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IBM/Oxford/UK Government Announce
“eDiamond” Mammography Grid
By Charles King
IBM, Oxford University, and the UK government this
week announced plans to build a computing grid to enable early screening and
diagnosis of breast cancer, and to provide information to assist in the
treatment of the disease. The project, code-named “eDiamond” by Oxford
researchers, will cost approximately $6 million and will be the first grid
built entirely with commercially available technology. The project is part of
the UK government’s eScience program, which is designed to carry out
large-scale science efforts via distributed, Internet-enabled global
collaborations. Initially, eDiamond will link a large database of mammograms
at four hospitals and breast screening centers, but could be utilized across ninety-two
screening centers throughout the UK. The grid will consist of IBM pSeries and
xSeries servers, workstations, and disk and tape storage systems, and will
also utilize software developed by Mirada Systems to standardize new and
existing digital mammogram images. Additionally, patient, diagnostic, and
treatment information will be securely encoded in every image file.
Eventually, the eDiamond project could be expanded to create a worldwide
digital mammography grid by linking up with similar programs in France,
Germany, Japan, and the U.S. No schedule or timeline for the project was
included in the announcement.
To better understand what the eDiamond intends to
be, it helps to understand how it differs from other grids. First, eDiamond
is a data grid as opposed to a computing grid. That is, it is designed to
facilitate the acquisition, storage, and usage of large sets of data rather
than leverage the computing resources of a specific infrastructure. Since the
average mammogram image is 30MB in size and each patient session results in
eight images, the sheer volume of information collected demands a specialized
support infrastructure like a data grid. Additionally, while the purpose of
eDiamond is similar to the work being done at National Digital Mammography
Archive based at the University of Pennsylvania, there are critical differences.
The Mirada software tools for standardizing mammogram images can be used for
creating digital images from film-based mammograms, allowing patients’
archival records to be included in the eDiamond database. Also, the
IBM/Oxford grid is based on off-the-shelf solutions rather than the highly
customized technologies that typify most grids.
Could eDiamond potentially enhance the way patients,
physicians, and researchers benefit from mammography data? We believe so. The
ability to include archival mammogram images offers doctors a centralized
methodology for spotting potential or tracing developing cancers.
Additionally, the inclusion of diagnosis and treatment information should
enhance analysis of the effectiveness of specific drugs and therapies, and
also provide a valuable teaching tool for medical students. Finally, if
eDiamond expands to serve all ninety-two breast cancer screening facilities
in the UK, and is connected with other similar programs, the resulting grid
could provide the means for systematically tracking breast cancer trends
across specific populations and geographies. Overall, we believe that
eDiamond has the potential to both measurably improve the health and lives of
the patients it will serve, and to help to drive grid as a useful, workable,
affordable IT solution for real-world problems.
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AOL to Treat Members Like Members (Not Customers)
By Jim Balderston
AOL has announced that it will no longer accept
third party pop-up advertising or merchandise sales for the AOL service. The new
policy will take effect when AOL has completed existing commitments to
advertisers using pop-up ads. AOL CEO Jon Miller said that members should
have a better experience as a result, and that the company would find ways to
keep advertisers happy. AOL also announced that it is making it easier for
members to find and change their marketing preferences and that opt-out lists
will no longer expire on an annual basis. AOL did not indicate when they
expected the backlog of third party pop-ups to be expended.
Pop-up advertisements have gone from the mildly
irritating but ubiquitous X-10 camera phenomena to an overwhelming deluge
that encompasses subscription offers, casino touts, online surveys, gadget
promotions and all sorts of other pimping of electronic effluvia that fills
one’s browser window in much the same way junk mail fills the mailbox or spam
crowds one’s inbox. In fact, the spam analogy would appear to be right on the
money here.
