April 30, 2011

Could the economic stimulus plan delay patent reform?

After warning as late as yesterday afternoon about the possible disruptive side effects that Congress' economic stimulus program might have on future legislation, a powerful trade organization is suddenly applauding its passage today.







Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Last night, the US Senate passed the Economic Stimulus Package of 2008, after a few moments of heated debate over cloture (the rules of debate) that threatened to kill the bill, and that even led cable news to report at one point the bill was already dead. Among its provisions is one measure that extends the cap on business deductions on assets from $150,000 to $250,000.

It was that provision that prompted the Computing Technology Industry Association this morning to applaud the bill's passage, with its group director for public policy, Roger Cochetti, saying the raising of the cap will "incentivize the purchase of IT."

"This will create powerful cascading benefits," Cochetti wrote. "Small-to-large businesses will more rapidly bring new IT online, boosting competitiveness; laborers will have newer IT tools with which to be more productive; and average Americans will be more likely to purchase IT, decreasing the digital divide."

In an IDG News Service report yesterday, a CompTIA spokesman sounded an alarm, saying that the bill's passage could have a detrimental effect on other IT-related legislation Congress is considering down the road, including the critically important patent reform bill, which was drafted last April.

But this morning -- now that the stimulus bill is passed -- that same spokesman, Mike Wendy, told BetaNews he and his group are somewhat pleased that it went through, saying that the cap extension has been a measure the group has been prompting Congress to consider ever since President Bush took office, when Mr. Bush first mentioned the idea in his State of the Union Address following his inauguration.

"We've been pushing Section 179 small business provisions, pushing exemptions up, for seven years," Wendy told us. "We wish they'd make those deductions permanent."

His organization did achieve some success in that regard twice before, said Wendy, most recently in 2003. This year's stimulus package should give a boost to exemptions for at least one year.

A full one third of those business exemptions will be tech-oriented, CompTIA believes. If those exemptions were written into law permanently, Wendy argued, businesses would be able to amortize their assets over 18-month periods, thus aligning their deduction cycles with the real life cycles of their technology assets, rather than doling out deductions over three or four years for assets they no longer use. "We've been trying to make depreciation even faster," he said.

Business are asking, Wendy passed on, "Can't we expense this stuff? Isn't that the reality? But the IRS says, we still have to pay for these tools three years after they're useful."

But the fact that CompTIA won a small victory yesterday could be a problem in itself, Wendy warned.

"Look, we wanted this to go through, to benefit the IT industry," Wendy told us. "But Congress has other stuff that's still on the platter," he said, renewing his warning that Congress could conclude it's done its part for IT, thus "popping the bubble," as Wendy put it, for this year.

"Congress might say, 'We helped you out, we know...But we're so busy."

The big problem now lies with coordinating with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D - Nevada), who is responsible for scheduling debate there. There are a huge number of items still on the docket for consideration, Wendy noted. Patent reform is one of them, and another problem from last April -- the overflow in demand for H-1B visas -- is another. Tax credits for research and development efforts is a third.

Sen. Reid promised CompTIA that these issues would be addressed, said Wendy, and when last they talked, the date was mid-March. But with economic stimulus having been passed in early February, the group's concern is that Reid may think the IT industry's chip has already been cashed in.

"The Senate is the upper body. It has a different pace [than the House]," remarked CompTIA's Wendy. "Sen. Reid cannot put [patent reform] on the schedule until he knows that there's consensus." So it's his group's job, therefore, to make the case that the IT industry has reached consensus.

Then there's the difficult little matter about the Bush Administration expressing disagreement with certain aspects of patent reform, especially its proposed limitations on the amounts of judgment awards.

One more prominent senator added his voice to the din of applause for the stimulus package's passage: Sen. John McCain (R - Ariz.), now widely considered to be the front runner for the Republican presidential nomination. In a statement issued this morning, Sen. McCain wrote, "America has the second highest corporate tax rate in the world. Cutting corporate taxes will spur economic growth immediately and over the long run. We need to allow first year expensing of technology and equipment investment for businesses, which would further simplify our code and provide incentives for capital expenditure."

CompTIA's Wendy was happy to align himself with everything...in the second part of McCain's paragraph. The first part, he said, he'll leave to others to debate. Right now, there's too many issues on the table to tackle something so big, so soon, as the overall corporate tax rate.

"Congress wasn't made to move quickly," remarked Wendy. "It wasn't made to pass bills. There are so many checks and balances."

April 29, 2011

Hotmail fail: Microsoft lays an egg in the cloud

Microsoft lost all email for 17,000 Hotmail customers, then botched the response. Is this a harbinger of Office 365 hassles?

Even a simple "We don't know what's going on, but here are the symptoms and we're working on it" pinned to the top of the Hotmail forum would've been a breath of fresh air.

Instead, on Jan. 3, Microsoft posted an official terse explanation: "We have identified the source of the issue have restored email access to those who were effected."






Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



It's now six days since the initial problem surfaced and we still don't have any definitive word from Microsoft about what happened. In fact, we're still getting conflicting stories. At 4:55 p.m. on Jan. 5, the tech support staff posted this response to a series of inquiries about still-missing messages:

I'd like you to know that we are actively working on resolving on this issue since it's already under investigation. We will post back as soon as we have the latest news on what caused this issue. Thank you for your understanding.

For heaven's sake. Microsoft's engineering team has been working on the problem for almost a week, and that's the only explanation they can give us? Three days ago, we were told that "we have identified the source of the issue," and now the support team's telling us, "we are actively working on resolving this issue"?

Granted, on the Hotmail scale, 17,000 inboxes doesn't amount to a hill of beans. But Microsoft's ongoing fumbles in identifying and analyzing the problem; its trouble restoring user data; its muddled explanations of what happened and how the problems were resolved; and repeated communication gaffes with its customers certainly have me worried. How about you?

April 27, 2011

Tablet Wars: Microsoft and HP to Unveil Apple Tablet Competitor

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is set to reveal his own rival to the Apple Tablet, according to The New York Times Bits Blog. We first learned about a Microsoft tablet device in September. We believe tomorrow’s announcement will be about the same device, currently called the Courier.

According to leaked details at that time, the Microsoft Courier is a tablet built like a notebook, with a two-screen setup and a stylus, made for saving and sharing content and “clippings” from the web. It also supposedly acts as an e-reader. The NYT piece reveals that its manufacturer will be none other than computing giant HP.







Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



While we don’t have any more details, we do think that it makes sense for Ballmer to reveal a new device at the world’s largest gadget trade show. We’re almost certain that Apple‘s coming out with a tablet at the end of the month, and this is a strong way to counter that problem. We’ll be at Ballmer’s keynote, covering whatever may come from Microsoft and HP live tomorrow.

April 26, 2011

Introducing An App Store for Microsoft Outlook

This post is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark as a new part of the Spark of Genius series that focuses on a new and innovative startup each day. Every Thursday, the program focuses on startups within the BizSpark program and what they’re doing to grow.

In your inbox, who can matter more than what. If the sender is someone you know, a coworker you collaborate with or a sales lead you’ve identified, the email becomes infinitely more meaningful.







Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



Dallas-based RedCritter connects the who to the what with RedCritter for Outlook, an app store for Outlook that includes 25 applications ranging from the social to the practical.

RedCritter’s approach is not dissimilar from Xobni’s. The email add-on lives in the right-hand side of the user’s inbox and displays a plethora of dynamic data on the sender or emails.

Founded in January 2010, RedCritter aims to be more than just a tool to enhance your email experience. It wants to be a company that builds enterprise software that incorporates the latest technologies and social media innovations to make business systems easier to use.

“I want to build a new breed of enterprise application,” says RedCritter CEO Mike Beaty. “It’s always been an interest of mine to streamline business processes.”
Apps for Outlook

RedCritter’s most consumer-friendly product is the Outlook app store, where you can install any of the company’s 25 Outlook applications. Beaty describes it as converting standard email to Inbox 2.0.

