Vista: 64-bit usage climbing

We from the multilib-enabled Linux world extend a belated welcome to our Windows-using counterparts

clipped from arstechnica.com Unlike Apple, Microsoft does not control the hardware that its software runs on. This means that Apple can more easily move all its users to an x64 operating system: all Macs currently have 64-bit CPUs, and Snow Leopard is rumored to be a 64-bit-only release. Windows 7, on the other hand, will still be released in x86 and x64. Microsoft would prefer not to make Windows 7 available on computers with 32-bit CPUs (indeed, Windows 7 Server will be x64-only), but the decision is driven by software compatibility demands.

Midori : NT/Vista :: NT : Win95

Looks like Microsoft is preparing for their next great leap forward in OS design. Just as Windows NT’s kernel is a clean room without any DOS baggage, Midori is based on the Singularity research kernel, that is written in .NET and utilizes a new compiler backend to output native code.

This will be rather interesting to watch. The idea of writing an OS kernel in a strongly-typed language makes sense — witness House and Singularity. The effort is not expected to be ready for years — this is not Windows 7, and I’d guess there will still be a traditional Windows 8, even if Midori is ready by then.

Incidentally, the OSS community already has a strongly-typed virtual machine designed for efficient native code generation: LLVM. If one takes a Unix kernel (or, more practically, microkernel) and get it to compile using LLVM’s C front-end, one then has the opportunity to gradually rewrite it one module at a time in any language with LLVM front-ends. In the time it will take for Midori to get ready, would there perhaps be an ML-like front-end to LLVM?

clipped from arstechnica.com Every once in a while, an article gets posted somewhere in the blogosphere about how Microsoft needs to release a complete Windows rewrite, something along the lines of what Apple did with Mac OS X. Most people realize that Microsoft is in no position to pull a stunt like that at the moment; it’s hard to see Microsoft phasing out support for a billion-Windows-PC-strong user base, but that day may one day come, perhaps thanks to robust virtualization technology. But in the meantime, Microsoft has settled on rewriting bits and parts of the Windows operating system as it sees fit, with Vista being one of the biggest rewrites (a fact which partially explains the many hardware and software compatibility issues XP’s successor experienced at launch). Speculation around a non-Windows operating system in the works at Microsoft has been present for years, but recent trustworthy tidbits of information have found their way into the hands of Microsoft ZDNet bloggers Mary Jo Foley and Ed Bott.

Silverlight for Linux. And it’s open source!

As reported by Linux Weekly News, Microsoft has just announced version 1.0 of their Adobe Flash competitor, Silverlight.

An interesting development is that they are also working with Novell to bring the technology to Linux (to be known as Moonlight). Moonlight supposedly will be GPL’ed, with the exception of the binary codecs needed for playback of proprietary Windows Media formats.

So Linux is still a second-hand citizen (version 1.0 is out, and development on the Linux port is just announced?), but this might be interesting for those of us (read: most Linux desktop users) that have been waiting for a decent Flash playback (forget authoring) solutions. Still no x86_64 support after all these years, forcing people to stick to 32-bit browsers (or use nspluginwrapper). And unless Adobe has changed things since acquiring Macromedia, anyone who has merely used the Flash plugin is tainted and can’t work on Flash reimplementations!

(From this interview [lwn.net] with principal developers of Swfdec and Gnash)

Rob: The Adobe EULA for Flash forbids anyone who has installed their Flash tools or plugin from working on Flash technologies. This has had a chilling effect on the development of free Flash players, since a developer must either choose to decide that Adobe won’t sue them over this, or to do what Gnash does, which is a slow and inefficient, clean room, reverse engineering project.

As I argued, Novell would most likely require copyright assignments on contributions to Moonlight, and thus the use of GPL is not going to hinder Microsoft benefiting from community contribution (interesting, from a once anti-GPL company). The framework is conveniently written in C# as well, so it’s not going to directly benefit the Gnash and Swfdec projects (Flash), but depending on how clearly Novell marks up their code for patent-encumbrance, it could still either benefit or act as a time bomb for Flash projects..

Naturally, I’d still advise anyone to refrain from using Silverlight/Moonlight unless it’s being used as a container for standard (H.263/4) codecs. WMV is an abomination dating back to the AVI days — note how most HD- and BD-DVDs are encoded in H.264, not VC-1 which is basically WMV.

Embeddable Google Maps!

This is cool beyond belief. For example, here’s a map showing the ridiculousness of US-style hub-and-spoke flying arrangements (unless you book enough in advance, or pay more, to get more direct routes), if you live in a remote place like Bloomington, Indiana (as yours truly do).

Due to WordPress.com limitations, though, you’d have to check my personal blog for it.

Dear Interweb: Watching YouTube in H.264 *without* paying the Apple Tax?

Dear Interweb,

I’ve heard this great news [apple.com] that Google is transcoding its videos to high-quality MP4 format for AppleTV and iPhone users. To my surprise (and disappointment), however, there are no instructions on how to use it from non-Apple devices (or even a non-appliance Mac).

I have been to YouTube Mobile, and as reported by jukkaeklund [allaboutsymbian.com] the video available to other mobile users (or PC users who use the URL) are still H.263, though in a saner container than those horrible FLVs. Not all the videos are there too.

Is Google giving Apple preferential treatment? Is Google becoming like the IBM of the past, with balkanized teams not coordinating with each other? (Hope not). Funny thing is, the video that motivated this question was a Linus Torvalds tech talk at Google, on distributed SCM. Unlike earlier Tech Talk videos hosted on Google Video, this one is on YouTube only — meaning no decent-quality downloads!

I can imagine even ordinary Mac users (as opposed to those on the consumer appliances) getting disappointed at this. They have paid the Apple Tax already, after all.