The Disappearing Desktop - It's Real This Time

Sivakatirswami katir at hindu.org
Sun Nov 13 14:45:06 EST 2005


More real world testimony:

For several years I've been uploading the files for our magazine  
Hinduism Today to Banta Publication in Missouri, using their "Emerge"  
program which is this giant JAVA applet that runs inside a browser  
and interfaces with Creo's amazing InSite prepress system. It's  
really a marvel, but horribly slow, and I can tell from machinations  
on Banta's side they and Creo have been struggling with engineering  
this beast to run inside different browsers with different levels of  
JAVA installed. Does it work? yes... but.. guess what..  after three  
years of this, while sort out some tech upgrades on Jan 06 upload, my  
tech support in Electronic Prepress in Kansas City is on the phone  
and says to me "Hey right Emerge is a pain... go to this directory  
and download Creo's new desktop app, I know you are not afraid of the  
bleeding edge and you can test this for us...  not all the functions  
are there, yet, still in beta, but you can just drag and drop your  
files.. and ... etc."

OK, so I open up Creo's new desk top app to interface with the remote  
InSite server in Missouri from Hawaii... it's beautiful...and we all   
know the Creo's engineers must have breathed a huge sigh of relief  
when someone said "OK, ditch the browser guys, just build something  
that works"  If Banta Publications (one of US's top five printers)  
and Creo (recently purchased by Kodak) do not represent real market  
forces... I don't know what real market forces are... and they seem  
to be going the other way... yes of course, use the internet, but  
just the wires... i.e. it is "our web" not MS's web, or Netscape's  
web or anybody elses web. For these people, as Chipp said,  
productivity is the most important issue, with nearly 500  
publications a year to get out the door, some of the weeklies, its  
time to get real, and the glitter of the web service has finally worn  
off, get the job done...just build the tool we really, really need.

Sivakatirswami



On Nov 10, 2005, at 8:15 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote:

> That web apps will become an increasingly important "also" at  
> Microsoft and everywhere else is a given.  But replacing all apps?   
> Somehow I think not, and I suspect Microsoft's clever marketing  
> move is as much a distraction as anything else, consistent with the  
> company's demonstrated character and history....




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