Archives for April 2008
Back at the end of October last year, Apple’s new version of Mac OS X aka Leopard, had just shipped, with an important piece missing. The mising piece that people had been hoping for and expecting was Java SE 6. Mac Java developers around the world freaked out, and a campaign (code word 13949712720901ForOSX ) [...]
If you read the tech press, you’ll be aware that, in some circles, Twitter is regarded as the most amazing new tool released in years. However, while some people think it’s insanely great, others think it’s terminally dull. What is Twitter? It’s what I call a micro-messaging system. You can send 140 character messages out [...]
Netbeans, the free, open source, software development environment from Sun Microsystems, has just reached version 6.1 (see the Netbeans 6.1 release notes for detailed info). If you’re one of those that hasn’t looked seriously at Netbeans in a while, I think it’s worth another look: it’s now a genuinely world-class IDE (for best results, make [...]
In the last few days, Sun Microsystems seems to have launched an on-demand utility computing offering that allows software companies to provide their software through a SaaS (Software as a Service) model. At least, I thought that’s what it was…
Sun calls it - “Solaris On Demand”. From the name, if sounds like it could [...]
One of my favourite sayings is a quote from Sun’s CEO, Jonathan Schwartz - different isn’t always better, but better’s always different. So, I’m a fan of a lot of the super-innovative work that Apple does. However, their thinking is sometimes different to the point of not making any commercial sense. The iPhone is [...]
JavaOne 2008 is almost upon us. What will the big story be this year? In order to figure that out, it’s worth taking a look back to see what the big story was at JavaOne 2007. A year ago, the big announcements were around the new JavaFX platform, most of which simply didn’t exist. [...]
I don’t like witch hunts. Apart from anything else, they rarely solve the problems they’re purporting to fix; and don’t bring people any closer to understanding the truth of what’s happening in any given situation. Today, the knives seem to be out for a guy called Blaine Cook, who up until a couple of weeks [...]
There’s been some speculation that the forthcoming 3G iPhone may include a new patented Apple technology - a so-called “integrated sensing display”. This is an LCD screen, with image-sensing elements inserted in between the pixels in the LCD panel. The images detected by the many thousands of sensors can be “stitched” together in software to [...]
Reports suggest that Apple will announce a 3G version of iPhone in June. Whether there will be any new hardware beyond 3G support (presumably the latest version of HSDPA - ‘cos it needs to be) is unclear. My guess is not. That’s not the big question, though. The big question is whether this new version [...]
I thought it was clear. Jonathan Schwartz, CEO of Sun Microsystems said that all of Sun’s software was to be Free and Open Source. I don’t remember the precise date on which this decision was made - but I think it was early 2006. At the end of November 2006, Jonathan wrote the following on [...]