IT seems to be growing again. Gartner forecasts worldwide IT spending will increase 4.5% this year to $3.68 trillion, driven by artificial intelligence, big data analytics, blockchain technology, and the IoT.
Digital transformations are fashionable. You won’t find an enterprise that isn’t leveraging some combination of cloud, analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning to better serve customers or streamline operations. But here’s a hard truth about digital transformations: Many are failing outright or are in danger of failing. Typical reasons for failing are not understanding what is digital transformation (different people understand it differently), lack of CEO sponsorship, talent deficiency, resistance to change. Usually a technology-first approach to digital transformation is a recipe for disaster. Truing to just push trough technically unfeasible transformation idea is another way to fail.
The digital era requires businesses to move with speed, and that is causing IT organizations to rethink how they work. A lot of IT is moving off premises to SaaS providers and the public cloud. Research outfit 451 standout finding was that 60 per cent of the surveyed enterprises say they will run the majority of their IT outside the confines of enterprise data centres by the end of 2019. From cost containment to hybrid strategies, CIOs are getting more creative in taking advantage of the latest offerings and the cloud’s economies of scale.
In 2018 there seems to be a growing Software Engineering Talent Shortage in both quantity and quality. For the past nine years, software engineers have been at the top of the hardest to fill jobs in the United States. And same applies to many other countries including Finland. Forrester projects that firms will pay 20% above market for quality engineering talent in 2018. Particularly in-demand skills are data scientists, high-end software developers and information security analysts. There is real need for well-studied, experienced engineers with a formal and deep understanding of software engineering. Recruiting and retaining tech talent remains IT’s biggest challenge today. Most CIOs are migrating applications to public cloud services, offloading operations and maintenance of computing, storage and other capabilities so they can reallocate staff to focus on what’s strategic to their business.
The enterprise no longer is at the center of the IT universe. It seems that reports of the PC’s demise have been greatly exaggerated and the long and painful decline in PC sales of the last half-decade as tailed off, at least momentarily. As the sales of smartphones and tablets have risen, consumers had not stopped using PCs, but merely replaced them less often. FT reports that PC is set to stage a comeback in 2018, after the rise of smartphones sent sales of desktop and laptop computers into decline in recent years. If that does not happen, then PC market could return to growth in 2019. But the end result is that PC is no longer seen as the biggest growth driver for chip makers. An extreme economic shift has chipmakers focused on hyperscale clouds.
Microservices are talked about a lot. Software built using microservices is easier to deliver and maintain than the big and brittle architectures or old; these were difficult to scale and might take years to build and deliver. Microservices are small and self-contained, so therefore easy to wrap up in a virtual machine or a container (but don’t have to live in containers). Public cloud providers increasingly differentiate themselves through the features and services they provide. But it turns out that microservices are far from being one-size-fit-for-all silver bullet for IT challenges.
Containers will try to make break-trough again in 2018. Year 2017 was supposed to be the year of containers! It wasn’t? Oops. Maybe year 2018 is better. Immature tech still has a bunch of growing up to do. Linux Foundation’s Open Containers Initiative (OCI) finally dropped two specifications that standardise how containers operate at a low level. The needle in 2018 will move towards containers running separately from VMs, or entirely in place of VMs. Kubernates gains traction. It seems that the containers are still at the point where the enterprise is waiting to embrace them.
Serverless will be talked about. Serverless computing is a cloud computing execution model in which the cloud provider dynamically manages the allocation of machine resources. Serverless architectures refer to applications that significantly depend on third-party services (knows as Backend as a Service or “BaaS”) or on custom code that’s run in ephemeral containers (Function as a Service or “FaaS”), the best known vendor host of which currently is AWS Lambda.
Automation is what everybody with many computers wants. Infrastructure automation creates and destroys basic IT resources such as compute instances, storage, networking, DNS, and so forth. Security automation helps keeping systems secure. It bosses want to create self-driving private clouds. The journey to self-driving clouds needs to be gradual. The vision of the self-driving cloud makes sense, but the task of getting from here to there can seem daunting. DevOps automation with customer control: Automatic installation and configuration, Integration that brings together AWS and VMWare, workflows migration controlled by users, Self-service provisioning based on templates defined by users, Advanced machine learning to automate processes, and Automated upgrades.
Linux is center of many cloud operations: Google and Facebook started building their own gear and loading it with their own software. Google has it’s own Linux called gLinux. Facebook networking uses Linux-based FBOSS operating system. Even Microsoft has developed its own Linux for cloud operations. Software-defined networking (SDN) is a very fine idea.
Memory business boomed in 2017 for both NAND and DRAM. The drivers for DRAM are smartphones and servers. Solid-state drives (SSDs) and smartphones are fueling the demand for NAND. NAND Market Expected to Cool in Q1 from the crazy year 2017, but it is still growing well because there is increasing demand. Memory — particular DRAM — was largely considered a commodity business.
Lots of 3D NAND will go to solid state drives in 2018. IDC forecasts strong growth for the solid-state drive (SSD) industry as it transitions to 3D NAND. SSD industry revenue is expected to reach $33.6 billion in 2021, growing at a CAGR of 14.8%. Sizes of memory chips increase as number of layer in 3D NAND are added. The traditional mechanical hard disk based on magnetic storage is in hard place in competition, as the speed of flash-based SSDs is so superior
There is search for faster memory because modern computers, especially data-center servers that skew heavily toward in-memory databases, data-intensive analytics, and increasingly toward machine-learning and deep-neural-network training functions, depend on large amounts of high-speed, high capacity memory to keep the wheels turning. The memory speed has not increased as fast as the capacity. The access bandwidth of DRAM-based computer memory has improved by a factor of 20x over the past two decades. Capacity increased 128x during the same period. For year 2018 DRAM remains a near-universal choice when performance is the priority. There is search going on for a viable replacement for DRAM. Whether it’s STT-RAM or phase-change memory or resistive RAM, none of them can match the speed or endurance of DRAM.
