Future: Making gadgets invisible

It is often people imagine a future where our human skills will be lost. We'll be life-forms around plethora of machines helping and regulating us. But while we are advancing towards future, it can be seen slightly. Here's two mind-blowing projects, i was honored to know about.

Sixth Sense
How nice a thought, draw a watch on the wrist and there's time. Make gesture of taking a picture and it it's taken. Like those Harry Potter movies, there is actually in real life videos in the newspaper. Latest status on boarding passes. Solving what should i buy problem. Dialing on the hand. Using paper as a digital medium, you can drag a graph or some paragraph from the paper to the digitally connected paper. Collaboration of this intimate technology is amazing.
It also looks the real version of Hollywood Movie, Minority Report.

Fie! Do You need Your Hard Drive? Really? I don't think So!

Chicago (IL) - Google Drive, or Gdrive as it is better known, has to be the most anticipated Google product so far. When it arrives, Gdrive will likely cause a major paradigm shift in how we use computers and bring Google one step closer to dethroning Windows on your desktop.

 

WHAT IS GOOGLE WEB DRIVE? Mac users at MacRumors forums noticed that Google's recently released Picasa for Mac offers the option to move image collection to Google Web Drive. The company remains silent on the finding while most view this as an indication of imminent launch of the so-called "Gdrive service."

The service has the potential to eclipse even Gmail, Google's second best-known product after their google.com search engine. That said, it's no wonder users have been ripe with anticipation for years - yes, that's how long the rumors have persisted. Gdrive is basically online storage where Google servers have enough capacity to hold the entire contents of your hard drive. It will likely also come with enough brains to do cool tricks now with bigger things down the road - like booting your computer from online drive to load the Google operating system.
Gdrive is basically a cloud-based storage that should have two faces: A desktop client that keeps local and online files and folders in two-directional sync via a web interface for accessing your desktop files anywhere and anytime, using any network-enabled computer. In addition, it will come tightly integrated with other Google services to enable editing of supported document types, like spreadsheets and presentations via Google Docs, email via Gmail, images via Picasa Web Albums, etc.
This opens powerful possibilities. For instance, you could start working on a spreadsheet at home and continue via Gdrive web interface accessed in an Internet cafe. When you arrive back home, changes to the spreadsheet have already trickled down from the cloud to your desktop. The idea, of course, is all but revolutionary, but Google's execution could set it apart.

SkyDrive, MobileMe, Back to my Mac
Microsoft's SkyDrive offers 25GB of online storage free of charge but is limited to 50MB per file. The software maker's more advanced beta service (dubbed Live Mesh) comes with a less spacious 5GB of online storage but with more intelligence: Its service keeps your files seamlessly synced across desktop, web and mobile worlds. The latter client also allows you to access files from your desktop using a Windows Mobile-powered cellphone.
Apple has promised similar desktop, mobile and web file syncing between Macs, PCs and iPhones via a MobileMe cloud service, but the feature was delayed due to ongoing MobileMe difficulties - even though Apple built it into its desktop. Called "Back to my Mac," this OS X Leopard feature pairs with MobileMe online storage to let you search, access and edit files stored on a remote Mac. Besides such offerings from industry heavy-weighs, there are similar free or low-priced online storage services from others that let you do more or less the same.
Storage for your entire life
Most of the aforementioned services are crippled in one way or another, however. None of them gives you enough storage in a free version, but paid upgrades are too expensive and you're better off buying a bigger hard drive for less money. It is these weaknesses that Gdrive aims to exploit as Google allegedly plans to offer an unlimited (or nearly unlimited) storage either free of charge or at a small fee.
If the company applies its "free-everything" policy to Gdrive, a free version should give us enough online storage to match the capacity of hard drives typically found in the machines of average users. Paid versions could offer true- or near-unlimited storage. Added intelligence could enable other neat features as well, like comprehensive backups with the ability to go back in time like Apple's Time Machine and revert previous file versions, automatic file scanning against known viruses and malware, searching the hard drive on your desktop remotely via google.com, and more. Yes, we're speculating here, but there are facts which indicate that Gdrive could arrive soon, and likely this year.


It's not vaporware
For instance, Google Apps in the past identified "www10.google.com" URL that led to the service login page as a Gdrive service. Although the reference was removed, you can still login to the mysterious "www10" service of Google Apps, although you can't do anything with it. Google also added CNAME entries for the "webdrive-client.l.google.com" subdomain,  suggesting a product named "Webdrive." In addition, WHOIS check of googlewebdrive.com reveals that the domain points to Google's name servers.
As revealed in this MacRumors forum entry, the latest piece of evidence comes from several Mac user who noticed that Google's Picasa for Mac application, recently released as beta, offers "Google Web Drive" as one of the choices in the context-sensitive menu that appears when you right-click on a folder with images. Another Mac user confronted Google on Picasa forum to clarify this feature, but the company remained silent. Finally, Google's Todd Jackson, Product Manager for Gmail, alluded to Gdrive in a recent interview with Cnet. "We know people's file sizes are getting bigger," he said. "They want to share their files, keep them in the cloud, and not worry about which computer they're on. Google wants to be solving these problems."

