Blue Sky On Mars

I started the ball rolling on this a few weeks ago, and I’m thankful that some folks picked up that ball and ran with it. I’m reposting Matt Simmons’ announcement here:

The Michigan Python Users Group (MichiPUG) in conjunction with Google are happy to present: Google App Engine Hack-a-thon: Ann Arbor

What: An App Engine developer event for Google App Engine!

• Learn about Google App Engine: We will have talks on the major features of Google App Engine at different points throughout the day. We will run through developing an app with the SDK and show you how to deploy and manage applications on Google App Engine.
• Build With Us, or Build Your Own: You are welcome to bring along anything you can prepare ahead of time (sketches, designs, web page mock ups, etc.) and use the time and information provided to develop your idea into a working application, then share it with the world. Or, you can code along with us in building a Google App Engine application from start to finish.

Who: You! Your ideas and your enthusiasm complete the mix. We will assume some basic skills and preparation for the event, including an
existing knowledge of the Python programming language. We’ll provide power, copies of the SDK, and an awesome ambiance. Just bring yourself and your laptop. Some light snacks and beverages will be available, as will a pizza lunch. If you decide to bring extra food, please make sure it is computer friendly.

When: Monday Nov 17th, 2008 10AM-6PM

Where: Google’s Ann Arbor Office: 201 S. Division St. Ann Arbor, MI 48104

You can read more about previous hack-a-thons at the AppEngine blog
(http://googleappengine.blogspot.com)

RSVP for the Ann Arbor event with the link below.
http://hackathon.appspot.com/index.html?event=agloYWNrYXRob25yDAsSBUV2ZW50GLw2DA

Looking forward to seeing you there!

We’ve settled on a topic for the coming Michigan Python Users Group meeting: Google App Engine. We do not have a speaker, so this will be a combination of discussion and exploration. I have written some App Engine code, and I’m guessing that others that will be attending have, too, so it’s not all trial-and-error.

Following our usual formal (first Thursday of the month), the meeting will be on June 5th at 7PM at SRT Solutions in downtown Ann Arbor. There are parking structures nearby (4th and Washington and Liberty Square are both close), and there is usually free street parking on Ann Street near the police station.

See you there!

Isn’t quoting out of context great:

I hate computers.
[From Ian Bicking: App Engine: Commodity vs. Proprietary]

More seriously, though, in saying “I hate computers”, Ian is actually talking about the opposite of being a Luddite. He’s dreaming of a world in which much of computing just works in the background, so that we can spend our time doing more important and interesting things in the foreground.

I’m linking to Ian here because he’s said exactly what I have been thinking about App Engine: from a Python programming perspective the APIs are simple and clear. I can easily imagine a ZODB-based implementation of Google’s data store API. Just change your imports, and you can be off of Google’s infrastructure and on to your own.

Of course, for a great many people there won’t be any reason to be off of Google’s infrastructure. App Engine is just so darn easy. Amazon Web Services is impressive because it makes scalability affordable and available. App Engine interests me because, for its broad-but-still-limited set of use cases, it makes scalability a no brainer. “Build your app like this, and you never have to think of scaling” is a nice thought. I’ve been around enough to know that people using App Engine will still have to think of scaling some, but not nearly as much as with just about any other solution.

Back to the lock-in aspect, though. I still see App Engine as likely to be utterly unsuccessful with large businesses. That is, until a new Google Appliance comes out. I’ve been predicting such a beast since Google Docs was first introduced, and I think App Engine makes it all the more likely. I still believe that there will come a time when Google will sell boxes to big companies that those companies can toss into some racks on their networks and deploy App Engine apps locally, as well as run Google Docs on their private nets. Things will get even more interesting at that point.

You can bet that Amazon is studying App Engine closely and considering their own high-level service as I write this. From a developer’s perspective, this competition is going to be awesome.

It occurred to me just now that Google App Engine and Amazon Web Services are only barely in competition right now. If you want an infinite storage system like AWS S3 in App Engine, you need to code it yourself (ignoring the preview limits App Engine currently has). If you want to deploy apps as easily as you can with App Engine in AWS, you need a bunch of infrastructure that AWS does not provide.

I’m happy to see that App Engine’s datastore is transactional, unlike SimpleDB. I didn’t see anything in my skim of some docs about whether App Engine has eventual consistency or if you can immediately pull out data that you stuff in. My guess is that you can immediately pull out the data you shove in. This is a win over SimpleDB, in my opinion.

App Engine is just tons higher-level than AWS. Of course, you can host anything you want in AWS. But, by trading away a bunch of that flexibility, Google has made a service that allows people to build apps that scale well with a minimum of fuss.

Google’s App Engine has been released. This is much cooler than just opening up BigTable for outside access (which is what TechCrunch reported over the weekend). One big difference between App Engine and Amazon Web Services is that the The Development Environment lets you build an app locally, including Google’s auth API and datastore. That’s very clever. You can build up an app completely and then deploy it when ready.

Or, in the case of the preview period, when you get an account… which, sadly, I didn’t. I rather wish there was a bit more information about when more developer slots will be opened. It would be a shame to create a cool app and have to sit on it for months. It would also be nice to know what pricing will look like, but given what they are giving away for free, I’m guessing it will not be unreasonable.

Overall, I’ve got to say that it looks like a great service on the surface.