Apple/Genentech BLAST Boosts Performance 21
chobee tells us that Apple and Genentech have released an implementation of BLAST, a popular bioinformatics tool, for G4s running Mac OS X. The blastn tool of Apple/Genentech BLAST, used for finding similarities between nucleotide sequences, has been optimized to deliver up to five times the performance of the standard implementation, using the power of the Velocity Engine on the G4. Source code and binaries are available.
Cool (Score:2, Funny)
BTW, first post?
Kinda old news (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Kinda old news (Score:1)
This is Apple courting other markets (Score:4, Interesting)
This is smart business.
Even if Apple doesn't have grand designs to take over the enterprise server market, they're definitely going to gain mindshare in the grad student/corporate researcher community with tactics like this. And corporate research can mean big money, especially if a genetics lab decides to purchase a few hundred dual-GHz boxen and set them up as a Beow.... er, cluster.
If this happened, suddenly other institutions would sit up and perhaps take notice of a) the versatility of OS X, b) the ease of use of OS X, and c) the TCO advantage Macs have. I think this is very canny marketing by Apple, working on markets where they already had their foot in the door and trying to open that door a bit more. There's no way OS X Server (given appropriate hardware to run on) would displace Linux/Sun/MS in any Enterprise overnight - but with a few years of incubation and hardening in a research environment, it could have the technological and mindshare boost it needs to attempt a takeover.
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:2)
Hmm. I don't think it's about gaining mindshare. Apple already has mindshare in the sciences. There are more Macs at a nearby medical school and center for research in molecular biology* than there are anything else.
I think this is more about Apple continuing to focus on its core markets: consumers buying computers for the first time (the iMacs and iBooks), creative arts pros, scientists, and other similar segments (the Power Mac G4), and snobs with too much money (the TiBook).
Okay, that last one was a joke born out of jealousy for my friends TiBook.
Of course, taking a market where you already are doing well and just trouncing your competition is great for company, customer, and shareholder morale. So yeah, it's definitely good business.
I'm just glad Apple is continuing to spread the message that there's more to desktop computing than salespeople with PCs running Act, Word, and Excel.
* I have omitted the name of the school to preserve my last shreds of privacy.
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:1)
Okay, that last one was a joke born out of jealousy for my friends TiBook.
Thanks alot! I went into the deepest debt I have even been in to get TiBook, and now you insult me!?! *sniff*
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:1)
That 20 second rule is annoying.
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:1, Interesting)
During the 80's Apple made it a point to be as anti-corporate as possible. Remember the "Lemmings" and "1984" commercials? At that point, they were so reliant on the Education market they could afford to thumb their noses at the corporate market. However the tables have now turned and Windows is moving into the education market at a fast pace. Apple needs to not only reclaim portions of the education merket, but get new users from the scientific and corporate communities to build their marketshare.
I am known for being an avid ABMer and after 3+ years of preaching to others about the superiority of the Mac, I have finally convinced 2 people in recent weeks to purchase Apple systems.
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:1)
Apple will be around for some time to come. I don't think anyone really understands the market niche they're occupying, but clearly they are somewhere, because they've been around this long and have $4 billion in the bank.
Re:This is Apple courting other markets (Score:1)
I convinced a coworker to order one of the sexy new iMacs rather than an intel box. She's still waiting for it to be deliveried, but I feel that she made a wise decisions.
Inside the (infinite) loop (Score:3, Interesting)
-adso
Karma Spanking on apple.slashdot.org (Score:1)
I submitted this to Slashdot on Feb.7! The day the Press Release came out! And I got nothing for it! Waaaaahhhhh!!!!!
See the release at Yahoo [yahoo.com]
BLAST parallelized for OS X (Score:1)