PCI Express 4.0 is ramping up. PCI-standards consortium PCI-SIG (Special Interest Group) has ratified and released specifications for PCIe 4.0 Specification Version 1. Doubling PCIe 3.0’s 8 GT/s (~1 GB/s) of bandwidth per lane, PCIe 4.0 offers a transfer rate of 16 GT/s. The newest version of PCI Express will start appearing on motherboards soon. PCI-SIG has targeted Q2 2019 for releasing the finalized PCIe 5.0 specification, so PCIe 4.0 won’t be quite as long-lived as PCIe 3.0 has been. So we’ll See PCIe 4.0 this year in use and PCIe 5.0 in 2019.
USB type C is on the way to becoming the most common PC and peripheral interface. The USB C connector has become faster more commonplace than any other earlier interface. USB C is very common on smartphones, but the interface is also widespread on laptops. Sure, it will take some time before it is the most common. In 2021, the C-type USB connector has almost five billion units, IHS estimates.
It seems that the after-shocks of Meltdown/Spectre vulnerabilities on processors will be haunting us for quite long time this year. It is now three weeks since The Register revealed the chip design flaws that Google later confirmed and the world still awaits certainty about what it will take to get over the silicon slip-ups. Last pieces of farce has been that Intel Halts Spectre, Meltdown CPU Patches Over Unstable Code and Linux creator Linus Torvalds criticises Intel’s ‘garbage’ patches. Computer security will not be the same after all this has been sorted out.
What’s Next With Computing? IBM discusses AI, neural nets and quantum computing. Many can agree that those technologies will be important. Public cloud providers increasingly provide sophisticated flavours of data analysis and increasingly Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). Central Banks Are Using Big Data to Help Shape Policy. Over the past few years, machine learning (ML) has evolved from an interesting new approach that allows computers to beat champions at chess and Go, into one that is touted as a panacea for almost everything. 2018 will be the start of what could be a longstanding battle between chipmakers to determine who creates the hardware that artificial intelligence lives on.
ARM processor based PCs are coming. As Microsoft and Qualcomm jointly announced in early December that the first Windows 10 notebooks with ARM-based Snapdragon 835 processors will be officially launched in early 2018, there will be more and more PCs with ARM processor architecture hitting the market. Digitimes Research expects that ARM-based models may dominate lower-end PC market, but don’t hold your breath on this. It is rumoured that “wireless LTE connectivity” function will be incorporated into all the entry-level Window 10 notebooks with ARM processors, branded by Microsoft as the “always-connected devices.” HP and Asustek have released some ARM-based notebooks with Windows 10S.
Sources:
Ohjelmistoalan osaajapula pahenee – kasvu jatkuu
PC market set to return to growth in 2018
PC market could return to growth in 2019
PC sales grow for the first time in five years
PCI-SIG Finalizes and Releases PCIe 4.0, Version 1 Specification: 2x PCIe Bandwidth and More
Hot Chips 2017: We’ll See PCIe 4.0 This Year, PCIe 5.0 In 2019
Outsourcing remains strategic in the digital era
8 hot IT hiring trends — and 8 going cold
EDA Challenges Machine Learning
The Battle of AI Processors Begins in 2018
How to create self-driving private clouds
ZeroStack Lays Out Vision for Five-Step Journey to Self-Driving Cloud
2017 – the year of containers! It wasn’t? Oops. Maybe next year
2018′s Software Engineering Talent Shortage— It’s quality, not just quantity
How Central Banks Are Using Big Data to Help Shape Policy
Digitimes Research: ARM-based models may dominate lower-end PC market
Intel Halts Spectre, Meltdown CPU Patches Over Unstable Code
Spectre and Meltdown: Linux creator Linus Torvalds criticises Intel’s ‘garbage’ patches
Meltdown/Spectre week three: World still knee-deep in something nasty
What’s Next With Computing? IBM discusses AI, neural nets and quantum computing.
PCI Express 4.0 as Fast As Possible
Microsoft has developed its own Linux!
Microsoft Built Its Own Linux Because Everyone Else Did
Facebook has built its own switch. And it looks a lot like a server
Googlella on oma sisäinen linux
Is the writing on the wall for on-premises IT? This survey seems to say so
12 reasons why digital transformations fail
7 habits of highly effective digital transformations
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Valentina Palladino / Ars Technica:
HP unveils Envy all-in-one PCs with built-in Alexa support, updates Envy and Elite device lineup with new designs, faster processors, and better displays — Better graphics, 700-nit brightness screens, and more define HP’s newest PCs. — HP announced a slew of updates to its premium lines …
New HP all-in-one houses Alexa, provides power with wireless charging base
Better graphics, 700-nit brightness screens, and more define HP’s newest PCs.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/05/new-hp-all-in-one-houses-alexa-provides-power-with-wireless-charging-base/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Intel’s First 10nm Cannon Lake CPU Sees the Light of Day
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/18/05/15/0054257/intels-first-10nm-cannon-lake-cpu-sees-the-light-of-day?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Slashdot%2Fslashdot%2Fto+%28%28Title%29Slashdot+%28rdf%29%29
A Chinese retailer has started selling a laptop featuring Intel’s first 10nm CPU the Intel Core i3 8121U. Intel promised to start producing 10nm CPUs in 2016 but the rollout has been postponed almost until the second half of 2018. It’s worth noting that this CPU does not have integrated graphics enabled and features only two cores.
