HTML5 vs. Native Mobile Development

I just prepared this new slidecast.  It provides a comparison between HTML5 and Native way of development.

It is available at Youtube:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuFqUspiR8g

As always, look forward to your feedback, suggestions and comments.  Please feel free to leave your comments inline at YouTube.

Microsoft Webcamp summary

Last week I attended Microsoft WebCamp here in their Silicon Valley Campus.  The event was a two day, totally hands on, delivered and attended by developers.  According to my estimates there were around three hundred attendees. May be more.

Microsoft showed 3 things:
1. HTML5 and IE9
2. WebMatrix
3. Microsoft Azure


Let us try to take a deeper look:
 I.  HTML5 and IE9
IMHO, Microsoft with IE9 has worked very hard to catch up with competition (Apple, Google and Mozilla) and in a few cases really surpassed.  I started paying attention to HTML5 from April of 2010 when Steve Jobs banished flash from iPad.  Samples and demonstrations from Apple with HTML5 support and hardware accelerated CSS on the Mac  seemed mind-blowing.   Chrome seemed like a good second runner and IE8 was no where in the picture.  Since then Chrome has very aggressively riding the HTML5 wave.  I almost wrote off Microsoft during summer of 2010. However, I am somewhat amazed that within a short period of 12 months Microsoft bridged that gap.  Even though they still  lag behind Chrome and FF they have come a long way in html5test  (http://www.html5test.com ) and W3ctests (http://w3c-test.org/html/tests/reporting/report.htm).

IE9 is holding the lead in several performance metrics.  Since this area is highly debatable and contentious I will stay away from this.  But the point is. IE9 holds a commanding position in the leaderboard which IE8 could not.   They definitely have sped up the Javascript engine!

Also just like Apple and Google Microsoft has put together a site called BeautyOfWeb ( http://www.beautyoftheweb.com/) where they are show-casing some of the coolest items.  One area where IE9 pushed the envelope is in hardware acceleration.   Fully utilizing the modern day GPU, running significant amount of graphics functions on these chips, getting away from general purpose CPUs and a single-threading model, IE9 is capable of outstanding graphics, animations and smooth transitions.    Take a look at IE Test Drive:  http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/

The other area where they have excelled is full SVG support.  Applications like mapping and charting for dashboard applications where zooming in and out without pixilation and quality loss is critical remain strong candidates of such technologies.  One site which caught my attention was http://www.highcharts.com/

Please note, IE9 is not for everyone.   It is available only for Vista and Windows 7 users.  Sorry XP!

II. WebMatrix
Microsoft has really tried to simplify web development with this toolset.

WebMatrix is a free web development environment.     This tool comes with a compact IIS web-server, a compact database (MySQL or SQLServer) and plugins to hook up external modules called helpers (e.g.  FaceBook, PayPal, Twitter, Amazon).   It was instant love for me!   Here is why.  Traditionally, when I setup an environment, I fought for setting up and installing/configuring Apache, installing/configuring mySQL and fighting setup for a day or two. What a waste of time when I would rather be working on my application!   Using WebMatrix,  just opening a new folder, creating a few pages, creating a data-model and serving up a dynamic page was quite impressive.

What attracted me even more was the ease with which we can put together a FaceBook or a Paypal integration.   Now, my friends, I have always needed these in recent web apps and slated 1-2 days to accomplish these aspects.  WebMatrix can remove that CRUD!
WebMatrix provides Helpers so that Common Scenarios (e.g. FaceBook Likes, Twitter posts and Paypal payments) are as easy as the following:
@Facebook.LikeButton()
@SimplePay.Execute()

If you like this, please read on.   WebMatrix also has hooks to  several open source site builders like Orchard, Joomla and Drupal.  That way, these site builders can be configured and manipulated from the WebMatrix environment.  Web Matrix has about 60 open source templates to build from.  WebMatrix also works with PHP.

WebMatrix also provides a special markup syntax called Razor.  This makes combining front end code (HTML, Javascript) and backend code (PHP) very simple and readable.

Watch the video in this page for a good idea on WebMatrix:  http://www.microsoft.com/web/

In Summary: Microsoft is doing what they do best!  Come up with Development tools which are very easy to use and can be democratized.   The fact that they are leveraging open source is really a very interesting phenomena.


III.  Azure
They made a presentation on Azure.  Well, this is a topic for another post.



Best Regards, Somnath

S3Tonik- Making Amazon Simple Storage Service even Simpler

This week our iOS Application S3Tonik made it to the Apple App Store.  This is Version 3.0 of the application and this one is an Universal application.  That means the same binary runs on both iPhone and iPad.  In case someone has already bought it for the iPad, they should be able to upgrade to the new version at no cost.

Speaking about cost, the application (S3Tonik) is modestly priced at $0.99c.

At this price what you get is access to a demo account (Amazon Simple Storage Service account) where we provide key documents, materials, audio and video content on modern technology topics like Mobile, Web 2.0, Cloud, Green Computing. Topics like Security, computing in different government departments are also of key interest to us.  We constantly scour the web, collect publicly consumable materials on these topics and bring them together at one place for you to consume.  Now whether you are waiting at the doctor's for the next appointment, or in that airport terminal you should not get bored as long as you carry an iPhone or an iPad with a dosage of interest in these topics.

Now if you really like the content and want to save it, you can download the files to your briefcase (a feature brought to you by S3Tonik) and carry them for offline access.  So your browsing will not stop even when you board that long flight or even after you enter the doctor's chambers where WiFi signals thin out.  Comprende?

If you wanted to share a key document with a friend, colleague or loved one, you can do so with email share option.  And if you are rushing for the next key client meeting and have found a statistic from our content, whcih you wanna share with your client for convincing, you can always choose the PRINT option and make use of a network printer.

Like it so far?

Well, if you do, you might want to go tell your head IT guy at the corporate that the easiest way for him to disseminate key documents (sales collaterals, brochures,  product videos) is to cycle it through Amazon S3.   It is inexpensive ( costs around 20 cents a GB per month for storage and 10 cent a GB for bandwidth) and durable.  Also, if you choose the proper Security options, you can make it really Secure.  Hey, even the government people are using Amazon.  No Kidding!

