Friday, November 7, 2008

Obama Web site Ever wonder why the high tech industry was behind Obama? Check out this Web site. It accepts your comments, too. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, was prominent in some of the post election Obama photos. Don't know if manufacturing will make it into the inner circle, but technology certainly is there. <rant>I have a feeling that there just isn't much in the way of good leadership at the top of manufacturing right now. GM's CEO just has his hand out for free cash--just like any Wall Street banker who squandered away our fortunes. He should have been raising his voice for the future of manufacturing instead of asking for our money to make up for his lack of vision.</rant> 2:42:33 PM    comment []

Fitness tip A fitness tip from Slashdot, news for geeks??? Yes, it's true. And I agree. The article discusses stretching before a workout or game. I had heard it was good to stretch. Several years ago I was about to take a fitness (running) test for my college referee certification and did a bunch of Yoga stretches in preparation. Wrong thing to do. My muscles were shot for running. Stretch after running, not before. 2:37:46 PM    comment []

Managed Remote Services There's a market area that keeps perking along under the covers called remote services. It has gone by other names--M2M, pervasive Internet and probably more. Its proponents keep calling me but seldom have direct manufacturing applications, yet. The potential in manufacturing is interesting. At a simplistic level of discussion, it involves embedding data collection and communication into machines or devices that can be remotely monitored by the OEM or supplier. The information can be used for things such as troubleshooting, assistance in technical support and feedback for future product development. The main uses so far really seem to be in IT. But, it must be gaining ground. This week I heard from two companies with announcements in this space. Axeda Corp. and Perle Systems have partnered to provide an end-to-end remote service management solution for any device with a serial port. Axeda supplies on-demand remote service technology and Perle Systems is a world-wide provider of serial connectivity and device networking solutions. Axeda ServiceLink enables product manufacturers to deliver remote service to their customers securely over the Internet, however certain assets do not have an Ethernet port and are not attached to the customer's network. This integrated solution enables the Perle Device Server to run the Axeda Agent, allowing connection of these assets and secure 2-way transmission of vital service data across the Internet. ILS Technology LLC announced it has acquired substantially all the operating assets of ComBrio Inc., a provider of Remote Product Services (RPS) software for mission critical remote data center management. ComBrio's virtual IP infrastructure is used to monitor and manage devices for RPS providers and their enterprise customers. The acquisition enables ILS Technology to expand its footprint in the Managed Service Provider market by capitalizing on ComBrio's Virtual Service Infrastructure (VSI) that provides simple, secure monitoring and access to a wide variety of information technology devices and systems. The VSI product apparently allows ILS Technology's products to communicate through firewalls and switches that can complicate the task of constructing an enterprise information management system in manufacturing. 2:34:57 PM    comment []