November 26th, 2009

Microsoft: To spam or not to spam

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 11:18 pm

Categories: Cloud computing, Discussion, Microsoft, Research, Security, Web 2.0, Weird and wonderful, Windows Live

Tags: Microsoft Corp., E-mail, Cyberthreats, Spam, Online Communications, Security, Spam And Phishing, Zack Whittaker

It’s not often that I get spam through to my university email account, mostly on the part that I am careful with who I subscribe to using the email address given to me. No doubt through subscribing to certain services through a single email account would determine which subscription providers were selling on addresses to spammers.

So as you would expect, I was surprised when I got this strangely outdated-looking email from Microsoft, stating that my subscription to Hotmail Plus (more space, no advertisements and a few other features) was due to expire. But every bone in my body screamed out to me that I should take this email with a pinch of salt even though I have a Hotmail Plus subscription.

Here’s what I saw, and with your knowledge of spam which you have received, come to your own conclusions.

So, out of interest and by using a totally democratic process through a voting system, let’s see what the vast majority of you think, and then you can draw your own conclusions from the answer.

 Loading ...

Afterwards, you can find the answer here.

October 31st, 2009

Web addresses to extend to non-English languages

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 8:46 am

Categories: Breaking news, Environment, Major breakthroughs, Next-generation technology, Web 2.0

Tags: Web, ICANN, Web Address, Channel Management, Domain Names, Marketing, Internet, Zack Whittaker

Since the very start of web addresses being introduced, only Latin-script (English) based web addresses would work. With the ever increasing number of web addresses in use, the regulatory body assigning domain name details has approved the use of non-English addresses.

ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, have approved a number of internationalised domain names (IDN’s) which could be rolled out as soon as next year, the BBC report.

At the moment, only the standard 26-letter English alphabet from A-Z and including 0-9 can be used. This new process will allow in theory any language using any symbol to enter web addresses.

This move will see the next generation web for non-English speaking users, and in short, will make the Internet truly local to whoever may use the web.

From two weeks time, ICANN will begin accepting applications for IDN’s and will make the first ones available from mid-2010.

Starting with the most popular languages, according to the BBC article:

“It is likely the majority of early non-Latin net addresses to be approved will be in Chinese and Arabic script, followed by Russian.

Some countries, such as China and Thailand, have already introduced workarounds that allow computer users to enter web addresses in their own language. However, these were not internationally approved and do not work on all computers.”

This appears to be ICANN’s first major step since receiving autonomy from the US government last month. How web browsers will respond to this it is not so clear. However, with Firefox, by entering in a non-English set of characters, seems to convert it only to English when submitted.

Will this make the Internet more accessible? Have your say.

October 15th, 2009

Internet Firechrome Safari: A browsing identity crisis

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 9:43 am

Categories: Discussion, Multimedia, Productivity, Research, Web 2.0

Tags: Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Web Browser, Web Browsers, Internet, Zack Whittaker

The importance of the web browser in our everyday lives has become a focal point of conversation to many. But to throw an interesting slant on browsers, can the average user just get away with using one?

There have been times when I have waded into the browser-battle debate (most notably here). But now I think that the world has it wrong. It shouldn’t matter which browser you use. For me and many of those I work with, it is not a case of “Internet Explorer or Firefox”; it is a case of “Internet Explorer and Firefox”.

(Well, first and foremost, forget the Safari element because running that browser on Windows is like being voted the most attractive person in the burns unit. It sounds all good and well but if you put them into comparison, it really isn’t as good as you would have hoped for. It just sounded like a good headline.)

I play FarmVille but my Firefox browser it gets slow and sluggish, and the Flash element automatically downgrades the quality to try and compensate for all of the things going on within that session. After a search around, I discovered that Google’s Chrome browser was great for FarmVille. While at first Chrome was a “dedicated FarmVille browser”, I have since expanded by browsing to Facebook then and other interconnecting sites.

I am pretty much forced into using Internet Explorer - which may I add, still suffers from frozen tab syndrome - when using Outlook Web Access on campus. But there are times when I will open up a few tabs in Internet Explorer and leave them as they are; my email, the staff directory (global address list) and a status window which is my welfare switchboard for the entire set of buildings under my umbrella.

The point is, is that now I not only use Internet Explorer for email, I also use Firefox primarily for the tab-saving element to bookmark items for later, and Chrome as well initially for gaming but now for broader use.

So in this day and age with multiple sites and online services requiring certain prerequisites or browsers to function, most of us cannot go through a single working or studying day without having to change browsers at some point.