Many of the apps simply add a social media layer. The Tweets app cycles through your email senders’ recent Tweets. The Klout app displays contacts’ influence scores. The Foursquare app highlights their profiles and badges.

Business users can opt to install the sfContacts app, which creates a connection between Salesforce and Outlook. The Attachments app highlights attachments from senders, while the Office Docs and Google Docs apps find documents related to your email or contacts.

With a Basecamp app, Highrise app, Constant Contact app and even a Dual Clock app for seeing the email sender’s time, there’s no shortage of convenience and context that can be added to the inbox experience.
RedCritter Labs

The startup is developing more enterprise products, such as RedCritter Guide and RedCritter Tracker. Beaty lumps them all under the RedCritter Labs label but suggests that individual products may be spun out as their own entities in the future.

RedCritter Guide is for website owners and is designed to help them enhance the usability of websites with easy-to-create interactive guided tours and online product demos for site visitors. The product is in an invitation stage, but readers can enter “MASHABLE” as the invitation code to gain access.

RedCritter Tracker, a web-based project management tool slated for July release, aims to improve the work relationship between companies and their developers. Tracker weaves gamification elements into the project management experience — so companies can reward developers for completing tasks.

“RedCritter Tracker offers streamlined project management for Agile methodology along with tightly integrated message feeds, gamification and rewards,” Beaty says.

The product includes a rewards store so developers can exchange their achievements for gift cards and other prizes.

“Developers will have a day-to-day incentive to complete more complicated tasks,” says Beaty, himself a long-time developer.
Critter Who?

RedCritter has been under the radar, Beaty says, focused on building and releasing new products. Meanwhile, other startups in the email-meets-social intelligence space command headlines on a regular basis.

Still, Beaty says investors are very excited by the Outlook tools. They have the opportunity to reach more than 500 million Outlook users. The investors he has talked to are also enthusiastic about Tracker’s gamification elements.

Beaty’s next big decision will be whether to take funding and move out west. While he doesn’t need outside capital to continue research and development on RedCritter products, he admits to being at a disadvantage by not being in Silicon Valley.

“You’re not in the club if you’re not out there,” he says.
Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark

Microsoft BizSpark

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

April 25, 2011

Next stage in mobile device battery tech: rapid charging

Mobile device enthusiasts may argue about what is the best in class device, but when it comes to battery technology all agree that it isn’t progressing fast enough. While devices can run longer now on a battery charge than in the past, that’s due to hardware power optimization, not improvements in battery technology. That may be about to change as two new products are using faster battery charging to extend mobile usage of devices.






Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



The BlackBerry PlayBook is getting a less than outstanding reception since hitting the market recently, ranging from lukewarm to downright hostile reactions. Few folks sharing these reactions point out one area that is unique to the PlayBook, and that is the special charging port that works with two rapid charging accessories. While the conventional power brick that ships with the PlayBook plugs into the microUSB port on the bottom of the device, these rapid chargers plug into the unusual port to the right of the microUSB port.

According to RIM, these chargers work “up to 2 times faster” than the conventional power brick included with the PlayBook for recharging the battery. This is designed to allow the PlayBook, with already decent battery life, to take advantage of short periods of opportunity for charging that come along. That would allow travelers waiting for flights to double the amount of charging possible by using these special chargers working with the special port on the PlayBook.

Lenovo, the folks behind the ThinkPad notebook line, have been extending the useful battery life of its laptops through innovative hardware design. A new notebook, unconfirmed by Lenovo, has recently leaked to the web that promises rapid battery charging over two times faster than normal. The thin ThinkPad X1 is obviously taking on the MacBook Air given its thin and light form, and is reported to have special battery technology designed to charge “up to 2.5 times faster than previous ThinkPad batteries, charging 80% in 30 minutes”.

ThinkPad notebooks are already pushing the limits for battery life, as reported in my recent review of the ThinkPad X220. This hardware optimization coupled with this new rapid charging technology for the batteries will usher in a new era in long battery life for mobile devices.

April 24, 2011

HOW TO: Make Craigslist Better & Prettier With a Browser Extension

Craigslist is one of the most useful and yet one of the ugliest tools on the Internet. And its bare-bones, basic feature set is both a blessing and a curse.

So, how to ease the pain of using Craigslist while keeping its simplicity and utility? Allow us to introduce you to Craigslist Helper.






Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



This handy browser extension (available for Chrome, Firefox and Safari) lets you preview text and thumbnails from your Craigslist search results. You can also bookmark listings and even make your own notes on them.

For example, if you’re househunting, you might use the app to see images of your new pad options without having 30 tabs open; then, you’d be able to prioritize them and even keep track of conversations with potential landlords, all without leaving Craigslist.

Other features include:

* Alerts when new listings that match your search appear
* Multiple searches by geographical area, or even a whole-site search
* Hide ads
* Filter by keyword; for example, choose not to see listings with “freeway”
* Map popups to show locations
* Phone number highlighting

Here’s an example screenshot showing housing listings within 350 miles of San Francisco:

As the extensions’ mysterious developer writes on Quora, “My guess is, [Craigslist doesn't] innovate simply because they can afford not to — at least until a Facebook to their MySpace comes along.” And until another classifieds startup successfully challenges Craigslist — and believe us, a few of them are trying — apps like Craigslist Helper will have to do.

Will you be trying Craigslist Helper next time you have to do a classifieds search?

April 23, 2011

Japanese Company Unveils 'World's Thinnest' Glass for Touch Screens

Multitouch devices could get even thinner. Tokyo-based Asahi Glass Company (AGC) has developed what it says is the world's thinnest glass for touch-screen panels.

The new soda-lime glass substrate is 0.28 millimeters thick. AGC says that's 15 percent thinner than the thinnest substrate on the market, which measures 0.33 millimeters thick.

The substrate is a piece of glass that sits underneath the glass cover and above the LCD screen on a smartphone or a tablet. Embedded with electrodes, Asahi says soda-lime material is ideal "for touch screens because it maintains form when subjected to heat, resists discoloring due to ultraviolet radiation, accepts chemical strengthening, and is easily processed." ACG says it will begin production on the component by the end of the month. The company expects to be successful with the ultra-thin glass, too, projecting sales of more than $1.2 billion.






Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Earlier this year, Asahi unveiled "Dragontail," a super durable glass that it plans to market as a competitor to Corning "Gorilla Glass," which is used in the Apple iPhone. Asahi claims that Dragontail is six times stronger than conventional soda-lime glass, but free of arsenic, lead, and antimon. It's "highly resistant to scratches and features a beautiful, pristine finish compared with resin," Asahi said in a January press release.

It seems parts for touch-screen products can't be produced fast enough. Apple reportedly controls 60 percent of the touch-screen supply, secured in advance for products like the iPhone and iPad. However, in its quarterly earnings call Wednesday, Apple reported a decline in iPad sales, possibly due to a shortage of these components.

April 21, 2011

Office 365 Beta Testers Run into Mobile, Mac Issues and Other Headaches

It's been two days since the public release of Office 365 beta and Microsoft forums are lively to say the least. On the Office 365 community forum there are heaps of technical questions and complaints around some very specific problems that beta testers are encountering, as well as a smattering of compliments about the service.

The majority of complaints—the threads with 10 or more posts; focus on issues with Sharepoint Online, Lync interoperability with Mac, and Exchange mobile syncing.




Microsoft MCTS Certification, MCITP Certification and over 2000+ Exams at Actualkey.com




Microsoft beta testers seem to be having a hard time, especially with SharePoint Online. Several posters reported that their initial setup of Office 365 hangs during the SharePoint portion of setup:

"We are doing the standard setup of Office 365 and the SharePoint is hanging."

"I am having the same issue, seeing '..this may take a few minutes' on the sharepoint online site creation, now waiting for appox. 48 hours."

"Two days later the sharepoint site has successfully been created. It just seems to take much more than a 'few minutes', but otherwise is fine now."

Another big SharePoint issue, one that is generating multiple threat posts, is a problem with SharePoint sites:

"[The]SharePoint site doesn't seem to exist. When I login, it either goes into a loop between windows live login and sharepoint.com…"

"None of the user accounts I created can access the sharepoint public or team sites."

