iConverged

So the rumors of many years ago were true. Google finally did release a browser. Naturally, I downloaded it and took it for a test drive. Here is the short of it.

Version reviewed:

Google may be rolling out updates regularly (For example, I suddenly see evident popup blocking), so to put it in context, this is the version I am reviewing

Installation:

The installer is just around 470K to download, but of course that is the ‘pre-installer’. Once you grab the pre-installer, it downloads the rest of the browser from the net. As of now, in its first release, focus seems to be on super simplicity. It does not even ask you where to install it. I am OK with that, but it really does choose a weird location to install it (in Documents and Settings!)

(click on any image to see a full size version)

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Image credit

Yahoo recently launched Fire-Eagle, which is essentially an ‘open platform’ that allows two simple things:

A) Users can update the system whenever they want with their location

B) Application Developers can access the system whenever they want to know the location of consumers and do anything with it (i.e. serve any application that can make use of that information)

Of course, ‘Users’ can explictly set permissions on who can or cannot view their location.

For a long time, I have wanted to see such an open and simple platform, where ‘executing a service based on location’ is completely independent of ‘the technology used to provide the location’. Because I believe providing individually accessible repositories of data is the key construct to building a hierarchy of innovative products. You collect data, expose it to others so they can transform your data into information. And your information, is data for the next application. So turns the wheel of the Web 2.0 circle. And a location repository is one key missing element to personalize services.

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(image credit to Engadget)

Ever since iPhone SDK got released, we have seen a lot of requests from customers wanting us to build iPhone apps. Naturally, we have loved to oblige -after all, we love hacking on new platforms.

The biggest problem, however, was not being able to run background applications, which KOed out a lot of neat things one could do, especially for location related apps. At the keynote today at WWDC, Scott Forstall said this:

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If you are in this emerging ‘applications’ market, and are in the business of building applications for OEMs/ISVs or Service Providers (yes, some Operators actively invest in R&D work), the term ‘Rapid Prototype’ is not new to you. In short, people are always looking at ‘quick and dirty’ demonstration code that shows off a cool concept which they can take to prospective customers as a viable product or service to be rolled out. Customers who ask for this are not sure if that idea will go anywhere, but are willing to test the waters with you (if you are willing). A typical software development organization follows the ‘Build Rome one stone at a time’ model whereas this particular market needs the ‘pre-fab modular home in 1 month’ model and therefore struggles with this particular market. I know of many organizations who  believe this is not an area to be in, because of the limited scope and length of such projects. The problem however, is that they fail to understand that this market is actually very attractive and profitable, but only if you look at it the right way, and approach it the right way. Last week, I was chatting up with a friend on the same issue and was sharing some insights into what one should try and institute to make this model work. He suggested a blog post, so here goes - some common problems, pitfalls and solutions:

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Hi folks, as promised, HSC released the ported SIP UA including the stack. This is an update to our previous ’stack only’ release. We have overwritten the old release with this new one in our download area. You can get it from here (look for the post titled “SIP UA + Stack for Google Android).

This release includes a short illustrative manual on how to use the SIP client and some things you need to do to configure it (mostly because of the limitation of the android emulator and what it does(not) support as of the current date). We have also included a ported RTP stack with this release. Theoretically, this release is all set for a signalling + media use case. I say theoretically, because it seems the android emulator does not support audio capture, so everytime one tries to start a media conversation, the emulator crashes. Folks @ the android-dev group have confirmed this is currently not supported in the emulator (but works on their actual phone).

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I had the opportunity to do a sneak preview of Microsoft’s popfly mashup platform a few months ago. Based on the quick look, at that point of time, it was just a prettier looking  version of Yahoo! Pipes. However, another peek a few months later and I am much more impressed. I must admit that till now, of all the mashup editors I have evaluated, Google Mashup Editor has been my favorite. And that was because I truly feel powerful mashups which are globally useful will be written by developers, not my grandmom, so the interface need to provide more powers and not just pretty ‘connectors’.

