http://webensemble.org/mike Life, love, learning, libraries, technology, money, music, travel & the world around us. Thu, 10 Jul 2008 11:10:19 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Hard to believe Bill Gates has moved on from Microsoft. As Gates sheds the role of monopolist for that of philanthropist, it could be that he will ultimately go down in history as one of the greatest charitable figures of the 21st century. He leaves Microsoft at the relatively fresh age ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20080705/a-firm-foundation.html Sympathize, with the different burdens we each face Understand, even as we hope to be fully understood Recognize and respect differences Forgive, even as God forgives us These are cornerstones of relationships - between family members, friends and even countries. http://webensemble.org/mike/20070628/surf-through-life.html Wondering what the newly announced WebSphere Content Discovery Server is and where it came from? Line56.com writes that it evolved from the acquisition of iPhrase. Tony Frasier of IBM says that 40 percent of the legacy iPhrase base was in financial services, definitely an information overload vertical. "Search is ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20070105/smart-about-search-limiting-is-goodness.html O Great Spirit, God: Mother, Father, Guide, Comforter - we hallow your name and seek your presence; May your Spirit define us today and everyday; May we find our daily bread and be filled, yet be mindful to love everyone else as we love ourselves; May we find forgiveness, and be forgiving in all things, may ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20061208/my-daily-prayer.html Joe McKendrick's piece on commoditization of software, based on a conversation with Gluecode founder Winston Damarillo, seemed hopelessly optimistic to me at first read. "Thanks too open-source and Web services/SOA, Damarillo says, 'software is going to commoditized, much like hardware has commoditized a decade ago.' Over time, Damarillo added, traditional applications ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20060303/commodity-software.html Gregg Wolper at Morningstar comments that "index funds are in effect momentum players," since they must buy into rallying stocks or countries, to continue to mirror an index. http://webensemble.org/mike/20060223/index-funds.html IDC has published their annual Server Tracker report, and CNET pulls out some highlights: "The overall server market grew 4.4 percent to $51.3 billion from 2004 to 2005" and "much of the growth took place in lower-end servers costing $25,000 or less" "Blade server revenue grew 84 percent from $1.15 billion in ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20060222/server-market-2005.html If you have data in lots of places, it's a challenge to synchronize files and directories bidirectionally, right?  Check out these links: Unison Data Transport Between Different Machines Synching Files Between Remote PCs SourceForge.net: Tsync: (Transparent) Synchronization http://webensemble.org/mike/20060217/synchronize-your-life.html "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect." http://webensemble.org/mike/20060217/mark-twain-on-contrarian-reflection.html The eMarketer reports on research into why 37% of US households still choose dial-up over broadband.  Whatever the reason, if you're designing a site for universal (US) access, be thoughtful of your page rendering times.  This portion of the market is apparently satisified with email, IM and simple Web browsing.  ... http://webensemble.org/mike/20060217/still-on-dial-up.html