Dhruba Bandopadhyay Maximum Zeal » Emphatic prose on indulged fascinations

From this video alone I simply can’t see how this will ever compete with the iPhone 3GS. (Source)

On Ubuntu, on fresh installs, I frequently tend to get UnknownHostException(s) while running Java such as below.

INFO: I/O exception (java.net.UnknownHostException) caught when processing request: repository.springsource.com.s3.amazonaws.com

This normally happens for me when running 32-bit Java on 64-bit Ubuntu. The solution is simply to install lib32nss-mdns as follows and then retry.

sudo apt-get install lib32nss-mdns

Sources (ubuntu bug, ehow).

After the great elation of hearing about the release of the new iPhone 3GS by Apple at the WWDC 2009 now comes the heartbreaking and shocking news that UK residents simply cannot own one. In essence this means that if you were one of the keen purchasers (on a monthly contract) of the iPhone 3G early on when it was released then you must now pay the penalty of being ineligible for an upgrade. This has caused a public outroar on the web and enraged and frustrated many. Twitter is flooding almost in real time with messages of outrage and complaint, a twitter trend #o2fail has appeared and direct dialogue has been established with O2 through their very own twitter account. There is even an online petition (twitition) for the cause.  News websites (1,2) and blogs are also expressing their dismay and reporting on that of others. Despite this frenzy of activity O2’s policy remains and that feeling of lack of control and an inability to get around these restrictions can be difficult to channel and vent.

My situation is dire. In order to upgrade to the new iphone I must pay £555 in total: £280 for the remaining term of my existing contract (8×25) plus £275 to get the 32gb version of the new iphone on a £35/month tariff. This is equivalent to buying the iphone 3gs outright on pay as you go for £540. Either is a serious amount of money. Many factors have given rise to this incredibly difficult situation. Apple has released a new phone within a year of their previous release and that too with a brand new operating system and new hardware specifications. Secondly O2 has for some time had exclusive rights to sell the iphone in the UK which means that they have now acquired a captive audience that must continue their subscriptions simply because there are no alternative provider opportunities. Lastly, whether you wish to believe this or not, the truth is that the iphone is unlike any other and is therefore evoking a reaction unlike any other.

I understand where O2 are coming from - when people bought the iphone 3g last year, like myself, they agreed to heed the terms of their 18 month contract. At the time we were happy to have the new iPhone that utilised the fastest available data network in the UK and also it certainly didn’t seem likely that Apple would re-release as soon as they have done especially given that data networks were not expected to leap in speed anytime soon. O2 also set their own trend by allowing upgrades from iPhone Edge to iPhone 3G. However things change and when Apple is involved you have to expect the unexpected.

Regardless of what the contracts say there is one simple yet crucial fact that O2 have failed to realise - for innumerable reasons the iPhone has become an exception to all rules and for that reason must be treated as one. The iPhone is unlike any other phone and has an appeal unlike that of any other phone. At this point it is no longer a phone - it is whatever you want it to be at all times. It has become an ingrained part of peoples’ lifestyles and the two are virtually inseparable and indistinguishable. It would be redundant to go through why it has become such an exclusive item and an object or desire as that should be more than obvious by now but simply to say that it has and it will only become more so. Given that - anyone who stops to consider the dynamics of the iphone’s appeal to the mass public whether a lay person or a business entity should realise that you simply cannot deprive the public of a new iPhone release and get away with it unscarred. O2 is facing the rebellion assault and will have made many enemies over time - even more so than previously.

The lack of competition i.e .a monopoly for such reasons is a very bad thing. There are rumors that the exclusivity contract between O2 and Apple is coming to an end in the last quarter of this year. Let’s hope that’s the case. The shifts in mobile phone contracts is worrying to say the least - initially we moved from 12 month to 18 month and now O2 is beginning to offer 24 month contracts. Expecting consumers to keep the same phone for that amount of time is hardly realistic. There will be new releases and consumers will want a change after some time. The feeling of lock in is not a pleasant one - it can be incredibly frustrating. On top of that O2 is beginning to charge around £15/month for iphone network tethering despite the fact that the phone has unlimited data. The average consumer needs the internet but is the average consumer able to afford such exorbitant monthly fees?

So now what? O2 customers will either fork out £500-£600 to upgrade from their existing contracts and grow bitter over time in the company of their new iPhone about the amount of money they’ve spent or they’ll forego the purchase and grow bitter over time about having been made to watch the iphone 3gs revolution from the sidelines. Either way the outcome for O2 is not good in terms of public opinion and loyalty.

