Clouds: Fast, Slow, Broken
March 6, 2010
Measuring cloud speed is one of those chores aspiring meteorologists must endure. Here’s a snapshot of what’s involved. My source is Charles F. Brooks, The Use of Clouds in Forecasting, page 1167:
The quickest way of getting cloud motions is with a window-sill nephoscope consisting of a plane, black, horizontal mirror of eight to ten inches diameter, with- out markings on the mirror other than a depression at the center, and a peephole eyepiece through which the observer can watch the motion of the image of a cloud and follow it with a small marker. When followed for a standard period (or easy fraction or multiple), the direction and relative speed are determined with a single placement of a ruler,
Whew. That’s going to take some hunting here in Harrod’s Creek. I wonder if the gun and ammo shop has a nephoscope.
I was thinking about cloud speed when I read “Steve Ballmer’s Memo To Microsoft Staff: “We Must Move At Cloud Speed”. I think the idea is for Microsoft to move quickly. As I said in my SSN Minute today, Microsoft is turning to Cray to help Microsoft with its data center issues. My hunch is that if Microsoft moves too quickly its plumbing might not be able to keep pace. Here’s the snippet that caught my attention in the write up:
We have strong competitors. We need to be (and are) willing to change our business models to take advantage of the cloud. We must move at “cloud speed,” especially in our consumer offerings. And we need to be crystal clear about the value we provide to all our customers. To drive our message home even further, today you will see an ad campaign in the U.S. focused on our commercial and government businesses, a new website with consolidated content and case studies, and ongoing emphasis on the cloud from me and other members of the SLT in our upcoming speeches and presentations.
I will be most interested to see how Microsoft Fast, the enterprise search product, performs as a cloud service. I recall the good old days of the application service providers (ASP) and hosted Exchange. The cloud was moving slowly. Will Microsoft Fast move quickly as indexes update and queries get processed? There are fast clouds and there are slow clouds? Which will be the cloud for Microsoft Fast?
Stephen E Arnold, March 6, 2010
No one paid me to write this. I have to report unpaid writing to NOAA, an outfit that understands but is not yet able to control clouds. Someday I expect. Someday.
Quote to Note: Cloud Revenue Potential
March 5, 2010
Thinkq.com yielded a quote to note. “Microsoft Spies a Billion Dollars in Cloud” reported that Stephen Elop, head of Microsoft business software unit, allegedly said:
Three years, five years, is it [cloud services] a billion-dollar business? I’m quite certain it will be.
I have marked my calendar.
Stephen E Arnold, March 2, 2010
A freebie. Because I mentioned a calendar, I think I must report to NIST, a clock and calendar manager of some repute.
Did Microsoft Go Down the Wrong Path in Data Centers?
March 5, 2010
Microsoft has spent big bucks on its data centers. If you browse through my Microsoft data center articles in this blog, you will see that Microsoft has reversed course several times. With the economic downturn, Microsoft curtailed some of its plans. A management shift took place and now Microsoft is going where no Google competitor has gone before.
According to “Cray and Microsoft Join Forces on Cloud Datacenters,” Microsoft is turning to one of the giants of yore in supercomputers for technical help. For me the most interesting segment in the write up was:
The alliance is the first step into the commercial market for Cray’s custom engineering group, which was formed in 2008. The group builds special-purpose supercomputers for individual customers, applying Cray technologies such as the EcoPhlex liquid-cooling system and providing custom data-management and consulting systems. Last summer, Cray said the custom engineering division was growing more quickly than the rest of the company.
My reaction to this announcement was:
- Is Microsoft going through another course change?
- With Cray venturing into a forest for the first time, will its engineers know where to find food and water and how to avoid the bears and snakes?
- How much will this new tie up cost?
Windows 7’s cash may be rolling in, but Microsoft may be running out of time to get the plumbing right. Bad plumbing means that Microsoft Fast will forever be a local install and that may be good for consultants but not so hot for licensees who want to get free of the hockey stick costs for that type of service.
Without plumbing, Google will win because Microsoft cannot deliver. Just my opinion.
