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Steven Harris

Steven Harris has been a Java Developer since 1998. He lives in Framingham, Massachusetts with wife Helen and cat Jessica. He has many interests in the vast arena of Java Technologies, but Jini Network Technology is a particular favorite. Check out his Federale project on jini.org. He is currently employed as a senior software engineer at Idiom, Inc. Thus far, he has been unable to disprove the fundamental premise of Fred Brooks' "Silver Bullet" paper, although he continues to try on a daily basis. His current favorite authors are Dave Thomas, (not of the Wendy's fame) and Andrew Hunt. Steve has a BA in Geology from Boston University and an MS in Computer Science from Worcester Polytechnic Institute. His interests include Computer technology, Music (he's an acoustic folk guitar picker), Science in general, and Ham Radio (callsign: W1CTO).

 

sfharris's blog

JavaOne 2006 - The final session

Posted by sfharris on May 19, 2006 at 2:52 PM EDT

It's the last day at JavaOne 2006. The Sun General Session just ended. I've still got a full day of technical sessions that I am looking forward to.

Here is brief overview:

Scott McNealy was in rare form in today's general session as he talked about his new post CEO life with a good dose of humor.

Grids in a flash

Posted by sfharris on May 18, 2006 at 8:42 PM EDT

Grid computing is getting a fair amount of press these days.

Long Distance Medicine for All

Posted by sfharris on May 17, 2006 at 8:38 PM EDT

Can you imagine a world in which everyone is wearing medical sensors? Where everyone is downloading 10 megs of medical data per day to some remote database. Where doctors can perform physicals without needing their patients to visit the office and researchers can spot medical trends such as flu outbreaks in real-time?

What Matters Most

Posted by sfharris on May 16, 2006 at 7:12 PM EDT

It is only natural that from year to year different themes are emphasized at JavaOne. This year the slogan seems to be "For Everything that Matters".

In the Sun General Session this morning Jonathan Schwartz and others placed an emphasis on "things that matter".

Happy NetBeans Day

Posted by sfharris on May 15, 2006 at 10:47 PM EDT
Happy NetBeans Day.

Yesterday was Mother's day. I sent my mother a card.

Today is NetBeans Day. I could not find any NetBeans Day cards anywhere. I think Hallmark might want to look into this.

The first session hosted by Jonathan Schwartz at Net Beans Day was filled to capacity so much so that I could not get in.

Anticipation

Posted by sfharris on May 15, 2006 at 1:21 PM EDT

It's Net Bean Day Eve. JavaOne is upon us once more and I am looking forward to a week of learning, connecting with my fellow engineers, and hopefully being amazed on occasion.

On Saturday I attended the java.net Community Leaders Meeting.

Judging a cover a by its book.

Posted by sfharris on November 19, 2005 at 3:13 PM EST

It's been said that you can't judge a book by its cover. But can you judge a cover by its book? Sometimes, yes.

Publishers of technical books often use a theme when designing book covers. Doing so gives books from that publisher a sort of instant recognition.

For example, O'Reilly's has it's animals. Manning has, well ...

One more cup of coffee for the road.

Posted by sfharris on June 30, 2005 at 10:52 PM EDT

I've never attended a JavaOne conference where the final keynote has failed to pique my interest and this year is no exception. James Gosling always comes up with some interesting stuff.

Fortuitous Synergy

Posted by sfharris on June 30, 2005 at 2:18 AM EDT

I was sitting in the java.net booth waiting for the next presentation to begin when the person sitting in the next row turned around and gave me a look of recognition as if he knew me. I was quite certain I had never seen him before. "Hi", I said. "Still going...?", he asked.

Day 2 -- still going ...

Posted by sfharris on June 29, 2005 at 1:50 AM EDT

I really enjoyed the morning keynote today. Scott McNealy described "the digital divide" and how Sun is helping to bridge the gap. He talked about all the efforts to apply Java technology around world (both from within and outside of Sun) to improve quality of life in such areas as education and health care.