcam relies on a regional ISP to get the signal out. Most of the time that works well. Sometimes, like November 22, 2010, it doesn't.

Having a webcam offline for an hour or so won't make or break the Lemming: although some folks may have been disappointed when their view disappeared.

Having everything I do stopped dead, because of a communications glitch somewhere in the upper Midwest? That could be a bit more than merely annoying. Practically everything I do involves stored data and a computer.

If I've got the computer, but the data is in a server that I can't reach - I don't have a computer. I've got a very expensive paperweight. Come to think of it, I can get almost enough light to read by from the monitor: so it wouldn't be a complete loss.

Then there's the matter of security. Well, the Lemming supposes that information stored in the cloud is completely secure, safe from any hacker. Oh, wait: every now and then there's another news item about credit card data that's been stolen or lost. Presumably the folks in financial institutions are plugging the holes: but it's happened. (April 29, 2010, June 28, 2010, January 18, 2008) Then there's the WikiLeaks thing that's in the news - and will be for the foreseeable future, it seems.

No, the Lemming strongly suspects that data isn't entirely safe when it's stored on someone else's server.

Someday, maybe. Not today.

The FoxNews.com article discusses applications where it would, in the Lemming's opinion, make sense to have the device in your hand and your data off on a server in Nigeria, New Jersey, Romania, or wherever your ISP found the cheapest rates.

Sort-of-related posts:

• "Your PC Crashed: Now What?"
  (July 22, 2010)
  • Data on the desktop can be lost, too
  • Now, let's say that the crash happened on another continent - - - -
    
• "Cloud Computing: Still Now, Still Wow"
  (July 13, 2010)
• "The Web Rewires Your Brain: Ain't That Great?"
  (July 2, 2010)
• "Lemming Tracks: Where was the Lemming?"
  (June 7, 2010)
  • Loss of service in "isolated" areas
    • Involving several nations
• "3,300,000 People's Student Loan Data Stolen: That's a Lot of Zeroes"
  (March 27, 2010)

Like this post? Tweet it: Tweet Or, not: your choice.

Cloud Computing: Still Now, Still Wow

"Microsoft Unveils 'Turnkey' Cloud Appliance"
InformationWeek (July 12, 2010)

"HP, Dell, and Fujitsu to offer versions of the system, while eBay signs on as first customer."

"Microsoft on Monday unveiled a preconfigured system designed to help businesses move to cloud computing quickly and efficiently without disrupting existing IT operations.

"The Windows Azure platform appliance consists of the Windows Azure cloud operating system, Microsoft SQL Azure, and, according to the company, "a Microsoft-specified configuration" of network, storage, and server hardware.

"Cloud computing is a new wave IT architecture under which enterprises tap applications and data from a central location that is often hosted by a third party. In addition to Microsoft, the market for technology to power cloud systems is attracting big investments from tech giants like IBM and Google, as well as hardware makers...."

Okay: Microsoft has a new service, and some companies with high name-recognition value like it. So far, so good.

But, "a new wave IT architecture?" Maybe, for IBM: but I've been reading about cloud computing for quite a long time. Then, there's that YouTube video, posted in May of 2008. (Not a typo: 2008)

"What is Cloud Computing"

joyent, YouTube (May 7, 2008)
video, 9:58

"At the Web 2.0 Expo, we asked Tim O'Reilly, Dan Farber, Matt Mullenweg, Jay Cross, Brian Solis, Kevin Marks, Steve Gillmor, Jeremy Tanner, Maggie Fox, Tom McGovern, Sam Lawrence, Stowe Boyd, David Tebbutt, Dave McClure, Chris Carfi, Vamshi Krishna and Rod Boothby the same question: 'What is Cloud Computing?'...."

Compared to the age of the Universe, two years isn't a very long time.

For information technology, two years is a long time. Particularly for "a new wave" of anything.

Oh, well: that InformationWeek article gives a bit of insight into what's happening at Microsoft.

I'm even more 'behind the curve' than IBM, in a way. My blogging is a sort of 'cloud computing' situation - but it'll be a long, long time before I rely on an Internet connection for critical tasks, or access to my data. The technology simply isn't reliable enough yet.

Sort-of-related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: Catching Up"
  (June 29, 2010)
• "Lemming Tracks: Twitter, Capacity, and AOL's Reality Check"
  (June 15, 2010)
• " 'Cloud Computing?' Sounds Familiar"
  (January 26, 2009)

"Cloud Computing?" Sounds Familiar

"Google plans to make PCs history"
"Industry critics warn of danger in giving internet leader more power"
guardian.co.uk (January 25, 2009)

"Google is to launch a service that would enable users to access their personal computer from any internet connection, according to industry reports. But campaigners warn that it would give the online behemoth unprecedented control over individuals' personal data.

