On The Margins

Friday July 11, 2008

[ Technology ] DTrace Envy

A colleague in our PostgreSQL team just pointed me to a "little" note on DTrace, which seems to be ignited by the work that Robert Lor and Jignesh Shah have been doing. (The PG presentation involving the Mac OS and DTrace is Robert's)

2008-07-11 00:03:02.0 -- Comments [0] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Tuesday July 08, 2008

[ Technology ] Using Apache Derby / Java DB with Caroline

Here is another embedded use case for Java DB in a full Java environment: On Grid Derby-based Server. For more on Caroline, see here.

2008-07-08 17:21:00.0 -- Comments [0] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Monday June 02, 2008

[ Technology ] Community Statistics for Netbeans Database Usage

"The database support in NetBeans allows users to connect to a database and view and modify the database structure and data. These graphs show which database servers users connect to most often." Of particular note, besides the large usage of MySQL and Oracle, is the large usage of Java DB (Derby), and the significant PostgreSQL usage.

2008-06-02 13:20:38.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Wednesday May 07, 2008

[ Networks ] The Self-Ordering Chaos of Communities

In the chaos of their buzz and movement, bees build amazingly ordered nests for their young.  So do many communities of practice.

2008-05-07 23:30:42.0 -- Comments [2] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Monday February 11, 2008

[ Technology ] "Asset Specificity" and Open-Source Software

Despite some excellent coverage of issues related to transaction cost economics of Open Source Software in The Success of Open Source (Harvard University Press, p. 193, "Business Models and Law"), Steven Weber may have misapplied Oliver Williamson's concept of "asset specificity" as an attribute of transactions .

Weber seems to be saying that Open Source Software, by virtue of its openness, will reduce asset specificity for those (including enterprises) who consume or use software, releasing them from lock-in. While the effect might be true, the reasoning diverges from the original meaning of the concept of "asset specificity," as coined by Williamson.

In The Mechanisms of Governance (Oxford University Press, pp. 59-60), Williamson states that his concept of asset specificity refers to "the degree to which an asset can be redeployed to alternative uses and by alternative users without sacrifice of productive value."

To clarify matters further, Williamson notes that there are varieties of asset specificities, e.g. (1) site specificity, (2) physical asset specificity, (3) human asset specificity ("that arises in learning by doing fashion"), (4) dedicated assets, (5) brand-name capital, and (6) temporal specificity. 

Let me elucidate the concept by giving some examples.

If I use some assets, say my Prius, to drive to the local supermarket to buy oranges, I have not used any assets specific to the transaction of buying those oranges. The transaction is a fully market-driven transaction. I could buy the oranges from a large number of groceries that do business near where I live.

Now, assume I'm an orange broker in Florida. I may station my operations site near the largest orange groves or near the largest auction market for oranges. I may buy some forensic equipment specific to orange analysis, and pay for membership dues in the orange auction market, etc. I may spend money to brand my brokerage service, calling it "Honest Oranges." Now, I've invested in assets that have a higher degree of specificity (in site, in physical nature, in brand capital, etc.) in order to carry on with the transactions I conduct as an orange broker in Florida.

Now, let's turn from oranges to software.

When it comes to software, we can have some in-dept discussion of each of the specificity types mentioned by Williamson and see if there are others. For example, the Internet, the digitalization of storage, content and distribution, has almost done away with "site specificity." You can consume software made in city A even if you live 12 time zones away in city B. On the other hand, some software must still be installed in a particular way and on particular hardware, generating a "physical asset specificity" effect.

The most important kind of specificity when it comes to software, however, is "human asset specificity."

When an enterprise uses open-source software, they still have this aspect of specificity to deal with. For open-source software, as for any software, human specificity arises in learning by doing fashion. In fact, human asset specificity governs the software transactions world much more deeply than many other product types.

Unless there is a backing from a supplier that has reduced the need for investments with high degree of "human asset specificity," the user of the open-source software will have to make such investments on its own.

This is exactly the reason why we see great consulting, services and integration businesses thrive around open-source software products.

2008-02-11 12:32:51.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
business economics opensource programming software technology

Tuesday February 05, 2008

[ Technology ] PostgreSQL 8.3 is Released

Josh Berkus has just announced the release of PostgreSQL 8.3. Bjorn Munch has posted a note on the release of the Solaris binaries for PostgreSQL 8.3 on the OpenSolaris database community discussion forum. Munch also has a wiki entry that describes how to build PostgreSQL for youself. (Important note: As should be expected, Sun provides support only for PostgreSQL versions that it itself ships with Solaris. While this should be kept in mind, we also like developers to know how to build and develop PostgreSQL on Solaris. Hence the wiki entry!) This, I believe, is the first time official Solaris binaries of a GA release of PostgreSQL become available also through PostgreSQL.org. About this release, there has been a lot of commentary in the press and in blogsphere. These were forwarded by a colleague. I selected some of the news and blog items below, giving the relevant links:

• PostreSQL 8.3 ups performance, XML support -- Computerworld AU, 2/5

• PostgreSQL 8.3: UUID, XML, ENUMs… -- Orangeis My Favorite Color, 2/4

• PostgreSQL 8.3 Released -- AjaxLine (also appeared on Massimiliano Dessì's blog), 2/4

• PostgreSQL 8.3 Released -- UNIX System Administration, 2/4

• Postgresql 8.3 released -- Profoss News, 2/4

If interested, you should also consult the official PostgreSQL 8.3 release announcement.

Finally, I would also recommend checking out Sun PostgreSQL web site and the OpenSolaris database community for discussion and other topics related to PostgreSQL and databases in general!

