Internet Explorer 9 Released

Microsoft Corp. has finally released their much anticipated Internet Explorer 9 in 39 languages during the Microsoft event at the South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive Conference in Austin, Texas, on Monday.

Claimed to be the most downloaded beta browser of all time, boasting 40 million downloads and already gaining more than 2% usage on Windows 7, it is actually a complete rebuild of IE8, which has its own fair share of complains to date.

Most notable improvement is performance, according to Engadget, it is faster than IE8 and Mozilla Firefox 3.6.15 but still not as fast as Google Chrome and boasts advanced support for the emerging web standard HTML5. Design has been simplified and updated (much too late in my opinion). Another new feature is the 'One Box' which doubles up as an address bar and search bar where when searching through it, results show up instantly.

All-in-all it looks promising but I still have my reservations, maybe because of previous versions, just the mention of IE turns me off. But to be fair, it deserves a chance, give it time, maybe I'll be a convert since my weapon of choice is currently still Chrome. 

Those of you who want to give it a try, you can download it at http://www.beautyoftheweb.com/

Gary Moore Gone....

Gary Moore, notable and influential guitarist(also one of my biggest heroes) has passed away in the early hours on the 6th December 2011 while on holiday in Estepona, Spain as revealed by his official website http://www.gary-moore.com/.

Known as a blues-rock guitarist and singer, he was best known by his hit single "Still Got The Blues" in 1990. To those more familiar with his work, he was a member of Thin Lizzy of "The Kids Are Back In Town" fame. 

Also known to have experimented with all sorts of genres including hard rock, pop and even modern dance, it was ultimately the blues that worked best for him.

He was also almost always seen with a 59' Gibson Les Paul Standard guitar. Gibson even issued a Gary Moore Signature guitar in 2000. 

He has collaborated with a broad range of artists including B.B. King, George Harrison and Ozzy Osbourne to name a few.

Incidentally, I was listening to "Empty Rooms" this afternoon and boy, does the room feel empty without him...

R.I.P 

Gary Moore

1952-2011 

Google Leads Smartphone Platform

Canalys, the high-tech expert analyst, has ranked Google's Android as the top smartphone platform leapfrogging Nokia's Symbian in their final Q4 2010 global country-level smartphone market data. With 33.3 million Android-based devices shipped out, Nokia trailed by a slim 31 million devices worldwide although they still take the lead as the top smartphone vendor with 28% market share.

Apple took third with 16.2 million iPhones shipped trailed by RIM at 14.6 million. Microsoft was last with 3.1 million but to be fair, they started pretty late to be a real competitor in 2010.

For 2011 though it's anybody's guess as the market goes into overdrive with Android's Honeycomb just around the corner, iOS 5 coming soon, Windows Phone 7 upgrade rumoured in February.

Sony Unveils NGP

Sony today unveiled the successor to the PSP, the Next Generation Portable(NGP) in Tokyo today. The device will make it's debut at the end of 2011 although how much it will cost and it's games are not yet  known.

Key NGP features are :

• Multi-touch 5-inch organic light emitting display (OLED) as the front display
• Multi-touch pad on the rear of the device
• Dual analog sticks
• Two cameras (front and rear)
• Software titles on small, dedicated flash memory-based cards
• Three motion sensors, gyroscope, accelerometer and electronic compass
• Wi-Fi and 3G network connectivity
• PlayStation Network access, including ““LiveArea™”, “Near” and “Activity” log features Trophy Support
• NGP will be able to play PSP titles, minis, PS one classics, video and comics from the PlayStation Store.

And the technical specs would be :

CPU	ARM® Cortex™-A9 core (4 core)
GPU	SGX543MP4+
External Dimensions	Approx. 182.0 x 18.6 x 83.5mm (width x height x depth) (tentative, excludes largest projection)
Screen (Touch screen)	5 inches (16:9), 960 x 544, Approx. 16 million colors, OLED Multi touch screen (capacitive type)
Rear touch pad	Multi touch pad (capacitive type)
Cameras	Front camera, Rear camera
Sound	Built-in stereo speakers Built-in microphone
Sensors	Six-axis motion sensing system (three-axis gyroscope, three-axis accelerometer), Three-axis electronic compass
Location	Built-in GPS Wi-Fi location service support
Keys / Switches	PS button Power button Directional buttons (Up/Down/Right/Left) Action buttons (Triangle, Circle, Cross, Square) Shoulder buttons (Right/Left) Right stick, Left stick START button, SELECT button Volume buttons (+/-)
Wireless communications	Mobile network connectivity (3G) IEEE 802.11b/g/n (n = 1×1) (Wi-Fi) (Infrastructure mode/Ad-hoc mode) Bluetooth® 2.1+EDR （A2DP/AVRCP/HSP）

