3 ms·

I'm not going to say it's false. But I've love to see citations supporting the notion that technological progress has slowed since the 1970s. Looking around me

by new299 10y ago

I'm not going to say it's false. But I've love to see citations supporting the notion that technological progress has slowed since the 1970s. Looking around me I see some evidence: CCD Cameras: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge-coupled_device#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge-coupled_device#History LEDs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode#Initial_commercial_development https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode#Initial_c... Laser diodes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_diode#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_diode#History LCDs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid-crystal_display#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid-crystal_display#History Microprocessors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microprocessor#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microprocessor#History All invented before 1970. However, they were not really in the hands of consumers by this time. So, I wonder if the point of invention, or the point at which they really had widespread availability is more important?

nickpsecurity 10y ago
Cloud computing is the mainframe model. ALGOL was safe, maintainable language for systems with LISP being ultimate for scripting or flexibility. Current languages mostly do what the could already do. High-performance, NoSQL databases were how mainframes started. Clustering & early distributed systems by Dec's VMS & Tandem NonStop. Xerox PARC came up with desktops. Englebart's people demonstrated all kinds of stuff in 1968: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mother_of_All_Demos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mother_of_All_Demos Most stuff I see today is just rehashes of concepts that were made from the 1960's to 1980's. The core ones you need for personal communication or running a business were all built before 1970. There's still innovation happening but most improvements were just incremental rather than ground-breaking. The most groundbreaking stuff today, like a computer in your pocket, were often result of massive, economic investment into a pile of incremental improvements by many people over time. I'm fine with this but let's not act like we're having many Xerox PARC or Doug Englebart moments.
- jdminhbg 10y ago
  > Cloud computing is the mainframe model. It really, really isn't. It shares one characteristic (computation done on behalf of one client by another remote client), but pretty much nothing else. The need to pigeonhole all developments in terms of historical patterns is just revisionism.
  - trevyn 10y ago
    Computation done on behalf of one client by another (more powerful) remote client, with a timesharing model, is kind of the defining characteristic of both, though. ;)
    - jdminhbg 10y ago
      That's not at all the defining characteristic of modern cloud computing; if it were, you would call VR systems (laptop or phone does computation on behalf of video system on your face) "cloud computing." What's different about cloud computing is the persistent connection and availability, combined with the ownership model and the resulting implied scalability.
      - acoard 10y ago
        >persistent connection and availability I can't really comment on the ownership model, but surely a persistent connection and availability is an incremental change.
        jdminhbg 10y ago
        If always-on-from-everywhere is incremental, then what isn't incremental? Are smart phones an incremental change from desktops?
        nickpsecurity 10y ago
        If we give you that, they have one breakthrough over mainframes. That makes them "mainframes that are always on from everywhere." Mainframe apps were already doing that with terminal, thin clients, web apps, and so on. It was part of modernization efforts to give workers or customers better access to data or business logic on mainframes by putting better interfaces in front of them. Situation is improved today with cloud stuff but core capability was there.

by new299 10y ago

nickpsecurity 10y ago

Cloud computing is the mainframe model. ALGOL was safe, maintainable language for systems with LISP being ultimate for scripting or flexibility. Current languages mostly do what the could already do. High-performance, NoSQL databases were how mainframes started. Clustering & early distributed systems by Dec's VMS & Tandem NonStop. Xerox PARC came up with desktops. Englebart's people demonstrated all kinds of stuff in 1968: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mother_of_All_Demos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mother_of_All_Demos Most stuff I see today is just rehashes of concepts that were made from the 1960's to 1980's. The core ones you need for personal communication or running a business were all built before 1970. There's still innovation happening but most improvements were just incremental rather than ground-breaking. The most groundbreaking stuff today, like a computer in your pocket, were often result of massive, economic investment into a pile of incremental improvements by many people over time. I'm fine with this but let's not act like we're having many Xerox PARC or Doug Englebart moments.

jdminhbg 10y ago
> Cloud computing is the mainframe model. It really, really isn't. It shares one characteristic (computation done on behalf of one client by another remote client), but pretty much nothing else. The need to pigeonhole all developments in terms of historical patterns is just revisionism.
- trevyn 10y ago
  Computation done on behalf of one client by another (more powerful) remote client, with a timesharing model, is kind of the defining characteristic of both, though. ;)
  - jdminhbg 10y ago
    That's not at all the defining characteristic of modern cloud computing; if it were, you would call VR systems (laptop or phone does computation on behalf of video system on your face) "cloud computing." What's different about cloud computing is the persistent connection and availability, combined with the ownership model and the resulting implied scalability.
    - acoard 10y ago
      >persistent connection and availability I can't really comment on the ownership model, but surely a persistent connection and availability is an incremental change.
      - jdminhbg 10y ago
        If always-on-from-everywhere is incremental, then what isn't incremental? Are smart phones an incremental change from desktops?
        nickpsecurity 10y ago
        If we give you that, they have one breakthrough over mainframes. That makes them "mainframes that are always on from everywhere." Mainframe apps were already doing that with terminal, thin clients, web apps, and so on. It was part of modernization efforts to give workers or customers better access to data or business logic on mainframes by putting better interfaces in front of them. Situation is improved today with cloud stuff but core capability was there.