Income Advice to Young Workers: RELY

Over the years, I have had the good fortune to speak to countless Universities and Colleges on a variety of technical topics.  Lately, popular topics have included security, open source, cloud computing and Trusted Services Oriented Architectures.  

While I have the attention of these young folks (it helps when you also pay for the pizza and soft drinks as well as bring along some t-shirts that have the school's logo with Sun's technology also on the t-shirt :-) I bring up career advice that I believe is very important.   One of my favorite phrases about Unix was when Neil Groundwater told me that "The design of Unix is elegant in its simplicity." 

RELY is the acronym that I coined to make it easy for young people to remember how to think about your income.


           Retirement
           Emergency Funds
           Living Expenses
          You

Specifically, here are some rough guidelines that have worked for me.

           Retirement
                  Max out your 401k if your employer has a 401k plan.  Do the math on the tax savings.   Check out a Roth IRA and see if that makes sense.  Checkout your companies stock program, but if you decide to do this, BUT have a plan to sell your stock over the years because a concern is having all of your eggs in one basket.  My personal belief is that you should put a quarter away in your retirement fund for every dollar you make.  Yes, it is a chunk of change, but, trust me, it will HUGELY benefit you in the long run.  You will sleep soundly at night, even when the economy is a mess and your job situation is unclear.

           Emergency Funds
                  Starting out, it is too easy to think that your Emergency Funds and your Retirement Funds are the same thing - they're  not.  You need to first know your actual living expenses, be honest and figure that out, then add 20% as a buffer.  For every year of employment, aim to have one month of living expenses (include the 20% buffer).  So, that at five years you have five months of living expenses in your Emergency Funds.  The logic is that as you get older, it takes longer in higher income levels to find new jobs as well as you have more expenses and individuals depending on your income ie kids, dogs,houses, car payments, out of pocket medical expenses, houses that need expensive repairs, ...
           Living Expenses
               This is also called your BUDGET.  You need to sit down with a spreadsheet and put in every single expense you have on a regular basis.  The only way to do this is to start by tracking your every expense for at least three months.  Then you can create your realistic budget.  This is HARD.  This might cause a LOT of difficult conversations with yourself and/or your significant other.  BUT, you must do this step or you will always be in trouble.

          You
                You have to budget for fun.  It is totally unrealistic to not plan and budget for fun.   If you are not having fun, what the hell are you living for?  OK, that might be blunt, but certainly you need to have plans for vacations, sports cars, tools you want but do not need, home theaters, gaming systems, in other words wants and not needs :-)

Below is one of my favorite quotes that you should apply to thinking about your income.

To measure is to know.    

       If you can not measure it, you can not improve it.

In physical science the first essential step in the direction of learning any subject is to find principles of numerical reckoning and practicable methods for measuring some quality connected with it. I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely in your thoughts advanced to the state of Science, whatever the matter may be.

        Lord Kelvin - Sir William Thomson

Finally, go read two books:

1. Roger Smith's "Advice Written on the Back of a Business Card"   I am quoted in there on multiple pages :-)
2. The Wealthy Barber book that I discuss in an earlier blog entry.  The most important point I want everyone to understand is the magic of compound interest.  Albert Einstein called compound interest “the eighth wonder of the world” and "the most powerful force in nature."   

Cloud Computing and Roach Motels

If you have not read Jonathan Rosenberg, Senior Vice President, Product Management of Google's blog post on "The Meaning of Open" - you really should.

 The most interesting section IMHO is regarding open information.  As Mr. Rosenberg said:

"As Eric said in his 2009 strategy memo, "we don't trap users, we make it easy for them to move to our competitors." This policy is sort of like the emergency exits on an airplane — an analogy that our pilot CEO would appreciate. You hope to never use them, but you're glad they're there and would be furious if they weren't.

That's why we have a team — the Data Liberation Front (dataliberation.org) — whose job it is to make "checking out" easy. Recent examples of their work include Blogger (people who choose to leave Blogger for another service can easily take their content with them) and Docs (users can now collect all their documents, presos, and spreadsheets in a zip file and download it). Build your products so that the Data Liberation team can work their magic. One way you can do this is by having a good public API that exposes all your users' data. Don't wait for v2 or v3, discuss this early in your product planning meetings and make it a feature of your product from the start."

This will be a critical issue for years and decades to come.  As cloud computing becomes more and more ubiquitous these types of issues will be critical.   The best white  on cloud computing, that brings this issue out, is UCB's "Above The Clouds".

Scott McNealy first brought this concept out prior to Google's existence back in the early 1990s when Scott coined the term "TCE Total Cost to Exit".  TCE is about the ability to move/migrate both software and the data to other hardware and software vendors.

Scott also stated that consumer privacy issues are a "red herring."  Scott also said "You have zero privacy anyway, get over it." 

The challenge will be the balance between privacy and the benefits of sharing information, but the killer issue in all of this is that there is no MASTER DELETE on the Internet.  Wrong information exists and spreads forever on the Internet.  When it comes to negative information on an individual that is incorrect, this is obviously a serious issue.  It will be interesting to watch how Google addresses these very tough issues that Jonathan Rosenberg brought out in his recent, excellent blog entry in the upcoming years.

iPhone GPRS/Edge/3G/Wifi Speeds

Neil Groundwater and I were discussing the various speeds of the iPhone on our IntraCoastal Waterway trip.  Neil send me these screenshots on his iPhone 3GS which I find very interesting and useful to know.  Neil used the the iPhone speed test site located here.

Above shows GPRS speed.

Above shows 3G speeds.

Looking Back at 2009, But Most Importantly, Looking Forward to 2010

2009 was an interesting year.   Yes, I know that 99.9999% of the people on planet earth will think of the quote, "may you live in interesting times" and incorrectly attribute it to an ancient quote.  But as I stated back in August of this year:

The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson writes a very interesting article almost a year ago dispelling the age old myth about the origins of the phrase"May you live in interesting times"

As Mr. Robinson wrote on November 27th, 2008: "May you live in interesting times" is supposed to be an ancient Chinese curse, but I can't find evidence that the saying is Chinese at all, much less that it's ancient. One of the earliest reliable citations seems to be a 1950 short story by the British science-fiction author Eric Frank Russell, writing under the pen name Duncan H. Munro, who quotes the imprecation and then adds: "It isn't a curse any more. It's a blessing."

