MikeM,
Remember the days of worrying about Java's threat to Citrix?
Take a look at this:
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"But sales of ``Windows-based terminals' are growing faster than any other thin-client category, according to O'Brien.
Conversely, Java-centric thin clients -- the original network computers are going the way of the dodo. According to Dataquest, 144,433 were sold in 1997, but the figure has declined steadily to 17,323 last year. The research company expects sales to dwindle to just 7,638 this year, then disappear.
What happened? The problem was the inefficiency of the Java language and the software ``virtual machines' needed to run Java applications, according to Jeff McNaught, vice president of marketing at San Jose's Wyse Technology, the leader in thin clients unit sales. (IBM is second, followed by an array of smaller companies including Network Computing Devices of Mountain View and Maxspeed of Palo Alto.)
Wyse tried to build a Java-oriented NC, McNaught said, ``but it just wasn't viable. The Java apps just got way too big and needed way too much CPU and memory -- up to 96 megabytes. It would have ended up costing more than a PC.'
Besides, McNaught noted, ``the applications people want are Windows applications -- there's just no denying that point.'
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For the entire article: sfgate.com
--Mike Buckley |
