Archive for the ‘Software’ Category
Another weekend is behind us folks and it barely made its presence felt. Not a lot happened over the weekend, as you might imagine. But we have a job to do, and we’re going to do it damnit!
New phones from Sony Ericsson could be unvelied on November 6, or so sayeth CellPassion. We’ve already seen leaked shots of the W890 and the W380 while the K660 was made official by SE. So really, the only thing to look forward to is the confirmation of the existence and specs on the W890 and W380. Maybe, just maybe, if we’re lucky, SE will unveil more than these three. [CellPassion via Boy Genius Report]
In more rumor-mongering, noises are being made about the Google Phone/OS/Whatever might finally be announced on November 5. It seems that the technology in development is a full-fledged mobile OS with tight integration of existing Google products. The OS will be open and distributed freely under an ad-supported revenue model. Whatever it is, we hope it’s good. This kind of hype is usually only reserved for Apple products. [Via The New York Times]
Firefox has released version 2.0.0.9 and we recommend you download it. The release contains bug-fixes for problems found in earlier versions. Download it here.
The Wall Street Journal now has over a million subscribers for its online edition. Quite a milestone, we must say. A lot of websites, including The New York Times have ditched their pay-for-access models and are now completely free in order to attract more visitors. In such a time, it’s a wonder that WSJ.com has managed to attract such a large subscriber base. [Via Yahoo! News]
Swedish glam-rock band Lamont has collaborated with, wait for it, The Pirate Bay, to freely distribute their music via P2P. Their new album is available in multiple file formats and over 100k users downloaded it on the first day. It’s a sign of musicians finally warming up to the idea of P2P distribution. Besides, a lot of music fans will go out and buy CDs of music that they like. [Via TorrentFreak]
Popularity: 34% [?]
- By Vivek on Nov 5, 2007
A bit of a slow news day today. Not a lot happened but coming up is a short summary of today’s top stories. On slow news days like today, we’ll try and add a “Recommended Reading” link which will take you to an analysis/article/editorial/op-ed that while not news, makes for good reading.
The
Indian government did a U-turn on OLPCs today as it agreed to a pilot project that will give 22 students in Maharashtra an OLPC each. The government will evaluate the usefulness of the OLPC and then decide on whether to get more OLPCs. A few months ago,
the government was bragging about being able to build $10 computers which was as unlikely then as it is now. A year ago, the Indian government snubbed the OLPC but things appear to have changed now. [Via Yahoo! News]
For once, Microsoft has managed to beat Google. The company managed to clinch a 1.6% stake in popular social networking site Facebook earlier today for a whopping $240 million. This means that Facebook is now worth $15 billion in the short span of three years. The deal gives Microsoft exclusive rights to post adverts on the website outside the United States among other things. [Via REUTERS]
In news sure to please open source aficionados, Version 2.4 of the GNU Image Manipulation Program or GIMP was released to public today. While it hasn’t brought any GUI changes with it, the GIMP website has been given a much-needed makeover. Version 2.6 is expected to bring in a new interface but this is a solid release by the GIMP team. Click here to download the latest version.
In our last item for the day, we have information courtesy HardMac that copies of Leopard have already made their way into retail stores ahead of its impending release. Leopard is the new Mac OS X operating system (10.5) and ushers in several new features and enhancements over Tiger. [Via HardMac]
Recommended Reading: Why Motorola and Sony Ericsson need to “get it” from AllAboutSymbian.com
Popularity: 20% [?]
- By Vivek on Oct 25, 2007
Well, it looks like AutoPatcher is gone for good. According to the official blog,
Today we received an e-mail from Microsoft, requesting the immediate take-down of the download page, which of course means that AutoPatcher is probably history. As much as we disagree, we can do very little, and although the download page is merely a collection of mirrors, we took the download page down.
It’s unfortunate that this had to happen. Several users love AutoPatcher and the ease of use associated with updates clubbed together monthly. Good bye AutoPatcher. It was nice knowing you.
