The News – 03/19/04

Easter Egg in BMW Software

Alert SNS Reader Valerie Janda sends along an item about the ultimate car hack. Ever since performance management computers crept under the hood, car enthusiasts have been hacking the software that controls ignition timing and other performance parameters. Most of the time, this is illegal. The latest trend combines a software practice known as Easter Eggs (programmers put in special funny or strange features that can be found with bizarre key combinations or actions) with this time honored automobile hack.

I’ve commented before on the high degree of computer automation in the latest BMWs. A whole lot of the car is now controlled by Microsoft's Windows CE operating system, including the transmission. Car rockers who want to rev up the engine, slam into gear and smoke the tires are typically prevented from doing so if their car has BMW’s sequential manual gearbox. Well the BMW engineers/programmers put in an Easter Egg to appease these speed demons. Simply follow a specific procedure and you can smoke miles off your high performance tires.

So this whole idea of running a car with Windows reminds me of the old joke: If your car ran like your (Windows) computer.

For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash twice a day.

Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull over to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason, you would simply accept this.

Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single "General Protection Fault" warning light.

The airbag system would ask "are you sure?" before deploying.

Every time GM introduced a new car, car buyers would have to learn to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

Popular Science

Briefly Noted

• Shameless Self-Promotion Dept.: It’s here: A new company from StratVantage – The WiMAX Guys. The service has two parts. The first is targeted at consumers and small businesses who buy the wireless networking gear, but can’t get it to work. We visit and get it up and running fast. The second part of the business is new installs for people who want to set up wireless hotspots. Check out the Website at www.TheWiMAXGuys.com.
  
  I provided some background info for my colleague, Marcia Jedd, who prepared an interesting white paper called Six Ways to Increase Marketing ROI. Check it out.
  
  My article, Why Your Company Needs a Professional Wireless Network, was published in the Reside newsletter, which also published my article about Short Messaging Service (SMS), Wherever they go, there you are.
  
  My second article for Fawcette Technical Publications’ Enterprise Architect magazine, Companies Collaborate on IT Practices, reports on a best practices sharing effort called Project Avalanche. My feature article, Grid Computing Takes Off in the Enterprise, was published in the magazine’s inaugural issue last May. (Registration required to view.)
  
  My article, Innovative Marketers Target Unwired Customers was published in the NetSuds newsletter in May.
  
  Coming Soon: A new eBook, Be On the Wave Or Under It™ will collect the best of SNS’ insights over the last couple of years, along with additional material from CTOMentor white papers and new material. It will make a great gift for associates and friends in need of a guide to the latest and greatest technology. Watch for more information in upcoming SNS issues.
  
  Several issues ago I debuted SNS Begware, an opportunity for you, gentle reader, to express your appreciation by tipping your server via PayPal. See the sidebar for more info. Total in the kitty so far: $86.48.
  

• Vendor Solves Swiss Cheese Humvee Problem: US Global Nanospace wants to remedy the military Humvee design flaw that’s killing troops in Irag. Seems that the military is deploying many vehicles without any body armor. Thus, troops have packed their vehicles with sandbags to try to keep body and soul together. US Global Nanospace has developed Guardian™ Antiballistic Replacement Door Skin (GARDS™), which install in 15 minutes. The coolest thing about them is the company uses their new G-Lam™ nano-fiber anti-ballistic material. Not only is this another example of the current uses of nanotechnology, that’s one groovy name for a product (say it with me gee-lam, g-lam, glam).
  US Global Nanospace
  
  
• Wal-Mart Already Using RFID: Wal-Mart, the 800 pound gorilla of discount retailing and perhaps the company most committed to RFID technology, is already tracking pallets and cases from two suppliers coming into one distribution center. And there are those who persist in claiming that Information Technology no longer provides a competitive edge. Here’s what I said online about the recent conference dust-up between Bob Metcalfe, the inventor of Ethernet and founder of 3Com, and former Harvard Business Review editor Nicholas G. Carr, author of "IT Doesn't Matter:"
  
  While I think Carr is just being sensationalist, he has some valid points. Nonetheless, even in this age of CIO reporting to CFOs, IT can definitely give an advantage. Try telling Wal-Mart that requiring RFID tagged pallets isn't a competitive advantage. The examples are myriad.
  
  However, I had to laugh at one of Metcalfe's assertions:
  
  "Unless his views are thoroughly debunked, Metcalfe said, 'today's current crop of MBAs will be running WordPerfect on 286s,' and American ingenuity will be 'strangled in the bassinet.' "
  
  Umm, there's really very little your typical MBA or other civilian needs in a word processor that couldn't be provided by a 286 running WordPerfect. Bob has inadvertently touched on one of the features of the IT explosion that undermines his point: pointless, inexorable feature bloat. I mean, really, who needs a word processor that has a 10MB executable and a 60MB disk footprint? Only a small percentage of users tap even 10 percent of MS Word's features.
  
  As a CIO said to me once, "Tell me the competitive advantage I got from upgrading from Excel 95 to 97?" Answer: precious little.
  
  If feature bloat is what's necessary to ensure a strangle-free existence for American ingenuity, God help us all.
  RFID Journal