Peter Coffee

Over its lifetime, software often falls into a vicious circle: Enhancements make the code more difficult to understand, increasing the likelihood of errors—including errors in the changes meant to repair the previous generation of bugs. Continue until collapse. Containing this software entropy is the mission of re-factoring, the practice of continually seeking out redundancy, identifying […]

Not only does it look like a prop from “Star Trek,” but it also serves up decidedly 21st-century content—in this case, a real-time weather radar view for the ZIP code of choice on a surprisingly clear (if tiny) color screen. Motorolas i95cl communicator was one of the dozens of embedded-Java wireless devices shown to eWeek […]

Theres been lots of comment about this months report on our bad manners—formally titled “Aggravating Circumstances: A Status Report on Rudeness in America,” produced by Public Agenda for the Pew Charitable Trusts. So far as I know, though, Im the first to point out that reports most glaring oversight. This report ignores a terrible influence […]

One of the best words in the modern technical lexicon is “discoverable.” If were designing software, the word describes features and behaviors that a user can recognize and use without instructions. If were designing networks, the same word applies to resources that announce their presence to anything else that needs them. And if were discussing […]

After years of being infamously unfriendly to casual programmers, the Macintosh has suddenly become the machine of choice for out-of-the-box programmability—with tools that not only generate great-looking Macintosh applications but that also generate them in Java so you can take them anywhere. Apples Java team showed me their latest work at last months JavaOne conference, […]

Bits are a lie. The difference between the fiction of bits and the truth of actual hardware is a fundamental threat to secure computing. The software pretense of bits depends on an upstream hardware reality of voltages, currents, stray radio-frequency emissions and other artifacts that our abstract models omit—but that a determined attacker can study […]

The voice on the telephone sounded as if its owner couldnt decide between rage and exhaustion. “My machine re-booted while I was working, and now most of my e-mail in-box is gone. I thought you could only lose work that you hadnt saved!” I had to break the news that behind the scenes, his e-mail […]

When I wanted to read a web article on my handheld device, I knew enough to bring up the “printer-friendly” version before saving to my synchronized-files directory. I was sadly mistaken, though, in hoping to get device-independent HTML. When I could not read the resulting file with my Pocket PCs version of Internet Explorer, I […]

Developer issues will be the central concern of IT for the next several years. The platform choices, the tools, and the new ways of thinking about loosely coupled asynchronous interactions—Web services, for short—completely overshadow rising chip speeds, growing network bandwidth, pervasive wireless connections and other enabling technologies. Hence, the following notes from this years JavaOne. […]

Sometimes, I get what I deserve, but most of the time, thats not what I want. When last weeks eWeek featured my story about Javas proven security, based on more than six years of practical trial and theoretical refinement, I should have known that the same week would see a conspicuous new announcement of a […]

Welcome to “stupid customers,” the saga of IT vendors ongoing attempts to blame the victim. This week, we honor Jim Balsillie, chairman and CEO of Research In Motion, who commented earlier this month on the intrinsic insecurity of Internet traffic—and why its not his companys fault that people dont understand it. Balsillie was asked about […]

In a roundtable discussion moderated by eWEEK Technology Editor Peter Coffee, some of the industrys top security experts spoke candidly about the ability to secure e-business; the responsibility and culpability of the vendor, IT management and hacker communities; the security challenges inherent in Web services; and how enterprise IT can not only respond to but […]