NYT: Rethinking the Computer at 80

[sterrycal]

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=990009

 

Do we need a do over?

[Jason Wehmhoener]

"capability architecture" is mentioned in the article. It's the fundamental principle behind Caja, which is a technology developed at Google that makes it possible for JavaScript from multiple origins to live together on a single web page while still being walled off from each other. (That definition is a simplification, but it works well enough). 

It's the only technology mentioned in the article that I have some personal experience with, and unfortunately my experience with it wasn't very easy. I attribute this difficulty to the fact that people aren't being taught to think like Dr. Neumann, and systems thinking just isn't a very strong part of large parts of computer engineering culture. In other words, if every tech blogger was thinking about this stuff, it would be easier for all of us to think about it together. 

Caja is a technology that exists today, but it is hardly used outside of Google (specifically iGoogle), Yahoo (specifically My Yahoo) and other places where lots of third party JavaScript is likely to end up on the same page together. When new Caja code is needed, the task of writing it is generally left to folks that specialize in it. It's not common knowledge in either company. 

My concern about the Clean Slate project is that it will generate lots of useful ideas, but will be just as ignored as the last 40 years of Dr. Neumann's work. His own quote in the article is telling, "I'm fundamentally an optimist with regard to what we can do with research," he said. "I'm fundamentally a pessimist with respect to what corporations who are fundamentally beholden to their stockholders do, because they're always working on short-term appearance."

-Jason

On Wed, Oct 31, 2012 at 9:33 AM, sterrycal <ster...@yahoo.com> wrote:

http://mobile.nytimes.com/article?a=990009

 

Do we need a do over?

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[Steve Terry]

This is a topic worth discussing, worth thinking about, worth worrying about. Why?

We are ALL stakeholders in the Internet. Not just IT folks. Not just codemonkeys and network gurus. In the Beginning...it was just a few geeks with computers talking between themselves. The only network was host to a "research environment". Later, the genie got out of that bottle and EVERYONE knows where it went from there. The Internet (the Cloud, yada yada) is now the foundation for ALL institutions. Can you think of a business, agency, bank, factory, school, sushi bar, etc., large or small, that doesn't run it's core functions (billing, banking, cust svc, marketing, sales, yada yada) from computer based, network connected software? (What a stupid question, Steve!)

Now, Imagine building your house on a foundation made of driftwood and stones cobbled together by folks that thought they were building a beach shack for the Summer. Actually, I meant to say that it was intended for for a few weeks in the Summer and the occasional weekend. Cool! And it was cool...enough for a beach shack. But a house? Whoa there, Steve! It's not just the house anymore! No! Now it's the foundation for the town, the state, the nation, the world!

The problem is that Murphy fellow. He is a persistent! Then there's those goofy White Hats, the nasty Black Hats, those stealthy, Maniacal Cartels, and the sneaky State Actors. We know this for sure: Things ain't going to get better! "What can go wrong, will go wrong," and it's corollary, "What can be made to go wrong, will be made to go wrong," are already rampant fact. We are, in fact, already...(drum roll)... AT WAR!!! Deny it!

I'm not in IT. I just hang out and try to look busy, stay out of trouble, and check the mirror often to be sure there's no spinach on my teeth. Still, I don't have to be Einstein or Al Gore to know the importance of this topic. The concerns of Jason and Dr. Neumann are also my own.  Being that I'm old and have seen more of Murphy than most of y'all, my expectation is that some hugely catastrophic event will force the changes needed because nothing short of catastrophe can move the needle on this one, folks!

The good news is that AFTERWARD, we will certainly not allow a good crisis to go to waste! You betcha! Everyone will link arms, Democrat and Republican, Muslim and Christian, Dawkins and the Pope, Darth Vader and Jar Jar Binks. We'll get 'er done! We will finally "reach across the isle". Damn! Brings a tear to the eye, don't it?

The bad news is... the Event.

It has been said that nothing focuses the mind like survival. Even Wall Steet understands that survival trumps a large profit on the bottom line. I spy (with my little eye) this apocryphal event becoming forever referenced emblematically in the following way: BC, AD, and AE (After the Event).

What else but the threat of extinction can overcome the inertia of the politico/socio/economico status quo? But, alas, is there a cat-herder alive that is up to the challenge? We have a meager few authoritative voices crying in the wilderness. (So,OK, I know mine is not one of them!) Besides, who ever listens to geeks in white coats, anyway? (Black turtle necks? Maybe.) Science is the Cassandra of our time.

What we do know is this: Chicken Little ran around yelling, "The sky is falling!" It wasn't. Then there was that crazy Noah who built an ark and, boy, did the neighbors laugh at him! Which one is Dr. Neumann? Ah, but stay tuned! We shall see, we shall see.

Despite all this, I remain optimistic that geeks in white coats somewhere are even now building some kinda craaaaazy ark! (They can't help it, poor dears, it's what they do!)

But then you have to ask, how much room? Who gets left behind???

