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Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Tue Feb 09, 2010 7:37 pm
by alex.barylski
First of all, you're on your trip in the jungle/nature and you take photos with your camera or mobile device. If your mobile device where a cloud based device, it would NOT have local storage so you'd need an internet connection in order to take photos. Unless somehow the internet was accessible globally by mobile networks, you couldn't take your photos
That is the general idea, yes. That one day Internet access will be ubiquitous. In fact I am sure no matter where in the world Bill Gates goes he probably has some connectivity. It just takes money, then again so will building a software system as complex as what you describe, otherwise it would be done and easy to do already, which it is not. However, every we need for real cloud computing is practically in place, it the stability of Internet connections that concern some.
Personally I side with having internet connectivity. If I lose a connection for an hour, yes it's annoying and might even be mission critical if you ran a busy shop, but in those rare conditions I would rather see software that cached purchases and uploaded that data at a later time, thus not requiring re-duplication of any source code from the server onto the clients.
You could turn every computer into a server, but there are issues that go along with that. Mostly running an enterprise server is not easy, it requires hundreds of applications running and constant upgrading, something best left to a dedicated team, not a home computer user.
The less administration control you can remove from ens users the more productive you make them, IMO and that is a win win for both parties.
Cheers,
Alex
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Thu Feb 11, 2010 3:26 pm
by JellyFish
I see your point PCSpectra. However I'm not suggesting every computer to become a full, complete, enterprise server. I'm just suggesting every computer have some level of remote access, not necessarily a server hosting a website for example.
Posted: Sat Feb 27, 2010 9:03 pm
by Jonah Bron
I agree with JellyFish. I want to control my data, and not just give it to some big company that I have no reason to trust (not trying to be paranoid, just sensible). I'm not just trying to promote my project or anything, but this is part of my idea when I started development on CloudSuite (see signature).
It would be cool to make designs for a minimal server computer, meant to be use by (around) one person. Fanless, tiny, easy, etc.
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2010 4:52 am
by kaisellgren
PCSpectra wrote:One day I see home computers being nothing more than a basic linux core and a browser such as FireFox, with all applications being web based.
I doubt I'm going to see that day. I wonder if I ever see games like Bad Company 2, Far Cry 2, Bioshock 2 or Mass Effect 2 run on the cloud smoothly 60 FPS everything tuned up. I wonder when I can do heavy 3D modeling or video editing (mostly effects) on the cloud. Processing all that data (I'm talking about processing data of 10-40 GB's per minute) in the cloud seems like impossible. I'm glad if I ever see that day.
Having everything in the cloud does have some interesting benefits. There's no way to crack games as you don't have access to them (other than playing them). There's no way to crack any software, you have to pay. It's also impossible to download movies or TV shows - you have to pay for them. This happens as long as there are no cloud services that allow pirated material and if there are such services, you never know when they go down and you lose your money (and get caught).
Maybe in the future we shop online for cloud servers and in order to play games or use software illegally, you would need to setup your own cloud server (which could be only possible if run your own company).
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2010 8:39 pm
by JellyFish
There are projects out for 3D in the web via a new context for the canvas element. When you think about it, it all comes down to being able to download the code to be interpreted, in which case, the web can potentially virtually do anything any other OS can. Think about the web as a platform like the Java. Java applications can run anywhere there is a Java runtime, similarly web applications can run anywhere there's a web browser. There was a time when many said Java was to slow to do intense 3D rendering, it might be 1.5 times slower now. Sense web applications are interpreted, it will always be slightly slower than a compiled binary. But who knows maybe one day there will be web apps that are super compiled and super fast.
Google "onlive", it's like a cloud gaming console.
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 7:44 am
by josh
JellyFish wrote:When you think about it, it all comes down to being able to download the code to be interpreted, in which case, the web can potentially virtually do anything any other OS can.
Only if we had unlimited pipes with <.001ms ping... (and was also impossible to have a dropped packet/connection). Too bad the real interweb has limits though. Maybe we will see the day before we die.
Example -- Graphically intensive multi-player game that renders 60fps... from 3d models that take up 10+ GB of space.... some things you just need more than a web browser for
From an article I found about the platform you brought up
http://www.cultofmac.com/onlive-thin-ga ... llow/31282
The only question is: will OnLive be able to solve the latency issues inherent in the thin client gaming approach? Perlman swears it’s feasible, as long as each OnLive user is within 100 miles of a server, but a high ping’s a deadly thing in an FPS.
^ umm yeah so I could either (A) move to a new place so I am next to a server... so I can play it on a 2.5" screen.. or (b) pop a little piece of plastic in my computer and install the game, run it on my HDTV at 5x the frames per second, with a nice keyboard, etc.. yeah you get the point
Sounds like they are on to something though. But I'd ask yourself this. If we can stream games of this quality, why wouldn't the next generation of games be so uber uber complex that games like crysis start to look like pong

lol, and by the time they get that "uber uber" game to run something better will come out. Always a moving target.
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 6:16 am
by kaisellgren
I agree with Josh, however, when it comes to gaming, I wonder how well it would work out if you only send keyboard + mouse signals, and you only receive a screenshot of the screen of this cloud machine? Sending the mouse and keyboard signals won't require much uplink and receiving a 1680x1050 screenshot 60 times a second requires a speed of about 30 MBps (220 Mbps), which I doubt is going to be of any issue in the future. Then we wouldn't shop for high-end GPUs, we would shop for high-end connections

Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Fri Mar 05, 2010 11:46 am
by josh
kaisellgren wrote: which I doubt is going to be of any issue in the future.
Well then I'll just take my teleporter to the main frame and play directly on it... because I doubt that will be an issue either.. in the future... lol
Here's another (just one of many examples) where you still need offline software. Onboard software for fighter jets. You really want some South Korean hacking into your wifi signal and taking over your jet in the midst of battle?
It's not a matter of having 30M/mbs connections. We have that now. The issue is the back-bones would then have to be 30mbs X millions of users (and the server too).. I think...
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:49 am
by kaisellgren
Wierd news, within a year 90% of Microsoft's employees will work on cloud projects! Check out Microsoft's new cloud site
http://www.microsoft.com/cloud/
"We are all in cloud."
Since MS has 800,000 employees, then about 720,000 of them will work solely on cloud projects which is crazy.
Google, beware!
Re: Web OS Concept
Posted: Wed Mar 10, 2010 10:00 pm
by JellyFish
Apparently OnLive isn't the only one with it's foot in the "cloud gaming" industry:
OTOY.
josh wrote:The issue is the back-bones would then have to be 30mbs X millions of users (and the server too).. I think...
Maybe. Think about it this way, you have a console that sits idle most of the time (unless most of the time you're playing video games

). While you're not playing, the same resources you used on OnLive's servers can be used by other people. Only when everyone one is playing at the same time will it put strain on the servers, unless the servers are prepared for such events.