The Sun Sets on Google

[KingBahamut]

According to this post at Dirson's blog, Google and Sun Microsystems are to announce a new and kick-*** webtool: an Office Suite based on Sun's OpenOffice and accesible with your browser. Today at 10:30h (Pacific Time) two companies are holding a conference with more details, but Jonathan Schwartz (President of Sun Microsystems) claimed on Saturday on this post of his blog that "the world is about to change this week", predicting new ways to access software.

External Links
http://google-blog.dirson.com/post.new/0285/
http://www.openoffice.org/
http://www.sun.com/events/google/
http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/jonathan?entry=the_world_changes_this_week

My biggest question in all of this, very simply put.....What does Bill Joy have to say about it? While I am a Sun advocate, I was a bigger fan of them back when Joy had much more input on when , and why, and where in the company. Based on recent developments im curious as to what he has to say about it all.

[GeneralZod]

There are lots of people who, in the past, have stated that they couldn't see why Microsoft viewed Google as a competitor, and to be honest, it wasn't all that clear to me, either.

Hopefully, this piece of news will serve to clarify things. Make no mistake - this is a direct assault on Microsoft, threatening as it does not just its major cash-cow, Office (Microsoft's profits come almost exclusively from sales of Windows and Office - on everything else, they make at most a minor profit or, in the case of the X-Box, huge losses), but the very concept of needing a specific operating system in order to run an app at all.

The "Browser Wars" were ignited in large part by Microsoft's realisation that the Web (Web apps in particular) had the potential to make Windows irrelevant - if an app works in any browser, the underlying OS is unimportant. This is Microsoft's worst nightmare, and so they sought, largely unsuccessfully, fortunately, to control it. If Google and Sun's project takes off, then MS's nightmare rears its head again, and there's no telling what will happen this time around.

Interesting times indeed.

[UbuWu]

Nice...

[openmind]

Openmind <-------------Barely suppressing bursting into uncontrollable laughter, but still making those 'snorting" noises while biting his lip until tears come to his eyes.

[macewan]

had the potential to make Windows irrelevant

;)

Microsoft's Windows operating system is irrelevant to some people already, I'm one of those people. AJAX Office apps are taking over the need for stand alone applications, whether it's the wysiwyg textarea being typed into right now, the one in gmail, in wordpress, writely.com's app, numsum's app or any of the apps discussed on ehub or techcrunch.

It would rock if Google provided an AJAX office app that exported to .doc, .odt and .pdf. Plus allowing for easy upload to storage area & sharing of documents.

*dreaming**** :p

[mstlyevil]

Real competition for Microsoft from a major corporation like google is the best thing to happen for the consumer in the computer arena in a long time. Those that are loyal to Microsoft will probally get a much better product in the future and the rest of us who are not loyal will benefit with services and apps that are equal or better then anything that Microsoft would ever put out including games native to Linux. Now if the Linux community could get Google to endorse the most popular distros and provide the same services for us that MS customers get, I believe that Linux could very move to the 20 to 25% range within a year. Now if Blizzard or some other major player in the gaming industry would make Linux native games, we could give MS more of a run for their money.

[macewan]

rtsp://rx-lvl3-pa02.rbn.com/farm/*/sun/sun/live/VIP-2166_01_200.rm


http://play.rbn.com/?url=sun/sun/live/VIP-2166_01_200.rm&proto=rtsp

^ - starting any minute now


Starting right now

[aysiu]

Those that are loyal to Microsoft will probally get a much better product in the future and the rest of us who are not loyal will benefit with services and apps that are equal or better then anything that Microsoft would ever put out including games native to Linux. This is something few Microsoft die-hard advocates realize--competition is a good thing even for the company that's already "won." Internet Explorer is already going to be better because of the Firefox threat. Microsoft Office will be vastly improved, now, too.

[Wide]

I can see myself walking around with a thumbdrive, just plug it into any computer, boot & access my OS on Googles servers.

Not sure if the world is ready for it, security concerns, data loss concerns, privicy issues.
HHHHmmm Gmail is a success.

