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TCC 6.10 (Full Moon Edition)
``` [Some useful pointers under "Online computer publications".]
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Date: Sat 3 Feb 96 23:34:40-PST
From: Ken Laws
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AI Vol. 6, No. 10 IS February 1, 1996 CS THE COMPUTISTS' COMMUNIQUE
1> NSF funding news. 2> Apple news. 3> Online computer publications. 4> Other industry news. 5> Business philosophy. 6> Research software. 7> Valentine's Day sites.
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In proportion as the structure of a government gives force
to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should
be enlightened. -- George Washington, "Farewell Address."
[Hamish MacEwan
Goood Morning, Full Moon Subscribers!
The next issue is March 5, unless you sign up for our Tuesday/Thursday editions. Ask laws@ai.sri.com for details.
1> NSF funding news:
Clinton's State of the Union speech made no mention of science, for the second year in a row. Robert L. Park says that basic science isn't under attack, it's just not controversial. Science funding is being vetoed only because it's embedded in controversial appropriations bills. [WHAT'S NEW, 1/26/96.] (NSF is under another continuing resolution, until 3/15/96.)
Capitol Hill received more than 2,000 contacts from physicists in four days, after a call to action from the APS. Several other societies also prodded their memberships to act. "Surprised Appropriations Committee staff said that no one from NSF or OSTP had made them aware of the severity of the problem." [Robert L. Park, WHAT'S NEW, 1/26/96.]
NSF is holding fast to deadlines that fell during recent
shutdowns, but later deadlines may be extended. NATO
Postdoctoral Fellowships in Science and Engineering including
Special Fellowship Opportunities for Visiting Scientists
from Cooperation Partner Countries (NSF 96-9) has been extended
from 1/22/96 to 2/22/96. For other extension announcements,
see
NSF has revised its announcements for Grant Opportunities for Academic Liaison with Industry (NSF 95-112); International Opportunities for Scientists and Engineers (NSF 96-14); Partnerships for Advanced Computational Infrastructure (NSF 96-31); and Management of Technological Innovation (NSF 96-27). [grants, 1/29/96.] (You can FTP them from stis.nsf.gov.)
NSF's New Technologies Program (ASC), Microelectronics
Systems Architecture Program (MIPS), and Computer Systems
Program (CCR), in collaboration with ARPA and NASA, are
soliciting proposals for "point design" studies of high-
performance computing environments. Point design refers to
a proposed architecture plus programming environment.
Six to eight grants of up to $100K each will be awarded
for studies of 100 TeraOps systems feasible in a decade or so.
Proposals are due 4/1/96. Grantees are expected to attend
the PetaFlops architecture workshop (Oxnard, CA, 4/96),
and the PetaFlops software summer study (Bodega Bay, CA, 6/96),
and to submit a final written point design by 11/1/96.
Foreign scientists visiting US academic institutions may apply,
and proposals involving academic/industry collaborations are
especially welcome. John Van Rosendale,
2> Apple news:
Apple has hired Heidi Roizen, 37, as VP of Developer
Relations. She's a developer herself, co-founder (with her
brother) of T/Maker -- the Mountain View company that
made it big in Mac/PC clip art, fonts, desktop publishing
software, and children's CD ROMs. She has a Stanford MBA
and was president of the Software Publishers Association
for several years. "After running T/Maker for 13 years,
I was ready to do something new." Roizen is
Dave Winer has put up source code for MacBird Runtime
and a new manual for the Frontier scripting language
on his website,
Rumors have been flying about Apple possibly being sold to Sun for $4B. Cooperative ventures would make more sense for Sun, though. It's likely that Sun offered $23/share and Apple is insisting on at least the current market value of $33/share -- after having turned down IBM's offer of $40/share two years ago. Sony might bid higher than Sun, but there's really no reason for the company to be up for sale. Apple has twice the revenues of Sun, and great prospects. 10% market share isn't bad for a premium product, demand is ahead of supply, disappointment with Windows 95 is spreading, and Apple's bad quarter (or year, or two) is hardly unusual for high-tech companies. Mercedes had a much worse year, and it's not for sale.
A 4,000-person survey by Government Computer News (1/8/96)
rated MacOS 7.5 above MS DOS and Windows alternatives in
compatibility, power/speed, ease of use, memory use, installation,
documentation, interface, CD ROM customization, and enhancements.
Windows 95 was rated superior only in multitasking and price.
[Chris Habig
3> Online computer publications:
MacUser is archiving a reduced version of EvangeList,
at
Macworld magazine has eliminated sign-in requirements for
many of its website services, including current and back issues
of Macworld. (The message boards and vendor areas still gather
demographic data for advertisers.)
Macworld UK Online is updated biweekly.
MacSense can be found at
The Windows 95 QAID (Question - Answer - Information -
Database) is a large collection of Windows 95 information.
PC Today includes reviews and thousands of products for
comparison shopping.
Newsbytes now has online archives and subscription service
at
Internet Business Journal is offering its 2/96 issue
free at
The Online Column is Steve Kelley's weekly newspaper column
covering books, shareware, and online services issues.
See
To find other computer/software magazine websites, visit the
Top 100 list at
4> Other industry news:
Windows NT has passed OS/2 in 1995 server sales, with Netware losing customers. [IDC. SNS, 1/28/96.]
Microsoft has found Windows 95 sales somewhat slow, with companies waiting until hardware upgrades are needed for other reasons. Many will then upgrade to NT instead of 95, since users are reporting problems configuring Windows 95. [MacWay, 1/31/96.]
