Oh what a day it was yesterday. First the Fed raised interest rates. This is an important event that basically affects everyone in the world. The interest rates in the United States were way too low. The US Dollar fell 27% against the Euro and 18% against the Japanese Yen since January 2002 and a mortgage boom was created in the USA. The US was in danger to experience inflation and an overheating economy. Countries like China that have their currency pegged to the US Dollar were starting to experience inflation.  Other central banks like Canada may follow suit. But not Europe. They can’t raise rates, the Euro zone is only expected to grow around 1.8% this year compared to the estimates for 4.5% for the US Economy.

What does this have to do with anything important you ask? For starters my buddy Clemens Vasters can finally shut the fuck up! Every time I see him he tells me how strong the Euro is and how it is a real currency and that the dollar is nothing and on its way down. And proof that the US is on its way down as world leader is show by the declining dollar. Soon all world transactions will be done in Euro, including oil. Well crazy talk ends today, thank you Alan Greenspan. The only reason why the Euro was so strong was that in the USA interest rates were effectively zero, with the US raising rates and a stronger economy and the Euro zone keeping rates the same, the US currency begins a years long resurgence against the Euro. (But I will still love you my humbled German friend)

Next Spider Man 2 opened and trounced the anti-Bush propaganda film Fahrenheit 9/11. Spider Man made more in its first 15 minutes than Fahrenheit 9/11 did in its first weekend. Ok cool, I am not one of those crazies who think that the film should not be shown, but as long as we all know that Moore cherry picked the issues, used sensationalism, and out of context clips to help enhance his point. No big deal, I am just glad to see Spidey back on the big screen and left wing propaganda defeated by computerized special effects. (Maybe I will make my own movie called bad men flew planes into buildings that I worked in and I am now pissed off.) *This section of today’s blog sponsored by Progressive Systems Consulting. Just kidding Andrew.. :)

NASA also flew a satellite into Saturn’s rings, which apparently sent back photos showing sharp edges and ripples of energy in the rings. As a kid I thought I could ride my bike on those rings, I guess I am mistaken.

Yesterday also saw Mono released! So now we have .NET for Linux. This is so cool. Also it is proof that Microsoft is Borg.

Microsoft launched a new search engine to compete with Google today. Most importantly, they spent a year improving the algorithms used to search the web doing super cool stuff like Google and preview the technology here. This is quite important, there has not been any new innovation in the search technology since Google came on the scene a number of years ago. Google and Yahoo will compete, and this is good. I don’t personally like it since if you search the new MSN for me, the first site to come up is some other crackhead named Stephen Forte, not me! Google brings me up and only me for like 20 pages. Fix that Bill! I will do a comparison one day and blog it here.

Ok and the big news of the day. Speaking of Microsoft, the DOJ case is finally over! An appeals court threw out the states last appeal against the company. Basically yesterday’s ruling struck down Massachusetts' appeal of a 2001 settlement between Microsoft. and the DOJ. Massachusetts was seeking stronger remedies against MS. Ok now they get nothing. Good. I went to DC a few times to testify, lobby and complain in the late 90s on this trial. Ok, so now they have to deal with the EU and Media Player, but let’s saver this one. It is the final nail in the anti-trust coffin here in the United States. So I am happy. Microsoft's (and other companies') right to decide the design and engineering of their products was upheld - which bodes well for all industry companies. Meaning the frigging government won’t decide how I write my next piece of software. How 1984 is that?

Ok so it was a good day yesterday. I guess someone will break into my house today. :)

"We are a big supporter of the open source movement and have been forever," said Larry Singer, SVP of global market strategies at Sun, in an interview. "We think Linux is a huge movement that is pretty good for the industry and that for some implementations Linux makes sense. We also think there are a lot of people that consider Red Hat for the wrong reasons."

 He went on to say that Linux is not free and stuff like that. Why is SUN so anti-Linux? Because it takes away from its sales. SUN really has to figure out what it is going to do about Linux, it is a much bigger problem for them than Microsoft. Bill can always sell MS Linux and also sell MS Office for Linux when the open source people do a find and replace with Microsoft’s “monopoly“. (Can’t wait to see the EU sue Red Hat). Bill can also port .NET to Linux and VS .NET and developers will write lots of MS centric stuff for MS Linux.

SUN can’t really sell that much. Technically they are a hardware and chips company. They can try selling Java, since they have such a tight control over it. Also Linux takes away from big expensive SUN servers much more than it takes away from Windows 2003 server.

Forget Iraq, the real thing that happens on June 30^th is the Microsoft ends support for Windows NT. There are over a million NT 4.0 clients out there. Good, the world need to upgrade to at least Windows 2000.

I am not a fan of big companies forcing upgrades down your throat, and nobody is forcing anything at all, you can still use the produce Microsoft will just not support it, but this technology is over 7 years old. Time to bite the bullet and upgrade.

Upgrading is a no brainier. Microsoft got it right with both Windows 2000 Server (2003 server is pretty rocking too) and Windows XP Client. I bet the people who “hate” Microsoft and complain most about the “crashes” are the ones running the oldest software. Well starting June 30^th you can’t complain anymore. If you don’t want to upgrade try the “free” Linux. Please report back to me how that works out for you. :)

Please end the trial of Oracle. Let them merge with PeopleSoft. Right now SAP owns the largest market share of ERP/EAS systems with 34%, if the merger were to go through it would create an Oracle of 38% market share.

For starters Oracle is losing market share in the database field and needs something else to survive. If not it will dwindle in importance and IBM and Microsoft will own the database market. Second, in the ERP/EAS field SAP would face stronger competition and the customers would benefit from more innovation and better prices. The market works-only if you let it.

Besides are you going to let a German company be the market leader? Aren't they against us in the war on terror? (Sorry Clemens, couldn’t resist!) :)

So I am back and alive from Alaska. We were snowed in for a few days and I missed a slew of flights (and conferences) but the worst that really happened to me was a bad sunburn.

The climb was great. We all had to rope up just in case we fell into a crevasse and needed to be rescued by our fellow climbers. We had to break trail in snow up to our hips and sometimes up to our armpits.

I am the second person on the first rope.

Eventually we got to the summit.

In Alaska at the base camp of Mt. McKinley (Denali), at 20,320 feet (almost 7,000 meters) it is the tallest mountain in North America, and one of the “7 summits”.

I am in the land of the 24 hour sunshine, I have not seen nighttime since last Thursday. The weather forecasts are a hoot, “party sunny“ and “sunshine“ for the “overnights“.

I am not going to the top of Denali, but climbing a much smaller mountin next door to build up my skills. More to come....

You need to read this blog by my pal Richard Campbell. There are some strange things afoot in the Java and Open Source Community.

http://www.campbellassociates.ca/blog/PermaLink.aspx?guid=be972f31-02e4-47f5-919a-faa5c7211b60 

Here is a quote from the blog to whet your appetite: “How badly derailed is the EJB 3 development path given the implied manipulation of the working groups?”

Well we win one. After a few years of Microsoft hiring away RDs (Chris Selles, etc), today we stole one from them. Rob Howard was made an RD today. As of 6/1/04 Rob is no longer a Microsoft employee and we snagged him as an RD!  Rob is fulfilling a career goal and has started his own company, Telligent Systems based in Dallas, Texas.

Welcome Rob. This doesn't suck.