Byte Into It blog: October 2009

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Friday, October 30, 2009

Ubuntu 9.10 Officially Released

palegray.net writes "The latest version of Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala) has been released. Offering numerous enhancements for both desktop and server environments, this release includes notable features like Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud images, the Ubuntu One 'personal cloud,' and Linux kernel version 2.6.31. Please be sure to use a release mirror close to your geographic location to help reduce the stress on Ubuntu's primary servers; using BitTorrent for downloads can help alleviate the load even more. If your organization has adequate network and server resources, please consider hosting a mirror as well."

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Google Redefines GPS Navigation Landscape: Google Maps Navigation For Android 2.0

If you weren't sure about switching to an Android phone in the near future, this might put you over the edge. Google Maps Navigation is an absolutely killer app. And it is only available for Android 2.0 phones.

Today is Droid day, and for the most part Google is taking a backseat and letting their partners get most of the attention. But Droid is the first Android phone to run Android 2.0, and Google Maps Navigation is clearly the early trophy app for those devices.

Google Maps already has 50 million active users across various mobile phones, says Google. But what users have today isn't even close to the new Navigation product.

First off, it's connected, which puts it ahead of all but a tiny percentage of in-car navigation systems which have no Internet connectivity (Dash is a notable exception).

The application is also completely free. So all those paid navigation apps (Navigon, TomTom, CoPilot, MapQuest, GoKivo and Sygic Mobile) are at an immediate disadvantage.

But even if Google charged for this app, it would still win hands down. The features include easy search (no need for address), voice search, traffic information (from data sources and crowd sourced from app), and street view close up pictures when you get near your destination. And the car dock mode gives bigger, simpler icons and auto-voice mode (see video):

Search in plain English. No need to know the address. You can type a business name (e.g. "starbucks") or even a kind of a business (e.g. "thai restaurant"), just like you would on Google.

Search by voice. Speak your destination instead of typing (English only): "Navigate to the de Young Museum in San Francisco".

Traffic view. An on-screen indicator glows green, yellow, or red based on the current traffic conditions along your route. A single touch on the indicator toggles a traffic view that shows the traffic ahead.

Search along route. Search for any kind of business along your route, or turn on popular layers such as gas stations, restaurants, or parking.

Satellite view. View your route overlaid on 3D satellite views with Google's high-resolution aerial imagery.

Street View. Visualize turns overlaid on Google's Street View imagery. Navigation automatically switches to Street View as you approach your destination.

Car dock mode. For certain devices, placing your phone in a car dock activates a special mode that makes it easy to use your device at arm's length.

Here's Navigation in the Droid dock, followed by an image gallery for the app:

Video Demo Of Google Maps Navigation

Official Google Navigation Video

Screenshot Gallery Of Google Maps Navigation

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

[link to original | source: TechCrunch | published: 9 hours ago | shared via feedly]

Mozilla’s Raindrop Looks To Make Your Inbox Personal Again

Mozilla Labs, Mozilla's innovation group, has developed a new open-source, experimental email and communication platform called Raindrop. Mozilla says that Raindrop was built to be focused on highlighting and breaking out personal conversations, making it easier for you to see all of your conversations in one client. It is designed to "bubble up" the important conversations from your messages

According to the site, Raindrop "is an effort that starts by trying to understand today's web of conversations, and aims to design an interface that helps people get a handle on their digital world." Still in prototype form, the platform is very young but it aims categorize messages and then separate the personal messages from bulk messages, so you know what to respond to vs. just noting a communication. So Raindrop will import all of your email, but break out your personalized email from your mailing list emails and will portray the personal emails higher on the page. Raindrop will also separate direct messages and @replies from your stream, acting like a Twitter client And you'll be able to Tweet from the platform and pull in RSS feeds.

I briefly spoke with one of Raindrop's lead engineer's and the CEO of Mozilla Messaging, David Ascher, who told me that in the future iterations the platform should include all types of messaging, including IM, Facebook, FriendFeed, YouTube and basically, any communication with an open API. And according to the site, content with in communications, such as links from YouTube or Flickr should be shown near or as part of the message, rather than in a separate tab. Ascher said that Raindrop doesn't really aim to replace your Gmail account but add to it with an intelligent way to understand your communications. The application works on Firefox, Safari and Chrome.

Mozilla also wants to developers to build applications off of Raindrop and is releasing its API to help users customize their communications experiences. The back-end of the platform is a non-relational database (CouchDB) which was optimized for massive web interactions. The front-end, says Ascher, uses high-powered JavaScript libraries, modern CSS to give your best browser with the platform. Ascher told me that Raindrop is still very, very early stage but the platform will continue to evolve with time.

It takes page from social media messaging aggregation services like FriendFeed but with a strong focus in filtering. It will be interesting to see what two-way interactions the platform will feature and what content it eventually will bring in. Because its a modern communication system, it could compete with open communications platform Google Wave.

If you're confused, take a look at the video. It explains the purpose of Raindrop pretty well.

Raindrop UX Design and Demo from Mozilla Messaging on Vimeo.