So, Google gets to see all my stuff, right?
With Gdrive, privacy implications could overshadow its benefits. Remember how privacy advocates chased Google "to hell and back" for indexing content of Gmail messages? It also didn't help any that the company scanned your email in order to serve better, more relevant ads when viewing a message. Gdrive would scan everything you upload to it, just like Google Desktop - the company's application that brings the power of its search engine to your desktop (it scans the content of authorized files and folders on your machine).
We don't, however, see a problem if Gdrive will let users exclude any file or folder from being sent online, plus if indexed Gdrive stuff can't be associated with our personal information. As long as Google uses Gdrive indexing to provide better search and serve better ads, most would be willing to trade tiny bit of their privacy for a free online storage. [I wouldn't, not in a million years. -Rick]

Google built an empire on "free services - a bit of privacy" strategy and it'll certainly work with Gdrive. Yet, we have no doubt that Gdrive will become holy grail for privacy advocates around the world.

Pieces of the Google operating system fall in place

The Gdrive "leads and hints" mentioned in this article does not mean that a product exists, but they strongly indicate a new Google-branded online storage service is in the works. Google Web Drive, Gdrive, or whatever name Google decides to call it, may be just around the corner. Online sources are now sure Google will unleash Gdrive in 2009. Google watchers have no doubt that the product will stun users.
If the company can really deliver cloud-based storage with enough free space to hold entire content of your hard drive, it will be a key paradigm shift. Although Google once led in free email storage with Gmail, and still rates high with 20GB per account, rivals overtook the search giant with general-purpose online storage. Most of them offer around 50GB of cloud storage free of charge. Of course, that is not to say there is no innovation left in Google anymore. The company of its size and millions of users may prefer to wait for the right timing to do the job right.
We have no doubt that Gdrive could have a huge impact on everyone, especially the cloud-based generation that's coming up and running mainly web applications - doing most of its computing online. We're also pretty certain that Gdrive, Chrome and Android are important pieces of the bigger picture, the one that replaces Microsoft logo on your desktop with Google's. So, don't be surprised if the computer you'll be using a few years down the road comes with no hard drive at all, but boots the Google operating system entirely off Gdrive and the Internet.

There are other linuxes besides Ubuntu also!

One of the pleasures of Linux is that you can try out different distributions to see which one works best for you. You likeUbuntu, but you want to fine tune the desktop engine? OK, tryKubuntu with its KDE desktop then. Some worthwhile distributions, however, don't get as much attention as they deserve. So, here's my list of five great distributions that you might want to try.

Before launching into my list, let me preface it by saying that this is a list of what I consider relatively easy to use desktop distributions. So, while Debianis a great distribution, I haven't included it because to get the most out of it you should be an experienced Linux user. I also haven't included special purpose distributions like my favorite system repair Linux, SystemRescueCD. It's a great system repair operating system. Even if you don't care for Linux and your job is bringing misbehaving PCs back into line you really should get a copy. It, however, isn't a good, general purpose desktop.

So, without further adieu, here's my list of the five best desktop Linuxes you may not have tried.

First, on my list is an old favorite of mine: SimplyMEPIS. What I like about this distribution is that, more so than any other Linux I know, it just works. It really does. I install it on any machine, it runs and life is good. I especially like that its creator, Warren Woodford, includes several small, but extremely useful utilities to make using the desktop easier.

So why haven't you heard of it? Well, MEPIS is in many ways a labor of love. Woodford isn't just the creator; he's also, by his own choice, the only major developer. That means that when sometimes life pulls him away from the distribution and that happened recently. Now, however, Woodford is back to working on his Debian-based distribution so a new version of MEPIS should soon be arriving. Trust me; it will be worth your time.

Another distribution which fell on hard times, but is back and looking really good is gOS (Good OS). The first version got a lot of attention as being the "Google operating system," because instead of emphasizing desktop applications it focused on bringing users Google's applications. It's not that, but after a 2.0 version, which wasn't that well polished, the latest version gOS 3.0, though, looks really sweet.

It's meant really for OEMs to install on netbooks, but you can download and use it on your own PC. It includes an installer for a small horde of Google Gadgets, as well as links to Google Mail, Calendar, Reader, etc. etc. You get the idea. You'll never want to run this distribution without an Internet connection, but with one, I'm finding it to be a lot of fun and darn useful.