First 10nm Cannon Lake Laptop Spotted Online: Lenovo Ideapad 330 for $449
by Ian Cutress on May 13, 2018 11:02 AM EST
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12749/first-10nm-cannon-lake-laptop-spotted-online-lenovo-ideapad-330-for-449
Tomi Engdahl says:
AMD Integrates Ryzen PRO and Radeon Vega Graphics In Next-Gen APUs
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/18/05/14/2029201/amd-integrates-ryzen-pro-and-radeon-vega-graphics-in-next-gen-apus?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Slashdot%2Fslashdot%2Fto+%28%28Title%29Slashdot+%28rdf%29%29
The three biggest PC OEMs — Dell, HP, and Lenovo — are now offering AMD Ryzen PRO mobile and desktop accelerated processing units (APUs) with built-in Radeon Vega graphics in a variety of commercial systems. There are a total of seven new APUs — three for the mobile space and four for the desktop. As AMD notes in its press release, the first desktops to ship with these latest chips include: the HP Elitedesk G4 and 285 Desktop, the Lenovo ThinkCentre M715, and the Dell Optiplex 5055.
AMD integrates Ryzen PRO and Radeon Vega graphics in next-generation APUs
AMD unveils seven new Ryzen PRO APUs, three for mobile space and four for the desktop, for the commercial users.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/amd-integrates-ryzen-pro-and-radeon-vega-graphics-in-next-generation-apus/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Chipmaker Nvidia sees fewer crypto miners, more gamers in future
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nvidia-results/chipmaker-nvidia-sees-fewer-crypto-miners-more-gamers-in-future-idUSKBN1IB2X8
Too many cryptocurrency clients and fewer cloud computing orders than expected underwhelmed Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) investors on Thursday, although the graphics chip maker said a supply shortage that hit its core video game audience had eased.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Apple will soon grow bigger than Finland
News agency Reuters has presented figures that are confusing. Apple’s turnover has exceeded $ 200 billion and the figure is approaching Finland’s gross domestic product. For example, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is half smaller than Apple.
Apple’s share price was quoted at $ 188. At this valuation, the company’s market value is $ 944 billion. As the share reaches $ 195, Apple’s market value will break the trillion, or $ 1000 billion.
However, Reuters recalls that Apple is not the fastest growing company. Amazon is growing significantly faster and its market value is already $ 780 billion.
Source:http://www.etn.fi/index.php/13-news/7992-apple-kasvaa-pian-suuremmaksi-kuin-suomi
Tomi Engdahl says:
5 misconceptions CIOs still have about agile
https://www.cio.com/article/3061232/agile-development/3-misconceptions-cios-have-about-agile.html
Agile has made great headway in the enterprise, but common misconceptions prevent organizations from making the most of the methodology.
By now, CIOs should be aware of the many benefits of the agile methodology. But there’s a few persistent misconceptions that could be getting in the way of even greater outcomes. We asked experts to discuss the most common misconceptions they see organizations falling prey to when it comes to agile practices. Here’s what IT leaders are likely to misunderstand about effectively implementing the framework.
Understanding the relationship between the agile methodology and effective talent management is an area where many CIOs struggle, says Dave West, product owner at Scrum.org. Agile is more than just a set of processes and policies for defining workflows, and it takes more than just hiring technical talent with agile experience to succeed.
“Almost every organization says, ‘People are our greatest asset,’ but so many don’t follow through on it,” he says. “You need to have structures and policy in place to support education, progression, feedback, continuous improvement, yes, but your talent management strategy has to be agile and focus on different factors.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Dell PC business to continue thriving in 5G era, says CEO
https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20180514PD208.html
Unlike most IT players showing pessimism about the future of the PC industry, Michael Dell, CEO of of his namesake company, has optimistically stressed that Dell’s PC business will continue to thrive as the advent of 5G and the raging development of AI applications will fuel the demand for multiple advanced cloud and edge computing algorithms, thus providing more space for the development of PC products and computing applications.
IBM declared the beginning of a “post-PC era” 20 years ago, prompting many to feel pessimistic about the PC prospects. Over the past 20 years, however, more than four billion PCs have been sold globally, and IBM was right in that computing would expand to include embedded devices, the CEO said while speaking at his firm’s recent major annual conference.
Now the world’s No. 3 PC brand and top server vendor with its affiliate EMC as the leading storage vendor and VMware as the largest supplier of virtualization software products, Dell is continuing its business integration and consolidation efforts
Tomi Engdahl says:
WE GOT INTEL’S PROTOTYPE GRAPHICS CARD!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=um-1fAVU1OQ
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fedora 28 Is Out And Developers Are In Love With It
https://www.technotification.com/2018/05/fedora-28-is-out-and-developers-are-in-love-with-it.html
The latest version of Fedora uses Linux Kernel 4.16.3. The latest Fedora28 comes in three different editions for a different use- cases: Fedora 28 Workstation, Fedora 28 Server, and Fedora 28 Atomic Host.
The latest Fedora28 base package comes with all the latest compilers including GNU Compiler Collection(GCC) 8, Ruby 2.5 and Golang 1.10.
The latest Fedora version tries to solve a very common problem most programmers face. It brings the modular repository feature which lets the developer use alternative software versions rather than the default package
“Application Stream” or AppStream in short. This software ships the software versions on independent life cycles. This helps in choosing the right version of the repository and still keep the operating system up-to-date.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Void Linux gave itself to the void, Korora needs a long siesta – life is hard for small distros
If you want your fave to survive, you’ll need to dig deep
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/05/16/contrinuting_to_keep_small_linux_alive/
If you’re new to Linux you’d be forgiven for thinking there are only a half-dozen distributions – names like Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux tend to get most of the headlines.
These big distros tackle big projects like Wayland, systemd, Mir, and other tools that will, for better or worse, change Linux as we know it. The big fish always get the attention, if for no other reason than these are also the only distros with million-dollar companies backing them.
They are not, however, the end of the story. In fact there are hundreds, if not thousands, of distros out there that barely register on trackers like distrowatch.
Two such distros managed to shake the boat recently when, for separate but related reasons, they announced their closure.
Take a chance on me
However, if the trend among users is moving against small distros, all Linux users may suffer, even those that never move away from the first distro they try.
Without people willing to take a chance on unknown but potentially really great distros, there would be no Linux Mint, no elementaryOS and no Solus, to name three recent, very popular arrivals in the Linux world.