Full disclosure: My husband works for the Mozilla Corp.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

[link to original | source: TechCrunch | published: 6 days ago | shared via feedly]

Discover Music

[link to original | source: www.google.com | via: feedly]

Lord Mandelson sets date for blocking filesharers' internet connections | Technology | guardian.co.uk

[link to original | source: www.guardian.co.uk | via: feedly]

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Syntax DemoParty 2009 : Melbourne, Australia

[link to original | source: www.syntaxparty.org | via: feedly]

Telstra is trapped - Alan Kohler - News - Business Spectator

[link to original | source: www.businessspectator.com.au | via: feedly]

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Amazon Releases Relational Database As A Service - My Initial Thoughts | CloudAve

[link to original | source: www.cloudave.com | via: feedly]

iTWire - Netflix coming to PS3 via Blu-ray

[link to original | source: www.itwire.com | via: feedly]

Friday, October 23, 2009

CIA Invests In Social Media Monitoring Technology -- Web Monitoring -- InformationWeek

[link to original | source: www.informationweek.com | via: feedly]

Google To Take On ITunes?

An anonymous reader writes 'Multiple sources say Google is preparing to launch Google Audio. According to people familiar with the matter, Google has been securing content from record companies. Is Google about to go head-to-head with Apple's iTunes?'

App Turns iPhone Into Dime Jukebox | Epicenter | Wired.com

[link to original | source: www.wired.com | via: feedly]

It's not just Bing - Google makes Twitter search deal, too

[link to original | source: www.downloadsquad.com | via: feedly]

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Is it Windows 7 or KDE 4?: Insight - Software - ZDNet Australia

[link to original | source: www.zdnet.com.au | via: feedly]

Red Hat share price trumps Microsoft's - News - PC Authority

[link to original | source: www.pcauthority.com.au | via: feedly]

Light Peak - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[link to original | source: en.wikipedia.org | via: feedly]

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

50 most annoying things about the internet - Telegraph

[link to original | source: www.telegraph.co.uk | via: feedly]

Instapaper

[link to original | source: www.instapaper.com | via: feedly]

Xmarks | Bookmark Sync and Search

[link to original | source: www.xmarks.com | via: feedly]

Google Fast Flip

[link to original | source: fastflip.googlelabs.com | via: feedly]

‘I’m tired of your analogue attitude’ - mUmBRELLA

[link to original | source: mumbrella.com.au | via: feedly]

Microsoft Unveils SharePoint 2010 -- InformationWeek

[link to original | source: www.informationweek.com | via: feedly]

Zoho Projects Now Integrated With Google Apps

Web-based productivity suite Zoho has continued to integrate its products with Google in order to make it easier to use Gmail and Zoho apps simultaneously. Last summer, Zoho, a web-based software suite that includes document, project and invoicing management tools, integrated Google and Yahoo sign-ins, allowing users to sign into Zoho using a Google or Yahoo account. And over the summer, Zoho is launched sign-in integration with Google Apps, letting users login to Zoho using their Google Apps credentials. Today, Zoho's project collaboration product, Zoho Projects, will become an extended application to Google Apps.

Zoho Projects is a team collaboration and project management application that allows teams to plan, track and collaborate on everyday activities and big projects with external customers. With the new integration, Google Apps users can login to Zoho Projects using their Google Apps sign-in info. Users can then upload their documents from Google Docs to Zoho Projects directly. Any tasks, meetings or activities in Zoho Project will automatically bee updated in Google Calendar. And Zoho Projects gadgets can be embedded within Gmail, iGoogle and any other OpenSocial compatible sites.

The integration comes on the heels of the initial roll out of Google's own all-in-one, futuristic collaboration tool, Google Wave. But despite facing competition from the big guns like Microsoft and Google, Zoho continues to remain as a player in the document management space thanks to continuous innovations and iterations to its products. It's almost reminiscent of Salesforce.com's strategy.

In fact, because of this highly competitive landscape, integrations are vital to the software's success as an application suite. Recently, Zoho launched integration with Microsoft Sharepoint as well as with Microsoft Access. Zoho's project management application, Zoho Projects 2.0, also added the capability to import existing projects from MS Project, Microsoft's project management desktop software. And Zoho also launched a forum tool, called Zoho Discussions. It looks like the startup's strategy is paying off—Zoho has been able to accumulate 2 million users in just 4 years.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

[link to original | source: TechCrunch | published: 1 day ago | shared via feedly]

The Kindle Killer Arrives

GeekZilla sends coverage from Wired's Gadget Lab on the Nook, Barnes & Noble's first e-book reader. "Sleek, stylish and runs the Android OS. What's not to like about Barnes and Noble's new e-book reader? Despite the odd name, the Nook looks like an eBook reader that would actually be a worthwhile investment. Best feature? The ability to loan e-books you have downloaded to other Nook owners. The reader, named the 'Nook,' looks a lot like Amazon's white plastic e-book, only instead of the chiclet-keyboard there is a color multi-touch screen, to be used as both a keyboard or to browse books, cover-flow style. The machine runs Google's Android OS, will have wireless capability from an unspecified carrier, and comes in at the same $260 as the now rather old-fashioned-looking Kindle." Here is the B&N Nook site, which is still not visible on their front page and has a few non-working links. (Nook.com isn't set up yet.) Their comparison page takes dead aim at the Kindle. Among the advantages in the Nook's column: Wi-Fi, expandable memory via microSD, MP3 player, and PDF compatibility. (But remember the cautionary note B&N struck six years back when they got out of the e-book business.)