Hello guys… hope you all are doing fine…..
Couple of weeks back I had a very interesting email conversation with one of my friends over Cloud Computing. The debate was whether Cloud OS which is a facet of cloud computing would stand tall and adhere to the ever growing appetite of future humans or should I say humanoids. Thought I would preserve the conversation here. So here it goes...
Mail by MeHi All,
Clouds are thundering my friends...
Check out this tool which claim to take computing to the web
http://lifehacker.com/5208903/icloud-takes-your-computing-to-the-web
The article also spoke about the two cloud operating systems EyeOS and Glide.
http://lifehacker.com/364873/set-up-a-web+based-desktop-with-eyeos
http://lifehacker.com/394146/glide-web+based-desktop-now-syncs-local-files
Microsoft has Azure to take over the clouds.
I am sure google would have something coming soon... after all google would just need to integrate its existing stuffs.
Geekiii...
Friend
This looks pretty useless to me. For one you need to boot into your present OS and then log on to the internet and then again boot into your web based OS. Its like doing a remote desktop to a machine on the internet and then using it. Secondly you'll need very good internet connection (in India this is a myth).
I think the future is in low cost low weight netbooks. You can carry them anywhere you want and they have very good battery life.
For LAN based environments this may just be useful, but there's already no.of solutions available like thin clients which many universities already use.
Ameya, I am curios to know as to why you think this is a useful product?
Mail by Me
Hi Friend,
Well I am just curious about every second thing.. but thats just me.
Yes you are right in terms of saying its pretty useless considering the current day usages.
But these are the initial steps towards cloud computing which I believe is the future of High speed on the run computing.
Internet speed is a dismal in India, but that’s just India where internet is still a commodity rather then a “Janam sid Adhikar” ;)
We rank 115th in the Internet speed chart.
South Korea has an average Internet speed of 15mbps
http://www.techpark.net/2009/04/08/internet-connection-speed-the-top-10-countries/
I think that should a sufficient speed to run application like Cloud OS.
Companies like Google had already proved that internet storage had become inexpensive.
Low cost low weight notebooks are the future, but they still might be running a hefty OS like Win VistaXXX which would require XGB RAM.
Current scenario: I asked my office hardware people to upgrade my Lappy with 2 GB RAM and they laughed right on my face.
“2GB are you serious”
But I still managed to successfully upgrade my office Lappy from 512 to 1 GB RAM... and that is an achievement as only few manager have got it.
You must have heard of Kindle 2
Check this out
http://astore.amazon.com/kinddle-20/detail/B00154JDAI
http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/chris-dannen/techwatch/kindle-2-wont-change-your-life-someday-kindle-3-will
Approx Rs. 16000 in India
This slim device is Wireless enabled and has a built in browser using which you can download eBooks.
Drawback the browsing is grayscale, but it supports display of Microsoft Word, PDF, HTML, TXT, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, PRC...
You never know Kindle 3 might have a beefed up processor and browser which would allow us to render better graphics.
And such a device could become one of the first clients of Cloud OS
Kindle 3 with Cloud OS - could be renamed as Low Cost Low Weight notebooks in the future.
Regarding on the run internet, cities like Taipei have proved the ability of wireless internet by becoming a completely Wireless city
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taipei
Clouds OS are no way replacements for Desktop OS, it would certain have its own set of Enterprise user and on the run users.
Slowly we might even see the gap between Desktop OS and Cloud OS becoming shorter and shorter.
Well it’s all in the future… and we all would certainly have fun seeing how it unfolds.
Friend
Hi Ameya,
I somehow think that there are just too many variables that go into using cloud computing. To name a few:
- Stable browser
- Good Internet connection
- What OS will the cloud deliver you? Do you like this OS? Does it run all the applications you want?
- If its Windoze, you'd better know for sure that its going to come at a good cost! (unlike free google products/services)
- Windoze (unfortunately) is still the most widely used OS. Most useable softwares on Windoze come at a cost, who pays for it?
- If you need 2GB ram to run applications on your windoze lappy, then most likely you'll need the same amount on your part of cloud.
Its very likely your cost/convienience ratio boils down to the same as you would have in a normal lappy scenario. If they really manage to get all of this sorted out, think about the blow it would give to the hardware manufacturers! I am pretty sure hardware manufacturers would come up with something even more fantastic/competitve to offset this! .
This sounds like a tough sell to me, but as you rightly said that if gaints like google come into this they could provide more value and make this a reality!
As far as Kindle goes I would much rather put in a few more $$ and get a netbook which can do a lot more things for me and probably as portable as a Kindle. http://eeepc.asus.com/global/product1000.html
Bulky OS are going to be a thing of the past, Windows 7 promises to be sleeker and more fun to use. I am yet to try out the beta version.
Mail by Me
Just to share a news article which I had read a couple of days ago.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7969458.stm
It was about the fight for ownership rights in cloud computing strategy and the proposal to make the tech open...
Big brand companies including Google are actively intrested in it.
If Google and Nasa are intrested in something that means their labs are already working on it ;)