Will I use it? I do ;)

[mstlyevil]

Microsoft office now will be compatible with Adobe Acrobat reader and they made an agreement with staroffice 8 by Sun to be compatible. The users of bot word and OO.o have both won int these very recent developments.

[graigsmith]

I can see myself walking around with a thumbdrive, just plug it into any computer, boot & access my OS on Googles servers.
Not sure if the world is ready for it, security concerns, data loss concerns, privicy issues.
HHHHmmm Gmail is a success.
Will I use it? I do ;)

it's web based, why would you need a thumb drive. just save the documents to googles servers. available anywhere, anytime you have web access.

[macgyver2]

it's web based, why would you need a thumb drive. just save the documents to googles servers. available anywhere, anytime you have web access.
I'd use a flash drive because I don't trust others with my important data. If I have a deadline to meet and suddenly their servers go down, I'm screwed.

[bob_c_b]

I'd use a flash drive because I don't trust others with my important data. If I have a deadline to meet and suddenly their servers go down, I'm screwed.

Not quite as big an announcement as we'd hoped for, but Google and Sun are in a much more interesting partnership than before, and it is kind of funny to watch Sun thumb their nose at MS after McNealy was so humble during the Java lawsuit settlement.

[23meg]

I can see myself walking around with a thumbdrive, just plug it into any computer, boot & access my OS on Googles servers.

Not sure if the world is ready for it, security concerns, data loss concerns, privicy issues.

i myself am skeptical and reluctant about having my important files and apps on someone else's server. i'd rather have them local, on my hd. this may not seem like a big issue especially after we see the real convenience of it, but in the near future the computer industry will probably come up with no-hd solutions (remember that Sun is already a fan of stripped down computers) that will depend on web based applications and online storage. i'll oppose that trend to the end.

[23meg]

I'd use a flash drive because I don't trust others with my important data. If I have a deadline to meet and suddenly their servers go down, I'm screwed.

you couldn't be as screwed as i was when the Microsoft Exchange server running my school mail account judged that ".rar files can contain malicious software" and prevented me from opening a .rar file in my OWN inbox, rendering me unable to deliver the week's assignment :)

[Wide]

it's web based, why would you need a thumb drive. just save the documents to googles servers. available anywhere, anytime you have web access.


I'm sorry, I should have wrote what the voices in my head were saying :)

The thumb drive is where the OS itself resides, no need for an installed OS on the computer=no more windows OS.

Like the others say, data back up is a vital part of my systems.
Hopefully they will have a resync type ability that we can periodicly back up our data to our local system, I'm sure they have that under consideration.

[Kvark]

it's web based, why would you need a thumb drive. just save the documents to googles servers. available anywhere, anytime you have web access.
And available to google whenever they want to gather some user statistics, help business partners customize ads or whatever other use they might find for all that info. And no doubt soon to the US government whenever the feds want to know what a suspected terrorist, net pirate, a foreign government or corporation is up to.

Email, forum posts and other things that are already communicated over the net and meant to be read by others, that I can accept storing on a server someone else controls. But I'm never going to put personal or work related documents where others can read them. If the documents are encrypted locally before being sent to google's server and I'm the only one who has the key, then it'd be acceptable.

[macewan]

I had to leave before I could watch most of the announcement.

What exactly was the Sun & Google announcement today?

[Wide]

I'm never going to put personal or work related documents where others can read them. If the documents are encrypted locally before being sent to google's server and I'm the only one who has the key, then it'd be acceptable.


I wouldn't put any sensitive data, credit card purchases, buying ****** etc, let alone my work files that are of extremely sensitive content.


Perhaps this is just the PDA of the future, heck we use cell phones dont we:D

[Kimm]

Ofcourse it would be very convenient but I wouldnt like having my files stored at some huge server somewhere (what if it goes down, or a terrorist attack?) or what If I lose my internet connection? what happens then?

