Month: April 2008

A recent announcement from Dell and a BBC report, outline that sales of Linux based computer have experienced a year of constant growth. Linux is rebounding, at least for non Wal-Mart customers, among end-users for several reasons. Let’s take a look at some of these.

Both end-users and organizations are largely unhappy with the latest version of Windows OS, Windows Vista, which has been perceived more as a theme-pack for Windows XP than as a new operating system. It has been said to be slower, to require more resources and to have still lots of bugs. Bill Gates has announced in fact that a new edition of Window, version 7, will be released in one year time.

On top of this, many computer producers, Dell is an example, decided to offer the option to buy PC and notebook with Ubuntu pre-installed – a user friendly Linux distribution. This allows them to lower the final price, offering cheaper but competitive products. The reason behind a general lower price is not only because Linux is free and almost all its programs are as well. This operating system tends to require fewer resources so that the hardware used doesn’t necessarily have to be the latest, cutting edge kit.

On top of these two main factors, the security side also plays a big role in favor of Linux. The threat of virus spread via P2P and other Internet technologies is greatly reduced, as not only are there far fewer viruses and Trojans designed to attack Linux, the kernel (or core) or the operating system is inherently more stable than that of Windows.

Last but not least, the availability of software like Wine and Cedega, allows users to emulate the Windows environment in order to run games and programs they couldn’t otherwise run. Consider it just as an option for specific programs you can’t find a Linux version of or for games. To be clearer, it will be much faster to use Linux OpenOffice rather then using Windows MS Office with Wine on Linux. But for specific apps, like phone managers, 3D games etc, Wine or Cedega are better.

While the prestigious Web 2.0 Expo got underway in San Francisco yesterday, a new report claims that Web 2.0 is set for record investment as it revolutionises business over the next 5 years. Tech research group Forrester claim that around $5 billion will be spent on Web 2.0 by 2013 and it will represent a “fundamentally new way” for companies to do business.

The report claims that behind this drive will not just be developers but multinational giants such as General Motors and McDonald’s which have already embraced tools like blogs, RSS feeds, podcasting and social networking tools. The report analysed seven Web 2.0 categories: blogs, mashups, podcasting, RSS, social networking, widgets and wikis. It found that social networking tools will attract the greatest levels of investment but even that will be dwarfed by the multi million dollar revenues the software industry commands.

Report analyst Oliver Young told the BBC that this boom will quickly level out however:

Companies are now looking over their shoulder to the business market where even revenues of $50 per user per month are looking increasingly appealing. However, there will come a saturation point and investment will start to slow down as Web 2.0 applications become increasingly prevalent and absorbed into collaborative software packages.

You can follow all the latest news and exciting Web 2.0 developments in the pipeline in the Web 2.0 Expo newsroom here.

Microsoft have announced via Microsoft Technet that they have released Service Pack 3 and users can expect updates at the end of this month.

Chris Keroack, Release Manager of Windows XP Service Pack 3 said in the announcement:

Today we are happy to announce that Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) has released to manufacturing (RTM). Windows XP SP3 bits are now working their way through our manufacturing channels to be available to OEM and Enterprise customers. We are also in the final stages of preparing for release to the web (i.e. you!) on April 29th, via Windows Update and the Microsoft Download Center. Online documentation for Windows XP SP3, such as Microsoft Knowledge Base articles and the Microsoft TechNet Windows XP TechCenter, will be updated then. For customers who use Windows XP at home, Windows XP SP3 Automatic Update distribution for users at home will begin in early summer.

Service Pack 3 will include some important updates including Microsoft’s updated Management Console 3.0, which appears in Windows Server 2008 and Vista, and an update to Wifi protected access. There will also be a “health checking” component added that’s already used by Windows Server 2008 which can check to make sure that certain upgrades and security features are in place for XP-based clients before they are allowed to log onto a network.

Usually, whenever I hear about a new free SMS texting service I tend to be very skeptical. In my experience they either never work, are not available in my country, are limited to a handful of messages or require extensive registration which later involves getting my own mobile bombarded by messages, horoscopes and other junk that I don’t want.

Jaxtr, I was pleasantly surprised to find, falls into none of the above categories and allows you to send an unlimited number of SMS messages to people in 38 countries. The setup process is really easy – just enter a name, user-name, password and e-mail address and you can start sending immediately without any verification required. Jaxtr is mainly designed as a VoIP app but it allows sending texts to mobiles via a small interface on the right of the screen. Even better, you can receive responses on your own mobile phone although this involves verifying your mobile number with the Jaxtr website.

The other good thing about Jaxtr is that it seems to work independently of mobile operators so you don’t have to worry about them intercepting your free messages or putting a stop to it all like has happened in the past to such services. It’s also an interesting alternative to Skype because Jaxtr works with any phone, both mobile and landline. When a member adds their Jaxtr link to their email signature, friends and family can call them from their regular phone from anywhere in the world without paying expensive international toll charges. Family and friends simply click on the member’s Jaxtr link to generate a local number in their own country. By saving this permanent, direct-dial number on their phone, people can call friends and family abroad at the same cost and with the same convenience as calling a friend down the street.

I’m still to meet another person who uses this service despite the developers claiming that over 10 million people in 220 countries use Jaxtr to receive calls from people visiting their social networking pages, to make calls to their friends and family worldwide and to get to know fellow Jaxtr members on café Jaxtr, the world’s largest talk network. Now that they’ve launched free mobile texting however, maybe it will give the site the profile boost it needs.

If you’re constantly searching the web you must be tired of always following the same procedure: open up a website, click on the search field to activate it, enter the keywords and press enter. Well, I’m glad to tell you this tiring task can be reduced to just one step with a very simple trick that enables you to search from the address bar. Let’s see how it works with Softonic as example.

The first thing you need to do is bookmark a search page. In this case, we’ll search for anything on Softonic and bookmark the resulting URL, naming it with something like Search or similar.

See the “winamp” bit at the end of the URL? That’s the word we used to search for this given piece of software, but we’ll need to replace it with a variable if we want to use the search function with anything. So open the bookmark’s Properties menu, replace the search term you used with %s and enter the keyword you’ll be using from now on to trigger the search tool.

Done! Now you can search Softonic by simply entering softonic + your search term. Continue reading “Search the web from your address bar”

Tired of the default media player on your Symbian phone? Then turn your handset into a portable music center with XSound. The application supports audio files in AAC and MP3 format and also ID3 tags to keep your playlists in order. An integrated search function scans your mobile for music, so that everything is ready to play.

Join the most exciting online racing competition with Trackmania Nations Forever! This amazing free racing game lets you play on your own in more than 60 tracks and also compete against players from all over the world. Create your own circuits, customize your car, make friends and become the fastest driver on Earth!

Looking for an alternative to iPhoto for organizing pictures on your Mac? JetPhoto Studio is a promising solution. You can browse your photos in calendar view, make Flash movies, screen savers and slideshows, locate them via GPS in Google Earth and and easily rate and tag them. JetPhoto Studio also works with a number of web printing and publishing services like Flickr.