Perhaps a more liberal attitude towards browsers should be considered by the consumer. Whether I would still call Firefox my primary browser, I don’t know because in all honesty I use at least three because there is no browser which offers the full functionality that I need in all circumstances.

Do you use multiple browsers and if so, why?

October 14th, 2009

Double slash in Web addresses 'a bit of a mistake'

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 10:42 am

Categories: Research, Web 2.0, Web development, Weird and wonderful

Tags: Web, Protocol, Channel Management, Marketing, Zack Whittaker

The creator of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, has admitted that the double slash we see in every website address was a mistake, and that if he could go back and change things, it would be to remove this oblique double punctuation.

The British scientist according to the BBC News says that the double forward-slash is “pretty pointless”, with:

“[t]yping in // has just resulted in people overusing their index fingers, wasting time and using more paper”.

The rest of the address is relatively important for the browser. Back in the “olden days” of the Internet, there were http protocols, gopher protocols and ftp protocols - and all followed with a colon and a double forward-slash. Now we have more protocols which are used, such as Skype and AIM to initiate a VoIP call or an instant message.

But there is practically no reference to the double forward-slash on the web, or as to why it is even there. In an interview with The Times of London, he could have easily redesigned URLs not to have the double forward-slashes in. Perhaps as a result, it would have reduced initial frustration, confusion over web addresses and saved on paper.

Perhaps along with the evolution of Web 3.0, we may well see the end of the double forward-slash. Anybody fancy visiting http:news.bbc.co.uk or http:www.zdnet.com today?

October 7th, 2009

Next-gen operating systems: Facebook on steroids?

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 10:33 am

Categories: Cloud computing, Discussion, Google, Next-generation technology, Productivity, Research, Social networking, Web 2.0, Weird and wonderful

Tags: Facebook, Operating System, Operating Systems, Software, Zack Whittaker

The conversation I had with Mozilla Labs UX chief, Aza Raskin, last week has made me think about the future of the web. He envisions a future when the vast majority of things in the cloud are combined with a social web, and “something” where the two overlap. Stick with me on this one for a minute…

Readers of the ZDNet “All About Microsoft” blog should be aware that in the next decade, Windows will be phased out and replaced by a next-generation operating system, “Midori”. My guess is that it will run as a Software+Services model where the client machine will do processing but the vast majority of the “workings” will be run from the cloud, including applications.

It’s just a guess, mind you. There’s nothing definitive yet, and even the Queen of Redmond herself isn’t entirely sure, due to the tight-lipped nature of the Singularity/Midori teams. This is at very least my vision of the future operating system.

So based on this thinking (and I am keen to stress that this is purely conjecture), isn’t this to some extent what Facebook could turn out to be if it was stuffed full of electronic uppers and poppers, and poked very hard with an ingenious stick?

The very nature of Facebook is that of a social experience. You interact with others - friends, family and colleagues - in a way which has gotten modern sociologists wetting themselves with excitement. The psychology of the whole thing is blowing the minds of these radical professors into new ways of thinking, and technologists are seeing this sort of platform as the potential for the future.

Read the rest of this entry »

October 2nd, 2009

Mozilla Labs UX chief: What's next for Mozilla, Firefox and the Web

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 12:08 pm

Categories: Cloud computing, Discussion, Events, FOWA London 2009, Major breakthroughs, Next-generation technology, Open source, Research, Security, University, Web 2.0

Tags: Security, Web, Mozilla Firefox, Web Browser, Mozilla Corp., Aza Raskin, Web Browsers, Internet, Zack Whittaker

Shortly after having a door slam in my face and it nearly breaking my nose, I sat down with Aza Raskin, the head of user experiences at Mozilla Labs to discuss not only where Mozilla is heading in the near future but also what he sees in the next-generation World Wide Web.

This interview was done over a cup of coffee in a bustling room. Everything said here is from Raskin himself, with notes taken by myself and paraphrased to make it readable.

The views from the UX guy

As the head of user experiences at Mozilla Labs, he looks at future-proofing Mozilla as an organisation, and as a result focuses mainly on the web. He assists and helps out on other non-Firefox projects but does spend the largest portion of his time on the browser. Even though he and his team are separate from the Firefox development team, he has a large sway of input. On the other hand, some bits he suggests go in and some do not.

