Review: Lexmark Z2320 inkjet printer
June 30, 2008
Cliff Joseph, Computeract!ve, Monday 30 June 2008 at 15:56:00
Affordable printing for home and education
The most popular printers tend to be all-singing, all-dancing ‘multifunction’ devices with a built-in scanner and copier, and some even have wireless networking and other fancy features….
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Review: Imation Apollo USB storage
June 30, 2008
Paul Lester, Computeract!ve, Monday 30 June 2008 at 10:57:00
A compact external hard disk
Portable hard disks can help you keep backups of important data and carry files around when you’re on the move….
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Closing the Gates
June 30, 2008
Microsoft’s diminished influence is testament to Bill Gates’ success, says Bill Thompson.
"The publicity surrounding Bill Gates’ departure from Microsoft should not obscure the fact that he is still deeply involved in the company he founded in 1975.
Steve Ballmer, Ray Ozzie and Craig Mundie may now be in charge, but they were chosen by Gates, worked with Gates and are still answerable to Gates.
After all he remains company chairman and a major shareholder, and he will be working as an “advisor” on special projects.
Gates also played a major part in setting Microsoft’s strategy for the next few years, as it continues to try to figure out how to convert its enormously profitable operating system and office software business into something that can generate money as we all move applications online and look for stripped-down, secure and reliable operating systems on our desktops, laptops and handheld computers.
So it isn’t quite the end of an era, even if less of his time and concern will be spent on Microsoft matters as he makes the transition to being a global philanthropist through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
As a programmer, trainer, web developer and writer my professional life has certainly been shaped by Bill Gates and the choices he made for Microsoft, right back to 1985 when we used the Multiplan spreadsheet for the accounts at Bensasson and Chalmers, the software house in Cambridge where I had my first programming job.
One-time rivals
I remember seeing Windows 1.0 for the first time running on Apricot hardware at Anglia Business Computers and thinking it was a lot less useful than GEM, the earlier graphical environment from Microsoft’s one-time rivals Digital Research, and a lot less flexible than the Macintosh Finder.
But even back then Microsoft knew how to learn from mistakes and improve a product release by release until it did what was needed.
Throughout the 80s and 90s I kept up with the new releases of Windows and Office, partly because I felt I needed to understand them and partly because everyone else was doing the same.
Once Internet Explorer became the dominant web browser then anyone working on the web had to take account of its many peculiarities, non-standard extensions and broken features, with all the pain of trying to make sites work on multiple incompatible browsers.
But things have changed. Microsoft’s presence in the mobile world, IPTV and gaming remains important, as are many of the technologies coming out of its research labs, but what Microsoft does or doesn’t do is now less central to the continued development of the networked world.
Clearest example
The clearest example is Vista, the latest version of Windows and the release that was supposed to change the world.
It may be more secure and more stable than Windows XP but the many differences between Vista and its predecessor, especially systems administration, have created a massive barrier to upgrading. My sister bought a new home computer with Vista pre-installed and has regretted not specifying XP ever since.
A few friends work in companies that use Vista, but the majority have not yet upgraded, and when I installed Windows on my desktop Mac this weekend I chose an old XP license because I don’t need the features that Vista offers.
Yet when Windows 95 was released I queued up to buy a copy from PC World, knowing that an understanding of the operating system was vital for my work as a consultant, commentator and critic of technology.
In the 1970s and 1980s IBM dominated the computing industry and their moves were observed by those working in the field with the sort of attention that the US State Department devoted to the Kremlin.
The world that Microsoft helped create on the back of IBM’s own personal computer architecture gradually eroded its importance, and even though IBM is large and profitable its strategy no longer shapes the computing industry.
New monarch
Now the same thing is happening to Microsoft.
When the EU fined them £680m over their anti-competitive practices the general feeling within the industry was one of schadenfreude, taking pleasure in seeing a bully laid low.
Few thought there was any need for the EU to change the way Microsoft worked because it no longer mattered in the way it had done back in 2000.
It’s easy to see Google as the new monarch, and any software developers with a good idea for a new tool, service, program or utility must now be wondering how they will compete with Google in the way that companies developing disk utilities and office systems wondered about Microsoft back in the 1980s.
But just asking “what would Google do” is no longer enough.When IBM and Microsoft were dominant the computing industry was just that, an industry that stood slightly apart from other parts of the economy and was, because of the rate of technology innovation, relatively unregulated compared to more mature sectors like cars or steelmaking.
Like Mikhail Gorbachev using his power ashead of state to dismantle the Soviet Union, Gates used Microsoft to give us one computer on every desk - in offices and schools if not yet at home- and allow the internet to penetrate every one of them.
Windows may not have been the best possible operating system, but it was good enough to build on, usable enough to show us the possibilities of networked computing, and cheap enough (or easily pirated enough) to spread even to developing countries.