Near the top of the list in 2009 was a very interesting year as Oracle announced its intent to purchase Sun.  I have lots of friends at Oracle.  I have long ago accepted that Sun Microsytems will become a very important chapter in the history of computing.  It was a great ride with memories I would not trade for the world.

As Chief Technologist for Sun's Global Systems Engineering Software Line Of Business, I had the great opportunity to work and continue to work for James Hollingshead, VP of GSE SW LOB.  I had the opportunity to work with customers and partners around the globe for Sun.  I also traveled internationally as well in my global role.

In 2010 I am looking forward to many new challenges.  It would have been 23 years with Sun Microsystems on May 4th, 2010 - so a change is probably long over due :-)  The reason I did not look outside of Sun is because it provided everything that anyone could ask for in a job/career.  I had a number of GREAT bosses.
  

In almost 23 years at Sun I have been in a number of technical leadership positions while working with a broad range of software and hardware technologies.   I worked with both commercial and government markets.

 

I was the "father" of the Mid Atlantic Area Technology Center for Sun.  This multi-million dollar Center had over 300 customers through it in just over seven years and had posted world class industry leading benchmarks.  The Center won the 1996 World Wide System Engineering Creativity Award.  This was in addition to my "day job" and was an all volunteer group of Systems Engineers that provided support at this Center.  As Scott McNealy would say, "we kicked butt and we had fun".

 

I was the leader of a group that created the Software Genius University which had over 760 hours of technical content that was created by Sun's field Systems Engineers (SEs) for Sun's SEs and Sun's Partners.
 

In 2006 I worked with Dr. David Patterson of UCB to create the  MTConnect machine tool standard.  MTConnect is revolutionizing the machine tool industry.
In 2010, below are my career thoughts:

 

               1) I want to work for a great company.
               2) I want to work with creative, smart and passionate employees.
               3) I want to work for a company that is truly making a
               difference in the market place and is growing.
               4) When John Gage coined the term, "The Network is the
               Computer" in 1984, that phrase summarizes my belief where the
               most interesting opportunities are today and will be tomorrow.
               Cloud Computing is simply the latest manifestation of John's
               vision.
               5) I want to work for a company that believes in open systems.

               6) Most importantly, I want to make a difference.

 

 

Android 2.0 Running on Sun's VirtualBox - Very Nice

I put opensolaris 0906 on three different systems during this holiday break (upgrading from previous versions of opensolaris).  opensolaris has an amazing list of systems that are supported.

Something I installed yesterday and very impressed with is Google's 
Android 2.0 running on VirtualBox.

Above is a screenshot of VirtualBox running Android 2.0 on my Toshiba notebook that is running opensolaris 0906.


It is brain dead easy to install both:

1. Download VirtualBox.
2. Goto VirtualBoxImages.com to download a VMI that has Google's Android 2.0

The advantage of doing it the above way is that you completely eliminate downloading then installing an iso image since you are downloading an appliance.  The short instructions are at the links - it could not be any easier.

As you work with Android on VirtualBox it is important to remember the control key that toggles between your host OS and your guest OS (it is typically the RIGHT_CONTROL_KEY) as well as the ESC key inside Android which will switch back to the main screen.

Android has a real opportunity to take significant market share from the iPhone because it is Developer Friendly and an open system.  It will be interesting to watch this market play itself out in the next few months and years to come.

Great Example of Poor Maintenance Design

I  have been a huge fan of Honda.  I have owned a 1986 Accord an a 1987 Civic Si - both very nice cars.   My oldest son owns a 2001 Accord Coupe.  His headlight was out, no problem, replacing a headlight bulb is not a big deal.  Taking a closer look at the manual, I found it interesting that replacing the headlight assembly should be basically a straightforward job?  Not, with a 2001 Accord.  Why would you need to remove or replace the headlight assembly?  Headlight assemblies get cracked or damaged over time and sometimes replacement is the only option.


What do you have to do?  You have to remove the entire front bumper to replace the headlight assembly.  When I read this in Honda's Official Service Manual, I was so surprised that I called the repair shop that works on my cars to make sure that there was not some workaround that I was simply not aware of.  What did the repair shop tell me?  "Yes, it's a nightmare, you have to take the entire front bumper off.  That is why people who have done it once, never want to do it again."  

This design philosophy goes along with what you have to do in order to replace the Accord's in cabin air filter which is a pain as well.

This is headlight assembly replacement is one of the worst designs that I have ever seen.   The only thought I have is that it is true that Honda Accords are one of the top stolen cars.  Unless Honda designed it this way to make it more difficult to steal headlight assemblies (I seriously doubt it) then this design was not well thought out.

It has prompted me to include a new list of basic maintenance questions that I will ask before I buy another car. 

MTAG and MTConnect Institute Meeting in Charlotte

We held our quarterly MTAG and MTConnect Institute Meeting in Charlotte, NC last week.  I think MTConnect can best be summarized by the great article in Modern Machine Shop that is titled:  "MTConnect is For Real".

There are many fantastic real life examples in the above article. 

The article also references the two talks that Dave Patterson and I did in October 2006 at AMT's Members Meeting in Lake Las Vegas.

 "MTConnect has its roots at AMT. The members and administrators of this organization, which represents machine tool builders and other manufacturing technology suppliers, became aware of the need for interoperability when experts from the computer industry were invited to discuss the needs of manufacturing at its fall 2006 annual meeting for members. The message from these experts was blunt: Unless machine tools and other types of computerized manufacturing equipment can readily communicate critical data in a standard format, the industry cannot automate rapidly enough to keep up with global demands. Integration on the shop floor would be difficult or impossible. Progress in productivity gains and cost reductions would be stymied.

The response to this wake-up call was the MTConnect project, for which AMT put up more than a $1 million in seed money in January 2007. The committee formed to pursue this initiative brought together computer science researchers from the University of California-Berkeley, the Georgia Institute of Technology and other institutions to conceive, design and develop a draft communications standard. Paul Warndorf, AMT’s vice president of technology and liaison to the MTConnect development committee, recalls highlights of that development effort. "Early on we knew that the standard would have to be open and extensible; use existing standards such as XML or HTTP borrowed from the Internet; be easy to understand and implement; and not conflict with proprietary communications technology already in place. So that’s how we made it."

