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Jumping From Computer To Computer
Posted by
michael
on Thu Jul 08, 2004 09:25 AM
from the wherever-you-go-there-you-are dept.
from the wherever-you-go-there-you-are dept.
Roland Piquepaille writes "Imagine a world where computers become so ubiquitous that the idea of carrying a laptop will almost be laughable, a world where any computer could be your computer! According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, this is the goal of Intel Research Pittsburgh's Internet Suspend/Resume (ISR) project, a project that may one day let your work jump from computer to computer without interruption by using the Internet, distributed file systems, and virtual machines. When the non-proprietary technology becomes available, a user will suspend a task on the computer he's working on, and resume this work using another computer in another part of a city or several thousands of miles away. The second system will look identical to the first one, with the same files and applications opened. This technology would also ease OS upgrades or eliminate the pain coming from a hard disk failure. The project has even a feature named Rollback which would permit to go back in time, eliminating these pesky viruses. A pilot test will start this fall, so don't expect to be able to use ISR for a while. You'll find more details and references in this overview."
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Hmmn... (Score:5, Funny)
I love this quote... (Score:5, Insightful)
Despite their outward sameness, most computers are so personalized with desktop preferences and software that borrowing someone's computer can seem as creepy as borrowing their underwear.
Does this mean that borrowing someone else's underwear could be made less creepy if it were made to look like your own? Will we laugh at people someday for actually travelling with luggage- Ha ha, fools- I just use the underwear that is laying around at the hotel?!
Seriously, who would use this? How long will it be after introduction before someone comes up with a way to hack/hijack an Internet Suspend/Resume account and get all of your data?
Re:I love this quote... (Score:5, Insightful)
Your shell account can also be hacked. But that doesn't stop people from using Screen [gnu.org], now does it?
Instead of laughing about how noone will use this, try to come up with how you could make it secure and usable instead.
Parent
Re:I love this quote... (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? The parent has no stake in making this work and honestly, I don't see why anyone would want to do this. I like my laptop and the way I've configured it and customized it. PersonaIization is what makes a lot of peoples' machines what they are. don't want to have to resort to using some random public terminal somewhere.
Here's an slight corrolary, I ran out of the house without my cellphone yesterday. I needed to make a call, realized I'd forgotten my phone and then ran around for the next 10 minutes looking for a payphone that wasn't either broken or covered in mystery spooge. Rest assured that most of these public terms will probably suffer the same fate. At least in the larger cities.
Parent
Re:I love this quote... (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see why anyone would want to do this. I like my laptop and the way I've configured it and customized it. PersonaIization is what makes a lot of peoples' machines what they are. don't want to have to resort to using some random public terminal somewhere.
Maybe you have PC at work, and a PC at home, and a laptop you rarely use in the car. Wherever you are, grab one (non-yucky, I hope), plug in, and get your environment exactly as you left it. I do this with screen and sometimes citrix, and it's handy.
I, for one, don't like carrying a laptop (or much of anything, for that matter.)
Parent
Re:I love this quote... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Data logger (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I love this quote... (Score:4, Funny)
We could run Longhorn on it.
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Parent
Already done before - MIT's Project Athena: 1983 (Score:4, Interesting)
Project Athena at MIT already did all of this, back in 1983. Digital Equipment Co Ltd (DEC) even took the technology, productized it and told it onto some Universities in the UK. And all with (at the time) state of the art MIPS Unix workstations.
Here's a link with some info about the MIT implementation:
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V119/N19/history_of_ath
It was really cool technology and way ahead of its time. The only reason it didn't take over the world was because of the prohibitive price of RISC workstations back then. Way too expensive for a corporate desktop. Shame really.
Those who don't understand Unix are doomed to reinvent it, poorly!
Parent
Um... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Um... (Score:3, Interesting)
Do real work in VNC/X/Remote Desktop over a 128 kbs DSL and you know the answer to that.
This will run stuff on the local machine, and limit lags to filetransfers. I can live with a lag of a second or two when I save a file - NEVER a lag of 100-200 ms or even more everytime I hit a key or click my mouse - and this is the reality of X/VNC over anything but very fast connections.
Re:Um... (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, but assume (if the powers that be at the Internet providers decide to allow it...) conectivity imporves and bandwidth is not an issue? We are getting closer and closer to that every day. Some public utilities have started to bring fibre to the door of every house in their district. Some day soon this will be common. At that point your argument will nolonger be valid.
Parent
Re:Um... (Score:5, Insightful)
Try using VNC over a 64k Frame line. (It's not so bad if you remember to set the desktop to 640X480 and 256 colours.) Now try driving 6 hours to get to the same machine. Which was a better use of your time?
It might suck, but sometimes it is faster to VNC or Remote X in to a machine.
