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December 29, 2003
The Social Life of XML
If you've got an interest in XML and Web services, pop over to Jon Udell's article in XML.com on the Social Life of XML. I've liked Jon's ideas in this area and this is a pretty good compilation.
While you're at it, read his hilarious post about getting questioned by the local cop while sitting outside the local junior high downloading email through their unsecured Wi-Fi. I've been there, although fortunately I've never been stopped. If I had, I'd probably have been thrown in jail knowing my luck. If you're in Salt Lake and need broadband access, the Salt Lake Public Library has free Wi-Fi access as does the Marriott Library at the University of Utah.
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Clark Going Open Source
Clarks' campaign is going open source with the launch of Clark TechCorps. Taking a page from Dean's book, Clark is looking for some volunteer programmers to build software to build an online Clark community. The software will be distributed under a BSD license. From a Wired news article:
Dean technology staffers said they welcomed Clark's open-source initiative. "We both have the same exact problem: We need to mobilize our grass-roots base. There are vendors who have tools that help, but the complete toolkit doesn't exist. The pieces are out there, but there's no solution," said Zack Rosen, a Dean technology developer involved with DeanSpace. Like the Dean campaign, Clark supporters adopted open source for both idealistic and practical reasons. "Open source for us symbolizes organizational transparency. We really feel that it's important that all development we do has this methodology behind it," said Clark TechCorps project manager Josh Hendler. Open source also offers concrete advantages in a campaign environment, where people are both chronically short on time and reluctant to spend money on anything but advertising and fund raising, Clark technology director Josh Lerner said.From Wired News: Clark Campaign Going Open Source
Referenced Mon Dec 29 2003 09:55:12 GMT-0700
You might be asking yourself why they distribute the software. The answer is: they have to. If they run it all on their servers it becomes "official" campaign material. That leads to legal issues and makes it harder to distance yourself from some of the crap that will inevitably be posted.
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Top Ten Utah Tech Stories
Dave Politis and Dave Fletch both have their own top ten tech stories for 2003. Fletcher focuses on tech in state government while Politis is general and give SCO top billing.
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VoIP Growing Pains
I'm a big proponent of VoIP, partly because I've always liked the idea of getting rid of the additional burden inside the enterprise of maintaining the traditional phone network. I also have to admit that I like the idea that it challenges the way we think about communications regulation. But as this c|net News article points out, there is a big difference between VoIP in a controlled environment and using it for general purposes telecom services on the Internet.
The problem basically comes down to standards. There are two primary standards: H.323 and SIP, but I've found that even when you can agree on a standard (as you can in a controlled environment) that gear still may not be interoperable. The only way to assure that my AudioCodes boxes will work with a VocalData softswitch is to test them. The answer is that they will if you carefully match AudioCodes boxes and versions with VocalData versions. When its time to upgrade you may need to upgrade both ends simultaneously to ensure that nothing breaks.
Imagine the problem then of just giving your customers a SoftPhone and telling them they can call people on other networks with different equipment and software. Right now, its probably the rare exception when that works. The short term answer will be to route VoIP traffic destined for another network onto the PSTN. That hardly fulfills the promise of VoIP, however. The only thing that's going to bring it about is tighter standards and better interoperability testing. I'm confident that this will happen---some mighty big players are betting on it and they're going to push the VoIP vendors hard in 2004.