Byte Into It - 25 Feb 09

Asus planning to port Android to netbooks - Hardware - iTnews Australia

Asus is planning to port Android, Google's operating system designed for phones, onto netbooks.

According to an interview with Bloomberg Asus has allocated a squad of engineers to put the operating system onto its range of netbooks.

Asus kicked off the netbook market with the EeePC and retains a market position.

Initially Asius only offered netbooks running Linux but Microsoft has been quick to move into the sector and now licenses Windows XP to netbooks, getting it 85 per cent of that market, albeit at the cost of reduced royalty charges.

“With the strength of Google behind it, Android could really challenge Microsoft and steal some market share,” said Calvin Huang, a computer-industry analyst at Daiwa Securities Group Inc. in Taipei.

“The benefit is the free license and you can use a lower-power, cheaper processor.”

Google originally designed the Android operating system for mobile phones but the Linux-based system is proving flexible enough to be ported to a variety of platforms.

Microsoft reveals details of Gazelle browser - Internet - iTnews Australia

Microsoft researchers are working on a new browser called Gazelle which it promises will have some impressive new features and capabilities.

The firm released a research paper (PDF) late last week, saying that the new browser would offer significant security improvements compared to other browsers, including Internet Explorer.

"No existing browsers, including new architectures like Internet Explorer 8, Google Chrome and OP, have a multi-principal operating system construction that gives a browser-based operating system the exclusive control to manage the protection of all system resources among web site principals," Microsoft said in the report.

The browser will change this tradition by being built on its own kernel, in effect allowing it to operate as an operating system.

This means that Gazelle could intelligently identify traffic and react to anything malicious.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Easy login plans gather pace

Plans for a system that would allow people to use one username and password across the internet have moved closer with a number of popular sites agreeing to the scheme in recent weeks.

Earlier this month Facebook became the most recent site to sign up to OpenID, joining the board of the scheme that provides users with a single digital identity which can then be used across many websites.

Microsoft and Google were early adopters of the single sign-on scheme, and have since been joined by the likes of AOL, Yahoo, IBM and PayPal.

"The idea is that just as you can use e-mail anywhere on the web to sign up for a new service, you should be able to do the same thing with an Open ID - but without having to create a new password," Chris Messina, an Open ID board member told BBC World Service's Digital Planet programme.

'Reusable and durable'

Mr Messina, who describes himself as a "social web advocate," said that Open ID would be much more convenient than the current system of individuals having to create separate accounts for each website they visit.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Quake boosts browser video games

Classic game Quake III will be re-released for the web browser on Tuesday, highlighting the rapid development in web games.

It runs inside browsers after the installation of a software plug-in.

"It is a significant step which proves browser games can be sophisticated," said Michael French, editor of games industry magazine Develop.

Quake Live is a version of a PC game which was first launched in 1999.

The game is being released free of charge for browsers by id Software, and is supported by advertising. It opens to the public as a beta later on Tuesday.

BBC NEWS | Health | Game consoles 'cause skin sores'

A new skin disorder caused by use of games consoles has been identified by skin specialists.

The condition, dubbed PlayStation palmar hidradenitis, is described in the British Journal of Dermatology.

Researchers outline the case of a 12-year-old girl who attended a Swiss hospital with intensely painful sores on the palms of her hands.

The girl, who had been using a games console regularly, recovered fully after 10 days of abstinence.

The 30 best features of Windows 7 - Features - PC Authority

After the disappointment - perceived or otherwise - of Windows Vista, many are pinning their hopes on a revival with Windows 7. And from our first impressions of the pre-beta code, that's exactly what they can expect.

Microsoft readies new Windows 7 and Vista releases - News - PC Authority

New updates for Windows 7 beta and reports of impending Vista SP2 Release Candidate emerge.

Microsoft has announced it is to release new updates for PCs running the Windows 7 beta next week, whilst at the same time seeding the Release Candidate build of Service Pack 2 for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 to a select group of testers.

In a posting on The Windows Blog, Windows 7 manager Brandon LeBlanc said the firm would be releasing up to five test updates on February 24, which “will allow us to test and verify our ability to deliver and mange the updating of Windows 7”.

LeBlanc was keen to emphasise that the updates would not deliver new features or bug fixes and would merely “replace system files with the same version of the file currently on the system”.

Users will need to manually install the updates through Windows Update, he added.

But as Windows 7 took a step closer to a full release, Microsoft has been busy preparing for a Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 SP2 release, according to reports.

The Ars Technica site said the Vista SP2 RC, build 6002.16670.090130, was released to Microsoft Connect testers and will soon be made available to a broader range of testers via the Windows Update site.

