I just ran across this cute little 3D game on the internet:
http://blog.largeanimal.com/demo/
Remember to click the full-screen button in the bottom left, for a full experience. You will need the O3D plugin which will be included in Google Chrome, soon.
The game seems to be entirely made using JavaScript. If you want to see how it looks using Google Chrome app mode, in Windows, create a Windows shortcut like this:
"C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe" --app=http://blog.largeanimal.com/demo/
The game does not adapt to the window size and still shows some HTML stuff when not in full-screen mode, and it's also a bit slow to load compared to what we can expect in the future, but even in its current state, it makes it awfully old-fashioned to run setup programs or to use MSI files.
Monday, 27 July 2009
Buying CO2 credits doesn't make IT CO2 neutral
More and more IT companies try to become CO2 neutral by buying the CO2 credits that match the amount of power they use for the IT equipment. The argument is, that if they use 1 ton CO2 to run their servers, then they buy 1 ton CO2 credit from the market, removing 1 ton of CO2 emission elsewhere.
Nice thought but that's not how it works. Buying CO2 credits like that just means that you need 2 ton CO2 credits produce 1 ton CO2, basically increasing the price for emitting CO2. If everybody did this, CO2 emissions would be cut by 50%, but not 100%. The good thing is, that the increased price of emitting CO2 generates additional incentives for developing new energy technologies. However, the IT company still emits CO2.
What makes matters even worse, is that market economy ensures, that if you can spend your money on energy during operating equipment, or energy during manufacturing of equipment, you will spend your money where you get most value. And if the equipment is produced in one of the countries outside the CO2 market (like USA or China), you will basically just push the problem out of the market, but not away from planet Earth.
It is good that companies try to use the CO2 emissions topic for profiling themselves, but nobody gets CO2 neutral by burning coal.
Nice thought but that's not how it works. Buying CO2 credits like that just means that you need 2 ton CO2 credits produce 1 ton CO2, basically increasing the price for emitting CO2. If everybody did this, CO2 emissions would be cut by 50%, but not 100%. The good thing is, that the increased price of emitting CO2 generates additional incentives for developing new energy technologies. However, the IT company still emits CO2.
What makes matters even worse, is that market economy ensures, that if you can spend your money on energy during operating equipment, or energy during manufacturing of equipment, you will spend your money where you get most value. And if the equipment is produced in one of the countries outside the CO2 market (like USA or China), you will basically just push the problem out of the market, but not away from planet Earth.
It is good that companies try to use the CO2 emissions topic for profiling themselves, but nobody gets CO2 neutral by burning coal.
Friday, 24 July 2009
Delphi apps as Chrome apps?
Google is doing a lot of great stuff with Chrome these days. The first version of the browser included it's own task manager, process administration, sandboxing etc., but Google now also announced accelerated 3D support and native code, sandboxed. I would not surprised to see Google Earth to be one of the first applications, that stop being Windows applications and start being Google Chrome applications: Install chrome and visit a specific URL, and it works. No more "download this app" or "install this app", except for Chrome itself.
This is all great, of course, but what development tools do we use for that? C/C++ is notoriously unproductive, and so are web apps. Web 2.0 apps are even worse. We need some tool that can create cross-platform apps, delivered using Google Chrome or similar, that perform well and are easy to write. Delphi has previously shown, that it can compile to several platforms, and Delphi Prism officially targets mono, so why not take on this one?
This is all great, of course, but what development tools do we use for that? C/C++ is notoriously unproductive, and so are web apps. Web 2.0 apps are even worse. We need some tool that can create cross-platform apps, delivered using Google Chrome or similar, that perform well and are easy to write. Delphi has previously shown, that it can compile to several platforms, and Delphi Prism officially targets mono, so why not take on this one?
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