So now, if your corporate central guys decide to do this, you can always access the S3 account which your office guys have setup by configuring your own account in S3Tonik.  It will need a complex Access/Secret Key which you can hand enter from the setting screens of S3Tonik.   If you find hand entering cumbersome, well... you are not alone!  We found it tough too and hence we provided a second option. You can setup your access/secret key pair in a XML file, make it accessible behind an URL. S3Tonik will access the url, parse the keys and setup your account.  Not too bad!

Now, with your own account setup, ALL those sales collaterals, brochures, product videos are accessible with a flick of a finger, a quick touch and a pinch.  Magic!  Right?

You never have to go through the document dis-array or suffer version anxiety  (hey , did I send the right version to the client or will I face the music tomorrow morning when I reach corporate?).  Sweet, isn't it?

Well, we also thought so.  Hence we call S3Tonik,  the Tonik that you have been waiting for to make Amazon Simple Storage service even Simpler.

Now, if you want even more complicated stuff like versioning, auditing or 2 factor authenticating,  feel free to send us an email at support@s3tonik.com

And if you like the app, do not forget to rate or even review the App.

Our Facebook page is http://www.facebook.com/s3tonik

Our Twitter hashtag is #s3tonik
Our Website is http://www.s3tonik.com 

Best wishes and Best Regards,  Tonik Team!

p.s.  I forgot to tell you that we will be keeping the screencasts at http://www.youtube.com/s3tonik

Windows Phone7 for iOS Developers

This evening I attended a very interesting event. Microsoft hosted Windows Phone 7 for iPhone OS Developers. This was our regular Silicon Valley iOS Group meet-up. But today it was held at Microsoft headquarters at Mountain View. No I am not dreaming. This actually happened!

Microsoft wanted to present Windows Phone 7 to iPhone developers and attract them to port their applications to Windows Phone 7. Microsoft presented the tools, the overall development methodology and constructed an application on the fly. That was quite impressive. They also brought in a third party development team who develop on iOS, Android and Windows Phone and had them show their app and share the development experience across platforms.

Nice touches:

• The development environment was based on regular VisualStudio and SQL Server 2008. They showed the development using C# and XAML.
• Two primary development frameworks are XNA (for game development) and SilverLight.
• There was a visual design environment where you could drag and drop design elements on a canvas and then program the events (OnClick etc.) and edit the code-behind. This metaphor is already very well known to many developers.
• It was very simple to develop using a DB on the local machine and then pushing the DB over to a remote Azure Cloud. The migration of local data to the cloud (at least for small example) was nice. Support for SQL Azure and Migration tools finally seems to be coming together.
• The programming model was built around developing Against Web Services which made it very simple to change.
• Unlike Android, submission to Windows Market Place needs to be vetted by Microsoft and hence there is tighter control over security. Pretty much like Apple.
• There are some really innovative controls like Panorama which shows Microsoft has tried to set itself apart and not just copy iPhone, the way Android has been doing.

The rough edges:

• Windows Phone 7 has no enterprise distribution model. The Application market place is only for the consumer. So if a corporation wanted to build an Application and distribute through a store they cannot do it today. Please note that Apple has an enterprise version of their developer license which allows a corporation to distribute their apps.
• It did not seem to me that Windows Phone 7 has true multitasking for applications. An incoming phone call would send a running app to tombstone. Which means it is where iOS was in the previous generation.
• Windows phone has to support multiple devices and form factors (for example phones can come with or without sliding keyboard). Although this is nothing compared to the dreaded Android fragmentation, but this puts an onus on QA. Here are some choices: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsphone/en-us/buy/7/default.aspx
• They do not have the concept of an ADHOC build. This is used to give iPhone Applications to BETA testers without cycling through the store.
• When asked “What are the top selling Apps in your marketplace?” there was no clear answer.

My take
Overall Windows Phone 7 seemed behind iOS and will continue to do so. However, they have a few things. The widely known and understood development model and the foothold in the enterprise. Also, with the recent success of Kinect they seem to have their mojo. Time will tell whether the Nokia marriage will last happily ever after or end in a messy divorce. But it does seem like they are making a sincere effort to win the hearts and minds of developers.

Tidbits

• When asked whether they would port their apps to WP7 several developers raised hands.
• Flurry is reporting a sharper increase in developer interest with WP7.http://wmpoweruser.com/after-nokia-deal-flurry-confirms-windows-phone-7-overtook-blackberry-in-developer-interest/
• If you want to remember one link, keep this in mind: http://create.msdn.com/en-US/

Thought I would share this with you all.

Best Regards, Somnath

Enterprise Mobile Security

Industry analysts and security experts believe that as smart-phone adoption increases within the enterprise, attacks and malwares will also increase. Smart phones may become conduits to breaches of corporate data. Malwares and viruses will masquerade as apps and may compromise both personal and corporate data. 2010 saw a huge rise in such instances of targeted malware.

2011 is really a year to watch for mobile attacks. With WikiLeaks and StuxNet, fear is looming in everyone’s mind regarding what and how the next attack will be. Let us try to imagine and understand the surface of potential risks. We will focus on risks related to large businesses and enterprises.

I) Data breach as a result of lost/stolen device
A lost device means potential for loss/theft of sensitive information and also enabling unauthorized users to gain access to ENTERPRISE networks. Remember the hapless Apple engineer losing the iPhone 4 prototype in a bar? In case you are rolling your eyes, please remember, that over a six month period, 3,000 laptops were lost in London cabs. Compare that to 55,000 phones lost during same period!

Also, when individuals lose a device it is a personal loss. When enterprise devices are lost it is a much bigger affair. Some experts put the total cost of a lost laptop to be around $49,000. This cost reflects the enterprise wide effort (corporate, legal, purchasing, admin, etc.) required to deal with a lost laptop.

A sophisticated approach is to use a service such as “remote-locate-and-lock” which will remotely locate the phone using built in GPS service and lock out a lost phone. Even more stringent policies of “remote-wipe” can be enforced to remove all sensitive data from a misplaced phone. There are several vendor software options which are emerging. For iOS there is “Find My Phone”, for Android there is Lookout .

Additionally, it is important that key content be encrypted and stored in a fashion so that even a device loss does not compromise key information using a proper standard like AES-128 or AES-192.

