RE: Where is IBM?

-----Original Message-----
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Having lots of cheap RAM and disk have interesting consequences that 
have yet to play out. Some researchers propose doing away with 
databases on hard disks and keeping gigabytes of data in RAM memory. 
The rationale seems to be the impedence mismatch between objects and 
database rows. By keeping everything in memory, you can maintain the 
data more easily in an object model. This also meshes nicely with 
the single level store model. But then again, you still have to 
address the issue of communicating with other systems and saving the 
objects to persistent store for backup purposes.
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        Hans, I believe the next quantum leap of technology will be the 
'diskless' system.
        Not an easy task, but as you alluded to in your write up, the cost of 
memory is dropping so dramatically
        I can envision a computer, with perhaps 20 tera bytes of memory, and no 
disk.
        Impossible you say...isn't that what makes technology so attractive, 
overcoming the impossible...
Ken