For people not using broadband and those plowing
through the World Wide Web with a computer that was purchased in the last
century, pop-up ads have become a noticeable drain on resources. Processors, memory,
and bandwidth are all consumed while waiting for pop-up ads to clear out of
the way and allow the desired page to finally display. In short, pop-up ads
severely downgrade the Internet experience for many users. AOL, with its
rafts of in-house promotions, is enough to challenge the most patient of
users without third party flotsam clogging the access lines. Apparently (and
shockingly) the AOL membership made their collective voice loud enough to be
heard in the well insulated office of AOL executives. As a result, AOL apparently
has decided that its membership was more valuable to the company as a
relatively contented exclusive audience than as calves offered for slaughter
to any company willing to pay an access toll. The change in attitude can be
found, we believe, in the new pop-up policy as well as those governing the
marketing preferences and opt-in lists. AOL may also be feeling the pressure
from the changing needs of an ever-more sophisticated user base, which now —
by means of ever more user-friendly software and ISP connection options —
have alternatives for connecting to the Internet and the World Wide Web that
suppress pop-up ads.
No longer captive, this user base may in fact be seeking less
cluttered pastures, ones in which they are allowed to graze (and browse) in
relative peace and quiet.
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Correcting a Significant Omission: XML
1.1 Moves to Candidate Recommendation
By Clay Ryder
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) this week
released XML 1.1 as a candidate recommendation, the second to last phase in
the W3C recommendation process. This revision of XML changes the treatment of
Unicode, an increasingly global standard for representing characters. Amongst
changes to Unicode support in XML 1.1 is one that will specifically address
IBM mainframe users by fixing issues related to the end-of-line character,
which is not properly processed in version 1.0. Some industry participants
have complained that the new specifications would break XML’s
backwards-compatibility in order to benefit IBM, but the company maintains
that this would not be the case given the flexibility of XML in describing
the contents of documents and the W3C defended the proposed changes. The
W3C’s commentary period closes on February 14, 2003.
Discussion about standards, especially within
industry consortia, can be often seem like ongoing grudge matches whereby the
participants seek to improve their competitive position by codifying existing
technological advantages. While there are those who would maintain that XML
1.1 has been bent to accommodate Big Blue’s aspirations, we believe the
reality is that an important class of computing citizens has been locked out
of full participation in the benefit imbued by the use of XML, namely
mainframe users. It is difficult to accept the notion of an internet-enabled
cross platform technology such as XML limiting the participation of some of
the most tried, tested, and true computer users, especially given their
potential effect on the marketplace. With this candidate recommendation, it
appears that this omission will be addressed.
While IBM is undoubtedly pleased with this W3C
recommendation, ultimately we believe the significant user base of mainframe
systems are the real winners. By being able to more fully participate in the
realm of XML and Web Services, the myriad data housed in mainframe
installations can be more easily leveraged within the enterprise along with more
contemporary information solutions. Additionally, the concept and process of
server consolidation on mainframes has another potential barrier excised as
the mainframe computing paradigm continues its resurgence. Obviously, this
announcement will have little direct impact on the SMB sector; however, its
indirect affect may be felt as more information that has traditionally lived
in the glass house finds yet another method by which to escape the historic
castle of computing and emerge into the mainstream of Internet-based business
processes.
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Sun, HDS, IBM, Veritas Announce CIM
Product Rollout
By Charles King
Sun Microsystems, HDS, IBM, and Veritas have announced
plans to deliver Common Information Model (CIM), Web-Based Enterprise
Management (WBEM), and Storage Management Initiative (SIM, formerly Bluefin)
compliant storage area network (SAN)-based storage management products, and
to support joint interoperability guidelines and testing. The four companies
said that their joint effort is open to all storage vendors, and should be
seen as a public demonstration of their commitment to deploy open storage
networks. Participating companies would be expected to ship CIM/WBEM based
storage management software commercially in 2003, support the emerging SMI
specifications and CIM/WBEM interface endorsed by the Storage Networking
Industry Association (SNIA), make their CIM Provider (SMI agents) available
to others for testing, and conduct joint interoperability testing and
qualifications. In separate announcements, HP said that it had declined the
group’s invitation but will continue to support the SNIA and to develop
CIM/WBEM-based products. Storage vendor EMC, which sits on SNIA’s CIM development committee, said that it had not
been invited to join the effort.
