Apple Safari 3 (Now on Windows!)

Apple's standard compliant safari browser version 3 has entered into public beta. According to Apple, it is 2 times faster than Internet Explorer.

Web Developers which has been bound by Windows (like me) has reasons to cheer as now it is possible to test websites in Safari without the need to break my piggy bank to buy a Mac.

I would love a Mac but no financial funding to do so. Thus the news on Safari on Windows is highly welcomed.

By bringing Safari to Windows, Apple should have given Microsoft a jab to bring Internet Explorer even more standard compliant than now. Safari, based on the WebKit open source project, which is a standard compliant web rendering engine.

In my view, Internet Explorer, though more standards aware, still has a long way to go. Some developers (like me) still have to resort to using JavaScript workarounds (for example, Dean Edwards IE7 script) to get IE to behave and understand CSS which follows closely to standards.

Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR)

Adobe® has officially renamed the Apollo runtime.

Now named Adobe® AIR™, the beta runtime is now available to public. Go to http://labs.adobe.com/downloads/air.html to download it.

Read more about it on Adobe Labs or my previous blog post.

Cheers

Google Gears

Google is now on the path to making its Web-based apps available offline.

Google Gears is an open source browser extension that lets developers create web applications that can run offline. For now, it consists components called LocalServer, Database and WorkerPool.

Only the Google Reader will be made for offline use for now. However, as time goes on, other useful applications such as Docs and Spreadsheets, Calendar and Gmail will be put for offline use.
With the talk about a Google Presentation Software (see my previous post), the bringing of these applications offline could post a serious competition to Microsoft in the future.

For interested developers, take a look at Google Gears Developer Website: http://code.google.com/apis/gears/index.html

Google Gears (Beta) can be found at: http://tools.google.com/gears/

Microsoft Surface

I guess many of you may have heard about it already.

Well for a closer view on it, Microsoft has a website for it at:
http://www.microsoft.com/surface/

Tech News: Google's PowerPoint

I guess this is expected every since the inception of Google Docs and Spreadsheets.
Google's future launch of a presentation tool was confirmed at the Web 2.0 Expo Google CEO Eric Schmidt. Expect integration of all their products (i.e. Blog, Docs, spreadsheet, presentation and mail. etc.)

Schmidt stressed that their office suite isn’t a threat to Microsoft. Of course, users feel slightly otherwise. Docs and Spreadsheet came after the acquisition of Writely and it seems that this time, the presentation tool announcment comes after the acquisition of Tonic Systems.

However, a search on the internet lists some sites saying that this technology has in fact been used in meetings at Google, fueling thoughts that this product has been under development for sometime now.

Most probably, the new tool will allow for the conversion of a document into a presentation, create slides and view full-screen presentations.

For now, consumers will have to wait for its slated release in Summer...

Yahoo's Photos and N.America Auction Closing

Last week, Yahoo made an announcement that it will close its auction service in North American with effect from 3rd June. This come just after the announcement that they will be closing down their photo service, Yahoo Photos.

Not much I can say for the N.America Auction site. Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan are unaffected by the auction site announcement...

The closure of the Yahoo Photos doesn't really come as a surprise. Its closure seemed inevitable since its acquisition of Flickr, which was deemed as a pioneer for Web 2.0. Yahoo underwent a significant reorganization in December to better focus its efforts. The closure is seen as an attempt to rationalize its services and remove what was deemed as overlapping services.

Yahoo Photos users will be given the opportunity to move their pictures over to Flickr, Shutterfly or Kodak Gallery.

However, much is to be seen from the closure.

I for one feel kinda sad. Flickr isn't suited for everyone. Especially with limited set creation unless you have a paid account, it doesn't really match up to that of Yahoo Photos.
For now, we just have hope that Yahoo removes that limit which is highly unlikely.

Maybe Google can come up with a photo sharing site with unlimited sets and free.....Possible?... Just maybe...

