Software application development
This blog is intended to provoke discussion and exchange between like minded software application developers, engineers, architects, project managers - and keen hobbyists too.
Tuesday 11 March 2008, 5:33 PM
Technology research labs: pure vs. applied
I had a meeting with IBM’s head of research at its Rational User Conference last year in Orlando and got into a discussion about the process for R&D as it actually happens in the lab. I liked the fact that Big Blue takes a two pronged approach to research and has both a “pure” and “applied” team of boffins beavering away in relative isolation from each other.
The idea, according to IBM, is as follows:
PURE: This is a team a wacky way out “hey let’s see what happens if we put this application in a microwave and set the power to full” developer guys (and gals) whose mindset is finely tuned to the “let’s play with it until it breaks” principle of research. These guys are real ‘out of the box’ thinkers who want to develop new applications just because they have never been developed before.
APPLIED: This rather less excitable but equally talented team take a more empirical approach to R&D and, when reviewing the PURE team’s work, might just be overheard muttering things like “well, that’s a crazy idea that would never work in the real world” – but they may take just a pinch of that craziness and use it to temper some of the existing application development that’s going on.
I just liked the duality of it. The fact that we can be crazy with application development, then semi-sensible semi-crazy afterwards seems like a nice world to live in. Why dig up this thought today? Only because I understand from the news round up this afternoon that Yahoo! has launched a new research lab in Haifa, Israel. I have a pal working in Tel Aviv in IT (hello Guy!) and he always tells me what a hotbed of innovation Israel is for tech R&D. You only have to look at the number of new media technologies that came out of the place to know that there is a fair bit of truth in this.
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Yahoo!’s lab will, according to Yahoo! focus on, “Boiling down complex technology problems into simple solutions to change the game in web search.”
“Search is still in its infancy,” said Prabhakar Raghavan, head of Yahoo! Research. “At Yahoo!, we are working on the hard core science that can lead to search experiences that are significantly beyond the current art.”
I was supposed to follow up a story on Intel in Haifa some time back but trouble flared up just beforehand so I was unable to go. It’s a shame really, I’d love to know what makes the place such a creative centre for information technology.
So there you have it – more R&D, this time in the Holy Land rather than Disneyland.
Sunday 9 March 2008, 10:52 AM
Turning up TV ads with data
I need to settle a long running argument as to whether the TV companies can turn up the volume of advertisements by altering the amount of data they “force” down the pipe (so to speak) into my set. Embarrassingly, I used to work as a transmission engineer for a TV station in Rome – so I should know this – but I don’t.
The theory… and the crux therefore of this data-related pub discussion. Is that they can’t actually turn the volume up, but that they can ‘compact’ the data packets that are transmitted down the line so that sound is richer, harder, heavier and basically, louder.
I stress, this is a pub-based tech theory and may hold very little water. But I can’t find solid proof.
Herb Weisbaum wrote a piece on this last year on his
MSNBC pages. Interestingly, he quotes CNET’s own Brian Dooley who talks about “perceived loudness.”
Weisbaum himself says, “They want to grab your attention. To do that, the audio track is electronically processed to make every part of it as loud as possible within legal limits.”
Maybe they are compacting data, maybe they are post-production processing it, maybe they’re just actually physically turning the sound up – either way, I’m switching channels or making a cup of tea.
Thursday 6 March 2008, 10:09 AM
Migration frustration across the nation
Oh no, not another data migration story! Well, no actually, just a passing mention to say that this year migration could just be one of those IT vendor-speak buzzwords that you are more than just a little tired of hearing by the time you’re stuffing your Christmas pudding full of USB sticks.
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Why all the fuss? It seems like the migration vendors have found a new raison d’etre and a new line or argument to extol the virtues of their ground breaking state of the art high performance solutions (did I really just say that?).
According to the vendors… the “motivation” for data migration has fundamentally changed. Historically, migrations were often due to issues such as re-platforming applications in order to decrease costs and increase efficiency (IT issues). Today, apparently, the motivation for migrations is increasingly due to revenue drivers (business issues). This change, if it’s real, may signal a shift in responsibility for migrations from IT to the business.