Firefox 3.6 will be the next release of Mozilla’s open-source browser and will be designed specifically with Windows users in mind. The new user interface will incorporate many of the technologies that Vista and Windows 7 have such as the Aero theme; more so with Windows 7, though, as multi-touch features will be included in the browser’s functionality.

The future of the web is difficult to guess or estimate in any capacity. Nevertheless, everyone desires an open web. Microsoft, Apple, and Google with their respective browsers are all aiming for the majority share of the market. Raskin assures me that this is not Mozilla’s aim. As a not-for-profit organisation, they benefit from having a wide range of users but for the most part the userbase is the size it is through personal, hands-on experience and “Word of Mouth 2.0″. The aim is not to get 100% of the marketshare, but enough to get the shift and the space to create.

Something Raskin mentioned in the “open web” were things such as Flash and Silverlight - technologies which are plug-ins but don’t allow you to view the source. In his opinion, it is important that everything you see, view and use should provide the code alongside it. Having non-view source so you don’t know what is going on is not an “open web”. There will of course be exceptions to this, but I’m sure you understand what he means.

I asked why Firefox 3.5 had slowed down, become more sluggish and more lethargic in quality and usage from personal experience.

Because Raskin struck me as an unflinchingly honest and supremely intelligent man who understands full well is responsbility to the end-user, I believed him whole-heartedly when he said it was predominantly Adobe Flash that slowed things down. More often than not, web sites hold Flash advertising which is why when you open a selection of ten random tabs, the collective memory going towards running these advertisements cause Firefox’s memory footprint to rocket. I believed himl it made perfect sense.

He told me that Firefox 3.5 was introduced to make things better. With different technologies incorporating a more user-centric set of experiences such GeoLocation, Private Browsing and SeaMonkey, these were base-level features to make the end-user more client (rather than cloud) based and provide an overall enhanced experience; not only on their own volition but to keep up with other competing browsers.

Google and Microsoft have huge research departments with thousands of people working towards making their browsers accessible but also house the potential for a wealth of features for future releases. Mozilla has “tens” of people, but as Firefox is open source, anyone from academics, students, universities, developers and ordinary consumers make the research process so much more democratic. This is what drove him to work on Mozilla Ubiquity.

Along with this and their “personas”, the customisable themes which you can see in the first image above, the browser should be yours and not be the company developing the browser to determine what it should look like. People love personalisation through their sites, bookmarks and add-ons, which is another reason  why Firefox has done so well.

The future of Firefox –>

September 22nd, 2009

Students vs. Google Apps vs. Office Web Apps

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 4:01 am

Categories: Discussion, Google, Microsoft, Next-generation technology, Office 14, Productivity, University, Web 2.0, e-Learning

Tags: Google Inc., Google Apps, Google Docs, Web Application, Microsoft Corp., Windows Live SkyDrive, SkyDrive, Cloud Computing, Microsoft Office, Office Suites

I have spent quite a portion of my time covering the developments between Google Apps (Education Edition) and Microsoft’s Live@edu online suites; the latest features, the timeline and background information, and the increasing competitive natures of the companies.

But throw in an interesting twist like Office Web Apps and it makes me consider the depth and breadth of Microsoft’s determination to make an impact in the office-in-the-cloud niche market.

For what I am trying to conclude in this post is the Google Apps (Docs specifically) vs. Office Web Apps war but from the students perspective. This was admittedly my editor’s idea, but a “student perspective” requires one to think outside the bog-standard definition-of-a box. Both are equally good - even though the latter has not been fully evaluated by the masses yet. From the documentation, the videos and the images we have seen already, what they have to offer seems appealing to the iGeneration.

Gallery
To see a screenshot gallery of the new features in the Office Web Apps technical preview release, head on over this way, or read on.

So let’s take this from a logical perspective and see which offers what exactly, rather than a finger-pointing exercise of which is better. Frankly, I don’t care. Everyone is different and personal preference prevails in this; hence the competition factor between the companies.

A brief tit-for-tat comparison

With Google Docs I have the ability to use my university email address and corresponding password; that, however, is a feature of Google’s account setup. With Google Apps which is a combination of Gmail, Google Docs and some other bits and pieces, it can link in directly with your university’s account servers for a single sign-on solution.

Microsoft’s Office Web Apps runs in two main capacities. In this context it falls into a “free for everyone” category where Office Web Apps is an online office suite which is activated when you access a compatible Office document through Windows Live SkyDrive. The second is the “for the university” where SkyDrive is non-existent and is replaced with an existing internal SharePoint site which allows Office Web Apps to open up in a very similar way to the consumer view.

