On The Margins

Wednesday April 16, 2008

[ Technology ] Skype and Sun

Skype and Sun have much in common—including not only their leveraging of the Internet but also their support for PostgreSQL!

They are both Gold Sponsors of PGCon 2008. 

2008-04-16 00:45:23.0 -- Comments [1] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community opensource technology

[ Technology ] It Runs Your Company

Monty's T-Shirt says it all.

2008-04-16 00:37:12.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community opensource software technology

Sunday April 13, 2008

[ Technology ] Community Dinner

Giuseppe Maxia blogs about the MySQL community dinner with some special guests in attendance.

2008-04-13 23:59:39.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community mysql sun

Tuesday April 08, 2008

[ Business ] Open Source Databases on the Rise

Christopher Lawton of The Wall Street Journal reports on the rise of the open source databases: The potential benefits in cost and flexibility have not been lost on customers. The market for open-source databases is expected to grow 35% to $270 million this year from $200 million in 2007, according to Gartner Inc. Among the earliest adopters are midsized companies, which don't always need the high-end features of conventional databases, says Carl Olofson, analyst with IDC, a market-research firm. For example, Sun Microsystems Inc. provides supported offerings of MySQL, PostgreSQL and Java DB (Apache / Derby) to its customers. If you're interested in discussion and community around open source database technologies for Solaris, see here.

2008-04-08 19:15:34.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
business community databases economics opensource software solaris sun systems technology

Wednesday April 02, 2008

[ Technology ] The Conference Around the Corner

For those living in the Silicon Valley and working on software for the Web, one of the best technology conferences of the year will arrive literally around the corner: MySQL Conference & Expo, April 14 to 17, 2008, here in Santa Clara California. 

2008-04-02 00:53:50.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community databases software technology

Thursday March 20, 2008

[ Sun Microsystems Inc. ] OSDB Events

The best way to learn about major open source databases (e.g. MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc.) is to attend developer and user conferences. Sun Microsystems sponsors many of these conferences and events. (This April, you can catch Sun folks attending the MySQL conference in Santa Clara, and in May, you can catch them at PGCon in Ottawa.) Finally, if you're interested in Sun technologies and databases, you should become a member of the OpenSolaris Databases Community and start contributing.

2008-03-20 01:06:17.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community databases developers opensolaris opensource software solaris sun technology

Saturday February 09, 2008

[ Personal ] Proud of my better half

Working for non-profit organizations requires a special kind of dedication and personality. 

So, I'm really proud of my wife, Liana, for all her work at the Northern California Community Loan Fund (NCCLF) and for having played a key role in putting together NCCLF's 25th anniversary annual report.

If you have money you want to invest in local non-profits, including community art centers and low-income housing, NCCLF can be an excellent venue to look into.

2008-02-09 02:53:15.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
california community fund loans local non-profits

Thursday August 02, 2007

[ Technology ] Underground Notes and Voices from OSCon and Ubuntu Live

Some say Sun is as cool as OSCon (if not cooler) because, among most companies that support OSCon, only Sun can produce truly underground notes on OSCon.

David Van Couvering reviews Mike Olson's comments about his keynote at OSCon and pontificates about whether the value of Open Source could be limited to the collaboration it fosters. David aptly notes that

Open source and an open community gives you the assurance that the technology you are depending on is not going to be discontinued or put into "maintenance mode," it won't be acquired by someone who you would rather not do business with, and it won't be used as leverage against you to extract money or modify your behavior.

By way of further review, David contrasts MySQL as an Open Source project to PostgreSQL as an Open Source project.

In a separate underground note from OSCon, Barton George has posted his interview with Free Software Foundation lawyer Eben Moglen.

Barton has also produced a series of interviews with some six dignitaries during Ubuntu Live: Mark Shuttleworth. Tim Gardner, Jane Silber, Daniel Holbach, Stephen O'Grady, Jono Bacon.

2007-08-02 10:42:13.0 -- Comments [1] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community databases javadb linux mysql open opensolaris opensource postgresql software sun technology ubuntu

Monday July 30, 2007

[ Art (هنر) ] Hands Cutting Things

A couple of hands cutting things:

2007-07-30 21:21:27.0 -- Comments [1] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
art community hands technology

Friday May 04, 2007

[ Java ] Blog Entries on JavaOne 2007

At java.net, I will be compiling some blog entries in anticipation of JavaOne 2007 and following the conference (mostly from the pavilion floor).