Actually, that’s kind of hard not to agree with. I’m just wary of being told that this is – and I quote, “A fundamental, far-reaching change of huge significance.” Blimey!
Data migration is often presented as an opportunity to actually improve the quality, quantity and storage of data. For large enterprises migration can make up around half of the initial project costs, so you can bet our migration vendors are going to keep hammering home the ROI (return on investment) message here.
Sifting through the pdfs, press releases, white papers and backgrounders I found one point that I think is worth mentioning from an outfit called Celona who say that while every development environment is unique, only about 20% of it is actually different – meaning that 80% of the issues are common to all environments. That commonality points to an opportunity for automation, which allows the business to benefit from previously-developed technology and hard-won experience.
If we heard more of the stuff I’ve mentioned in the last paragraph above and less of the whole “game-changing” whiz-bang marketing-speak then I personally think we’d take this kind of technology issue more seriously. But then, that’s just my opinion.
Tuesday 4 March 2008, 9:56 AM
Do we need visibility into open source?
The searchlight seems to be shining on open source software more than ever right now asking for visibility into form and function to ensure vulnerabilities and instabilities are avoided. HP’s recent FOSSology announcement claimed to launch an initiative to, “Facilitate the study of free and open source software by providing free data analysis tools.”
While these developments appear to be, on the surface at least, creditable programmes to further the cause of quality code creation – one can’t help being drawn to a quietly sceptical thought that these processes (even in the world of open source) will always be engaged in by vendors with one eye on profits. So what’s the real issue at hand here?
The problem, I think, may be down to the fact that open source software development is not inherently more risky - but it is the nature of the way development is done that allows potential issues to arise. Specifically, I mean that there is often less documentation, annotation, reporting and recording in open source.
I read a research study on this from Palamida (a company that bills itself as a specialist in application security & vulnerability detection for open source) and they say that their professional services group last year viewed hundreds of millions of lines of code in applications across multiple industries – and that it was rare for them to find an application that was not made up of at least 50% open source.
Palamida’s study says that these are the factors to question yourself on if you work in open source: what open source code are you using, where are you using it, how much do you have, what security vulnerabilities are associated with it and what are your rights for using it?
So where do we go from here? Well, some say that as open source software gets better and better – there is a possibility that its success will form part of its downfall (or core flaw least). If it works just “too darn well” then a programmer may simply pull down some code from the web, configure it into his or her system and then forget it – leaving no documentation or records to support a fellow coder who comes along three years later with the task or a major reconfiguration and system upgrade.
But no need to worry – that type of thing never happens in the real world. Right?
Saturday 1 March 2008, 6:48 PM
Andy Warhol eat your heart out
I seem to have written so much about designers integrating with developers (mainly due to Rich Internet Applications I guess) that the word ‘designer’ feels like it’s becoming part of my core developer vocabulary these days. Maybe this isn’t such a weird thing - as a journalist, talking to page layout designers (hi Jerry!) is part and parcel of the work that I normally do. Plus, having started using photos in my blogs far more regularly now makes them much easier on the eye for sure. So an appreciation for code, structure and form, for me, goes hand in hand with making things look good.
With that thought in mind, I went off on a bit of a design daydream this weekend and started looking around at how software for web designers is integrating with the more “artistic” type of software packages normally associated with the design department. On my web travels I came across a community-based web site for designers called ilovedesign.com – this place allows users to create their own profiles and upload samples of their own design work. I don’t know about you, but there’s something about this being web based that makes me suddenly fancy myself as the next Andy Warhol.
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In much the same style as rather less serious ‘ratings’ style web sites, this site allows users to search, view, and rate designs uploaded by other members. The site creator (Quark) says that, “The content of the site is largely user generated and the aim is to create a platform where designers can showcase their work, be inspired by the work of others and discuss their love of design.”
Anyway, after I fire up every image manipulation app I’ve got tucked away in my MacBook Pro I might just have a stab at the ‘design of the week’ competition. I guess this is segmentation of social networking to a level we may not have considered so far – this is social networking for designers.
Whatever next I wonder, social networking for technical journalists perhaps? Would I sign up for that? Don’t even ask.
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