Apple Safari on Windows - Issues

There are few stuff that are annoying about Apple Safari. It would not allow me to open up SAP SDN website. Try opening https://www.sdn.sap.com/ using Apple Safari and you will get annoying

Safari can’t open the page “https://www.sdn.sap.com/” because it couldn’t establish a secure connection to the server “www.sdn.sap.com”.

I wonder how Apple Employees must be accessing SAP SDN, considering Apple uses SAP as ERP.

Apple Safari on Windows - Plug ins

Here is a list of what works automatically - if components are already installed on your machine:

• Macromedia Flash
• QuickTime and QTVR
• Java Applets
• Ajax

What does not work for sure:

• Microsoft's new Silverlight

Finally - IE and Safari Side by Side

For Comparision, here is IE and Safari side by side. Safari offers better fonts by default (you can get them with IE too with twicking).

Apple Safari Beta... on Windows.. First Run - Screen 3

The Browser even on first run seems to suggest sights based on what you may have typed.

But on a closer look, it is actually reading the history of IE session from my machine.

Bad for someone who may not like such sharing.

Apple Safari Beta... on Windows.. First Run - Screen 2

For the multitasker, just pressing ctrl+t, will create new tabs to browse on. Just like Mozilla/Firefox and new IE 7.

Apple Safari Beta... on Windows.. First Run - Screen 1

After performing the installation, first run was just few minutes away. So is how it goes:

The UI has a very iTunish look (I am assuming that the normal windows user has never used Mac OS). It looks clean.

Apple Safari for Windows

Apple finally released a version of its Safari Browser for Windows. The Browser is currently in Beta. It will be a definite addition to what I have on my PC. I have used Lynx, Mosaic, IE, Netscape, Opera, Firefox/Mozilla before.

Let's take a look at Safari Running on Windows:

Step 1
The Installation Starts with a very simple screen.

Compared to installation of iTunes, the Beta has a very simple installation right now.

Step 2

It comes with an extensive Beta license agreement.

One of the key terms defined on the license are:
Consent to Use of Data. You agree that Apple and its subsidiaries may collect and use technical and related information, including but not limited to technical information about your computer, system and application software, and peripherals, that is gathered periodically to facilitate the provision of software updates, product support and other services to you (if any) related to the Apple Software, and to verify compliance with the terms of this License. Apple may use this information, as long as it is in a form that does not personally identify you, to improve our products or to provide services or technologies to you. Indicating that the browser has something that calls home.
It also has several open source components - which is why Apple asks uses to refer to GPL and LGPL license (says the license is supplied with the software). I tried to look for the copy of LGPL and GPL license distributed with the software, but could not find one.

Step 3

Browser is supplied with Bonjour and Apple Software Updater (if you ahve iTunes, that you probably have both of these already).

Step 4

The setup ends. It does not provide any clue if Java is supported or of any other feature from the setup.

What is outsourcing and what are the terms around it

Sometimes, the terms such as outsourcing become to confusing. Hopefully this post simplifies it. It can be applied to any process such as manufacturing. This example tries to explain IT Outsourcing.

IT applications and infrastructure around it is an asset for a
company.

When a company would keep the ownership and hand over management and upkeep of IT applications to another entity, it is outsourcing.

Sometimes company would outsource the management to captive unit providers (subsidiaries, sometimes legal entities seperate from the company but part of same conglomorate) - in this scenario companies are mostly shifting jobs from one company to other company, one location to other location. Sometimes it is done to save taxes (Layers of companies, less tracabilities)

Sometimes companies will outsource to third party providers. This is what is most people understand at outsourcing. Sometimes, the providers execute the work from same location - which is called onsite. Sometimes, the providers execute
the work from different location - in same territory (country, timezone, region
- dffers per vendor) - which is called nearshore. When the proejct is executed
from a far off location - it is called offshore.

Jajah

Well, Intel decides to invest in Jajah and also provide its patents on VOID for use at Jajah. Smells fishy? How would Intel and Verizon have patent on same concept? if they have, different patents, because their concept is different, then how would the products interoperate? One thing stupid about Jajah is that you need to be connected to the net to make a call .. which means you should be on the PC, or should have a phone capable of running Jajah client.. (The call actually goes thru the Phone and not PC, but it needs to be initiated from the web... that is pain. It would be good if they would add a call in number..

Joost Anyone?

If you have not heard about Joost, take a moment to check http://www.joost.com, It is a web based Video Player based on P2P technology by the founders of Skype... and Napster..... and it is Legal.

If you need a Joost invite, all you need to do is just ping me - provided you know me...

New Google Analytics

Google has updted its Google Analytics software to make it more simple. Google Analytics was added to Google's portfolio with addition of Urchin and MeasureMap, two of the aquisitions it had made.

Note: This blog's visitors are tracked using Google Analytics.

Tibco and Web 2.0

While other companies are heavily investing in SOA, Tibco is silently reinventing itself as a Web 2.0 company. It has heavily invested in Ajax technologies, while its mainstream products are still doing good in the market. What does it plan to do next?

