A dozen years ago, Microsoft broke Sun's run-anywhere Java technology, which was supposed to make operating systems irrelevant for most applications. The Windows version of Java changed one function call, in a way that seemed trivial. It made many apps written for Windows not work on other operating systems. Sun sued, cementing the company's has-been status. Microsoft eventually paid a token settlement for having cock-blocked Java in favor of its own buggy, security-violation-breeding ActiveX technology. I'm sure Bill Gates considers it the best $20 million he ever spent. Where was I? Oh yeah: Sun has been reduced to bundling a non-Java Microsoft toolbar with every Java download, to pick up a few extra bucks. I can only hope the Sun staffers involved are too new to be humiliated.

Look, I get it, working on a dissertation can make you go crazy. That said, armed with his advanced degree, Chang should at least be able to get a job at Google answering customer-support calls or keeping an eye on toddlers at the Kinderplex.

Testing is still underway to identify the specific virus in question, but they believe it to be the Norovirus, a common cause of the "stomach flu", which can cause temporary flu-like symptoms for up to 48 hours.

The San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) was notified on Wednesday May 7, 2008, of several persons that became ill after attending or working at conferences at the Moscone Center in San Francisco from April 30, 2008 through May 8, 2008. The SFDPH is working with the organizers of the meeting facilities to make cleaning recommendations and to confirm the cause of the illnesses. The ill attendees/workers are suspected to have a viral illness called Norovirus. Noroviruses are a common cause of the "stomach flu," or gastroenteritis (GAS-tro-en-ter-I-tis).

What are the symptoms of illness caused by Noroviruses?
The symptoms of norovirus illness include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and some stomach cramping. Sometimes people also have a low-grade fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, and a general sense of tiredness. The illness often begins suddenly and the infected person may feel very sick. The illness is usually brief, with symptoms lasting only about 1 or 2 days.

Are Noroviruses contagious?
Noroviruses are very contagious and can spread easily from person to person. Noroviruses are found in the stool or vomit of infected people. People can become infected with the virus in several ways, including:

• Eating food or drinking liquids that are contaminated with Norovirus;
• Touching surfaces or objects contaminated with Norovirus, and then placing their hand in their mouth;
• Having direct contact with another person who is infected and showing symptoms (for example, when caring for someone with illness, or sharing foods or eating utensils with someone who is ill).
• Persons suspected of being ill with Norovirus should abstain from attending or working at any Moscone Center conferences until 48 hours after symptoms have resolved.

How can Norovirus infections be prevented?

• Frequently wash your hands, especially after using the toilet and before eating or preparing food.


• Carefully wash fruits and vegetables, and steam oysters before eating them.


• Thoroughly clean and disinfect contaminated surfaces immediately after an episode of illness by using a bleach-based household cleaner.


• Immediately remove and wash clothing or linens that may be contaminated with virus after an episode of illness (use hot water and soap).


• Flush or discard any vomit and/or stool in the toilet and make sure that the surrounding area is kept clean.


• Persons who are infected with Norovirus should not prepare food while they have symptoms and for 3 days after they recover from their illness.

Information on more Frequently Asked Questions on Norovirus can be viewed on the San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) website at http://www.sfcdcp.org/norovirus.cfm

Young used his time on stage during the keynote to show off a 10-disc Blu-Ray project that included almost every song he'd ever recorded, in chronological order. Sun's role? In providing Sony the Java code that allows for interactive features on Blu-ray. Young said that while he'd been working on the project for 15 years, only now was the digital audio quality up to standard. Each track had visual accompaniment from the relevant era. When a recording from the compact disc era appeared, he joked "We took a giant dump at this point." He also mentioned that he was working to create a car that didn't require stops for refueling, which also has some tangential relationship to Java, showing off an American mid-century model he's entering in the automotive X-Prize challenge.

Interestingly enough, us bloggers with our hair-trigger deadlines were given first crack at asking questions of Young (and indulging in the complimentary fruit plate), while the print reporters with their leisurely deadlines had to wait outside. As we waited for Young and his entourage to arrive, O'Reilly Media founder Tim O'Reilly showed off his Livescribe pen for recording audio in time with written notes to News.com editor-in-chief Dan Farber, who remarked sagely about the need for special Livescribe paper, "So they're selling the razors and the blades." But the two quickly went into fanboy mode when Young arrived, peppering the man with questions before anyone else could get a word in edgewise.

The car project, part of a documentary Young's working on with filmmaker Larry Johnson, a longtime collaborator, seems to be a bit of a lark. He wants to create a superefficient car that doesn't need to stop for gas or electricity, and he wants it to be heavy. While I might have gotten a C+ in college physics, it's enough to know that you can't run a Lincoln Continental on unicorns and rainbows. "It's very kooky. When you try to do something like this, people say you're nuts." Wonder why?

I mostly went on behalf of my father, who's pretty much a superfan (to the point where, besides the mutton-chop sideburns and dark glasses, he and Young seem to have identical fashion sense). My question had to do with the fact that my father had already bought Young's work on vinyl, then again on CD, and will now probably buy it all over again on Blu-ray in the fall. "I think it's the same as Microsoft selling the same applications every year with new bells and whistles." He then made this vinyl collector very happy by lambasting the quality of digital audio, and saying that he still records and edits everything in analog.

Young was at his best when he pierced through the Sun marketing hype of the morning. When O'Reilly asked how the musician felt about the "free" aspects of Sun's open-source efforts with Java, Young veered well of the "Keep on rockin' in a free world" tagline I assume Sun paid dearly for: "The free aspect... I think that's a word, that's a marketing thing." Touché.