Addenda:

"Open Source PostgreSQL 8.3 Better Suited For Web Applications: New features include a full text search tool, improved overall throughput, and ANSI standard SQL/XML support ," InformationWeek, 2/7

2008-02-05 18:13:20.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Tuesday January 29, 2008

[ Java ] Next Generation Java Testing

At Java.Net, I have written a short review of a Java testing (TestNG) book.

2008-01-29 18:18:48.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Thursday January 24, 2008

[ Technology ] The Friendly Elephant and the Rising Elephine

Amol Chiplunkar describes his experience migrating an application to PostgreSQL. Here's how he describes the server requirements met by PostgreSQL.

Courtesy of Petr Zahradnik

The product has a central server layer that collects data from tens or sometimes hundreds of systems periodically. The collected data needs to be processed and stored in the database for generating reports and graphs. The data retainment policy is to keep on rolling it up so that the data stays over a long duration at a gradually reducing granularity level with time. Which means the freshly collected data should be the most granular while the older data should be summarized over a period of time and purged out as and when required.

In the meantime, Bjorn Munch describes how to build PostgreSQL for Open Solaris ... and Zdenek Kotala presents the "rising elephine" ...

2008-01-24 14:22:44.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Friday November 30, 2007

[ Sun Microsystems Inc. ] Where was I?

While I was away for meetings at Sun Microsystems's India Engineering Center, Eileen Alan of SDN channel posted a recent conversation I had with Kuldip Oberoi about Java DB and Apache Derby. I think Kuldip and I touched on a number of important topics about the technology, the business and Sun's general strategy behind Sun's Java DB work, and it is certainly very exciting to see the uptake by the user and developer community. It would be even more exciting as we see Java DB used for more and more database courses. I know Sun's Java DB (Apache / Derby) engineers are coming up with some very cool features and applications, too ... For a glimpse of what might be coming up, take a look at Rick Hillegas' "Saucer Separation" presentation given at ApacheCon (Atlanta, Nov. 2007) ... You might also want to check out the upcoming JavaME conference (Santa Clara, Jan. 2008) and check out JavaPolis (Anwerp, Dec. 2007), where there may be up to 4 Java DB related talks, Francois Orsini tells me. So, stay tuned, and, in the meantime, don't forget to check out Orsini's blog!

2007-11-30 01:09:58.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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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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Tuesday April 03, 2007

[ Economics ] Political Economy of Open Source Communities

Lots of people have said lots of things about open source communities.

Among the books I have seen on shelves and articles in books and online, I've been wanting to read Steven Weber's 2004 book The Success of Open Source but time has never allowed.

Finally, I've been able to start and finish the first 15 pages of Weber's book, and I can tell you that it has all the right elements and sources for its analysis of the political economy of open source communities. Mancur Olson's work, transaction cost economists', Chester Barnard's and others' are weaved together beautifully in those pages.

I look forward to reading more of it as time allows, and I'll be quoting from Weber, here.

2007-04-03 16:23:35.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Tuesday March 20, 2007

[ Code ] John W. Backus

Today, The New York Times carries an obituary to John W. Backus, of the "Backus | Naur form" notation and the lead of the IBM team who brought us Fortran. Many a scientific computing wizard will today salute Mr. Backus for what he and his team accomplished.

While the need for new programming models was dire in the 1950s, a move by Backus to initiate an applied research program to invent a higher-level language led to a revolution in software. The first Fortran team worked on the language from 1953 to 1957. ("The first written reference to 'software' as a computer term, as something distinct from hardware, did not come until 1958," according to The NYT.)

In my experience with Fortran, I join many others who used this first-generation higher-level language to do useful things, including much scientific research.

I wrote my first toy computer program, which calculated the first 1000 primes, in Fortran. Later on, I wrote Fortran programs to calculate temperature profiles in three dimensional body embedded in a heated environment, to study dispersion and diffusion of particles in turbulent flows, to investigate the dynamics of particle-particle collisions and systems, and to perform direct numerical simulations of fluid flow and vortex-vortex interaction in an infinite body. In short, in the mid 1980s, I spent many hours doing scientific programming in Fortran. (Some of this work got its way into my masters dissertation and other to my Ph.D. dissertation. Much of it remained at the level of pure investigation and study.)

Note: For a modern progeny, see Fortress.

2007-03-20 08:59:43.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Sunday February 04, 2007

[ Code ] Railing about Rails

While I may rail about Rails here, you could do something more useful by consulting  Peter Schow on how to get Rails 1.2 up and running on Solaris 10 with PostgreSQL, and by checking it out and sharing on Open Solaris. Alternatively, for another Web 2.0 development environment, consider Phobos.

2007-02-04 22:54:51.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Wednesday January 31, 2007

[ Technology ] All The Uses

All the current uses of Apache / Derby  are truly astounding in the variety of applications. Those who have not had a chance to take a serious look are missing out. Sun Microsystems Inc. distributes Derby as Java DB, independently and with the JDK, beginning with JDK 6.

2007-01-31 23:33:07.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Thursday December 21, 2006

[ Code ] Statistics on Open Source Projects

Now, we have places to go to for open source project statistics.

For example, see the Ohloh statistics for Apache / Derby.

2006-12-21 19:10:43.0 -- Comments [2] ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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Sunday November 12, 2006

[ Sun Microsystems Inc. ] Watch It

Watch for Java news as "Sun Opens Java"!

Related reports: Wall Street Journal. 

2006-11-12 23:50:18.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.
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