Chiming in with its own network-computer offering, Cisco Systems has developed a new kind of server aimed at making the management of these machines easier.
Cisco claims that these "thin clients," as NCs and devices of their ilk are called, will unduly congest traditional networks. Users will be more active on networks as they must rely on their access to a server to download applications, store and access their documents, and to conduct normal network activity such as sending and receiving email. Thus, Cisco sees a need for a specially designed "thin server."
"[Thin servers] could help the NC find its place in the network, give it its IP address, download boot service, and serve applets - particularly in environments where NCs will be replacing terminals," said Cisco director of Internet appliances and applications Frank Roys.
Although Cisco is not the first to make noise in this arena - Data General's spinoff group, THiiN Line, has been probing similar ground for some time - it is the loudest, given Cisco's size and clout in the networking industry.
Thin servers solve the traffic problem associated with these thin clients trying to obtain everything - boot instructions and all - from traditional servers while competing with other devices on the network, Roys said. "The first and most obvious thing is peak times, when people get to work and fire up their computers - this will put a tremendous bandwidth stress on the network. Secondly, because of that issue, it'll take you a lot longer to get your NC booted and information drawn down that you need to do your job. Thirdly, there is always with every server an issue of performance against client requests."
But just how many NCs are - or will be soon - plugged into the world's data networks is a question worth asking. Sun Microsystems, for its part, has yet to ship its Java Stations commercially; the company expects to ship these in the fall. Sun's internal deployment of 3,000 machines is still awaiting the go ahead. But the company did ship Java Stations for over 150 pilot programs - involving third-party developers - last December.
Whether consumers will bite the latest round of NC bait is also a theory awaiting proof. Zona Research, which follows the NC market, estimates that 1.7 million NC devices will ship by the end of this year, and that by 2000, 6.7 million will adorn users' desktops. A recent Price Waterhouse study states that many of the over-35-year-olds who aren't already online don't want to be.
This demographic group - part of the focus of NC makers - may not go into the digital age willingly, but the results of the thin client research being conducted by THiiN Line indicate that the catalyst for this transformation is just now coming out - including network-aware cordless phones and audio devices. THiiN Line's argument? Consumers may not have any other choice among devices such as phones through which they conduct their everyday communications. "The grand conversion is starting," said product architect Craig Heim.
Part of the conflict also results from the varying definitions - or the lack of definition - of what an NC is. A "network computer," for instance, is often referred to as both a networked appliance and a low-cost, no-maintenance Web box. But if the goal is a cheap machine that runs Java apps or functions as a graphical Web browser, the home-brewed US$200 Internet machines some are fashioning out of secondhand PCs and software such as Arachne seem perfectly adequate.
Generally, said Roys, an NC is a device that, when initially powered on, has no notion of what's going on in the network, or even any program information - including any kind of boot instructions. All of this is fed to it at startup from a big, or "thick," server on the network.
This sounds an awful lot like an X Terminal.
Greg Blatnik, Zona Research vice president, agrees. The technology of the graphical X Terminal was a step in what he calls the Internet's trend toward "access-based computing," where one is able to do useful work and access large amounts of information without having any of it reside on your desktop. This has helped propel today's thin-client rage, he said. "The most successful NCs in the marketplace have been X Terminals."
Blatnik believes that thin servers aren't specifically necessary for the NC, but it's simply the Cisco Way, how the company thinks it ought to work. "Cisco is a tremendously successful company - customers have purchased Cisco products by the boatload," he said. "They've got their eye on having more and more influence on the networking environment in organizations, especially the large organizations which they tend to work with, which are the ones likely to be interested in the NC."
Network managers at ISPs are scratching their heads over thin servers as well. "It almost seems silly to build a dumb terminal and build a dumb server for it," said Josh Wepman, a network specialist at ans.net.
Nonetheless, Wepman does see the overall network load - and demands on the server - increasing if there is less intelligence in the machine adorning users' desktops.
"I guess [thin servers] are a good idea if you see that the dumb terminal is going to take off, but it sounds like Cisco's trying to invent the wheel," Wepman said. "They like to move in every direction possible, so no matter where the market goes, they have their butts covered."
Reporter Kaitlin Quistgaard contributed to this story.