"The Google Drive, or 'GDrive', could kill off the desktop computer, which relies on a powerful hard drive. Instead a user's personal files and operating system could be stored on Google's own servers and accessed via the internet.

"The long-rumoured GDrive is expected to be launched this year, according to the technology news website TG Daily, which described it as "the most anticipated Google product so far". It is seen as a paradigm shift away from Microsoft's Windows operating system, which runs inside most of the world's computers, in favour of 'cloud computing', where the processing and storage is done thousands of miles away in remote data centres...."

Well, that's interesting. People who don't like Windows and/or Bill Gates would probably be dancing in the streets: except they may be like people I know, who don't particularly like corporate giants in general.

My guess is that, published opinions notwithstanding, Google's GDrive and "cloud computing" will have their chance in the marketplace, find their niche, and become last week's news.

"Cloud Computing" - New Name, Old Idea

Remote computing isn't a new idea. It's been around since 1940. Actually, the desktop computer was a 'breakthrough' of sorts, which made it possible for people to store data and use computing power literally at their desk. It was quite an improvement over the 'good old days,' when computing power was shared with everyone else on the network.

Personal computing has a long history: the basic technologies have been around since the mid-seventies. One thing that's stayed the same in the last 30 years is that things change.

Change Happens

Heraclitus said: "Nothing endures but change." That was about two and a half millennia back, and I think he's still got a point. Change happens.

Particularly in information technology. We're in a very exciting period.

Quite a few technologies are supposed to be the one that will replace desktops. I used "end of the desktop" (in quotes) on Google just now, and got about a million hits. And, discovered that the laptop (Reuters (January 7, 2009) is the "end of the desktop" this month. Or was, until "cloud computing" came up. Last year, WiFi wireless networks were going to end the desktop (MC Press Online (September 24, 2008)").

I'm waiting for someone to rediscover the abacus. It could be called the ZitherCalc, and be the end of the pocket calculator: no more hard-to-read displays; results at the flick of a finger!

End of the Desktop? No - Change of the Desktop - Yes

I think that Mike (The World Is My Office) Elgan is on the right track. last week he wrote about mobile computing, desktops, and (I think) common sense. He didn't mention "cloud computing," but made what I think is an applicable point:

"The big picture is that the whole desktop PC/mobile computing dichotomy is dying....

"...So is it the end of the desktop PC era? Well, sort of. But it's not the beginning of the mobile computing era.

"It's the end of the whole desktop-or-mobile concept, and the beginning of everywhere and anywhere computing."

Sooner or Later, I'll Probably Use "GDrive" - or Something Like it

There are many reasons, from security issues and the occasional gaps in Internet service to a preference for something cool on the desktop, for me to keep using a desktop computer. I also had a laptop, until it died on me: and intend to replace it when I've got the budget.

And, sooner or later, I'll probably use something like the "GDrive" - in fact, I have, by uploading files I'd need to work on to a server, later accessing them from another location.

I've nothing against using remote facilities. Right now, my websites are on servers that are about a thousand miles away from me. I regard what's on those servers as copies of the original websites, which are stored and backed up here in central Minnesota.

I don't mind working with Google, either: or Microsoft. Each are 800-pound gorillas, but got that way by good marketing - and by providing services and products that get the job done. (I also use the FireFox browser, since 'way too many hackers are dedicated to exploiting IE's weaknesses - and that's a whole different topic.)

I think that "GDrive" - or something like it - will catch on, as a service for people who want to store and access data: and whose preference for convenience and portability outweighs their need for security and control of the data.

More:

• "No, mobile computing is NOT killing the desktop PC"
  Mike Elgan, Computer World (January 23, 2009)
• "A Brief Timeline in the History of Computers"
  Bob Houghton, Western Carolina University (June 16, 2008)
  (The first entry's title is "350 millions years ago to 1000 B.C." - but aside from the occasional hyperbole and prediction-as-fact, it's a pretty good resource)
• "Google's 'Gdrive' online storage due in a few months"
  Computerworld (November 28, 2007)
• "Google Drive, GDrive, Platypus Coming Soon?"
  Search Engine Roundtable (July 11, 2006)
• Microsoft to serve up Google Gdrive storage rival"
  Computer World (April 21, 2006)