subject: The Internet As The OS: Computing Trends [print this page] The Internet As The OS: Computing Trends The Internet As The OS: Computing Trends
There isn't much difference in structural terms between a file system and a database. Ok, we could argue that a file system is more static, harder to access data, maybe a container of sorts; and finding, sorting, and filter data is much easier with a full-blown database. So if we can agree file systems and databases, in fact, are similar, then could we also say that the Internet is just one gargantuan database? Which makes sense--Unix was the first Operating System specifically designed for networking, and it is by far the largest server OS in use worldwide today. Microsoft owns the desktop, surely, but the Unix/Linux world run the servers that keep the entire internet humming along. So, if you agree that the programs used to execute data contained within a database are in themselves part of the same database, then we can see that the whole concept of an Operating System is just a database process structure. Slowly we are also seeing a massive and prevailing growth of a single OS that will someday antiquidate the concept of what a computer is. In fact, this is already partially happening, because if you are like most people you leave your computer on a great deal of the time and during most of that time your computer I would guess is connected to the Internet. Now, a lot more is happening through connectivity than you might think and a least some of your data is being used in the Net even if your browser is not open. Still, disconnect, and once again you have a self-contained computer contraption. I foresee a day however when the boundries between your computer and the Internet will be seemless. Wouldn't you argue though that a computer is composed of 'all' of its hardware parts and the data those parts process? Mostly then in this world there is mainly one monolithic computer and in fact all you really need for digital survival in this world is a terminal with Internet access. So the Mother of all OS's is the Internet. Frightening to some, but I think it will come to pass before we've even realized it.
