Kevin Hoffman

Kindle Session at Cloud Expo Barnes and Noble just recently unveiled their upcoming eReader, the Nook. On the blog of my non-techy alter-ego I've posted a comparison of the two readers that is entirely based on my own personal feelings of what is cool and what isn't, so take it as opinion and certainly not as a technical review. So far I've remained relatively aloof from the whole "eBook" craze. Ordinarily, given my geeky background and borderline insane craving for technology, one would think that I'd be all over these things. The problem is, my love for the written word also extends to a love for the experience of reading a book. Click here to check out the blog post. Call me crazy, but I love the smudged thumbs I get from a 3-hour reading session where the real world ceased to exist and it was just me and my alternate reality, lovingly prepared for me by my fav... (more)

The Difference Between Web Hosting and Cloud Computing

Cloud Hosting Journal on Ulitzer Yesterday a friend of mine was asking me what I've been doing lately in my spare time. When I mentioned that I'd been doing a lot of messing around with Windows Azure, he was naturally curious. After explaining what Azure is, he asked me what the difference was between Windows Azure, a cloud computing environment, and traditional web hosting scenarios. On a really high level, he's got a valid point : With Azure you can develop your application offline locally and then when you're done you can publish it to a remote host. To the casual observer, th... (more)

Orcas' Hidden Gem - The Managed PNRP Stack

Kevin Hoffman's Blog Lately there's been a lot of buzz about Orcas. You keep hearing about Silverlight and the Entity Framework and Jasper and Astoria and who knows how many other code names. One of the things that you don't hear about is PNRP. Why? I haven't the faintest idea because this is some of the coolest stuff to surface as a .NET API since .NET 1.0 reshaped our opinion of streams. While experimenting with Orcas, I noticed that the PNRP (Peer Name Resolution Protocol) did in fact have a managed API. It is exposed through System.Net.PeerToPeer in the Beta 1 bits. PNRP is ba... (more)

My Appearance in the "RIA Shootout" on SYS-CON.TV

Click here to view this program Hopefully you saw me during the RIA Shootout that was held live yesterday from the Times Square TV Studio in the Reuters building. The panel discussion was all about RIAs, the future of RIAs, AJAX, where it's all headed and what the landscape looks like. In attendance were Java folks, a representative from Adobe who works in the Flex division, an open source advocate, Coach Wei (the founder of the OpenAJAX alliance and CTO/Founder of Nexaweb), and Roger Strukhoff, SYS-CON Publisher, who hosted and moderated the event. Oh, and me. I was there too :)... (more)

Apple Developer Connection Changed My Life

Kevin Hoffman's Blog Before I start into the editorial, here's a quick timeline for reference: January 2007 - Apple holds a Leopard Tech Talk in New York City. I attend and am absolutely blown away by what I see there. January 2007 (a week later) - I sign up for the Apple Developer Connection February 2007 - I purchase a 17" MacBook Pro June 2007 - I actually get to present at Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) February 2008 - I will be the track chair as well as a presenter at the iPhone Developer Summit in NYC (Part of AJAXWorld)Since I purchased my ADC subscription i... (more)