Category Archives: Standards

Early Win Required for Partner-Friendly, Post-Acquisition Platform Computing

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Further to the LinkedIn discussion on the relatively recent acquisition of Platfom by IBM, I just posted:

Platform CEO and Founder Songnian Zhou has this to say regarding the kernel of this discussion:

“IBM expects Platform to operate as a coherent business unit within its Systems and Technology Group. We got some promises from folks at IBM. We will accelerate our investments and growth. We will deliver on our product roadmaps. We will continue to provide our industry-best support and services. We will work even harder to add value to our partners, including IBM’s competitors. We want to make new friends while keeping the old, for one is silver while the other is gold. We might even get to keep our brand name. After all, distributed computing needs a platform, and there is only one Platform Computing. We are an optimistic bunch. We want to deliver to you the best of both worlds – you know what I mean. Give us a chance to show you what we can do for you tomorrow. Our customers and partners have journeyed with Platform all these years and have not regretted it. We are grateful to them eternally.”

Unsurprisingly upbeat, Zhou, Platform and IBM, really do require that customers and partners give them a chance to prove themselves under the new business arrangement. As noted in my previous comment in this discussion, this’ll require some seriously skillful stickhandling to skirt around challenging issues such as IP (Intellectual Property) – a challenge that is particularly exacerbated by the demands of the tightly coupled integrations required to deliver tangible value in the HPC context.

How might IBM-acquired Platform best demonstrate that it’s true to its collective word:

“Give us a chance to show you what we can do for you tomorrow.”

Certainly one way, is to strike an early win with a partner that demonstrates that they (Zhou, Platform and IBM) are true to their collective word. Aspects of this demonstration should likely include:

  • IP handling disclosures. Post-acquisition Platform and the partner should be as forthcoming as possible with respect to IP (Intellectual Property) handling – i.e., they should collectively communicate how business and technical IP challenges were handled in practice.
  • Customer validation. Self-explicit, such a demonstration has negligible value without validation by a customer willing to publicly state why they are willing to adopt the corresponding solution.
  • HPC depth. This demonstration has to be comprised of a whole lot more than merely porting a Platform product to a partner’s platform that would be traditionally viewed as a competitive to IBM. As stated previously, herein lies the conundrum: “To deliver a value-rich solution in the HPC context, Platform has to work (extremely) closely with the ‘system vendor’.  In many cases, this closeness requires that Intellectual Property (IP) of a technical and/or business nature be communicated …”

Thus, as the fullness of time shifts to post-acquisition Platform, trust becomes the watchword for continued success – particularly in HPC.

For without trust, there will be no opportunity for demonstrations such as the early win outlined here.

How else might Platform-acquired IBM demonstrate that it’s business-better-than-usual?

Feel free to add your $0.02.

IBM-Acquired Platform: Plan for Sustained, Partner-Friendly HPC Innovation Required

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Over on LinkedIn, there’s an interesting discussion taking place in the “High Performance & Super Computing” group on the recently announced acquisition of Markham-based Platform Computing by IBM. My comment (below) was stimulated by concerns regarding the implications of this acquisition for IBM’s traditional competitors (i.e., other system vendors such as Cray, Dell, HP, etc.):

It could be argued:

“IBM groks vendor-neutral software and services (e.g., IBM Global Services), and therefore coopetition.”

At face value then, it’ll be business-as-usual for IBM-acquired Platform – and therefore its pre-acquisition partners and customers.

While business-as-usual plausibly applies to porting Platform products to offerings from IBM’s traditional competitors, I believe the sensitivity to the new business relationship (Platform as an IBM business unit) escalates rapidly for any solution that has value in HPC.

Why?

To deliver a value-rich solution in the HPC context, Platform has to work (extremely) closely with the ‘system vendor’. In many cases, this closeness requires that Intellectual Property (IP) of a technical and/or business nature be communicated – often well before solutions are introduced to the marketplace and made available for purchase. Thus Platform’s new status as an IBM entity, has the potential to seriously complicate matters regarding risk, trust, etc., relating to the exchange of IP.

