Sat, 12 Aug 2006
Internet Save and Restore
It’s about time. Instead of it being “your” computer, it’s “your OS image”. Walk up to a participating machine, log in, and your VM is demand loaded from the network, just like a laptop which has been resumed from sleep.
Lots of problems (for example, the prototype uses VMWare for VM, so no 3d acceleration, and it’s unclear what happens if you switch between radically different hardware platforms), but it is apparently a functional prototype.
Interestingly, they are using CODA for a backing store. I’ve been keeping an eye on CODA for a while; sadly, the rate of development on it is very slow, otherwise it could be a seriously awesome network file system. What’s neat about ISR is that they are using the VM to work around some of the CODA file system limits.
Details here:
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~satya/DOWNLOAD/isr-ieee-computer-july04.pdf
Atlas Shrugged
Okay, I am now done with Ayn Rand.
Seriously.
It was interesting the responses I got from people who saw that I was reading Atlas Shrugged; they ranged from visceral disgust to “oh, I read that… when I was 15” to “Everybody I know who read that book turned into an asshole. Are you going to turn into an asshole?” to “Wow. Did you get to the monologue yet?”. To which I can now respond “Yes, in fact, I read the 68 page monologue. I read the whole damn thing. And you know what? I’m done with it. Oh, and I don’t plan on turning into an asshole, but if you think I have, let me know, ‘kay?”
My favorite part was the industrialist ninja strike force at the end; being ruthless in business obviously equips you to be an elite commando in and out of the boardroom.
The sad part here is that the underlying message here is actually valuable, if very simple. Be independent. Don’t rely upon the graces of others to survive. Don’t feel obligated to obey the tenets of society. Do think. Those aren’t bad things to do. Unfortunately, this seems to get twisted around by the people who adopt these novels as holy text, and get transformed into one even more simple creed: be an asshole.
I mean, honestly. I’m beginning to think that Ayn Rand is in the same class of holy book as the Bible: the folks who are yelling the loudest about it haven’t paid attention to the source material. So much for rationalism.
The Fountainhead was a much more entertaining novel; however, Atlas Shrugged was worth reading from a “seeking to understand the loonies” perspective, which I seem to get into from time to time. Still, no crazy-cult books for at least a month.