II) Malicious code attack coming from masquerading applications
This usually happens after downloading an application, which in-spite of masquerading as an innocuous app, actually engages in nefarious activities (keyboard logging, transmission of private information secretly, etc.). In July 2010, The ‘Carrot App’ for Android was disguised as a calculator application. The malicious application was programmed to email to the attacker of transcripts all text messages, both sent and received by the infected device.

Due to Apple’s stringent application review and publication process these problems are less common in iOS, but are still an area of concern. Android, due to its open publishing policy can be more prone to such attacks. Please refer to the recent in-depth study on App genome.

III) Mobile device OS, Applications or protocol vulnerability
Software vulnerability at this level is hard to fend off and can only be mitigated by constant study of and vigilance against security threats. It is advised to ensure that the latest versions and patches of the OS & development environments (Apple XCode or Android SDK) are applied carefully and security patches are taken seriously. Remember the chain is only as strong as the weakest link!

IV) Weak or non-existent mobile device authentication

This is a double-edged sword. Having a very hard pass-code is easy to forget and hence affects the usability. On the other hand, having something straightforward like “1234” or “admin” is easy to guess and easy to crack. The long-range solution for this is using some form of biometric or fingerprint based authentication. However, until these are refined we should have a TWO FACTOR AUTHENTICATION (a combination technique of something you know, e.g. pass-code and something you have, e.g. a CAC reader). In many cases a simpler variant of CAC Reader can be adopted, e.g. a token code which is distributed via SMS. Such two-factor authentication schemes are proposed by large organizations such as Google and Microsoft. Such options will provide additional protection against phishing and malware attacks, as the one-time token codes are valid only for a limited duration of time and are deactivated automatically, thus preventing access to any sensitive information.

There can be additional attack surfaces which we have not thought about yet. After all, a “Hacker’s mind” has a different orientation than a “Builder’s brain”. Constant vigilance can never be overstated in today’s world, specially when you adopt more modern means to conduct your business.

Google's Gift - Chrome OS Device

Santa came a bit earlier this year for me.

I was invited to a Google HTML5 tech talk. Learnt some of their plans and next steps regarding IndexedDB as part of the local storage strategy for HTML5.

But the real surprise came when they announced that they would give attendees a Chrome OS device as pilot devices. Google's goal is to have us test drive these devices and give them feedback. Thank you Google!

Well, first things first. Why do we need a Chrome OS Device?

According to Google, last 25 years of computer and laptop development have added a lot of not-any-more-needed cruft to our computers. For example, does BIOS still needs to check the existence of Floppy Drive when starting? Also, most people (yes my dear wife is a member of this club!) tend to spend all their time inside a Browser. Considering these, Google felt that the world needs a ground up device which is built completely for a browser and cloud based services.

Let me describe the key things which I have seen so far.

1. It is a pretty minimalistic laptop form factor, overall lighter, lesser keyboard with a very functional design. It comes with touchpad supporting single tap and double finger swipe. The keyboard has a set of browser friendly keys (has a search key).

2. Getting started was painless. After plugging in the battery, the device started up asked me to log in with my Google Account, took a picture and I was set.

Wonder how will it behave if i did not have a Google account?

3. Upon startup I see a Chrome Browser with access to Gmail , Docs, YouTube and a few other applications.

4. This is a completely internet connected device which immediately discovered Wi-Fi connections. It also has a 3G connectivity package from Verizon Wireless. It seems to be priced at $9.99 a month, but I am yet to check it out.

5. The device seems to be a cloud-enabled and the promise is to be worry free from all your documents, pictures and emails being lost from a crash or virus since they are supposedly stored and protected in the Google Cloud for us.

6. CloudPrint - It seems Google is working with a set of printer manufacturers to make them cloud ready and as consumers we should be able to connect and print to a remote printer without having to go through the pains of installing a driver.

7. App Store - Chrome App Store is already open for business and Google is encouraging developers to submit their HTML5 enabled webapps. This to me is quite fascinating.

8. Instant-On - It seems the startup time is around 1 sec.

9. Guest Mode - For non-registered users there is a guest mode to browse the web.

10. Confusion & Conclusion

With tens of Android devices coming after the iPad juggernaut, I am not sure how to use yet another device! But the idea of a cloud ready, browser only, cruft-free device seems like it may have a future. We will have to wait till the jury deliberates.

But I am feeling reasonably strong that HTML5 is a strong contender for next-gen development. And the idea of App-Store from iOS, MacOS, Android and now on to Chrome OS will democratize app development giving smaller talented developers a level playing field to compete. Nice!

iPad is here

After weeks of eager anticipation, we are proud owners of an iPAD – the truly “family device” meant for casual computing.
Unlike the iPhone 3G (4 hour waiting in line), the wait time was a brisk 20 minutes. Yes, I reserved online!


The party started around Saturday (April 5th) lunch time and is still on!

I do plan to publish a series of posts. This one is on general features. The next one would be on the entire development experience. Yes, I did stay up most of Friday night getting my sample apps to work in iPAD Emulator (iPhone SDK 3.2) and remained very eager to get those running on actual device. That I did. So let us start with general features in this post!

Summary
What rocks: An amazing web browser, awesome photo album, and great book reader! Apple has put together the Netbook, e-reader, gaming device, photo frame and iPod features. Add-ons like movie rentals, 10 hours of battery life and the most-celebrated App Store on the planet are combined in a magical cocktail! 175,000+ apps and ~1000 iPad only apps.
What doesn’t: The iPad's size is a bit cumbersome, specially to carry. The iPad's lack of video camera, USB, missing Flash support and HD video output keep me wondering whether I should have waited for next year.
My Worries: Will this device survive a fall? Did I make a right choice not to buy the 3G version? How will life be without GPS?

Overview
iPad is a 8x10-inch tablet computer which combines laptop, smartphone, gaming console, and iPod into a single experience. The absence of an integrated video camera and no Flash video support is a damper. "Why do I need an iPad?" Apple says: The iPad is a Web browser for your living room, an e-book reader for the den, a movie player for the kids, a photo album, a jukebox, a gamer's best friend, a word processor, an e-mail machine, and a YouTube junkie's dream come true. No excuse good enough for you? Wait a few minutes and a developer will inevitably make an app for it.