Although it’s been stated elsewhere that IBM will allow Platform measures of post-acquisition independence, I doubt that this’ll provide sufficient comfort for matters relating to IP. While NDAs specific to the new (and independent) Platform business unit within IBM may offer some measure of additional comfort, I believe that technically oriented approaches offer the greatest promise for mitigating concerns relating to risk, trust, etc., in the exchange of IP.

In principle, one possibility is the adoption of open standards by all stakeholders. Such standards hold the promise of allowing for the integration between products via documented interfaces and protocols, while allowing (proprietary) implementation specifics to remain opaque. Although this may sound appealing, the availability of such standards remains elusive – despite various, well-intended efforts (by HPC, Grid, Cloud, etc., communities).

While Platform’s traditional competitors predictably and understandably gorge themselves sharing FUD, it obviously behooves both Platform and IBM to expend some effort allaying the concerns of their customers and partner ecosystem.

I’d be interested to hear of others’ suggestions as to how this new business relationship might allow for sustained innovation in the HPC context from IBM-acquired Platform.

Disclaimer: Although I do not have a vested financial interest in this acquisition, I did work for Platform from 1998-2005.

To reiterate here then:

How can this new business relationship allow for sustained, partner-friendly innovation in the HPC context from IBM-acquired Platform?

Please feel free to share your thoughts on this via comments to this post.

Aakash: A Disruptive Innovation in the Truest Sense

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Much has been, and will be, written about the Aakash tablet.

[With apologies for the situational monsoonal imagery …] As I awash myself in Aakash, I am particularly taken by:

  • The order of magnitude reduction in price point. With a stated cost of about $50, marked-up prices are still close to an order of magnitude more affordable than the incumbent offerings (e.g., the iPad, Android-based tablets, etc.). Even Amazon’s Kindle Fire is 2-3 times more expensive.
  • The adoption of Android as the innovation platform. I take this as yet another data point (YADP) in firmly establishing Android as the leading future proofed platform for innovation in the mobile-computing space. As Aakash solidly demonstrates, it’s about the all-inclusive collaboration that can occur when organizational boundaries are made redundant through use of an open platform for innovation. These dynamics just aren’t the same as those that would be achieved by embracing proprietary platforms (e.g., Apple’s iOS, RIM QNX-based O/S, etc.).
  • The Indian origin. It took MIT Being Digital, in the meatspace personage of Nicholas Negroponte, to hatch the One Laptop Per Child initiative. In the case of Aakash, this is grass-roots innovation that has Grameen Bank like possibilities.
While some get distracted comparing/contrasting tech specs, the significant impact of Aakash is that it is a disruptive innovation in the truest sense:
“An innovation that is disruptive allows a whole new population of consumers access to a product or service that was historically only accessible to consumers with a lot of money or a lot of skill.  Characteristics of disruptive businesses, at least in their initial stages, can include:  lower gross margins, smaller target markets, and simpler products and services that may not appear as attractive as existing solutions when compared against traditional performance metrics.”
I am certainly looking forward to seeing this evolve!

Disclaimers:
  • Like Aakash, I am of Indian origin. My Indian origin, however, is somewhat diluted by some English origin – making me an Anglo-Indian. Regardless, my own origin may play some role in my gushing exuberance for Aakash – and hence the need for this disclaimer.
  • I am the owner of a Motorola Xoom, but not an iPad. This may mean I am somewhat predisposed towards the Android platform.
Feel free to chime in with your thoughts on Aakash by commenting on this post.

On Knowledge-Based Representations for Actionable Data …

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I bumped into a professional acquaintance last week. After describing briefly a presentation I was about to give, he offered to broker introductions to others who might have an interest in the work I’ve been doing. To initiate the introductions, I crafted a brief description of what I’ve been up to for the past 5 years in this area. I’ve also decided to share it here as follows: 

As always, [name deleted], I enjoyed our conversation at the recent AGU meeting in Toronto. Below, I’ve tried to provide some context for the work I’ve been doing in the area of knowledge representations over the past few years. I’m deeply interested in any introductions you might be able to broker with others at York who might have an interest in applications of the same.

