Tuesday January 03, 2006

Coffee tasting in El Segundo ...

Marc Hamilton is having a coffee tasting event in El Segundo, California. Yeah, like I can pass that up. If you see a bunch of folks in El Segundo all wired up, you'll most definitely know why.

(2006-01-03 16:43:37.0) Permalink

What is an "Industry Standard" Server?
From OSNews I found the Infoworld article on the best products of 2005. The good news is that the T2000 is listed as the most innovative product. There are others who think well of the T2000, as Suren points out.

I have to ask this question, if the T2000 were released in July instead of December with some amount of industry adoption in place, I wonder if it would have made a best server category (if so, which one)? Stepping back a bit, I feel I have to ask how trade rags come up with their categories? If, for example, the T2000 wasn't announced until January 2006, would there even be a "2005 most innovative server" category? Or is it just the beneficially disruptive nature of the the T2000 that created the category? Not a complaint, just a question.

The last question I have is why call the category "Industry Standard" servers? I have to admit that I do not like the term "Industry Standard". Never have. Everyone uses it (including Sun). When I think of "Industry Standard", I think of formal process. When I think of what Infoworld states as "Industry Standard", I consider "Defacto Standard". Ok, ok, one last question, is anything that doesn't fall into "Industry Standard" considered "Industry Non-Standard"? Where's that category? Probably filed under "politically incorrect" :) Wait, wait, one more question. Why don't they have the same categories for desktop operating systems? The "Industry Standard" desktop OS of the year is ... Microsoft Windows, for the 15th year in a row! Hmm. That also goes into the politically incorrect pile. I can just think of the mess an "Industry Standard Office Suite" would create, given the Massachusetts brouhaha.

IIRC, "Industry Standard Server" terminology was created to define Intel-X86-based (volume) hardware, followed by X86 hardware in general when AMD created some competition. Now it includes X86 and X64 (less is more, I guess :) ). I suppose this moving target can be neatly summarized as X86 compatable volume servers. I'll admit that "moving target" is debatable. Let's say for a moment that the T1/Niagara based servers becomes a raging success, which they has the potential to do. Let's say they capture 33% of the enterprise market for their primary target: web-facing horizontally scalable apps. Which category will the T2000 fall in, "Industry Standard" or "Enterprise Server"?

Let's see, 33% market penetration would be industry accepted, that's for sure. The Niagara specs are going "open source", so "standard" applies. The T1000/T2000 fit the volume server space. Would the T2000 be considered an "Industry Standard" server? Could the moving target of "Industry Standard" encompass the T2000? If The T1000/2000 captured 100% of their primary target market, would they yet be considered and "Industry Standard" server?Or is "Industry Standard" forever limited to x86-based volume servers?





(2006-01-03 11:20:57.0) Permalink Comments [1]