The company then trotted out the likes of Ian freed, Amazon.com's VP on the Kindle project, and Rikko Sakaguchi, SVP at Sony Ericsson, to explain how their devices were using Java. A Sun software engineer and designer showed off Java-powered apps, such as the ConnectedLife widget which travels from Facebook to desktop client to mobile device. (He did not mention that Facebook has dropped support for Java.) Green announced that the latest build of the Java software was available today, and that the developers suite, OpenJDK, now supports popular Linux distributions Ubuntu and Red Hat, with a Fedora release within a month.

A software-emulated mobile device was shown running Google's Android — presumably the two companies have made nice. But beyond the OpenJDK announcement, nary a word was spoken about the enterprise market and if any role for Java in datacenter applications was mentioned, I missed it. I was listening for Green or CEO Jonathan Schwartz to say something, anything, about the company's quarterly earnings and new revenue streams. Instead, he talked about how the latest Java releases will be free and open-source.

I guess the company will make their coin providing support to the device manufacturers who use the JavaME mobile platform or the JavaFX suite of multimedia tools — competing with other application development environments such as Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight. Problem is, Sun's tools for content developers require a level of Java expertise well above that required by Adobe's easy-to-use Flash tools, and both Flash and Silverlight are also being licensed for free to device manufacturers. But hey, did we mention Neil Young?

So wherever you are, join the fun and support your freedom to access your information.

The irony is that BEA rose to prominence on the notion that its application server would make things simpler for database buyers. Buy any database you'd like, and BEA's application server would connect to it. Likewise, MySQL grew as a cheaper, open-source alternative to databases from IBM and Oracle.

A database here, an application server there, a bit of open-source software on top of that all sounds nice in theory. It proved in practice to be a headache for the influential tech buyers at large corporations. One salesperson calling on them, one phone number to dial when things went wrong, it turns out, is what they really wanted.

The consolidation was inevitable, if perhaps a bit sad. The goal of the stack game is to make sure that your software is the layer on top — the one that matters to programmers, the one applications are designed for. BEA and MySQL both had grand ambitions in that regard. Those are now coming to an end. Sun and Oracle will no doubt make grand statements about how compatible their software is, how well their children play with others. Ignore those. The history of IT tells us those promises are false.

The party circuit last night was no different. With MySpace at SFMOMA,Yelp at the Cartoon Art Museum, and a host of others scattered between the W and the Thirsty Bear, it was a mild party night to say the least. All suits, all half-drunk, all talking on their fucking Bluetooth headsets, despite the deafening music and chatter.

"What?! No, paradigms! Do you hear me? No, no no no, I said 'going forward' ... no, can you hear me? Shifting paradigms going forward ... No ... Facebook... No ... I said 'paradigms'!"

Last night's parties got off to a slow start, with a cavalcade of rejected HTML gurus drinking themselves to enjoyment at the House of Shields. They were obviously depressed by the conferences boring tone, and focus on moneymaking. These were the once-weres, the might-have-beens, and the suitless masses.

The suits were over at the W, where Sun, Accel Partners, and the German government all had their soirées. Sun's was relatively subdued, what with all the press and juicy Java details. The Germans were quite awkward, with a schwanky full-service meal served inside a miniature conference room, complete with menus, crystal glassware, and expo booths around the side. Oddly, no one really felt comfortable eating, only standing around and watching as the German consulate folks resisted the beer.

Of course, the real suit-haters were over at the Yelp party around the corner. Kind of appropriate for them to have it at the Cartoon Art Museum, since Yelp, without a buyout offer from Google, is basically a cartoon impression of a startup. It's been around so long now that Google can only see them as a potential competitor, and a potential database to buy.

But that didn't stop the Yelp folks from bringing in all their relatives, friends and roommates to crowd the venue and eat the free food. In half an hour, only two suits made it in; the rest were urban hipsters seeking a free meal, some of them looking homeless.

As for Accel Partners, Facebook's big venture-capital backer, over at the W, it was a standard W affair, with potstickers and chocolate cake. Inside, it was all "How's your capital?" and "Can I stroke your cock for you Mr. Wagner?" The real function of this event was to provide adequate alcohol to fuel the maniacs who would eventually wander into the MySpace party after 8.

Here's a tip: if you want your party to be wild and crazy, and packed with drunks, start it after 8. That's exactly what MySpace did, and that's exactly what happened. When you get down to it, this event wasn't really too spectacular. The food was standard, the drinks were relatively cheap, and the art was in danger of being puked on. Hmmm ... sounds a lot like MySpace's clientele.

Commenter rheiser says:

Google occupies buildings that Adobe once occupied when they were in Mt. View across from the Amphitheater parking lot. I haven't looked to see if the statue we used to call "Gumby" is there anymore in front of the green buildings.

Those certainly look like the acrobat sculptures that used to be outside the Adobe buildings — I used to pass by them every day when i worked at Sun in the early 90's. I had always assumed that Acrobat was named after the sculptures ....

A potentially interesting factoid: The statues referred to in #10 are holdovers from when Adobe occupied these buildings, and are why it's called 'Acrobat'.

Total coincidence. No relation to Acrobat the product. However, like most big tech companies Adobe has an agreement with it's local government (now city of San Jose) to provide some level of public art in its environs. Adobe now has a couple of rusty sculptures in front of its San Jose HQ. And that funny light thing on top of its building. Funnily enough Apple has a similar agreement with Cupertino. But Steve Jobs took down the art (it was a collection of big software icons in front of Infinite Loop) because he didn't like it.

I don't know whether or not that building was ever Adobe, but I do remember when Bldg 45 was owned and occupied by Sun, back when the Google Campus was SGI. I used to work for SETI (yes, *that* SETI), which was in the building just on the other side of Landings from the one marked marked "1965 Charleston" on your map at that time, and drove by those statues every day. I always thought they were a bit odd, since Sun isn't in the habit of littering their campus with giant kids. Except for the executives, of course.