Doesn’t we all from time to time wish to be able to download a whole website we have found to be able to study it later on with enough time and patience? Or perhaps just to store away some info we have found on the net to later on access it more easier again than searching for it again for hours.

Now being familiar with UNIX I for sure know about the utility called wget and I’ve used it already several times. Today working with my Mac I’ve found a nice and easy to use graphical interface for it called CocoaWget.

Quickly installed, I’ve played a bit with it and just can say it does a good job. There is no need anymore to know about linemode arguments and downloading a site, even with specific settings, is donein seconds.

From then it just belongs to you to organize the information well enough on your local harddisk for you.
Guess I do like and will keep it now!

Being familiar with VMWare Virtualization Software since years, switching over to a Mac as my preferred  laptop was also looking for new stuff and finally brought me to Parallels Desktop. It isn’t that expensive and I’m anyway and always looking for new and fancy stuff.

Installing and working with it was easy and I first gave it a test ride with Windows XP … flawless and easy and especially the coherency mode did attract me much.

Principally being lazy but always seeking for and looking into technical challenges I thought about the XP as boring and started digging into it’s’ options and possibilities a bit deeper. A Parallels Transporter?! Now that sounds interesting!!

Reading it and using it was once and … sad but true … absolutely easy to use. I’ve started it, connected it to my Laptop with Vista on it and right a hours lates I was able to start up my Vista System as a Paralles Workstation on my MAC. It just … worked …. too easy! …. and what about FUN and CHALLENGES?!

By coincidence I did run into a discussion making me aware about how difficult it is to loose some given status someone claims for him or herself.

I guess everyone of us working with computers is familiar with the old dispute between Mac and PC users about who has the better system …. 

Sure I was also jokng from time to time and one time I even lighted a wild discussion about when I very mindless wrote a cheeky comment at an internet list.

Since a while I’m used to work with both and I have to confess that i have likes and dislikes at both sides. It is not that I would really prefer on, but there is also no one I would define or decide as better or superior. At the end both world are the result of there history and special in some way.

But back to the topic. My recent posting about the Mojave Experiment I did send also to this internet list with no idea, but to share it. At the end I was amaze people there starting again to talk about PC versus Mac.

Now knowing myself that OSX since a while is running on non Apple hardware I try to prevent people there again running into a wild discussion but was amazed myself about some responses like:

"I kind of miss the days when you could walk into the Apple Store and there were only the true believers"

Wow! It must be really hard to recognise that your MAC is just another computer at the end.  

ps: You don’t take my todays posting too serious please … 

Virtualization is one of the today’s  key words of modern .IT. Today hardware and software vendors do offer virtualization solutions for nearly everything and all.

Regardless it is a CPU, your memory or hosting package, the disk access or finally an middleware or application runtime layer it needs to share and virtualize, the ready to use managing framework for it is already developed and offered on the market.

Even Apple, this so far manufacturer of nice and trendy hardware for geeks - "Show me one person not being aware about this brand new  iPhone 3G!" -  is now part of the game. Finally since opening their world, no longer using own hardware for their MACs and porting OSX to Intel CPUs things like Parallels and VMware are part of the big game and the world has changed.

But …. What does this mean for customers and application owner. Do we have to forget about all? Or perhaps to throw away all our nice but old applications and sites?  …. What kind of world we developers have to work in tomorrow?

Good Question!

Following actual market researches, lower costs for application development, system integration and application maintenance,
accelerated integration of applications, more flexible adaptation of existing applications to future changes in technology and, not least, the ability to develop and market new products and services more quickly – are just some of the many benefits that
companies are expecting from a new approach to application design resulting from the introduction of service-oriented architectures (SOA).

Will this influence the work of small business owners? Such one or two man shows designing special and individual tailored customer solutions?

For me the answer is YES. Perhaps not today and with a bit of luck not right tomorrow (the reprieve to learn about!). But certainly in a predictable time frame we all will have to deal with it …… Why?

Experts are in agreement that an infrastructure that is not flexible quickly comes up against its limits, resulting in logistical, as also performance problems. Today only a service-oriented software design (using web service technology, for example) involves the development of modular, reusable software units that can be distributed across different systems. And therefore is able to deal with common hassles and business impacts like software upgrade, maintenance, server crashes and downtimes in a reasonable and appropriate way.

Early this year I changed my hosting provider because of feeling more and more disappointed about their leak of professionalism. For years my former hosting partner offered a solid hosting at a fair and reasonable price to me - At the end and shortly before I left they just and basically had ignored and /or missed to do their homework!

Two years ago I was able and willing to wait a few hours until my mail host was up and running again. Today I’m no longer and I really  insist in receiving all my sms, emails and micro blog postings instantly without any service interruptions.

 I basically expect - as for my feeling all customer do - my site and services up and running all time! There is no way for me to think about missing inquiries and business I might loose out of some service disruption.

The new provider I decided for does now offer grid-Services to me. Oh!! … How exciting you may now throw into our discussion.

Sure there are still issues and hassle to deal with, but since then my pages were never down for more than a few minutes and my emails came always through - Not to speak about the plenty of more resources I do now get at a similar rate like before!

You see?! There are impacts on our daily business. And virtualization and a service orientated application design does for sure have a serious impact and direct impact on our all business.

Thats my opinion and my 5ct on the topic! You have another one?

I know that I scratch a difficult topic today and that the front between the different parties are very strict enforced - Just  … who cares?!

Whenever a discussion between Mac and PC users comparing there system starts, it ends up in a big discussion comparing all the benefits - depending on which side they are - they believe to have!

I personal never saw it really that polarized.

For sure I’m a major Windows User working with PC’s since the very first IBM XT I touched. But I also have a long and old history working with other Operating Systems  like VMS and Open VMS, Ultrix , TrueUnix 64 nearly all other available UNIX Distributions someone thought about to implement once.

So I guess it just didn’t happend to me, being seriously forced to work with some Macintosh Computer before.

Nevertheless by staying in contact with quiet a lot of folks being confirmed Mac Users by own word, I know a lot about Mac’s and OSX. And I really would lie in case I would try to hide that since a while I’m sneaking around those systems again and again recognising more and more things I like about them.

For example one of those things I really like about Mac OSX is the Dock application it comes with! Some really cool and neat application launcher always just one click away to start some needed application.

Now recently a friend made me aware about some “Dock” clone for Windows which I downloaded and installed.

It is called RocketDock and can be downloaded for free. Try it, and I’m sure you will immediately like it as much as I do!!