The Apple WWDC 2009 is now over. I had been following it this evening on twitter in real time courtesy of macrumors live. Below is a summary extract from the macrumors live twitter account. Points of note that are relevant to me - I’ll be upgrading to Snow Leopard for $29 in September and I’ll also be getting the 32GB iPhone 3GS June 19th onwards or at the soonest possible opportunity (assuming they allow premature upgrades). If I am not able to get my hands on the new iPhone 3GS I’ll be upgrading to the new v3.0 OS on June 17th for free. As much as I’d like the new 15″ macbook pro it’ll be a while before I can afford it. Apple have now updated their website. Overall great news.

• iPhone 3GS available June 19th in US, UK, and 6 others. More come a week later, others this summer. 8 GB iPhone for $99 available today.42 minutes ago from web
• iPhone 3GS: $199/16 GB and $299/32 GB for new and qualifying AT&T customers. Available in black and white. Current 8GB avail for $99.about 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone 3GS: VoiceOver accessibility, Nike+ support, data encryption, improved battery life (up to 50% on Wi-Fi), eco-friendlyabout 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone 3GS: API allows devs to integrate video capture; Voice control for call dialing, iPod playback; Digital compass integrates with Maps.about 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone 3GS camera has still and video modes. Video mode: 30 fps VGA with audio, auto-focus, auto-exposure. Can trim video right on iPhone.about 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone 3GS supports 7.2Mbps HSPDA data, has 3 MP auto-focus camera with “tap to focus” and improved low-light sensitivityabout 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone 3GS announced (”S” for “speed”). 2-3x faster at tasks. Looks essentially identical to iPhone 3G. No front-facing camera.about 1 hour ago from web
• iPhone OS 3.0 available June 17th. Free to all iPhone users, $9.95 for iPod touch users.about 1 hour ago from web
• More Zipcar: iPhone app can honk vehicle’s horn and unlock car; Line6/Planet Waves: add guitar effects from iPhoneabout 1 hour ago from web
• Ngmoco: Star Defense; Pasco: hardware accessories for scientific experiments for children; Zipcar: car-sharing reservationsabout 1 hour ago from web
• TomTom: turn-by-turn GPS directions (apps and hardware). Car kit will hold iPhone on suction mount and integrate charging.about 1 hour ago from web
• Dev Demos: Gameloft (Asphalt 5 racer), AirStrip Tech (Critical Care medical data app), ScrollMotion (digital books via in-app purchasing)about 1 hour ago from web
• Turn-by-turn directions apps supported. Push notifications: alerts, sounds, badges. Now developer demos.about 2 hours ago from web
• Reviewing OS 3.0 APIs: in-app purchasing, peer-to-peer connectivity, hardware accessory support, Google Maps available for use by devsabout 2 hours ago from web
• “Find My iPhone”: Allows MobileMe customers to locate lost iPhones, send alerts, and remote wipe.about 2 hours ago from web
• Safari for iPhone: HTTP audio/video streaming support, autofill, JavaScript 3x faster than OS 2.2.1., HTML 5 supportabout 2 hours ago from web
• Tethering via USB or Bluetooth. Supported on 22 carriers, but not on AT&T at launch.about 2 hours ago from web
• Cut, copy, paste, undo. Search. MMS in 3.0, but AT&T not supporting until later this summer. iTunes movie rentals/purchases from iPhone.about 2 hours ago from web
• Video of developers and customers talking about the revolutionary platform and apps. Now moving on to talk about iPhone OS 3.0.about 2 hours ago from web
• Now shifting to iPhone: 1,000,000 SDK downloads, 50,000 apps, 40 million iPhones/iPod touches, 1 billion+ appsabout 2 hours ago from web
• Snow Leopard available in September for all Intel Macs. $29 for Leopard users, $49 family pack.about 2 hours ago from web
• More Snow Leopard: Grand Central Station/OpenCL harness the processing power of GPUs, Demoing Exchange support for Mail, iCal, Address Bookabout 2 hours ago from web
• Safari 4 final version released today on all platforms. Also showing demos of new QuickTime (brand-new interface), Stacks and Expose in SLabout 2 hours ago from web
• Previewing Snow Leopard: Streamlined installation, Expose built into Dock icons, Preview and Mail 2x faster.about 2 hours ago from web
• MacBook Air update: now starting at $1499, $1799 with 256 GB SSDabout 2 hours ago from web
• 13″ MacBook now called MacBook Pro: starts at $1199. Same RAM and HD options as 15″ MBP, backlit KB, FW800. All models available today.about 3 hours ago from web
• 17″ MBP updated: starting at $2499, retains ExpressCard slot, CPU and HD spec bumpsabout 3 hours ago from web
• New 15″ MacBook Pro: non-removable 7 hr battery, improved display, SD card slot, up to 3.06Ghz, 8 GB RAM, and 500 GB HD/256GB SSD - $1699about 3 hours ago from web