While we are always heartened to see kids playing
nicely together, we believe it advisable to disperse the fog of genial
self-congratulation that permeates this announcement. For the uninitiated,
CIM is a set of emerging, SNIA-endorsed SAN management application
programming interfaces (APIs) that purports to be the lingua franca that will
eventually enable true heterogeneous storage management (at least among
CIM-compliant hardware and software). Good enough. It should also be noted
that virtually every notable storage vendor is a member of SNIA, and that all
have publicly stated their intention to create CIM-enabled products. Okay, so
what does this announcement really mean? First, the effort’s sponsors are stating
publicly when they will produce commercial CIM-enabled products. For this we
applaud them. Huzzah! But the fact that the storage industry’s two biggest players
(EMC and HP) are absent detracts from whatever value this effort might appear
to offer. Additionally, sponsor’s executives have taken the CIM announcement
as an opportunity to demean the value of storage API swaps between individual
vendors.
There are three dirty little secrets about CIM that
we believe it is wise to remember. First, the glacial nature of industry
standard evolution means that the deployment and adoption of standards is
incremental and highly variable. Despite the CIM sponsors’ attempt to present
a united front, the extent of their individual efforts varies widely. Second,
the true value of CIM-compliance depends entirely on the number of vendors
involved. In other words, CIM-based tools will be largely worthless unless
every box in a given heterogeneous environment is CIM-enabled. Finally, two
words: legacy compatibility. While a great deal of vendor effort and
investment has gone into CIM and most are happy to promote upcoming CIM-based
products, few have discussed just how far back they will extend
CIM-compliance to their legacy systems. Though a few companies offer highly
flexible methodologies for complex management tasks (EMC’s Widesky includes
universal translation middleware that allows EMC software to talk to hardware
that uses interfaces including CLI, API, and CIM; and IBM’s virtualization
engine provides a single point of control for block level storage management)
just how most vendors will extend CIM-based solutions’ backward compatibility
is still unknown. Until vendors are willing and able to publicize that
particular roadmap, storage customers would do well to remember that for the
time being, anyway, vendor API swaps will be far more important to their
worlds than new CIM-compliant products.
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NAI Offers Professional Services
By Jim Balderston
Network Associates announced this week that it would
begin offering enterprises network and security consulting services and
education. The company has brought together experts from its Sniffer
Technologies and McAfee Security product lines and melded them into a single
organization called Network Associates Expert Services with the charter of
helping companies manage security and networks in a more holistic fashion.
The company will offer three separate expert services; network, security, and
education. Network services will focus on networks assessment and design,
product deployment, and network downtime emergency response. Security expert
services will target security design and management, assessments of existing
security deployments, and emergency response to security breaches. The expert
education service will provide ongoing, hands-on training in the areas listed
above.
Network Associates has rightly recognized what we
see as a solid, irrefutable reality: that of the convergence of network
technology and security technology into a comprehensive and seamless whole.
While not the first company to notice this trend, the fact the company is
moving with the flow in this regard bodes well for the future of the company
and its fortunes.
Both networks and security technologies are becoming
more complex as demands and threats escalate. And the increasing complexity
of each area adds to complexity of the other. As network topologies grow ever
more tangled, the complexity of the task of securing them also increases
dramatically. As security technologies become more dispersed and granular,
they add strain to the networks they are deployed upon. Designing and
building secure networks no longer happens sequentially. Network first, and
then security is a doomed design model. The company seems to have grasped
this essential idea. We think the development of the service arm could also
aid and abet the new Network Associates as it moves forward to hold and
reclaim existing or past customers, as well as securing new ones. The old
regime at Network Associates had a rather haughty attitude toward customers;
the general consensus was that customers had but two choices, Network
Associates or Symantec. With the new management team now clear of various
financial misdoings of the previous gang, its new services operations could
become a powerful conduit for customer feedback and design suggestions,
something that will hopefully not fall on deaf ears.
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