Parent
Re:Um... (Score:5, Insightful)
(In X, the server runs on the client, while the clients run on the server.)
It always baffles me why people use VNC or convoluted scripts to copy over the settings when most of the time, remote X would do the job just fine. Possibly because the man pages for X in general and remote X in particular are not meant to be read by Normal People?
Regards,
--
*Art
Parent
Re:Um... (Score:4, Informative)
All of these programs let you access a machine remotely, but screen & VNC allow you to keep a particular session alive while you access it from different locations. With remote X (or telnet), if you want to access the server from a different location, you have to log in again, starting a new session. With screen or VNC, you are continuing an already opened session. Any programs that you were running are still there, unchanged. Read up on VNC a little more and try to understand the implications of this feature. It really is a nice feature, above and beyond what X provides.
Parent
Uh, right. (Score:5, Funny)
Computers keep shrinking and prices keep dropping. Why depend on a remote site to host your desktop when you could keep the same data in your watch [thinkgeek.com], jackknife [thinkgeek.com] or wallet [thinkgeek.com]?
Re:Uh, right. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Uh, right. (Score:4, Insightful)
People like to own things, whether it be a car, home, clothes, etc. Only when there is no other choice will be use "communal" stuff (electricity, etc)
When I went to University we had this "virtual" computer concept (University of Waterloo). Everything was networked and you could log on anywhere and get access to your files and programs.
YET people who could afford it bought their own computer. Simple reason why:
1) Can use the computer when you want to
2) Can put silly stickers and colors on your computer and using your own keyboard and mouse. Remember not everybody wants to use an American keyboard and push mouse. I need a trackball because I have problems with my fingers.
3) Have access to a computer, without the hassle of finding one. Imagine going from your office to a library. With a laptop it is called suspend. Going from the office to library first means finding a free computer at the library.
Nope, generally speaking silly idea....
Parent
Re:Uh, right. (Score:3, Interesting)
The trouble for me is, I like my personal machines. Not just the settings, which are relatively painless to transfer (since I don't use Windows when possible), but rather, the hardware: I love my particular old Marble FX trackball and NMB keyboard...
Re:Uh, right. (Score:4, Insightful)
Where is your data stored? How do you manage who owns the data? Do you own the data if you don't own the media on which it's stored? How do you enforce this?
Part of the reason people like their own cars, houses, whatever, is that they *own* it and it's tangible. People don't like to license music on a CD - the want to own the CD and do whatever they want with it (and the music on it - most people who advocate fair use aren't in the business of redistributing the music off the CD they purchased).
The issues of security and technological barriers aside, the issues of intellectual property and having control over your own [stuff] will become what's important...
Parent
Umm.. Security? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Umm.. Security? (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Back to the Future (Score:3, Insightful)
Rollback? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Rollback? (Score:3, Informative)
If a user's computer becomes infected, she could use the Rollback feature to go back to an arbitrary point in time prior to the infection and resume work there, deleting the subsequent work -- and the virus.
So I was right with my original assumption, if the virus simply hangs low for x days you rollback and still lose x days work.
Sun Ray (Score:5, Interesting)
To simply "go back in time"... (Score:3, Insightful)
(Just my two off-topic eurocents).
Interesting concept (Score:5, Insightful)
This would also make it very difficult for any non-standard OS (Linux, MacOS, BSD) to get a foothold once it gets going - I'd guess you would be pretty limited in just what you could have loaded in order to use this system.
I dunno. It's an interesting concept, but I have my doubts. I actually like managing my own systems. I'd rather have the control than hand it over to a company who's going to do upgrades without my knowledge.
Beautiful (Score:4, Interesting)
Beautiful idea, but I want to carry his memory/state with me on a little and duplicable box or card.
Interesting, but incomplete (Score:4, Insightful)
1. Most people have lots of data on their computers (here, I define a 'lot' as over 10 GB of data). Even if they were only using say 200 mb of data, at today's broadband transfer speeds, that could take 10 minutes to transfer, or much more if they can only get dialup speeds.
2. As I said, most people have lots of stuff on their HD's (I for one always have 80-100GB on my HD). Where are they going to get the space to store 100GB(or more) for every person who is going to use the system? It will cost them a fortune just in the cost of disk space, not to mention bandwidth to transfer the running state of all these systems.
3. It might seem obvious to some, but how are they planning on getting the system into widespread use? If you haven't noticed, people tend to resist change, and even if they do get it into wide use, not everyone will use it, so there will still be computers you cant just walk up to and use.
4. If it costs money to use the service, I guarantee it will take a lot longer to get into widespread use. The only place I can really see it being worth the cost would be in a business setting, where you could sit down at any computer and it would be like you are sitting at your own desk.