All three are big now, but they got that way only because some people took a chance on them long ago.
There’s a reason RHEL, CentOS and Ubuntu dominate the server market – they’re backed by companies that other companies can understand. Corporate customers are always going to stick with the bigger distros for a variety of reasons such as reliability of support, the existence of a roadmap – things they, as corporations, can rely and bet their infrastructure on. This will pour more attention, more contributions, and, more importantly, more money into big projects like Ubuntu, RHEL, CentOS and openSUSE.
“The distros that seem to last – be they large or small – tend to be the ones that have some form of revenue. Whether that comes from users via donation as in the case of Linux Mint, or from a corporate backer as in the big-name distros, at the end of the day – in our culture – money matters.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Opinion: New AMD chip goes after $10 billion market that Intel dominates
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/new-amd-chip-goes-after-10-billion-market-that-intel-dominates-2018-05-15
Advanced Micro Devices is launching yet another offensive on a market that has been sewn up by Intel for more than a decade.
While the Ryzen processor family that was unveiled in 2017 goes after a premium segment of the PC market with more than $20 billion of TAM (total addressable market), more than half of that is tied to commercial-device sales. Commercial PCs and notebooks are bought by companies for employees or purchased by employees themselves as part of the BYOD (bring your own device) trend. And that’s what AMD has its eyes on.
Commercial customers have more demanding requirements on product portfolio stability and security, and not having a processor designed for laptops was keeping AMD AMD, +2.97% out of race for that $10 billion segment of the market.
PC manufacturers appear to be signing on to work with AMD and its new family of Ryzen PRO processors.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The new processor challenges Intel, Nvidia and everyone else
New processor architectures are not published every day, and at least those that promise to revolutionize everything from computers to graphics cards and artificial intelligence to servers and datacenters. The architecture of Silicon Valley Tachyum promises to do so.
Tachyum has released its first processor family. Prodigy promises 10 times more performance per watt than universal processors. According to the company, the server machines are so efficient that the same computing power equals one percent space and consumes ten less power than the current solutions.
Tachyum says that in 2020, the Prodigy processors are to build a supercomputer capable of simulating human brain activity in real time.
Source: http://www.etn.fi/index.php/13-news/8025-uusi-prosessori-haastaa-intelit-nvidiat-ja-kaikki-muutkin
Tomi Engdahl says:
IT’s adult day care dilemma
https://it.toolbox.com/blogs/kevinbeaver/its-adult-day-care-dilemma-050718?mid=6158450&lgid=3441165&mailing_id=3843071&lpid=699&tfso=149898
Curious, malicious or otherwise careless users can create all sorts of information security-related issues in your business including:
· Malware infections that can install keylogging software, or worse, ransomware on your computers or allow your systems to be accessed and controlled by outsiders looking to attack others
· Exposed intellectual property which can negate the time, money and effort you’ve put into the legal side of protecting your business assets
· Compromised personally-identifiable information that can lead to compliance violations and subsequent legal problems
· Accessing illicit web sites that can create HR-related challenges such as sexual harassment that you might not be ready to take on
Tomi Engdahl says:
Amazon’s new Marketplace Appstore connects sellers to software
https://www.cnet.com/news/amazons-new-marketplace-appstore-connects-sellers-to-software/
The app store is part of Amazon’s broader push to work more closely with developers of seller tools.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Victor Luckerson / The Ringer:
Lawyers, journalists, and other key players talk about the antitrust case against Microsoft, and how it may relate to today’s dominance of Google and Facebook
‘Crush Them’: An Oral History of the Lawsuit That Upended Silicon Valley
https://www.theringer.com/tech/2018/5/18/17362452/microsoft-antitrust-lawsuit-netscape-internet-explorer-20-years
Twenty years ago, Microsoft tried to eliminate its competition in the race for the future of the internet. The government had other ideas.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The 8 biggest IT management mistakes
https://www.cio.com/article/3240943/leadership-management/biggest-it-management-mistakes.html
Sure, nobody’s perfect. But for those in charge of enterprise technology, the fallout from a strategic gaffe, bad hire, or weak spine can be disastrous. Here’s how to avoid (or recover from) big-time IT leadership mistakes.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The largest Git repo on the planet
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/bharry/2017/05/24/the-largest-git-repo-on-the-planet/
effort we called “Git Virtual File System”. As a reminder, GVFS, together with a set of enhancements to Git, enables Git to scale to VERY large repos by virtualizing both the .git folder and the working directory. Rather than download the entire repo and checkout all the files, it dynamically downloads only the portions you need based on what you use.
Windows is live on Git
Over the past 3 months, we have largely completed the rollout of Git/GVFS to the Windows team at Microsoft.
As a refresher, the Windows code base is approximately 3.5M files and, when checked in to a Git repo, results in a repo of about 300GB. Further, the Windows team is about 4,000 engineers and the engineering system produces 1,760 daily “lab builds” across 440 branches in addition to thousands of pull request validation builds. All 3 of the dimensions (file count, repo size and activity), independently, provide daunting scaling challenges and taken together they make it unbelievably challenging to create a great experience. Before the move to Git, in Source Depot, it was spread across 40+ depots and we had a tool to manage operations that spanned them.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Katie Canales / Business Insider:
Microsoft surpassed Alphabet’s market value for the first time in three years by about $10B on Tuesday — – Microsoft’s market value was $753 billion at end of day Tuesday, surpassing Google’s parent company Alphabet in valuation for the first time in three years.
http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-tops-alphabet-google-market-cap-2018-5/?r=UK&IR=T
Tomi Engdahl says:
Paul Thurrott / Thurrott.com:
AdDuplex report: Windows 10 April 2018 Update is installed on ~50% of Windows 10 PCs worldwide, significantly faster adoption than previous Windows 10 updates — An astonishing new report from AdDuplex shows that the Windows 10 April 2018 Update has rolled out at a historically fast rate.
