Widget vs. Android story...

Some buddies emailed me saying that they liked this piece. Original story at:
http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/techNu/Monday/Notebook/20080218152854/Article/index_html

Really can't wait till Android comes to town...

Widget versus Android
by: Hazimin Sulaiman

IT might sound like a cult sci-fi movie title from the 50s, but it’s not. It does, however, concern two superpowers in the Internet realm – Yahoo and Google. The year 2008 certainly has proven to be a fast-moving one. It was just earlier in the year when Yahoo unveiled its plans at CES 2008, Nevada, and gave us glimpses into what the company’s future looks like.

A few weeks later, it was reported that Yahoo was suddenly laying off 14,000 staff. And just two weeks ago, the news came that Microsoft wants to buy Yahoo yet again after similar attempts in the past.

Last week came the news that the main Internet search engine, Google, has just released its much-awaited Android operating system at the World Mobile Congress in Barcelona.

Well, it seems that the battle has just escalated to mobile devices. This is of course, not surprising, given that Yahoo’s projection said that the mobile market segment will reach four billion phones by 2010.

From the likes of it, Yahoo will have to be on its toes in order to survive all these external pressures. It is doing so with the power of widgets/widgetry if you please.

Ironically, the way that both Yahoo and Google are going about laying their stake on this new territory are one and the same. This involves making it easy for a lot of people such as developers, advertisers and publishers to get on board and be profitable.

In Yahoo’s case, the company wants to make it extremely easy for mini-applications called widgets to be made by anyone who is familiar with .XML coding. Yahoo has been widget crazy and driven for some time.

This is proven by its purchase of Pixoria, the company behind Konfabulator years ago. Pixoria used to make widgets for the Mac OS.

Similarly, in Android’s case, Google wants to make it easy for developers to quickly and cheaply write applications for mobile phones, minus the licensing fees.

Both ideas are the same as they are different: one wants you to invade your mobile/smartphone via a client called Yahoo Go (which is needed to run the widgets), and another wants to have its operating system on your phone.

The Yahoo Go 2.0 is supposed to be already available for over 300 devices. Such a “soft-invasion” might have better acceptance by various manufacturers, and it also means that widgets can be written once and used in many devices, regardless of manufacturers or platforms. Hence, the beauty of widgets.

In the case of Andriod, Google intends to provide what seems to be another platform altogether. However, just like open source OS such as Linux, this might pose some problems. Granted this can only be qualified in due time when we actually get to see, use and feel Android.

OSes also tend to require more time to mature into a stable platform. Take Windows Mobile, for example, it only started to reach a degree of reliability and stability after Windows CE 3.0 (Microsoft Windows Pocket PC).

Needless to say, the lesser Windows CE (or WinCE for short) 1.0 to 2.0 made a lot of people WinCE. In those days, Palm OS reigned supreme. But it serves to show that diligence and financial stability does make the OS better.

It all boils down to how long can an OS developer sustain itself to get better. Is Google game enough to do this? Only time will tell.

Teething problems and a rocky road will definitely be abound for Android. Google will have to toughen its resolve, especially since the company is not just aiming for the mobile phones market.

Google’s chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt believes that Android would start an entire new wave of innovation unseen before in the industry. He is confident that this platform will amaze users by the amazing things it will be able to do on their mobile devices.

What does Yahoo think about the invasion of the Android? Will it disrupt the Yahoo widget invasion plan for the mobile phone space in 2010?

Marco Boerries, executive vice president of Yahoo Connected Life, cited at the recent CES that “Android is just another operating system. We’ll support it by giving its users a great user experience with Yahoo Go.”

Well, Yahoo Go on the Android? Now who’s invading who? Let’s see how it goes.

Personalised Google Themes!

Google Teams Up with Leading Artists to Create Fun New Themes

INTRNET giant Google Inc., has teamed up with leading artists to creatte new themes for iGoogle. Google recently launched a collection of new themes created by leading artists, designers, actors and other personalities for iGoogle, Google's personalized homepage.

With iGoogle, users can choose and arrange the content they want to see on their Google homepage to personalise their Web experience. Google has collaborated with almost 70 artists from around the world, inviting them to use iGoogle as their canvas by creating unique, dynamic themes for users to decorate and personalize their homepages.

