Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 30th Nov 2009 23:45 UTC
Yesterday (today if you're in the US), Sun released the latest version of its virtualisation solution, VirtualBox 3.1. Among speed improvements and other smaller features, the biggest news is that Virtualox 3.1 introduces something called teleportation: you can move running VMs between machines - servers or clients, different architectures, different host operating systems, it doesn't matter to VirtualBox. Coincidentally, this reminded me of an idea I once had about moving running applications between machines.
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RE: Email between multiple machines
by vortex on Tue 1st Dec 2009 00:54
in reply to "Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2009-12-01
RE: Email between multiple machines
by Delgarde on Tue 1st Dec 2009 01:19
in reply to "Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2008-08-19
Gmail.
While probably sufficient, that's not quite there though. You can certainly write a draft email on machine and continue it on another, but you still have to make a conscious action to fetch the email from the draft folder.
Thom's idea seems to have as much to do with preserving the entire application session in the state you left it. Fairly easy for a web app like GMail, somewhat harder for desktop apps...
RE[2]: Email between multiple machines
by umccullough on Tue 1st Dec 2009 01:42
in reply to "RE: Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2006-01-26
Thom's idea seems to have as much to do with preserving the entire application session in the state you left it. Fairly easy for a web app like GMail, somewhat harder for desktop apps...
Well yeah, I understand - but the likelihood that it will happen between disparate systems running different OSes (I know arguably, one could eventually run the same OS on a phone and desktop) in the next few years is pretty slim IMO.
In the meantime, I enjoy roaming Gmail chat discussions between multiple machines, and the nearly-instant availability of drafts from one machine to another.
Enter Google Wave protocol and it's even more instantaneous compared to GMail as each participant of the wave is receiving live updates instantly.
You could conceivably manage a program's running state as a Wave instead...
RE[2]: Email between multiple machines
by sbenitezb on Tue 1st Dec 2009 04:33
in reply to "RE: Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2005-07-22
RE[2]: Email between multiple machines
by Thom_Holwerda on Tue 1st Dec 2009 09:57
in reply to "RE: Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2005-06-29
Exactly. Think about this one, for instance.
I watch my television series on two computers - I have an HTPC in my bedroom as well as my living room. They both draw from the same storage space. OFten, however, I won't be able to finish watching an episode on f. ex. my bedroom HTPC before I go to sleep - so I pause. Wouldn't it be handy if instead of having to remember where I left off and scrub until that point on the other computer, I could just drag the video player to the other machine, preserving its state?
It sounds very handy to me, but it would probably require a heck of a lot of work, and I'm not sure if it is a desirable enough a feature.
Edited 2009-12-01 09:58 UTC
RE: Email between multiple machines
by ggeldenhuys on Tue 1st Dec 2009 10:17
in reply to "Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2006-11-13
That's what IMAP is for! ISP's simply use POP3 because they don't want to store everybody's email - which is fair I guess. But IMAP so a SO MUCH BETTER protocol for email. Mail is stored remotely including folders and filters. The IMAP server notifies you about new mail, you don't have to keep polling it ever 10 minutes, etc...
I move back and forth between my mobile phone, home desktop and work desktop. I personal emails are all store remotely via IMAP and is always accessible from any device, even my web mail frontend reads from the IMAP server.
RE[2]: Email between multiple machines
by umccullough on Tue 1st Dec 2009 15:20
in reply to "RE: Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2006-01-26
even my web mail frontend reads from the IMAP server.
But does your webmail frontend automatically save your draft email progress as you're writing it so you can go to any other machine and resume where you left off?
It's pretty handy this way in case you accidentally close your browser while writing an email, or the machine you're on dies (read: laptop on battery) - you just go to another machine and fire up gmail and there's your draft.
RE: Email between multiple machines
by felipe_alfaro on Tue 1st Dec 2009 15:37
in reply to "Email between multiple machines"
Member since:2006-04-16
This doesn't work. Teleportation requires the VM to be stored in shared storage. Hence, if you teleport your VM to your laptop, you won't be able to use it while on the train since the VM will not be stored on your local disk but on the network (and I doubt you can access your network from the train).
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Google added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 21:41 UTC
Glass is getting some love at Google I/O as well. New applications have been released - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Elle, Tumblr, and CNN. Perhaps more interesting: the newly announced Google Glass Developer Kit will allow offline applications and direct hardware access - great for hacking and expanding Glass' potential. This kit will really allow hackers to put Glass through its paces.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 17:04 UTC
"But Beck and Merrill decided that simply banning toxic players wasn't an acceptable solution for their game. Riot Games began experimenting with more constructive modes of player management through a formal player behavior initiative that actually conducts controlled experiments on its player base to see what helps reduce bad behavior. The results of that initiative have been shared at a lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on panels at the Penny Arcade Expo East and the Game Developers Conference." Absolutely fascinating stuff. I'm a League of Legends player, and to be honest, the community isn't nearly as bad as some make it out to be. I'm happy Riot games has the guts to employ science to address the issue.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 13:17 UTC
"Android and iOS, the number one and number two ranked smartphone operating systems worldwide, combined for 92.3% of all smartphone shipments during the first quarter of 2013 as Windows Phone crept past BlackBerry for 3rd place. According to the International Data Corporation Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, Android smartphone vendors and Apple shipped a total of 199.5 million units worldwide during 1Q13, up 59.1% from the 125.4 million units shipped during 1Q12." Windows Phone doubles from a few to twice few, iOS loser market share as its growth is slower than that of the overall market. BlackBerry continues slide into irrelevance.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/16/13 12:06 UTC
"According to the latest research from our Wireless Smartphone Strategies service, global Android smartphone profits reached US$5 billion in total during the first quarter of 2013. Samsung dominated and captured an impressive 95 percent share of all Android smartphone profits." Wow.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/15/13 23:03 UTC
"During its Keynote today, Google announced new features coming to its flagship search function - you know, that thing we all started using Google for. VP Amit Singhal spent some time discussing what Google's search functionality will eventually morph into. Google's strategy is summarized by three words: answer, converse, and anticipate. Singhal explained that many of the pieces of these upcoming changes can already be seen in products that Google has recently introduced - namely, Google Knowledge Graph and Google Now, with perhaps a splash of Google Glass, too." I hold on to my hat every time Google changes Search. It's such a vital product in my daily life.More News »
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2006-01-26
Gmail.