Some of the SharePoint access issues are actually problems with DNS records and not specifically with Office 365.

The majority of beta testers are technology professionals. Many of them have existing Exchange on-premise servers or are currently Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) customers. BPOS users have no choice but to adopt Office 365 since Microsoft is requiring them to transition within 12 months. One poster complained about a problem he encountered after migrating from BPOS, and that he can no longer send email from an external source to Office 365 after adding his company's domain to the service.

There is an interesting post from a user experiencing problems setting up an Android phone with Exchange online. The user writes that he followed Microsoft's instructions for configuring the device to sync with mail, calendar, and contacts. After doing so, he got only the cryptic error, "Failed to create the account, Please try again later." The user noted that the same phone was previously able to sync with an on-premise Exchange 2007 server. A moderator on the forum, presumably from Microsoft, suggested the device be set to accept all SSL certificates and also suggested testing the validity of the connection to the online Exchange server. No response yet from the user if the suggestions worked.

Complaints are also being made about lack of support and the time it is taking to get an email invitation to test the service:

"This is IMO unacceptably slow service: 'You will receive an email invitation from us as soon as your account is ready. We anticipate that the average wait for an account is approximately 2-4 weeks during the Beta period.'"

"I filed a support ticket…and got the answer to instead post my problem here in the forum."

Questions abound about interoperability with Mac, particularly with Microsoft's Lync client. A forum mod responded that while Lync 2010 is not supported on Mac, the Lync Web App—which can respond to Lync invites but not initiate them—can run on Safari and Firefox on Max OS 10.4.8+.

The comments are not all gloomy. One poster called Office 365 a "pretty great service" and another stated that "I'm pumped about being here and being part of the Beta, I also enjoy some of the challenges as I feel they keep your sharp."

It's important to note that Office 365 is still in beta and hopefully, Microsoft will have these issues worked out before final release. In the meantime, we have a request for comment out to Microsoft and will update this piece when they respond.

Facebook Fixes Spamming Glitch

Facebook has fixed a glitch that reversed selected email notifications for some users.

Typically, Facebook users can customize which emails or text notifications they receive, whether it's for friend requests or new Facebook events. But on Tuesday, users began complaining that their selected email notifications had been reversed. For instance, those who had opted not to receive emails for events, were suddenly receiving emails about them, while those who'd checkmarked that box were not receiving emails at all.





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



This prompted Facebook to post the problem on its "Known Issues on Facebook" page on Tuesday night: "Some people are suddenly receiving email notifications for settings they had turned off, and the checkboxes are now checked. We are currently working on a solution to this problem."

By Wednesday afternoon, Facebook apologized and declared the problem resolved.

"Yesterday evening, we discovered a bug that caused a small number of people to start receiving notifications they had previously turned off. We have since resolved the issue and apologize for any inconvenience," a spokesperson said.

Last Friday some Facebook users also reported seeing an error message when trying to access their "Notifications" menu, which Facebook said it resolved within 24 hours.

On Monday, U.K.-based security company Sophos published an open letter to Facebook on its blog, Naked Security, urging Facebook to improve its opt-in privacy schemes, vet app developers (where many phishing scams originate), and turn on a secure connection (HTTPS) standard.

April 20, 2011

The 75 Best iPad Apps

Considering its impact on the portable computing space, it's amazing to think that the iPad platform has only been around for a little more than a year. Still, in its relatively brief existence, the iPad and iPad 2 have revolutionized the tablet market—not only for its sleek form factor and ease of use, but for the wide variety of apps that are available for it.





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com


The Apple App Store lets users expand their iPad's abilities with new software that ranges from the business-centric to the highly entertaining. The sheer number of apps, unfortunately, can make it difficult for someone to find the ones worth downloading. Consider this: As of January 2011, there were over 350,000 apps available for download. As a result, it may prove challenging to figure out which iPad apps are the best. So let us provide a helping hand.
Apple iPad Coverage

In compiling this list of the 75 best iPad and iPad 2 apps, we focused on the ones that aren't just larger versions of iPhone and iPod touch apps, but deliver unique and compelling tablet-based experiences all their own. And to make finding apps even easier, we've broken them down by category: Social networking, Business, Communication, Games, Entertainment, Creativity, and News, Reference, and Information. Unless stated, all of the apps are compatible with the iPad and iPad 2.

It should be noted that iPad and iPad 2 apps tend to carry a higher price than their iPhone counterparts. Still, many of the apps listed here are free, or cost less than $10. That's may be pricey by iPhone standards where .99 cents rules the roost, but compared to desktop software it's a bargain—and there isn't a dud in the bunch. Install them all, and you'll be well on the way to an excellent tablet computer experience. You can either navigate our list via the 75 Best iPad Apps slideshow above or via the pages that follow. If a particular application catches your eye, click through to the full review to learn more.

Got a beef with an app we liked, or an app you'd like to suggest for the next version of this story? Let us know in the comments.

April 19, 2011

Royal Wedding: The best, worst and indifferent Apple iOS apps

There's nothing like celebrity frenzy, especially a long-in-the-planning one like the Royal Wedding, to bring out the best and worst of mobile application development.

Here's a sampling of the best, worst and in-between mobile apps for Apple iPhones, iPads and other iOS devices being touted as indispensable for keeping track of and connected with The Wedding -- the royal nuptials for Prince William and Catherine Middleton on Friday, April 29, at Westminster Abbey in London.





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com





THE BIG DAY: Will & Kate & YouTube

To continue reading, register here to become an Insider. You'll get free access to premium content from CIO, Computerworld, CSO, InfoWorld, and Network World. See more Insider content or sign in.

Page 2 of 3

WeeMee Royal Wedding Countdown, by WeeWorld.com, a "social engagement" network for teens and women; free, for iPhone. The emphasis here is on "countdown" -- the app apparently does nothing more than that. In fact, it's so simple that it has generated enough confusion and antipathy among downloaders that someone, apparently from WeeWorld, had to post on iTunes the following explanation: "Many people are confused at what this app does! It's simple! There's a royal wedding in a couple months! This is just the countdown till that day! Well [sic] glad to help!"

Royal Wedding Countdown Timer, from Fruity Digital. Yes, another one. With one difference: "Celebrate each day of the countdown with a new royal family quote!" With a straight face, the app page includes this warning: "Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humor." Those naughty royals.

The Royal Wedding Tea Towel App, from MD Media, a UK-based "new media consultancy"; $0.99, for iPhone and iPad. Though billed as an app to "entertain and inform," its main mission seems to be sell "official and unofficial merchandise." An MD Media tweet about two weeks ago trumpeted that "Kate and Wills Wedding Cake Toppers are the most sold items in our Royal Wedding Tea Towel iPhone App." You know: those ... things you stick on top of cakes. It offers Royal wedding music, modern and traditional wallpapers, and promises live coverage of The Wedding, if you're in the U.K.

Royal Wedding Pairs, from Press Association, the "UK's leading multimedia news agency and information provider"; free, for iPhone and iPad. The Association's website assures us that it delivers "unrivalled content and digital media services." Nothing like that makes it into this game, which gives you a deadline to flip pairs of cards and match two of the same type before time runs out. You can hit the "hint buttons" to, basically, cheat. It gives you something to do between checking your Wedding Countdown apps.


William and Kate's Royal Wedding, from Lexington Creative, an iOS app designer; $0.99, for iPhone and iPad. It promises to be the "complete app" for The Wedding. But its "information" about the couple is stuff like "December 2006: Will graduates from Sandhurst," the Royal Military Academy for training army officers (you won't find that fact in the app, by the way); and a raft of other stuff that reads like it was cribbed from Wikipedia or an official website.