The “free for everyone” version will be advert supported and will no doubt be quite annoying to those working with their documents, but it is after all how the Internet remains as free as it presently is. This version doesn’t support your university single sign-on details mixing your Windows Live ID and your university credentials. Anything academic should stay that way; using “personal” accounts makes things messy and you lose track of your stuff.

Google Apps is a purely hosted solution so if something goes horrendously wrong then the chances are it is Google’s issue and your IT technicians haven’t tripped over an important cable in the server room. As Google has a far better infrastructure in place than even the most powerful university, so it takes costs out of the hands of the university to provide more services elsewhere.

Microsoft’s side is getting a little confusing though. It seems to be mixing together so many services and not making distinct lines between services and products. Windows Live SkyDrive hosts the documents, whereas Office Web Apps opens them, but it can be integrated into SharePoint and Office Web Apps will be an integral part of Live@edu too.

Google Docs, however, uses the same space for storage of files and editing. It is as close to an actual online office suite as you can get, really.

But whether you like it or not, Google Docs or any non-Microsoft company will never make a fully compatible online or offline office suite which works 100% with Office documents. The simple reason here is that Microsoft made Office and that Office has a set standard. Only those with the know-how and the original source code can make it happen. If Google were in that position, Google Docs would be on top.

And there’s more… Read the rest of this entry »

September 17th, 2009

Office 2010 for students excludes Office Web Apps

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 11:19 am

Categories: Breaking news, Microsoft, Office 14, Productivity, University, Web 2.0, Windows Live, e-Learning

Tags: Web Application, Office Web Apps, Cloud Computing, Microsoft Office, Office Suites, Software, Zack Whittaker

In a strange and frankly pathetic move on behalf of Microsoft, the Home and Student edition of the next generation of the Microsoft Office suite will not include Office Web Apps.

According to the documentation just released on the Microsoft website, looking through the editions available, Home and Student includes the same applications as Office 2007 but without the Office Web Apps function.

From inspecting the product documentation, Office 2010 Standard and Office 2010 Professional Plus will be providing Office Web Applications licenses.

There is limited access to the Microsoft Office Web Apps, which has been confirmed as the final name for the web applications, through SkyDrive at the moment. Only beta testers with Office 2010 access will be able to use the online office suite.

Office Web Apps seems to be running through SkyDrive rather than a separate service. Users can connect Office already to their Office WorkSpaces which may or may not interlink with SkyDrive, to then access their documents through the web interface.

The limited technical preview will open up the Word Web App, Excel Web App and PowerPoint Web App (as they are now officially known as), and the OneNote Web App will be added soon after. The simple reason is that it is not ready yet.

Support is being provided to Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari users; browsers which support the Silverlight software which is used to render the web applications.

What is interesting, however, is the wording of the answer to their self-provided question:

Are Office Web Apps free? What are the different ways people can get them?
For business use, Office Professional Plus and Office Standard 2010 licenses will each include access to the Office Web Apps. A customer will then be able to run the Office Web Apps on SharePoint 2010. For personal use, Office Web Apps will be available as a free ad-supported service to consumers via Windows Live.

So while the Office Web Apps will still be available for use but will be paid-for by advertisements displayed on the screen.

Live@edu users will be given access to Office Web Apps “soon”, according to Microsoft. The reason they get access before anybody else is explained in my previous post.

• Read more: What Office Web Apps will and won’t do (Ed Bott)
• Read more: Do you really need Office? Really? (Chris Dawson)
• Read more: 10 things to know about Office Web Apps (Mary Jo Foley)

Update: after digging deeper into this, it does seem that though Office 2010 Home and Student will exclude Office Web Apps, the online suite of applications are designed more for the corporate environment - including universities.

Everyone, including students, will still have access to the Office Web Apps for free. The only difference is how they are delivered to the end user. It will be either through Windows Live - for consumers - or through SharePoint - for enterprises. The SharePoint interface will have no advertisements whereas the consumer view in Windows Live will be advert supported.

Again, Live@edu users will still have access through their university networks. However if universities and colleges opt to roll out the more enterprise based Office suite to their client machines, students will have access to Office Web Apps available over the Internet but will be hosted internally.

Internally-hosted Office Web Apps allows integration with existing university network logins, whereas Windows Live will not (Live@edusupports local Active Directory integration). It will also include backup and restore features and groupings for organisation in true SharePoint style.