Design
The screen is made of oleo phobic-coated glass which makes it easy to wipe away fingerprints. Behind the glass is a LED-backlit, 9.7-inch capacitive touch screen that uses IPS (in-plane switching) technology for different viewing angles. The home button is the same as on the iPhone and iPod Touch, switching between an open app and main menu. iPad is 7.47 inches wide by 9.56 inches tall by 0.5 inch thick, and weighs 1.5 pounds. It has a natural, magazine-like feel. Like the iPhone, it has a touch-friendly OS with an on-screen keyboard, and an accelerometer that detects device mode: portrait or landscape. The buttons, switches, and ports around the edges are same as iPhone. A 30-pin dock connector at the bottom, an integrated speaker, a volume rocker to the right and a switch that works to disable the iPad's automatic screen rotation in case you need to look at something sideways without the iPad assuming you want it rotated. The design feels very upscale. Compared to other tablets the iPad is a jaw-dropper!

Display
9.7-inch backlit LCD screen is comparable to net book screens. Images are sharp and vivid with technology called "in-plane switching" to ensure the display looks good when viewing at an angle. A built-in light sensor automatically adjust the screen's brightness based on its surroundings.

Web
With full-size pages which are true Web pages, not the scaled-down mobile versions, web browsing is nearly as good as a MacBook. Downside: No support for Adobe Flash! iPad users who visit a site that uses Flash will be greeted with error messages. Try sites like Hulu.com. CBS and Disney will format some shows online just for the iPad. Jury is out for the rest. Safari is the only Web browser for the iPad. That means no tabbed browsing support.

Books
iBooks store includes content from: HarperCollins, Hachette, Penguin, Macmillan, and Simon & Schuster. Titles are organized by popularity and by genre. Users can preview the first few pages before purchasing, and putting in virtual bookshelf. iPad allows you to read books in either portrait or a landscape mode that shows two pages at once. Onscreen settings also allow changing the size of the text, searching text within the book, looking up words in a built-in dictionary, and hopping around using a persistent table of content. Public domain books and any EPUB book format (Project Gutenberg and Google Books) can be transferred to iPad via iTunes. Amazon Kindle app is available on the iPad. As an e-reader does not use e-ink technology. Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and others don't use backlit LCDs because: they drain battery life; fatigue the eye; and become difficult to read in direct sunlight. You can read for four days on the Kindle without a recharge, compared with approximately 10 hours on the iPad. As on any LCD text isn't as easy on the eye as on printed paper. iPad works better in the shade than on sunlight. However, the presentation of books is absolutely gorgeous. Cover graphics and illustrations display in rich color, book pages have a deliberate paperlike tone, and turning pages by tapping or flipping is intuitive. Page turns
also render much faster than with e-ink technology, allowing you to quickly flip through pages. Unique features, such as in-book music and video playback
(when supported), and one-touch dictionary makes it a category winner. At least IMHO! Also, for magazines and photo essays, the iPad's color screen is a clear winner. iPad's ambient-light-sensing screen provides just enough light for an
in-bed read and automatically ramps up the brightness elsewhere.

Email
works with: Gmail, Microsoft Exchange, Yahoo Mail, Hotmail, AOL and most other standard e-mail systems. Comes with a multi-pane view that shows inbox and a message preview window. Document and image attachments can be seen in full screen, and the search function looks through e-mail on both iPad and the server for most accounts. The downside? The weak onscreen keyboard makes it tough to type out long messages.

Keyboard On-screen virtual keyboard is about the size of a notebook keyboard, which looks impressive. But the virtual keyboard is not for typing long emails or text documents. Anyone looking for an external keyboard would need to buy ONLY from Apple for $69 because the device lacks a USB port.

iPhone OS
iPAD uses the mobile version of OS X : the iPhone OS. Very touch friendly and integrated with App Store, user don't need to worry about traditional issues,
scattered files on desktop, installing drivers for third-party hardware, or trying to figure out where you put a downloaded image went? Instead, all apps are clearly laid out, organized to respond to a single touch. A downloaded image, appears in one place – the photo library. Looking for something--a song, e-mail, photo, or Web page--double-clicking the home button brings up a Spotlight search feature. On the iPad, just like iPhone things are simple and DECLUTTERED! The only way for users to purchase and download movies, apps and music on the iPad is to use Apple's iTunes store. Compared with the more free approach of a Windows Netbook or Android, the iPad user is giving away freedom of choice in exchange for convenience. However, this control over the iPhone OS and the commerce within it also serves to minimize the iPad's vulnerability to computer viruses.
With a 1GHz Apple A4 processor, capacitive multitouch display technology, and a 802.1n compatible Wi-Fi, Apps launch within seconds; waking from sleep
mode is nearly instantaneous; and even a cold boot-up takes just 10 seconds.
Music
You can play songs in the background while you work on the Web, email or an app. The iPad's built-in mono speaker is ok, but users can plug in headphones
for dual/stereo sound. The iPad will also connect to other devices like wireless headphones through Bluetooth, and it can connect to home stereo systems.
iTunes on the iPad is very similar to the one on your computer. Scroll through itunes with your finger, or view by album with cover art.

Photos
Snapshots look great on the iPad's sharp display. Users can browse and sort photos with some cool tools. Preview the photos inside a folder by pinching
out to reveal the contents in a little scattered bunch of squares. You can also set up slideshows with music and use the iPad as a digital picture frame. The bad news: You'll have to import all of your snaps from elsewhere, because the iPad does not have a built-in camera.

Movies
Film buffs will love this sharp, crisp display. It is great for a personal video viewer on the road. But the iPad doesn't support the widescreen 16:9 format of most movies, so viewers will have to look at thick black edges on two sides -- or cut off some of the picture. The iPad also lacks a DVD drive, so movies will need to be imported into it also.

Battery
The iPad has 10-hour lifespan when playing video. The battery will last a full month on standby. But like the iPhone and iPod, the battery is built in. That means, if it dies you cannot simply pop in a new one; if the battery is broken, so is the iPad. Apple will replace the entire iPad device for a $99 service fee if you qualify for a battery replacement. That means the battery's charge capacity has simply worn down naturally. It doesn't cover water damage, or a device that's been dropped or modified in any way.