And the titles shown or talked about are :

1. Killzone
2. Uncharted
3. WipEout
4. LittleBigPlanet
5. Call of Duty
6. Resistance
7. Little Deviants
8. Hot Shots Golf
9. Reality Fighters
10. Gravity Daze
11. Smart As
12. Broken
13. Hustle Kings

Also announced was the Playstation Suite, where you can enjoy Playstation content on an open operating system, namely android based, "Playstation Certified" portable devices such as mobile phones and tablets worldwide.

More details to follow...

Do Nothing For 2 Minutes

Here's a challenge, do nothing on the internet for 2 minutes. Launched by Alex Tew - the man behind the Million Dollar Homepage - donothingfor2minutes.com is just a picture of the ocean with a sun on the horizon and a timer. Everytime you move the mouse the timer will reset. Tew says the site is designed to make the point about the way we spend all of our time surrounded by an unlimited supply of information.

I did it and I could swear I saw the water moving..honest! Well, I dare you to do it too...and no cheating!!!

Print From Your Phone with Google Cloud Print

Need to print when on the move? Now you can with Gmail for mobile and Google Cloud Print. You can print your emails an it's attachments from your phone when you are on the go.

This service will roll out in the U.S in the next few days and we will eventually get it here hopefully soon. It also is only available for Windows-based PC but watch out for Linux and Mac support soon.

Relating to my previous post this would be great addition to the project if they can print from space. On the other hand this application would probably put the fax machine in the ranks of the telex pretty soon.

Space Android

British engineers from Surrey Satellite Technology Limited(SSTL) and the Surrey Space Centre are planning to send a smartphone, notably an Android powered one into space soon. Code named STRaND-1, which stands for Surrey Training, Research and Nanosatellite Demonstrator, the satellite will be launched into orbit later this year to demonstrate the capabilities of off-the-shelf components to build a satellite quickly.

The phone won't be making calls back home though but instead will initially be taking images of earth and eventually if everything goes according to plan, take control of the satellite itself. The actual phone model is not yet known but it will be a sub-£300(RM1,400) smartphone available at High Street stores.

Why Android?  Being open-sourced, apps can be developed for the phone to suit the functions off the satellite. Even though they won't be taking the phone apart and sending it as it is, common sense dictates that they eventually would when it comes back to earth to check for damages or whatnot. So screw the iPhone.

If the mission is a success, it will shake-up the space industry tremendously especially when the satellite costs less than an average family car powered by a smartphone!

Sophos names social networks as main target for cyber criminals in 2011

Sophos, one of the leaders in IT security, published their Security Threat Report today and cited social networks as the haven for scammers and cybercriminals this year after analysing the polls they conducted recently. Facebook was singled out to be the popular destination with 82% respondents felt it posed the biggest security risk.

The problem isn't just for home users but also a threat to businesses as people also log in at work or the company itself has their own page. Sophos Senior Technology Consultant, Graham Cluley questions if security is in the company's DNA. He also said that "Either Facebook simply doesn't "get" security and privacy. Or it just don't care".

The report also mentions that the United States continues to be the home of most infected webpages. 

You can read the press release here, Graham Cluley's comments here or if you are up to it, the full report here.

Google Earth, Picasa and Chrome available for download in Iran

It seems like Google is buzzing(pun intended) around a lot these days. They announced hours ago that Google Earth, Picasa and Chrome will be available for download in Iran as some of U.S's export restrictions have been lifted.

The U.S. export control and sanctions programs prohibited software downloads during protests which erupted in Iran in June 2009 following the disputed Presidential election. At that point in time, Iran shut down traditional media outlets, deported foreign journalists, closed off print journalism and disrupted telco lines. All that left the use of the internet as the best source of information out of the country where Youtube and Twitter were cited as the main contributors for firsthand news.

This is a significant move by Google as they are helping the cause for freedom of speech and giving people the tools to do it.