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The real solution to this is how we solved it last time we were here: abandon the mainframe and go back to local applications on PCs. The cloud really provides
by api 4y ago
The real solution to this is how we solved it last time we were here: abandon the mainframe and go back to local applications on PCs.
The cloud really provides two things for most applications:
(1) Data synchronization at scale. This could be provided by a much, much thinner cloud that basically just syncs files but using CRDTs to make that more robust. Applications could use these services to sync state for collaboration. The vast majority of the brains could be at the endpoint.
(2) The cloud is copy protection and DRM. It gives software publishers an easy place to put a toll booth. This could be solved by a reboot of the concept of local licensing, or by just periodically calling out to a license server. Yes people will pirate your software but those people aren't going to pay anyway.
- mwcampbell 4y agoIf I'm not mistaken, you overlooked another role of cloud services: coordination of real-time connections between endpoints, and in some cases actual relaying of data to work around NAT. I guess this is the space you're in with ZeroTier. But I'm not sure how much of a market there is for generalized solutions like ZeroTier and Tailscale. For the most part, people want solutions that connect their machines for a specific purpose, such as remote desktop access (e.g. TeamViewer/AnyDesk), and developers of such products don't want to require their users to have another networking product (ZeroTier/Tailscale) first.
- spion 4y agoNot sure this works. For example, how do you implement search? I'm not looking forward to having to download the entire search index catalog of a web store in order to find out whether they have something.
- quickthrower2 4y agoMaybe not run everything locally, but most “web apps” could be local apps with something like dropbox to back up the data and make it accessible. The issue with this is the web is zero install cross platform and it is hard to compete with that.
- api 4y agoI'm not really talking about store web sites and other classical (and appropriate) uses of the web. I'm talking more about all the SaaS applications that are really desktop apps running remotely on a "mainframe."
- spion 4y agoI'm afraid I don't know of examples that don't take advantage of the much larger storage availability of the cloud, especially for things like search.