2008-02-29: Data & Knowledge Differences on Interop Stack
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To reuse data you need the publish-find-bind approach. Reusing knowledge can also follow a similar approach if it is in an open space.
Data and knowledge differ however, because data has physical roots, a fixed time-span, provider and trail.
Knowledge can have many contributors, has a distribution of time and can change dramatically making it hard to describe.
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[edit] Turn your SOA into a HOA (human oriented architecture)
Ultimately, the way forward is governance. Without governance, there is no SOA. But maybe we don’t want too much governance. I had the opportunity to join the panel in Dana’s podcast panel to talk about the emerging relationship between Web 2.0 and SOA, and the governance of each. However, both Jim and Dana agreed that this open, collaborative process should not be open to anyone when it comes to SOA planning and management. Runtime SOA governance, in particular, “depends on clear-cut policies, designs, data definitions, and so forth that have been handed down by the policy gurus, and now are governing ongoing operations without ambiguity,” Jim said. “In that case, you don’t necessarily want any Joe Blow to be able to overwrite the policies and the business rules that are guiding the ongoing monitoring, management control, or security of your SOA.”
Jim Kobelius says SOA activities can benefit from the collaboration Web 2.0 brings to the table. “When I think of governance, I often think about crack-the-whip, controls, and setting controls on how people interact and how policies are created,” he said. “When I think about wikis, I think of the exact opposite. There are no controls. It’s basically a shared space to which everybody can post, everybody can overwrite, and everybody can erase everybody else’s comments.”
Still, as Jim pointed out, maybe Web 2.0 is paving the way to HOA, or Human Oriented Architecture. “It’s giving human beings the tools to share what’s in their minds, to share their creativity with the big wide world,” he said. “SOA, Service Oriented Architecture, is about sharing and reusing all matter of resources in a standardized way. HOA, the Web 2.0, is the most critical resource, and the most inexhaustible energy supply is human ingenuity and creativity.”
[edit] 2008-04-06: Age of the Right Brain
The software layer of interoperability can execute many of the logical, left-brain activities, e.g. physical modeling, data processing chains, clear causality chains etc.
The humanware layer can connect the activities that are not logic-based, non-linear, right brain activities. Therefore, the humanware software needs to be designed for the right brain. But, what are the right brain activities - needs review.
- Farmed out left brain activities to computer e.g. spreadsheets, drawing routines, word processor. Scientific data processing using own data.
- Requirement: Machine tools (Hardware/software)
- Impediments: Not having the hardware/software; Not knowing how to use it.
- Collaboration: None
- Networking data and processing services. More shared data means broader context, more shared methods and tools means more power.
- Requirement: Network data access, shared tools/methods
- Impediments: Can't share/ Don't want to share; Can't use/Don't want to use.
- Collaboration: Sharing and willingness to use. No direct human/human interaction.
[edit] Hardware, Software, Human Interoperability Stack
- As you move up the interoperability stack the 'human-ness' and level of complexity increases in communication (1 tcp/ip protocol, multiple data access standards, ..., human conversation where neither person knows the outcome.
- Use machine for as much left-brain logical activity as possible, to allow more right brain activity.