MTConnect has been officially out for just one year and it is amazing how much industry and customer success we have seen in such an incredibly short amount of time.

Merry Christmas and Thanks George Michael Sports Legend

Merry Christmas and thanks to George Michael, Washington DC's Sports Announcer at the local NBC affiliate for a lifetime of providing the best sports shows in memory.  As Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon said, "George was ESPN before there was an ESPN."   George was a legend and an institution in the DC area.  George passed away yesterday after a two year fight with cancer.  Michael Wilbon wrote a great article on George Michael.

After Glenn Brenner passed away in 1992, there was only one sports announcer in the DC area and that was George Michael.  Glenn Brenner had one of my favorite lines of all time when talking about Mookie Wilson, Brenner looked at his new anchor and said, "Mookie Wilson?, Does anyone really believe Wilson is is real last name?"

There will never be another George Michael....

IntraCoastal Waterway - My Bucket List Trip :-)

A couple of weeks ago I went on one of the trips of my life thanks to Mike O'Dell.  I was able to cross some of my bucket list items off my list.  I can not thank Mike O'Dell enough for inviting me along on an incredible yacht for a fantastic week.  This was like the mother of all Geek Cruises - with long time friends and Internet legends.

Mike O'Dell asked Neil Groundwater (npg) if I would be interested in going on a week long trip down the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW).   When Neil asked me, I did not have to think a single yoctosecond about before I said yes.

Above is a picture that npg took of the front of Mike's 57' mega super yacht Bebop Tango.  Mike hates it when I call it a mega super yacht :-)  Since I do not know the difference, it certainly seems like a mega super yacht to me.  There is more technology on Bebop Tango than I could possibly even start to list here.

Above is a great photo that npg took of Mike's yacht called Bebop Tango.  Bebop Tango was designed by Capt. Ivar Franzen, Naval Architect.  Bebop Tango is described as a "Franzen 57" because she's 57' on-deck with the LOA (Length-Over-All) at 60'.   It was built by Walter Schurtenberger of Constellation Yachts and Multihull Technologies Inc. 

• Kevlar
• Carbon Fiber
• Foam core
• Honeycomb Core
• Epoxy resins
• 2 500hp Diesel engines
• 1,200 gallons of fuel
• ability to make fresh water on board
• washer and a dryer, full kitchen 
• easily sleeps 8
• I am leaving out tons of innovative features, this is truly a one of a kind vessel
  

 
Above is a sign showing the distances on the Intracoastal Waterway.  We would travel about 150 nautical miles a day, usually at around 15 to 20 knots.  We started in Annapolis.  We would get going around 7:00 every day and try to be in the next port prior to sundown.  As soon as we were docked and tied up - the digital bar would be officially open :-)   On the morning of December 10th, npg and I rented a car in Savannah and drove back to DC in 10 hours.

Not every day was picture perfect :-)  Above was some rough water we had on Saturday.

One of the great quotes that Mike told me, that I had never heard before, is a popular line at Lawrence Berkeley National Labs in Berkeley, California which is, "Why use lead, when gold will do?"

Above is a great photo npg took while we were in Savannah.  That is me up top on Bebop Tango.  When I was asking Mike one of my many questions on the design of Bebop Tango, Mike said, "A boat is simply a series of horrendous choices."

From left going clockwise is Neil Groundwater, me, Mike O'Dell and Captain Fred Denniston.  This was a German restaurant that was the best meal we had the entire trip.  Thanks to Fred, Mike and Neil I did learn some things during the trip:

• Right on Red Return or going south if it is not clear you are returning or leaving a waterway
  
• Green Port Entering or going south if it is not clear
• Clove Hitch, bowline and sheet bend are key knots to know
• it is not a rope, but a line when you get on a boat
• four lines are needed to secure a boat to a dock
• bow line
• stern line
• two spring lines that criss cross between stern and aft
• pads are used to protect boat from dock
  

Above was our favorite dessert of the entire trip at a German restaurant we went to where they specialized in fried Oreos.  Yes, it sounds nasty, but it was to die for...   This was a HUGE improvement over Captain Fred's choice one night at a Holiday Inn where the two main selling points of this restaurant was:

1. As the waitress said, "This is a great restaurant, we get all of our food from Sysco."
2. When we asked her was the carrot cake any good, her reply was, "Well, it is not as good as a HoHo."  She was correct on both accounts above :-)

Eating at Holiday Inn violates the Dave Edstrom Rule #42 Of Domestic Travel, which is NEVER eat at the hotel's restaurant unless it is the free breakfast, cold/hot cereal or you have ZERO choices and getting ready to pass out from lack of nutrition :-)

Above is just one example of the amazing technology on Mike's boat - a digital liquor bar.  I am not a liquor person, but I still like the idea of digital bar.  While Neil, Mike and Captain Fred would get a digital drink, I would get an old fashioned cold beer.

Above is an early morning sunrise on the intracoastal waterway in South Carolina.

Above is part of the main helm on the Bebop Tango.  Here is a video of me at the helm of Bebop Tango that shows the instrument panels off well.


Below was our itinerary:

• December 4th Friday left from Annapolis
• 4th Friday night in Deltaville
• 5th Saturday night in Great Bridge, VA
  
• 6th Sunday night in Oriental, NC
  
• 7th Monday night in Little River, NC
  
• 8th Tuesday night in Seabrook Island, SC
• 9th Wednesday night in Savannah, Georgia
• 10th npg and I drove back to DC
  

Above is the kitchen or galley as I guess it should be properly called.

Finally, above is a fantastic sunset on the Chesapeake Bay during an incredible week on the Bebop Tango with Mike O'Dell, Neil Groundwater, and Captain Fred Denniston traveling down the IntraCoastal Waterway from Annapolis to Savannah.  

Java EE 6

Sun released Java EE 6 and I think it is a very important statement just how important Java is that Sun continues to invest even in these very tough economic times.  Check it out:

   * Learn more about Java EE
   * Download Java EE 6 SDK
   * Learn more about GlassFish Enterprise Server v3
   * Download GlassFish Enterprise Server v3
   *  Register for the virtual conference
    

NetBeans 6.8 IDE Release

NetBeans just keeps getting better and better - it was already GREAT.  Checkout NetBeans 6.8 here.