Royal Wedding Essential Guide, from BlueYellow Media, Ltd.; $0.99 (half the regular price, for a limited time), for iPhone and iPad. Listed by The Telegraph as one of the 10 best Royal Wedding apps. One of the few that seems to have been designed from the ground up as a mobile app actually useful on the day of the event. An interactive, searchable GPS map lists hundreds of Wedding-related locations: Tap on a map marker to get detailed information, including a Wikipedia link. Bookmark your favorite locations and share them with friends. One section lists "Best Viewing Areas." There's a 3D tour of the Wedding Procession through London streets, a Wedding Twitter feed, and a "Royal Personality Test" (also available as a separate free app). The blend of data, mapping, GPS location, and Web links can double as a guide to Royal London.

April 18, 2011

InfoWorld preview: Office 365 beta II

Office 365 also includes the Office Web Apps -- stripped-down versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote -- but those are free to anybody, and they can be accessed via Windows Live Hotmail, SkyDrive, or Docs.com. Microsoft emphasizes the role of Office WebApps in making Exchange email and SharePoint documents accessible on mobile devices, such as Windows Phone, of course, but also iPhone/iPad, Android, and BlackBerry devices. If the document is stored on your company's SharePoint site, editing it by phone isn't as impossible as it sounds.




Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Office 365 will work with Windows 7, Windows Vista SP2, Windows XP SP3, Mac OS X Leopard, and Mac OS X Snow Leopard, while the Office Web Apps will work with Safari, Firefox, and Chrome, and Internet Explorer. If you've already paid for Office 2007 or 2010 (or Office for Mac 2008 or 2011), you don't need to rent Office 2010 as part of your Office 365 subscription.

Options and pricing structures are varied and complicated, as we've come to expect from Microsoft. For definitive pricing, download Microsoft's official pricing guide and wade through the offerings, which range from $6 per user per month for small companies (1 to 25 users) that already own Office, to $24 per user per month for large companies that want to license Office 2010 as part of the deal. If you have questions about how much it will cost to shift your current Office and server licenses over to Office 365, you aren't alone.

Office is from Mars, Office 365 is from Alpha Centauri
If you remember the early days of the Office suite, your experience with Office 365 may feel like déjà vu all over again. Word, Excel, and PowerPoint grew up on three different planets, and it took years and years of cross-fertilization to get to the point where the pieces started acting at least a little bit similarly. Even today, more than 20 years later, there's an enormous number of conceptual differences. Try something as simple as sticking a footer on every printed page of a Word doc, Excel spreadsheet, and PowerPoint presentation. See what I mean? Completely different.

Office 365 attempts the same sort of mash, but this time the goal is even more ambitious. Now we're seeing the same-old, same-old desktop Office apps mashed together with the server pieces that tie them together. The pieces don't hang together very well. The Office apps grew up on different planets, but these server apps grew up on different solar systems. Sometimes trying to execute a simple action requires conceptual leaps among products that are just plain dumb.

An example: I have a Word document that I want to save on the SharePoint Team Site. In Word, I click File, Save and Send, Save to SharePoint, then I double-click on my Team Site. Word shows me a dialog that's very similar to a standard Save As dialog. I type in the name of the file, choose Save As Word Document (*.docx), and click Save. Then I twiddle my thumbs for a minute or two, and finally SharePoint shows me a dialog that says, "The Web server requires you to pick the type of document before it can be saved." I have to tell SharePoint that I'm saving "A blank Microsoft Word document." Sorry, that's just dumb, and it's indicative of the lack of communication that goes on between the Office apps and the server apps.

InfoWorld preview: Office 365 beta

The fact that I had to tell SharePoint that the .docx file I was uploading was a "Word document" had me wondering which planet I was on.

April 17, 2011

Microsoft Office 365: What's on tap for big businesses, federal users?

While Microsoft has begun detailing some of the planned packaging and pricing for its Office 365 suite of cloud-hosted applications, a few details still remain murky.

One of those is whether Microsoft will carry over from its current Business Productivity Online (BPOS) suite the “D” (dedicated) and “F” (federal) SKU options.

I’ve heard from some of my contacts that Microsoft is poised to offer a public beta of Office 365 the week of April 18, in anticipation of its early June launch of the Office 365 suite. So maybe we’ll hear more about the company’s SKU plans next week. Or maybe not….





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Check out Office 365 in pictures: 70 slides showing SharePoint Online, Lync Online, Exchange Online and more

Office 365 is Microsoft’s successor to BPOS, its bundle of hosted SharePoint, Lync (unified communications) and Exchange services. It is Microsoft’s head-to-head competitor with Google Apps.

With BPOS, Microsoft currently provides users with a choice of “S” (standard, i.e., mulitenant); “D” (dedicated); and “F” (federal) SKUs. The BPOS-F option is a highly locked-down bundle of Microsoft-hosted SharePoint, Exchange and Communications Server. (“Physical access to those (BPOS Federal) systems is limited by biometric access controls to a small number of individuals who, in compliance with International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), must be citizens of the United States who have undergone rigorous background checks, including fingerprinting,” according to the Microsoft press release announcing BPOS-F last year.)

When Office 365 ships, those three SKUs may not carry over, from what I’m hearing from some of my contacts.

When I asked the team whether there’d still be S, D and F options with Office 365, I received this rather vague response from a spokesperson:

“There will definitely be an offering for those government organizations that have additional regulatory needs, like ITAR-compliance (included in the FAQ on the Office 365 website), but Office 365 for enterprises works well for most federal, state and local governments, because the services have been certified as compliant with ISO 27001 standards, completed SAS70 Type I and II audits, and achieved the EU Safe Harbor seal. Microsoft has also added controls for helping customers comply with HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) and FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act).”

So does that mean there will be an Office 365 D offering or not? Your guess is as good as mine. I (kind of) think there will be some kind of F option for Office 365, but again, I am not 100 percent sure.

BPOS-D currently requires a minimum of 5,000 seats and requires an automatic three-year licensing agreement. It offers users more options for customization. BPOS-S has a minimum requirement of five seats and is the version of BPOS that Microsoft targets at SMBs.

Any customer out there care if Microsoft does away with the Dedicated option for Office 365?

April 16, 2011

RIM BlackBerry PlayBook: The Unboxing

Next week, RIM's first tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook, will finally go on sale. Before we took the PlayBook to the labs for testing and itsfull review, we unboxed the tablet and played with it, taking photos all along the way, to give you a look at what you'll get if you buy a PlayBook when it becomes available on April 19th.

At launch, you can buy one of three versions of the tablet, all identical except for varying amounts of built-in storage. All current models are Wi-Fi-only, but 3G and 4G models are on the way. The 16BG model will sell for $499.99, the 32GB for $599.99 and the 64GB for $699.99—the same prices and capacities as the Wi-Fi-only Apple iPad 2.





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com





Included with the PlayBook is a soft carrying pouch. And we also got our hands on optional rubber and leather cases from RIM. None of the cases have magnets or special interactions with the tablet, unlike the Apple iPad Smart Cover, which can wake up the iPad or put it to sleep by simply moving the cover on or off the tablet's screen. The cases have cutouts for the Volume and Power buttons, and for the front- and back-facing webcams. Pricing has not yet been announced for either case.

The PlayBook runs a new operating system, optimized for tablets, called the BlackBerry Tablet OS. In the past few months, other competitors have redesigned their mobile operating systems to be optimized for tablets as well (like Google's Android 3.0 and HP's upcoming WebOS 3.0 for the HP TouchPad.)

Check out our full BlackBerry PlayBook review to see how the latest tablet stacks up against the competition. And hit the slideshow below for the unboxing photos.

April 15, 2011

AV-Comparatives Releases Latest Antivirus Test Results

Austrian antivirus testing lab AV-Comparatives.org tests up to 20 antivirus technologies four times per year. The tests alternate between on-demand detection of current malware and retrospective detection that attempts to measure the product's ability to detect new threats. This week AV-Comparatives released results for its latest on-demand test, which used about 400,000 samples, none more than six months old.

With this test, AV-Comparatives switched from a fixed-threshold rating system to a system that clusters similar results. On a fixed threshold plan, a product that detects 94.9 percent of threats might rate lower than a product with the near-identical score of 95.0 percent. Clustering avoids this problem, putting threshold-change values in the gaps between clusters.