The most eagerly awaited and hyped annual Apple event - the WWDC - starts tomorrow and, in a similar fashion to every year, they are expected to make ground breaking announcements about their products. Rumours (macrumors, engadget, gizmodo) are that they will announce Snow Leopard, the new iPhone OS v3 and a range of new iPhones with different technical hardware and software specifications. Steve Jobs is also rumored to make a come back from extended sick leave to announce the new iPhones. Let’s admit it - neither Apple nor the WWDC would be the same without Steve. I wouldn’t like to speculate on what iPhone OS v3 will support or what tech specs the new iPhones will feature. However it goes without saying that I can’t wait to hear what they have in store. No doubt that wwdc news will be streamed in real time over twitter (macrumors live twitter), rss and web (macrumors live).

If Apple allow premature upgrades for existing iPhone users then I’m definitely taking the leap and getting the new one - although be aware that any new OS release can be unstable to the point of being unusable as I’m sure most iPhone 3G owners will remember. Having used the iPhone 3G for about a year now I’m beyond any doubt that it is light years ahead of the competition and that RIM or Windows Media have become almost primitive and out of touch with the modern day consumer. If Apple were to incorporate video calling and editing as well as push notifications and a magnetometer, all of which have been rumoured to be in the new iPhone, then that will widen the gap even further. The exclusivity contract with O2 in the UK is also rumoured to be coming to an end in the last quarter of this year and if true then it is great news. I’ll also be purchasing Snow Leopard to satisfy my curiosity but also for the massive performance and weight improvements that it has made since the original Leopard.

As I always say - innovation at the rate of Apple is simply astounding. Rather than recreating what we already have time and time again like everyone else they are one of the few companies that are creating new things and that is the fundamental difference. Anyway, let’s see what happens tomorrow.

Jdk6u14 has been released with following notable changes (taken from release notes).

Java HotSpot VM 14.0

6u14 includes version 14.0 of the Java HotSpot Virtual Machine, which provides improved reliability, serviceability and performance.

Contributing to increased performance in this release are numerous enhancements to HotSpot’s optimizing compiler, more efficient SoftReference processing and improvements to Parallel Compacting garbage collection. Optionally available are two new features - escape analysis and compressed object pointers. A preliminary version of the new Garbage First (G1) garbage collector is also included.

• Optimization Using Escape Analysis

  The -XX:+DoEscapeAnalysis option directs HotSpot to look for objects that are created and referenced by a single thread within the scope of a method compilation. Allocation is omitted for such non-escaping objects, and their fields are treated as local variables, often residing in machine registers. Synchronization on non-escaping objects is also elided.

• Compressed Object Pointers

  The -XX:+UseCompressedOops option can improve performance of the 64-bit JRE when the Java object heap is less than 32 gigabytes in size. In this case, HotSpot compresses object references to 32 bits, reducing the amount of data that it must process.

• Garbage First (G1) Garbage Collector

  Garbage First, or G1, is a low pause, server style collector. G1’s primary advantages over the Concurrent Mark-Sweep (CMS) collector include incremental compaction, better predictability and ease of use. Although G1 is available for use in this release, note that production use of G1 is only permitted where a Java support contract has been purchased. [..].

  To try G1, specify these command line options:

  -XX:+UnlockExperimentalVMOptions -XX:+UseG1GC
  

  In addition, the following options can be used to affect G1’s behaviour:

  • To set the max GC pause time goal in milliseconds that G1 will attempt to meet:

    -XX:MaxGCPauseMillis=<X>
    

  • To set the time interval over which GC pauses totaling up to MaxGCPauseMillis may take place:

    -XX:GCPauseIntervalMillis=<X>
    

  For more information about G1 (how it operates, more options, etc.) see Java HotSpot Garbage Collection.

Improvement TreeMap Iteration

6u14 includes an experimental implementation of java.util.TreeMap that can improve the performance of applications that iterate over TreeMaps very frequently. This implementation is used when running with the -XX:+AggressiveOpts option.

JAX WS 2.1.6 and JAXB 2.1.10

JAX-WS 2.1.6 and JAXB 2.1.10 are integrated into JDK 6u14. You can find more details about the new features in the JAX-WS 2.1.6 changelog and in the JAXB 2.1.10 changelog.