http://www.thurrott.com/windows/windows-10/160287/april-2018-update-rolling-even-faster-expected
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://techcrunch.com/2018/05/30/nvidia-launches-colossal-hgx-2-cloud-server-to-power-hpc-and-ai/
Nvidia launched a monster box yesterday called the HGX-2, and it’s the stuff that geek dreams are made of. It’s a cloud server that is purported to be so powerful it combines high performance computing with artificial intelligence requirements in one exceptionally compelling package.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Robert Hof / SiliconANGLE:
Nvidia unveils HGX-2, a cloud computing platform for AI and high performance computing, which consists of 16 GPUs delivering 2 petaflops per second
Nvidia debuts cloud server platform to unify AI and high-performance computing
https://siliconangle.com/blog/2018/05/30/nvidia-debuts-cloud-server-platform-unify-ai-high-performance-computing/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Catalin Cimpanu / BleepingComputer.com:
Google unveils Chrome 67 for Windows, Mac, and Linux with Generic Sensors API, WebXR Device API for building VR/AR experiences, WebAuthn protocol support, more
Google Chrome 67 Released for Windows, Mac, and Linux
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/software/google-chrome-67-released-for-windows-mac-and-linux/
Google released earlier today Chrome 67, the latest stable release of its web browser. According to changelogs released with Chrome 67, this version adds support for a Generic Sensors API, improves AR and VR experiences, and deprecates the HTTP-Based Public Key Pinning (HPKP) security feature.
Probably the biggest change in Chrome 67 is the addition of the Generic Sensors API. As the name implies, this is an API that exposes data from device sensors to public websites.
The new API is based on the Generic Sensor W3C standard. Intel, the company whose engineers proposed the API, has a website devoted to demonstrations of the sensor APIs with sample code available for download.
https://intel.github.io/generic-sensor-demos/
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to Find Out Why Your Windows PC Crashed or Froze
https://www.howtogeek.com/222730/how-to-find-out-why-your-windows-pc-crashed-or-froze/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google quits selling tablets
https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/01/google-quits-selling-tablets/?sr_share=facebook&utm_source=tcfbpage
Google has quietly crept out of the tablet business, removing the “tablets” heading from its Android page. Perhaps it hoped no one would notice on a Friday and by Monday it would be old news, but Android Police caught them in the act. It was there yesterday, but it’s gone today.
We (well, Romain) called tablets dead in 2016, which was probably a little premature, since over 160 million of them shipped last year — but even so, it’s not much of a life they’re living.
Google in particular has struggled to make Android a convincing alternative to iOS in the tablet realm
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ensuring Chip Reliability From The Inside
https://semiengineering.com/ensuring-chip-reliability-from-the-inside/
In-chip monitoring techniques are growing for automotive, industrial, and data center applications.
In the datacenter
Inside of data centers, as CPU temperatures rise, the server power consumption drastically increases due to CPU leakage current. Real-time temperature monitoring systems are necessary here, as well, to allow for power optimization.
“In-chip embedded temperature sensors also can help extend device lifetimes or provide protections through the enablement of server shutdown schemes, the latter being the result of rising temperatures from sudden increases in dynamic CPU load profiles,” Moortec’s Crosher noted.
“For data centers, they call these RAS (reliability, availability, serviceability) features,” said NetSpeed’s Mohandass. “Data center guys get paid and get monitored based upon what percentage of the time they are online. It’s not the 99, but it’s 99 followed by how many nines you have. We’ve seen this many times. One data center goes offline for United Airlines and millions of people get stranded. It’s bad publicity for United, bad publicity for the data center guys.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Arm Targets Laptop Performance
Cortex-A76 mobile core aimed at Intel’s Skylake
https://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1333333
Arm announced a new mobile CPU core that it said can deliver performance within 10% of Intel’s latest Skylake chips. Analysts praised the architecture’s leap forward but said that they doubt Arm will take a significant share of today’s x86-based notebooks.
The Cortex-A76 arrives in tandem with new Mali G76 GPU and V76 video cores. All three are expected to appear in premium smartphone SoCs before the end of the year.
The A76 marks a full redesign for mobile systems, packing up to 2-Mbytes L2 cache, 4-Mbytes L3, and running at more than 3 GHz in a 7-nm node. It aims to deliver 90% of the Specint2006 performance of an Intel mobile Skylake chip with one-fourth the area and half the power — or roughly the same performance in thermally constrained systems.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft has acquired GitHub for $7.5B in stock
https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/04/microsoft-has-acquired-github-for-7-5b-in-microsoft-stock/?sr_share=facebook&utm_source=tcfbpage
After a week of rumors, Microsoft today confirmed that it has acquired GitHub, the popular Git-based code sharing and collaboration service. The price of the acquisition was $7.5 billion in Microsoft stock. GitHub raised $350 million and we know that the company was valued at about $2 billion in 2015.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Tablet section was removed from the Android website by mistake
https://9to5google.com/2018/06/02/tablet-section-removal-android-website-accident/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ian Cutress / AnandTech:
Intel announces limited edition 5GHz Core i7-8086K anniversary CPU, its fastest ever, as a homage to the 40 year anniversary of the eponymous 8086 processor
Intel Announces the Core i7-8086K: Coffee Lake at 5 GHz
by Ian Cutress on June 5, 2018 2:30 AM EST
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12875/intel-announces-the-core-i78086k-coffee-lake-at-5-ghz
As an homage to both Intel’s 50 year company anniversary and the 40 year anniversary of the eponymous 8086 processor, today Intel surprised us all in announcing the Core i7-8086K: a limited edition processor that becomes its fastest ever.
