The calendar says it is almost September, the days are getting shorter, the nights are getting cooler.  It must be football season!  And with football season comes me spending my weekends trying to get my computer ratings going again.

This year, rather than muddling up this blog with the occasional entry on my computer's ratings, I've created a computer ratings blog that I'll do my best to diligently keep updated each week.  I've already posted last years season ending college ratings and the NFL will be there soon.

Go take a look and let me know what you think! 

• HTML5 Starts Looking Real - The "Why Openness Matters" section is spot on:
• "If proprietary technologies and browser plug-ins were required for every site, the Web couldn't run as it does today, nor would the Web be as successful as it has been."
• AnyShell.net - Interesting service.  Certainly doesn't appear to have the ability to scale or do full hosting/cloud, but still a convenient way to get access to other platforms and operating systems.

My Snow Leopard DVD arrived yesterday but I didn't have a chance to install it until this evening.

I actually did an upgrade, upgrading a MacBook Pro from 10.5, and the upgrade itself took about 45 minutes.  One strange thing was during the middle of the upgrade the screen went 90% dim and I could hardly read how much longer it would take.  But alas everything completed without a hitch and the machine rebooted.

Since one of the perks of the new OS is improved performance, I had done a few very unscientific tests on the machine prior to upgrading and then did the same tests post upgrade.  The tests I performed and timed were:

• Boot and login.
• Start NeoOffice.
• Open a simple .ods file from a fully closed NeoOffice.
• Start Safari pointed to the default apple.com page.
• Start Firefox pointed to google.com.
• Open Eclipse.
• Re-open Eclipse from fully closed.
• Transcode a .wmv video to .ogv format.

After these tests I also looked at memory usage to see where things stood.

I did perform the tests on Snow Leopard twice since I was a bit surprised by a few the first time.  Note that in each case the tests were performed in order so everything started from a fresh reboot.

• So Snow Leopard boots a little faster, but not dramatically so.  Further, on the first reboot, completing the login took about 5 seconds whereas with Leopard it was just a second or so.  The second test on Snow Leopard was in the 1-2 second range so perhaps it was just something with the very first login.
• It would appear NeoOffice itself starts a bit quicker under Snow Leopard, but opening a spreadsheet is roughly the same.  I'm not sure if anything can really be concluded here.
• Safari certainly starts quicker, I'm not sure if there is a new version that is faster or if they sneakily have it partly loaded/started behind the scenes.  Firefox took basically the same time to start but was perhaps slightly faster under Snow Leopard.
• Oddly, the first time under Snow Leopard, Eclipse took much longer to open than with Leopard.  This was the big reason I did a second test and in that one it was closer to the same time.  I'm not sure if there was something about running Java the first time or what.  In both cases re-opening Eclipse after a full close was the same time.
• Surprisingly the transcoding of the video was slower under Snow Leopard the first time.  The second time it was just about the same.
• The memory management with Snow Leopard seems to be quite a bit different as performing the exact same steps resulted in over 50% memory being used, although in the second test the bulk of this increase was inactive.  But the VM size was over 3 times greater in each case.

• Over 75% of organizations haven't upgraded to latest Microsoft Office - The challenges of a mature market/product.  How do you innovate and differentiate with yourself to sell more?
• My PayPal credit card beef, Part II: PayPal responds - I'd seen the earlier blog he had on this and agree with him, but found this blurb in PayPal's response interesting: "he’d pass along the suggestion to the engineering team".  Now perhaps they are organized such that product management is in engineering and so I'm making a mountain out of a molehill, but just passing ideas to engineers could be the problem.  Nothing against engineers, I love'em and am one at heart, but you really need product management to provide guidance on things like this.
• White House not equipped to hold keys to the Internet - I would have to agree.
• Adobe on "HTML5" - Given my recent blogging on HTML5, I was interested to see what Adobe had to say.  But it is hard to take it seriously and not simply discount it as FUD by a threatened competitor with these comments:
• "...consortium of minority browser vendors..." - Only all browsers using WebKit!
• "...it might be a decade before HTML 5 sees standardization across the number of browsers that are going to be out there." - Ummm, WebKit based browsers have significant support already.  A decade?  Really?
• "...iPhone helped to radically increase the number of phones with Flash support".  Seriously?
• And this was a pretty classic comment to the post: "This is an excellent piece by Adobe to lay bare their open standards animosity."

