Everything is just beginning
Editor’s note: This article is from “The brain body” ( ID: unity007), author Tibetan fox.
In this round of technology, whether it is the underlying development ecology, the hardware foundation of computing power, or the variety of commercialized landing scenarios, Chinese companies have unquestionable verbal output capabilities. Another long-standing pain in China’s ICT industry, the domestic operating system, has also experienced a globally focused military parade at the 2019 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC).
Therefore, re-entering the self-developed operating system and even becoming a world-class, it has become a major problem that Chinese technology companies are striving for. What is the face of the Chinese operating system camp today? How can the global ICT industry be stirred up? This is what we hope to explore at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference.
The evolution of domestic operating systems
I believe that most people can’t deny the reality that information intelligence terminals are part of the human body. The operating system that grasps every interaction between human and machine has naturally become an important symbol of industrial authority.
Unfortunately, from the PC era to the mobile Internet, the localization of the operating system has been particularly difficult.
Simple combing, we will find that the domestic operating system has experienced two bitter growth:
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From scratch
From the 1980s, personal computers entered the Chinese market, and the desktop Internet flourished. In the following years, Windows is the global PC market. China’s IT industry can only follow the footsteps of Microsoft’s operating system. Whether it is the technical ability and cognitive time difference of the practitioners, or the overall development and testing environment, it is not enough to support the Chinese IT industry to prosper in independent research and development.
Until 2001, the national power united industry and academic circles (China National Defense Science and Technology University, ChinaSoft, Lenovo, Inspur, National Star), launched the earliest commercial closed source operating system – Kylin OS (Kylin OS), it is startedThe first shot of the domestic operating system.
After several years, there have been several successes such as Wei Ke Leen Linux, starting point operating system, condensed meteorite security operating system, creating Linux, Sipu, Zhongke Fangde desktop, Puhua Linux, Zhongxing new fulcrum, etc. Domestic operating system solution.
Overall, the new system seems to be emerging in this phase, but on the one hand, it is based on the variant of the open source system Linux, which is improved and enhanced, such as the Red Flag Linux widely used on ATM machines; meanwhile, Windows The siphon effect of talents is too strong, and the software and hardware manufacturers have also formed a stable interest linkage, resulting in the domestic system simply can not obtain enough upstream and downstream resources of the industrial chain, so it can only be a small fight, many systems Plus is not comparable to the market equivalent of Microsoft.
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Aspirations
The rise of mobile smart terminals represented by mobile phones seems to be a key historical moment for the loss of the PC system. However, until last year, the operating system of mobile Internet terminals was still firmly in the hands of Apple IOS and Google Android.
It is worth noting that at this stage, domestic operating systems are not collectively weak. In fact, during this period, not only Huawei Hess, Zhongxing International and other semiconductor manufacturers have launched their own self-developed Kirin processors; mobile phone manufacturers represented by “China Cool Alliance” and Internet giants such as BAT have also successively Joined a third-party ROM and tried to get a share of the operating system. The domestic mobile phone manufacturers who need to develop based on the Android mobile phone architecture and interface, naturally also intelligently make small innovations on the Android system, such as Xiaomi’s MIUI.
马Under the effect of too, the domestic operating system has neither the ecological appeal of software developers nor the support from mobile phone hardware manufacturers. Naturally, it has not won much voice, and independent research and development has gradually stopped with the collapse of commercial value.
Reviewing the past experience of the Chinese operating system, we can find two trends that are also happy and sad: First, the industrial base is getting deeper, and the technology research and development talents, commercial power, software and hardware facilities are gradually growing; second, they are losing successively. Ecology, whether it is a computer system, a commercial operating system, or a smart phone system, has had many bright spots, but it has been quietly swallowed up by the giant’s constantly prospering and optimized ecosystem.
Starting again: heading to the “no man’s land” on the AI foundation
From the PC Internet to the mobile Internet, it can be said that the domestic operating system has formed an unfavorable picture of being stuck at the neck. But obviously, after the long-term suppression of the basic system design in these 30 years, in the face of this AI boom, Chinese technology companies are more alert and more energetic.
First of all, unlike the mobile Internet, AI puts higher demands on cloud computing. The tightly coupled monopoly advantage of WINTEL is disappearing, and the Chinese cloud service providers with latecomer advantages have the opportunity to re-create through the cloud operating system. Divide the market structure. For example, Huawei Cloud began to explore the virtualization infrastructure system FusionCompute for cloud computing. In contrast, Microsoft just merged Windows into the cloud computing department last year.
In addition, the rise of massive IoT devices and new smart terminals such as automobiles is attracting a steady stream of development teams to explore new ideas, car networking and other smart terminal operating systems in games, interaction, life, entertainment and more. Interconnected with IoT devices, there is also a huge wealth of “eggs”.