For what was a funny request from David Schor from WikiChip over six months ago, with some faked screenshots appearing out of China in March, Intel has jumped us all and announced a new hyper-frequency version of its best performing mainstream Coffee Lake processor in the Core i7-8086K. This new processor, of which only 50,000 will be made, is a boost over its current Core i7-8700K offering.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nvidia Launches AI Computer To Give Autonomous Robots Better Brains
https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/18/06/04/2036207/nvidia-launches-ai-computer-to-give-autonomous-robots-better-brains?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Slashdot%2Fslashdot%2Fto+%28%28Title%29Slashdot+%28rdf%29%29
At Computex 2018, Nvidia unveiled two new products: Nvidia Isaac, a new developer platform, and the Jetson Xavier, an AI computer, both built to power autonomous robots. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said Isaac and Jetson Xavier were designed to capture the next stage of AI innovation as it moves from software running in the cloud to robots that navigate the real world. The Isaac platform is a set of software tools that will make it simpler for companies to develop and train robots. It includes a collection of APIs to connect to 3D cameras and sensors; a library of AI accelerators to keep algorithms running smoothly and without lag; and a new simulation environment, Isaac Sim, for training and testing bots in a virtual space. Doing so is quicker and safer than IRL testing, but it can’t match the complexity of the real world.
But the heart of the Isaac platform is Nvidia’s new Jetson Xavier computer, an incredibly compact piece of hardware that’s comprised of a number of processing components. These include a Volta Tensor Core GPU, an eight-core ARM64 CPU, two NVDLA deep learning accelerators, and processors for static images and video. I
Nvidia launches AI computer to give autonomous robots better brains
https://www.theverge.com/2018/6/4/17424118/nvidia-ai-chip-jetson-xavier-robot-platform-isaac
New Jetson Xavier hardware will make it easier for companies to develop robots that navigate the real world
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft commits: We’re buying GitHub for $7.5 beeeeeeellion
GitHub 365, anyone? Guys?
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/04/microsoft_buys_github/
Microsoft has agreed to acquire development platform GitHub in a deal worth $7.5bn, sending developers scurrying for cover.
The Office-maker is chuffed to call itself the most active organisation on GitHub, claiming more than two million commits made to projects. The Seattle software slinger has its origins in development tools and platforms, and the acquisition can be seen as a return to its roots.
“We recognize the responsibility we take on with this agreement,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.
“We are committed to being stewards of the GitHub community, which will retain its developer-first ethos, operate independently, and remain an open platform. We will always listen to developer feedback and invest in both fundamentals and new capabilities.”
Developers, however, have not reacted too well to the news.
Microsoft + GitHub = Empowering Developers
https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2018/06/04/microsoft-github-empowering-developers/
Tomi Engdahl says:
FYI: Qualcomm hasn’t given up on Arm-based Windows 10 slabtops
Snapdragon 850 is latest attempt to lure PC makers, buyers from the x86 realm
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/05/qualcomm_snapdragon_850/
Today, in time for Computex in Taiwan, Qualy emitted details of the Snapdragon 850, a 64-bit Arm-compatible octo-core processor aimed at touchscreen tablet-sized smartphones disguised as laptops. This 10nm FinFET Snapdragon is expected to appear in Microsoft Windows 10 PCs shipping in time for Christmas 2018.
The 850 is a bit of a surprise because it is very similar to the Snapdragon 845, which was unveiled in December and is also aimed at fondleslab-notebook hybrids and top-end phones. And the 845 followed the 835, which was announced in 2016 and entered production in 2017. The Snapdragon 835 made its way into various Windows 10 slabtops, the kind of hardware the 850 and the 845 are also aimed at. So you can see Qualcomm is really firing them out, trying to get these chips to stick to something.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/04/microsoft-promises-to-keep-github-independent-and-open/?utm_source=tcfbpage&sr_share=facebook
Tomi Engdahl says:
Devs are flooding to GitLab amidst Github Microsoft acquisition
https://thenextweb.com/dd/2018/06/04/devs-are-flooding-to-gitlab-amidst-github-microsoft-acquisition-rumors/
Suffice to say, not everyone is happy about it. A quick search on Twitter finds countless people proclaiming that Github is dead, and promising to move to rival services — like GitLab and Atlassian’s BitBucket.
It seems some are making good on their promises. GitLab says it’s seeing ten times the usual normal daily amount of repositories.
Tomi Engdahl says:
5 laws every aspiring DevOps engineer should know
https://opensource.com/open-organization/17/5/5-devops-laws?sc_cid=7016000000127ECAAY
Good engineers become great engineers when they follow these rules
1. Forget ‘I don’t know’
2. RTFM
Documentation is everywhere. Solutions to complex problems are at our fingertips. Make an effort to not ask your peers how something works without reading its documentation first
3. Search before asking
4. Anything is possible. Never say never. Trust but verify.
5. Acknowledge technical debt
Technical debt is the result of decisions that made sense at the time someone made them. But those decisions are likely causing issues now because they no longer make sense.
Tomi Engdahl says:
6 Github alternatives that is open source and self-hosted
https://www.cyberciti.biz/open-source/github-alternatives-open-source-seflt-hosted/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Version control isn’t just for programmers
https://opensource.com/life/16/2/version-control-isnt-just-programmers?sc_cid=7016000000127ECAAY
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.tivi.fi/blogit/eurooppa-putosi-digitalisaation-kyydista-mika-meita-riivaa-6726156
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Microsoft had to acquire GitHub to attract developers because it lacks a mobile platform with enough users and its cloud strategy hinges on corporate customers
The Cost of Developers
https://stratechery.com/2018/the-cost-of-developers/
Yesterday saw three developer-related announcements, two from Apple, and one from Microsoft. The former came as part of Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference keynote:
The iOS App Store, which turns 10 next month, serves 500 million weekly visitors, and as of later this week will have earned developers over $100 billion.
Sometime next year developers will be able to write apps for the Mac using iOS user interface frameworks (known as UIKit).
Microsoft, meanwhile, for the second time in three years, outshone Apple’s keynote with a massive acquisition.
“Microsoft Corp. on Monday announced it has reached an agreement to acquire GitHub, the world’s leading software development platform where more than 28 million developers learn, share and collaborate to create the future.”
