Emerging Technologies You Need to Know
Microsoft joins OpenAjax partyAs a followup to Christopher's post earlier today, here is a link to a RegDeveloper article, Microsoft joins OpenAjax party about the recent announcement. "In a statement, Microsoft's Kevin Smith - arguably owner of the most challenging job title in IT as core web platform and tools to UX web/client platform and tools group product manager - said the company will collaborate with other industry leaders to ensure a "high degree" of interoperability in AJAX-style development. "Microsoft is continuing its commitment to empower web developers with technology that works cross browser and cross platform," Smith said. OpenAjax Alliance membership puts Microsoft back into bed with IBM, also an alliance co-founder. IBM joined with Microsoft to flesh out the WS* family of web services specifications underpinning many of today's SOA and Web 2.0 architectures. Microsoft and IBM also teamed up, with others, to form the Web Services Interoperability (WS-I) organization in 2002..." Jim Hsu [Read More] |
Mathematicians Map E8From the "and I thought computing my taxes this year was complicated!" department... Here is an interesting new development in the field of mathematics that I thought I'd share. It's amazing what large-scale computing can accomplish these days. From the article Math research team maps E8: "An international team of 18 mathematicians, including two from MIT, has mapped one of the largest and most complicated structures in mathematics. If written out on paper, the calculation describing this structure, known as E8, would cover an area the size of Manhattan. [emphasis mine] The work is important because it could lead to new discoveries in mathematics, physics and other fields. In addition, the innovative large-scale computing that was key to the work likely spells the future for how longstanding math problems will be solved in the 21st century... The magnitude and nature of the E8 calculation invite comparison with the Human Genome Project. The human genome, which contains all the genetic information of a cell, is less than a gigabyte in size. The result of the E8 calculation, which contains all the information about E8 and its representations, is 60 gigabytes. This is enough to store 45 days of continuous music in MP3-format." Here is another article with pictures and explanations of E8: http://aimath.org/E8/ Jim Hsu  [Read More] |
Microsoft joins Open AjaxBelow is a recent Emerging Technologies in the News email from Joe Becker. Joe does a terrific job promoting and spreading the word about achievements in the broad realm of Emerging Tech. His contact info is: Joe Becker IBM Communications 11 Madison Ave., 18th Floor NYC, NY 10010 Office: 917-472-3428 bjoseph@us.nospam.ibm.com 'Some great early coverage from today's OpenAjax announcement that Microsoft had joined the group (which now totals 72 members) and that the organization has 11 members who have received interoperability awards. The interoperability certificates represent progress by both OpenAjax Alliance and its members towards defining and achieving industry support for OpenAjax Conformance. Additional coverage is expected this week and next. "My view is this is strong indication that businesses are telling all AJAX vendors and developers [that] open [de facto] standards and interoperability matter," said Rod Smith, vice president of Emerging Technologies at IBM Software Group. "OpenAJAX is now viewed as the leading organization fostering Rich Internet Application [RIA]-related technologies. Microsoft has always been a leader in rich user experiences—having their active participation in OpenAJAX will be welcome by developers and enterprise customers alike." "Obviously, Microsoft is a very important player in the AJAX world because it has the dominant browser on desktop computers and a significant share in the server world and with the .Net servers," said Jon Ferraiolo, acting director of OpenAjax Alliance and Web architect for Emerging Technologies at the IBM Software Group.' Christopher Perrien [Read More] |
Social Networking to manage personal financesCustomers want a useful interaction with companies that have lots of information about them. I imagine that an eBay or Amazon or WalMart could offer Wesabe-like communities and make a big dent in the revenue streams of traditional banking institutions. Christopher Perrien [Read More] |
Peer to Peer lendingAs I prepare for a week of Financial Sector customer roundtables to discuss Web 2.0, I think about both Prosper.com for peer-to-peer lending and Wesabe.com for financial management. Community affiliation across the Internet will provide some competition to national and regional banks, even if they can continue to keep WalMart out of the banking business (NY Times Sat. March 17, section B1). Here is the Prosper link. I'll follow-up with Wesabe. Christopher Perrien [Read More] |
