I don't understand why so much effort is expended on things like WAP when
99% of the real world still doesn't have any access at all to the Internet,
much less wireless access. And even of those who do, most have such slow
connections that even download a simple test page is an ordeal.
I know it's not very sexy to drop the blue-sky toys, but doesn't anyone ever
work on improving and democratizing existing infrastructure instead of
widening the gap between what people really have and what looks cool in the
lab?
-- Anthony
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon Crowcroft" <J(_dot_)Crowcroft(_at_)cs(_dot_)ucl(_dot_)ac(_dot_)uk>
To: "'IETF Mailing List'" <ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org>
Sent: Thursday, June 29, 2000 09:10
Subject: Re: WAP - What A Problem...
a technical discussion worth reading is at
http://www.osopinion.com/Opinions/MikeBanahan/MikeBanahan1.html
it would seeem (as i've suspected for a while) that the community in
charge of this development has the same problem as the guy who built
jurassic park - they haev no discipline, or understanding of computing
and the software/jhardware interface tradeoffs - this is qutie a
common problem in communications work - people come from one side of
the tracks (either jsut software or just engineering, or ust plain
theory) - systems architecture is hard stuff, but there is little
point standing on the toes of giants, when its possible to stand on
their shoulders....it both ends of the problem space, whether
application level and devising new markup languages for restricted
display, or low level work in customising
protocol stacks for resource scarce environments , there is a body of
public work out there, and of researchers who are willing to
cosntructively critique proposals provided they are carried out in a
public way with optimally zero cost for access to early drafts, but
at least low entry cost - it is also a good idea to let those wacky
media lab types get their hands on hardware prototypes, since they
will (as william gibson puts it) "find a street use for things" - its
instructive to see how wavelan and its cousins have fared so well
after being handed over to the ietf - if we'd have PCMCIA GSM and GPRS
(and bluetooth) cards, despite battery power or other clunkiness
problems, we might haev made less of a dogs dinner of things...(when i
say we, i mean the interdisciplinary, apparently unstructured, but
actually highly organised force that will fit anything to IP, and not
vice versa)
give me a level long enough and we can moev the earth - give the wrong
end of the same level to the wrong people and they can crush a
diamond.
j.