What is Holism?

An Wikipedia definition is:

Holism (from ὅλος holos, a Greek word meaning all, entire, total) is the idea that all the properties of a given system (biological, chemical, social, economic, mental, linguistic, etc.) cannot be determined or explained by its component parts alone. Instead, the system as a whole determines in an important way how the parts behave.

In other words, Holism is a property of any System. But what is Systems? Wikipedia says:

System is a set of interacting or interdependent entities, real or abstract, forming an integrated whole.

Then, Holism could be used as an approach to understand the reality or abstraction. No?. Yes!.

A map-printed is a system, in this case it represents a specific geography/location (reality). Its elements or parts are: paths, orientation, size/scale, blocks, streets, traffic signs, etc.
Commonly, this map-printed is called model.

A PC is other example of system. In Software Engineering a Database Server is a set of elements as PC-server, DDBB engine, tables, rows, columns, metadata, data, constrains, etc. A representation of the Database Server could be a Entity-Relation model.

The Global warming Problem is other kind of System and it is possible to get a model too . It is a complex problem because is a big-System with many element and unknow relationships beetwen its parts. There is not enough paper for drawing this model.

Well, Holism is an approach that help us to interpret a System.

Here a table that summarize all that a bit more clearly.

http://marikaya.wordpress.com/2007/04/03/holism-versus-reductionism

Regards!

Ultra-mobile PC (UMPC): PC Portálites de bajo-coste, seguros, accesibles y usables

Después de la iniciativa de Nicholas Negroponte con su OLPC, PC Portátil para niños de 100 USD para fines educacionales, los fabricantes de Portátiles han visto una interesante oportunidad de negocio; hacer portátiles low-cost. Asustek, que fabrica portátiles para HP, Dell y Apple, además de su marca Asus, ha lanzado la propia hace algunos meses llamado Asus EeePC a sólo 249 USD, luego otros fabricantes han sacado sus propios modelos por ejemplo el Intel Classmate PC, VIA NanoBook y el PackardBell EasyNote XS, éstos dos últimos basados en el mismo chipset.

La intención de Nicholas Negroponte con la Fundación OLPC era dar acceso a recursos informáticos a los niños para fines educacionales de los paises pobres y para ello solicitó a la taiwanesa Quanta la fabricación de un portátil muy barato, accesible, usable, seguro y que consuma pocos recursos. Estos portátiles OLPC tienen procesador AMD y Linux.
Pero lo que ha despertado esta iniciativa en el sector tecnológico es que los fabricantes miren a los portátiles low-cost como una oportunidad de negocio.

En fin, estamos viendo una cambio en el mercado donde los fabricantes, en lugar de incrementar las capacidades de los portátiles y evitar reducir los precios, estan reduciendo precios manteniendo las características de los portátiles para un tipo de usuario; el usuario profesional.
La rápida focalización en esta oportunidad de negocio hace pensar que los fabricantes están pendientes de los gustos de los usuarios, eso es bueno, siempre nos han dado “gato por liebre”. Por ejemplo, recuerden incorporar cámaras fotográficas a los teléfonos celulares.

Creo que es muy evidente los usuarios profesionales también deseaban un portátil low-cost con las mismas prestaciones que ofrece el OLPC de Nicholas Negroponte, Intel, Asustek, VIA y Packard Bell lo han creído así. Para contrarrestar a estos nuevos competidores, aunque OLPC no persigue fines comerciales, la fundación OLPC lanzó un programa muy oportuno; “Give One Get One”, que permitía comprar dos OLPC, regalar uno de ellos a un país pobre.

Es tiempo del PC Low-cost?, Qué hay de la seguridad, de la Usabilidad y Accesabilidad que existe en OLPC?, dichas características también estarán en estos nuevos modelos de portátiles?. Pue sí, cada fabricante a su manera.

Estos portátiles tienen soluciones bien pensadas para mitigar los problemas intrínsecos de la portabilidad, por ejemplo:

OLPC aplica un modelo de seguridad llamada BitFrost, garantiza la seguridad, accesabilidad y la usabilidad, se basa en principios clásicos como “Open Security” y “Unobtrusive Security” (aka The principle of Psycological Acceptability). También, OLPC se nutre de una serie de aplicaciones para educación, herramientas ofimática y juegos fáciles de usar. Otra interesante funcionalidad es que permite establecer redes inalámbricas de forma segura con otros OLPC cercanos, es lo que OLPC llama wireless mesh networking. Otra punto interesante es el poco consumo de energia y la manivela para cargar la bateria del portátil.