Whatever Happened To SeeBeyond?

When Sun acquired SeeBeyond, it was widely speculated that it would be open sourced or atleast it will be made freely available. But all of a sudden, that seems to have died completely. Sun does have Seebeyond based Java CAPS on its site for marketting, but there are no downloads. Has it changed plans?

Google and Its Yada Yada

You must be wondering what is Yada Yada got to do with Google. Check out the screen shot of the message that I got when I downloaded New Google Desktop.

Microsoft Snooping on PCs without users knowing about it

Normally I implement most Microsoft Office patches without getting into fine prints, but the latest one spooked me completely. Here is a screenshot.

Want to read it verbatim? It says:

Size: 1.0 MB
Microsoft has released an update for Microsoft Application Error Reporting. This update fixes an issue with Microsoft Application Error Reporting that may cause some information about application errors to be sent to Microsoft without notifying you.
More information for this update can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=EE28696F-0826-409F-9B1C-781D28BB5981&displaylang=en

That means Microsoft had been getting data from My MS Office about crashes without me knowing about it.

Free ZIP software from PKWare

Not sure how many of you recall, PKWare, the company that created PKZip program. They are offering free SecureZip utility for Individual use. Go to http://www.securezip.com/ for more info.
You could also try this link.

webMethods after Software AG

I have been having offline and online discussions with people about Software AG's acquisition of webMethods. Some of the concerns that we have discussed are:

• Combined Company has multiple overlapping products: Products from Software AG, webMethods and Infravio overlap in SOA Registry area. They would have to identify how they want to position these products.
• webMethods' History of Combining different finished products is not so great. They spent a hugh amount of time developing products such as Modeler, Workflow etc and took a long time to merge them.
• webMethods' History of Product Upgrade is not great either: Customers who upgraded from ActiveWorks/webMethods Version 4 Solution to their Version 5 and then Version 6 would tell you nightmares they have had trying to do the upgrade. Now the customers face a similar issue upgrading from Workflow to the new modeling tool.
• A foreign company: webMethods has had large Federal Accounts: DoD, Military using webMethods for EDI etc. Would they want to buy same software from a non-american company? It is not a fair world out there.
• Open Source: webMethods has been using Open Source Tools into its products for a long time now. It built first version of webMethods Manager and Optimize on Tomcat, Hybernate etc. It used embedded Tomcat Server for variety of purpose. But it has not been so great in contributing to Open Source. Now it faces increasing compitition from open source world itself. Without having partners in that arena, it faces a great challange in small and medium enterprises.
• Losing F2000 Customers: webMethods positioned itself as a solution provider in Fortune 2000 arena. That is a highly crowded space. Integration Tools from SAP and Oracle when bundled with respective ERP solutions promise a better value proposition to the Fortune 2000 companies. Fortune 2000 companies also find that their IT Teams tooled in Java and Java Servers are able to adapt to SAP and Oracle's J2EE solution easily compared to a non-J2EE webMethods (this is also being seen as a way to lower TCO by not requiring specialized webMethods skillset).

There are more things to discuss... will wait to hear comments.

IONA acquires LogicBlaze

IONA acquired LogicBlaze, a company with an open source Integration Platform apart from active supporter of Apache ServiceMix and ActiveMQ. They do not appear planning to provide support for LogicBlaze's products, which may cause worry for its 20 customers. But it means other Vendors may have a chance at these customers, unless IONA offers them an option.

Integration Space, Who remains?

After webMethods's aquisition, 0nly pure play ESB/Integration ISV that remains in the market are TIBCO (going strong and moving into other areas such as AJAX), IONA (which has developed a decent open source strategy as well as has a legacy of CORBA Servers to sustain on 2005 –ve, 2006 +ve) and Vitria (already burning money ;-ve net income in last two years). See the graph comparing their fortunes from Google Finance.

There are other integration tools such as Sterling Commerce (very strong in EDI and SupplyChain Space) from AT&T stable, and Seebeyond (now part of Sun), We have to wait and see how they grow.

Software AG to Aquire webMethods

Also see http://www.softwareag.com/Corporate/Company/latestnews/20070405_WebMethods_page.asp.

Why?
First Thoughts:

• I think all the 3rd Party ISV Integration Tools are losing market share (new license revenue as well as from existing customer accounts).
• Fortune 2000 companies are moving away from Home Grown Legacy applications to off-the-shelf Enterprise Applications.
• Off-the-shelf Enterprise Applications are promising better integration capabilities, as a result, clientsforesee a reduced need to perform internal integrations using Integration Tools.
• Proliferation of SAP XI and Oracle Fusion bundled with ERP Rollout has reduced size of market for ISV integration tools.
• webMethods' lack of footprint in J2EE space makes it less attractive (say compared against a JBoss, webSphere or webLogic based Integration Tool)
• Its investment in SOA Space (in terms of money spent in acquisitions of about 6 companies in last 4 years) did not pay off very well (compared to pure play SOA companies such as Cape Clear).