Best Microsoft MCTS Certification – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



Products that pass the test rate STANDARD, ADVANCED, or ADVANCED+, depending on how well they did. A product that doesn't pass gets the rating TESTED. False positives (valid files identified as malicious) can drag down a product's rating by one level or even more.

Ratings Go Up and Down
Seven products attained the ADVANCED+ rating: Avira, BitDefender, eScan, F-Secure, Kaspersky, McAfee, and TrustPort. Kaspersky, Trustport, and McAfee all moved up, having rated ADVANCED in last August's on-demand test.

Avast!, ESET, G Data, and Panda would have received the same top rating, but false positives knocked them down to ADVANCED. Microsoft, Norton, and Sophos also rated ADVANCED. That's a step down for Symantec, which rated ADVANCED+ in the last test.

AVG and PC Tools passed the test, receiving a STANDARD rating; both scored better in the last test. Qihoo, which also rated STANDARD, doesn't have many users in this country, so PCMag hasn't reviewed it.

Surprising Failures
Three products failed to reach STANDARD: K7, Trend Micro, and Webroot. K7 simply scored low for detection; it achieved a STANDARD rating last time. Webroot, tested for the first time, also scored low, and suffered false positives to boot.

I was surprised that Webroot's results didn't track more closely with Sophos, since Webroot licenses Sophos technology. AV-Comparatives.org's Peter Stelzhammer briefly explained that "Webroot equals Sophos minus cloud." Webroot plans to incorporate that cloud technology within the next 60 days.

As for Trend Micro, their representatives have made it clear that they don't approve of these scheduled tests by AV-Comparatives, nor of my own tests for PCMag. Trend Micro doesn't participate in the retrospective tests at all. They argue that "independent test labs [should] source threats live from the Internet at the time of the test."

The odd thing is that Trend Micro's detection rate would have merited a score of ADVANCED. The problem was that it led the pack in false positives, naming 290 valid files as malicious. False positives, not poor detection, caused Trend Micro to fail this test.

AV-Comparatives also timed how fast each product scanned files. The fastest scanners, in descending speed order, were avast!, Panda, K7, and Webroot. Microsoft and PC Tools were the slowest of this bunch. You can view full test results in detail at the AV-Comparatives.org Web site.

April 13, 2011

Control Windows 7 with Kinect

Xbox Kinect is the ultimate hack machine, and that’s it the most popular gadget of the year 2010. Kinect has often been hacked to work with a large number of hobby electronics to attain Gesture based control for systems. It has been hacked to control Widnows 7 PC a number of times, but it was never done and sold like a regular software bundle.




Best Microsoft MCTS Certification – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Win&I is the first fully useful commercial software that let’s you control your windows 7 PC with a Kinect controller using gestures alone.

You can control Windows 7 and thousands of applications with this natural user interface. WIN&I software replaces the computer mouse by tracking simple gestures from users up to several meters from the screen using the power of the Kinect depth-sensor.

You just have to Connect your Kinect with your PC and run the WIN&I control session to control windows 7, And leave the rest for Kinect to manipulate.

Checkout the Video demo below:

Tutorial: Using Kinect with Windows 7:

We write latest and greatest in Tech Guides, Apple, iPhone, Tablets, Android, Open Source, Latest in Tech, subscribe to us@taranfx on Twitter OR on Facebook Fanpage:

April 11, 2011

Windows Phone 7 sells 40k on first day. Sales Forecast lower than iPhone, Android

When Apple launched iPhone 4, it broke every previous history and became the singlemost highest selling product, atleast for first few weeks.

Knowing that Microsoft has grown up to live upto smartphone industry with Windows Phone 7, lets take a look at how well did it do on its first day as compared to any iPhone or Android.

Micrsofot managed to sell 40,000 WP7 devices on its day1 launch in the U.S. If you are under the impression that this is quiet a number, let see how does it compare with iPhones, Androids. Google said last month that it was selling 200,000 Android phones a day. And Apple has said that its iOS sales rate was 270,000 a day.

WP7 was launched on monday, which experts believe is the worst day to launch a new product, when compared to weekends. Beyond the timing, Microsoft may have confused consumers with too many models. Microsoft introduced nine Windows 7 phones at its October press event. “In the phone world, our surveys show that there should be a choice between A or B.” May be it confused buyers more than helping them.



Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com




Apart from that there are loads of reasons why most buyers are holding themselves back– The good & Bad of Windows Phone 7:

1. Existing smartphone users won’t switch
2. The Wait for Apps: do you really want to limit youself to 2000 apps as compared to richer apps on iOS, Android?
3. Time to Mature: If took Apple & google 2+ years to prepare a Robust Mobile OS, what is your bet for Microsoft?
4. No Copy Paste, No Multitasking: Welcome to year 2007

So what do we forecast? What can be predicted?

It’s early in the game. Not every product surges right out of the starting blocks. The first Android phone was not a big seller at T-Mobile. A better time to judge Windows Phone 7 will be Christmas, the black friday.

Industry evangelists do forecast that eventually WP7 would gain a share which would become 3rd largest after iOS & Android. How much time will it take? To be honest atleast a year. don’t expect any big growth till the WP7 platform matures with more apps, better platform support.

April 10, 2011

Steve Ballmer Kickstarts Microsoft TechEd 2011

Microsoft, known for its Windows OS and its Microsoft Office software is organising an event, TechEd 2011. The event is happening in Hyderabad, starting from today, i.e., 13th May and continues till 15th of May.


Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com


Well, the event started off with the keynote of Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft. But, unfortunately, I could not attend it because I came in late. Anyways, keeping that apart, this event is rocking folks!

Speakers from various places have gathered and are giving session on various software platforms that Windows supports, like Virtualization, SQL, .NET and many others. All these sessions are happening in parallel.

I have attended the Virtualisation session and it was awesome. As I said earlier, there are so many sessions happening in parallel. You cannot attend all of them.

Many contests are also happening across the different stalls that have been set up. Each and every contest that's being conducted gives visitors a chance to win either a T-shirt or a Pen drive or some or the other cool stuff.

Apart from this, a round around the stalls can provide one a glimpse into 'hot' technologies. You can find the new improved Xbox being displayed with certain cool new features.

There are also Windows 7 demo sessions happening and based on certain tests you can also get a certificate from Microsoft. And Oh! the EFY Group of publications has its stall too, with some cool subscriptions schemes.
The sponsors of this event are The EFY Group, Intel, Citrix Systems, CA, Dev March, Oreinsoft Technologies, Oracle, Kingfisher and many others.

April 8, 2011

Educated beyond common sense.

A follow onto Knowledge Normalization Methodology.

A perspective on the evolution of technology and the corresponding view of educating the users to interface with next generation computer application, visions. The next frontier is understanding knowledge in such a way that it can be stored, interrogated, changed and managed according to business models. And engineering the meaning of relating knowledge elements according to specific: models, algorithms and formulae's all seeking to explain the: how, why, who, where and when a 'decision making' action produced the correlated relational data elements.



From clay tablets transaction record keeping to punch card file processing, information was stored as data (fields) elements, retrieved and presented as knowledge regarding a business activity. A watershed was reached when the hardware evolution introduced random access, capability, to data elements, the Relational Data Base.



● The advent of Data Normalization Methodology.



This era of integrating RDB capabilities with management methodologies created a software industry to rationalize the results of human endeavors though Data reasoning logic.



The USER education continues;____________________________

Canonical synthesis

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Generally, in mathematics, a canonical form (often called normal form or standard form) of an object is a standard way of presenting that object.



Database normalization

Entity-relationship model

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A sample Entity-relationship diagram using Chen's notation

In software engineering, an entity-relationship model (ERM) is an abstract and conceptual representation of data. Entity-relationship modeling is a database modeling method, used to produce a type of conceptual schema or semantic data model of a system, often a relational database, and its requirements in a top-down fashion. Diagrams created by this process are called entity-relationship diagrams, ER diagrams, or ERDs.



Data modeling.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Data modeling in software engineering is the process of creating a data model by applying formal data model descriptions using data modeling techniques.