Below is from the NetBeans homepage to provide a high level view of NetBeans IDE 6.8

The NetBeans IDE is an award-winning integrated development environment available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Solaris. The NetBeans project consists of an open-source IDE and an application platform that enable developers to rapidly create web, enterprise, desktop, and mobile applications using the Java platform, as well as JavaFX, PHP, JavaScript and Ajax, Ruby and Ruby on Rails, Groovy and Grails, and C/C++.
The NetBeans project is supported by a vibrant developer community and offers extensive documentation and training resources as well as a diverse selection of third-party plugins.

Release Overview

NetBeans IDE 6.8 is the first IDE to offer complete support for the entire Java EE 6 spec with improved support for JSF 2.0/Facelets, Java Persistence 2.0, EJB 3.1 including using EJBs in web applications, RESTful web services, and GlassFish v3. We also recommend it for developing with the latest JavaFX SDK 1.2.1, and for creating PHP web applications with the new PHP 5.3 release or with the Symfony Framework.

Our unique integration of Project Kenai, a collaborative environment for hosting open-source projects, now comes with full JIRA support, and improved instant messenger and issue tracker integration. We also added features to the IDE's Maven and database integration, and improved the editor and tools integration of Ruby, Groovy, and C/C++ projects.

Get the NetBeans IDE 6.8

Great I/ITSEC Conference in Orlando, Florida

I attended the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference (I/ITSEC) which (as the site states) promotes cooperation among the Armed Services, Industry, Academia and various Government agencies in pursuit of improved training and education programs, identification of common training issues and development of multiservice programs.  It was held November 30th to December 3rd.

Chris Melissinos, Sun's Chief Gaming Officer, and I presented Sun's software story including  Project Dark Star, Sun's Cloud Computing Story, Sun's Development environment, Solaris, GlassFish, Identity Management, Security and of course, open source.  We made lots of inroads and are following up with partners and customers.

Final Day of the 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES Nurnberg, Germany Conference

This is a high level recap of the last day of the 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES for automation technology.    Just as a reminder, John Byrd, former President of AMT, has stated on many occasions that  MTConnect will be the most important change to the machine tool industry since CN

I took most of today, Thanksgiving in the US, to followup with personal emails to the following customers/prospects:

• Bonfiglioli
• Schneider Electric
• ART - Applied Robot & Technologies
• Reliance Precision Mechatronics LLP
• DAC Electric
• Lenze
• isel
• Carpanelli Motori electrici
• WEIS GmbH
• ISG Industrielle Steurungstechnik GmbH
• POLARIS Motion Control Systems
• YASKAWA
• Baumuller
• Mattke Servotechnik
• VISPA
• THK
• Bosch
• already a member, but felt I should stop by
• RS Components GmbH
• An Electrocomponents Company
• SEW EURODRIVE
•  Industrie-Electronik GmbH
• Siemens
• epis
• BeR Industrie-Elektronic GmbH
• KUHNKE
• sontheim
• Beckhoff Automation
• ascolab
• NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS
• KW Software
• intel
• Schwieger
• CERTEC
• XiSys Software
• ige-xao
• Mitsubishi Electric
• Siemens
• Phoenix Contact
• Panasonic
• infoteam
• linutronix
• OPC Foundation
• OSADL
• Rexroth Bosch Group
• adstec
• Rockwell Automation
• ROSE
• A Phoenix Mecano Company

Second Day At 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES Nurnberg, Germany Conference

Today was day two at the Conference in Nurnberg, Germany.

This is a high level recap of the second day of the conference is the 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES for automation technology.    Just as a reminder, John Byrd, former President of AMT, has stated on many occasions that  MTConnect will be the most important change to the machine tool industry since CNC.

When  I met with customers and prospects today, I had a basic format that I followed to make my points in a clear, concise and compelling fashion. 

• Introduce myself, Sun Microsystems, AMT, MTConnect Institute and MTConnect
• I asked how they provided information about their device to the outside world.
• I listened carefully, then when they were finished I asked if they ever heard of Java.  Everyone, of course, has heard of Java.
• I then asked if they heard of MTConnect.  Most had not heard of MTConnect.  I then said that MTConnect will do for controllers and machine tools what Java did for computers.  This got their attention :-)
  
• I then explained why they should care about MTConnect for their business.
• I explained how customers could taken advantage of MTConnect with their specific set of products/technologies.
• I then went into the brief history of MTConnect so they understood the context of where, when, why, what and how this is important for customers, integrators, software and vendors at this Nurnberg Conference.
• ITalk about why Sun Microsystems cares about MTConnect.
• After they understood everything above, I gave them my business card and the sheet Paul Warndorf gave me on MTConnect and said I would follow up with them via email this week.
  
• I typically spent about 15 minutes with some vendors/customers/prospects and up to 45 minutes with others.
  

Today was a very good day, but a very long, long day as I spent nine hours talking with the very nice and extremely interesting vendors that I met with on Wednesday the 25th of November:

• Industrie-Electronik GmbH
• Siemens
• epis
• BeR Industrie-Elektronic GmbH
• KUHNKE
• sontheim
• Beckhoff Automation
• ascolab
• NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS
• KW Software
• intel
• Schwieger
• CERTEC
• XiSys Software
• ige-xao
• Mitsubishi Electric
• Siemens
• Phoenix Contact
• Panasonic
• infoteam
• linutronix
• OPC Foundation
• OSADL
• Rexroth Bosch Group
• adstec
• Rockwell Automation
• ROSE
• A Phoenix Mecano Company

I am going to use Thursday, Thanksgiving in the USA, to follow up with the many customer/prospect meetings that I had the past two days and then fly out Friday morning to get some cold turkey when I arrive late Friday :-)  It was a GREAT Conference!

First Day of 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES Conference In Nurnberg

Yesterday was my first day in Nurnberg, Germany and I had a very nice dinner at a restaurant that first opened in 1331.  I think that is a couple of years older than McDonalds in the US :-)

This is a recap of the first day of the conference is the 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES for automation technology.    Just as a reminder, John Byrd, former President of AMT, has stated on many occasions that  MTConnect will be the most important change to the machine tool industry since CNC.

When  I met with customers and prospects today, I had a basic format that I followed to make my points in a clear, concise and compelling fashion. 