The entire list of participating artists and their themes from around the world, can be found at www.google.com/artistthemes.According to said Derek Callow, Marketing Manager, Google Southeast Asia, Google has teamed with artists and other public figures as a way to give iGoogle users more fun, cool options to personalize their Google homepage. “We’re providing users
with some great new homepage designs and giving these artists a way to be discovered and to express themselves to millions of people on the Internet,” says Callow.

Participating international and Asian artists include Akira Isogawa, Alice Mak, Anne Geddes, Carrie Chau, Coldplay, Dale Chihuly, Diane von Furstenburg, Dolce&Gabbana, Jackie Chan, Jeff Koons, Kwon Ki-Soo, Young-Hee Lee, Mark Ecko, Mark Morris, Michael Graves, Nigo, Oscar de la Renta, Philippe Starck, PPAPER, Robert Mankoff, Rolf Harris, Tezuka Osamu, Tory Burch and Yann Arthus-Bertrand.

All of the themes are dynamic, which change throughout the day. The new collection provides users with a diverse selection of themes to reflect personal style on personalised a Google homepage. Can't decide? Google has a sampler theme that rotates through all of the participating artists' themes.

The New Lenovo X300: Lighter than Air!

Product review

Hmm. OK, been working on this one and just thought that it was interesting to some people who want to oogle at a RM9,588 notebook PC!

Lighter than Air

By Hazimin Sulaiman

Product: Lenovo ThinkPad X300Enquiries: Think Products (Malaysia) (03-76818000) or www.lenovo.com/my/en

Price: RM9,588

Specifications: Processor: 1.20GHz Intel Core 2 Duo L7100 (800Mhz FSB, 4MB Cache)

Operating System: Windows Vista Business

Graphics Adapter: Intel X3100Memory: 2GB Hard disk drive: 64GB SSD

Optical Drive: Ultra-thin DVD BurnerConnections: Intel 4965AGN (802.11 a/b/g/n wi-fi), BlueTooth 2.0 EDR.

Dimensions: 12.4 x 9.1 x 0.73 mm

Weight: 1.3Kg (3-cell battery) and 3.32Kg (6-cell battery and DVD Burner).

Verdict: 4

Physical design: 4.5

Features: 4

User-friendliness: 3.5

Performance: 3

Value of money: 2.5

Documentation: N/A

TO summrise, the Lenovo X300 is exrtremely really light. The basic black design, familiar to the ThinkPad series adds to slim-looking appearence of the X300. How light is the X300, well at 1.3Kg (1.42Kg with DVD Burner) it is even lighter than the famous Macbook Air! The Air weighs in at 1.36 kg. Of course if you fit in the 6-cell battery plus the DVD-burner for the X300, the weight goes up to 3.32Kg. But you get the idea: the X300 can give the Air a run for its money. The test model came with a 3-cell battery.

Technically, the X300 has some great features such as a 13.3-inch LED backlit 1440 X 900 screen and its composite F1 material chassis form factor. The body construction is very solid, as the internal chassis and roll cage uses an advanced carbon-fiber. Even if it feels too light to take punishment, believe me it will. The X300 is thin, almost anorexic like the Air but it comes in the all too familiar design of the ThinkPads before- very business-like; it is after all a business
notebook PC anyway.

The lid is covered with a black rubber-like resin, just as the plam rests near the keyboard- nice to touch but sweaty palms will show and leave residue on your X300.

The Intel Dual Core CPU 1.2 Ghz. does come a tad low as far as specifications are concerned, but for most business applications, thanks to Lenovo's optimisations, the X300 seems to respond OK. For example, the 64GB SSD storage really makes a difference in performance as the boot-up time is less than 30-seconds. The 1.8 inch solid state drive delivers twice the performance of 2.5 inch hard drives used in older ThinkPad notebooks. It also weighs less, uses less power and offers better shock resistance.

This however, obviously, isn't a on-the-road gaming rig; compound that with the Intel Xtreme Graphics Adapter and paltry battery life from the 3-cell battery. While surfing,checking out Youtube and some word-processing, with screen brightness set to medium, the X300 did not even manage two hours usage. Compare that to the rated 4.3 hours; granted however, it depends on what sort of Wireless connections and applications are being used. The 6-cell Lithium-Polymer battery has been rated by Lenovo to run for 6.5 hours.

