Towards the Web-based Desktop
It might have seemed unbelievable quite a few years ago, but
today, most serious computer users work on two or more PCs. Some
people use an office and a home PC, others an office and laptop
PC while others have a desktop PC at home and a laptop to
accompany them at travels. A similar pattern can also be seen in
other consumer products, such as cars, where the general purpose
family car has been replaced by more specialized models such as
an SUV and a roadster weekend-drive.
This new reality in computing is bound to bring major changes
into the way we work and also regarding the demands we have from
our PCs. First of all, networking is no longer just a useful
feature. It is a very basic requirement and the absence of it is
unjustifiable. It is so easy and cheap for computers to
communicate with each others, that even if one needs to transfer
one file per week, networking is worth it. Moreover, the
Internet is now as important as office applications such as MS
Office and it would be pointless to have a stand-alone PC while
it's so easy for many machines to share a single network
connection.
The second change deals with the synchronization issues of data
on multiple machines. It would be nice if every file and every
setting that we create on one machine is automatically and
securely passed on all other machines that we use as well.
Imagine for example, adding a new e-mail address on you PC. It
would sure be convenient if that e-mail address could also be
added on the PC you use at work and on your PDA. How about
adding a web page on your Favorites? The same synchronization
issues occur, and although it has been promised many times in
the past, total synchronization is far from automatic, and
people who actually achieve it have spent long hours trying to
make it work.
However, the set seems to be changing and we should prepare
ourselves for a greater change. If all that we did were not even
stored on a PC but somewhere on the Internet, then we could have
access to our desktop, wherever we were, whatever PC we were
using, ours or someone else's. If all my MS Office documents,
media files and settings were available like this and accessed
by a username and a password then any PC could become my 100%
Personal Computer. Of course, the idea of web applications
through thin clients is not new. But today two major issues make
it more feasible than ever before. First of all, there exists an
infrastructure for fast and cheap Internet connections available
in most places. And second, there exists the need for it,
through the use of multiple PCs by the same user. And for every
day that passes, the need grows stronger and the infrastructure
gets better. It is therefore no surprise that Microsoft has
started Windows Live and it should be expected, that Google will
undertake a similar effort that may, in the end, completely
change the use of PCs as we know it.
Finally, the added benefit of the "everything on the Web"
approach is that the cost of a basic PC would radically drop and
soon, Nicholas Negroponte's $100 dollar PC might be considered
an expensive one! With such reduced cost, we could start seeing
PCs embedded in cars and cell phones. And of course, nobody can
predict where an even bigger wave of spreading PC use might lead
to. In other words, we seem to live in a world that continuously
creates opportunities for those who love technology or work in
the hi-tech sector.