• Introduce myself, Sun Microsystems, AMT, MTConnect Institute and MTConnect
• I asked how they provided information about their device to the outside world.
• I listened carefully, then when they were finished I asked if they ever heard of Java.  Everyone, of course, has heard of Java.
• I then asked if they heard of MTConnect.  No one had.  I then said that MTConnect will do for controllers and machine tools what Java did for computers.  This got their attention :-
  
• I then explained why they should care about MTConnect for their business.
• I explained how customers could taken advantage of MTConnect with their specific set of products/technologies.
• I then went into the brief history of MTConnect so they understood the context of where, when, why, what and how this is important for customers, integrators, software and vendors at this Nurnberg Conference.
• After they understood everything above, I gave them my business card and the sheet Paul Warndorf gave me on MTConnect and said I would follow up with them.
• I typically spent about 15 minutes with each vendor/customer/prospect.
  

I spent most of the day talking with the very nice and interesting vendors that I met with on Tuesday the 24th of November:

• Bonfiglioli
• Schneider Electric
• ART - Applied Robot & Technologies
• Reliance Precision Mechatronics LLP
• DAC Electric
• Lenze
• isel
• Carpanelli Motori electrici
• WEIS GmbH
• ISG Industrielle Steurungstechnik GmbH
• POLARIS Motion Control Systems
• YASKAWA
• Baumuller
• Mattke Servotechnik
• VISPA
• THK
• Bosch
• already a member, but felt I should stop by
• RS Components GmbH
• An Electrocomponents Company
• SEW EURODRIV

 

Leaving For Germany Tonight - MTConnect in Germany

I am leaving tonight for my trip to Germany to meet with many customers. The conference is the 2009 SPS/IPC/DRIVES for automation technology. John Byrd, former President of AMT, has stated on many occasions that  MTConnect will be the most important change to the machine tool industry since CNC.


I am really looking forward to this trip as nothing is more interesting to me than talking to customers about MTConnect.  I will be reporting on meeting with many customers and prospects via my blog.

Java For Business - Which Level of Support Is Right For Your Business?

Sometimes I get the question, how does Sun make money with Java?

The truth is that Sun makes money in many ways from Java - some direct and some indirect.  What many individuals think of is support and it is true that Sun makes money from various support offerings.  I thought it would be nice to have a simple reminder of the various service levels that Sun offers.  You can see the entire list of Java support offerings here. Below is from the entry at sun.com

Which Support Level is Right for Your Business?

 

Java for Business offers four levels of support to ensure the right fit for your business needs

• Access-Only offers continued access to software that has reached end of life for those customers who do not needs support. Security updates and any other bug fixes made to releases after end of life will be available to you via this program. Access-Only is perfect for customers who are using legacy applications with no bugs or problems but who wish to continue to receive security updates and general bug fixes for Java.
• Standard Support extends the life of existing Java applications for your organization and for your customers. Fixes provided to you will continue to be made available to Java for Business customers along with new operating system support and all other maintenance in quarterly updates. Perfect for customers whose primary interest is in running their Java applications much longer than ever possible before.
• Premium Support adds the ability to have a fix provided to you by Sun to also be incorporated into Sun's next available bi-weekly standard revisions, ensuring your network of customers and partners can leverage that same fix, faster than ever before. Premium support is perfect for customers' whose Java application are critical for their and their customers businesses.
• Premium Plus Support further adds the ability to request a quote for a Java for Business custom revision for an older update or revision of the Java platform (additional terms and conditions apply). Premium plus support is perfect for customers seeking maximum assurance for their Java applications from Sun
•  

Java Classic offers two levels of support to ensure the right fit for your business needs

• Java Classic Standard Java Classic is for the most recently released Java SE family, and provides basic business-hour coverage for less critical systems. It also provides 3 years maintenance from time of Java SE product family release.
• Java Classic Premium Java Classic is for the most recently released Java SE family, and provides enhanced support including 24/7 help desk assistance. It also provides 3 years maintenance from time of Java SE product family release.

The Wealthy Barber and the Twins Saving Story

The Wealthy Barber is one of my favorite books to recommend to young people because of the clarity of its stories.  Neil Groundwater initially told me about this great book.

Below is my favorite story from the book:

“Two twenty-two-year-old twins decide to start saving for retirement. One opens an IRA, invests two thousand dollars a year for six years, and then stops. His IRA compounds at twelve percent a year … very good. The second twin procrastinates and doesn’t open an IRA until the seventh year — the year his brother stopped.   The second twin then contributes two thousand a year for thirty-seven years. He, too, earns a rate of twelve percent a year. At age sixty-five, they go out for dinner to compare their IRA holdings. The second twin, who is fully aware that his brother stopped contributing thirty-seven years earlier, is confident that his IRA will be worth at least ten times as much. What do you think, Cathy?”
“I think he’s wrong … or you woulnd’t be telling us the story,” was her clever rationale.
“Yeah, yeah,” Roy laughed. “At age sixty-five, they would both have approximately one million two hundred thousand dollars.”

The first brother paid $2,000 a year for six years. He contributed a total of $12,000. The second brother contributed $2,000 a year for thirty-seven years. He paid a total of $74,000 — more than six times his sibling!"

The main point of this is the magic of compound interest and the most important attribute young folks have in this formula is TIME.   That is why I always tell young folks when I speak at Universities and Colleges that I was never very good at math, but by God I know compound interest backwards and forwards :-)  I have always put a 25% of whatever I made into long term savings since age 16.  As the old saying goes "and that has made all the difference...."

Infrequent Depth versus Frequent Noise aka Quality vs. Quantity

I just noticed that my LinkedIn Contacts went over 500+    One of the reasons LinkedIn works so well is that it runs on Sun hardware and software.   When I am asked why I don't have a Facebook page, my answers are two fold.  First, LinkedIn is really the Facebook for business people and secondly, my wife has a Facebook page.   When I am asked why I do not Twitter, my answer is that I prefer to blog and I have LinkedIn.  I am interested in big projects my friends and contacts are working on, but I am not interested in what they had for dinner (the Twitter femto-level info stream I simply do not care about). 

It could be argued that I do not twitter because I am old.  I do agree with my father on his analysis of twitter.  When he called and said, "what is Twitter?" and
I explained it to him, his response was, "why the HELL would I waste my time doing that?"   Good question :-)    I guess I prefer infrequent depth verus frequent noise....