Since 2004, I’ve been interested in expressive representations of data. My investigations started with a representation of geophysical data in the eXtensible Markup Language (XML). Although this was successful, use of the approach underlined the importance of metadata (data about data) as an oversight. To address this oversight, a subsequent effort introduced a relationship-centric representation via the Resource Description Format (RDF). RDF, by the way, forms the underpinnings of the next-generation Web – variously known as the Semantic Web, Web 3.0, etc. In addition to taking care of issues around metadata, use of RDF paved the way for increasingly expressive representations of the same geophysical data. For example, to represent features in and of the geophysical data, an RDF-based scheme for annotation was introduced using XML Pointer Language (XPointer). Somewhere around this point in my research, I placed all of this into a framework.

A data-centric framework for knowledge representation.

A data-centric framework for knowledge representation.

 In addition to applying my Semantic Framework to use cases in Internet Protocol (IP) networking, I’ve continued to tease out increasingly expressive representations of data. Most recently, these representations have been articulated in RDFS – i.e., RDF Schema. And although I have not reached the final objective of an ontological representation in the Web Ontology Language (OWL), I am indeed progressing in this direction. (Whereas schemas capture the vocabulary of an application domain in geophysics or IT, for example, ontologies allow for knowledge-centric conceptualizations of the same.)  

From niche areas of geophysics to IP networking, the Semantic Framework is broadly applicable. As a workflow for systematically enhancing the expressivity of data, the Framework is based on open standards emerging largely from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Because there is significant interest in this next-generation Web from numerous parties and angles, implementation platforms allow for increasingly expressive representations of data today. In making data actionable, the ultimate value of the Semantic Framework is in providing a means for integrating data from seemingly incongruous disciplines. For example, such representations are actually responsible for providing new results – derived by querying the representation through a ‘semantified’ version of the Structured Query Language (SQL) known as SPARQL. 

I’ve spoken formally and informally about this research to audiences in the sciences, IT, and elsewhere. With York co-authors spanning academic and non-academic staff, I’ve also published four refereed journal papers on aspects of the Framework, and have an invited book chapter currently under review – interestingly, this chapter has been contributed to a book focusing on data management in the Semantic Web. Of course, I’d be pleased to share any of my publications and discuss aspects of this work with those finding it of interest.

With thanks in advance for any connections you’re able to facilitate, Ian. 

If anything comes of this, I’m sure I’ll write about it here – eventually!

In the meantime, feedback is welcome.

April’s Contributions on Bright Hub

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In April, I contributed two articles to the Web Development channel over on Bright Hub:

Recent Articles on Bright Hub

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I’ve added a few more articles over on Bright Hub:

Google Chrome for Linux on Bright Hub: Series Expanded

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I recently posted on a new article series on Google Chrome for Linux that I’ve been developing over on Bright Hub. My exploration has turned out to be more engaging than I anticipated! At the moment, there are six articles in the series:

I anticipate a few more …

It’s also important to share that Google Chrome for Linux does not yet exist as an end-user application. Under the auspices of the Chromium Project, however, there is a significant amount of work underway. And because this work is taking place out in the open (Chromiun is an Open Source Project), now is an excellent time to engage – especially for serious enthusiasts.

ORION/CANARIE National Summit

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Just in case you haven’t heard:

… join us for an exciting national summit on innovation and technology, hosted by ORION and CANARIE, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Nov. 3 and 4, 2008.