In conclusion, good idea, but it needs major work, and there are many major major problems to be solved before it "revolutionizes" computing
Re:Interesting, but incomplete (Score:4, Interesting)
You are thinking about it in the wrong way. In The Future(tm) everyone will use one big shared HD, and its name will be Google.
Parent
The future is now. (Score:5, Informative)
The future is 10 years ago.
Well, with Xterminals... dummy boxes with small system image, loading a desktop off the central server.
The future is 20 years ago.
Well, with mainframe technology, and 3270 terminals.
Re:The future is now. (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
GoToMyPC?? (Score:3, Insightful)
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
Imagine that! (Score:5, Insightful)
Insecure as all get-out. (Score:3, Interesting)
Note that this memo wasn't just idle paranoia; we sent it out after having some IP address in Korea attempt to log in to our corporate webmail server, after one of our salesdroids checked her mail from a public terminal in the lobby of a business hotel. He had her username, password, and who knows what else in the way of corporate data, all from her using a public PC.
Me? I'll stick with bringing my laptop around, even if it looks funny, just like I stick to using GPG and public-key encryption on my emails.
Idiotic technofantasy (Score:3, Insightful)
For example: "If a user's computer becomes infected, she could use the Rollback feature to go back to an arbitrary point in time prior to the infection and resume work there, deleting the subsequent work -- and the virus."
There are several reasons why that statement is idiotic.
1) This exact capability has, of course, been available for several years now, first as the commercial product GoBack, then as a built-in feature in Windows XP. (And it has done nothing substantial to solve the virus problem).
2) The breeziness with which the reporter acknowledges that using this capability would "delete the subsequent work" is astonishing. Most of us would not like losing one, two, or several days' work.
3) If you always were aware of the exact moment at which you acquired a virus, viruses would be a relatively small problem. The fact is, you don't know.
4) There's even a nonzero probability that in going back to a time when you did not have the virus that you might also be undoing security patches preventing you from acquiring new viruses.
Security (Score:3, Interesting)
Very easy to put in a keyboard, mouse, USB key sniffer in.
If I can't trust my own computer running the 'standard' OS, how can I trust someone elses.
People have finally gotten to understand they must keep their bank PIN number secret, they should be able to understand putting it into random computers is also a bad idea.
How about... (Score:5, Interesting)
I walk up to an unused machine, sit down, the login script/screen detects my bluetooth device, notices that is a user account storage device, and prompts for a username/password that is checked against the device via encrypted bluetooth... If successful, links, shortcuts, small apps(putty), documents, contacts, email, etc.. are all 'loaded' onto the local machine, as if i were at my home computer...
Even better if these were on a linux/x11 setup so we could do some automatic screen attach/detach scripts on all processes/programs running!
Issues (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Where are the applications and data really going to be stored?
2. Who has access to this information/hardware?
3. Can I trust that a terminal doesn't have a keylogger (hardware/software) attached to it?
4. How traceable will this be if somebody gains access to my "environment" without my permission.
Oh... the "Thin Client" debate again... (Score:4, Insightful)
Fifteen years ago, I was one of the Thin Client evangelists trying to keep M$ Win off of the company desktops.
Thin Client has its place, but so does public transportation... and some people, no matter what, want to "drive their own."
It's amazing how many people DON'T GET IT... (Score:5, Informative)
1. Sun's Sun Ray is a glorified terminal. All processing takes place on the server, and the resources of the terminal itself are almost non-existant. From Sun's website "Compact, fanless plug-and-work device that processes input and output and manages communication with the shared Sun Ray server." These might be nice if the price stated about $99, not $359. And if I could run the server end on a Linux box (cluster), not some ungodly expensive Solaris behemoth. [Okat, the SunFire v210 isn't expensive, but who the hell wants a 1 GHz UltraSpark IIIi cu to run stuff like this?]
2. VNC over SSH/Remote X. Same issues as the Sun Ray -- not using local resources. You're running everything on a remote server. NOT what the article is describing at all.
3. Hijacking a session, security, etc. Yes, a concern, but it is a totally separate issue. How about keeping a super check, super small USB key with you that has a personal certificate. Then, encrypt all communication between your location and the main servers using that? There are plenty of solutions to this problem.
What this article is talking about using local resources (CPU, sound, 3D acceleration, etc.) to do the task but combine it with a distributed file system. Use the "local" hard drive as a file system CACHE, to speed things up.
Use the "local" CPU and RAM to run programs, not some server on the other side of the world. This way you can run DISCONNECTED or not consume mega networking resources.
Think "IMAP in disconnected mode" or "web browsing while offline".