• FlightCaster - AWS-Powered Flight Delay Prediction - Cool idea, I'll give it a shot on my next flight. Blurb in story about it running on AWS and being built on a budget less than $1M. I'm not sure I'd call less than 60 minutes only "slightly delayed" though! Also interesting the web-site is free, iPhone app is $4.99, but then BlackBerry app is $9.99.
• PG&E to compress air to store wind power - Sounds more efficient for handling bursts than the other alternatives.
• Researchers crack WPA Wi-Fi encryption in 60 seconds - All the more reason to use WPA2.
• Not wanting to expose NSFW links, 1 in 4 Firefox 2 users avoid upgrading to FF3 - This is hilarious.  Folks, if you don't want a trail, don't visit the site!  But the new feature is nice.
• Dear Apple: Where’s Facebook 3.0? - If getting Facebook 3.0 out sooner will result in selling more iPhones and iPod Touches, Apple cares.  If not, they don't care about how quickly or even if apps get approved.  There are over 50,000 apps now and that is what they market.  And there is an existing Facebook app there already.  What difference does it make to the general population and thus their market, the consumer, if a few don't make it or this new Facebook app takes a little while?  Have we not learned that yet?  Further, if Apple were to give preferential treatment to approving this app quicker, that would only serve to set precedent that if you announce submission to the world you get better treatment.  I wouldn't be surprised if they actually drag their feet on this one to set an example.

I mentioned HTML5 in my links entry from yesterday and reading about what is coming is great, but seeing some of it in action is even better.  So I've created a few examples of a couple new features that I describe below.

The first is the ability to have video in web-pages without requiring any plug-ins.  This is done with the new <video> element, an example of which can be viewed below or here which happens to show Galen Rupp going sub-4:00 earlier this year.  But take a look at the source of that page and see how simple it is:

    <video src="RuppMile.ogv" controls/>

Isn't that easier than relying on plugins and or much more complicated HTML that has to download and use Flash? 

Now, a few caveats are that (to my knowledge) this only works in Firefox 3.5 and Safari 4 and the video has to be in Ogg Theora, Ogg Vorbis, or WAV format.  The Ogg media formats are not patent encumbered like other formats are so look for their growth and adoption to increase.  Learn more about it here.

The second is the use of some geolocation APIs that are not part of HTML5.  This can open a whole host of possibilities for applications to take advantage of location and deliver innovative applications for consumers.  I've created a simple example that uses the information provided to create a Google map centered on your location.  Try it here.

The source for this is a little more complicated due to the Javascript and use of Google's APIs but it boils down to the following:

navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(showPosition);

function showPosition(position) {
    var latLong = position.coords.latitude + ',' + position.coords.longitude;
    document.getElementById('latLong').value = latLong;
    loadPage();
}

The first line of code registers a method to be called when the location is known and when that method is called it can retrieve the coordinates and do with it what it wants.  In my case I load the map.

Again, this requires Firefox 3.5 where it uses a service to get your location from your IP address which is somewhat accurate, or you can use Safari on your iPhone which tends to be much more accurate with its cell tower triangulation and GPS capabilities.

Grab Firefox 3.5 and start giving HTML5 a try!

Galen Rupp video requiring no Flash, Silverlight, or other plugin!

• Introducing Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) - This is cool.  The real power and value of the cloud beginning to come to fruition in new ways, specifically supporting so called "hybrid" clouds.
• "Imagine the many ways that you can now combine your existing on-premise static resources with dynamic resources from the Amazon VPC. You can expand your corporate network on a permanent or temporary basis. You can get resources for short-term experiments and then leave the instances running if the experiment succeeds. You can establish instances for use as part of a DR (Disaster Recovery) effort. You can even test new applications, systems, and middleware components without disturbing your existing versions."
• The Future Doesn't Have A File System - Interesting view.  He introduces the term "Object-Based Information Stores" which sounds a lot like an object database, and while those have found some success in niche areas they have by no means eclipsed relational databases.  I think his idea, while it has merit, will have a similar uphill battle just because of history/legacy/inertia.

• HTML5 and The Future of the Web - Great overview of what HTML5 offers and links to learn more.
• Flex's coopetition: HTML5 - Can HTML5 rival Flex?
• Frustrated developers and scrutiny of other apps: Are things falling apart at Apple's app store? - "What’s interesting here is that the backlash from the developer community is starting to mount against Apple - and that can be a dangerous thing, seeing how the real secret sauce behind the iPhone is the third-party apps. (There’s no way the phone service on that device is the big reason for its success.)"