Accessories
There is a physical keyboard with an integrated dock ($69), a charging dock without the keyboard ($29) that engages the iPad's photo frame mode, a camera connection kit ($30) that includes both a USB and an SD card adapter for importing images from a digital camera, and a wrap-around leather case ($40) that doubles as a kickstand. Need the iPad for presentations, there is a $30 VGA adapter that can connect to a projector or computer monitor. Video output is only compatible with specific apps, such as Apple's Keynote. The maximum output resolution is only 1,024x768 pixels.

iWork software suite for iPad includes three apps: Pages (word processing), Numbers (spreadsheets), and Keynote (presentations). It's the first version of the software to run on one of Apple's portable devices and makes full use of the iPad's touch screen. Each app is offered separately at $9.99 apiece. There are some practical problems for iPad being a productivity tool. The first hurdle is the keyboard. When it comes to writing long text (essays and report) our fingers crave a real keyboard. Apple's $69 keyboard can be start but may not completely bridge the gap. Users will complain about a missing mouse! Second is, getting files off the iPad isn't as simple as plugging in a thumb drive or burning a CD. You either need to e-mail them or upload them somewhere . Printing a document you've composed on the iPad—is an issue. We may see an elegant solution for this in time, but your best bet at the moment is e-mailing or transferring the document to a printer-equipped computer--not a good solution for printing out airline boarding passes, for instance. Time will tell whether a student can get away with using an iPad as a primary computer? It is here that a Netbook will win!

Conclusions:
Although it won't replace my laptop, at least not yet it remains an awesome family device for “casual computing”. Browsing, photo albums, videos, maps
have never been better!

Android Developer Lab, California

I attended Android Developer lab yesterday. Wanted to share the experience with all of you.

First the background

I try to attend a local coding group where a gang of around 20 or so developers meet on a weekly basis huddling with their laptops to review code, applications and discuss overall Android state of art. It is from this group that I got the wind of Android Developer Labs: http://sites.google.com/site/androiddevlabs/faq

I applied few weeks back. However, very few from my group were getting the acceptance invitation. Mine did not come until yesterday morning. I guess, they ran out of all the good candidates by then J

Anyway, I was finally in!

The Place

The event was happening in a VERY large conference room at Google complex. I want to say there were upwards of 300 attendees. Everyone is supposed to show up with their Laptops + Android SDK + Eclipse + Sample code. I being myself, arrived 5 minutes late. The conference room was WALL to WALL full with attendees and I could find a sitting place only at the last row. Well, I would not take that for this kind of event. Walked right past all 30 rows and took up a position at the very FRONT row right in front of the speaker. I was in a good neighborhood! The guy sitting next to me has Remote Desktop Application for Android market which he is selling for $20. Nice!

Key Things covered

The session started around 2 p.m. The person presenting was from the Google Developer relationship team and his job is to evangelize to developers like us. They are holding similar sessions across the country. He first focused on letting us know what were the features in the latest SDK (Android 2.0). I will send you the presentation later on or you can get it on your own from the Web. But here are my key takeaways:

• As of end of 2009, Android was in 48 countries with 59 carriers and 20 devices
• They are truly trying to make it an OPEN source, OPEN platform which can target MANY devices as opposed to ONE (I guess you all know which the CHOSEN ONE is!)
• They want to differentiate by making Apps super–simple to publish. You can submit and upload your app in 5 minutes or less and that’s it. No Hurdles, No Reviews!
• If that is scary, they say it has always been the Google Way. Let the Community review process shake out the undesirable elements and not Google central committee.
• Finally, they want devices and applications which will cater to four key aspects: EYES, EARS, TOUCH and LOCATION.

The Surprise

After giving us an overview of the SDK, the presenter wanted us to open our laptops and do a lab solution. He suggested that we use some test devices that they will provide. Then he looked at us and said: “Tell you what! We will give you all a Droid Phone each!” The room burst into thundering applause. Within 5 minutes, I had my own Droid phone. It took me minutes to set the battery, hook up to my laptop via USB and the phone turned on. I had to press 1 to activate my phone. Here came another surprise. The phone was activated with 1 month free Voice and Data from Verizon and a $120 discount from a yearly service if I sign a contract within 30 days. Santa Claus has truly come to town!

Getting my own apps loaded

I have been developing Android applications, but had to remain satisfied with the emulator running on my laptop. I was ready to deploy the apps on the actual device and see it going. It took some hurdle to get the USB driver configured and my laptop to recognize the phone. Within next 30 minutes I got my starter Apps running on the phone! Developing on Eclipse, downloading via USB, running on actual device! I was in heaven. Almost!

I forgot to mention, during this wait time, I was able to connect with Gmail, suck all my contacts and mail down, take a picture of my worthy neighbor, email him and also check out Facebook.

The Assignment

Beyond the euphoria, the serious business of application development continued. Google wanted us to work on a Bluetooth based chat application. We had to write a simple piece of code to control bluetooth, locate other bluetooth devices that are within communication range, request communication with a remote device, and listening for incoming requests

The App Show

Next developers were asked to walk up to the podium and show everyone any apps they can share. Four or five walked up to the podium and presented. Since there was no phone projection, people had to be happy with the desktop screen dumps and webpages. Most apps shown were in the consumer category. One developer from our meetup group camp showed her coin collection app. One guy showed a 3D gaming engine. One gentleman showed an Android tablet.

Thoughts and Conclusions

2010 will be an interesting year to watch for mobile application development!

DrupalCamp Stanford, Jan 2010

Hello everyone,
This weekend (last Saturday and Sunday) I attended the DrupalCamp at Stanford.
Overview
The sessions were from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. both Saturday and Sunday. Most sessions were very technical and hands on in nature. There were 100 or so attendees. Acquia and ChapterThree were the strong corporate presence. Stanford also had a strong representation and we learnt that there are 70+ Drupal sites at Stanford.

Instead of drowning with all the details, I will focus on my FIVE key takeaways.

