they will cause. If we're even half on the mark, you'll be getting a preview of our Editors' Choice Awards of 1998 a full 11 months early as you read this issue.
More Than a Face-Lift
By now, you may be thinking that 25 significant technologies will peg your changeometer needle all the way into the red and that focus is called for. If so, start with basic platforms, where serious churn will occur in 1998. A prime example: Both of Microsoft's major OSes will undergo big changes, in at least a few ways.
Both Windows 98 and NT5.0 will contain Microsoft's best effort to date at taming the beast of PC unreliability. If limited self-administration and self-healing don't do enough for you, consider multiuser Windows. For some, that will be the way to achieve a more centralized, manageable environment.
Both OSes will gain a common way of addressing hardware. Put simply, if the Windows Driver Model gets quick and capable support from
device makers, it will be a lot easier to switch from Windows 98 to NT5.x or 6.0.
Next year will be a major year for what's fast becoming the main alternative to Windows, Java. The entire environment will begin to look a lot more prime time with a new version of the Java Development Kit (JDK).
The coming year is likely to be make or break for Apple, as it unveils Rhapsody, its multithreaded, multitasking OS. Rhapsody will also get some attention as a cross-platform environment. While it's not quite as universal as Java, it does offer developers a way to cross-develop for PowerPC, Intel, and Alpha, because its development environment will also run on NT. Judging by its predecessor, NextStep, Rhapsody will be a strong object-oriented development environment that deserves a look-see, at least for companies with a significant Mac population. We've already seen, however, that some in the Mac community are coalescing around Be instead of waiting.
Better Mousetraps
We'd like to say that t
urmoil at the OS level will be offset by stability at the chip level. However, that's only partially true. Intel appears set to continue its "Motherboard of the Quarter" program.
Faster bus architectures and memory will debut next year. Finally, these components will catch up to the speed of today's blazing processors. One year from now, the computer you buy will be completely different at almost every component and subsystem level from today's system.
The most action in computers could well be in the various flavors of network computers (NCs). Will the diskless, Java-based NC prove to be cheap, available, and really simpler to manage on existing networks? Will the NetPC stick around? After more than a year of serious hype, this technology is much more talked about than used.
Some of the most dramatic opportunities for improvement in 1998 lie in the network infrastructure.
Check it out:
- large-scale directory services for any major environment
- cheaper, more mature G
igabit Ethernet
- intelligent switches that unclog the router bottleneck
- more ways to leverage your data network for voice traffic
- enhanced security from digital IDs and smartcards
Much of what they need to do that already exists. Build your extranet on the Internet by leveraging virtual private network (VPN) technology -- it's likely to mature to be secure enough and easy enough for most uses without the cost of private networks. Many of you will take advantage of that better security, combined with the productivity of component-based development (whether it's JavaBeans or ActiveX controls) to develop and deploy on-line commerce applications. You'll be helped in that effort by new electronic-cash technologies, Internet transaction-monitoring middleware, and even a new Dynamic HTML (DHTML). All this will bring order to the relative chaos of Web development today.
So dig in, roll up your sleeves, and exalt in the fact that you'll have no lack of new technology to put to
work next year. And by the way -- while you're trying to get through 1998 with your sanity intact, let's not forget that 2000 is only 24 months away. Fortunately, there will be no shortage of tools for the job.
Talk Back!!!
BYTE wants your thoughts on the 25 technologies we highlight in this issue.
Your individual responses are confidential, but we will publish a report on the overall results. To participate, go to
http://www.marketperspectives.com/tech_invest/survey.cgi
.
Standing on a Moving Platform
