__/ [www.1-script.com] on Tuesday 03 January 2006 16:24 \__
> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>
>> Apparently you can sell computers to boost your search engine
>> popularity, or
>> encourage use of Web services.
>> http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-predict1jan01,0,3503327.story
>> Maybe it's just an attempt to gnaw at the competitor's share and maybe
>> an
>> attempt to invade a new sector for good. It stirs many thoughts in
>> one's
>> mind. Google Mini, Google O/S, Java Runtime Environment...
>
> Well, the legend has it that Google has always been building their servers
> themselves, so hardware expertise is apparently already there, in house.
> Add the Google Search Appliance, and you'll see that embedded Linux
> expertise is also already there since several years ago. Throw in Linux
> cluster distributed computing expertise that has also always been there
> from the beginning, and it looks like if anybody can win this market, this
> has to be Google that, co-incidentally is loaded with cash right now.
Yes, supercomputing is an area they dominate. For example, have a look at:
http://labs.google.com/papers/mapreduce.html
Microsoft have recently articulated their plan to dominate large
computational servers as well. They must be unhappy with the fact that the
world's strongest machines (/framework) are related to and run on variants
of UNIX. IBM probably used Big Blue and that Chess commotion as a PR
opportunity, maybe a publicity stunt even.
> Microsoft, OTOH had never wetted their feet in hardware other than
> keyboards (that suck) and mice (that are nice, but I switched to Logitech
> anyways) and some obscure multimedia players that never took off.
Well, the XBox 360 is very well-invested in. It's a complete set of hardware
with decent architecture that could be turned into a desktop PC. Last week
at the cinema, no less than 3 commercials for the XBox 360 were run before
the film got started. No doubt Microsoft take this seriously. Dell and
others are currently making up for the 'hardware gap'. Microsoft's
peripherals are probably from Asian manufacturer with products relabelled
"Microsoft". Same with Dell.
> And, once again: what's up with anti-Google pre-disposition, Roy?
You're right. I'll take that back.
Best wishes,
Roy
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