Coming elimination of hardware dependence
Austria and France had very early entries in on-line information services,
however, due to their standardization on specific hardware and low level
physical interfaces - they have failed to adapt.
Changes:
- Most web browsers available for all hardware platforms
- Java, Limbo (part of Lucnt's Inferno), and other
interpreted languages eliminates hardware dependence
- optimized network communication (Lucent's Styx)
- small kernel (JavaOS, Inferno, ...) - typically less than 1 Mbyte
- native execution of interpreters of special hardware (Java chipsets)
- Handheld Device Markup Language (HDML) - related to HTML
- standard interfaces for telephone, security, ... - hide the hardware differences
Thus:
- Network Appliances - disks, camera, etc. as direct network devices
- Network Computer (NC): http://www.nc.ihost.com - Oracle, Acorn, IBM [ < $700 IBM Netstation (made by Network Computing Devices Inc.)], ... - Larry Ellison predict 100 million NCs by 2000.
- Networked Peripheral (NP) - Lucent, Sun Microsystems, Unwired Planet, ...
However, we need:
- Gateways between existing and emerging services and systems
- Change in attitude of customers - toward generics (rather than brand loyalty)
