Thus Spaketh Idd Salim

Cloud. Yes. Tuko juu.

Well, I could easily have had the title of this blog as ‘Safaricom launches Cloud Service’. But that would be an insult to those who know this already and those who know how to use google. More insulted would be the 3000+ people who were at KICC last night. The lack of originality and literary profundity on the blog-scene always leaves me cacchinnating.

I believe you have come here to read about the intricacies of this new service and get an abstruse insight. You are seeking the answer to : “How does it work for my business” and, more importantly, the answer to eternal question business people ask, “How do I make money off it?”.

Today, I also wanted to talk about “8 ways local developers could harness the Safaricom cloud”. But then I realized two things. 1 – No body gives a fck. 2 – No body gives a damn. So I will keep that to my self.

Step in, Safaricom Cloud

Well, I could NOT wait for the launch to start. I was getting bored of being surrounded by loud talking, thunderously laughing, suit-wearing (yikes!!) people. How fast can I get to iHub, home. Where people are simple, free and real?

Then started the presentations. QnA from RamahNyang to Bob, Macharia, Hamdan and a ‘Mr Smith’. The presentation from Mike and Bob was, as expected, idiot-proof. Even my cat would have understood what cloud computing is and why we needed it by just listening. More here.

The service offers Storage-As-a-service, Backup, Archiving and Software-as-a-service. Google those if you don’t know what they mean. They are below the context of this short post.

Then came the PS. Described by Bob as the Kenyan IT Sector Demi-god. And finally, someone was talking to ME.

In the last paragraph of this blog post, I recommended that Google should NOT host Kenya government data and suggested we setup a local setup to manage that. Google would shut down their cloud in a blink and years of our history would be lost. I made some few enemies at google, ofcourse. I mean who is this 3rd World blogger that thinks Kenyans can setup a world-class cloud? We are google. We know how to do all that stuff. Well, 3rd world country, A1 1st world brains. End of. Moving on.

Ndemo spoke of the need for the cloud. The government was spending SO much on hardware and storage and labor to sustain a core business necessity that was NOT their core business. IT infrastructure. That money could be used to empower other IT needs. Safaricom and SST were now heaven-sent. The government will be the first customer for the cloud. I smiled. Kenyan critical government data hosted HERE. By us. Another big FU to those who said it could not be done in Africa.

Ndemo spoke about something everyone was, until this time, ignoring. IaaS. Or as I love to call it, Computing Power as a service. He spoke about  once talking to Rabaa of homeboyz and hearing him speak of having a handicap in terms of computing power. I talked about this earlier. We need to create a monster of a computer and call her I.S.I.O.L.O. [Immanently SuperCharged Infinitely Omnipotent Limitless Operationator]. A computer that can render HD+ videos for homeboyz in seconds, serve all government data in real-time, perform complex maths in micro-seconds. We have the knowledge and skills to develop one. And we will be showcasing one at @iHub in 3 months, if everything goes to plan.

All in all, I see the stars aligning.

I await to see what they will offer developers and innovation hubs.

I hope top techies will be consulted on this, as the potential is limitless, if harnessed properly.

Back to code…

Wazi.

Yes. I am better.

It is an interesting time indeed. Just reached home from Qz in Westlands and it is 2:17 AM. Not an ounce of sleep. An interesting day, it was.

Kwanza, Mbugua and Mutinda won (A collabo between Symbiotic and Shimba). Yes. Mezeni wembe. We pocket some USDs. Plus a trip to Silicon Valley. Gunning now to make Shimba the FIRST Kenyan firm to get SV funding.

Hope I can get a spare space and go wakilisha. Angalau nitoke Africa Once. If I can’t, well who cares. If One of us wins, all of us win. Code itaendelea.

As bystanders, we can stand up and applaud the technology, the pitch and the model, or just sit down and hate and bitch about how the winners were ‘favored’. It is your choice. A-lier tells a lie all the time.

I was manning the Google stand on Day 1of2 of Pivot25 after a request from GoogleKenya and I talked about what Opportunities Android offers. I was not talking about ‘How Android Development is Better than J2ME/QT Developers’ or ‘If one needs to switch from QT Dev to Android’. No, just what Android does. Period.

Then comes what Java Mobile and QT does on Symbian and J2ME.

