My take is, if these sports judging inconsistencies aren’t fixed soon, they might as well remove them as sports from the Olympics.  That would be a tragedy.  I am talking about Amateur Boxing and Gymnastics.  Both of which are seemingly controlled by judges who interpret rules in many ways based on the country the competitor is from or complete confusion of how they should implement a rule!

Amateur Boxing - For those that don’t know, the way you win here is not by the typical knock-out.  Although it can happen.  Amateur boxing is more about the boxers accuracy with the correct part of the boxing glove, and their ability to avoid “hits” from their opponent.  A “hit” is determined by a strike within the white portion of the boxing glove, which happens to be on the business end of the fist!  Sounds simple enough, yet time and time again I have watched matches that have ended 5-1, 8-2, 13-9.  Sounds reasonable on the surface, but you are talking 4 - 2 minute rounds!  So, you would expect a lot of punches to happen - especially if that is ultimately the deciding factor.  I have seen matches where the true winner was not the winner because his “count” was not enough to beat the competitor.  Yet, watching the match and counting on my own, not only did the true winner have more “hits” but the loser had many more than counted as well.

Boxing Solution - So, here’s a couple of possibilities.  What if sensors were imbedded in the gloves just within the “hit” portion of the glove.  To keep false positives from occuring, have pressure sensitivity set so it’s more than just a tap.  Further, sensors could be placed in the boxers shorts to also penalyze on “low blows.”  You could also have a system set up similar to fencing where the head-gear and shirts worn also contain feedback sensors.  It just seems that the controversy can be easily solved with technology, and take away from the human error that seems to be the judge.  By the way, you still need a ring official to determine if either boxer is not acting “normal!”

Gymnastics - It seems to me that the biggest problem with gymnastics continues.  The judges, their interpretation of the rules, and this years change in the way point calculations are performed!  If you have been watching, it is amazing how those judges start pounding those calculators trying to figure the difference of 1/1000th of a point because of some “critical” move that not one spectator saw!  How about the gymnasts who loose balance - two different competitors I saw from different teams had solid performances with the exception of balance checks.  One contestant had 8 balance checks, the other 5.  The one with 8 checks scored better by 2/10ths!  Go figure!

Gymnastics Solution - When I was at LinuxWorld, I went to a presentation by Sebastian Thrun of Stanford University.  He has been driving a project for several years to make cars drive themselves!  It’s pretty remarkable how far they have come.  They most recently competed in an event that allowed the car to drive itself for 200 miles!  This was done through a series of lazers, visual environment detectors, and lots of programming!  So, one approach might be to begin to leverage hardware and software similar to what this project used to “watch” the gymnast perform their routines.  Based on environmental parameters and established rules, a much more consistent scoring system could be created.

Obviously, these are things that would not be solved overnight - it might even take years.  But, the spectators and supporters of these sports could enjoy the sports without the inclusion of opinionated and inaccurate judges.

(MS)NBC Doesn’t Like Linux!

Okay, now my final complaint is this.  Although NBC has been able to leverage other broadcasters in China and cring a plethora of channels in High-Def - they fall way short on their web interface!  They do not support any Linux desktops what-so-ever, thank you very much!  maybe it has comething to do with the “MS” portion of the MS/NBC name!

In all fairness, one of the engineers at the booth made mention numerous times that the device was still somewhat “BETA.”  That usually means, “Hey, it works, but your experience might be impacted!”  So, having participated in a lot of trade shows where I was on the receiving end of criticism, I tried to keep my general thoughts to myself.

I grabbed a couple of the devices they had on display for the visitors to “play” with.  Obviously, no phone interface or GPS was available for demo.  Although, I asked the booth sitters a few times about GPS, no real answer.  System info and games were available to take a look at.  On the particular handhelds I used, there was one common theme - S.L.O.W!

Physical

Okay, let’s start with size. I can’t complain about the physical size, but might struggle with the touch screen.  I have large fingers, so anything I have to “touch” to interact may be a challenge.  There is not a stylus to use, which is a positive to me.  I have never been a fan of the stylus.

The device measures out at 4.75″ X 2.44″ and is about .73″ thick.  It weighs in at am impressive 6.5 ounces.  So, when it’s held, you feel like you have something to hold on to.  There is some density to the product.  That’s a plus!