What's equally annoying is that when the screen blinks out to save power and you coax it back to wake up, the screen brightness is set to dimmed. It doesn't seem to remember the brightness you've set before. This is at Lenovo's Maximum battery life preset setting of course. Optionally, you can also remove the optical drive and slot in another battery for longer usage.
Well, that all said, the X300 is extremely comfortable to tote around and use.

Thanks to its full-sized keyboard, trackpoint navigation, touchpad and fingerprint reader. The fingerprint reader is cool for security reasons as it relieves you the process of re-entering your password everytime you wake it up from a nap. The integrated Web camera along with the built-in condenser microphone is supposed to allow Skype calls to be made, once you're signed on to Skype and installed the software.

The 1.2 GHz core 2 duo processor also means that it eats up les power in the long run and builds up less heat as well. The glossy bottom bezel area and the blue-glowing ThinkVantage and power buttons do add a nice touch. The surprisngly decent sounding speakers are located on the corners to come seamless with the X300. They actually sound better than previous
generation of Thinkpad X series. Even the heat vent grills are painted black to blend in.

The X300 offers more ports and an Optical Drive compared to the Apple MacBook Air: 3 USB 2.0 ports, Gigabit Ethernet, audio out, microphone in, monitor out and Kensington lock slot. There's no expansion port, no PCMCIA nor ExpressCard. There's also no type of media card reader.

All in all the X300 has a lot of appeal for business users who constantly travel, but comes off lacking in some departments. Being priced at a premium above RM9,000 range, some would expect more. But the X300 itself is quite a wonder when held and carried. Build quality was not compromised and that's what you're mainly getting by getting the X300. A lot of new
technologies were also put into this machine , such as the new SSD storagte medium- smaller and faster than older SATA hard disk drives.

Free Movies On-line?

Well, this piece, more or less came out in a Malaysian daily newspaper's pull-out; I just like the topic. So for the benefit of those who like this sort of stuff I reproduce it below:

Bored? Watch movies on-line for free
By Hazimin Sulaiman

THERE'S obviously nothing new about watching movies on-line. Everyone with a broaband Internet connection has more or less experienced watching movies on-line; the very least a .flv (Adobe Flash) based movies on Youtube.com and the likes of it. Of it might not compare to the excitement of going to watch the newest blockbuster with full silverscreen glory, DTS and ambiance to match, but it offers something else that movie buffs would appreciate. These are rare film specimens that you most probably won't find in stores.What are we talking about?

The classics and excellent works of art dating from the 1930's and older available on-line. Some of these movies have actually shaped and inspired the movies that we see today. One excellent example of a brilliant piece of science fiction-horror would be the 'I Am Legend' novel written in 1954 by Richard Matheson.

So influential was this piece of literature that it has so far inspired three movies. The latest, starring Will Smith, entitled the same to the book, caused a stir in the on-line community to search and find out more about the other works surrounding the classic novel. All of a sudden, Internet movie viewers were trying to see what they could find on trusty old Youtube.com.

The first movie adaptation in 1964 of the novel mentioned, was titled 'Last Man on Earth' 1964 and the second version in 1971 titled 'The Omega Man' starred Charlton, which is a cult-status movie itself. Heston thought that the novel would make a great movie when he read it on a plane, not knowing that it had been turned into a movie before, starring Vincent Price. Both the Price (the version more faithful to the novel) and Heston version influenced the 2007, Will Smith, I Am Legend version.

Good news is that, if you have a craving to watch how a strong storyline still makes a great movie and not the digital special effects; you can watch it free on-line! Vincent Price in his role as the Last Man On Earth, as Dr. Robert Morgan. The movie has fallen into the public domain and is free to watch on-line. In some instances, with some know-how one can download movies of the same sort for free as well. On Youtube.com the movie is available in two parts at about 40 minutes each.

Most public domain movie Websites will link the viewer to a Youtube or similar on-line movie service due to the heavy logistics involved to host movies. The quality is OK and watchable but some public domain movies do not share the similar fate as sources to convert from are hard to find.

These rare movie versions have detriorated and will probably be lost forever if nothing is done to digitalise them. Efforts to digitalise such classics are important not only for the study of film history but also for the understanding of the contemporary popular culture surrounding the particular timeline in history. After all, who can deny the irreverant comedy genius of 'Monty Phyton's Quest for the Holy Grail' available from moviesfoundonline.com? The movies found in this database usually link to somewhere else, but it makes it easier to find public domain movies available.