Java VisualVM Updates

6u14 contains the following updates to Java VisualVM:

• CPU usage and GC activity graph in the Monitor tab
• Table view in the Threads tab
• Command line options: –openpid, –openjmx, –openfile
• Compare Memory Snapshots action in the context menu
• Copy To Clipboard / Save To File buttons in the About dialog
• Monitoring IBM JVM via JMX connection
• Based on NetBeans Platform 6.5 and NetBeans Profiler 6.5
• Faster computation of references, and improved readability of path to GC root in HeapWalker
• Improved integration of the Visual GC tool

Click for a list of Java VisualVM bug fixes related to this release.

Next Sunday on Regent Street is A Taste of Spain. Come along. If nothing else it’ll be a fun day to walk around town and sample some Spanish delicacies as well as the giant paellas. Hopefully the sun’ll be out.

In the past few months I’ve had the good fortune of getting familiar in depth with Spring Integration and being responsible for adopting it for use within a major investment bank. I’ve learnt a lot through many different channels, met in person with people from SpringSource and those directly contributing to Spring Integration and provided my own feedback through all these channels derived from my experiences in using it to fulfil my commercial use-cases.

During all this time I’ve been dying to blog about Spring Integration and particularly my use of it but haven’t been able to due to lack of time and energy outside of work. Going forward, however, my hope is that I’ll write a series of articles, one at a time, each exploring a different perspective on Spring Integration.

Here we begin by looking at how to get started with Spring Integration and how to get close to the source of the project using Eclipse IDE. The value of this will be felt most when browsing the org.springframework.integration.samples project which contains numerous fully working examples of how to use Spring Integration in different ways.

Getting started

My approach to learning any new subject is to put theory first. Here’s what I did to get started.

1. Read the manual (yes the entire ~100 pages).
2. Set up the source (as in the next section of this article).
3. Review the sample applications (once you’ve set up the source).

If you prefer a more pragmatic approach from the start you can dive straight into the sample applications and start to write your own by referring to the manual as and when needed but this approach has the danger of leaving gaps in your knowledge as you start to write code.

Getting close to the source

The tools that you’ll need to work with the source are as follows.

• Eclipse
• Ant
• Subversion
• IvyDE
• Spring IDE (optional)

Here’s how to set up the Spring Integration source in Eclipse.

1. Check out the source.
   svn co https://src.springframework.org/svn/spring-integration/trunk/ si
2. Increase max perm size available to Ant.
   export ANT_OPTS="-XX:MaxPermSize=512m"
3. Build the project. This will take approximately ten minutes while it downloads all dependencies using Ivy.

   cd si/build-spring-integration/

   ant

   If you are running on Ubuntu and at this point you get UnknownHostException error messages then see recommended fix.

4. Import the project into eclipse.
   • File > Import > Existing projects into workspace
   • Select root directory > Browse > Select the si/ folder
   • Deselect the project with no name and click Finish
5. Create an ivy cache variable as follows.
   • Right click on any of the projects you imported above.
   • Properties > Java Build Path > Libraries
   • Add Variable > Configure Variables > New
   • Enter variable name as ‘IVY_CACHE’ and value as something similar to /home/dhruba/sources/si/ivy-cache/repository
   • Confirm all the dialogue boxes. The projects should automatically rebuild.

At this point you should have all the Spring Integration projects imported into Eclipse with no fatal errors and at the time of writing 94 warnings. Common guys we can reduce that to zero ;-) Now you should be able to open up the org.springframework.integration.samples project and browse through and run the sample applications provided for you.

With any luck a number of further articles on Spring Integration should follow. I have a lot that I want to convey but it is, as always, finding the time and the energy to write not only the articles but fully working illustrative showcase applications.

Thanks to Jonas Partner, Spring Integration committer, for providing the instructions.

I purchased Crysis Warhead from Steam (after cod5) and recently completed that too. It was absolutely awesome. Here’s a snapshot.

What next? Perhaps Far Cry 2 or GTA4? Deadspace and Fallout3 are also waiting but somehow I’m not as drawn to them. I also want to purchase the Nvidia GTX 285 as I fear I’ll be needing it for GTA4 and also for other games in general.

The video of Jonas Partner’s talk on Spring Integration (one of my favourite software products) at the last Spring User Group is now available. It was very interesting indeed as was the informal Q&A afterwards. I very much like the fact that you can meet such key people in person and that they have time for your questions. On a related note the next Spring User Group meeting called ‘Spring Along‘ is on 12 March at 7pm in The Old Star. Interestingly, not only are Rod Johnson and Graeme Rocher going to be there but this venue is literally two steps away from my flat! See you there.