Recently, Richard Stallman called cloud computing “worse than stupidity.” His argument for this view is that, by giving your data away to the host of the web application you are using, you are essentially giving up all rights to that data. After all, they own it and there is little you can do to stop them from doing whatever they want with that data.

I agree with Stallman that there is a potential risk to putting your data in a closed-source, closed standards web application. I do not believe, however, that it is fair to say that web applications in general are a data trap, or, for that matter, in any way something to avoid.

If a web application is open-source, supports open standards, and has a good privacy policy, I see little to worry about. The privacy policy, which you can in part confirm through the source code, ensures that your privacy is protected, assuming there are also some reasonable data protection methods in place; and the open standards ensure that you can easily get data in and out of the application, so you don’t have to worry about losing your data or being locked into the application.

I understand the concerns about locking your data into a web application, but we should keep in mind that, as long as you have good open standards and a good privacy policy, (open-source is, of course, good, but not absolutley needed), you don’t have to worry too much about your data.

I just recieved my new laptop: a Dell XPS M1530 pre-installed with Ubuntu. I plan on doing 7 posts related to the M1530. I will not, however, be doing them all in a row, so don’t worry. Anyway, today I have some unboxing pictures for you.

First, though, here are some of the important specs:

• XPS M1530 15″ Laptop with Ubuntu
• 4GB RAM
• 2.16Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
• 256MB NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT
• 320GB 5400 RPM HD
• 1920×1200 Resolution (After using this for a little, I thought my other display was set at some super low resoltuion. This display rules!)

Now, on to the pictures:

Brilliant Brainstorms is a weekly summary of some of the best/most interesting brainstorms from the Ubuntu Brainstorm site.

(Disclaimer: my idea.) When you are trying to copy multiple pieces of information, it is easy to get confused about what you have copied right now. To solve this, you could just hold down control+v and it would show you what it would paste.
I have little doubt that some really good applications, open or closed source, (like these) could help spur adoption of Linux. So it would make sense to spend some time making it as easy as possible for developers of these cool applications.
Ubuntu has a LOT of screensavers, but not many of them are that good. For me, if they just included the fireworks one and Electric Sheep, that would great. Of course, not everyone will agree with those choices, so some others should be selected too, but we do not need all the ones we have now.
Ubuntu needs more marketing and some good videos explaining how Ubuntu works as well as some advertisements.

Recently, the executive director of the Linux Foundation, came out basically saying that Solaris, Sun’s recently open-sourced operating system, will never go anywhere. He even took a shot at it being open-source, saying that open-sourcing it was “too little and too late.”

Okay. First of all, in my opinion, the Linux Foundation should not be in the business of criticizing any other operating system, unless they are specifically defending Linux. Furthermore, if there is any operating system that should be completely off-limits, it should be an open-source one, such as Solaris. If anything, they should be praising Solaris for becoming more open.

One of open-source’s huge advantages is collaboration and sharing. If one project does something interesting, that can be picked up in other projects. If we are all busy criticizing each other (non-constructively, that is), we lose that advantage.

Perhaps it is too much to expect the Linux Foundation to be above the constant flow of attacks from Microsoft, Apple, and the other major players, but it seems that, at least with other open-source operating systems, the criticism should at least be kept to minimum.

Recently, an early draft of a semi-unofficial art roadmap for the much-discussed GNOME 3.0 was proposed. Though nothing here is ground-breaking, it is the kind of thing we need. Here are a few of the interesting points from the roadmap:

• Seamless transition from login to desktop, without a splash screen.
• New wallpapers, possibly to be found through a competition.
• Animations to smooth everything.
• “Dock mode” with large icons.
• An updated and more modern website.

All of these points are good, but for a proposed date of March 2010, we need more. Keep in mind that this is not supposed to be a roadmap for all of GNOME 3.0, just the art and UI part, but I still think that more should be done. Right now, this is a good starting point and I agree with basically everthing in it, but there should be more. I am not suggesting a KDE 4-style change, but more ideas like the dock mode need to be at least proposed, even if only a few of them are actually implemented.

A recent Free Software Magazine article lays out the case for open-source and free software in web applications. I agree with the arguments, but I also  want to add another one that I feel is important.

The author touches on data portability, saying that:

“If the users can’t get their data out they will be more reluctant to put it in and they will tell others.”

The issue is more than just getting your data out. Let’s take the example of e-mail. Say I use Thunderbird (if anyone cares, I actually just use the Gmail web interface). I can export my data from Thunderbird to another email client, but it is a hassle. It is perfectly usable if you plan to switch to that new program full time, but if you want to use both or want to try one out, exporting your data is not going to be a workable solution. What you need is a protocol for syncing and exchanging data between multiple applications (in this case, IMAP).