Tech News: Adobe Labs | Apollo

Always wanted to create cross-platform desktop applications? Well there is now a new solution for developers, in the form of the new Apollo platform from Adobe.

Web Developers have reasons to cheer too. You can use HTML and Javascript to actually communicate with the Apollo framework, giving web developers a change to put their web apps onto the desktop.

At the Adobe Labs, Apollo is described as "the code name for a cross-operating system runtime being developed by Adobe that allows developers to leverage their existing web development skills (Flash, Flex, HTML, JavaScript, Ajax) to build and deploy rich Internet applications (RIAs) to the desktop."

Currently in Alpha stages, it has demonstrated vast possibilities with the runtime. Sample applications can be found through out adobe's website as well as its weblog.

Whats more the Apollo runtimes are free just like Adobe Flex.

Chart functionality in Google Spreadsheets

In another move that brings Google Spreadsheet's functions up to scratch, Google has added Chart functionality in its Online Spreadsheet program. Chart functionality was one area which Google Spreadsheets was lacking.

With the new feature, you can now create a decent number of types of charts: columns, bars, lines, pie, scatter. Just select the columns you want to plot and click on the new chart icon. Charts can be saved as a PNG file.

However, Charting is only available for Firefox 1.5 and above and Internet Explorer 5.5 and above. Users of other browsers will have their charts rendered as images, thus users will not be able to edit these images..

Here is a screenshot of the new function:



Other new features include Range Names and Comments. For more information, go to http://www.google.com/google-d-s/whatsnew.html

Google Spreadsheets can be found at: http://docs.google.com

Tech News: An 8-Core Mac Pro

Technology just can't seem to move fast enough for many. With the recent quad-core chips released last year, Apple rolled out the company's first eight-core processor Mac system a week or two ago, in the form of a custom Mac Pro configuration. The Mac Pro, is based on a 3.0GHz, 8-core Intel Xeon Processor.

According to Apple's website, you can "Opt for the 8-core Mac Pro and you get the power of two Quad-Core Intel Xeon “Clovertown” processors running at 3.0GHz. Or choose a quad-core Mac Pro featuring two Dual-Core Intel Xeon “Woodcrest” processors and decide how fast they fly: 2.0GHz, 2.66GHz, or 3.0GHz. At 3.0GHz, the quad-core Mac Pro runs up to 2x faster than the Power Mac G5 Quad." (This paragraph was quoted ad-verbatim from Apple's website at: http://www.apple.com/macpro/)

So the question becomes "what's next". Will the PC market respond with the same? We'll have to wait.

On a separate issue, Intel's vPro technology has made its way into several manufacturer's machines. It is said to improve on security and provide Intel's Virtualization Technology (VT). Read more about it at Intel's Website at http://www.intel.com/business/vpro/

Tech News: Yahoo Mail announces Unlimited Storage

As many would have heard by now, Yahoo inc, in an announcement, said that all Yahoo Mail users will have free unlimited email storage starting in May 2007. The current storage limit is 1 GB per account for the free accounts. With this move, Yahoo Mail will overtake Google Mail in the virtual war of email space likened to the cold war.

Google Mail, at the last count was offering about 2.5 gigabytes of space. Yahoo is currently the leader in terms of users, with about 250 million users worldwide.

Will this announcement make many change over? I don't think so. While a Yahoo Mail Account will be added into the service list of many people, I don't think it will appeal to users using POP mail interface as currently, Yahoo Free Users do not have this option.. This is unlike Google Mail which provides Email forwarding and POP access.

However, for Yahoo Singapore Users, the situation may be different as we do get POP mail functions. So the question will be now related to other value-added services like mail attachment size.

Furthermore, as an afterthought, it is wondered if a tool like Gmail Space will arise to allow users to make full use of the unlimited storage. I for one will be looking out for it...

It is now time to wait and see how will Google and Microsoft react to this.