It is therefore up to the educational establishment to consider Office Web Apps for its users - the students - as opposed to the students buying a copy of Home and Student and having instant access to the web applications.

They still haven’t included Outlook in the Home and Student edition. This is something that still grates me but something that will probably never change.

August 21st, 2009

Twitter: 40% babble, but what about the users?

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 4:20 am

Categories: Cloud computing, Discussion, Gratuitous rant, Productivity, Research, Social networking, Web 2.0, Weird and wonderful

Tags: Twitter Inc., TVs, Tv & Home Theater, Personal Technology, Home Entertainment, Zack Whittaker

On Monday, research carried out by Pear Analytics determined that 40% of all messages (”tweets”) on Twitter are pointless babble. It doesn’t say anything about the users though, but does give a rough indication of their personalities without any direct specifics.

Now this set me thinking. If I was to take a slice of Twitter pie and serve it on a shiny, clean plate, what ingredients would make up that pie? What would be in there - in shape, form and character? I came up with these five in my perspective of the worst kind of Twitter users.

1. The “has to be part of a wider circle of like-minded thinkers” user. These are the people who have to hashtag pretty much everything they write. #I #am #going #for #a #shower. Are you? That’s gripping stuff there, but frankly I couldn’t care less and you have missed the point of hashtags completely.
2. The “must tell the world how busy and important I am all the time in case they forget” user. The majority of Twitter users are no doubt busy people and it’s understandable if they need to attend meetings. Some people work with the press and media and attend radio and television interviews. That’s all good and well; sometimes it comes with the territory of the job you do. But when every other tweet includes your diary for the day, that gets tedious and makes you look pretentious and arrogant - two remarkably bad qualities for a person.
3. The “can’t tweet without mentioning somebody” user. I’m sick to death of seeing tweets which consist of nothing other than literally a small handful of readable words and the rest are @other @users. Don’t use Twitter as a mailing list. Use a mailing list.
4. The “link whore” user. I can understand when people such as myself or those in a similar position where they have work which they want to spread around the web. Twitter is a great tool for that. I have my blog entries automatically sent out over Twitter so I don’t have to do it myself. But those who sign up to the service just to send out links to their followers, to me it’s like a very short version of junk mail.
5. The “1s who cnt spk prprly n hv 2 cram as mch in as poss” user. We’re quite aware that you can only send the maximum of a single text message - 160 characters - but it’s not the hardest thing in the world to do. If you need more than that, send an email. If you have plenty of space spare, add a few vowels into your tweet for once.

On a similar note, CNN published the 12 most annoying types of Facebook users, which is definitely worth a read. I like to think I fit into the one who publishes far too much information.

What annoys you about Twitter? Got the need to name and shame? By all means, go ahead.

August 14th, 2009

British PM at TED: "First generation to change the world for the better"

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 11:49 am

Categories: Discussion, Events, Government, Legal and political, Next-generation technology, Security, University fun, Web 2.0

Tags: Prime Minister, Video, Corporate Communications, Performance Management, Marketing, Human Resources, Workforce Management, Zack Whittaker

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is an unlucky man. Within the first few days of his premiership, there were nationwide floods, a foot-and-mouth outbreak and attempted terror attacks in London that were only discovered through sheer luck.

The extent of this man’s bad luck was emphasized by popular Irish comedian, Dara O’Briain yesterday which would extend to him finding a chain in the Lake District on his recent holiday, wondering what it is, pulling on it and ending up watching as the entirety of the Lake District just drain out through a hole in the ground where the plug was. The video is here - it’s hilarious but absolutely not safe for work.

But amidst all this, he spoke at TED, widely confirmed as one of the most brilliant conferences of modern time where the very cream of the crop of intelligence, knowledge and understanding come together to share their thoughts.

A friend of mine, Steve Clayton, summed up his experience of the video:

“I’ve always pondered that given his lacklustre performances we regularly see on TV. It shows how much our impressions are formed by the media as I thought this performance was brilliant. He spoke passionately, excitedly and with humour. For 18 minutes I was actually transfixed by our Prime Minister. He was really rather good and he seems to understand the power of the web to change the world. OK you can argue that he made lots of bold statements and action are how we should be judged but one pure delivery, it was the best I have seen from him.”

This video really shows how much power this generation has with the Internet and the good that can come from using it to speak out and use technology to our advantage. I strongly recommend you take 20 minutes from your day, sit down with a cup of tea and listen to his vision for using the wired web for a global good. Besides, he ain’t half funny for a middle-aged politician…