Are we ready for the clouds?
I think yes and no. Simply put, we need a transition. We cannot jump directly from a system at our disposal to a world looking uncertain, un-secure and unoccupied. Actually last 3 reasons are the solutions as well. We are waiting for a transitive device. Something which slowly will place our resources on cloud, without letting us know. A seamless integration between the services, storage medias and security features.
We are trying to bring in this transition in our device. A slow but steady transition. And as I said, smooth.
Here comes something which is very crucial to figure out. Should we move services first or storage? Solution lies in understanding what is current system better at, transmitting data or processing it? If the processing power at disposal is high, you can compromise with lesser information being sent. But that would effect the energy efficiency, something very important for us. But there has to be a compromise. A compromise which takes advantage of situations which the data to be processed is small but processing involved is really very high. Sent it to clouds in this case and vice-versa for the other case.
Clouds provide us something which we can only imagine in our PC. They are huge rendering farms. Anything for them is cheese and butter. And here lies the answer to optimization as well. Imagine working on softwares like Maya on your PC for design but sending the files over the net for rendering and voila! You see the power you can get. In short “Pervasive Processing”. Its like providing minimal but optimal tools to the user, for anything more, talk to the Gods over the clouds.
notionink 
I just saw your device on slashgear. Looks very interesting, and very close to my bullet list of an “ideal mid-range device” (http://johnkzin.livejournal.com/55488.html). I’m hoping you’re going to be ready for market soon … I’d love to buy one of these.
But, some questions:
1) how much RAM?
2) how fast is the CPU?
3) Will you support USB keyboard/mouse/trackpad (ie. KVM switch)?
4) it’s not clear if you have a real GPS, or just using wifi/cellular assisted pseudo-GPS.
5) when are you expecting to go to market?
6) slashgear says there’s an expected $300 price tag … any ideas from you?
7) When WHEN WHEN!? 🙂
… 7) tegra 1 or 2?
8) which version of android? Upgradable?
9) resistive or capacitive screen?
10) file formats support? Since its android guess that would be JUST h.264?
Beats the purpose of 8 cores of tegra glory doesnt it?
11) it sure is a matter of national pride, heres hoping that it can get its act together as the revolutionary new tablet that defines portability and power like no netbook can and ousts the horrendous ‘ifruit’ off its ridiculous perth of supremacy.
Keep it up!
The thought of choosing what to do where, ie storage or processing in the cloud Vs. locally, IMO is not exactly binding with the device capabilities
It is also dependent on the legacy we carry and have, there is sufficient computing power in the millions of existing desktops to do a photo-shop, and people have *already* paid for it, therefore it should be still used, there are numerous work going on in low power efficient CPU’s. Combining the thought there is a good reason why I would not still use the cloud services/storage.
So one more reason compelling for the cloud move would be, economics – financial and socio.
And I am seeing a stage where my application could multitask with cloud processing services/storage to give me a better processing power. Why do I need to upgrade my CPU/memory, for the new 64bit photoshop, if my P4 can collaborate with the cloud and do the job? In the middle path lies the solution.
It is very interestingly written, to the author thanks.
when hdd is very cheap as it is and storage increases even in handheld devices, don’t u think its not relevant to move to cloud computing ? whatever information we need, pertinent that is, can be stored in a lot less storage area than whats available even now. most of the end users use it to store data which are of no use such as movies, songs and stuff. isn’t it?