For a database related topic, you might want to check out Francois Orsini's "Enabling Offline Web Applications with Java DB," where he previews his upcoming JavaOne talk with Zimbra's Kevin Henrikson.

2007-05-04 15:42:24.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Monday March 26, 2007

[ Economics ] Open Source and Property Rights

Open Source development—whether it is OpenOffice, Apache, Open Solaris, Linux (Debian), Sun Studio, Open JDK, Apache Derby (Java DB), PostgreSQL, Glassfish or Netbeans—engages communities in production of value governed by a revolutionary model for property rights, emphasizing open distribution of software rather than the traditional "exclusive-rights" notion of property.

The new property model finds its grounding in the use of the Internet as the backbone for parallel development of relatively complex systems of value generated by (non-idyllic) communities of developers—large quantities of value being generated for little, direct financial compensation. 

In the exclusive-rights model of property ownership, the state uses force (or the threat of force) to prevent "unlawful" use, in order to "secure" those rights and encourage their development. 

In the open-source model of property ownership, the width of distribution and availability represents the only "security" that needs to be provided.

The state's role must be vastly different, and it must be focused on rights of distribution and use, and of mixing. Being a vastly different model of ownership, open source has often confronted a state which wants to apply its traditional understanding of property and its "security." We have witnessed this with property "rights" over content because general content in the digital-distribution world possesses many characteristics similar to software.

2007-03-26 11:19:44.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community content economics ownership property society software

Monday February 19, 2007

[ Philosophy ] Conflict and Self

People distrust strangers. Only in conflict can you "prove" yourself. In conflict your true self is revealed. On the stage, as well as in life, every one is a stranger who does not first "prove" himself. A person who stands by you in adversity is a proven person. Even an illiterate knows that politeness and smart talk are not signs of sincerity or friendship. But sacrifice is...

...Since most of us play possum and hide our true selves from the world, we are interested in witnessing the things happening to those who are forced to reveal their true characters under the stress of conflict... In conflict we are forced to reveal ourselves. It seems that self-revelation of others or ourselves holds a fatal fascination for everyone.

                                                       Lajos Egri, The Art of Dramatic Writing

While most can agree with Egri that conflict provides one medium for self-revelation, they may also see that community and care could provide similar media. In fact, all these aspects are bound up together. For example, community incorporates, in its very institution, passageways for a variety of conflicts and their resolution. However, one thing remains certain and confirms Egri's viewpoint. In the crucible of conflicts, characters reveal themselves most revealingly. We may extend our human observation and note that embedded in every conflict, justice will show its weight and import regardless of the apparent justice of a specific resolution.

2007-02-19 22:38:43.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community conflict self

Friday December 09, 2005

[ Philosophy ] Why We Need to Learn about Learning

We need to learn about learning because never before have we "meddled with it on the scale on which we do today," to borrow Etienne Wenger's words —

For many of us, the concept of learning immediately conjures up images of classrooms, training sessions, teachers, textbooks, homework, and exercises. Yet in our experience, learning is an integral part of our everyday lives. It is part of our participation in our communities and organizations. The problem is not that we do not know this, but rather than we do not have very systematic ways of talking about this familiar experience.

In his book, Wenger focuses on disclosing a new, systematic way of talking about the familiar experience of learning in "communities of practice" by way of finding meaning and identity through "participation". One should probably also think about knowledge networks.

2005-12-09 00:26:30.0 -- Comments [5] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
community learning philosophy

[ Philosophy ] Communities of Practice, Learning, Meaning, and Identity

I've begun reading Etienne Wenger's Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity.

I ran into this book while reading John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid's Social Life of Information, about which I've written here earlier. I've always been interested in how social groupings and organizations learn, evolve, prosper and survive, how we learn and work, and how we come to be who we are as individuals.

Wenger's book would be a good start for whoever wants to explore these topics. Wenger is also deeply interested in building the conceptual framework that will help with the design of organizations, artifacts and processes.

Wenger's ambitious enterprise suits the practitioner as much as it stimulates the theoretician. As the book plate says, the material "is presented with all the breadth, depth, and rigor necessary to address such a complex and yet profoundly human topic."

2005-12-09 00:13:05.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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