Here they are:

1. Getting Started
Drupal can be daunting to get started. Even for me, it took months to get the hang of it. Still working on it…
I made a specific point to attend the most basic, getting started Drupal Session. IMHO it was one of the BEST sessions. I will propose that we use these materials to bring new-bees (and old hacks) up to speed. Take a long look at Matt Cheney's presentation: http://rychosis.org/slides/Mastering-Drupal-Stanford-1-23-10.pdf

2. Admin and Drush
Unfortunately, I could not attend this sessions, but I have been hearing lot of good things about DRUSH. For the layman, it is a command line interface to Drupal and lets you do lot of powerstuff. In my experience, mastering a good set of command line tools can be incredibly productive.
Here is a tutorial from Stanford on Drush: https://techcommons.stanford.edu/topics/drupal/drush

I will await your thoughts!

3. Focus on Design and Themes
The entire camp had a huge design focus. There were a whole set of sessions on designs, themes and what is coming next. I think the Drupal creators believe that UI is a huge gap and they are trying to fill that. Two things attracted my attention: What is possible with the XEN theme and also a new theme called FUSION from Top Notch Themes
It will very interesting to watch the next generation of Drupal UI.

4. Services Module is key to connect Drupal to other systems
We chose Services module to develop our own Flex and AIR Components. I was delighted to cover the iPhone APP on Drupal track and discover that they are all using Services. This is a great validation of our strategy. We have been using Services to build Flex/AIR apps on Drupal using AMF for Services. However, other interfaces like XMLRPC, JSON and REST are important and being actively used.

5. In Summary, Drupal is Hot, Very HOT!
We are seeing this from all quarters. But the key evidence was the number of totally dedicated attendees who came from ALL quarters. There were designers, developers, web masters, entrepreneurs and corporate site builders. The excitement and participation could be felt everywhere. Keep in mind this is a completely FREE, all volunteer supported show. The keynote speaker was Earl Miles, the creator of the VIEWS module. He received a hero’s welcome!
I sense something very strong is brewing in the Drupal area.

In summary, I had a great weekend. Thanks to my wife and children for letting me attend an all weekend event.

Thank you for reading this long. Here is the link to all the sessions: http://stanford.design4drupal.org/

Best Regards and Warm wishes, Somnath

Exercise and Brain

Recently I attended a talk presented by Dr. John Ratey , a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

The presentation, content and the afterthoughts were so compelling that I cannot resist sharing this information and enlist your serious feedback.

First, the topic: “STRONGER, FASTER, SMARTER, The Amazing Science of Exercise and the Brain”.

Second, the speaker: Dr. John Ratey is a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. In his entitled, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, John Ratey presents new scientific evidence that exercise should be viewed as a medicine and that without appropriate levels of activity, our brains actually “shrivel.”

Last but not the least are my thoughts or the key take aways from the discussion.
Again, I paraphrase these in my simpleton terms. Scholars can pick up the book and dissect the medical terms, but here are the seven things which I learnt.

1. We are basically Hunter/Gatherers
Human beings are essentially hunter, gatherers. Just a few years back (around 10000 or so) we had to run 8-10 miles each and every day to get food. You did not move, you get did not get to eat. Only recently, particularly in the last 20 years or so we have created a society of gadgets and gizmos, of mashups and widgets where even my family of 4 are instant messaging each other to move from one room to another to get together for FOOD! (not true)We have created a social affliction called “sedentism” which has limited our physical movement and hence exploded our collective obesity. According to Dr. Ratey as many as 10 diseases, from blood sugar to blood pressure can be linked to obesity and sedentary lifestyle. Believe it or not, 20% (I mean 1 in 5) kids entering kindergarten are obese! Sigh!

2. Evolution of the brain

Over the years of human evolution, the back w8 so we have 2? say stuff clearly brain (the input source) has remained the same. It is the front portion which has gone through serious change which sets us apart from our ancestors. Most interesting amongst this is the “executive” portion of the front brain. The part which is responsible for organization, planning, learning from mistakes etc. Dr. ratey contends that the development of this executive portion is accelerated by exercise. Daily vigorous exercise. He gave charts and plots, examples and studies to prove this.Exercise is the “Miracle Grow” for the brain!

3. Exercise and Mental Acumen

Contrary to stereotype (I am speaking for myself), exercise does not make you a dunderhead. It sharpens your mental skills, your analytical abilities and processing power.“All things being equal, a physically active student has an advantage in learning; an inactive student is at a disadvantage for learning. Research even suggests that physical activity can impact student performance enough to elevate test scores”

4. Exercise and Depression
This I knew. Every time I exercise, I feel a high! Running is almost like a low grade drug for me. However, studies after studies have shown that you keep a group of patients in anti-depressants and a control group under exercise and the second beats the first. Also another trick which psyches use is to get an agitated patient for a walk. If they are still agitated you take them for another walk!Good to get a scientific validation!

5. Exercise and Education
Now this is interesting! Apparently kids who are exercising are not only making better grades (compared to when they were not), they are demonstrating more acumen and having much less behavioral issues. Data from schools after schools were presented to this effect. Most interesting is the Naperville School District which has made a serious commitment to FITNESS over last 20 years. The jaw dropping statistic was, overall US ranked 11th and 12th in math and Science when taking tests against other nations (Japan, Korea, Singapore are usually at the top). However, Naperville Central took the test as a country and came as #1 and #6.WOW!

6. Exercise and “NEW PE”

There is a difference between “sports” and “fitness”. Now this gets very close to my heart!Throughout our childhood, the “PE” class was a period of shame and agony for people like me. I was overweight, clumsy and lacked any skills in any sports whatsoever! I still have not gone far. However, the new PE is not about whether you are the fastest bowler, or the most daunting defender in football or someone who can hit aces after aces! PE is more of a competition with ones own self. Whether it is walking, running, swimming, biking, hiking, climbing, dancing or karate, just pick one and keep doing. Do it more, do it better and enjoy it to make it a part of your life.Just keep moving!

7. Conclusions
For me, it was a “milestone” lecture. I plan to study this, practice this and promote this.I thought I would share this with you, so that you exercise, you ask someone else to do the same. Whether it is a child, friend and even parent (oh yes, exercise is for ALL ages) request someone to do the same!

You can find Ratey’s Profile at: http://www.johnratey.com/newsite/profile.html

In case you want to watch his lecture in full here it is: Lecture at Google


Best Regards and Best Wishes, Somnath

Twitter, few weeks of serious usage

It is addictive, it is educational and yes, it is quite different!
The overall momentum around Twitter and the related ecosystem seems to be exploding. There is a tidal wave of information in the internet. I will not even attempt to replicate it.