En cambio, Asus EeePC, VIA NanoBook y PackardBell EasyNote XS están pensandos para usuarios profesionales, no para niños. Sin embargo han sabido mantener las características de portabilidad y rapidez que interesa a los usuarios móviles, y sin perder la facilidad de uso ni subir los precios.

En el caso de Asus EeePC, éste portátil viene con una variante del Xandros OS (Linux) muy fácil de usar, además dotado de las herramientas que un usuario típico puede necesitar.

Aquí se ve la importancia de Linux y las aplicaciones libres, usables y seguras que contribuyen a construir soluciones portables como el de los UMPC.

Ahora qué sigue?, para cuándo un teléfono móvil de bajo coste y/o open source, con aplicaciones fáciles de usar?, ahora con Google Android (sistema Operativo y SDK para desarrollar aplicaciones para teléfonos móviles) el sector también se está moviendo.

Saludos!

[1] One Laptop per Child (OLPC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLPC_XO-1

[2] BitFrost: System security on OLPC (Unobtrusive security principle)
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Bitfrost

[3] El portátil de 100 dólares, un sueño que atrae a empresas
http://www.lavanguardia.es/lv24h/20070525/51353696700.html

[4] Linux Debian on Packard Bell EasyNote XS
http://data.plaintext.cc/nanobook

[5] Intel Classmate PC, official page
http://www.classmatepc.com

[6] Intel Classmate PC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classmate_PC

[7] Asus Eee PC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASUS_Eee_PC

[8] VIA NanoBook
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NanoBook

[9] GPhone de código abierto para Android
http://tecmoviles.com/gphone-de-codigo-abierto-para-android

The Principle of Psychological acceptability

Jerome Saltzer and Michael Schroeder in “The Protection of Information in Computer Systems”:

“[...] Psychological acceptability: It is essential that the human interface be designed for ease of use, so that users routinely and automatically apply the protection mechanisms correctly. Also, to the extent that the user’s mental image of his protection goals matches the mechanisms he must use, mistakes will be minimized. If he must translate his image of his protection needs into a radically different specification language, he will make errors. [..]“

Any question?

Holistic System Security an cyber-security research priority

In the Report to the President on Cyber Security: A Crisis of Prioritization (February 2005) was published the cyber security priorities, theses were:

1. Authentication Technologies
2. Secure Fundamental Protocols
3. Secure software Engineering and Software Assurance
4. Holistic System Security
5. Monitoring and Detection
6. Mitigation and Recovery Methodologies
7. Cyber Forensics: Catching Criminals and Deterring Criminals activities
8. Modeling and Testbeds for New Technologies
9. Metrics, Benchmarks, and Best Practices … and
10. Non-Technology Issues than can Compromise Cyber security

Well, everything sounds known, but what does Holistic System Security mean?.
The report answers perfectly and explains why it is a priority:

4. Holistic System Security

Effective security in a complex, many-layered, global infrastructure such as the Internet and its nodes requires more than the security of its component parts. Establishing sound methods for authentication, secure protocols for basic Web operations, and improved software engineering will undoubtedly become
part of an evolving solution to this problem. But most importantly, researchers must recognize from the outset that an end-to-end architectural approach to the security of the whole necessarily transcends the security of the individual parts.For example, customers assume that their online banking transactions, based on secure socket layer (SSL), are indeed secure. But by spoofing the associated underlying protocols or end-user software, a malicious party can make a user’s transaction appear secured by SSL while allowing the theft of confidential data. It is also possible to compromise the security of the end computing systems, obtaining the data even though it was secure in transit.

Software usability itself is a legitimate and important research topic in cyber security. Incorrectly used software or hostile or confusing user interfaces can lead to user frustration and unauthorized workarounds that can compromise even the most robust security schemes. Research is also needed on how to make large and complex systems, where components can interact in unexpected ways, secure as a whole. Ultimately, fundamental research should address the development of entirely new, holistic security architectures including hardware, operating systems, networks, and applications. Research subtopics include:

• Building secure systems from trusted and untrusted components, and integrating new systems with legacy components
• Proactively reducing vulnerabilities
• Securing a system that is co-operated and/or co-owned by an adversary
• Comprehensively addressing the growing problem of insider threats
• Modeling and analyzing emergent failures in complex systems
• Human factors engineering, such as interfaces that promote security and user awareness of its importance
• Supporting privacy in conjunction with improved security

Systems Thinking, Holism, Trust, Security and Usability .. my first post

Yes, it is my first post and i hope that it will not be last one. So far I published my thoughts in Spanish and in a static web page, and it was boring.. now, i should be more funny for reaching a wider audience.

Well, here are going to publish some thoughts such as Quality, Systems Thinking, Holism, Trust, Security, Usability and different things without relation.. apparently.

Regards!