Mark Harrison › Comments

I'm amazed at the line: "So what will happen when the mobile web becomes dominated by iPhone users?" Shouldn't that read "So what will happen IF the mobile web becomes dominated by iPhone users?" At the moment, Apple have about 1% of the handset market. Nokia have about 40%, and they recently bought Symbian. Call me naive, but I suspect that it will be easier for Nokia to hire a bunch more good programmers than it will for Apple to beat Nokia. [I write from my Mac, with my iPod to hand, so no Apple-basher.] - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin

I'm amazed at the line: "So what will happen when the mobile web becomes dominated by iPhone users?" Shouldn't that read "So what will happen IF the mobile web becomes dominated by iPhone users?" At the moment, Apple have about 1% of the handset market. Nokia have about 40%, and they recently bought Symbian. Call me naive, but I suspect that it will be easier for Nokia to hire a bunch more good programmers than it will for Apple to beat Nokia. [I write from my Mac, with my iPod to hand, so no Apple-basher.] - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin

Firstly, I find it ironic that a post that talks about "Security" as a top 10 concept has so many uncaught spam comments :-) Secondly, and less trivially, I have to say that the phrase "relational databases" does stick out like a sore thumb, not because it's a bad idea, but because it's "product-class" based, rather than "concept" based. I'd agree that learning how to manage complex... more... - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin

Firstly, I find it ironic that a post that talks about "Security" as a top 10 concept has so many uncaught spam comments :-) Secondly, and less trivially, I have to say that the phrase "relational databases" does stick out like a sore thumb, not because it's a bad idea, but because it's "product-class" based, rather than "concept" based. I'd agree that learning how to manage complex data structures is a core concept... and I'd agree that learning how to map complex structures onto SQL-based backends is, at time of writing, a good part of that learning... ... but I'm unconvinced that it's in the same league as layering or algorithmic complexity. ... oh, and I feel the same way about cloud computing, by the way, but the difference is that strikes me as the NEXT wave, that might abstract OUT the need to think in SQL-join terms :-) - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin

I'm currently consulting for a client (under NDA) about some funky projects. One of the things I was shown last week was a prototype applet for the iPhone. The interesting thing was, the programming group had decided to NOT make it an "Application", but instead just write a web page that was optimised for an Ajax browser the size of, well, an iPhone. As a result of this, the app in... more... - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin

I'm currently consulting for a client (under NDA) about some funky projects. One of the things I was shown last week was a prototype applet for the iPhone. The interesting thing was, the programming group had decided to NOT make it an "Application", but instead just write a web page that was optimised for an Ajax browser the size of, well, an iPhone. As a result of this, the app in question runs on a bunch of other platforms, from the PDAs through to the little 800x600 ASUS Linux PC thing I use for taking notes in meetings. They'd need a lot of convincing to go for native applications when the iPhone has less than 1% of the mobile phone market... - Mark Harrison from FriendFeed MT Plugin