Database normalization.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



In the field of relational database design, normalization is a systematic way of ensuring that a database structure is suitable for general-purpose querying and free of certain undesirable characteristics insertion, update, and deletion anomalies that could lead to a loss of data integrity.[1]

Database Normalization Basics

By Mike Chapple, About.com Guide



...."If you've been working with databases for a while, chances are you've heard the term normalization. Perhaps someone's asked you "Is that database normalized?" or "Is that in BCNF?" All too often, the reply is "Uh, yeah." Normalization is often brushed aside as a luxury that only academics have time for. However, knowing the principles of normalization and applying them to your daily database design tasks really isn't all that complicated and it could drastically improve the performance of your DBMS.



What is Normalization?



Normalization is the process of efficiently organizing data in a database. There are two goals of the normalization process: eliminating redundant data (for example, storing the same data in more than one table) and ensuring data dependencies make sense (only storing related data in a table). Both of these are worthy goals as they reduce the amount of space a database consumes and ensure that data is logically stored.

● The advent of Data Normalized



Project Management Methodology.



In this era of integrating RDB capabilities with project management methodologies created new software industries specializing in project management products and services specific to particular market industries.



The USER education continues;____________________________

from: The history of PERT Network and project management.

Wiest, Jerome D., and Levy, Ferdinand K., A Management Guide to PERT/CPM, New Delhi: Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, 1974

1. INTRODUCTION

Basically, CPM (Critical Path Method) and PERT (Programme Evaluation Review Technique) are project management techniques, which have been created out of the need of Western industrial and military establishments to plan, schedule and control complex projects.

1.1 Brief History of CPM/PERT

CPM/PERT or Network Analysis as the technique is sometimes called, developed along two parallel streams, one industrial and the other military.



CPM was the discovery of M.R.Walker of E.I. Du Pont de Nemours & Co. and J.E. Kelly of Remington Rand, circa 1957. The computation was designed for the UNIVAC-I computer. The first test was made in 1958, when CPM was applied to the construction of a new chemical plant. In March 1959, the method was applied to maintenance shut-down at the DuPont works in Louisville, Kentucky. Unproductive time was reduced from 125 to 93 hours.



PERT was devised in 1958 for the POLARIS missile program by the Program Evaluation Branch of the Special Projects office of the U.S. Navy, helped by the Lockheed Missile Systems division and the Consultant firm of Booz-Allen & Hamilton. The calculations were so arranged so that they could be carried out on the IBM Naval Ordinance Research Computer (NORC) at Dahlgren, Virginia.



● The advent of Data Normalized



Business Intelligence Methodology.



Now begins an era of reverse engineering the meaning of relating data elements according to specific models, algorithms, formulae's and others from differing RDB designs; ORACLE, SYBASE, Microsoft, all seeking to explain the how, why, who, where and when a 'decision making' action produced the correlated relational data elements.



Each industry using RDB technology (that's pretty much everybody) has developed unique language descriptions to best fit their business, product and services operations. And when combined with each industry's unique product or service needs, has created a new software niche for developing 'business theory models' for analysis between software logic and business logic.



The ongoing business intelligence software development process will continue to orchestrate language as a source of knowledge to explain the how, why, who, where and when an action produced the correlated relational data elements. This process is ultimately destined to examine business knowledge, frozen in time and rewriting the language (English Grammatical Sentences, RULES) by which decisions are made that affect business operations. This process simply reverse engineers (rewrites) the business language that best explains decision making at a particular point in time. Real time access to the language of business decision-making would therefore provide for faster reaction to changes for the operation of the enterprise. To achieve a real time relationship with an enterprise operation requires that the language of the enterprise become normalized, for an enterprise operation's Relational Knowledge Base.



The USER education continues;____________________________

Business intelligence

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

Business intelligence (BI) refers to computer-based techniques used in spotting, digging-out, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments or associated costs and incomes. [1]

BI technologies provide historical, current, and predictive views of business operations. Common functions of Business Intelligence technologies are reporting, online analytical processing, analytics, data mining, business performance management, benchmarking, text mining, and predictive analytics.



Business Intelligence often aims to support better business decision-making.[2] Thus a BI system can be called a decision support system (DSS).[3] Though the term business intelligence is often used as a synonym for competitive intelligence, because they both support decision making, BI uses technologies, processes, and applications to analyze mostly internal, structured data and business processes while competitive intelligence is done by gathering, analyzing and disseminating information with or without support from technology and applications, and focuses on all-source information and data (unstructured or structured), mostly external, but also internal to a company, to support decision making.



● The advent of Knowledge Normalization Methodology.



IDENTIFYING KNOWLEDGE

From: WorldComp2010, Published research paper:

Paper ID #: ICA4325

Title: Knowledge Normalization Methodology

ICAI'10 - The 2010 is the 12th annual International Conference on Artificial Intelligence.



Title: Knowledge Normalization Methodology.

Introduction to CAMBO, a multi-Expert System Generator, and a new paradigm knowledge normalization (patent pending). "Any entity's knowledge, which can be described in "English Grammatical Sentences", can be extracted and software (Rule processing) managed through a Normalized Knowledge Base." Unlike Single EXPERT system generators, AION, Eclipse, XpertRule, RuleBook, CAMBO's kernel logic; Knowledge Normalization Methodology is based upon a methodology that closely observes the rules of medical science in identifying, applying and developing the science of machine intelligence.



Abstract of the Disclosure.

The invention's name is CAMBO an acronym for Computer Aided Management By Objective. The title is a "multi-EXPERT System Generator", and the vision an “artificial intelligent bridge between technology and the ability to automate the instruments of the MBO methodology, namely: Charters, Organization Charts, Operational Plans, Project Management, Performance Planning and others all containing the knowledge, expressed in 'English Grammatical Sentences', upon which an enterprise conducts business. It would require the design of a unique combination of advanced methodology and technology capabilities built upon and work in concert with current state of the art, 'Data Normalized', Relational Data Base structure. The “AI Bridge” would include an advanced methodology for Normalizing Knowledge, a unique definition for a unit or element of knowledge, an advanced structure for a Spatial Relational Knowledge Base and a 5th generation programming language to support a Natural Language Processing interface.



The USER education continues;____________________________

from: International Cognitive Computing, CAMBO a multi-Expert system generator.

What is it? Each employee of a business enterprise is a human expert possessing a measure of talent, developed through the experience of practical application, interaction and training with other employees. The result of job related experience is an acquired understanding of: How, When and Where each employee is expected to contribute towards the operation of an enterprise. This understanding is expressed and communicated through simple conversational language, in which each language sentence represents a "knowledge element." CAMBO describes knowledge in segments called elements with each element structured as a simple sentence, in which the employee expresses a single step, that when added to other related elements provide a complete description of a job related task. CAMBO imposes a single convention upon the formulation of each element, as a control parameter to support CAMBO's fifth generation programming language called "Language Instructions Per Sentence" (LIPS). The convention requires that each sentence must begin with an action verb, selected from the CAMBO-LIPS "Action Verb List."



“Analytical thinking requires the ability to compose business issues into logical and functional models that correctly reflect business processing, coupled with the skill to communicate the results to all levels of an organization”



Normalizing Knowledge



Knowledge engineering, which includes methodologies, techniques and tools, produces knowledge models for populating a storyboard layout for the design of a multi-expert system. Each knowledge engineering model is a particular life cycle view of activity and it models the functionality of a knowledge engine that drives the events within the life cycle. These models identify, capture, profile and relate the language of the enterprise for which the multi expert system supports. Knowledge engineering models the relationship between the business practices of an enterprise and the functionality of an ERP methodology and this information contributes toward the knowledge normalization process. The methodology for knowledge normalization expresses a knowledge element as an English grammatical sentence. Knowledge engineering codifies the business, science and engineering knowledge into its most basic form, the English Grammatical Sentence (EGS).



