witold's posterous

Why I think OS X is moving to ARM

This is something I've been considering for quite a while, so hang on while I do a deep dive into why I believe that OS X will be Apple's last X86 operating system.

For those who don't know me, I am a recent convert to OS X. XP was the end of the line for me, and i had no desire to use Vista, or even Windows 7. I came over to OS X because for what I do (computational protein redesign, protein crystallography, and other protein stuff), it was easier to have the BSD underpinnings. However, I've been a computer geek since my father showed me the Compaq "Luggable" when I was 5.

Apple moved OS X from the IBM PowerPC to the Intel x86 architecture in 2005 because it was becoming quite evident that IBM was not willing to invest resources into chip development, especially since the G5 were so power hungry for their performance. The whole architecture behind the G5 was more geared to big iron where power savings were not nearly as important as in a laptop. Its not really surprising as IBM thinks BIG IRON, not small devices.

Moving to x86 gave Apple access to a much richer hardware environment where the pace of development was much faster, especially since there was competition for Intel with AMD. Economies of scale won out, since all components are essentially common.

But now, we are in a different shift, towards even more mobile devices. Look at the iPhone 4, or my EVO 4G Android phone. These devices have more computing power than I ever imagined I could have in my pocket. And I bought many PDAs, Sharp Zaurus, Dell Axim, many Palm Pilots. But notice, all the modern smartphones run on ARM processors.

ARM vs Intel is RISC vs CISC

The reason we never see x86 family processors in mobile devices is simple, they are just not power efficient. CISC, or complex instruction set computing makes it easier for assembly programmers to write efficient code, but the problem is that the processor is saddled with lots of potentially obsolete instructions that have to be integrated onto the die. This all wastes space and power. This is MUCH better explained by Security Guru and overall genius Steve Gibson of GRC in episode 252 of Security Now (http://www.grc.com/securitynow.htm) .

RISC is inherently less power hungry, and therefore more apt to being in a mobile device. Thats why your iPad can go for 10 hours. Apple knows this, they purchased PA Semiconductor for the engineers.

The iPad is the first, cautious step.

I think I can see where Apple is going with this, the name change from iPhone OS to iOS makes it clear. Apple wants desktops to move to ARM based iOS, with an Aqua layer. This makes so much sense because iOS has built in touch support, it was made to be power efficient and most importantly, it has a HUGE app development pool.

Now you really think I'm crazy

The change wouldn't need to be revolutionary, but more evolutionary like the move to x86. Current OS X developers would have to recompile apps and maybe rethink some things but imagine this scenario.

You have an iPad V4, it has all your data either on-board or synced to the cloud. You come home, slip it into a wireless dock, and you have a keyboard, mouse, and bigger screen. The interface changes to something more like the OS X Aqua, and you go to work. You want to leave, so you grab you iPad V4, and the on screen interface is like the iOS4 interface, (but with better multitasking). The app you were using (lets say Photoshop), switches to a more restrained but still capable touch only interface, and you still have all your data there.

Desktops will be the same as they are now, just smaller, more like the iMacs. Those who want power will get it in the form of more cores and higher parallelism. If you do lots of video editing, you will still do it on a Mac, but the underlying architecture will be different. I guess one would be ABLE to do the video editing on my hypothetical iPad V4, but you wouldn't want to the same way you don't want to do video editing on a Mac Mini but you could!.

My evidence for this is slim, but it does seem like the future trajectory Apple is taking. Notice that iWork has not been update for a while, and the Snow Leopard 'update' was more of a service pack. Also, note that there where NO design awards for OS X at this years WWDC.

Microsoft is clueless, Google doesn't have direction.

Why in the world would you want to shoehorn a desktop system into a touch appliance using a CISC based processor? I'll just leave it at that.

Google's Android has legs, so what is this Google Chrome OS thing? Honestly, I'm not sure whats going on there, but honestly, I think Chrome OS is a stop-gap for 'real people', while Android is the future. CISC is not going anywhere soon, so that might be why Google is making Chrome for the x86 architecture. If I were Google, I would tell Intel to invest heavily into ARM development.

I've been writing this for a while, so when I heard Andy Ihnatko and Alex Lindsay discussing this on yesterday's MacBreak Weekly, I realized I had to post it. Andy, I must agree with you, Apple will never Open Source OS X. Alex, I'd love to see more custom OS X hardware, but I don't see it happening either.

If you got to the bottom of this thesis, I congratulate you. I just wanted to put my thoughts down on the record. Please comment, i'd love to hear some feedback!

