After checking out your "NCs Predicted to Outnumber PCs" reference, I realized that the WSJ misrepresented Windows Terminals as recently presented by Bill Gates. Actually, Microsoft seems to have something in mind along the line of the NC, but with a thin variant of Windows NT or Windows CE - or Windows anything, as long as it is from MSFT. At boot up time, the Windows Terminal downloads an up-to-date copy of the thin OS. At that point, the Windows Terminal could behave exactly like a PC, pulling application programs and data from the server, hard disk or even a Novell server; or the thin client could implement functionality more like the NC, pulling down applets and using Object Resource Brokers to locate needed components; or the thin client could depend completely on the server for processing and just display results like an X-Terminal.
The PC-like solution, corresponds to what I thought WinTel might have been thinking about when they first floated the idea of a NetPC. This is minor extension to what corporations often do today when they put all application programs and data on network servers. This solution requires a high bandwidth connection to be practical, such as a LAN, so it doesn't address many of the advantages of the NC.
The NC-like solution requires some serious software development on the server like what NCI is up to their clavicles trying to develop today. The server software would have to work on all servers, not just Windows NT, for this to become a standard solution. Unfortunately for Microsoft, server solutions of this type are in Oracle's den, and would make the lion very aggressive indeed.
The third solution has all the problems I raved on about the other day. I am embarrassed because I thought the WSJ knew what it was reporting in the article on the Windows Terminal. That was a silly assumption, and will not be repeated by me.
Nevertheless, all this goes to show that Bill Gates doesn't know either, and is indeed panicked about the NC onslaught. We said the NC was big last September when WIND announced the NCI design win, and now everyone, including Bill Gates, seems to be agreeing with us.
For the NC to be maximally beneficial to WIND, it is important to know that NCI will get more than its fair share of NC/OS implementations. The argument against NCI dominating the NC/OS space is that the NC reference platform is an open standard and NCI is, by its origins, server-centric. The argument for NCI dominating the NC/OS space is that the relation between the NC client and the server will prove to be complex for optimum care-free performance, obviating the practicality of a non-NCI NC/OS providing a robust, long-lasting solution.
An example of the complexity of relationship between the NC client and server is that upon boot up, the NC server will discern the state of the NC/OS and download "patches" as necessary to keep it up to date. You can't "patch" someone else's OS.
At some point, the market will wake up and realize that WIND is the purest play in the approaching NC tidal wave.
Allen |
