The Weekly Round-Up: 11.11.05

"What would a software platform look like if it was designed from scratch with the primary goal of dependability?"

So reads the abstract of a Microsoft research paper on operating system development. Two things immediately apparent are that the report's author has (1) never waved the paper in the general direction of the top brass at Redmond and (2) has no concept of irony.

Unfortunately, the article doesn't refer to the forthcoming Vista release. Instead, the question appears in a research document for Microsoft's other operating system.

Wait a moment. 'What other operating system?' you no doubt cry - the Round-Up certainly did. Fear not, for you can learn all about it in the next paragraph.

Apparently, the really clever boffins at Microsoft (the ones who aren't allowed anywhere near the Armani-clad denizens of the marketing department) have created a 300,000-line microkernel-based OS from scratch and it has as much in common with Windows Vista as Steve Ballmer has with Mikhail Baryshnikov.

Singularity - as the project is called - has been built from the ground up with the kernel, device drivers and associated applications in managed code. This results in a more dependable system, the Round-Up was intrigued to learn.

So, what would a software platform look like if it was designed from scratch with the primary goal of dependability?

"Nothing like Windows!" opines cheeky reader Richard A Marshall, who was kind enough to send the Round-Up a link to the research paper on a week as bereft of humorous IT news as the Microsoft CEO is of dense, luscious head-hair.

"You might of course start by building on a ruggedly dependable Unix core and then put a beautifully intuitive and user-friendly GUI on top. But that would set the photocopiers in Redmond whirring so loudly you could hear them way over in Cupertino," adds the charitable Mr Marshall, who clearly has no qualms about opening up old wounds.

The Round-Up couldn't possibly entertain the merest thought of concurring, Richard.

Anyway, don't get too excited. While Singularity could lead to the construction of more 'robust and dependable' systems, there are no current plans to release it to the market. As an aside, you have to wonder about the choice of name for this research project. Sure, 'Singularity' sounds really cool but a singularity is also known as a black hole.

Not the most prudent name to give to a research project in search of funding. After all, a black hole exerts an immense gravitational pull that sucks in any matter foolish enough to drift too close to it and from which nothing ever returns.

(Note, the last sentence was written in the painful knowledge that some easily slighted astrophysicist will read it and spend 15 minutes composing a scathing flame mail highlighting the Round-Up's atrocious lack of knowledge about gravitational physics but, hell, it's better than doing any proper research and leads us neatly onto the last bit of this section.)

So good luck to the clever boffins at Singularity. Though a 'robust and dependable' operating system from Microsoft sounds too good to be true.

What are the chances of these software development principles ever making it out beyond the limit of this particular event-horizon?

Blogging is starting to make little 'ping' noises on the radars of CEOs, at least according to the latest piece of Round-Up-friendly research by Burson-Marsteller and PRWeek.

According to the study, an increasing number of US CEOs are rating blogs as highly effective tools to communicate with both employees and customers.

About 59 per cent of CEOs surveyed said they find blogs useful for internal communications, while 47 per cent see them as tools for communication with external audiences.

However, despite lauding the marketing benefits of the ever-growing web communication medium, the majority of business leaders balk at the thought of starting their own blogs.

Which is a shame as they would offer fascinating insights into the great minds that forged our industry. Consider the following (fictional) entries:

Personal blog: Bill Gates, chairman, Microsoft.

"Worked at home today. Melinda made me eggs over-easy and I was checking out the sports news on my iMac when the kids smashed a baseball through the patio doors. Great - glass everywhere! If I'd have wanted to deal with broken windows I'd have taken the Lexus into the office.

"Mistress Fate guffaws in my face once again.

"Our marketing guys have admitted that our cool new anti-spyware software Windows Defender isn't a finished product. Heck, are any of them? Heh heh...

"I also fired off a memo to the Seattle posse about the challenges our competitors bring to the table. If we don't deal with the new wave of services then Adobe, Apple, Google (damn them) and Yahoo! will. Why can't these guys take it lying down? Don't they realise how annoying competition is?

"And the Singularity guys keep bugging me again about their plans to start an OS from the ground up. They may be on to something but Steve insists it's just a black hole."