I see alot of ‘developers’ and bloggers massaging their scrotums on how Symbian is Dead or will die by 2016. J2ME is Dead. Nokia Devices are old-school. Android is the new nipple. etc, etc. And I seek to shed some light on this issue. Aiming to answer these questions: “What should a Mobile Developer focus on? Who gives better value in terms of opportunity, support and incentive?“.

From GoogleKenya:

Android phones come with a faster OS. True. A developer has full control of the end-product ad UX. True. Both the OS and SDK/API are open-source. True. Amoled. Maps. MultiThreading. Sexy-Apps etc. But, how many Devices? Max 200k.

From Nokia:

Same old J2ME. Now Develop using C++ code on QT. One standard. Etc. Over 20 M devices (8M+ On data).

But then comes the Dilemma. Who do you choose as a Kenyan Coder between the Aggressive Nokia, and the Aggressive Google? Both sides have good offers. But some cons outweigh the pros.

What Nokia Says:

Put your App in the Ovi Store and we will make sure you are visible, advertised (Billboard, TV, Print, Radio and Web) and paid for the development. We support the able. No developer contests.

What Google Says:

Unlike Nokia, we will foster development from the heart, not just have a coder develop because we ‘stuffed’ money into their pockets. We will then hold a developer contest and reward the best apps. No media. No pay to non-winners.

What Kenyan developers Say:

We don’t want/need developer contests. We need someone to give us a picture of success. What happens to those who don’t win the developer contests? They wither and die. Nokia addresses this issue by treating every App independently. And they pay well. Nokia is seen as Pay+Success+Support. Google is seen as Bullish and arrogant in this case. The message being : ‘Win the contest or suffer’. This needs to change.

So, ofcourse, Nokia beats Google handsdown. A developer once told me : “So what Android has all these super powers?! How many people can use my App? How does Google support me as a developer? Just Contests? No advertising, no pay, no Incentives”.

So Questions:

• Do you want the new and shiny, or the tried and tested?
• Do you want to develop for 8M users in Kenya, or 100k Users.
• Can you really code ama you want to use some fancy AppGenerators like a small girl.
• Do you want a long-term partner, or a short term stint?

I am just reporting. Isikuwe Ohh, Salim hapendi Google, Ohh, Nokia wamelipa Salim, Ohh, Salim hapendi color green ya Safaricom ama Andoid. I don’t hate anyone. I am a TechnoSlut. I don’t blog just for traffic. I am not A-Lier. I spaketh the trutheth.

Back to code.

Wazi.

Think small. Alot

Yes. I know. We are always being told. ‘Be all you can become’. ‘The sky is the limit’. ‘You are the only obstacle to what you can become in life.’. ‘Aim at the sun/moon and you might fall among the stars’. Alot of crap.

How about we, just for once, look at these concepts from another angle. A REALISTIC angle. Putting everything into consideration. Depending on acumen. Not luck.

The true measure of success and achievement lies in self-discovery. Finding out what YOU can do, and doing it the best way possible.

In thinking ‘big’, alot of people find out what CAN BE DONE, and try to do it, ignoring their own limitation. Allow me to indulge your mind and step on your ego for 5 minutes (hoping it is not as fragile and plastic as many Kenyan egos are). Look at life in a different angle. For 5 minutes.

I have met and read about alot of people who are ‘creating their own facebook’, who ‘have a better mPesa’, who ‘are the next BIG thing’, who ‘are the African Google’, who ‘will become the paypal of Africa’. Etc. The list is endless. Good stuff. Positive stuff. But is it REAL? Are these people/we thinking way above our cut? Are we attempting to do 100 MPH, using a Vitz?

Face it. Not everyone is destined to be great. I have met a lot of foot-soldiers who think they are generals. A lot of born-to-sweep people who will tell you, ‘this sweeping job is just temporary’.

‘Salim stop discouraging people! Let people dream!’, I hear you. Actually, the purpose of this post is to encourage you to CHANGE your tactic, to achieve your end. The Kompressing Coder end. So read along. There is a REAL confusion between the noble concept of ‘thinking big’ and the vice of ‘thinking greedy’. People look at the DESIRED END and totally ignore the ‘little boring’ nitty-gritty in the MEANS.

When I listen to alot of people talk about what they want to achieve, I sometimes engage them on a technical analysis to see if they really understand what it takes to do that. Sadly, most, when weighed and measured, are found wanting. Thinking beyond their knowledge and ability, just because they read about it somewhere or on a Twit.