Vista SP2 will include all previous updates and patches for the operating system, the site reported. There have also been reports of “significant performance improvements” over SP1, although SP2 RC contains 691 hotfixes, said Ars Technica.

Users panic as Google Mail goes down - News - PC Authority

Google's Gmail service was down on Tuesday morning, leaving many users with no access to their email, calendar or contact information..

Users of micro-blogging site Twitter complained that they could not load the site.

One Gmail user wrote on Twitter: "Seriously Gmail...I had some things to do this morning with you. You let me down. Hard."

Others talked of having to revert back to Lotus notes and other email accounts, while offline Gmail users celebrated still having access.

Meanwhile, Microsoft used the opportunity to poach users from its rival. " Need a new email account? Take a look at windowslive.co.uk - awesome!", twittered Mel Carson, Microsoft's advertising community blogger.

Google said that it is working on the problem, and has not yet determined the cause. A statement is due shortly.

A running script of problems Twitter users are having with their Google accounts can be seen here.

Internode FTTH speed offensive in greenfield estates - Internet - iTnews Australia

Internode will deliver 100Mbps retail fibre-to-the-home services over the OptiComm network to around a dozen 'greenfield' suburbs nationwide.

The ISP said it would partner with OptiComm to offer the services in Fernbrooke estate, which is located 32km southwest of the Brisbane CBD, and at the Lochiel Park and Northgate developments in South Australia, among others.

Fernbrooke comprises approximately 1,000 homes in the development.

Internode said it would offer FTTH services at 25, 50 and 100 megabits per second.

The plans start at plans $49.95 a month for 25Mbps downstream speeds and a five gigabyte download quota.

New Zealand's terrible copyright law suspended, may be dead - Boing Boing

treet demonstrations, netwide campaigns, unfavorable press attention and sustained lobbying have moved the New Zealand government to temporarily suspend its new copyright law, which would have required ISPs to terminate their customers' net access on the basis of three unsubstantiated accusations of infringement.

It remains to be seen whether the law is truly dead,

On the demise of books, newspapers, music and movies - Boing Boing

Information Week's Internet Evolution's just published Cory Doctorow's article, "Media-Morphosis: How the Internet Will Devour, Transform, or Destroy Your Favorite Medium" -- a noodle on the factors that led to the demise of newspapers, the transformation of music, and the potential destruction of big budget movies and mass-market publishing (and what can be done about the last one):

Big-budget movies (BBMs) require a lot of capital and rely on studios controlling the rate and nature of distribution of the finished product. If you're going to recoup your $300 million box-office turd, you need to move a hell of a lot of DVDs, TV licenses, foreign exhibition, Happy Meal toys, and assorted "secondary" revenues.

Let's be realistic here: Nothing anyone does is going to make it harder to get movies when you want them, where you want them, and at whatever price you feel you should pay for them (including free). And the harder you crack down on Internet movie-downloading, the more attractive you make buying pirate DVDs from criminals on the street -- a virtually zero-risk transaction that directly displaces DVD purchases.

Application lets Mac users save audio from Flash files - Ars Technica

DRM and content protection schemes don't always last very long these days, as enterprising individuals tend to find ways pretty quickly to get past the protection and get to the juicy nugget of content in the center. The latest content nuggets up for grabs are the wealth of music videos available on YouTube. MakeUseOf has the details of an application called iExtractMP3, which allows users to pull the audio from Flash files like those found on many sites.

YouTube already includes functionality that lets you buy the music found in certain videos, but some people just aren't willing to shell out the cash. YouTube and most other sites also have their content in FLV (Flash Video) format, and as you might expect, these files contain both video and audio information. FLV files can also be downloaded without a lot of effort, after which iExtractMP3 takes over. The software splits the audio and video tracks in FLV files, and saves the audio track separately. The application doesn't actually transcode the audio, meaning that there's no change of quality. This can be both good and bad, given the audio quality of some YouTube files.

OmniWeb and three other Omni apps set free, as in beer - Ars Technica

The Omni Group, those loveable guys behind OmniWeb, has announced that it's setting free four of its previously for-pay Mac applications. As of today, OmniDazzle, OmniDiskSweeper, OmniObjectMeter, and, of course, the Mac web browser with a cult-like following, OmniWeb, are now free to the public, fully-functioning and sans license.

Safari 4 how-to: Top Sites Browser in a nutshell - Ars Technica

Safari 4's Top Sites Browser probably represents its splashiest and most appealing new feature. The browser offers a visual wall of your most frequently visited Web addresses, with a thumbnail preview of each site. Just click on any item to jump to the page in question. But there's a lot more to your Top Sites wall than first appears. Here's a quick run-down of the Top Sites browser and how you can get the most from this new Safari 4 feature.