Without IMAP-like protocols for transferring data across web applications, working with web applications from different companies is going to be hard. Why does this require open-source? The answer lies a couple sentences back: “working with web applications from different companies is going to be hard.” Why would  you put in effort to make your software work with the competition, particularly if you are Google, Adobe, Microsoft, or any of the other big players? If your application is open-source, though, someone else can do it for you, no matter if you like it or not.

As I have said before, without good data exchange across all web applications, the web app scene is either going to be a monopoly or a disaster. Thanks, but I think I will take the good data exchange option.

The netbook craze has created a lot of netbooks that have Windows and Linux versions. This, naturally, creates something or a pricing issue, since Linux is free and Windows is not. The most obvious option is to make the Linux one cheaper, but that is not what Asus, and possibly others, have decided to do. Both Asus’s Eee Box and Eee PCs instead have additional resources in the Linux version.

I can understand the logic: don’t confuse the customers with different prices, while recognizing that Linux is less expensive. In fact, the way Asus did it in the Eee PC, where the Linux version has additional storage, makes a lot of sense. Perhaps not quite as much as just making it cheaper, but that is their decision.

What I don’t understand is the plan for their Eee Box. With the Eee Box, the Linux version comes with 2GB of RAM instead of one. The thing is that 1GB is plenty for Linux. Vista might need it, but most Linux users do not. Putting in a faster processor or a larger hard drive would make more sense.

I don’t mean to attack the Eee Box in any way. I simply want to point out the lack of logic in putting more resources in the one that needs less.

I cannot claim to be a developer, but I have been watching the whole iPhone application development issues with interest. As of today’s news, it appears that the iPhone development process is like this:

1. Ask Apple for permission to make an application.
2. Sign a non-disclosure agreement.
3. Invest time and money into an iPhone application.
4. Ask Apple for permission to sell or give away your application.
5. If Apple says YES: start making money and hope Apple does not change their minds.
   If Apple says NO: shut up and deal with it. If you say anything, Apple can sue you, further raising the wasted investment money.

It just makes no sense.

For months now, Apple, the company known for being good at generating a lot of good free PR, has received an almost continuous stream of negative press, first over MobileMe, then the 2.0 software, then over iPhone applications being semi-arbitrarily not approved, and now Apple has extended the NDA so developers cannot say why their applications were not approved. Essentially, Apple has responded to push back over a too tightly controlled system by controlling it even tighter. Worse, Apple managed to time this perfectly with the release of Android, a completely open platform.

Apple has not shot itself in the foot. They shot themselves in the leg or heart. If Apple does not loosen up on their NDA policies soon, developers may leave the iPhone for the much more open Android platform or another more open platform.  If the developers leave, Apple has suddenly doomed a potentially promising and incredibly successful platform. The only question that remains to be seen is how far iPhone developers are willing to be pushed? My guess: not much  more.

One of the frequent problems that new Linux users have is trying to install Windows .exe files, instead of using Add/Remove or a .deb to install software.  An easy way to fix this would be to prominently show the Add/Remove programs dialog after a fresh install (without a pop-up).

Even if you think that SSDs (solid state drives) will get better and this will eventually be unnecessary, a custom mode to minimize writes for SSDs would give Linux a real boost, at least in the short term, as SSDs become more and more popular, especially in netbooks.

Particularly with updates and software installations, it is a pain to have to wait for one thing to finish before starting the next. The simple solution to this would be to have a queue for tasks that cannot be preformed until the last one is finished, so I can tell my computer to perform an update and then install some application, and I can walk away.

Many computers are used by a number of different people, so providing an easy way of setting up multiple user accounts from the beginning would be useful.

Today, I am going to do something a little unusual. I have been thinking about a way of making application interfaces more productive. To explain it, I am going to use the example of a word processor.

Right now, in traditional interfaces, every button and menu item is locked to a particular place. You can manually move them around, but they never move on their own. This system really makes very little sense if you think about it. Two seconds after pressing save you don’t need the save button in the same place as 10 minutes after last pressing save. Similarly, if you have just selected all the text, you are much more likely to change settings such as the line spacing, than while you are typing. You can apply this sort of logic to almost all the buttons and options of any application, so why do these buttons always stay in the same place no matter what you are doing?

Taking this idea to an extreme, every button would be free floating and would simply move towards or away from you depending on how likely it was that you would need it. This is probably not practical, though, since you would never know where an icon was at any time. A better implementation would be a small toolbar that follows your mouse and is populated with the 5-10 buttons you are most likely to need.

The only challenge with this approach is keeping the toolbar out of the way and yet easy to access. Some effort would have to be put in to this, but as long as the toolbar stays well behind the mouse, it should be fine.

Finally, there is the challenge of actually deciding what buttons the user wants at any time. Some buttons, such as save, are pretty obvious, but others are not. Probably the best way would be to watch the user’s actions and learn from them. Thus, the selection of buttons displayed at any time would reflect how the user uses the applications and would get better over time.

Would you use this sort of feature if it existed? Should this sort of thing be applied to the entire OS?