I mentioned Amazon.com lowering pricing for EC2 in my links entry today, but having great pricing is only useful if you have something to deploy on EC2.  And a great way to deploy applications is in GlassFish.

Now, anyone can install everything from scratch on their EC2 instance, but Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) are a great way to get a head start with a pre-installed/configured operating system and other software.  As you might expect, for someone wanting to use GlassFish there are several AMIs available.

My quick perusal came across the following GlassFish and related AMIs:

• OpenSolaris 2008.11 With GlassFish 2.1 and MySQL 5.1 Provided by Sun Microsystems, Inc. - Everything you need to get started with OpenSolaris, MySQL, and GlassFish.
• GlassFish ESB v2.1 on OpenSolaris 2008.11 32-bit AMI - For those wanting to take the step up from GlassFish to incorporate routing, transformation, and orchestration in their applications.  See Hari's blog for more info.
• OpenSSO AMIs - Running in GlassFish, provides for single-signon and Web services security.

• Apple: 'Continues to study' Google Voice apps; AT&T: We played no part - "... it appears to alter the iPhone’s distinctive user experience by replacing the iPhone’s core mobile telephone functionality and Apple user interface with its own user interface for telephone calls, text messaging and voicemail ...".  So give people the choice of which experience they like better rather than dictating one and only one!
• The Google Voice app scandal: is Apple losing control over the iPhone? - "I can picture it now: Steve Jobs, sitting in a leather chair wearing a Hugh Hefner-like house robe, puffing on a pipe with his hand on his chin, looking like he’s weighing the the meaning of life."
• Amazon lowers fees on reserved EC2 instances - A great way to host without having to buy machines and deal with the associated headaches just got cheaper.

• CDs still sell: Who are these people?!? - "Sixty-five percent of you are still buying CDs for your music in the first half of 2009, according to research firm NPD."  That number seems high, but when you think about it not everyone is comfortable with buying over the web or dealing with files and burning CDs themselves or prefer to have physical media.  I personally have fell in love with Amazon.com's music store.
• Gmail moves past AOL as No. 3 web e-mail service in U.S. - I would have thought it would happen sooner.  I only have a handful of AOL addresses in my contacts and most of those are pretty dated.  But I guess AOL had a huge lead and folks are reluctant to change e-mail addresses.

• Dell: High Linux netbook returns a myth - Dell refutes Microsoft's FUD that netbooks running Linux are being returned in droves: "We don't see a significant difference between the return rate for Windows versus the rate for Linux. We've been quite pleased with the stability and technical soundness of the Linux machines."
• Brazilian ID thieves using Twitter as botnet command channel - Just goes to show that any cool technology can be used for good and bad.  But I often thought one could use Twitter as a poor mans queueing system for those too cheap to Amazon's Simple Queue Service.
• Analysts: Sales of Palm Pre have slowed, could drag down company - It's unfortunate if it happens.  Could be tied to Sprint having the lowest rated customer service.

• Hands on with USAA's iPhone check deposits - Great idea for any bank, particularly those that don't have physical branches.  It doesn't sound like it is that bullet proof yet though if one has to carefully write the check.
• Why 'Cheap' May Really Be Expensive - “The economics of Cheap cramps innovation, contributes to the decline of once flourishing industries, and threatens our proud heritage of craftsmanship.”

• The Case Against Apple (AAPL) - Interesting read, but some of the arguments are flawed.  Unlike Microsoft with Windows, Apple does not have a monopoly and in general consumers have choice and can buy others phones, computers, and software.  The one place they may be in hot water is around the practices of App Store approval, particularly the retroactive removal and inconsistent logic in approving one app but not another.
• The Science Behind Apple's Magic - A very good read, but this is excellent advice for lots of things: "Stop, step back from your product, and take a closer look. Without worrying about how much work you’ve already put into it, is it really as good as it could be?"
• How we fixed the MySQL.com Power Outage -Plans to rehost and have a redundant backup got accelerated.
• VMware plus SpringSource, more hype than substance, today - A good if not slightly biased (IBMer) analysis.

• Is Google Voice a Threat to AT&T? - Mentions Google creating a Web app version of Google Voice to replace the banned App Store one.  Also a good summary of the (lack of) logic use by Apple to reject the app.
• Twitter attack: Bots may have been hardest hit - "However, these bots are necessarily Twitter spammers. These are the automated tweets that comes from sources such as news services".  So twitter is being used as a poor mans replacement for RSS because people are lazy and want to use just a twitter client?  Sounds like an opportunity for a twitter client with RSS support.