The State of Computing

We are in for some big changes in power and portability, and they are for the better

DENNIS ALLEN, EDITOR IN CHIEF (dallen@bix.com)

Now that you've heard all the "State of the..." addresses from various world leaders, it's time to focus our attention on the computer industry. Throughout the next 12 months, three primary aspects of computing will be well worth watching: power, portability, and the enterprise-wide application of computer technology.

We will find increased power in hardware systems. Not only will we see a hefty number of Pentium-based systems this year, but RISC-based alternatives will garner more attention than ever before. The RISC movement will be led by the PowerPC, which Apple and IBM will promote heavily. No, 1994 won't be the final showdown year for Intel's 80x86 architecture against the RISC gang of Alpha, Mips, SPARC, and PowerPC CPUs. However, the stage will be set this year, and we will have to await Intel's next announcement to see just how well it can hold onto its advantage.

One thing we know for sure: Performance is being boosted big time. While some industry pundits have pooh-poohed the relatively minor gains of the Pentium over the 486, we should expect a lot more from the next generation of 80x86-compatible chips from Intel, as well as those from Cyrix and AMD.

On one side of the fence, you have the RISC gang trying to shift the CPU paradigm by offering big performance gains, and, because some of the RISC chips are fast enough to take on tasks usually done by support chip sets, they also offer simplified (i.e., fewer chips) circuit-board design. Apple's new PowerPC Macs, for example, promise to be three to four times faster than a 25-MHz 68040-based Mac Quadra 900 (see page 23). And on the other side of the fence, Cyrix and AMD are going head-to-head with Intel w ith their superscalar CPUs.

The CPU competition is hotter than it's ever been. The resulting performance boost in hardware will make system replacement attractive, create an installed base of more powerful platforms that software developers can write for, and--at long last--give 32-bit operating systems a place to exist.

The portability aspect of computing that will change is wireless technology. During the next 12 months, most folks will hear the wireless-technology alarm bell ring loudly. While we won't see a massive adoption of wireless devices--like PDAs (personal digital assistants)--this year, we will see a mind-set change. The awareness of wireless technology and its impact on corporate computing will reach critical mass as many hardware makers and service providers roll out their answers to mobile computing. Aided by software like General Magic's Telescript, even people who do not use a portable computer today will consider using one of the new compact devices.

The real challenge will be developing plans that show companies how to deal with all those wireless computers. Right now, some information managers don't even know what a PDA is; the problem is that very soon many of their employees will be demanding access to company data with their wireless devices. And once they get that, these people using wireless computers will want to actually update that data. That notion ought to scare the living daylights out of any information manager who isn't already making plans accordingly.

That dilemma leads right into the third aspect to watch this year--the enterprise-wide application of computer technology. Desktop computing has come a long way, and basic computing is at an acceptable level for single users in most applications. But moving any of those applications to the whole enterprise has been extremely difficult.

The problem is not new. However, this year will be different because many large companies are so confident in their ability to solve the enterprise computing probl em that they are restructuring their companies based on technology solutions.

So, the focus of computing in the workplace will change, and personal computers may become a little less, well, personal. It will also open opportunities for software manufacturers to exploit this new work environment. We will see the document-centered view of computing become more dominant as software developers strive to make whole organizations work together. We will also see LANs in organizations become linked into WANs (wide-area networks), so that workgroups can share data--the whole idea behind the empowerment-based restructuring that many companies are doing.