- Person-to-Person: Face-to-Face, Voice, e-mail, chat (synchronous not necessary, but direct connection necessary)
- Humanware: wiki, picture/video sharing, blogging (Search-based connection, tagging)
- Software: Data flow connectivity
- Hardware: Internet protocols
- Del.icio.us
- RDF/RSS - Communications protocol
- XSLT - transformer/adapter
- "WebEx" - has both person-to-person and person-to-software connectivity
- Screencast - person-to-person and humanware-to-person
[edit] Not Invented Here - NY TImes
ONE of the oldest barriers to innovation is “Not Invented Here,” a persistent bias of even the most creative people toward their own creations and against those of people who work for other companies;it can also infect the military and government resesearch
ONE of the oldest barriers to innovation is “Not Invented Here,” a persistent bias of even the most creative people toward their own creations and against those of people who work for other companies. And the problem of N.I.H. isn’t limited to business; it can also infect the military and government research agencies. To help counteract N.I.H., large corporations have promoted technology alliances with rivals, as well as the concept of “open innovation,” to draw on a wider circle of big brains — not on their payroll — to work on core technical problems. These efforts arise from the recognition that no single innovator or team, no matter how loyal to an employer or successful in the market, has a monopoly on wisdom. “That’s why we are always going to live with the make-buy tension,” says Greg Papadopoulos, the chief technology officer at Sun Microsystems. How much of a company’s technology does it create on its own? How much does it buy from others? These questions, Mr. Papadopoulos believes, are central to “dealing squarely with the dilemma of innovation” and the pursuit of great ideas. How to resolve the tension between make and buy varies from one organization to the next. Sun, for instance, has created many important technologies in-house, including a family of microprocessors based on an original design and the Java language, popular with programmers. Yet even companies that maintain their own powerhouse research-and-development units are increasingly aware that valuable ideas can sprout anywhere. For instance, Sun broke with its home-grown tradition this month, when it paid $1 billion for MySQL, which makes the most popular open-source database program. Sun needs a database program to support its line of powerful server computers, which can be optimized to work with MySQL. To create a viable database from scratch might take Sun 10 years, Mr. Papadopoulos figures. Instead, Sun gets a vibrant product overnight — and immediate contributions from scores of database engineers around the globe. “There’s no shame in buying technology,” he says. When acquiring a mature technology, the buyer usually pays more, and the risk of a conflict between the internal and outside cultures is greater. Fear of cultural conflicts looms large in any technology acquisition — witness the concerns over proposed hostile takeover of Yahoo — because an important benefit is adding talented employees, not only customers. In technology purchases, the creative people are usually accommodated. Sun has let most of MySQL’s employees stay put; they are so dispersed worldwide that they count 120 different airports as their nearest air hubs. Sun also will keep giving away MySQL’s core programs. Despite such concessions, there are no guarantees that MySQL will expand Sun’s revenue — or maintain its creative edge now that it is part of a much larger organization. “This marriage will either be a fantastic success or an enormous failure,” says Marten Mickos, senior vice president of Sun’s database group. Perhaps the most important reason that large companies are willing to gamble on buying technology is that not doing so carries risks, too. Two recent examples of hot innovations — YouTube and Skype — came from small groups of visionaries who then sold for high valuations to established companies (in these cases, Google and eBay). While neither acquirer has found a way to profit from these deals, they have gained in several ways. Google and eBay denied these innovators a chance to grow into large, and potentially threatening, companies themselves. They also denied their rivals the chance to buy YouTube and Skype. They bolstered their own pools of talent and bought themselves time to find profitable business models. “Because great new technologies are coming from people who want to do their own thing, and won’t necessarily work for someone else, acquisition may be the only way for a large company to get them,” says Mitchell Kertzman, a partner at Hummer Winblad, the venture capital firm in San Francisco. Companies are willing to travel farther than ever to acquire technologies, a consequence of the rise of engineering in China and India. “We haven’t acquired any technologies from these countries yet, but we have full-time people looking, and it is only a matter of time before we do,” says Ned Hooper, senior vice president for corporate business development at Cisco Systems. Cisco has 50 executives scouring the globe for technology acquisitions. They work closely with leaders of internal product teams. Just as the general manager of a baseball team might fill a gap in his lineup by acquiring a new center fielder or relief pitcher, Cisco’s business managers can ask for specific technology help from outside the company. In 2005, in response to such a plea, Cisco bought a California start-up, Nemo Systems, for $12 million. Nemo had designed a novel way of using standard memory chips to store data in Cisco’s routers, which needed more costly specialized memory. Routers are a key piece of computer networks and a major source of Cisco’s revenue. Cisco spent nearly three years refining Nemo’s approach; the memory technique will begin showing up in Cisco routers this year. While Mr. Hooper feels that he scored on the Nemo acquisition, picking winners isn’t easy, and he warns that buyers of technology must beware. “There are always people lined up outside my office offering technologies,” he says. “But often they are not the ones you want to buy.” G. Pascal Zachary teaches journalism at Stanford and writes about technology and economic development. E-mail: gzach@nytimes.com.
Wikipedia: Not Invented Here (NIH) is a term used to describe a persistent sociological, corporate or institutional culture that avoids using already existing products, research or knowledge because of its different origins. It is normally used in a pejorative sense. As a sociological phenomenon, "Not Invented Here" syndrome is manifested as an unwillingness to adopt an idea or product because it originates from another culture, a form of nationalism.
