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Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

elto — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 17:30:24 -0000

There are web OS's out there.It realy is a good idea.I'd like o see them evolve into a stable platform.I would make gerenal computing extremely flexable.Just log in anywhere,anytime etc.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

Michael Leis — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 07:39:02 -0000

All you have to do is look to South Korea. That's us -- as the article mentions hopefully in 5 years, but I doubt it with our corporate structure.

In SK, the government invested heavily in infrastructure, and they have not only ubiquitous computing, but a completely different societal approach than we do.

The generation that will bring "the cloud" will be the children who are 5-10 years old now. They approach the computer as a group within social situations, and value virtual gifts almost as highly as real ones.

Once they have buying power, and are running up their first college credit cards, in about 3 presidential (and fcc) administrations, we'll be at a place where the internet is fast and ubiquitous.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

Eric Rice — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 22:10:36 -0000

Aside from heavy desktop apps like games and paint programs I DO run everything in a browser, but of course, being at the mercy of the internet connection du jour, sorta sucks.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

zoostation — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 18:56:44 -0000

How do you get to write for this site, because seriously, us commenters could all write a better article than this one.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

CountRob — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 17:27:20 -0000

Final, knock out point: What exactly is running your computer before it connects to this "web based OS"? Um, an Operating System. No shit! You can't have a "web based OS" without first having a client OS to connect to it. When you boot up a computer, the BIOS hands control over to the OS. Well, you obviously can't connect to a network without using an operating system. It's impossible. You don't even need to have CS101 to figure this out.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

CountRob — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 17:13:32 -0000

Actually Paul, we already have web based OS systems. They're called VPS. Set up a $20 account at Dreamhost and you can see how enjoyable a remote OS is.

Second point: What happens when your internet connection goes down? Or you want to take your laptop to a remote area with no web access?

Third point: Very easy for someone to phish/crack into a system like this. If someone fakes your session, or gains entry at all, they basically have root access to your entire OS. PLUS, if someone is listening to the client/server connection, they'd see anything you do on your machine.

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Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

Luke Noel-Storr — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 16:01:27 -0000

"The Web OS. Sounds like a nice idea, right?"

No.

I've never read the words "web" followed by "OS" and thought it sounded like anything other than a really stupid idea.

I think "operating systems" may become more lightweight in the future, with more and more thin client apps, and hosted storage, etc..., but web OS - nah! completely utterly daft idea.

Re: The Web OS. It’s Coming, Just Not Too Soon.

zoostation — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 14:08:30 -0000

It's not really an OS, but more an online desktop. Operating systems manage a computer's resources, I.E. hardware and software and the interaction of both.

I seriously doubt we will all ever move over to what you are suggesting. We would be moving back to the days of the 70's and 80's. The days of the dumb terminal and mainframe computing where processing was centralized. Why would 'Web OS' companies want to pay for the resources? What would manage the hardware you use to connect to the web? I too long for the days when Windows disappears, although I haven't used Windows for more than 10 years. I'm a Mac user.

What about software packages that a user would like to buy and install? Oops! Can't do that with your future model. I doubt any company will want to provide the processing power needed to support 2 million online Abobe Photoshop or Illustrator users. (Adobe Air doesn't provide most of Photoshop's functionality, bear in mind)

There are many problems with this model, and all I think it will ever amount to is an online desktop for general word processing applications and spreadsheets etc,

You will certainly never get rid of a client OS.