The display is a “Touch Screen” 2.8″ VGA TFT.  Notice the size - so, if you have physically large fingers, some finer touch requirements may be hard to meet and frustrating for you.

My Physical grade is a B+.

Speed

The advertised processor speed is 400 MHz.  There is built in 2D/3D graphics acceleration.

My real world experience - driving the menus was intuitive on the two devices I played with.  Hitting a particular menu brought up the expected app.  However, going into the system menu left me a little confused at first.  There was not on immediate view, an icon that just took me back “Home” as I might expect.  I was not able to test WiFi or GPS.  For some reason, every time I tried GPS, the system appeared to lock up.

I did get to play a couple of games.  Here is where the finesse and fine touch requirements were a little bit of a challenge for me.  The touch screen itself worked fine, but where I touched did not always provide the expected result.

As far as speed goes, in general the device seemed slow.  That could be due to the way it loads information into memory, or actually runs a selected program.  It could even be the demo device itself.  In general, compared with other devices (commercial or otherwise) on the market today, it has some catching up to do.  Again, once an app was loaded, it would seem to respond reasonably well.  I just don’t know how the “instant gratification” crowd will respond.

My Speed Grade is C-

Hardware Highlights

As mentioned, for the show most of the features were not available.  So, the real intent on being at the show was to introduce the device, and garner interest.  Fair enough.  The glossy ad kindling says that it is WiFi 802.11b/g comliant, has AGPS (Assisted GPS), GPRS (2.5G not EDGE) General Packet Radio Service, Bluetooth 2.0, and 3axis Motion Sensors (2).

A quick mention on the motion sensors - this was kind of cool.  If I was viewing the screen, and turned it say 90 degress, it would rotate the screen for me!  That feature, I thought, was a great little addition.

You have to take the ad at faith, and I can’t grade on experience.  However, if all of the features are as described, it is a solid little package.  It has those things that are essential to a quality handheld experience.

Software Highlights

This device is really intended to allow the Open Commuity of developers another platform to target development.  In other words, they can either develop new, or translate existing open source software to fit the device.

The OS is based on Openmoko GNU/Linux-based architecture.  It is 100% FOSS on the CPU, and has GNU/Linux development tools available.  So, really it is up to the various open source communities to decide whether they want to play.  I guess a lot of the interest will depend largly on the popularity and acceptance of this device to the average everyday users.  Based on a lot of the attendees to the booth, I’d say it has a positive future!

Conclusion

This is a device that has some potential.  Without being able to really play with all the cool features, it’s hard to give anything beyond a neutral review.  I am one of those that has to see it, not just read it.  I was a little disappointed in the speed and responsiveness.  However, it’s a trade show, and hundreds of hands are messing with the hardware.  Physically, the device can take a lot of handling.  But, it really brings into question how stable and clean the OS is, and are the performance issues I observed due to a long day of running (garbage collection) or just the nature of the package.  That remains to be seen.  I’d love a better test drive, and will certainly look for one.  I think that if you are in the market for this device, you should really “test-drive” prior to making the commitment.

Overtime, I had been looking at just concentrating on Linux, Virtualization, and Web topics.  But, the truth is, they don’t hold my attention.  The LinuxWorld show is an example that I am not the only one in this tug!  More on that in another post.

So, I began to think about the things I do have a lot of knowledge on, and really enjoy - and therefore a change is in the air!  VelocityWebDev will live, but is now evolving to Technogory!  My idea is that I want to be able to talk about all kinds of tech things that interest me and that may not be necesarily Linux or Web only type stuff.  I will still talk about those things, but you will begin to see more discussions about more things.

Home Automation

For almost 15 years, I have been involved with a number of Home remodeling projects.  It’s a little thing I do on the side to keep myself busy!  I have been working with a number of Home Autmation products for some time.  I have seen a lot of advances, and continue to see new products that don’t break the bank!

Home Theater

I recently have been working with a lot of different technology that makes home theater and video/sound distribution work well.  Again, at an affordable rate that doesn’t break your bank.  I will be talking abot various products I have had a lot of success with, and hopefully will be something you find useful.

Computers

I will continue to talk about computing.  I will still have many topics on Linux, virtualization, consolidation, various system frames.  I will branch out a bit further though and begin discussion Windows, Mac, obscure Linux kernels, and diverse networking environments.