I must admit, Popfly on second look has good potential.

So here is my quick analysis of why I think it is like Pipes, like GME, like Facebook and somewhat different. In other words, I think Microsoft has been watching how the others do it, and picked some good features from all, along with some very irritating ones.

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My apologies for the delayed 2007 round-up. We are already 3 months into 2008, but better late than never. 2007 has been an amazingly busy year for me, both on a personal and work front. But all ’good’ busy, which helps. So here is what all this blog saw in 2007: 

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You know, one would think a person interested in technology always would do his research before adoption. Well, in my case, my heart always conflicts with my mind. Consider my sudden move from blogger to wordpress.com. It went sort of like this “oh cool, there are some neat wordpress.com templates, I’m bored of blogger, so let me migrate”. I know, it was a ridiculous reason. I did not research wordpress.com’s limitations. After migration, I realized:

1. No google-ads allowed. Darn. I had just about started to see a reasonable return on my old blog
2. The import tool imported the articles alright but did not import images - they kept the blogger URLs. Once I removed my blogger blog, several of the images disappeared. My guess is others will disappear over time
3. No detailed stats. Wordpress.com’s own stats is very limited. Statcounter was far superior, but since I can’t plug in JS code, statcounter works with wordpress, but cannot show referrer stats
4. No linkage to analytics.
5. No customizations to CSS unless I buy it.
6. Article URLs were not rewritten - so if you go to my yearly roundups (which I forgot to do for 2007), they will all point to my blogspot.com URLs which don’t exist.

Like I said, a badly researched option for me. Guess I deserve it. Can’t blame wordpress.com at all. Gee, maybe I’ll migrate back and pain my readers to re-do their entire subscriptions etc. Or maybe I’ll just stick to this limited functionality. Gee.

On the plus side, I think Akismet rocks. It’s a godsend for spam.

Update: Apr 29 2008: UA+Stack code released here

Hey folks, HSC released the android ported mjsip stack source code.

Grab it from here. Look for the attachment to the post titled “Ported GNU Mjsip stack for Google Android”

If you see a “PDF” icon under that post, don’t worry, its actually a ZIP with source in it. Our website folks will fix that annoyance soon.

Note that this is a “developer’s release”. It will allow you to start building applications using the mjsip stack on android. It’s not an “automatic solution for long distance calling” (as some blogs reported it) - it is a tool for developers within you to make such applications.

We also have a working SIP UA we ported on top of this stack (which we called ‘SIPDroid’ - no points for being imaginative here). We are yet to release that port - will do so in a short while.

Note that this is just a SIP stack. There is no RTP included. We did some initial experiments with porting open source RTP stacks - seems very simple. We may just do it later, or you do it and add to this effort

For those who attended VON spring, it is likely that they thought it was particularly low key in terms of attendance. I was there, both at the main event and the unconference (which was interesting, especially with Ken’s ‘online’ proposal to his partner Sheryl which was covered using Qik, a company started by Ramu Sunkara - ex head of RTC @ Oracle & a really inspirational guy. Congrats Ken & Sheryl, glad we finally met after reading each other’s blog for a long time - you make a great couple).

But I digress. Back to VON San Jose. The Boston and San Jose VONs have always been very well attended. So I was surprised seeing the attendance. But then again, I thought, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. And maybe it is also a testament to how well VON has actually worked.

The ‘Hype’ of many technologies like IMS, WiMAX etc. have passed. If you look at the typical exhibitor space of VON, they are OEMs. OEMs build products before they get deployed. They need to publicize. They need to excite people. And that is exactly where VON helps them. When technology is ‘new’, you need forums like VON to spread the word. When technology gets into deployment, people are too busy deploying to actually attend shows and talk about them. This is when the ‘money gets real’. The hooplah is over. And this is exactly in line with what I am seeing in the market. I had posted earlier that we have started seeing a significant rise in people deploying applications over IMS, or, deploying IMS and they are paying money for it (not the build and we will see story).

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