Platform-Developer Symbiosis
Over the last few weeks, particularly in The Bill Gates Line, I have been exploring the differences between aggregators and platforms; while aggregators generally harvest already produced content or goods, developers leverage the platform to create something entirely new.
This results in a symbiosis between developers and platforms: from a technical perspective, platforms provide the fundamental building blocks (i.e. application program interfaces, or APIs) necessary for developers to build new experiences, and from a marketing perspective, those new experiences give customers a reason to buy the platform in the first place, or to upgrade.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ian Cutress / AnandTech:
AMD announces Threadripper 2, a 32-core CPU for desktops based on 12nm process, coming later this year — One of the surprises from AMD’s first year of the newest x86 Zen architecture was the launch of the Threadripper platform. Despite the mainstream Ryzen processors already taking …
AMD Reveals Threadripper 2 : Up to 32 Cores, 250W, X399 Refresh
by Ian Cutress on June 5, 2018 11:05 PM EST
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12906/amd-reveals-threadripper-2-up-to-32-cores-250w-x399-refresh
One of the surprises from AMD’s first year of the newest x86 Zen architecture was the launch of the Threadripper platform. Despite the mainstream Ryzen processors already taking a devastating stab into the high-end desktop market, AMD’s Threadripper offered more cores at a workstation-friendly price. For 2018, the next generation is going to be using AMD’s updated 12nm Zeppelin dies, as well as including a few new tweaks into the system including better boost and faster caches.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Microsoft announces Windows Collaboration Displays platform for Surface Hub-like displays and Windows 10 IoT Core Services with promised updates for next decade
Microsoft announces Windows Collaboration Displays and IoT Core Services
https://venturebeat.com/2018/06/05/microsoft-announces-windows-collaboration-displays-and-iot-core-services/
At Computex 2018 in Taipei, Microsoft announced new Internet of Things (IoT) services and enterprise hardware during a keynote address. The news follows Microsoft’s promise last month to invest $5 billion into IoT over the next four years.
“For Microsoft, it’s more than just screens and devices; it’s about creating services and experiences with technology that support ambitions and aspirations,” Nick Parker, corporate vice president at Microsoft, said in a statement. “Imagine the devices and experiences we can create with ubiquitous computing, infused with AI and connected to the cloud. This is such an incredible time for our industry.”
On the intelligent edge front, Microsoft announced a new category of Windows 10 devices, called Windows Collaboration Displays; Windows 10 IoT Core Services; and a new IoT partner community.
Windows Collaboration Displays are large-scale devices designed for boardrooms. They’re preloaded with products from the Microsoft 365 family
In a related announcement, Microsoft took the wraps off of Windows 10 IoT Core Services, a new offering that aims to ease the burden of bringing IoT devices to market. It includes Device Health Attestation (DHA), which helps OEMs ensure that client devices have secure BIOS and boot software configurations enabled, and a suite of tools for managing operating system updates, app updates, and settings.
IoT Core Services, which is a paid offering, is meant to complement Windows 10 IoT Core, a lightweight version of Windows 10 optimized for IoT devices. It was released in August 2015 and counts Misty Robotics, Johnson Controls, and Askey among its users.
Device Update Center (DUC), one of the pillars of Windows 10 IoT Core Services, will allow users to create, customize, and control operating system, driver, and OEM-specific file updates, and to distribute them via Microsoft’s Windows Update content distribution network. It will also support test flighting to devices prior to widespread rollouts.
On the security front, DHA, combined with a device management system like Microsoft’s Azure IoT Device Management, can re-image devices or deny them network access.
Windows 10 IoT Core Services is backed by 10 years of support via the Windows Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC), Microsoft says, and devices will receive “quality” updates every two to three years that won’t introduce new features, minimizing the potential for exploits, bugs, and instability.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Amazon announces four pre-tested white box PC form factors manufactured by Wistron, Compal, and Quanta as part of its Alexa for PCs ecosystem — Amazon is making it easier for PC manufacturers to integrate Alexa into PCs. The retailer today announced four new pre-tested …
Amazon introduces 4 pre-built PC form factors for Alexa
https://venturebeat.com/2018/06/05/amazon-introduces-4-pre-built-pc-form-factors-for-alexa/
Amazon is making it easier for PC manufacturers to integrate Alexa into PCs. The retailer today announced four new pre-tested, white-box form factors designed with its voice assistant in mind from original design manufacturers (ODMs) partners.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft buying GitHub has led to some extremely nerdy memes
It’s the internet, after all
https://www.theverge.com/2018/6/5/17429054/microsoft-github-acquisition-memes-developers
It’s official. Microsoft is acquiring GitHub for a hefty $7.5 billion price tag — and the millions of developers who use the site have some feelings about it.
Despite Microsoft’s recent turn to aggressively embrace everything open source, the tech giant has a long history of opposing open software. This less-than-stellar past is spelling out a lot of distrust among the GitHub devs.
Commentators across the tech blogosphere and the burgeoning dev communities across Twitter and Reddit have come out for and against the acquisition, and because this is the internet, there have also been plenty of memes.
Tomi Engdahl says:
GitLab Sees Huge Traffic Spike After News of Microsoft Buying GitHub
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/technology/gitlab-sees-huge-traffic-spike-after-news-of-microsoft-buying-github/
Code hosting service GitLab has seen a massive traffic spike after news broke over the weekend that Microsoft has agreed to acquire GitHub, the world’s largest code repository.
According to Grafana, GitLab’s statistics portal, thousands of projects and code repositories are being imported every hour. These numbers are only expected to grow as Monday comes around and most developers get back to work.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Clouds under the sea: Microsoft deploys its Project Natick data center off the coast of Scotland
https://www.geekwire.com/2018/clouds-sea-microsoft-deploys-project-natick-data-center-off-coast-scotland/
Microsoft kicked off the second phase of its experimental underwater data center project Wednesday, submerging a shipping-container sized data center with 864 servers near the Orkney Islands in Scotland.