Now we have a global networked economy in which information and communications technologies are central to all areas of activity and cannot simply be separated out or left unregulated.Microsoft may no longer be dominant, but not even Google can rule the world that Gates has built.
I wonder if that will be enough for him
Bill Thompson
John Naughton on Gates’ farewellGEMWindows 1.0 screenshot
Bill Thompson is an independent journalist and regular commentator on the BBC World Service programme Digital Planet.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation
The New Google Mobile Community
June 27, 2008
Posted by Bret Luboyeski, Mobile Product Specialist
If you’ve been following this blog at all, it’s probably pretty clear that we’re passionate about mobile technology. And if you have really been following this blog, it probably means that you are passionate about mobile technology too. Well, we’ve created a place for you to connect with other mobile enthusiasts: the new Google Mobile Community.
We envision this community as being a place where you can discuss the world of mobile in general — like cool new applications you’ve discovered or what you wish your phone could do. Or maybe you’re looking to buy a new phone, and you’re not sure which one to pick. Ask the group.
We also want the community to be a place where you can tell us what you think about our very own products. Sometimes we’ll throw out a question about our products that only you have the answers to, such as why you use (or don’t use) a certain feature. So keep an eye out for posts where we’re asking for your feedback — like this one. But also feel free to give us unsolicited feedback. What do you like about our mobile products? What don’t you like? Are there features or products you would like to see? Be honest. We can take it.
There’s really no limit to the discussion, with one small caveat: if you are trying to troubleshoot a specific technical issue with a particular Google product, check out our general Google Mobile Help Group or our more specific Maps and Gmail for mobile groups — those are the places to ask technical questions. Search the group or post questions to find answers from other users about Google mobile products.
So come join the community… We’re excited to hear from you!
Review: Buffalo Drivestation Combo4 500GB USB storage
June 27, 2008
Anthony Dhanendran, Computeract!ve, Friday 27 June 2008 at 17:29:00
A well-designed external hard disk with plenty of connection options
The Drivestation Combo4 is so called because it has four connection options. You can attach it using USB, two versions of Firewire (which use different speeds) and the latest eSata connection, which…
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Sony HDR-SR12 reviewed: Lovely high definition pictures and sound, but no Progressive Mode?
June 27, 2008
After a lengthy period of being off the Sony radar, so to speak, it seems that the company really does want us to take a closer look at the latest camcorder offerings. That’s something we’re happy to do - especially when the latest offerings come in the shape of the marvellous new HDR-SR12 AVCHD camcorder.
Like its sibling, the HDR-SR11, this sturdy, fully featured HD camcorder appears to be up for anything you ask it to do. Not only does it offer a full range of connections that includes HDMI and USB 2.0 but also sports a external microphone input and dedicated headphone output. The latter two are enough to score serious SimplyDV brownie points alone, but even then it has lots more to commend it.
Read our exclusive review of the full high definition camcorder that offers a choice of either HD recording to its built-in 120GB hard disc drive or to an optional Memory Stick PRO Duo flash memory card. As you’ll see from our new review, we like it in almost every respect - except that it doesn’t offer recording in Progressive Scan mode - all it offers is the basic 1920 x 1080/50i mode in addition to MPEG2 standard definition recoding.
Why no progressive mode at a time when the company’s competitors all offer this? Answers on a postcard!
Meanwhile, you can chat about this and other matters of a camcordery nature over on our SimplyDV Forums. They’re free!
Farewell Mr Gates
June 27, 2008
By Mark Ward
Technology reporter, BBC News
As Bill Gates finally bows out of Microsoft to pursue his charity interests, we look at some of the hits and misses of the software company he founded.
MISSES
NO MORE SPAM
In early 2004, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland Mr Gates predicted that within two years the problem of spam - junk e-mail - would be solved.
A triumvirate of technical innovations, financial measures and filters would make soon make it uneconomical for anyone to indulge in the practice of sending unsolicited e-mail in bulk.
Four years further on and it is clear that Mr Gates prediction has not been borne out. If anything spam has got worse.
Now junk mail, be it spam or error messages, make up more than 80% of all e-mail traffic.
While technical innovations have reduced the amount that makes it into e-mail inboxes, billions of junk mail messages are sent every day and many spammers make a very healthy living out of it.
THE INTERNET
The rise of the net and the success of the world wide web took a lot of people by surprise - Bill Gates included.
In 1995 Mr Gates co-wrote a book entitled The Road Ahead which gave little mention to the rising tide of interest in the net and its looming influence.
Later editions of the book were re-written to correct the omission but there is no doubt that Microsoft came late to the dotcom boom.
In late 1995 following the writing of a famous memo entitled “The Internal Tidal Wave” Mr Gates re-worked Microsoft to put the internet at the heart of everything it did.
Despite the dramatic turnaround Microsoft has always been seen as a laggard when it comes to online life.