Take an example 1: Creating your own Gmail.

The general thinking is simplistic. Get a Unix box, setup an SMTP Server (Exim/Postfix/qMail), some POP3/IMAP server (Courier/Cyrus), Throw in Procmail and Spamassassin. A  few 4TB Nas drives. Server Done. Get a python/php Mail system + a good MySQL/Postgres Db and register a domain. KenyaFreeMail.com. Done.

The REAL picture, is a little more daunting. Very many SMALL details come to play. How will attachments be stored and hashed? Are we avoiding duplicates by ensuring the SAME attachment batch is saved-onces and multi-referenced across forwards and reply-with-attachment convos? Is the Unix Kernel optimized to ensure maximum performance per node? Are you using a semblance of the Google SRE Standards to make sure you are ALWAYS online? What happens when you reach your 1, 089, 666th user?

Take an example 2: Creating your own Facebook.

Again. Thinking beyond the product. The user experience and user-fatigue management is King. Alot of people I have met have concepts on how Facebook can be monetized. But, trust me, FB would not be where it was if it was taken as an Ad Space. Think about the photos. The videos. User data and messages.

You wan to build your own Facebook. Have you tested your DB with just 10M users each uploading just 10 photos a week. A remote zombified simulation of actual events? That is just WRITE. How about READ? Each photo has 4 thumbnails. Make that 10*4. Think storage. What gives you more optimization? Storing the Images as real files or DB data. Are you going to use BLOB or a Base64 encoding of the Image if DB? have you considered CDNs?

Take an example 3: Creating your own Mxit/2Go/Mig33/eBuddy.

One of the most interesting and VIRGIN areas in Africa is the Mobile. People are still touching themselves over MMT, but the real goldmine is, as I blogged last week, is on Mobile Data. I will prove this in the coming weeks.

So, want to create your own Mxit? Wonderful! What server will you run? How will you handle conversations? Default XML Stanzas or Custom WBXML? Are you going to create your own content channel-bots (reliable but static) or hire humans (dynamic and updated but unreliable, needy and emotional). What about device fragmentation? Is the system ubiquitous (access-mode independent)?

From personal experience and in conclusion, my point is: don’t think ‘alphabet’, if you haven’t grasped the shape, sound and feel of letter ‘A’ and letter ‘a’. The human mind is a very powerful tool. Control it before it controls you. The school of thought that ‘you can do anything’ often renders one actionless. You end up doing NOTHING. Better think SMALL and do SOMETHING. Then build up from your small victories.

Your end might be Big. But looking at the FINAL picture is really overwhelming. In Concept and resource.

Think small. Now. Time is on your side. Small + Small = BIG. And that, boys and girls, is what I call the Erection Model. the ripple model.

Back to code…

Wazi

I had, have and always will be a big fan of Google. Everything they do is simple, well-thought, optimized, tested and done by the best of the best. So, naturally, I believe I am right beyond any possible reprieve to assume that ANYTHING that beats Google, is what we can call a real programming challenge.

I always test the Google-translate engine (English to Swahili) every now and then but the results are not all that impressive, even upto now.

Swahili. The hardest alphabet-based language to translate?

Swahili is a very structured and disciplined language and it’s translation defies the logic of common language translation algorithms. I can only ignorantly assume that Google have tried a combination of the best linguists they could get from YALE etc in Swahili + their endless resource of eubercoders to develop the engine. They are yet to hire real coders, who speak swahili. So, the logic flow between the linguists and coders gets polluted chinese-whisperesquely.

I have managed to source some support (moral, logical, conceptual and otherwise) from my boys, mentors and well-wishers and I think I can now officially start my quest to create a flawless ANY-to-SWAHILI translator. Text and voice.I will start the project in Dec, after a few Calculus remedial classes to polish up my maths.

I am yet to decide on the language, but I an inclined to use a combination of C++ and Java to build to the logic engine and weighting logic, then Python or plain old, cool PHP for the presentation layer. DB? MySQL of-course. Once done, web-services and APIs for Web, Wap, J2ME and android apps will follow.

I invite fellow coders who see this as a worthy challenge to join me in this task and let us put our beloved language out there and make it universal.

Habari ndiyo hiyo. Back to life.

Wazi.