Whats next?
So I'm listening to all these podcasts and such and I am hearing about cloud computing and I'm like yeah thats nothing new. People have been doing this for years. But something has fundamentally changed. It's not just email and web browsers or blogging and what have you. Its music, Its document storage and retrieval its collaboration software. I'm going to list some common Stand alone apps that didn't exist on the web until recently. And don't take me literally they may have existed in some form or fashion before I called them but they are widely known of and accepted today.
There is a whole slew of stuff from Google.
Google Reader
Google Documents
Gmail (ok Web mail isn't new) but you are more likely to leave your mail setting on the server now.
Firefox Just a browser? No to call Firefox just a browser would be wrong. It's a Web Platform
FireFTP An addon of the Firefox Web Platform
Blogs in general.
Pandora Music. An interesting Idea in music. You plugin a song or artist and it builds a list from that song/artist(s)
Meebo A web based Multi-IM client. Think of it as Trillian on the web. No extras but basic IM
These are just the ones I am using at the moment.
So what does this mean for the future of the home computer. That technically the computers will have lots of Ram and Processor to handle these new applications and bandwidth will have to increase as well. Storage will only be necessary on the home unit as a means of personal files you want to keep there for security reasons. Everything will be available on the web. Its a nice and terrifying Idea that everything that you want or need will be available from the "cloud" as they are calling it.
Now your thinking Great this will save all kinds of resources .. HURK HURK... Um no. It uses the same amount of resources as a local program they just get grouped under one application. Which is bad. because it creates a greater failure point if that one application you build off of fails due to a bad plugin or addon. So beware when working in the cloud. May be hazardous to your data.
PERSONAL NOTE: hard to type when you have a headache. harder even still to have a thought flow out onto screen)
I have more I would like to talk about but I will have to try again sometime.
There is a whole slew of stuff from Google.
Google Reader
Google Documents
Gmail (ok Web mail isn't new) but you are more likely to leave your mail setting on the server now.
Firefox Just a browser? No to call Firefox just a browser would be wrong. It's a Web Platform
FireFTP An addon of the Firefox Web Platform
Blogs in general.
Pandora Music. An interesting Idea in music. You plugin a song or artist and it builds a list from that song/artist(s)
Meebo A web based Multi-IM client. Think of it as Trillian on the web. No extras but basic IM
These are just the ones I am using at the moment.
So what does this mean for the future of the home computer. That technically the computers will have lots of Ram and Processor to handle these new applications and bandwidth will have to increase as well. Storage will only be necessary on the home unit as a means of personal files you want to keep there for security reasons. Everything will be available on the web. Its a nice and terrifying Idea that everything that you want or need will be available from the "cloud" as they are calling it.
Now your thinking Great this will save all kinds of resources .. HURK HURK... Um no. It uses the same amount of resources as a local program they just get grouped under one application. Which is bad. because it creates a greater failure point if that one application you build off of fails due to a bad plugin or addon. So beware when working in the cloud. May be hazardous to your data.
PERSONAL NOTE: hard to type when you have a headache. harder even still to have a thought flow out onto screen)
I have more I would like to talk about but I will have to try again sometime.