You Date Your Hardware Vendor, But You Marry Your Software Vendor

• You date your hardware vendor, you marry your proprietary software  vendor and have lots of kids, but with your open software vendor you are allowed to sleep around if you use protection.  Protection in this context is a defined dual stack strategy with governance ie a software game plan.  Date and Marry wisely :-)
• There is a myth that open source software is created and updated by teenagers and twenty-somethings in their spare time.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  
• The good news is that open source is largely created and supported by huge organizations.  For example, Sun Microsystems has donated more source code to the community than the next five entities combined.
• Scott McNealy's dotcom bubble Wall Street story.   For example, as Scott would say, "It's not just TCO, it is TEC Total Exit Costs that matter."

Participate – Don't Just Watch and Use

A Must Watch Security Segment "Sabotaging The Systems" on 60 Minutes

This was an excellent segment that 60 Minutes produced and showed on security issues around the globe ranging from Brazil's blackouts, to ATM hacking to hacking into CENTCOM.

Very Detailed iPhone vs. Droid Review

This is a very detailed review comparing the iPhone versus the Droid by Motorola at MobileCrunch.

The bottom line of the review is that both are very nice for any sane person :-)

Neil Groundwater's Computer History

Checkout Neil Groundwater's very historic and cool pictures of him in front of an  80 megabyte disk drive the size of a washing machine.  As Neil states, he had the opportunity to work with some of the legendary Unix engineers at Bell Laboratories and UC Berkeley.

Greg Papadopoulos, Sun CTO, Warning on Cloud Computing

                            "It's proprietary systems all over again."

I could not agree more with Greg - I think he is exactly right on with his concern.

SCAP: Important Protocol - Security Content Automation Protocol

Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP - pronounced "ess CAP" ) is a very important security protocol that is being embraced by a number of government agencies.

Wikipedia has a nice overview I would encourage everyone to check out:

SCAP Components

• Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE)
• Common Configuration Enumeration (CCE)
• Common Platform Enumeration (CPE)
• Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS)
• Extensible Configuration Checklist Description Format (XCCDF)
• Open Vulnerability and Assessment Language (OVAL)

These components can be used to build products that have SCAP Capabilities:

Bending Light and Catching Photons

David Brown of the Washington Post wrote a great article titled:

Optical Inventions That Fueled the Information Age

The article discusses Charles K. Kao, Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith, who won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics for the work they did that led to fiber-optic data transmission and digital photography. 

The article hits on the main point that Kao achieved when it states:

 "While light normally passes through glass and does not go around corners, Kao's work -- aided by that of many other scientists and engineers -- is proof that under the right conditions, those generalities do not hold true. Sometimes light can be kept inside a strand of glass, like water in a pipe.  

It seemed hopeless until Kao and a theoretician colleague, George A. Hockham, made some measurements and calculations. They determined that if the impurities scattering the light rays could be removed from the glass, and if they used a wavelength that the glass molecules could not absorb, then much, much more light would stay inside the fiber."

The other winners, Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith, in the article  won for their work on Charge-Coupled Devices (CCD).

The article hits on the main point that Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith achieved when it states:

"In the late 1960s, at Bell Laboratories in New Jersey, they were working on ways to improve memory devices -- a way of storing information acquired over time. The ultimate goal was to eliminate the annoying echo that sometimes occurred in very-long-distance telephone calls. 

They used an array of small squares made from silicon-based semiconductor material. "Semiconductors" are capable of generating an electrical charge, although not as readily as metals and other conductors (hence their name). Electrodes placed nearby can then be used to hold the charges in place and keep them from dispersing. 

Like a row of dominoes of different face value, a line of small semiconductor squares called "pixels" outfitted with electrodes were able to hold a row of different charges. If a voltage was then applied to the array in the right fashion, the charges could be moved off the pixels and "read out." 

After some pondering, they realized that light falling onto the semiconductor chips was being transformed into electrical energy. (Explaining that phenomenon, called the "photoelectric effect," is what won Albert Einstein his own Nobel Prize in Physics in 1921.) With the lab lights off, that interference disappeared.

 "They put two and two together and they realized they had made an imaging device," said J. Anthony Tyson, who was at Bell Labs with the two men and is now a professor of physics at the University California at Davis.

 By combining the photoelectric effect -- light's tendency to kick electrons out of atoms, creating a charge -- and the ability to hold and move an entire array of charges in an organized fashion, they created the basis for digital photography."

The article is a must read because of the tremendous benefit that all of us have seen in our lives from the Internet to digital cameras - to just name a few.

Veterans Day - Thanks to My Father, My Cousin Chris Edstrom, Dr. Harry Foxwell and Brad Kirley

Thanks to my father John Kenneth Edstrom who did two tours of duty in Vietnam as an officer in the Air Force.  My father is also in the very unique category in that he was awarded TWO BRONZE STARS for the two tours of duty for his countless acts of bravery in his two years in Vietnam.  The Bronze Star Medal is a United States Armed Forces military decoration that may be awarded for bravery, acts of merit, or meritorious service.  

 

Thanks to my cousin Chris Edstrom who has done three tours of duty in Iraq and one (so far) in Afghanistan.  Thanks to Dr. Harry Foxwell and Brad Kirley for their service to our country.

History of Veterans Day as stated at TimeAndDate.com

On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918 an armistice between Germany and the Allied nations came into effect. On November 11, 1919, Armistice Day was commemorated for the first time. In 1919, President Wilson proclaimed the day should be "filled with solemn pride in the heroism of those who died in the country’s service and with gratitude for the victory". There were plans for parades, public meetings and a brief suspension of business activities at 11am.


In 1926, the United States Congress officially recognized the end of World War I and declared that the anniversary of the armistice should be commemorated with prayer and thanksgiving. The Congress also requested that the president should "issue a proclamation calling upon the officials to display the flag of the United States on all Government buildings on November 11 and inviting the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples."

An Act (52 Stat. 351; 5 U. S. Code, Sec. 87a) was approved on May 13, 1938, which made November 11 in each year a legal holiday, known as Armistice Day. This day was originally intended to honor veterans of World War I. A few years later, World War II required the largest mobilization of service men in the history of the United States and the American forces fought in Korea. In 1954, the veterans service organizations urged Congress to change the word "Armistice" to "Veterans". Congress approved this change and on June 1, 1954, November 11 became a day to honor all American veterans, where ever and whenever they had served.

