Linked by Nik Tripp on Mon 2nd Mar 2009 21:40 UTC
IT solutions companies have been generating lots of buzz regarding thin clients basically since the early 1990s, but have yet to really penetrate into many suitable environments. These relatively cheap computer appliances carry broad promises like energy efficiency, space efficiency, and centralized maintenance and data storage. These claims could sound like the computer industry equivalent of snake oil. Kiwi-LTSP, a combination of KIWI imaging technology and Linux Terminal Server Project, is one open source solution for thin client servers.
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Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 21:03 UTC
Jon Rubinstein, former CEO of Palm: "Well, I'm not sure I would have sold the company to HP. That's for sure. Talk about a waste. Not that I had any choice because when you sell a company you don't get to decide that. Obviously, the board and shareholders decide that. If we had known they were just going to shut it down and never really give it a chance to flourish, what would have been the point of selling the company? I think the deal we had with Verizon really hurt us, but who knew that at the time? These things are all hindsight."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 20:46 UTC
"And so it is with Dell's Alienware X51 R2, a small form factor gaming PC in console digs. It's shaped similar to Microsoft's Xbox 360 Slim, and though it's slightly larger than either a 360 or PlayStation 3, the X51 R2 would be right at home in a living room setting nestled next to a large screen TV. Indeed, it's adept at running Steam's Big Picture mode, and if your primary objective is to play games in the living room, go ahead and consider the X51 R2 a hybrid game console." This is obviously not the only machine like this - still, these are very valid console alternatives even for those that don't like being hunched over with a cramped WASD-claw. Also, PC gamers among us: could you get away with the $699 model for gaming?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/14/13 17:32 UTC
From Bloomberg: "Microsoft, the world's largest software company, provides intelligence agencies with information about bugs in its popular software before it publicly releases a fix, according to two people familiar with the process. That information can be used to protect government computers and to access the computers of terrorists or military foes." The lid has officially been blown off.More News »
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No. Thin-clients, by definition, do not use local processing, memory, OS, or anything. They boot off the network, they load the OS off the network, and configure themselves to act as an I/O hub (send keyboard/mouse data to the server, display graphics from the server). That's it. A thin-client is a dumb-terminal. Period.
Some vendors (like HP, NeoWare, WySE) have "hybrid" thin-clients, which use a local CPU/RAM/OS (usually WinCE) to boot into a local GUI that then runs an rdesktop client. These things are worthless PoS that are over-priced, under-powered, and give thin-client computing (such as it is) a bad name. Once the OS is loaded, and the rdesktop client connects, then it is back to being a dumb terminal. But, yes, the boot times for these things is horrible, as are the graphical capabilities, which is why we stopped looking at them after testing two variations. A standard P2 266 MHz w/256 MB of RAM performed better.
Of course a dual core and 4GB RAM server would suffice for 30 diskless PCs. That is no doubt, the server would almost act as a file server. Any OS would suffice for that task, even Windows. But I am talking about dumb terminals. There is no way a dual core and 4GB RAM server can drive 40 dumb terminals.
I don't know how many times I can say this: a dual-P3 system with 4 GB of RAM **DOES SUPPORT** 30 thin-clients, where Firefox, Java, OpenOffice.org, and Flash, are all running on the server, with just the display being shot back to the client. WE DO THIS EVERY FRIGGING DAY!! WE HAVE BEEN DOING THIS FOR 7 YEARS ALREADY!!! THIS WORKS!! Get it yet?
Which is absolutely horrible! But, you are running Windows, and we're running Linux (for the clients), which is probably where the disconnect is.
No, no, no, no, no, no and NO!!! You do not understand the difference between a thin-client (dumb terminal) and a diskless PC.
In a thin-client setup, 0 CPU, 0 RAM, 0 processing is done on the client. Everything is done on the server. The client is just an I/O hub: mouse and keyboard events are sent to the server, video is sent back to the client. That's it. The local CPU/RAM is only used to boot the client. Nothing else.
In a diskless client setup, you have a standard PC, with a normal CPU, a normal amount of RAM, a normal videocard, a normal NIC, etc. It's a normal PC. The only difference is that there is no HD, CD, DVD, floppy, etc. The client boots off the network, loads the OS off the network, mounts network shares. The OS runs locally, using the local CPU/RAM. Applications are "downloaded" off the network and run locally. Except for the boot process, there's no difference between using a normal PC and a diskless PC.
Do you see the difference yet?
One runs everything on the server, requiring a massive server and an even more massive network, as everything is pushed down the pipes to the display.
The other loads apps off the server, but runs them locally, allowing you to do anything (even play 3-D games) a normal PC can do. But there are no moving parts to worry about, no harddrives to worry about, no OS installs to worry about, etc.
The *ONLY* similarity between a thin-client setup and a diskless setup is that everything is managed from the server. Need to install new software -- do it on the server and all clients get it instantly. Need to upgrade the client OS? Just upgrade the server, and everyone instantly gets the update. Add a user on the server, and they can login from any client station and get their personal desktop.
Only for diskless clients. You never *have* to upgrade thin-clients. By definition, nothing is run on a thin-client, it's all run on the server. Hence, the local hardware *DOESN'T MATTER*. Period. The only time you replace a thin-client is when the hardware dies. You don't "upgrade" thin-clients.
Yes, for a diskless setup, where you run apps on the local hardware, you may need to upgrade. However, this is where planning ahead comes in, and you make sure that your initial roll-out can handle the apps you will be using for the next 3-5 years. Or, you find a hardware configuration that is so low that it's basically a disposable appliance (like we did -- at $150 each, we don't bother repairing them).
No, no, no, no, and NO! Administering thin-clients and diskless clients *IS THE SAME*. There is nothing to the clients. Everything is done on the server!! They are identical in pretty much every way ... except where the application runs (on the server vs on the client).
For some uses, yes, thin-clients are future-proof. But not for all applications, as the network and server disk are the bottlenecks.
No they don't, as there are no HDs or optical drives sucking power and requiring cooling. And you can build diskless clients using low-power CPUs, chipsets, and videocards.
We can do this as well, thanks to NX. It's one of our key selling points to the schools, as they always have access to their school destktop and files, even from Windows machines. Including "suspend" where you login from one machine, suspend the connection, and reconnect from another machine.
Thin-client solutions like the SunRay have their place. But they don't compare to diskless solutions when you leave the realm of simple web browsing and office documents.