Broad Range of Devices

I have kids.  Enough said right?  But, they tend to have some of the coolest new gadgets.  Along with that, I get opportunities to try gadgets out from various vendors.  Sometimes I get to keep them, sometimes I don’t want to keep them!  I will begin reviewing some of these things, and just give my opinion on how they function, and whether they will really make your life any easier.

Patience Please!

So, while I being tansitioning my “brand,” I will work diligently to keep things seamless to my readers.  However, from time to time, a link might break or a screen might not be found.  Please be patient, and continue visiting.  I will get things fixed as quickly as possible.

This was a very interesting discussion, and really brings to light the efforts that are being made to insure your Linux servers (and desktops) have some type of pre-emptive or early warning monitoring and alerting systems.

Dell is one of the hardware vendors that are offering Linux as a desktop preload solution with certain hardware purchases. Like any hardware OEM - they aren’t sharing any numbers. My guess is, the debate on the Linux desktop numbers will continue to be a mystery.

There were a couple of small issues while blogging and watching the presentation. So, a quick synopsis of what was missed!

* Wireless Dirvers - there are more OEMs taking advantage of the many new drivers available.

* More folks are taking advantage of the Network Manager architecture available.

* There continues to be advances in the web space. We thought this was over some time ago, but you have WebKit, Firefox, and KHTML continuing to improve service.

* Internationalization is becoming more important. The Linux distributions are finding there way to remote areas that have yet to experience a computer, much less a specific OS.

* There is still a lot of multimedia that needs to be done. The guess on the future is istros will leverage licensed commercial solutions so they don’t ahve to deal with the prevalent IP issues.

* Print is pretty stable, but there needs to be improved dialog management.

* Bluetooth - not simple today, and improvements need to include seamless integration.

* Netbook remixes - taking a distro and building down to the lowest common requirements for the hardware.

* Encrypted File Systems - Government is the biggest consumer/requirement driver for this.

* Linux desktops are growing in all markets, however it is tough to get the OEMs to share their internal numbers. Some estimate that just the netbook alone will net millions of units in the next year.

* Linux preloads are here - they are stable, and work well,.

* Linux has more device drivers than any other OS - think about it, from the smallest appliance device to the mainframe! It takes a lot of device drivers to do that!

* Forecast - Consistent and steady growth. The future is good - the question is, will the community developers sustain it?

First and foremost, I am not going to bore you with tech details, you can get that from their site.  But, I do want to mention one very impressive stat - 700MB/s Random Read and 600 MB/s Random Writes!  That is just over 3X the performance of their closest competitor.

Their drives are PCI Express x4. which means there is plenty of highway to move the data.  Their general idea, and I think it’s consistent with their competitors, is that the closer you can get the drive to the memory, the faster performance you can expect.

A real world example of this - gamers!  That’s right, they are planning on attending an upcoming gamers show, and that seemed to be ther “real” target audience.  Although, I am sure their are excellent Enterprise Data Center applications.  I was told Oracle is testing this technology now.  But, back to the gamers.  Can you imagine being a gamer where you have no level load times?  Where you are on the map before you competitors?  That’s the kind of performance you can expect with these drives.

The drives have a type of CRC checking that allows the drive to sense a “bad” DRAM and rebuild on the fly.  No data loss.  It also employs what many might know as “striping.”  The ability to cross drams with information.

You are probably wondering, what about thost 15K drives?  No competition!  First, what the guys at Fusion-IO shared is that in their research of large capacity drive arrays, many companies were using what is called “shorting the drive” - that is, they make sure they only use the inside 1/2 of the physical platter in the drive.  You might be thinking why, but it’s simple.  In a mechanical drive, you have head seeks.  That means, there is a reader that has to move across the diameter of the disk.  Information written on the outer edge actually spins at a slower speed than data written close to the spindle.  So, keeping data close, means faster reads and shorter seeks.  Now, I am not saying I didn’t think this is really crazy, I mean large disk arrays that are 50% or less utilized!  What a waste.  So, it appears to me the Fusion-IO drives take that away.  No moving parts, 100% utilization, and very fast access speeds!

A vendor that decides Linux is the first O/S is unthinkable.  These guys, out of the gate, only support SLES or RedHat!  Cool!

With hundreds of Linux distributions to chose from, how do you pick the right one? We will look at user requirements, from enterprise stability requirements to embedded systems - from cutting edge desktops to old, low power hardware, and introduce some Linux distributions that will fit your needs.