Back in 2016, Microsoft first tested its prototype underwater data center designs off the coast of California, hoping to prove the feasibility of a relatively portable data center design that could be placed near population centers as needed. This week a group of researchers deployed the first working production data center 117 feet below the surface of the sea, where it is designed to work without the need for maintenance for five years.
The datacenter has about the same dimensions as a 40-foot long ISO shipping container seen on ships, trains and trucks.
Project Natick gets electrical power from a cable connected to a wind farm on the Orkney Islands, and that cable also serves as the conduit for the data processed under the sea. Eventually, Microsoft would like to marry Project Natick to experimental ocean turbines that use wave energy to generate electricity, which could make these data centers entirely self sufficient.
Tomi Engdahl says:
At last: Magic Leap reveals its revolutionary techno-goggles – but wait, there’s a catch
Look – there it is. Sorry no time for trick questions
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/06/magic_leap_revealed/
After years of promises, augmented-reality hype-machine Magic Leap finally revealed its hardware… in the most bizarre way imaginable.
The American upstart promised a “closer look” at its Magic Leap One headset earlier this week, raising hopes that it would actually demonstrate a technology that it has been talking about in revolutionary terms since 2016.
The one question that was asked, again and again and again, was about the field of view (FOV) of the device. This is a critical component of any virtual or augmented reality gizmo. In order to be immersive, the broader the field of the view, the better.
In everyday life, walking around, human beings have a horizontal field range of 155 degrees and vertical field range of 135 degrees. That is how we experience the world. But that it very difficult to achieve with a headset, and with every degree that that field of view diminishes so does the sense of immersion.
In terms of headsets on the market, the most high-end products, the Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, offer 110 degrees. The lower-end Samsung Gear VR and PlayStation VR offer 100. And the lowest end Google Cardboard offers 90.
Critically, MagicLeap’s main competitor – Microsoft’s HoloLens – offers 90 to 100 degrees. Some argue this doesn’t matter because it is an AR headset where you see the real world through the visor, and so there is less of a sense of disorientation. But in reality, anything less than 90 is going to be a problem.
speculation that the Magic Leap FOV may be as low as 45 degrees – which is the equivalent to a driver’s side mirror
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Intel remains committed to pushing boundaries of PC
https://www.digitimes.com/news/a20180606PR201.html
In the transition to the data-centric era, the PC remains a critical facet of Intel’s business, and it is an area where the company believes there are still so many opportunities ahead, according to Gregory Bryant, senior vice president and general manager of the Client Computing Group at Intel.
Bryant was delivering a keynote speech at the onging Computex 2018, where Intel is showcasing how it is powering the future of computing, connectivity and communications through advanced innovations in client computing, artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G network transformation.
Tomi Engdahl says:
AMD tops Intel with its 32-core Threadripper 2, which will ship this year
Yes, it will probably run Crysis 3.
https://www.pcworld.com/article/3279264/components-processors/amd-tops-intel-with-32-core-threadripper-2-computex.html
AMD just did Intel one better at Computex. Intel wowed the Taipei crowds on Tuesday with a 28-core Core chip, which the company promised by the end of the year. One day later, on Wednesday, AMD announced Threadripper 2—and at 32 cores and 64 threads, it will easily top what Intel promised.
AMD’s Threadripper 2 announcement was the highlight of the company’s press conference, which didn’t have much to offer in the way of new announcements in graphics.
Over 400 million PC and console players use AMD’s Radeon technology; over ten times as many use Vega GPUs, said Lisa Su, the president and chief executive of AMD, comparing to the company’s previous-generation GPUs. Epyc, the company’s server processor, has captured 50 server platforms. Su highlighted design wins by Cisco, HP and Tencent.
Threadripper 2
“This is a heavy metal performance,” said Jim Anderson, AMD’s corporate vice president of the Computing and Graphics Business Group, summing up the performance of AMD’s Threadripper 2, a year to the day after Anderson announced the first-generation Threadripper at Computex 2017.
Threadripper 2 will be modeled on the second-generation Ryzen processor, based on 12nm, and the Zen+ architecture. More importantly, it will drop into the same TR4 socket—and it will be air-cooled
AMD emphasized what might be called the mondo version of Threadripper 2: 32 cores, 64 threads. However, Anderson promised more versions, and PCWorld learned of a 24-core version in follow-up questions
AMD has clearly had a success story with its Ryzen chips
Radeon: Vega Nano and Vega 7nm
AMD’s top Radeon executive made the argument that gaming and gaming GPUs assist everything from movies to social interaction, especially by virtually blasting each other in games like Fortnite.
The total gaming hardware market touched $34 billion last year
there was a significant disclosure: PowerColor’s Radeon Vega 56 Nano is available now, and the company announced a FreeSync partnership with Samsung TVs.
The company has multiple 7nm products in development, and Wang introduced its first: the Vega 7nm, which includes better security, Infinity Fabric, hardware virtualization, and deep learning logic. It will be optimized for workstations and datacenters. It will be complemented with an open software ecosystem for machine learning, Wang said. AMD showed off the 7nm GPU in action, paired with 32GB of HBM2 memory in a Cinema4D rendering demonstration.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft will ‘lose developers for a generation’ if it stuffs up GitHub, says future CEO
Plans integration, not alteration, and promises no ‘swamp’ of ads
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/08/nat_friedman_github_ceo_elect_ama_session/
GitHub’s future CEO Nat Friedman has conducted a Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) session and outlined a little of what Microsoft plans to do with the collaborative code locker once the acquisition is formalised and admitted that “if Microsoft screws this up, we will lose the trust of developers for a generation.”
Friedman, who was hired by Microsoft to take over the service once the acquisition closes, therefore said “We’re committed to doing this right.”
Which means doing nothing startling.
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://etn.fi/index.php/13-news/8116-sovellusohjelmistojen-markkinat-yli-30-miljardiin-dollariin