Each EGS is grouped into rule-sets that become part of a knowledge domain and because the knowledge normalization process establishes cross-domain relationships, the knowledge of many disciplines unite to answer questions. The procedure for asking questions is a simple, intuitive and interactive web based menu system that leads the user through a question and answer cycle - including a cross discipline review of the issues leading to a final answer. It responds as though the questions were asked of numerous engineers or business managers, in different disciplines, all contributing their knowledge towards identifying and answering issues on a specific business or engineering requirement. However, while the methodology for data normalization remains as a standard for developing a relational data base, the processes described are integrated with the processes for knowledge normalization. Data element: definitions, profiles, format, relationships, where-used and ontological associations all compliment the process of knowledge normalization.



“The methodology for knowledge normalization expresses a knowledge element as an English grammatical sentence. Knowledge engineering codifies the business: philosophy, science, engineering, and art's (the four prime domains of knowledge) "Relational Knowledge Base", into its most basic form, language”



Knowledge elements contain the logic by which data elements are created and manipulated. The status or condition of any individual data element is the result of a computer program, executing a series of knowledge elements (rules). Knowledge engineering is used to front end the data methodologies for: ORACLE, SYBASE, DB2, FoxPro, SAS, SAP, IEF, Microstrategy and all RDB application generating software.



For those readers that remember Herman Hollerith, congratulations for still being part of the technology evolution landscape. We have witnessed and been part of a most incredible industry journey. For this reason my hope is that your common sense, derived from decades of structured thinking, will view knowledge normalization as the next logical step for the technology evolution. Within this article I have expressed a direction for next generation technology towards a language based methodology to normalize knowledge. And while it does not replace relational data base structure, knowledge normalization (storyboards, rules and NLP) will identify and relate data elements and function as a front end designer for building a RDB.



Knowledge normalization raises many questions about design, structure and most importantly its business application. Consider the capability of reviewing, monitoring and testing new ideas about the manner in which, an enterprise conducts business. Reviewing the decision-making relationships that reflect the rationale and reasoning logic of the individual employee job description. Monitoring the working relationships between employees in which each job description, knowledge elements (rules) are associated with all other employee job responsibilities. Testing the knowledge storyboard by changing the knowledge elements (English grammatical sentences) and coordinating your changes with ALL employees' decision-making job description rules (English grammatical sentences).



The future of Knowledge normalization will reflect a repeat of the post data normalization technology evolution. Business intelligence, project management and process control about the manner in which, an enterprise conducts business will need 'application developers' to reprogram their products. The migration from data base systems to knowledge based systems will pass from gradually integrating and adapting new technology interface to adopting the benefits of real time decision-making management.




Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



* Special appreciation and kudos to the folks at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, that provides an open forum for the development and communication of new ideas.

April 5, 2011

Why Google's tighter control over Android is a good thing

Limiting availability of Android 3.0 code and apparent tightening of Android smartphone standards means that Google finally gets it about the platform

I've argued before that Android's fragmentation, encouraged by its open source model, was a mistake. Google should drive the platform forward and ride herd on those who use it in their devices. If it wants to make the OS available free to stmulate adoption, fine. But don't let that approach devolve into the kind of crappy results that many device makers are so clueless (or eager -- take your pick) to deliver.



Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com

So far, Google's been lucky in that the fragmentation has been largely in cosmetic UI areas, which doesn't affect most Android apps and only annoys customers when they switch to a new device. The fragmentation of Android OS versions across devices is driving many Android developers away, as are fears over a fractured set of app stores. Along these lines, Google has to break the carriers' update monopoly, as Apple did, so all Android devices can be on the same OS page.

It is true that HTC's Eris brought some useful additions to the stock Android UI, serving as a model for future improvements. But the HTC example is the exception, and Google's apparent new policy would allow such enhancements if Google judges them to be so.

More to the point is what the tablet makers such as ViewSonic, Dell, and Samsung did with their first Android tablets. Their half-baked products showed how comfortable they are soiling the Android platform. For them, Android is just another OS to throw on hardware designed for something else in a cynical attempt to capture a market wave. The consistently low sales should provide a clue that users aren't buying the junk. But do they blame the hardware makers or Google? When so many Android devices are junk, it'll be Google whose reputation suffers.

Let's not forget Google's competition, and why Google can't patiently teach these companies about user experience: Apple, a company that knows how to nurture, defend, and evangelize a platform. Let's also not forget the fate of Microsoft and Nokia, who let their Windows Mobile and Symbian OSes fragment into oblivion. And let's remember that the one company that knows how the vanilla-PC game is played, Hewlett-Packard, has decided to move away from the plain-vanilla Windows OS and stake its future on its own platform, WebOS, for both PCs and mobile devices. In that world, a fragmented, confused, soiled Android platform would have no market at all.

If Google finally understands that Android is a platform to be nurtured and defended, it has a chance of remaining a strong presence in the mobile market for more than a few faddish years. If not, it's just throwing its baby into the woods, where it will find cruel exploitation, not nurturing or defense.

April 4, 2011

Every day should be World Backup Day

A week or so ago, the folks over at Reddit threw together an initiative to transform March 31 into World Backup Day -- a day in which we'd be sure to make backups and test them. While the day is really more targeted at consumers who might not be backing up their personal data at all, we in the enterprise space could probably stand the reminder, too.

As I've said before, consistently ensuring that we have good, usable backups too often falls off the back of the truck -- pushed out by much more pressing firefighting or project work as a result of today's "do more with less" IT realities.





Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



Making error-free backups in the first place is bad enough, but setting aside the time to perform thorough usability testing of them is more than many of us can fit into our schedules more than a few times a year. If you're in that boat, you're leaving yourself open to an enormous risk -- especially considering how complex some backup methodologies have become. Including deduplication and multiple tiers of backup hardware and software in the mix may make backups faster and ultimately less expensive, but that complexity often comes at the cost of reliability.

As a commenter on that blog entry said, "Personally, I think if you aren't going to ensure your backups actually restore, you might as well quit making them at all." I couldn't agree more.

April 3, 2011

Making Computing In Rural India, Affordable

With an inadequate computing infrastructure impeding IT penetration in rural India, Microsoft's MultiPoint SDK 1.1 may provide the much required impetus.

"IT lets people learn things they didn't think they could learn before, and so in a sense it is all about potential." These words of Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft Corp, aptly sum up the phenomenal impact that information technology can have on the way we lead our lives.
An example of one such technological breakthrough is Microsoft's MultiPoint software development kit (SDK) 1.1.




Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com

Developed by Microsoft Research India, MultiPoint allows two to 50 students to collaboratively work on and learn from educational software on one computer, using multiple computer mice that drive specifically-designed on-screen cursors, says Latif Nathani, general manager, Unlimited Potential, Microsoft India.

"This not only offers a more affordable solution-the only increase in cost is that of the additional mice-it also creates an active, collaborative learning experience that engages each and every student," he adds.

The need that drove the innovation
As per a recent research conducted by Microsoft to understand how schools in India use PCs, it was found that only 7.02 per cent of the total government schools have computers and even there, the one or two PCs per class are surrounded by several kids. "In most cases, one observes that a dominant ‘bully' hogs the mouse and keyboard. The question was how to multiply the utility of the existing PCs without exponentially increasing the cost. This is how MultiPoint SDK was conceptualised by Microsoft Research India.

"On one hand, the technology enables collaborative learning between students, and on the other, helps a teacher engage more effectively with students and monitor each child's participation and progress, enabling all students to become active learners, thus enhancing the overall classroom experience," says Nathani.
The hardware/software requirements

For application developers working on the MultiPoint SDK platform, the list of requirements is as follows:

* Supported operating systems: Windows Vista; Windows XP Service Pack 2. Windows Vista is recommended. The MultiPoint SDK will also run on Windows XP SP2 (or greater)

* .NET framework version 3.0 or higher (Install from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/aa569263.aspx)

* Microsoft Expression Blend (install a trial version from http://www.microsoft.com/expression/products/Overview.aspx?key=blend)

* Visual Studio 2005 with WPF extensions installed (Visual Studio without WPF extensions is not supported by MultiPoint), or Visual Studio 2008 (install the Express edition from http://www.microsoft.com/express/product/default.aspx)

* Two to four mouse devices for testing

* USB ports on the computer

* 128 MB of RAM (256 MB or higher is recommended)

* 16 MB of video RAM (32 MB or higher is recommended)

* 800 x 600 resolution set in the video card (32-bit colour is recommended)

A platform to build collaborative school content
Using the MultiPoint SDK, curriculum developers can build unique and collaborative applications for schools. It supports new technology platforms like Visual Studio 2008 and includes support for technologies like Flash. The download includes tutorials, white papers and videos to help developers navigate the SDK and build applications.