In my last Twitter post, I raised a few questions regarding how to use Twitter and its related features. Here, I will try to answer some of those and quickly share my experience.

1. Regarding ReTweets, I found TweetMeme and its ReTweet Button to be quite useful. It was simple and straightforward and it works. I could even add a button to my blog!

2. Over last few weeks, I have started following (and be followed) a few heavy weights. Tim O'Reilly and Mashable are a few to mention. It was truly eye opening! It was like having your ear to the ground of what is happening right now in the universe(at least in our planet) and also getting an expert commentary. Very nice! I have even started following President Obama, although he has not reached out to me. At least not yet!

3. To track trends, I found TweetStats simple and helpful. There are a slew of tools with all kinds of sophisticated features, but this one had enough for me to digest.

4. For those who have not figured out hashtags, I will request them to try out hashtags . As we learn how to research on our favorite topics using the tags, we will understand the difference between Google Search and Twitter Search. Someone truly pointed out that Twitter is a thoughtstream!

5. I am yet to discover the value and difference of direct messages.

6. I loaded up my desktop with Twirhl and TweetDeck. Both are powerful and rich applications based on Adobe AIR. But I still remain a loyal plain vanilla web client user. I have loaded my iPhone with TwitterFon.

Overall, I remain fascinated by Twitter and the eco-system. The level of enthusiasm (related products, tools and news) seem to be ever expanding. On the business front, two things are worth mentioning:

A. Dell Outlet passed $2M in sales using Twiiter channel: http://mashable.com/2009/06/11/delloutlet-two-million/

B. Comcast seems be using Twitter for customer support. Try #comcastcares and check for yourself.

At least for now, my Twitter expedition is on. I will come back and report more in two more weeks. Stay Tuned!

Best Regards, Somnath

Twitter, What I learnt recently!

I am a late adopter. Noticed it since inception, but it seemed silly to me to pay attention. Oops!
Fast forward to November 2008, almost everyone I know is in Twitter. I decided to setup an account, log in and post a few tweets and accumulate a few followers. Kind of a slow start. Fast forward 6 months, May 30, 2009, Time publishes this seminal article (IMHO) regarding Twitter:

Here is my digest:
A. Twitter has an estimated 32 Million users growing at 50-100% a month. Wow!

B. From Britney Spears to Lance ArmStrong, all celebs are on Twitter. Who am I to resist?

C. Time predicts that it will have a *profound* influence on our life and businesses. From brand marketing, conducting surveys, micropayments, media and government alerts to local businesses Twitter may become the platform to play on. Hmm!

If you want to read the whole thing check it out the Time article.


Now, I am techie type. At least, that is what I think of myself! So hunting around for where I can learn more, I found a Youtube Video by none other than Mr. Tim O’Reilly. Mr. Web 2.0 himself! He has recently co-authored a book on Tips and Tricks of Twitter. I would provide my summary as a list of key questions to you.

Assuming you already have a Twitter account and have done some tweets and friends, do you know?

1. How to ReTweet?
2. How to Search for People, Words, Places and yes Attitudes?
3. How to Track Trends?
4. What is a hashtag? E.g. #wave
5. How to send a direct message using @
6. Do you have desktop tool like Twhirl?
7. Have you setup a way to track links using a service like http://bit.ly/
8. Are you familiar with interesting services like stocktwits or twitpay?
9. How some large businesses are using or thinking of using Twitter?
10. How the entire ecosystem might evolve?

I guess unlike me you are already up to speed. Just in case you are not, you might want to check out the YouTube video

Best regards, Somnath

p.s. Decorated the links auto-magically using Zemanta. Totally cool stuff!!!

Rich Social Web

I attended Web 2.0 2009 here in San Francisco today.
Needless to say, it was a low key event compared to 2008. Total attendance, level of crowd, number of exhibitors and announcements all appeared subdued. Since I went all the way to the city, I put on a brave face and started covering the show.

I am sure there several other trends. However, one thing which I picked up was Web 2.0 and Social Networks are embracing Rich Internet Applications (RIAs). This was apparent from two things.

Firstly, Adobe and FaceBook announced a Partnership. Adobe ActionScript 3 API has been made available for FaceBook. This will allow developers to deliver Rich social applications on the web using the Adobe Flash/Flex Platform. I attended the Adobe booth and indeed this was one of the key highlights with a FaceBook engineer showing off a Flex based game on Facebook. Looked really sleek! This was indeed interesting when I recalled that not too long ago (2007) Microsoft had bought a small piece of Facebook for $240M!

Well, wondering what the giant from Redmond was up to I went over to the Microsoft booth. No surprises, they were showing Windows 7, IE8, Azure and last but not the least SilverLight and ExpressionBlend. When asked about the Adobe and Facebook partnership, the presenter at the booth invited me to a joint session with MySpace later in the day.

I showed up for that session to learn that Microsoft has made a partnership with MySpace and developers can now use Silverlight to build rich media features into OpenSocial applications. The session had evangelists from both MySpace and Microsoft and they showed off the MySpace SilverLight SDK. The show was well attended and received. The key application shown was game to teach children on recycling and environment. Use of Expression Blend to develop RIA effects was very impressive!


Considering these two strong partnerships, I believe we will see a whole set of richer social applications in the near future.

Some links which may be helpful:
1. Adobe/FaceBook Partnership Details.

2. A Seminar to learn more about Adobe and Facebook.

3. Microsoft/MySpace partnership analysis

4. MySpace SilverLight SDK

Green & Clean Tech

This week (Feb 5th, 2009) I attended the Green&Clean show here in Menlo Park arranged by SD Forum. The overview of the event can be found in here.

First things First:
It was attended by over 100 people and had 6 panelists moderated by Greg Heibel from Orrick. The session continued from 6- 9 p.m. with some mingling at the beginning and tail end and was attended by an inspired audience. To me (someone totally green about green) it was a session worthwhile attending.