Now, one of the constant pains of desktop Linux is that so many media codexes aren't available in open-source versions. Mint, which is a child of Ubuntu, acknowledges this and then includes the proprietary programs needed to play Microsoft media formats and the like.

The result is, in my experience, a very pleasing desktop experience. While it can't run everything -- Apple's FairPlay DRM (digital rights management) encrypted tunes from the iTunes Store is beyond its powers - it does pretty darn well with everything else. If, on the other hand, you want to try life without any proprietary software, the distribution for you is gNewSense.

Another Linux that's worth a look is PCLinuxOS, which is based on Mandriva Linux. This is a solid desktop distribution that uses a KDE interface to good effect. If I could use one word to describe PCLinuxOS it would be 'sturdy.' Like MEPIS, it works well and with a large variety of hardware components.

I'm not the only one who thinks well of PCLinuxOS. While it doesn't get much press attention, it's long been one of the most popular distributions, according to DistroWatch's listing. Go ahead and give it a run and you'll see why PCLinuxOS has quietly gained many fans.

Of course you can also use straight Mandriva Linux, and perhaps you should. At one time, Mandriva was a well-regarded and well-known Linux distribution but over the years it's dropped out of sight. It's time to check into it again.

The newest Mandriva, Mandriva Linux 2008 Spring, comes in several versions. Besides a choice between the KDE 3.5.9 and GNOME 2.12.9, it also comes in a version without any proprietary software and another, the Powerpack edition that includes many useful proprietary programs. All versions also include a handy Windows migration tool that can bring over not just documents but Windows fonts. It can also read and write to Windows' native NTFS hard drives. Mandriva does a pretty darn good job at bringing over Windows files and the like and for that reason alone I think you should give it a try.

So, did I miss any of your favorites? Let me know. In the meantime, give these a try, your usage may vary, but I'm sure you'll find at least one of the less common distributions to be worth your time.

The Future Picture

From operating systems to video games, slick graphics are now the norm, as the chips behind the visuals grow up.

The gaming industry has led the way in the development of graphics

Graphics chipsets are taking over the handling of increasingly complex computational tasks traditionally dealt with by the central processing unit (CPU) in a computer.
The CPU can be thought of as an office manager, concerned with the day-to-day operations of a computer. It is a jack of all trades and master of none and spends its time completing many different sorts of tasks.
Before now the graphics processing unit (GPU) in a computer has done one thing and one thing only - crunch big numbers to display ever-more realistic graphics.
But now that number-crunching specialisation is helping the CPU perform the computational heavy-lifting.
"We have taken some of the functions from the CPU over to the GPU and that allows the CPU to be freed up to continue its daily functions," said Darren Grasby from chip-maker AMD which owns graphics specialist ATI.
Super computer
The development of graphics chips has been driven by the demands of gamers for higher resolution visuals.

Nvidia's boss says GPU has changed a user's computing experience

Jen-Hsun Hwang, Nvidia co-founder and chief executive, said that users' computing experience had become more sophisticated over time.
"The GPU is, in a way, a super computer on a chip and over the years we have made them more and more programmable.
"So all of a sudden this super computer could be used for all kinds of applications, whether it is Photoshop or Premiere, to accelerate your video editing or making it possible to transcode your video from HD to your iPhone," said Mr Hwang.
That programmability is helping to take the GPU beyond impressive graphics and gives it the potential to power some much more unusual applications.
For instance, the parallel processing power of a GPU is helping give it a role inside cars.
"Initially the requirement was for the infotainment business to give you what I would say is an iPod lookalike in look and feel," said Eddie Seymour from graphics chip specialist Nvidia. "As navigation has become very 3D orientated - all of the maps are going that way."
6D system
The next step for this technology could see it powering integrated virtual dashboards that are fully customisable to show only the instruments a driver wants to see.

The next step for the tech could be integrated visual dashboards in cars

However, some see the true potential of these graphical chips to fundamentally change the way we drive.
6D Vision is a sensing system that uses tracing points to calculate a car's distance from other vehicles or pedestrians.
It uses two car-mounted cameras to help build up a picture for the onboard computer of the size of other objects on the road and how near or far away they are.
"We used to track 1,000 points," said Clemens Rabe from car maker Daimler, "with the GPU we are tracking 10,000 points and analysing them with the CPU in parallel."
"And we can use this in a combination with additional hardware to improve our algorithms even more," Mr Rabe explained.
Mr Rabe said that such a GPU-driven system could eventually be used to "warn the driver, or even take some actions to prevent a collision."