If one is adventurous enough, the Internet offers a wealth of opportunities to view other pieces of monumental film art. Those which have fallen into public domain are available Websites such as http://www.moviesfoundonline.com/, http://www.openflix.com/, http://www.publicdomaintorrents.com/, emol.org/movies and http://www.archive.org/.

In some instances, rights are even given for aspiring moviemakers to 'mash up' movie clips by editing, copying or morphing them into new clips. This is all relatively easy to perform with even the most humble movie editor built into Windows and Mac OS machines. Sites such as emol.org and archive.org are two examples of sites such sites. Archive.org has also nearly 2,000 films from the Prelinger Archives.

The Prelinger Archives, founded in 1983 by Rick Prelinger, grew into a collection of over 60,000 movies within 20 years. Such flexibility in rights give ample opportunity for people to mesh up and try out their hands in desktop movie making. Making animation via Machinima is currently gaining popularity across the world. Surely enough if we all work together to put up more locally sourced pieces and release them on public domain content, we can inspire budding movie directors to start creating. Old movies after all inspire new ones in one way or another.

Cybercafe's not worried about hotspots

After the effort, this piece wasn't used, maybe because the inteviewee didn't want to be identified- his boss was on honeymoon somewhere and didn't want to be bothered. At the last minute I couldn't find anyone else, so for the sake of filing in a story, I actually asked a favour to use this incognito person's opinion. Bummer...

Cybercafes unaffected by Wi-Fi hotspot expansion
By Hazimin Sulaiman

CYBERCAFES or Internet gaming centres or computer centres, or whatever one would want to call them are unaffected by the Wi-Fi hotspot expansion seen in the food and beverage industry. Mamak eateries, restaurants and coffee shops might offer broadband Internet access to their customers but it caters to a different target audience all together.

That is what a cybercafe manager based in Subang Jaya, who wants to be known only as Ken, believes. When asked whether Wi-Fi hotspots effects his buisness in any way Ken says that "no we are not really affected.

The people that go to Wi-Fi hotspot and cybercafes are two different types of people. The most that most people do at Starbucks is probably chat and do some non-intensive Internet related stuff. Compare that to hardcore gamers who need a lot of bandwidth."

According to Ken the people that come to his cybercafe are mostly from the college age group to the those in their thirties. "There are some forty year olds as well," Ken notes. One can imagine with all the young hardcore gamers at in the cybercafe that it can get quite nosiy. Most of the customers that go to Wi-Fi hotspots probably prefer a quieter atmostphere to work and chat on the Internet.

In Ken's cybercafe, there are different sections for gamers and those wanting to use Internet services. Ken's cybercafe provides headsets for customers who just want to use the Internet, to shield them from the noises from the gaming side.According to Ken, most established cybercafes in Subang have a minimum of 120 to 140 PCs, while the largest has more than 400 PCs. On weekdays he notes 60 to 80 per cent of the PCs are used at the peak hours of 6pm to 12 am.

While on weekends, capacity is filled 100 per cent! With that Ken's confident that the mushrooming of Wi-Fi hotspots does not effect them in any way. "Besides catering to a different market, cybercafes provide cheap group entertainment for RM2 per hour. Try to compare that with the cost of a coffee at Starbucks," Ken says.

The cost factor is a good point as the gamers tend to be younger customers with less cash to splurge just for Internet access. Specialty coffee shops also do not provide adequate bandwidth for hardcore games and do not have the right environment for team games such as Counter-Strike. It would simply be too loud for the other patrons.

In the future Ken says cybercafes might be effected if broadband connections become faster to the home. As more people will simply plan games at home. He does not see that happening for at least 1 or 2 more years. At the moment cybercafes have at least 2 or 4 broadband Internet connections. "It depends on the demand for speed by the customers. Normally the connections are divided for browsing and gaming. A big cybercafe can have close to 20 Streamyx connections divided for gaming and browsing," Ken observes.

You like to play with Jin?

A screenshot of the game (left) and Gamers trying out the game (below)...