My biggest takeway was a high level on Obama/Biden Energy Plan. Here it is:

• Create five million new jobs by investing $150 billion over the next ten years.
• Within 10 years save more oil than we import from the Middle East and Venezuela.
• One million Plug-In Hybrid cars – up to 150 mpg – on the road by 2015
• Ensure 10% of electricity from renewable sources by 2012, and 25% by 2025
• Implement cap‐and‐trade program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 80% by 2050

You can read the full details here.

Ten Additional Things which I learned:
1. 2008 saw huge VC funding in Green & Clean. That money is still in the hands of startups!

2. City of San Jose has a huge green initiative. You can access it here.

3. California is uniquely positioned for Green & Clean because of Mojave desert and great Sun!

4. California uses 50% per person electrical power compared to national average.

5. Trying to explore Social Network & community technologies, I found about Positive Energy.

6. Researching about this show i found about this tool to track Clean Energy investments

7. Here is the link to Kleiner Perkins Green Initiative:

8. AB32 is a big deal.
AB 32 Bill requires that by 2020 the state's greenhouse gas emissions be reduced to 1990 levels, a roughly 25% reduction under business as usual estimates. The California Air Resources Board, under the California Environmental Protection Agency, is to prepare plans to achieve the objectives stated in the Act. Green House Gases include CO2, CH4, N2O, HFCs, PFCs and SF6 in the Kyoto Protocol.

9. This field needs Interactive Reporting.

10. Green Tech must make sense, watch Vinod Khosla.


I will eagerly await your thoughts.
Best Regards, Somnath

TraceMonkey

I do not know about you, but recently I have been hearing a lot about TraceMonkey, the Javascript engine to be released with FireFox 3.1. All news point to the promise of Javascript being propelled to a 10x faster speed. Well, I thought of giving it a try.

I downloaded the latest build of Firefox. Now I have Minefield version 3.1b1pre (It seems Minefield is the latest code name). I decided on trying out some benchmarks. I checked out the SunSpider JavaScript Benchmark.

I ran it first on Firefox 3.1b without the Tracemonkey Just In Time compiler.
Time taken: 7,572 ms.

Now I turned on Tracemonkey by opening an about:config tab and settting javascript.options.jit.content to true.

Time taken: 3,050 ms.

Not bad! I said. If not a 10x but certainly a 2.5x improvement. Not bad at all!

Curiosity set in and I tried the same test on Chrome. Time Taken: 4,919 ms. Well, Well!! The Google gang is not far behind.

I had to check out IE now. I already had IE7 on my laptop. I ran the tests. It was so slow that I had to run it again. The second time was only focussing on the tests and shutting the other applications. Hold your breath! The time taken was 57,680 ms!!!

Now this thing got me going. I have to push this to the next limit. I downloaded and installed IE8 beta and ran the tests there. Time taken is 13,224 ms.

This is truly something! I suspect another round of AJAX+ applications will hit the marketplace over next 12-18 months.

In the process of this experiments, I found another demo which was unbelievably cool. This link captures the experience: http://people.mozilla.com/~schrep/tm-image-adjustment.swf

Totally excited about Tracemonkey and carrying a bunch of Beta browsers on my machine!

Best Regards, Somnath

For those of you who are like me and want to try things for themselves:
1. Latest Nightly Build of Firefox
2. Here is the link to the benchmark: http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html

3. If you want to try the image manipulation demo you can try: http://people.mozilla.com/~schrep/image12.html

I could not get it working properly on IE or Chrome.

Google I/O 2008

Overview
This is probably first of its kind for Google, changing from a consumer driven search platform to emerging as a development platform. The conference was held in San Francisco’s Moscone Center. The conference was reasonably priced at $400. You pay only $55 if you are a student/teacher. Darn! I knew I should have stayed back in school!

Who was there?
The audience was mainly the young (20 and 30 something) developers. I did not find a single business suit. The crowd was eager, enthusiastic and participant. Code Labs remained wall to wall full.

What was shown?
Google showed these key tracks:
- Social
- App Engine & Apps
- AJAX & APIs
- Android
- Geo

What I saw?
I went there to learn more about OpenSocial and Social Networking widgets. (We are doing a lot of work on social media marketing. Sorry could not resist the self promotion). I found that Google’s OpenSocial is not only in but it is THE THING! Stalwarts like MySpace, Orkut, AOL, Hi5 and even Yahoo (I guess if you cannot beat them, might as well joinem) bragged about OpenSocial widgets. I also discovered a totally cool Open Social Container called Shindig with Java and PHP implementations. What this means to you? Well now you can build your own widgets and run it in NOT ONE but TWENTY TOP networks. If that is not enough for you, check this out. You can test it first on Shindig and then unveil it when it passes Shindig, chances are high that it will run on most. Sounds cool, right?

As I was walking impressed with this I found Google showcasing AppEngine. This is a framework to build apps on the cloud. So not only you can build apps on Google, you can Host it with them. It is amazingly simple! On top of this, I found a whole offering of app development, supported by a rich set of apis to access photos, videos, calendar, contacts and “you name it they have it” kinda spectrum. Google Gears, APIS and Gadgets.

Google has also come up with a partnership program for small business providers Small developers can build, host, train, promote their services and even market their solutions in a solutions marketplace. Now, there will be an army of VARs and ISVs walking the streets.

My Take away:
Google is now turning their attention to the $60B application development marketplace. They are doing it in a BIG way and they are doing it with a LONG look. They are trying to proliferate from the center to the LONG TAIL of the opportunity. Just like they did it for Search and AD Marketing. From conference setting, to target audience (young and next gen) all the way to dev tools (mostly just notepad and command line) they are stirring a revolution in SIMPLICITY.

Can you imagine, large sections of human population (even our moms) building a web app, crawling YouTube videos playing on a chrome-less player, distributing it on TOP 20 social nets to reach out to 500 M people, all hosted and served up from some Google cloud?

Tales which truly inspire me

After all these years the tales which truly inspires me is the story of a child we secures very good marks in Madhyamik Pariksha. He does this in spite of all the hurdles of his financial struggles.
Working as a day laborer or hawking peanuts in a railway station.

These boys and girls are OUR future.
We should take a moment from our daily rat-race to remember these faces and find out what we can do to make the world a better place for them.

Check this link out.

Monterey

This is a piture inside Monterey bay Aquarium.

This is ajust a mile away from Cannery Row?

Well how about a gentlemen called John SteinBeck