The Secret Powers of Time

via youtube.com

Great Video about time

A photo

via google.com

I have no comment.

My take on EVO 4G vs iPhone 4G

First of all, I want to take this time to thank the people at Sprint, who had to change my account around, and play with the calendar, so that I would be able to get the EVO 4G on launch day. John and Jackie, I am looking at you. So thank you.

I have been playing with my Evo since Friday, almost nonstop. I won't belabor you with an extended review, because other people have done much better than I could ever dream of doing. Let me just say, this phone has done something remarkable. It has lived up to my expectations. But like I said there are people who have reviewed this phone much better than I can, and have come to the conclusion that this is a great piece of hardware. I couldn't agree more. So now let's talk about the iPhone.

Today we saw the official unveiling of the iPhone 4 at the WWDC. And its…disappointing? I sat here at my keyboard stuck looking for a word that best describes how I feel about this new device.

Because of all the leaks, nothing was really surprising. The front facing camera, the new design, the larger battery, the higher resolution screen. All of these things have been seen online before today's reveal. We can't even fault Gizmodo, because all the Vietnamese leaks actually revealed more than theirs did.

After googles Keynote a few weeks ago, people were mocking the failed demos and how the presenters had to ask the attendees to shut down their WiFi. It has to be said, that Apple did not plan well for a failed WiFi setup. I was listening to a pirated stream of the keynote, and Steve Jobs was visibly (well audibly) annoyed the technical problems that they had. I don't want to be in the meeting where they rip apart the person who was in charge of that.

Now to the hardware, again slightly disappointing. I'm looking at my EVO 4G, and thinking to myself "what does the new iPhone do that this phone doesn't?" I love how Engadget and TechCrunch have both put up direct comparisons between that Evo and the iPhone. It really does feel that the iPhone is playing catch-up now.

The two main I guess you could call them advantages of the new iPhone are the gyroscope and the very high resolution screen. But to be honest, it's not that much better than my EVO's. Let's take a look at the numbers, shall we.

	EVO	iPhone 3GS	iPhone 4G	MacBook
w(p)	480.0	320.0	640.0	800
h(p)	800.0	480.0	960.0	1280

d(p)	933.0	576.9	1,153.8	1,509.4
d(i)	4.3	3.5	3.5	13.3


PPI	217.0	164.8	329.7	113.5

For comparison, I added the MacBook.

The other specs, are not so much important. They cost the same, and essentially do the same. Yes, the iPhone has iMovie mobile built-in, but that's a fair trade I think for being able to do whatever I'd like with my phone.

I'm not going to say that Apple has lost its edge, but with the iPad release and this new iPhone, I don't see Apple innovating as much as they used to. Yes the industrial design is gorgeous, and it is quite lust worthy, but I don't think it's at all better than my EVO.

Oh and one more thing, my phone can do two-way video calls already, on WiFi, 3G, and 4G.

And now something completely different:

The photo comes from Boston.com's The Big Picture

Census workers can enter your apartment in your absence | The Barr Code

Thousands of census workers, including many temporary employees, are fanning out across America to gather information on the citizenry. This is a process that takes place not only every decade in order to complete the constitutionally-mandated census; but also as part of the continuing “American Community Survey” conducted by the Census Bureau on a regular basis year in and year out.

What many Americans don’t realize, is that census workers — from the head of the Bureau and the Secretary of Commerce (its parent agency) down to the lowliest and newest Census employee — are empowered under federal law to actually demand access to any apartment or any other type of home or room that is rented out, in order to count persons in the abode and for “the collection of statistics.” If the landlord of such apartment or other leased premises refuses to grant the government worker access to your living quarters, whether you are present or not, the landlord can be fined $500.00.

That’s right — not only can citizens be fined if they fail to answer the increasingly intrusive questions asked of them by the federal government under the guise of simply counting the number of people in the country; but a landlord must give them access to your apartment whether you’re there or not, in order to gather whatever “statistics” the law permits.

In fact, some census workers apparently are going even further and demanding — and receiving — private cell phone numbers from landlords in order to call tenants and obtain information from them. Isn’t it great to live in a “free” country?

via blogs.ajc.com

My take on another Foxconn employee committing suicide

via engadget.com

I am not defending Foxconn, I don't know enough of the details to make a judgement either way, but this suicide thing really feels like a coordinated attack against the company.

To be fair, when you have ~350,000 employees, some will commit murder, some will commit rape, and some will commit suicide.