I believe that everybody is on their own spiritual path and they are also on their own path of wisdom seeking. A lot of people aren’t aware of this journey, and some people ignore it completely. I’ve decided to embrace it, so if I do ask you something rather strange or do something out of the ordinary, then it’s probably me just doing a bit of exploration. I think there is a lot to learn from the past in order to truly progress in this world, and I think the only way to do that is through openness, liberalism, peace and oneness…. which is going to be quite tough for a lot of people.

Anyway…. onward

Kingsley Idehen made an interesting blog post recently in a question and answer format (see his blog post: “The future of the desktop“), so i’ve decided to provide my own answers:

Q: Is the desktop of the future going to just be a web-hosted version of the same old-fashioned desktop metaphors we have today?

A: In terms of becoming web-based the desktop as we know it will not change much at the very surface level. I doubt that a web-hosted version of the old-fashioned Operating System would ever be stable enough (some of you will know if you’ve ever used a “

dumb-terminal“). The Operating System, however, is likely to become more and more web-aware; taking up more and more of the challenge of “Web Universal Plug and Play”.

Q: The desktop of the future is going to be a hosted web service

A: False. I think it’ll be totally the inverse, I’m even inclined to say that everybody would host their own space which is interconnected with other services across the web…. it won’t be a “hosted web service”.

Q: The Browser is Going to Swallow Up the Desktop

A: Interestingly this is where Microsoft were heading in the right direction… the file system explorer was also the internet explorer, just by changing the location in the address bar you were capable of switching from file mode to web mode. (takes quite a lot for me to admit that). If you have a fully integrated system then you can take full advantage of everything. The web of documents, is a web of documents…. what are file systems good at manipulating… documents (and also viewing metadata)! So is the browser going to swallow up the desktop? No… it already has.

Q: The focus of the desktop will shift from information to attention

A: No information is vital…. attention will become an interesting part of search, but it’s actually has to maximise utilisation of information (aka knowledge) in order to do it’s best (just as any other program needs to do). This effects both desktop systems and browser systems.

Q: Users are going to shift from acting as librarians to acting as daytraders

A: People are always going to categorise things, and other people will always want things categorised. How can you expect someone to trawl through their bookmarks without them being categorised? However, things will become more automised when interlinked with other interlinked data…. therefore users are likely to become Personalised Knowledge Managers controlling what knowledge they possess and how they want their intelligent agents to deal with it.

Q: The Webtop will be more social and will leverage and integrate collective intelligence

A: OK, first off… really bad terminology usage going on here. Webtop? That’s a bad name… and for something which I don’t think will become widespread. Also collective intelligence is actually about agents having specific knowledge. The web-aware desktop will slowly include more and more agent technology (see some of the Apple/Xerox work on Intelligent Agents and Intelligent User Interfaces done in the late 80s and early 90s) and will certainly encorporate

Linked Data technologies (see the Semantic Desktop and OpenLink Data Spaces).

Q: The desktop of the future is going to have powerful semantic search and social search capabilities built-in

A: Yes, I’ve mentioned this in most of my answers above.

Q: Interactive shared spaces will replace folders

A: I agree with Kingsley when he says “Data Spaces and their URIs (Data Source Names) replace everything. You simply choose the exploration metaphor that best suits you space interaction needs”… there is nothing more to say than that…. a URI is the key to a data space, a data space is where your data objects are stored which also have their own URIs.

Q: The Portable Desktop

A:The portable desktop (or ubiquitous desktop) will emerge as a mobilisation of a Linked Data desktop…. all depends on hardware at the moment. This will go beyond mobile phones, mobile computers (such as the Asus EEE) and PDA’s.

Q: The Smart Desktop

A: Yes, this is what I’ve been discussing.

Q: Federated, open policies and permissions

A: Have we not got the technologies for these points already :-)

Q: The personal cloud

A: Can’t add anything more to Kingsley’s point “

Personal Data Spaces plugged into Clouds (Intranet, Extranet, Internet).”

Q: The WebOS

A: There are some interesting implementations of the WebOS idea out there, and a few years I was actually considering building one using Ruby On Rails and AJAX….. really we don’t need to focus on this right now, it’s more about interlinking things (aka Linked Data)

Q: Who is most likely to own the future desktop?

A: I have nothing more to add to Kingsley’s comment: “You! And all you need is a

URI (an ID or Data Source Name for “Entity You”) and a Profile Page (a place where “Entity You” is Describe by You).”

Greenbelt 2008

Greenbelt festival 2008 was really fantastically good! Michael Franti & Spearhead are an awesome band, as are Aradhna. Plus my church (Foundation Bristol) did a fantastic service where they told the story about the Tower of Babel using some funky music and interesting visuals (it was quite “New Media” style and “Emerging“) (”To Confuse is to Liberate!”). I actually feel more enlightened after the whole weekend, and Beki and I have booked our tickets for Greenbelt 2009 and are even thinking about running our own event!

