Back to the future with the Sun Microsystems

Back to the future with the Sun Microsystems

Zakki Hakim, The Jakarta Post, Singapore/Jakarta

Sun Microsystems held a symposium earlier this month in
Singapore for South Asian media and analysts, themed "A new tech
order -- Innovations, breakthroughs and winning strategies".

Interestingly, among the line-up of top speakers was Sun's
Chief Technology Evangelist, Simon Phipps, who showed the
audience the future of the Net and how one could benefit from it.

As an evangelist, he said later, it was his job to convince
people of things he believed in -- although most of these
apparently do not yet exist.

He said we lived in a "massively connected era" today, but in
the future people would demand high mobility with security as
their main priority.

Soon, people will be able to access their personalized
desktops from anywhere in the world, without the risk of losing
their data or even their settings.

"It would be similar to signing onto a free e-mail account,"
he said. Nowadays, people could open their accounts anywhere in
the world if they verified their identity via a connectivity
device, a cellular phone or a laptop.

However, if one lost their cellular phone or laptop, they
would need to buy a new unit, reset it, upload contact numbers
and so on, Phipps said.

In the future, this would become obsolete because people will
be able to access their personal settings and data stored in
their workstation as easily as accessing e-mail accounts,
regardless of the device used, he said.

"There would be some kind of third party managing the data
center and the network," Phipps said, which could be a private
company, or even a government.

He admitted though, that a government serving as a data center
manager raised the risk of its citizens' privacy being violated.
A strong control exercised by the people was a precondition to
ensuring that such violations did not occur.

What exactly is Sun's role in this vision? The Santa Clara-
based company would provide the data center technology, the
network and ensure the establishment of "mobility with security"
-- all based on their platforms.

How would Sun realize this dream?

In line with Sun's core strategy as revealed at the symposium,
the first trial would be the development of Sun Ray product lines
that will enable users to open their personalized work station on
any computer in their office, verifying their identities with a
Smart card.

Additionally, Sun, which was founded in 1982 and has 35,700
employees worldwide, in regarding and treating networks as a
computer system, eventually developed N1 to simplify them by
facilitating network management.

Sun's solution to simplifying networks was to interact closely
with the open source community, which will consequently lead to
the deliverance of more innovative products at lower costs.

One of its products, the Java platform, is based on the power
of networks and the idea that the same software should run on
many different kinds of computers, consumer gadgets and other
devices.

Any Java application can be delivered easily over the
Internet, or any computer network, without operating system or
hardware platform compatibility issues.

With Java technology, the Internet and private networks became
possible. For example, users can access their personal
information and applications in complete security from outside
the office through any computer with an Internet connection. Sun
believes that soon, users will be able to access tailored
applications from a cellular phone based on the Java platform, or
even by using Smart cards as a pass key to everything -- from
cash machines to ski lifts.

The Java platform is being built into next-generation
telephones, TV sets, wallet-sized Smart cards and many other
consumer and business devices.

Phipps recommended that for the time being, Java developers
should focus on developing the application for Smart phones,
"especially in developing on-line games".

A recent survey by Electronic Arts, the biggest games
developer, showed that 17.6 million visitors spent 70 minutes
every day playing on-line games, he said.

The fact that so many people spent at least an hour a day to
connect to the Net made on-line games extremely appealing to
telecommunication providers, he said.

"People love to play their own character in a role-playing
game, while building a character would certainly need a lot of
time, and as long as they are connected to the Net, the cash
would keep flowing."

In Jakarta, Bhra Eka Gunapriya, President Director of PT Sun
Microsystems Indonesia, said Sun would also increase the number
of Java developers in the country, with a two-year target of one
million new Java developers.

Sun Indonesia is to establish the first Java Competency Center
next year to produce certified Java developers.

Bhra said Sun Indonesia had approached a number of reputable
universities in the country, and a cooperation with the Bandung
Institute of Technology (ITB) was close to being realized.

In addition to the center, Sun is also to establish the Java
Business Resources Center to serve as a business incubator,
through which developers could meet the needs of business clients
with support from the government.

Bhra looks forward to seeing more Indonesian Java developers
coming up with new applications, which he said would benefit
society, the business community, the government and of course,
Sun itself.

The question now is whether the government will be responsive
and relevant legislation supportive enough to back the
initiative, so Indonesia will not become disconnected from the
"massively connected era".