Warning on Internet's Future

Jonathan Zittrain believes that viruses and security threats will bring about a closed network where innovation will be restricted. Meanwhile, Lee Siegel worries about the loss of originality and real democracy on the web.

You can watch the two interviews - extended versions of those broadcast on TV - by using the links below.

Jonathan Zittrain

Lee Siegel

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JONATHAN ZITTRAIN

In his book The Future of The Internet and How to Stop It, Jonathan Zittrain celebrates the freedom the PC and the internet has given people to openly create and share their innovations with us all.

He points to innovations such as the web, e-mail and the wiki which were all given to society by their creators.

But increasingly with such freedom has come viruses, security threats and malware.

Zittrain describes these as "bad code" and he fears this is starting to drive us towards closed, guarded networks where everything is watched over and approved by a gatekeeper.

"I think more people will be driven into the waiting arms of either sterile information appliances - things like the iPod, iPhone and Sony PlayStation - which don't allow outside code on the machine at all, or without the permission of the platform vendor," he explains.

"Or they will end up migrating towards the web itself and by that I mean they will find someone on the web to deliver services to them which substitute what they do on their PC.

"They'll do their documents in Google Docs, their e-mail in Google Mail, their messaging on Facebook."

Software rights

For people who just want their devices to work this might not be a problem, but for innovators working to closed platforms like Apple, Google or Facebook, it changes the game.

"The natural presence of the platform online means that Facebook gets to control it far more," says Zittrain.

"If you read the Facebook terms of service. It contains things - provided automatically by the lawyers, it's not evidence of some terrible plan by Facebook - but it contains rights that Bill Gates, Mr Proprietary, could never have dreamed of.

"[There are] rights to charge the makers of applications for the privilege of allowing that application to continue to exist on Facebook at any rate Facebook chooses. Rights to terminate any application that they don't like, for any reason."

Product lockdown

If just a few big names had played gatekeeper in the past, would applications like Skype have got off the ground?

With no money in it for operators, Zittrain fears commercial interests would have strangled free international calling over the internet.

If the music industry had easily been able to kill off the file-sharing applications used to illegally swap songs, would the BBC's iPlayer exist, which uses the same technology?

So, if we move to locked-down managed gadgets in a bid to get a more reliable service, do we risk caging innovation itself?

"I think we need, either by law or technology, to make sure that when we move to cloud computing or to tethered devices, that the tether isn't too tight that new stuff can be strangled before it's had a chance to prove its worth," says Zittrain.

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LEE SEIGEL

Lee Siegel, author of Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob was bullied when he wrote about his views online which challenged the beliefs held by many bloggers, YouTube performers, and social networkers. It was, for him, a case of publish and be damned.

For Siegel, the online world is not so much inhabited by us as by our egos, which are slowly destroying civilization.

Humans are regressing to a "look-at-me" culture.

We are so desperate to be loved - chasing page rank, viewing figures, and "friends" we do not really know - that we are practically begging for others approval.

"It creates a culture of popularity," explains Siegal. "People look to the crowd for approval without getting in touch with their own instincts, without heeding their own conscience."

"People want to be watched, they want to be surveilled. Fame is the new wealth, obscurity is the new poverty. They want all eyes upon them," he adds.

Copycat culture

This dependence on approval is damaging originality.

Imitation is commonplace, a copycat culture where everything starts to look the same. It used to be called plagiarism, now it is celebrated and provides a quick-and-easy fix for our attention-seeking egos.

"I think life changes when a camera is put upon you," says Siegel.

"I don't think that you can have a natural, organic society when people are existing at that level of self-consciousness. They begin to perform for other people.

"They begin to market themselves. Authenticity becomes more and more rare."

Drowning voices

It is not just teenagers making videos. Many of us have carefully-crafted profiles designed to attract others on social networking sites.

Siegel believes our egos are now running riot on the web.

We have started to kick back at anyone who may try to lead us, or try to inform us. We will not be told.

Siegel points to the rise of the blog.

Strong opinions need little research or fact checking, yet the blog has quickly gained influence. He fears this trend will reduce what the truth is to whoever shouts the loudest.

"I think that's very, very dangerous because there are experts. No-one would talk of citizen heart surgeons, for example," he says. "But on the internet they talk of citizen journalists, because it seems that anyone can take up a keyboard and write a story.

"If the only truth is the result of the strongest, most emphatic assertion, what happens to the patient, soft spoken, contemplative people? They'll get drowned out."

Rational review

Lee Siegel knows his book is controversial but only because few people have questioned the net's show-offs and bullies.

"Unlike earlier transformative technologies, like radio and television, the internet has not been subjected to critical examination. It has escaped that.

"I think it's time to look rationally and level headed at this thing and talks about its dark side as well as its virtues," he says.

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