Or maybe... Personal blog: Steve Jobs, CEO, Apple

"Insanely great grapefruit for breakfast - pink. Gave me a fabulous new idea for a new Mac product range. Rang Jonathan Ive to discuss but only got through to his voicemail - again.

"Met with the Apple legal team to discuss the iPod nano lawsuits. One of them informed me with a smirk that the legal bill could be anything but 'impossibly small'. Just what I need - a lawyer with a sense of humour."

Or... Personal blog: Larry Ellison, CEO, Oracle

"Totalled another Tomcat this morning. Beard a bit itchy. Bought PeopleSoft. Felt better."

Surely, an opportunity missed...

The latest bit of research to expand the sum of human knowledge has discovered that IT glitches make normally civilised people swear like Gordon Ramsay, throw things around and miss out on seeing family and friends. Sometimes all three at once.

In a survey of 1,000 adults, a third of those who had experienced IT problems admitted to missing out on family and social commitments because a glitch had kept them at their desks late.

Two-thirds admitted to swearing, more than half said they'd missed deadlines and another 45 per cent confessed to being in a bad mood all day. A further 15 per cent have resorted to throwing things.

But it gets worse.

More research found that not only is dodgy IT turning us into potty-mouthed, missile-throwing social pariahs, we're taking out our frustrations on the very people trying to help us - IT service desk workers. Something that BT recently got very cross about.

The report claims 81 per cent of service desk workers admit that they - or an equally beleaguered colleague - have been verbally abused by furious technophobes. Meanwhile, more than one in five have been so abused they've considered quitting altogether and retraining as an Eskimo. Sort of.

Respondents were also asked how service desks could be improved. As soon as the barrage of missiles stopped, the nice people running the survey learned that 80 per cent advocated less automated voice response systems, better understanding of users' jobs and systems (55 per cent), and giving the support staff more technology to solve problems remotely (66 per cent).

In a thinly veiled attack at the rise in offshore outsourcing strategies, 70 per cent also called for support staff to have a better command of English.

Men are more difficult than women (like we needed research to figure that out) and older callers are worse than those in the blossom of youth. Grumpy old men - the bane of helpdesk officers everywhere.

Apparently, it's also a good idea to have an effective customer-support software solution in place according to the research, commissioned by customer-support software solutions company Touchpaper.

Now there's a turn-up for the books...

And finally, it's been the toughest technology-related week for California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger since some futuristic master-robots sent him back in time in the buff to eliminate the mother of the man who in the future would cause the very same machines terrible grief only to end up being squashed flatter than a Kraft slice.

Arnie made an appearance at a 'special election' in California (and before you ask, the Round-Up has no idea what was so 'special' about it) - to flex his democratic muscles in an e-voting workout.

No doubt The Terminator was surrounded by countless aides for the photo opportunity and as the media adjusted the white balance on their cameras to deal with the gleam from the assembled dignitaries' capped teeth, the burly governor pushed the 'vote now' button.

Computer says 'no'.

According to the system, Arnie had already voted and couldn't do so again. Apparently, there was a problem with duplicate names in the database.

It transpires the problem occurred when officials earlier entered sample names into some voting computers to make sure they could connect to the main election counting office. Someone entered Schwarzenegger's name during the test and failed to remove it, with the result that the system considered he'd already cast his vote.

Rumours that Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse also had trouble casting their votes couldn't be confirmed at the time of writing.

The lack of control on this is clearly rather worrying and you can't help but wonder how many other voters may have been refused because their names were used in the test run.

It's not often you can say that the State of California could learn much from the Republic of Estonia.

Meanwhile, one can only imagine that Jeb Bush is watching events with considerable interest...

Until next week, cast caution to the wind and take your pick of the following headlines selected with the utmost care to appeal to the dear reader's delectable fancy...

• Plate scanning cameras help cops spot dodgy drivers

• 22Mbps broadband goes nationwide

• ID cards could wear out too quickly

• Should businesses ban Skype?

• Online poker 'rife with cheats'

• Devil's Advocate: Should Microsoft be paying you to use Windows?