At the event I bought a didgeridoo and a Peruvian Ocarina. I also learnt how to sing Taize, Iona and Gregorian Chants and Songs.

Linked Data SemanticBible

Development of the Linked Data version of the SemanticBible is going well, and a big thank you to Sean Boisen of semanticbible.com for assisting us with various things. I’ll be working on hooking the ontologies in with various other ontologies around the Linked Data Cloud.

Fishes

It seems like two of my oranda fish are “getting it on”… having lots of little baby fish is going to be quite scary. Not sure what I’ll do with them!

Hospital

I went to hospital this morning for my Dilated Cardiomyopathy (for the first time in Bristol), they took 7 tubes of blood out of me, gave me an ECG. They are also going to book me in for an Echocardiogram appointment and potentially a treadmill, they will also be sending me a week-long heart monitor device. Also, rather unfortunately, I’ve got to double up on my Bisoprolol (a beta-blocker) which means that I’m going to probably experience some periods of fatigue while I get used to the new dosage :-(

Bristol Knowledge Unconference

Bristol Knowledge Unconference organisation is going really really well. I sent out a few emails to people on the registration list this morning, letting them know a bit more about the style and organisation of the event. And I’m formally publicising the following event structure:

All times are pm:-

  • 2:00 - 2:15 : Arrival & Whiteboard Scribbling (for the set-on-the-day talks)
  • 2:15 - 2:20 : Introduction to the event
  • 2:20 - 2:50 : 1st Preset Talk
  • 2:50 – 2:55 : Setup
  • 2:55 - 3:25 : 2nd Preset Talk
  • 3:25 – 3:35 : Break & Whiteboard Scribbling (for the set-on-the-day talks)
  • 3:35 - 4:05 : 1st set-on-the-day Talk
  • 4:05 – 5:05 : Setup
  • 4:05 - 4:35 : 2nd set-on-the-day Talk
  • 4:35 – 4:45 : Break
  • 4:45 - 5:15 : 3rd set-on-the-day Talk
  • 5:15 – 5:20 : Setup
  • 5:20 - 5:50 : 4th set-on-the-day Talk
  • 5:50 – 6:00 : Clearup
  • 6:00 onwards food & drink at the nearby restaurants/pubs

It looks like one of our preset slots might be fixed, so if you’d like to do a preset slot and insure that you have a presentation slot then please do email me.

University

I’ll be starting my masters at the end of September, and I’m really looking forward to it. I’m in conversations with a company who is willing to fund my masters project as part of a larger project (sorry, I can’t say more than that).

SemanticBible Linked Data: Version Alpha 1

I am very very pleased to announce something which I have been working on for a while which is the transformation of SemanticBible into Linked Data. Please be aware that this a very early version at the moment, and so if you see it break when you are looking around then I’m probably improving and enhancing it.

More information (and recent update information) is available on the Linked Data SemanticBible about page. But here’s a quote from it for you:

SemanticBible is an online Semantic Web version of the Bible, it has lots of facts and figures about the Christian sacred texts. Please do have a browse around.

A Brief History

SemanticBible started life as a project by Sean Boisen over at SemanticBible.com, but Daniel Lewis and his colleagues at OpenLink Software decided to help Sean out by providing a Linked Data based approach. The outcome was this service.

Starting URIs:

  • https://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/bible/cgi : The Composite Gospel : holds information about the stories in the Gospels
  • https://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/bible/NTIndividuals :New Testament Individuals : holds information about people and places referenced in the New Testament
  • https://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/ontology/cgi : The Composite Gospel Ontology : the vocabulary for describing the stories in the Gospel
  • https://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/ontology/NTNames : The New Testament Names Ontology : The vocabulary for describing the people and places referenced in the New Testament

As I said before, do expect it to break randomly…. but if it seems like theres something not quite right, or if you have any feature requests that you wish to add then do email my work email ( dlewis[at]openlinksw[dot]com ) or skype me ( daniel.lewis ).

We’re only one piece in a very very large interconnected puzzle

Watch “Pale Blue Dot“

I had evolution setup for a week now, and on Friday I decided to install the evolution-rss plugin which is an RSS and ATOM newsreader built into evolution. The plugin (without me being aware of it until today) stopped me from receiving emails (so I apologies if anyone has sent me an email to my work email address ( dlewis at openlinksw dot com) over the weekend and I haven’t received/responded). I’ve now uninstalled the evolution-rss plugin and I seem to be receiving email fine now, including those during the weekend.

Setup:

  • 64 bit processor
  • Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron
  • Evolution 2.22.3.1
  • evolution-rss 0.0.8
barcamp @ 18 August 2008, “No Comments”

It upsets me greatly that I have to provide you with this news. Pete and I have had to cancel the BarCampOxford because of bad luck, we were so close to getting organisation completely done. Here is the message that Pete is passing on to every one:

Hiya.
It is with a heavy heart that I must announce the cancellation of Barcamp Oxford on September 20-21. Here’s why:

i) the primary sponsor, who we were in the final stages of negotiation with (and who were ready to pay for 90% of everything), have ceased trading and brought the administrators in. Having talked with the administrators, there is no money. For anything. Evidently the company in question were VC-funded and blew too much money without keeping track.
ii) the secondary sponsor, who were initially willing to be a primary sponsor until they had marketing cutbacks, have had further marketing cutbacks and are now unable to assist with the current economic climate.