Stephen E Arnold, March 5, 2010
No one paid me to write this article. I will report this miserable situation to the GSA, an outfit able to remediate bad plumbing wherever there is a Federal facility.
Godzilla Haiku
March 5, 2010
In 2004, I started describing Google as Googzilla. No one really picked up on this word. I keep using it. Now that Google has lots of legal woes, many enemies, and has to go to the United Nations to get help with China, this picture struck me as poignant.
The source is http://i.imgur.com/E7K36.jpg.
Stephen E Arnold, March 5, 2010
No one paid me to write this. I suppose Googzilla is related to UFOs. The outfit that once had an affinity for UFOs and missing hard drives is LANL. I will report unidentified no payment to this fine group.
ISYS Gets Qurius
March 5, 2010
ISYS Search Solutions has announced that it will partner with IT company Qurius, N.V. to help organizations “ease Microsoft SharePoint data migration costs and complexities” by allowing fast, accurate results from queries made across the enterprise. “Organisations [sic] can fully leverage their knowledge assets” said ISYS VP Nicky Doherty, allowing them “to remain competitively strong in their respective markets.” This partnership is key for organizations using the SharePoint infrastructure, as ISYS’s new Enterprise Server will deliver “federated access solutions” with the help of Qurius’s system management.
Sam Hartman, March 4, 2010
ArnoldIT.com paid Mr. Hartman to write this news item.
Kiss Your Desktop Goodbye Asserts Googler
March 5, 2010
Now I know that Google hires only the world’s smartest individuals. Well, I know of one exception. There’s a fellow in sales at Google who does not read Google technical papers or patents, but everyone else is just so smart it makes my pinfeathers quiver with the excitement of it all.
The story in Silicon Republic has a peculiar title which is the main point of the article; specifically, “In Three Years Desktops Will Be Irrelevant – Google Sales Chief.” The “sales chief” is obviously a sales person, and his name is John Herlihy. The point, in my view, is that most folks will be doing Webby things via a mobile device, probably an Android-based gizmo.
For me, the key segment in the write up was:
The digital world is fundamentally different to the traditional business world. Things happen much faster, websites spring up from nowhere, a video could be a YouTube hit in hours. It’s not good enough to apply normal management disciplines – we think that scarcity breeds clarity. If, for example, we have enough resources invested in something, we halve it and eliminate overheads. The other thing we do is celebrate failure. Here’s an analogy – the Roman legions used to send out scouts in different directions. If a scout didn’t return, the army didn’t head in that direction. We seek feedback at every opportunity on something – we either kill it, adjust it or redeploy resources. When we build something we strive for ubiquity in usage and adoption. That helps us understand how customers react and then we build a revenue model.
Okay, let’s think about this. First, I understand the “failure” idea. Buzz is a pretty good example as is the legal decision in Italy, the European anti trust thing, the hassle with China, and legal dust up brewing over the Apple HTC patent squabble. So, I think the “failure” idea is solid.
Where does fact leave off and marketing begin? Source: http://elephanthunters.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/used-car-salesman-cropped.jpg
What’s not so solid is the notion of seeking feedback. The Google system monitors. When a person has a problem with Nexus One, Google had automated software in place but it wasn’t enough. There was no seeking. Users pushed themselves into Google’s semi automated spaces and Google scrambled to react. I still hear from potential customers that it is tough to get someone from Google to call them back, answer email, and keep appointments. When a gaffe occurs, Google turns to a “partner” in some cases. Maybe Mr. Herlihy is fixing up this confusion about seek and feedback, but I think the track record in the last 90 days is pretty easy to read.
The Google PSE circa 2007 Becomes News
March 4, 2010
Yep, another big surprise for the Google mavens, pundits, and azure chip crowd. You can get a good snapshot of the “discovery” at “Google Index to Go Real Time.” The big idea is that a Web publisher can “automatically submit new content to Google.” The news is a bit stale in my opinion. If you take a peek at the five patent documents submitted by Google in February 2007, you can get the full scoop, see code examples, and learn that this “method” has some interesting plumbing; namely, the context server. The inventor of this “new” method is a bright fellow in the Google engineering den. For the detail about this news, which dates from late 2005 or early 2006, check out US200700386616. The four related patent documents (filed on the same day by the way) and the team’s post PSE filings provide more color. The real question is, “What’s next?” I discuss this question in my 2007 monograph, Google Version 2.0, published in mid 2007 by Infonortics Ltd. in Tetbury, Glos. In my opinion reading about a fait accompli is probably not the best way to stay abreast of Google’s technology trajectory. The patent documents make clear how the method works. Let’s see. This is 2010, a bit more than three years since the patent documents appeared. This interval is a typical Google “deployment” interval. Check out the context server and ask, “What’s with this semantic Web stuff?”