No, personaly I belive in super strong computers and cross platform inplementions (such as Mono and Java (personaly, my bet goes with Mono))

[KingBahamut]

Well seeing as how so much Java was crammed into OpenOffice and , ultimately even more so, StarOffice, it seems likely that any office implementation between Sun and Google will but Java in a very heavy way.

[macewan]

I'm fairly disappointed with what I took from the announcement.

[yesplease]

This news has a big impact though, while I was reading this post it was an item on the news on the radio (Netherlands), and they rarely bring any software news (except perhaps for a large virus-outbreak, after the fact).

However, the bussiness community is very conservative, and sometimes rightly so, because of fear of loss of productivity. But I still hear things like "my boss wants Intel even though I recommend AMD".

[bob_c_b]

I'm fairly disappointed with what I took from the announcement.

Pointy headed bosses love Google (since the IPO) and now Google is involved in directly distributing OOo, this is good news.

You also have to note the subtext, Scott McNealy came off like Ballmer's lap dog when Sun and MS reached a settlement over the Java lawsuit. Making this deal with a company that Ballmer and MS clearly fear is a great big middle finger at MS.

[Ubunted]

Even CTV Newsnet in Canada here picked up on this story, talking about a "Java-based system that could threaten Microsoft's hold on the desktop and office market." It's pretty clear the talking heads haven't the slightest clue what they're talking about, but it's good to see it hit the mainstream like that.

[brentoboy]

Now if the Linux community could get Google to endorse the most popular distros and provide the same services for us that MS customers get, I believe that Linux could very move to the 20 to 25% range within a year.

You know, I wouldnt be suprized if google came out with its OWN distro - they have to compete with MS on MS's turf, and it would be difficult to stand up to them without a high profile alternative to windows on the desktop. the fastest way to offer that is to take linux, make it look like a google program, and distribute your own distro.

Google has already done bolder things, ...

[mstlyevil]

You know, I wouldnt be suprized if google came out with its OWN distro - they have to compete with MS on MS's turf, and it would be difficult to stand up to them without a high profile alternative to windows on the desktop. the fastest way to offer that is to take linux, make it look like a google program, and distribute your own distro.
Google has already done bolder things, ...

You might be right on that one. That may be why they are not as involved with making a linux version of google earth.

[23meg]

i don't think Google has to or will make an attempt to tackle MS head on in the OS market; that's not what Google is about. i'm not even entirely sure it would be very beneficial for the open source community if they were to step in with their own huge distro (read: distro acquistion) project like Novell did. but today's news is definitely good news, since it will make Open Office more popular and possibly allow it to mature even faster stand stronger against MS office. OOo's growing reliance on java had already hinted this anyway.

[blastus]

You know, I wouldnt be suprized if google came out with its OWN distro - they have to compete with MS on MS's turf, and it would be difficult to stand up to them without a high profile alternative to windows on the desktop. the fastest way to offer that is to take linux, make it look like a google program, and distribute your own distro.
Google has already done bolder things, ...

Before they could consider doing that, they would have to get Microsoft out of their business except where absolutely needed. I mean, I'm sure every desktop computer at Google's headquarters is running MS-Windows and MS-Office.

[mstlyevil]

Before they could consider doing that, they would have to get Microsoft out of their business except where absolutely needed. I mean, I'm sure every desktop computer at Google's headquarters is running MS-Windows and MS-Office.

Nope not true, Google prides itself on relying on linux for it's desktops and servers.

[brentoboy]

Before they could consider doing that, they would have to get Microsoft out of their business except where absolutely needed. I mean, I'm sure every desktop computer at Google's headquarters is running MS-Windows and MS-Office.

Have you looked at the qualifications it takes to get a job at google?
Lets just say that unix is a well spoken language there.

They target windows users, becuase that's where the the population is, so that is where their ads make them the best money. The geeks behind the curtain all speak *nix.

[macewan]

;) .
http://www.macewan.org/wp-content/images/CaliforniaDreamin.png

[papangul]

Lots of news on ZDNet on this issue: http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9593_22-5888536.html