Google, whose founders met at college in 1995, has set the pace that Microsoft struggles to match.
WINDOWS SECURITY
In January 2002 Bill Gates sent out one of his regular memos that defined the priorities for Microsoft over the coming months and years.
That memo was entitled “Trustworthy Computing” and declared an intent to put the security and integrity of user’s data at the heart of everything Microsoft did.
Internally at Microsoft that meant lots of training courses for staff working on software and updates for Windows products to make good on this promise.
Windows Vista was intended to be the ultimate result of this change of strategy and has built in to it several innovations and technologies that try to limit what hi-tech criminals can do to it.
Despite Microsoft’s efforts hi-tech crime is booming and Windows PCs are at the heart of it. Some anti-virus companies now report that there are more than one million items of malware in existence and Windows PCs are the target of choice for the bad guys.
INNOVATION
It is something of a myth that Microsoft is a hive of innovation that regularly pumps out products that take on the world.
In reality it is a good populariser of ideas but few can be said to have originated on Microsoft’s campus or at the research labs it has set up around the world.
The innovations that it has ridden to success on - the graphical user interface, the mouse, spreadsheets, the web, the web browser - all started life elsewhere.
Even now the company regularly pays huge sums to snap up companies, such as Hotmail, that are experts in areas where it is lacking.
In some senses this is not a surprise as few investors are likely to bankroll a start-up that has the declared aim of tackling Microsoft head-on. Even so given its research budget - billions every year - Microsoft rarely wows the world with its new products.
ANTAGONISM TO OPEN SOURCE
It’s clear that there is a profound philosophical difference between Microsoft, for which read Bill Gates’ approach to business, and the world of open source that has sprung up on and prospered alongside the net.
This philosophical difference was sealed in 1976 when Mr Gates sent a letter to San Francisco’s legendary Homebrew Computer Club in which he decried their rampant sharing of Microsoft’s Basic for the Altair.
Many of those who attended the Homebrew Meetings went on to be the leading lights that created the internet and defined its open source ethic of sharing for the greater good. By contrast Microsoft has jealously guarded the inner workings of its products.
That reluctance to open up has served Microsoft well but as the pivot of the hi-tech world is now the web that stance is holding it back.
Worse than that, dedication to older ways of working is stopping it embracing more far-reaching changes, in particular the way it sells and creates software, that could make it a better fit for the web age.
HITS
LEAVING HARVARD
Bill Gates entered Harvard in 1973 aged 18 but never completed his college education.
His early experiences with computers and the appearance of chips that promised to bring about an era of personal computing convinced him to take a leave of absence, in effect drop out, and start a software company.
It’s fair to say that this decision worked out pretty well for Mr Gates. Microsoft was founded in 1975 and its success defined the course of much of the hi-tech world for almost as long as he was in charge.
Financially too he has done well out of it and has been consistently named as the world’s richest man for a couple of decades.
In 2007 he was awarded an honorary degree from Harvard and on accepting it he said: “I will be changing my job next year. It will be nice to finally have a college degree on my resume.
STRIKING A DEAL WITH IBM
For much of its early history Microsoft’s rise was tied to the success of the IBM’s PC.
In 1981 Microsoft signed an exclusive deal with IBM to put its DOS (Disk Operating System) on the new machine.
As makers of clone PCs started popping up Microsoft aggressively sold its operating system to them and, effectively, cornered the market.
Since then most PC makers have bundled in the operating system with the machine and every time a PC gets sold Microsoft makes money.
This system is starting to break down now as the small form factor PCs running cut-down operating systems prove popular but that early deal guaranteed a huge slice of revenue for the Redmond giant.
XBOX AND XBOX LIVE
Microsoft’s Xbox was derided when it was announced and few gave it any chance of securing a significant part of the gaming market.
At the time it was launched Sony’s PlayStation was all-conquering and looked impossible to beat.
But one quality Microsoft has in spades is persistence.
Couple that with its enormous reserves of cash and the stage becomes set for a stand-up fight.
The result of this persistence has been the Xbox 360 - the first of the next-generation consoles to launch and one which championed online console play before anyone else.
One of the payoffs for its strategy was the launch of Halo 3 which, Microsoft claimed, set records for an entertainment product.
With the Xbox 360 morphing into a multimedia hub and millions regularly playing online, Microsoft has set trends that others, mainly arch-rival Sony, are responding to.
A COMPUTER ON EVERY DESK AND IN EVERY HOME
This phrase has been the mission and mantra of Microsoft almost since the company was founded in the mid-1970s.
While IBM brought together the hardware firms that made all the bits for those first PCs. Anyone that used them would more likely remember Microsoft more than they would the maker of a hard drive. Its operating systems have become the recognisable face of those machines.
There can be little doubt that Microsoft has helped to evangelise desktop computers and got many people using them. Today about 90% of desktop machines run Windows - a testament to the success of the company.
This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation
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