These are the two main reasons. A third reason was restrictions of internet access at the venue itself, not a deal breaker by any stretch, but the absence of wireless and an understandably well-controlled IT policy at the college itself was too big a mountain to climb with the other factors.

So, Barcamp Oxford in its current form is off, and I am hereby passing the baton to anyone who wants to take it and run with it. I am shortly to start discussions of a similar camp-style event in Abingdon (down the road, OX14), and if anything comes of that, I will communicate to you accordingly.

For anyone who is planning a camp-style event in Oxford, you have my best wishes - I am more than happy to share experiences if you want some tips. I can say that the venue, Manor Road, were by far the nicest, most co-operative people I’ve dealt with at Oxford venues, and the sponsors, until they went quiet, were very progressive thinking and very open to ideas.

With that, I wish you a good week.

best;

Pete
(Organiser)

If you’re still interested in attending a BarCamp or Unconference then these events are running from September until the end of the year (2008):

  • Bristol Knowledge Unconference
  • BathCamp
  • BarCampLondon5
  • SocialMediaCampLondon
  • Be2Camp (London)

Yay, I’ve got my new Linux based PC all setup in my house now. I’ve just taken this picture (which is a little blurry):

The New Linux PC

Current setup:

  • Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad 64-bit 2.4GHz (Energy Efficient)
  • Motherboard: Asus P5N-E SLI 650i (on-board audio circuit, on-board gigabit network circuit)
  • RAM: 4GB DDR2 with Heat Spreader
  • Processor Cooler: Arctic Cooling Freezer 7
  • Disc Drive: Optiarc 20x DVD RW/DL/RAM SATA
  • Hard Drive: Samsung 750GB (32MB Cache, 7200RPM) SATA
  • Graphics: nVidia GeForce 7300LE on a Microstar International PCI-E Card (256MB GDDR with 512 TurboCache, 450MHz Core Clock) (VGA, DVI and HDTV Output)
  • Case: Antler ATX Midi Tower with 350w PSU (white) (in-built card readers and usb & firewire ports). (the blue bit is the power light which flashes red when the hard drive is in use)
  • Wireless Keyboard and Mouse (comes with the case)… also have my Mac mouse plugged in.
  • Monitor: LG Studioworks 563N CRT
  • OS: Ubuntu Linux 8.04 (Hardy Heron) with AIGLX and Beryl on Gnome. (Cube is currently active, and also playing a Steve Vai DVD using VLC)

Things I haven’t got yet, but will do in the near future

  • A TFT Monitor (preferably 19inch)
  • Office chair (not leather) (at the moment I’m working on a dining table chair)
  • Mouse mat (at the moment I’m using a piece of paper, which has variable results with laser mice)

Other things in the picture:

  • Ibanez GIO Electric Guitar
  • Light from my large fish tank
  • Apple MacBook (Intel Core 2 Duo 2GHz) with Mac OS X 10.5
  • Book: Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach (2nd Ed) by Russell and Norvig
  • Remote control for my iPod speaker dock
  • Sony Ericsson P1i
  • TP-Link Router (with WiFi)
  • my watch (made by animnal)
  • beki’s old desk
  • Steve Vai: Live at the Astoria London DVD

I quickly zipped up a poster for the “Bristol Knowledge Unconference“. It’s available as a PDF by clicking the following link:

Bristol Knowledge Unconference 2008 Poster

Feel free to download the file, print it out and put it up at your workplace (providing it’s appropriate).

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Reminder:

  • When: Friday 5th September 2008
  • Where: eOffice Bristol, Prudential Buildings, Wine Street, Bristol, BS1 2PH
  • Cost: Free
  • Sign-up: https://knowledgeunconference.eventwax.com/bristol-knowledge-unconference (at the time of writing there are tickets available, get yours now)

In the past I’ve used the term “Universe of Discourse” in order to sum up the true meaning of Linked Data Spaces. Well, I’ve recently come across a great saying, which I believe is by the Sufi’s which goes like this:

From you I receive, to you I give;
Together we share, and from this we live.

Which I think is a wonderful quote, and something to certainly think about in order to analyse exactly how you do live your life. As this has a direct impact on life, it is a real bonus if we can take this into computer science also… the first part (”From you I receive, to you I give”) we see in Open Data Initiatives, but in order to pick up on the second part (”Together we share, and from this we live”) we have to look towards Linked Data (which together with the Open Data Initiative results in the Linking Open Data Project).

There is a lot of stuff in computer science which could take advantage of theories and practices within philosophy, psychology and even religion. The key is to be open minded!