More importantly, due to the scattered scenes, the interactive experience requires higher compliance between the system and the users, and needs to be closely related to the hardware and software vendors in the smart infrastructure field. Therefore, intelligence like the Internet of Vehicles Terminals, unlike PCs and smartphones, were initially smashed by overseas technology giants.
It can be said that it is the only way for Chinese manufacturers to circumvent the traditional terminal operating system market that the beasts are waiting for, and to enter the “no man’s land” of these intelligent eras.
For example, Google launched the “The Physical Web” project in 2014, trying to open up the interaction between smart devices and mobile phones, tablets and other terminals.Soft also launched an operating system called Windows 10 IoT Core (IoT Core Edition), Huawei also turned to an IoT device to create a 10KB operating system. In other words, today’s Internet of Things field under IAOT+5G still leaves a huge space for Chinese companies to imagine.
Similarly, the intelligent process of the Internet of Vehicles has also brought the industry’s focus to the track of the operating system from the competition for “screen”. Because it not only needs to rethink the logic of human-computer interaction, but also the long-sleeved dance in the broader field of life service, auto-driving, and road coordination.
To achieve such a powerful function, the difficulty is to let the IT and CT industry roles such as car companies, vehicle terminal manufacturers, telecom operators, software and hardware developers, and cloud service providers interweave in an unprecedented way. User habits are obviously not a day’s work. Domestic vehicle terminal manufacturers such as Zebra Network began to deploy as early as 2015.
History has proven that each independent terminal operating system is likely to grow an independent developer ecosystem, fostering prosperous applications and services that further stimulate the growth of hardware terminals and derivatives. In other words, the “no-man’s land” of the operating system is very likely to become a future industrial value town.
This also makes us start to care about, what challenges are Chinese technology vendors facing in these areas, and what results have they achieved?
Intensive Oasis: The “Chinese Age” of the operating system has just begun
Before we mentioned that the 2019 World Artificial Intelligence Conference is a military parade of a domestic operating system.
The reason for this is that the leading manufacturers who are currently moving to the “no-man’s land” are all present. We can also observe closely and comprehensively that Chinese technology companies are making smart life from the bottom system level. What shape. Also hide the domestic operating system wants to overtake a car, what do you need to do?
For example, challenge the commanding heights of the underlying technology. The most fundamental thing for a domestic operating system to develop is the solidity and leading edge of technology. For example, in addition to the core, end, and cloud levels, Huawei is constantly seeking breakthroughs and integrations, and empowering the basic operating system. At the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, it also proposes new algorithms for improving the computing power of optical computing, and solving the data explosion problem with gene storage. Technical concept. Chinese technology companyStarting to lead the way in cutting-edge technology, it is not a prerequisite for the new operating system to be born.
For example, the integration of the industrial chain, and constantly build the experience of the operating system “city pool.”
In the current operating system, the hardware system and the software ecosystem are highly bundled, and often need to communicate across terminals, which not only easily causes a break in the experience, but also puts higher requirements on the security of information.
At present, Tesla, a manufacturer with the ability to develop an independent intelligent system, will directly install and test the vehicle system and the car at the factory. In China, more host manufacturers choose to cooperate with smart vendors with low-level operating system development capabilities to integrate operating systems and vehicles.
With the head operating system AliOS as an example, Zema Zhixing has developed a complete set of in-vehicle systems for the automotive end based on the technical foundation of Ali YUNOS. Through in-depth cooperation with host manufacturers such as SAIC, it is completed at the factory. Software and hardware packages. This will allow the intelligent system to fully integrate the manufacturer’s OBD (on-board diagnostic system), and make the system more autonomous and controllable, and return the initiative to the owner.
More importantly, although the cloud operating system and smart car operating system are still in the early stage of development, the leader has already absorbed the experience of the PC mobile era and actively opened up its own technical architecture. At the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, we saw giants such as BAT, Huawei, platform, Zebra and vertical industry representatives attach great importance to ecological partners.
This has caused the domestic operating system to share the latest technological achievements with the industry and quickly optimize the user experience of the car. At the same time, it can strengthen the community and build a coverage link, terminal, application service and many other links. The complete ecosystem. The more hardware and software vendors that support their systems, the higher the replacement cost in the future, and the subsequent ecological services will have a broader soil. This is the grand scene that has not been seen for the past forty years.
An academician Ni Guangnan who has been running for domestic chips and operating systems for many years, once said with anxiety, if you do not seize the opportunity, the domestic terminal operating systemThere is no chance to do it. It seems that these warriors who are struggling to find an oasis in the desert are opening the door to a domestic operating system called Hope.