Computer memory chip prices are finally dropping. That will help bring down computer prices as well. Investors in chip plants are worried, though. [Dean Takahashi, SJM, 1/22/96, 1E.]
C|Net offers a review of more than 40 Pentium-class PCs
on
Intel is giving about $700K in "computer gear" to Cal Tech for its EE department, Center for Neuromorphic Systems Engineering, and an NSF engineering research center. [IBD, 1/15/96, A6. EDUPAGE.]
IBM is abandoning its 3-year effort to port OS/2 to the PowerPC chip. "Demand hasn't developed." IBM will still develop OS/2 products for Intel chips. [WSJ, 1/26/96, B3. EDUPAGE.] (That leaves the PowerPC to Mac OS, for now. If Mac OS is ported to Sun's RISC chips, Motorola could lose market share.)
Novell has sold its WordPerfect unit to Corel, the Canadian paint software company. [SNS, 1/28/96.] (The WordPerfect editor for Macintosh has been getting good reviews.)
"There's a club, here in Silicon Valley, of people with great stage presence, people with interesting names, or interesting backgrounds, who make sense to investors and CEOs of big companies. They run software ventures. Usually they run them right into the ground! They're all white. They're all boys. They make huge money. They get in the way. They contribute nothing. They know how to manage large things. (Not!) They speak at industry conferences. They get quoted a lot. Press releases are written about them. They form alliances. They buy things they don't understand. They move into something that's hot, and make it cold. ... And they make shitloads of money doing this." -- Dave Winer, DaveNet, 12/22/95.
5> Business philosophy:
"Companies are not people, and companies are not
happy places. They emit what they have. Fear. Uncertainty.
Doubt! ... To the users -- wake up! You can't depend on
the business press and trade weeklies to keep you informed
on technological developments on the Internet. They're caught up
in a huge trance, they believe this FUD crap really means
something." -- Dave Winer
Dave Winer notes that the culture surrounding Java is
changing, to require managers and personnel departments and
meetings. Developers Kim Polese, Arthur van Hoff, Sami Shaio,
and Jonathan Payne are pulling out to form "one of the hottest
startups that Silicon Valley has ever seen," still unnamed.
Polese,
Virtual companies -- fluid alliances of smaller organizations -- can be flexible, responsive, and cheap to pull together, but they don't work well for "systemic" innovations that must be integrated to form a new product line. IBM's PC business shows that you also need to control design (e.g., patents) or manufacturing so that other virtual companies can't compete. [Henry W. Chesbrough and David J. Teece, Harvard Business Review, 1/96, p. 65. NewtNews, 1/23/96.] (Intel is strong today partly because it didn't hollow out when other US chip makers did. Intel needed in-house chip production to guarantee quality and delivery schedules. For start-ups, though, alliances and contract work can make a lot of sense.)
Eric Schmidt, CTO at Sun Microsystems, believes that companies should be formed from large numbers of small teams. "Unix was developed by two people. Java was done by a team of less than five, Mosaic was done by two to four people, and the Mac system was done by about 12 people. Even DOS was actually developed by only two people." [IBD, 1/17/96, A1. EDUPAGE.]
6> Research software (in our CRS digest this week):
ECLiPSe: expert system using constraint handling rules.
Sugal 2.1: genetic algorithms package.
"Intelligent Agents II": book ed. by Wooldridge, Mueller, and Tambe.
"Intelligent Systems for Finance and Business": book ed. by Goonatilake and Treleaven.
AgentNews: agent technology newsletter from Tim Finin, UMBC.
Eliza: simulated psychologist, with Mac speech I/O.
FS-ATC 3.1: AI-based air traffic control for Microsoft Flight Simulator Macintosh 4.0, with speech I/O.
KeepTalking: WWW chat service for individuals or groups.
NTK 1.6: Newton Toolkit for the Mac.
SquareNote 3.5: note organization and retrieval, for PCs.
CyberSearch 2.0: CD ROM of the Lycos website database.
HTML Reference Library 2.1: documentation of HTML syntax.
7> Valentine's Day sites:
"It's hard to love an engineer/scientist. Sometimes it feels like trying to love your vacuum cleaner. It does the job. It is steady. It is reliable. It doesn't dazzle, polish, pet, or make you feel squishy." -- Jean Hollands, "The Silicon Syndrome: How to Survive a High-Tech Relationship."
Need Valentine's Day items?
Online cards for Valentine's Day and other holidays
are free on The Pad, from George A. Dillon.
Also sound files and audio-visual effects, and links
to other sites.
Create a free valentine with a cartoon cat or dog.
Webcards sends customized greeting cards over
the Internet.
You can leave Valentine messages, propose marriage,
or download music from the VALENTINES FOREVER site,
Or browse expressions of love in poetry, images, and sounds
at
-- Ken
February is a horrible month, which should be avoided whenever
possible. [Aaron Watters
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ISSN 1084-015X. Publisher/Editor: Dr. Kenneth I. Laws, 4064 Sutherland Drive, Palo Alto, CA 94303; (415) 493-7390. Internet: laws@ai.sri.com (courtesy of SRI International). Copyright (C) 1996 by Kenneth I. Laws. Computists' Communique is a service to members of Computists International. Members may make copies for backup, direct mentoring, or recruiting, and may extract occasional articles if attribution is given.
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