In 1968 the Uniforms Holiday Bill (Public Law 90-363 (82 Stat. 250)) made an attempt to move Veterans Day to the fourth Monday of October. The bill took effect in 1971. However, this caused a lot of confusion as many states disagreed with this decision and continued to hold Veterans Day activities on November 11. In 1975, President Gerald R. Ford signed Public Law 94-97 (89 Stat. 479), which stated that Veterans Day would again be observed on November 11 from 1978 onwards. Veterans Day is still observed on November 11.

Harry Foxwell always sends out a nice email to Sun employees (and I imagine others).  Today he asked the question: Do you know where your veterans are?

Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery:
http://www.arlingtoncemetery.org/visitor_information/tomb_of_the_unknowns.html
National World War II Memorial: http://www.wwiimemorial.com/
Marine Corps Memorial: http://www.nps.gov/archive/gwmp/usmc.htm
US Navy Memorial: http://www.navymemorial.org/
Air Force Memorial: http://www.airforcememorial.org/
Korean War Veterans Memorial: http://www.nps.gov/kowa//index.htm
Vietnam Veterans Memorial: http://www.nps.gov/vive/index.htm
Vietnam Women's Memorial: http://www.visitingdc.com/memorial/vietnam-women%27s-memorial.htm
Iraq Veterans Memorial: http://iraqmemorial.org/

Department of Veterans Affairs: http://www.va.gov/

Motorola's Droid Looks Very Nice

Motorola's Droid could be a very hot smartphone.

A long time friend picked up one of the first Droids and absolutley loves it.  Look out iPhone....

NYC 311 - Very Cool Service For Citizens

When I was in New York City giving a keynote at the NYS Forum.  I put together a proposal for a keynote at the following event and  was introduced by Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT) Commissioner Paul J. Cosgrave at the following event:




                            NYS Forum IT Corporate Roundtable
                                   MetroNY Program Launch
                                      September 30, 2009


I spoke on the following topic:

                            Open Government: Lessons Learned


Open Government: Lessons Learned - NYS Forum Presentatation
 
Mr. Cosgrave told me about a very cool app for the iPhone called 311 

The 311 system was designed to simplify the lives of New York City residents by having a single number for the of city residents  — questions, complaints, requests for service — through a single phone number, a Web site and an iPhone app that I put on my phone immediately.

Why can't all cities have this type of system?


                       

Electronic Medical Record Article Misses Main Point

The Washington Post has an article on October 25, 2009 called:

Electronic medical records not seen as a cure-all

The sub title is:

As White House pushes expansion, critics cite errors, drop-off in care

By Alexi Mostrous

Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 25, 2009 


Four of the points made in the article were:


"Anonymous reports sent to the Joint Commission, the body charged with certifying 17,000 health-care organizations; Grassley's staff; and the Food and Drug Administration disclose problems, including:
-- Faulty software that miscalculated intracranial pressures and mixed up kilograms and pounds.
-- A computer system that systematically gave adult doses of medications to children.
-- An IT program designed to warn physicians about wrong dosages that was disconnected when the vendor updated the system, leading to incorrect dosing.

This Story

• 
  
  Electronic medical records not seen as a cure-all
  
  
  
• 
  
  Letter from Sen. Grassley (pdf)
  
  
  

-- A software bug that misdiagnosed five people with herpes" 

This article misses the entire point in my opinion.  

The article fails to compare Health Care prior to electronic records and specifically the total number of deaths because electronic records did not exist.  The author digs down into low level examples of computer systems that made mistakes on a wrong dosage and then paints a broad brush that electronic records are inherently bad.   This begs the question, "so having manual paper records are better?"  Of course not.  The author misses the big picture....

My Cloud Computing Presentation at VT's ACM

Above is a photo of me (hard to see me) presenting to Virginia Tech's Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) Meeting on cloud computing.    My oldest son John is the President.   I spoke Wednesday night the 4th of November at VT for one hour and 45 minutes.   Sun Microsystems provided pizza, soft drinks and gave away very nice Java/Sun Microsystems/VT t-shirts in the school color of "Chicago Maroon".

This is the abstract that was used for my presentation:

Cloud Computing is the hottest topic in the IT industry today.  Cloud Computing is also most over loaded buzz word in the IT industry as well.  Come learn:

                What is cloud computing and what is not?
                Where cloud computing is being used and how?
                When cloud computing makes sense and when it does not?
                Why cloud computing is important for a VT student?
                What are the technical challenges of cloud computing?
                Most importantly, how cloud computing can help you at VT
                and in your career after VT?


My slides can be downloaded at VT's ACM site here.

Above is a photo that my son John took of the students and Professors who attended the ACM meeting where I presented.  I received some very nice comments from the students and professors in attendance which I greatly appreciated.

This is the first time that I presented to the VT ACM and the sixth time that Sun Microsystems provided a speaker to the ACM and picked up food and drink.  Previously, I have helped John by bringing down some real thought leaders in the computer industry:

• Chris Melissinos - Sun's Chief Gaming Officer to speak on gaming
• Dr. Bruce Haddon to speak on Java and software development
• Dr. Harry Foxwell to speak on Open Solaris and Solaris
• Curt Harpold to speak on grid computing
  
• Jim Fiori to speak on Software Perfrormance

With Oracle purchasing Sun, this may be the last time that Sun Microsystems provides a speaker.   If this turns out to be the case, I am very proud of Sun Microsystems and how it has helped VT's ACM over the past couple of years.

John is a Senior with 141 credits finishing up his BS in CS/Math and BA in Business as well as working on his Masters in CS as well this year.  I could not be more proud of him.

Edstrom's Law of Computing

Open Source Monetization: Follow the Money

• W. Mark Felt (Deep Throat) never said, “follow the money”, BUT, when it comes to open source, YOU BETTER FOLLOW THE MONEY.   
• You must know how the software is funded today and how it is funded tomorrow. 
• Open Source Monetization is an evolving with a community building source and enterprise binary model with horizontal/vertical non-open components  – understand what the open source software monetization strategy is.
  

More on My Open Government: Lessons Learned

• Users, abusers and losers.
  
  
  1. /usr/local/src
  2. /usr/local/bin
  • The 3,000 page open source guidelines document.
  • If the average person can not lift the document, then they will never read it.
  • “We're Open”.  The most over-loaded and abused sentence in computing today.  
  • Open source is a mandlebrot continuum.
  • Open source software 101
  • Make sure your data is open first
  
  

The Good, Bad and Ugly of Open Source in Government

I gave a talk in NYC called "Open Government:  Lessons Learned" and I am going to share some slides over the next few days.