Stephen E Arnold, March 4, 2010
No one paid me to write this post. When I get royalties, my publisher sometimes pay me. So I suppose this is a self funded post.
Analyze SEO on the Go
March 4, 2010
Novel angle for SEO crossed our desk on March 3, 2010.
Pear Analytics, a San Antonio based SEO firm, has just released their mobile app, Website Analyzer, as an iPhone and soon to be iPad application. The firm’s press release describes the app as a simple tool that “analyzes any website or blog by scanning the site and a variety of data sources to determine how ‘SEO-friendly’ the site is.” The result is returned within 30 seconds as a non-technical report, and will store up to ten reports in memory, or available in e-mail form. In addition, the report includes tips on how to improve ratings or potential issues. A short video demonstration by social media guru Alan Weinkrantz can be found on YouTube.com.
Pear Analytics designed the app for clients on-the-go, including “boutique ad agencies and web development shops,” who counsel others on SEO issues. While Pear develops higher end SEO solutions, this mobile app, similar to their free online SEO Analysis tool, provides keen insight about any site in seconds. The Website Analyzer seems like a promising tool.
Sam Hartman, March 5, 2010
ArnoldIT.com paid Mr. Hartman to write this news item.
Quote to Note: Most Stolen eBooks
March 4, 2010
I read “E-Book Piracy Costs U.S. Publishers $3 Billion, Says Study” and was genuinely surprised to learn that something other than technical books were stolen. The most stolen books? Here’s the quote to note:
On average, nearly 10,000 copies of every book published are downloaded for free,” the report concludes. Business and investing books are stolen the most, at an average 13,000 copies per title.
Now what about those ethics classes in business school? Ever wonder why certain clauses creep into legal agreements on little cat’s feet?
Stephen E Arnold, March 4, 2010
No one paid me to capture this quote. I feel as though I should report non payment to the US Postal Service which seems to have cornered the market on doing work for modest compensation.
IBM: Database or Public Relations Wizardry?
March 4, 2010
I cannot figure out if IBM has revealed a breakthrough in technology or publications. You will have to make up your own mind. Navigate to “Putting the Web in a Spreadsheet”. The write up explains that IBM has used Hadoop and its own code called Big Sheets to help make sense of Web information. According to the write up:
BigSheets uses Hadoop to crawl through Web pages, parsing them to extract key terms and other useful data. BigSheets organizes this information in a very large spreadsheet, where users can analyze it using the sort of tools and macros found in desktop spreadsheet software. Unlike ordinary spreadsheet software, however, there’s no limit to the size of a spreadsheet created through BigSheets.
The example in the article is the British Library’s use of the technology as part of an archive project. The article said:
The first test for BigSheets came at the British Library, which has been working since 2004 to create an archive of the roughly eight million UK websites. At regular intervals, the Library takes snapshots of Web pages, converts them to an archival file format, and stores them. But searching and analyzing this data is another challenge, and that’s where BigSheets came in.
IBM, according to the article will use this technology in future products. I will reserve judgment. I did write about the British Library taking months to create an archive of Web sites, noting that the project seemed to be moving slowly. The disconnect in my mind remains because this Web in a Spreadsheet write up suggests that the British Library has an archive of eight million Web sites, not a few thousand. More information is needed.
I don’t know if this is technology or PR.
Stephen E Arnold, March 3, 2010
No one paid me to write this. Since I mention IBN, recipient of a large US government integration project, I will report the fact that I wrote for no dough to IBM Federal Systems, a unit which does work for dough.
Stephen E
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