AutoPatcher Blog
Popularity: 14% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 30, 2007
In the continuing war for high-def supremacy, HD DVD has garnered the support of Paramount Pictures and DreamWorks Animation SKG. The two announced that they have chosen HD DVD as their next generation optical format for movies. From Yahoo! News,
The move by the two studios will include the upcoming blockbuster “Shrek the Third” and all movies distributed by Paramount Pictures, DreamWorks Pictures, Paramount Vantage, Nickelodeon Movies and MTV Films, as well as movies from DreamWorks Animation, which are distributed exclusively by Paramount Home Entertainment.
Of course, the Blu-ray camp gets 100% of the movies made by Sony including Spiderman 3. This format war just got more exciting drawn-out.
Yahoo! News
Popularity: 11% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 20, 2007
ArsTechnica is reporting that Windows Home Server has been released to system builders and should see an official release by the end of the month. While there will be a support team ready by August 27, Microsoft is refusing to divulge any details regarding pricing or availability in North America. ArsTechnica, however, has information that WHS is available in some markets such as New Zealand (for NZ$253) and the UK (for £88.74).
US pricing should fall in between $100 and $250 with $199 being highly likely. Information for other markets is unavailable.
ArsTechnica
Popularity: 9% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 20, 2007
If you’re among those unlucky users who have 965 boards and have been waiting for nearly a year for the graphics drivers promised by Intel to improve performance, then you’re in luck. As long as you use Windows XP, the drivers are up for download. Follow the download link below to grab the new drivers. If you use Vista, then your wait is not over yet. No, we won’t diss you.
Download Drivers
CNET News
Popularity: 9% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 19, 2007
Look who is having problems! Our dear friends at PCWorld are reporting that a login glitch that shut many users out of the popular VOIP services appears to have finally being fixed.
“We’re fixing issues in our networking software and monitoring the clients getting online with increased success,” the company said in a blog post.
The news of this outage, which was caused by a ’software issue’ as described by the company, first came out at around 2 PM GMT, according to PCWorld.
Well, some of us in the Techspot admin team are going for further studies abroad, so we’d be like using Skype quite a bit. We’re not sure we’d like any log outs in the middle of a call with the folks back home. Nopes.
Popularity: 6% [?]
- By Anand on Aug 17, 2007
All you Mac users out there grumbling about the lack of Skype updates on the Mac side of things have a reason to rejoice. Skype has released a beta version of Skype 2.7 for Mac OS X. There are a bunch of new features incorporated into this edition of Skype and here we list them briefly:
- Group contacts – organize your contacts into as many groups as you need
- See your Apple Address Book contacts in Skype
- Create and manage public chats by clicking on Chats in the menu bar and choosing Start Public Chat.
- Auto Redial for busy or unconnected calls.
- Easy sound-level controls
- Overhauled file transfer
To view the blog post, click the read link below. If you’ve seen enough and want to get hold of the beta right-away, then hit the download link.
Read
Download
Popularity: 9% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 16, 2007
 
According to PC World, a Yahoo Messenger security hole has been discovered which allows unwanted code to be executed on a user’s PC. The type of vulnerability discovered is a heap overflow which occurs if someone accepts a webcam invitation from another YIM user.
The vulnerability affects Yahoo Messenger version 8.1.0.413 and users are advised to avoid accepting webcam invites until a patch is issued. While no exploit code has been published yet, users should be careful. They could also block port 5100 which is used by the program.
PC World
Popularity: 9% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 15, 2007
Tomorrow, Microsoft will release nine patches for its products out of which a whopping eight are related to remote code execution. Out of these eight, six are tagged critical by Microsoft.
The patches will be released for various Windows operating systems such as 2000, XP, Vista, and Server 2003. Other software to be affected are IE, Office, Office 2004 for Mac, Visual Basic and XML Core Services.
ArsTechnica
Popularity: 10% [?]
- By Vivek on Aug 13, 2007