Sun (and Oracle, IIRC) both eschew this "three tier" client server system in favor of true terminal server sessions. However, terminal sessions, including things like VNC, are too limited when it comes to tasks like 3D display.
By combining the best of terminals (state saved computing) with the power and responsiveness of local resources (think "desktop PC"), they have a lot of potential.
They also have some major hurdles to overcome. Complete hardware abstraction is one. Differences in hardware capabilities, etc. are not trivial problems. (Go from 1280x1024 w/5.1 surround to a 800x600 screen w/o speakers and see how it handles it.)
-Charles
Re:Keyloggers (Score:3, Insightful)
If a computer is not my own computer i simply don't trust it.
Ah, but you don't need to trust it in order to use it [shmoo.com]!
Re:Good Luck with security (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, the screen could still be recorded.
It's here already (Score:4, Interesting)
It's tiny standardized robust plugable hard-disk (Firewire based) and 5G is all that I need to "keep running". That's enough space to have the core OS [X] and my Applications directory tree (which is absolutely loaded with only ~3G used).
I'm able to listen to my music anywhere -- and boot "my computer" on any Mac I encounter
Parent
Re:Well... (Score:5, Interesting)
The big deal is making it easy for Joe User to do it every day without thinking. I should remind you that Joe User is no scripting wizard.
Intel's Digital Briefcase [intel.com] will be realized with the introduction of the following technologies:
1) High-density, low-power, nonvolatile memory
2) Integrated logic & wireless
At this point, the Personal Server [com.com] becomes feasible. A specification for "personal server compliant" operating systems helps any compliant PC in the world "log on to you", as they say in Soviet Russia. All of your preferences down to the last minute detail (wallpaper, favorites, browsing history, etc) will immediately be transferred to this particular PC and it will be as if it were your own.
This is close. Since Microsoft will try to "embrace and extend" this to the point that we can't use these devices without Windows, the open-source community will need to rapidly develop this into an open, robust standard that will work with all PCs. I give it two years... Power consumption will be the biggest issue. Otherwise, you could stick a WiFi link on an iPod and do it now (though I suppose it could be done with a cable that also supplies power).
Parent
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed. These guys are WAY late to the ballgame. Sun Microsystems already puts out a "log in anywhere" product in the form of the Sun Ray Stations. The network can be configured so that access can be attained over the Internet from any Ray Station, anywhere. All you need is your security "smart-card" that tells the machine where your server is. Sun has even been whispering about a laptop version called "The Comet" that provides people with an "On the go" Ray Station. (I REALLY wish I'd saved that Sun Boardroom Minutes. That was a really neat piece of hardware.)
Parent
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, already on the market. I saw one on display at a technology show a few weeks ago. Shares the same chasis as one of their normal Sun laptops, though without all the peripherals built in. Only kink is that the wireless is 802.11b, not 802.11g. (FYI, I think the retail price is around $1500, which actually isn't more than some of the fully-integrated desktop models Sun makes) Also, it supposedly has 6-8 hour battery life.
Parent
Re:So what... (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, Sun Rays are really much more advanced than VNC. A bit more like Citrix ICA. Either way, it's cool technology. Just because Sun has packaged it better than everyone else doesn't invalidate their claim on the market. Personally, I'd love to have a Sun Ray network. I could take my smart card and work anywhere I want. No being tied to a desk with really bad lighting. I'll just take the comet downstairs to the Starbucks and actually get some work done!
I don't think anyone really wants this.
Actually, I think Sun's biggest problem is how expensive it is. I know of many people who would love to buy a used Sun machine and a few Sun Rays just to wire their house. But when their software costs more than the machine, you know you've got a problem. That's the same thing that killed NT Terminal Server. Citrix ICA was doing quite well with WinFrame until Microsoft pulled a fast one on them.
I think a visual protocol is too specific. The work needs to be in creating a widget/RPC API that lets you splat a standardized local GUI onto remote application servers.
Myself and others have spent a lot of time trying to figure out the best way to do this. I did some on renovating AppliWeb up until XWT [xwt.org] showed up. So far, XWT seems to be the best option. We'll see what the future holds, though.
Parent
Re:So what... (Score:4, Interesting)
Thank God that Sun hardware never becomes truly obsolete, eh? Visit AnySystem [anysystem.com] to get yourself some amazingly cheap hardware. And keep an eye on their ebay auctions [ebay.com]. I've seen more than one E8500 go for ~$3000! That's 8 processors, 9x(8Gig) fibre channel disks, multiple network cards, 6-8 GIGS of RAM, and lots of other goodies! Just slap a "free Solaris 9" copy on there and run with it! I just wish I had a few extra grand for this sucker [ebay.com]. Now if Sun would *just* provide a cheaper version of their RayStation Server Software, I'd have my entire apartment complex wired!
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