The actual splitting of screens is completely implemented at the end-user application. Hence, the number of screens that the monitor will be divided into, depends on the screen resolution and end user application that is being used.

A call to build a computing eco-system
To spread the advantages of the MultiPoint SDK to a larger base of users, Microsoft is engaging with partners to develop content, and also working towards creating an environment that will enable teachers to simply customise the content to run on MultiPoint systems.

MS has partnered with Edurite and the Education Development Centre (EDC) to develop the content, curriculum and applications for MultiPoint. Archana Nambiar, program manager, EDC India, says: "EDC has already developed two kinds of MultiPoint applications: physics applications for grades 6 to 8, and an English mentoring application for teachers and students across different age groups."

Edurite has also developed applications for maths and science for class 5 students. The applications developed by EDC will, post testing, be deployed in 2000 schools across seven states, including Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Bihar, according to Srikanth B Iyer, COO, Edurite Technologies.

An attempt is also being made to encourage young innovators around the world to utilise the MultiPoint SDK 1.1. "As part of this year's Imagine Cup software design competition, Team DISHA (Disease and Health Awareness) from India used MultiPoint technology to develop a multimedia platform for children in low income regions. The platform attempts to solve the problem of inadequate disease prevention education among children, while addressing the concerns relating to student involvement, understanding and retention, in a resource-constrained environment," shares Nathani.

The reach and the impact
An interesting case study is that of Vidya Pratishthan's Institute of Information Technology (VIIT), which is leveraging the platform to multiply the impact of its initiative to take computing to the rural schools of Maharashtra. VIIT is conducting trials of MultiPoint in its fleet of 30 technology module buses, which it uses to spread computer literacy in rural schools of the region. So far it has conducted pilots in 10 schools. "VIIT will offer these applications to interested schools from this academic year. VIIT has developed around 10 to 15 applications for Classes 4 to 9, in mathematics, English, biology and chemistry," says Dr Amol Goje, director, VIIT. His observation is that MultiPoint "...is a fantastic technology-simple and yet powerfully apt for a country like India where scarcity of computers for education is a reality."

Opportunities for application developers
To fill this huge infrastructural gap, as pointed out by Dr Goje, the need is to build innovative applications that help percolate the benefits of this technology to the far-flung and rural stretches of the country. The scope for application developers is infinite. The only challenge is to come up with applications that are contextual and innovative enough to not only engage rural students, but also complement their curriculum requirements.

April 2, 2011

How Apple Can Trademark App Store

Apple has been engaged in a public fight in recent weeks over its attempt to trademark the term "App Store." The company originally filed the request with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in 2008 and earlier this year the office finally gave tentative approval, putting the trademark (or simply "mark" in the legal vernacular) up for opposition.

Microsoft was only too game to oblige. Declaring the term "app store" to generic to be exclusive to any one party, Microsoft attacked Apple's application, which quickly (and entertainingly) descended into a war of words that reached its nadir when the two parties started arguing over font sizes. Along the way, Apple sued various parties (most notably, Amazon) for using the term.




Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com


If "App Store" is too generic to be trademarked, what about "Color?" The new social app, which shares photos with other users based on location, has one of the most generic names around, yet the company has trademarked the name and has an application with the USPTO for a registered trademark. How can companies go around trademarking such common terms?

Very easily. There's not much to limit a company from attaching at "TM" to the end of virtually any term (it generally doesn't even require paperwork), but such trademarks are limited only to the markets where the trademark is used, and it's only enforcable if that use is pervasive enough to show ownership. That's why companies try to register most worthwhile trademarks with the USPTO (and get the circled "R"), a legally weighty distinction that protects the mark nationwide.

Common or not, the actual words in the trademark are really only one part of it. Other factors such as the type of business and the goods and services on offer matter just as much when determining a mark's weight—and whether or not there's been infringement by anyone else using the term. Context matters a lot with trademarks.

"You can have common words used as trademarks," says Dyan House, a trademark lawyer at Munck Carter, a technology-focused law firm in Dallas. "They just have to be applied in an uncommon way. Apple is probably the best example of that. It's a very common word, but they've applied it to computers and software and everything that goes with that. It's a very strong mark. When you hear the term 'Apple' you know that you're talking about that particular company. You don't confuse it with the fruit."

The USPTO can reject trademarks for several reasons, but they typically boil down to one of four things: whether consumers could confuse it with another mark, if it's already a proper name (you probably won't get "Jones" trademarked), obscenity, or if it's a generic term used in the industry.

That last reason is the one Microsoft is focusing on in its attacks on Apple's "App Store" trademark. Just as a printer company can't trademark "toner cartridge," Microsoft says "app store" is likewise too descriptive a term to pass the trademark test. However, there is something that Apple can show that would strengthen its case: massive, widespread usage of the term in the context of its products.

"The real way a mark is developed is through use," says House. "That's how you acquire rights, through using the mark. The trademark office has said [app store] is descriptive, but Apple was able to show that through their extensive advertising and branding of the App Store that it has acquired 'distinctiveness,' so it's risen to the level of a trademark."

At least for now. With Microsoft's objections to the App Store trademark on record, the USPTO could reconsider and declare the term too generic to be trademarked. Until it rules one way or the other, expect to see the term used a lot by Apple—both in advertising and in its war of words with its competitors.

April 1, 2011

TwitJacker Lets You Tweet into Other Accounts

There are a number of third-party Twitter tools that allow you to, as they say, Tweet longer. In other words, they let you go beyond the Twitter prescribed 140 character count. These services will put your full tweet on a web page or break them into multiple tweets. Decent solutions, but now a couple of research students at University Principal have launched a new service that should transform overly-long Tweets forever: TwitJacker.

Like those other services, TwitJacker allows you to go well beyond the 140 character limit—in fact there is no limit. However, TwitJacker posts every 140 characters after the first 140 to someone else's Twitter account.




Best Microsoft MCTS Training – Microsoft MCITP Training at Certkingdom.com



Grad students Pahil Smith and April Terwilliger built the service last year, but only moved out of beta today. "We had quite a few technical and legal hurdles to clear before we could release TwitJacker into the wild," Smith told PCMag, "but now we have the clearances and servers to support the necessary Twitter API calls."

Here's how TwitJacker works: You post, say, a 420 character tweet in to TwitJacker's Web site or use the TwitJacker hashtag at the end of the Tweet in any other Twitter client. The first set of characters lives on your account. The next set of 140 is posted in the account of whoever last posted onto Twitter (the technology uses global time stamps). Subsequent sections are delivered to the next Twitter posters. Eventually, the entire lengthy tweet is out on Twitter.

When asked about the meaning of the name, Smith said, "Isn't it obvious? Your Tweet is hijacking their Twitter account. You, just for a millisecond, take control." Tweets posted by TwitJacker cannot be deleted from any account. "So Tweet much longer, much more carefully," said Smith, laughing.

Terwilliger admits that there are still a few bugs to work out. For instance, they originally wanted to post the Tweet portions to your followers' accounts, but apparently couldn't tap into that part of Twitter's API. "I remember looking at the follow code and finding a comment from, I think, Jack. I thought that was so cool, that I was touching code from the creator. Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out where Jack left the follower hooks," explained Terwilliger.

For now, it remains somewhat difficult to recompile the full Tweet since, as Smith noted this week, "You need to be wicked-fast to catch the next few Tweets after your first Tweet portion." In the meantime, the TwitJacker execs suggest using Twitter's search tools to find all of your Tweet.
Bookmark and Share