 

S>)

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From: Jason Wehmhoener <jaso...@gmail.com>
To: santacr...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 31, 2012 10:28 AM
Subject: Re: [santacruzgeeks] NYT: Rethinking the Computer at 80

[Jason Wehmhoener]

Thing is, not everything we do needs to be fault tolerant or secure. 

Ponder for a moment the enormity of expenditure represented by all computer science and engineering efforts in history. Now doing it all over again should be easier in some ways, but with a new architecture, we really would be largely starting from scratch. 

That's the thing about systems thinking. You really *can't* do a do-over. And I think Dr. Neumann is being somewhat disingenuous by not directly acknowledging that fact. I'm certain he is aware of it.

-Jason

[Sean Tario]

Steve,

The same "reinvent/rethink the Internet" mindset carries over to how we live with and treat the environment, our global, regional and local financial systems, food production and distribution systems, etc. etc.

These are the BIG issues I feel we face as citizens of the human race. I fear the existing paradigm may need a massive jolt and cataclysmic event to awake to the reality of these issues and our collective energy to shift toward solving them vs. perpetuating them. Especially when nearly all the choices we are presented with deliberately fail to mention or address these BIG issues.

Having come from NOT this region of the country, I remain optimistic now living in Silicon Valley/Santa Cruz County being surrounded by so many forward thinking DOERS trying to manifest positive change in the world. I look at most of the rest of the country and the world for that matter and I don't feel so optimistic :(

Alas, like many of you I feel so blessed to know, I Pray, Hope, Try not to Worry, and continue to try and BE the change I hope to see in the world.

Sean

On Thu, Nov 1, 2012 at 11:38 AM, Steve Terry <ster...@yahoo.com> wrote:

[Jason Wehmhoener]

Burn it down and start over is terrible systems thinking. 

We should be looking for leverage points. Places where small changes have a big impact on the existing systems. 

-Jason

[chris arkenberg]

There are innumerable pressures driving legitimate progress. It's just that we tend to think top-down legacy control systems will save us (e.g. gov, biz, god, etc). They won't. And much of the turbulence we see now is the foam thrown off by the steady flattening of hierarchy and the emulsion of central governance. The twin engines of globalization and computation are rewriting all human systems. Of course its disruptive.  

So we build more resilience and get better at putting our own pressure on those systempunkts that Jason notes. Roll NYC forward 10 years from today and you may see a model for urban resilience, distributed governance, and collaborative innovation born out of the ruins of Sandy. The system has given its feedback in a big way and the users have received the message and will now correct course to attenuate the turbulence. Maybe this weatherly deux ex machina will shift the entire debate about growth, profit, climate, and sustainability... Or at least remind us that it's short-sighted to always assume linearity; that systems management takes years & decades to see results; and that quarterly revenues and the churn of dumpware are closer to padding forests with detritus and kindling than to growing sycamores and healthy ecosystems.  

I don't really believe in apocalypse. Other than our own personal one's...

chris arkenberg | http://twitter.com/chris23 | http://urbeingrecorded.com

[Jason Wehmhoener]

Someday we'll be paddling boats through the canals of Manhattan. 

-Jason

[Steve Terry]

Good input. I feel better already. Seriously. I was hoping to get some feedback. I read a lot but there's a difference between the insight that comes from within the tech community and my own view, that of an interested outsider. A constant in human history is that we run from solutions and ignore the lessons for as long as we can. Our most important victories come when there is no place left to run and the pain is too much to bear. We seem to need that at this point in our evolution. Maybe in some future we can come to our senses sooner and give up the drama.

So, yeah, I expect we'll survive. But without a little incentive boosting event to build public consensus, we'll likely continue our sleepwalk. The more epochal the event, the greater the chance that it will awaken us and hold our attention long enough to do what is needed. 

Thanks to Sean, Chris, and Jason. I appreciate your thoughts and feel I'm better off for having them. Time will answer all my questions. Assuming I'm still around.

Cheers all!

 

S>)

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From: Sean Tario <sean....@gmail.com>
To: santacr...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, November 1, 2012 12:15 PM

[chris arkenberg]

"A constant in human history is that we run from solutions and ignore the lessons for as long as we can."

or

A constant in human history is that we are relentlessly curious tinkerers who continuously innovate and collaborate to overcome challenges. 

It's a matter of how you filter the data. And accepting that sometimes the things we innovate end up being very disruptive. 

[Steve Terry]

Thanks, Chris. As you say, it's all in how you filter the data. In fact, one could argue (and it has) that the data supports, paradoxically, that humanity has benefited more from war than from peace, more from competition than collaboration. My point is that human and natural catastrophe, more than markets, will determine the speed and distribution of change.

"The future is already here. It just not evenly distributed." -- William Gibson.

 

S>)

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From: chris arkenberg <chrisar...@gmail.com>
To: santa cruz geeks <santacr...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, November 2, 2012 11:26 AM