Archive for the ‘Communication’ Category
New in Labs: Got the wrong Bob?
October 13th, 2009 | 
Author: When’s the last time you got an email from a stranger asking, “Are you sure you meant to send this to me?” and promptly realized that you didn’t? Sometimes these little mistakes are actually quite painful. Hate mail about your boss to your boss? Personal info to some random guy named Bob instead of Bob the HR rep? Doh!
“Got the wrong Bob?” is a new Labs feature aimed at sparing you this kind of embarrassment. Turn it on from the Labs tab under Gmail Settings, and based on the groups of people you email most often, Gmail will try to identify when you’ve accidentally included the wrong person — before it’s too late.
If you normally email Bob Smith together with Tim and Angela, but this time you added Bob Jones instead, we’ll warn you that it might be a mistake. Note that this only works if you’re emailing more than two people at once.
While we were at it, we also changed the name of “Suggest more recipients” to “Don’t forget Bob” — the two related Labs features just kind of went together better this way.
If you want to test “Got the wrong Bob?” out, try faking a mistake like this:
1) Think of three people you often email together.
2) Compose a message to two of them.
3) Start typing the third member of the group (for help you can use one of the people we suggest in “Don’t forget Bob”), but then auto-complete on the wrong name.
If you have suggestions please let us know. And if “Got the wrong Bob?” happens to save you from making a really bad mistake, we want to hear about that too.
http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/new-in-labs-got-wrong-bob.html
Google Wave invites roll on, remain scarce
The initial hype for Google Wave invitations was massive and ended up leaving those who were left out of the first 100,000 disappointed. The good news is that Google has started to send out a larger volume of invitations again after having slowly trickled them out since the launch.
Google Wave’s Stephanie Hannon tweeted Sunday that Wave had overcome some of its stability issues over the weekend and that they were sending out a lot more invitations. As of Tuesday, “Google Wave” is the top trending topic on Twitter and the results are filled with users (including myself) bragging about receiving their invitations and not surprisingly, others begging for one.
The eBay economy for Google Wave invites has been pretty healthy, with some fetching upward of $80 to $100. This big influx of new invitees, all with 8 invitations each, will probably eliminate a lot of the demand for Wave invites on eBay, much like what happened with Gmail invites.
Full story :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13515_3-10373785-26.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Communication, Google, Internet | 
Tags: Google, Google Wave, invites, Twitter | 
Comments Closed
Microsoft’s Windows phones hit the market
After months of talking about Windows Mobile 6.5, Microsoft is announcing on Tuesday that the first crop of phones to carry the Windows Phone brand are ready to hit the market.
A host of new phones running the new operating system are expected to debut between now and the holidays, with many being announced later on Tuesday. AT&T has already announced two Windows Mobile 6.5-based phones–the Pure and the HTC Tilt 2. In all, Microsoft has said to expect more than 30 phones running the OS by year’s end.
(Credit: Microsoft)With the new operating system, Microsoft hopes to make the case that the devices are not only worthy phones, but also the best option for those who want to take their Windows world with them. The operating system itself features Adobe Flash support, an improved browser, and menus that are easier to navigate with a finger, as opposed to a stylus. Perhaps more interesting are two new services that come along with Windows.
The first, the Windows Marketplace, is Microsoft’s answer to the iPhone‘s App Store. It’s somewhat interesting that Windows Mobile has long had more programs than the iPhone–none of which involved approval from Microsoft. But Microsoft has found itself in the position of having to insert itself as middleman to match Apple’s approach.
Users will still be able to buy and download applications directly from developers, but Microsoft apparently felt it had to mimic the iPhone’s App Store in order to help connect less technically savvy users with the thousands of programs that already exist for its phones.
Full story :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10367699-56.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in cell phone, Communication, Internet, Windows, Windows Mobile |
Tags: cell phone, Microsoft, Windows, Windows Mobile |
Comments Closed
Photos: Fujitsu’s futuristic phones
The winning design, titled ‘Gesture.’
(Credit: Scott Ard/CNET)
CHIBA, Japan–Out of 2,000 design concepts for mobile phones of the future, the winning entry in Fujitsu’s Mobile Phone Design competition was not the flashiest or most forward-thinking. Instead, the grand prize was awarded to one that featured the most intuitive interface for users. What a concept.
Jin-Gwon Go, a South Korean college student studying design won the equivalent of about $20,000 for his mobile phone concept titled “Gesture.” Of all the finalists, Go’s design was probably the one that took the form of what most people would expect of a mobile phone. Fujitsu said his design stood out because of the gesture-based commands and touchable icons used to operate the phone using only one hand.
Back in May, Fujitsu asked for some input on phone design from anyone who was interested. Roughly 2,000 submissions and four months later, the company unveiled nine finalists on Tuesday here at Ceatec 2009, including Go’s Gesture.
Ceatec is a treasure trove of mobile phone design, thanks to the sophisticated cell phone culture here in Japan. Tuesday is the first day of the show, so be sure to check back throughout the week for more. And for the rest of the finalists, click on the gallery above.
Source :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-10368240-260.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in cell phone, Communication, Tech |
Tags: cell phone, Fujitsu, futuristic phones, mobile phone |
Comments Closed
Adobe spells out iPhone apps limitations
LOS ANGELES–Adobe Systems’ announcement of tools to create applications for the Apple iPhone comes with some restrictions.
Adobe announced on Monday at Adobe MAX, the company’s worldwide developer conference, that its Flash Professional CS5 developer tool will enable developers to create interactive applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch. A public beta of Flash Professional CS5 is expected to be available later this year.
In an interview at the conference Monday, Anup Murarka, director of technology strategy and partner development in Adobe’s platform development unit, spelled out some of the limitations of creating Adobe Flash-style apps for the iPhone. These limitations exist because the Adobe Flash player is not supported on the iPhone.
Murarka clarified that Monday’s announcement was not a joint announcement with Apple. “This is an Adobe announcement. This is just something that’s related to our tools and what they output, which is a native iPhone app,” he said.
“So, we’re not running Flash directly on the device. We’re actually allowing our tools to output for native iPhone apps,” Murarka explained.
He then described some limitations. “Let’s take it from the developer’s point of view. They have a very rich environment and language. That’s in Flash today,” he said. “You’re not going to get all of the Flash feature set that would normally be there in the run-time.”
Murarka continued: “For example, high-quality video, H.264, is not available with this product because Apple does not make available the decoders. They make you use their own UI (user interface) to play back high-quality video.” Apple describes the H.264 video codec as delivering “stunning quality at…low data rates.”
He also cited synchronization. “Being able to do synchronization between data and video. Those can be built as Flash applications. In sporting events (for example) using flash for data overlay. Those types of things are not going to possible because we don’t have access to the APIs (Application Programming Intefaces) that would give us the video decode along with all of the individual frames so we can do synchronization,” he said.
And he spoke about graphics effects. “Some of the filter effects. Some of the capabilities that as a programmer you would easily do within Flash are not available as they are not natural APIs that iPhone platform makes available to us.”
Murarka concluded by saying that Adobe continues to work with Apple towards getting Flash on the iPhone. “We’re not there as quickly as we would like. We’re not able to put Flash in the browser. We’re not able to put a Flash run-time on the device directly. But this is a good step,” he said.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10368171-64.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Apple, Communication, Entertainment, Internet, iPhone, iPod |
Tags: Adobe, decoders, Flash, iPhone, iPhone limitations, iPod Toouch |
Comments Closed
