Category Technology

Google Earth Browser Plugin

Sure, AJAX, when viewed through the prism of the still world of HTML and CSS, can be beautifully dynamic. But, let's face it, Google Earth --- despite its resource-laden design and slow response on slower systems --- is a much more natural, a friendlier way to view geographic data. With Microsoft trying hard to reclaim the (tech) lead on mapping (see Virtual Earth, WorldWide Telescope), it's up to Google to stop the surge. Enter the Google Earth API and browser plugin --- software that opens up Google Earth for use within browsers and accessible by web developers. Sadly, it's only available for Windows right now --- I bet this will change soon.

Bletchley Park to close?

In 2000 I visited what is probably one of the most interesting attractions for geeky history buffs in the UK: Bletchley Park. Even back when I visited it, the Park was in a dismal state, badly preserved, run down — definitely far from what it should be, given both the fact that sixty years ago […]

Ραντεβού στον Άρη.

Η ουσιαστική παρακμή της NASA άργησε να φτάσει στη συνείδηση του κόσμου, παρά το γεγονός πως μετά το καλοκαίρι του 1969 και τη προσσελήνωση του Απόλλο 11, το ενδιαφέρον, τόσο του κοινού όσο και των πολιτικών που ενέκριναν ή απέρριπταν έργα και ερευνητικά προγράμματα, που ουσιαστικά καθόριζαν τη πορεία της υπηρεσίας περισσότερο από οποιαδήποτε επιστημονική […]

Steamrollin'

Early last week a report was published online according to which Apple's share of the retail computer market for the first quarter of 2008 was 13.8%, a figure about four times higher than the company's market share in 2004 and six times higher than its share two years earlier. But the most impressive part of the report wasn't this figure. It was the fact that Apple owned 66% (!) of the $1000+ market. From the relevant Computerworld article:
And Apple essentially owns the $1,000-and-up market, according to NPD's data. Overall, Macs accounted for 66% of all personal computers in that price category sold at retail during 2008's first quarter, taking 70% of desktop sales and a 64% share of notebook sales.
This is an astounding percentage for a single company going against the whole industry, but it's also somewhat concerning given the weakness of Microsoft and lack of alternatives. Yes, Apple is a very US-centric company that seems to not-give-a-damn about the rest of the world for the most part, and it's certainly too early to start sounding the warning sirens ("Ahoy, new monopoly in sight! Not exactly incompetent like that last one, captain"), but if this report holds any water I'm pretty certain that it'd be no surprise if Apple became the No. 1 personal computer manufacturer in the next five years. As Steve Jobs told the Panic people when they refused to 'sell' Audion to Apple: "We're a giant steam engine about to run you down." Somehow this frightens me.

The Face of Hypocrisy.

Late last year, in an article about the need for interconnectedness of social networks and the ownership of user profile data, I wrote: If Facebook can connect to another service with your account (and your permission), what’s stopping the creation of a MetaSocial Network. A network to which you provide the login details for all […]

VMWare Workstation 6.5β

VMWare has a beta testing programme for its venerable virtualisation software VMWare Workstation. Version 6.5 is going to add a number of very impressive and long-awaited features such as the Unity feature (pioneered in VMWare Fusion on the Mac), proper 3D acceleration support for Windows machines (yes, this means Direct X 9.0c and most probably, yes this means games and a whole slew of applications previously impossible to run under VMWare). I'll be giving Beta 1 a try in the next few weeks and I'll report here if anything worth mentioning comes up. I'd be very much interested to find what the pricing of this upgrade will be for owners of Workstation 6.0.

WidSets. What a disappointment.

A reader of this blog sent me an email a couple of weeks ago, asking me to consider porting my Hellenic Reverse Directory Lookup widget (HRDL) for Apple’s Dashboard in Mac OS X to the Widsets service provided by Nokia. Over the past year or so I’ve been emailed another two or three times by […]

Phun

If anything is certain is that this is fun. Lots of fun. An excellent piece of software and a great educational companion.

Dissecting OLPC Politics.

This is an excellent article on some of the (somewhat obvious) political issues surrounding the OLPC --- some of which I have alluded to in previous articles on this site. At the same time, it gives an insight on the many of the policy and technology mistakes the OLPC project seems to have made over the past few years; from academic short-sightedness (call it arrogance if you will) to the abuse of free software ideology as a vehicle aiming to convince of the device's value. Absolutely worth a read.