•  The first motivation with open source software is typically about saving money.
• If saving money is higher than #3 on your list you likely have the wrong motivation.  Choice and  Flexibility, Security, Standards and building on a platform all should rank higher than saving money.
• You're not NSA, don't try to be.
• Unless you measure your Data Center in acres and you have floors of world class Ph.D.s , then don't fork your own OS or major application.
• There is a fine line between clever and stupid. 
• A room and/or software library full of new piece parts will end up being a history bin full of old piece parts.  Think governance.

5th Annual IT Security Automation Conference

This last week I attended The 5th Annual IT Security Automation Conference will be held on October 26-29, 2009.

I sat on a couple of panels:

• OS Vendor Panel with Microsoft and Red Hat
• Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP - pronounced "ess CAP" )Panel
  

It was a great conference and below is the framework and the agenda.

Sponsors:	National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), National Security Agency, Defense Information Systems Agency, Department of Homeland Security.
Audience:	Public and Private Sector. Executives, Security Managers and staff, Information Technology (IT) professionals, and Developers and Integrators of Software Products and Services.
Format:	Conference, Tutorials, and Workshop.
Purpose:	Provide a common understanding for using specific open standards and new security technologies across various domains of interest including Cloud Computing, Health Information Technology (IT)/Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) 140, and Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP) implementations. This conference will also provide tutorials and workshop regarding Department of Commerce, Department of Defense, and Department of Homeland Security technologies and initiatives..
Topics:	Cloud Computing (Security and Trust) DoD Data Pilot/Strategy/Architecture Health IT/Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act ( HIPAA) Crypto/FIPS140 Compliance Frameworks/800-53 Security Content Automation Protocol (SCAP)

In my opinion, the key points from this conference were:

• This conference is growing at a tremendous rate.
• SCAP is very real and very important.
• The quality of the attendees were very impressive.
• The vendor exhibits were very informative.
• There is a genuine outreach to vendors from the community and from the vendors to the community.
• It was great seeing so many long time friends at this conference.
• The food in Baltimore is always great :-)
  

Encryption Standard: Inception Until Full Implementation

When I attended The 5th Annual IT Security Automation Conference will be held on October 26-29, 2009, I learned an interesting fact regarding the time it takes for a new encryption standard to reach full maturity. 

This is from the initial point when NIST advertises they are considering a new standard, it has been advertised for admissions, the winner has been selected and finally when it has been fully implemented in the community and industry.

The time it takes?  Nine years.

GREAT Book: Advice Written on the Back of a Business Card by Roger Smith

This summer, Dr. Roger Smith, CTO for PEO STRI, asked me a very thought provoking question:

"What one piece of career advice would you write on the back of your business card?  Imagine that you are about to give your business card to a young person entering your profession. But first, you turned that card over and wrote a short piece of advice to help them get started in their career. What would you write on the back of your own business card to help this person? "

Roger turned this into a GREAT book that I highly recommend and is called:

Advice Written on the Back of a Business Card

This book provides fantastic advice from a variety of industry thought leaders that is succinct and to the point for anyone who wants to improve their career or life.  This book accomplishes a very rare feat  - it provides clear, concise and compelling advice for anyone.

The book can be purchased at Amazon.com here. 

The book can be purchased at Barnes and Noble here. 

The book can be purchase at Roger's site here as well.

My personal response was captured in the book as well :-)
     
I do have three things that I tell any young person, four things if I think they will listen and five things if I know them.

For any young person, my career advice is:

1) Life is short.
2) Death is certain.
3) If you do not make your own decisions now, time will make them for you.

If I think they are listening to me:

4) Always pay yourself first.  I tell the story about the importance of compound interest using the twins story on my blog.

NOTE: The entry above is from the presentation that I give to Colleges and Unviversities.

Best Halloween EVER 1991 Sunrise in Vienna Austria - SuperSPARC Chip and Socket :-)

Above is a photo from a 1991 Sunrise in Vienna, Austria on Halloween night.  Julie and I were attending Sunrise, which is Sun's highest honor it could give an individual employee, as part of a large group.  I went as a SuperSPARC processor and Julie went as the socket :-)

Brazil's National Health Care System

Brazil is an amazing country.  I would love to visit there some time to learn how they can be so forward thinking and progressive.  Here are some interesting statistics about Brazil and Health Care System:

• The Brazilian National Health Care System treats about 1.2 million inpatients and 100 million outpatients per month, providing everything from immunization to heart transplants.
• Complex, diverse computing systems that can effectively exchange huge amounts of patient data are a central requirement of a seamless health care system
• One of the main goals of the BNHCP was to avoid vendor lock-in or proprietary technology.  
• Two technologies -- Java technology and the XML data format -- were chosen to achieve this goal.  
• The nature of the project called for multiple vendors and system integrators to implement the system, and it was necessary to ease integration without hampering the different implementations.  
• XML, Java technology, and HTTP were used as the "glue" to bring these diverse implementations together relatively quickly.
  

40th Anniversary of the First Internet Message

Yesterday, October 29th, 2009 was the 40th anniversary of the first message sent on the Internet.

The two letter sent were "lo"  as in "lo and behold", but they were trying to get "login".

As CNN reported when speaking with Leonard Kleinrock:

"But there was no other computer to talk to. So a month later, Stanford Research Institute received its interface message processor, or IMP, connected it to their host computer, and we created the first piece of the backbone network when a 50-kilobit-per-second line was connected between UCLA and SRI.

What we wanted to do was send a message essentially from UCLA to SRI's host. And frankly, all we wanted to do was log in -- to type an l-o-g, and the remote time-sharing system knows what you're trying to do."

The systems crashed after the second letter was sent.  Leonard Kleinrock of UCLA sent the message from UCLA to Stanford Research Institute (SRI).  The two letters traveled about 400 miles.

As National Geograpic reports, "Packet-switching was the original transmission mechanism [for our network] in 1969 and is still the underlying technology of the Internet today," said Kleinrock.

Here is a great picture of the Interface Message Processor (IMP) that sent the first message.

Checkout this cool video on the start of the Internet. It also shows the last video game I played from beginning to end - Pong :-)