“Powering Innovation – a National Summit” brings over 55 keynotes, speakers and panelist from across Canada and the US, including best-selling author of Innovation Nation, Dr. John Kao; President/CEO of Intenet2 Dr. Doug Van Houweling; chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley Dr. Robert J. Birgeneau; advanced visualization guru Dr. Chaomei Chen of Philadelphia’s Drexel University; and many more. The President of the Ontario College of Art & Design’s Sara Diamond chairs “A Boom with View”, a session on visualization technologies. Dr. Gail Anderson presents on forensic science research. Other speakers include the host of CBC Radio’s Spark Nora Young; Delvinia Interactive’s Adam Froman and the President and CEO of Zerofootprint, Ron Dembo.

This is an excellent opportunity to meet and network with up to 250 researchers, scientists, educators, and technologists from across Ontario and Canada and the international community. Attend sessions on the very latest on e-science; network-enabled platforms, cloud computing, the greening of IT; applications in the “cloud”; innovative visualization technologies; teaching and learning in a web 2.0 universe and more. Don’t miss exhibitors and showcases from holographic 3D imaging, to IP-based television platforms, to advanced networking.

For more information, visit http://www.orioncanariesummit.ca.

Juniper Seminar: Key Takeaways

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Yesterday, I attended the Toronto session of a Juniper seminar focused on security and datacenter solutions.

The following are the key takeaways I extracted:

  • Juniper is standards-oriented. In the area of NAC, e.g., they are co-chairing with Symantec the Trusted Computing Group‘s Trusted Network Connect (TNC) effort. It’s not (yet) clear to me how the TCG interplays with the IETF … And speaking of IETF, Juniper’s Network and Security Manager (NSM) makes use of IETF’s NetConf standard in, e.g., simplifying the provisioning of new devices on the network.
  • Juniper has a comprehensive portfolio of offerings at the intersection of security and networking. Interestingly, Juniper’s Security Threat Response Manager (STRM) OEMs technology from Q1Labs.
  • 802.1x is a solid bet. Based on a number of trends, and a variety of requirements, Juniper promotes use of 802.1x. Even though this is a path we’ve already identified, it’s good to have it independently validated …
  • Security, and other services, can be offloaded to purpose-built devices in the core. Instead of inserting, e.g., a FWSM into a device (e.g., a Cisco 65xx) that is primarily providing routing and switching services, Juniper has recently introduced a new paradigm with its SRX series. Touted as a services gateway for the core, the purpose of the SRX is to offload from the routing/switching devices various services – e.g., firewall, VPN, etc. As I understand it, the SRX runs JUNOS with various enhancements from ScreenOS (their O/S from their firewall devices). Even if you don’t make use of Juniper solutions, it may make sense to understand and potentially apply the offloading-of-services concept/paradigm in your core.
  • Juniper allows for the virtualization of switches. Juniper Virtual Chassis (VC) is currently only available for their EX 4200 platform. With VC, it’s possible to virtualize up to 10 physically distinct EX 4200s into one. Within the next year, Juniper plans to provide VC on, e.g., their EX 8200 platform. Because vmWare’s vMotion requires layer-2 adjacency, server virtualization may prove to be a significant driver for switch virtualization. I expect that this will prove, e.g., to be particularly relevant in providing failover services (at the networking layer) between multiple, physically distinct, and geographically separated locations.

Even though the event appeared to be more of the sales-y/marketing-y variety, there was substantial technical content in evidence.

RDF-ization: Is That What I’ve Been Up To?

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Recently, on his blog, Kingsley Idehen wrote:

RDF-ization is a term used by the Semantic Web community to describe the process of generating RDF from non RDF Data Sources such as (X)HTML, Weblogs, Shared Bookmark Collections, Photo Galleries, Calendars, Contact Managers, Feed Subscriptions, Wikis, and other information resource collections.

Although Idehen identifies a number of data sources, he does not explicitly identify two data sources I’ve been spending a fair amount of time with over the past few years: 

Of course, whether the motivation is personal/social-networking or scientific/IT related, the attention to RDF-ization is win-win for all stakeholders. Why? Anything that accelerates the RDF-ization of non-RDF data sources brings us that much closer to realizing the true value of the Semantic Web.