Play with Jin on-line

By Hazimin Sulaiman




JIN, in Malay means geanie, which in turn originates from the Arabic equivalent 'Jann.' As of now, iG-Interactive Sdn Bhd, a top online game publisher and one of the pioneers of Malay language online game publisher in Malaysia and Singapore, has in partnership with game developer, TQ Digital Entertainment (China), launched JIN Online (http://www.jin.com.my/) for public open beta. It seems to be yet another “PayU2Play” massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) by iGI. In JIN, you are immersed and trasported into a fantasy-based MMORPG virtual world of JIN.

Gamers can choose one of the 2 heroic game characters, the Warrior or the Mage. JIN Online gamers will enjoy months of fun and exciting game-play commanding their heroes and pets to adventure the vast land of Atlantis and challenging monsters and real players with the power of sword and magic. What's more is that you can have pets which actually evolve into genies! As gamaplay progresses you can summon up to 3 genies concurrently, to help protect you from harm via convergence and attack tactics. The pet system provides a lot of genies to summon from. Some have super strength, some magic and some can self-destruct in sacrifice while others will possess enemies' spirit to impair them.

To help working adults to get into the game, JIN Online introduces a perfectly designed `Offline Training' system, a first in MMORPGs. As the name depicts, Offline Training allows you to train and level-up your heroes and genies even when your computer is switched off. The emphasis for Jin is team-work of tightly knitted common online game components which includes an excellent legion and competition system; effective trade system; player mentoring; rewarding and other various systems guarantee JIN Online to be highly interactive and full of fun.

In conjunction with the lauch, IGI will be running JIN Online Illustration and Comic Competition as well with the prizes of RM1,500, RM1,000 and RM500 for the Grand, Second and Third winner of each category and 5 consolation prizes each. More details will be available on our website as well. JIN Online CD starter packs are available at your local cyber-café, game-shop, news-stand early March, 2008 nationwide.

New Product update: Palm Centro available now

This one came out, but not in its entirety:

Palm brings in the Centro

By Hazimin Sulaiman

WITH over one million 'glacier white' Palm Centro sold in the United States, Palm, Inc has recently announced the availability of the popular model on our shores. The Centro definitely contributed to the USD$1.56 billion revenue that Palm collected in 2007 which amounts to more than 34 million Palm products.Featuring on-the-go e-mail and Web, contact-calendar capabilities, a colour touch screen and full Qwerty thumb-board, the RM1,399 Centro offers simplicity and organisation to users who want to be connected with friends, family and colleagues at a low entry price.

It is, according to Palm, the smallest and lightest Palm phone to date.The Centro comes in at a price which will be attractive enough for first time smartphone buyers and those who want to step up from their regular mobilephones to something which offers a richer user experience and capabilities. Opting however for the Palm Operating System provided by Access which is based on the Palm OS Garnet 5.4.9.Centro boasts simplicity of use thanks to the Palm OS interface which enables one-handed operation, one-touch speakerphone, conference calling, ignore a call with text messaging and Bluetooth connectivity.

Sticking to the Palm philosophy, user experience remains the key design factor and not specifications.Some unique features in the Centro include a handy chat-style view for message conversations, personal and work e-mail (up to nine POP3 and IMAP accounts). The Centro supports even Gmail and Yahoo! mail. And if your company uses Exchange Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 or Exchange Server 2007 and access is enabled by your IT administrator, you can also receive your work e-mail via Microsoft Direct Push Technology.

Besides that, it can automatically update your work calendars and you can accept or decline meeting invites while on the go.The Web browsing capabilities allows users to directly feed their personal blogs and the built-in Google Maps application offers fast access to maps, directions and local searches. Performing a search using the Palm search function, you can search for the Google Map you're looking for in an instant, using an GPRS/EDGE data connection.

Of course, the Centro also features multimedia: Pocket Tunes lets users “sideload” songs and manage music, audio books and videos easily. Users can also shoot pictures or videos with the built-in digital camera and share them with friends. The Centro is already available from major IT and wireless operator channels nationwide.

Specifications:

Display: 320 x 320 pixels TFT, 65K colours

Processor: Intel XScale 312MHzRadio: GSM/GPRS/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)Operating System: Palm OS by Access 5.4.9

Connectivity: Bluetooth 1.2, Palm Multi-connector

Memory: 64MB

Camera: 1.3 Megapixels with 2X digital zoom and video capture

Expansion: MicroSD (support up to 4GB)

Dimensions: 107.2 x 53.5 x 18.6 mm

Weight: 124 grams