The Web as Revolutionary
When Time magazine was rumored to make the Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg its Person of the Year, Ye 5th’s Editor thought that another Media “Academy Award” was a little too much. But with the revolt in Tunisia and the outbreak of dissent and protests in Egypt, both largely organized and propelled by social media including Facebook […]
Dockable Tablet: Motion CL900
Since dockable tablets get no respect, Ye Editor thought a striptease might be appropriate for the Motion CL900 tablet. Yes, Engadget and PCWorld had a story on the Motion CL900 but in general the coverage was cursory as Android tablets got the most attention. So here are the CL900 specs in a slow, revealing strip: – […]
No-cost Websites and Blogs
There is an awful lot of free web development software and even complete website services – Google’s Sites and Weebly are just two examples of essentially free blog and website creation+operation services that are available today. How do these free services make money? Well in the case of Google and Microsoft it is online ads […]
Dockable Tablets: Upcoming HP/Palm Tablet
Well now that Motorola has caused such a buzz with its eminently dockable smartphone, the Atrix 4G, more tablet players are leaking their dockable plans to the gadgetari. Case in point, Engadget’s coverage of the upcoming HP/Palm Tablet. And if Engadget is right, the Palm Tablet will be most impressive in the directions and features […]
What Is 4G?
If you are confused as to what 4G means other than faster access to and from your smartphone or tablet, you are not alone. There are several competing technologies including T-Mobile’s HSPA+, Sprint’s WiMax and Verizon’s recent LTE among others. And each technology does improve througput to your smartphone or other tablet/device – but the […]
Bob Muglia “Steps Down” at Microsoft
Bob Muglia, President of the Servers and Tools business has been announced as stepping down – euphemism for being Robbie Bach-ed at Microsoft. Bob was reponsible for bringing all the disparate developer tools together at Microsoft back in the mid 1990s with Visual Studio – still one of the best development platforms in the IT […]
Android Ascendant
The following graphic tells the story – Google’s Android may not be much of a direct money-maker for Google; but it certainly has made Google a major player in the fast emerging mobile market of smartphones and tablets: Certainly Motorola has a turnaround story based on Android. So now the question is what does Google […]
The Wave of Tablets
CES is not the only place where a wave of tablets have washed up on shore. There is a horde of “me too” variations on iPads and smartphones making it onto the market: many are Android based; most are from Taiwan and China; and most are competing on price based on a common set of basic […]
Agile Software Vendors: Apple vs Google vs Microsoft
One of the hallmarks of Web 2.0 and broader software development has been the rise of Agile Techniques. This is a roster of development methods that vary in exact processes but emphasize much shorter development and delivery cycles of 3-9 months instead of 1 to 3 years, client particpation through prototyping and testing, and adapting […]
Dockable Tablets at CES2011
This blog has been saying for a long time a dockable tablet makes a lot of sense; especially for the legions of iPad wannabee vendors at CES trying to differentiate their product from the 60, yes 60, new tablets introduced so far this year. Well to my chagrin very few tablet vendors it seems has […]
HTML5: Sencha’s Wishlist for 2011
Sencha are the people behind the EXTjs JavaScript framework with great database connections, Sencha Touch JavaScript for Mobile applications with full Webkit multi-touch capabilities [read works on Apple iOS4, BlackberryOS6 and Qnx, Google Android and ChromeOS], EXTGWT for Java to JavaScript UI development. So these gals and guys are on the frontline of Web 2.0, mobile and […]
The Mac IS Dead II
Our “esteemed friend[s]” at Taketh5th.com have taken exception to our post on why the Mac is Dead. Essentially their argument for the Mac being alive and well rests on the fact that Mac business is too big to fail for Apple. $18 billion dollars too big. Takethe5th notes that Mac sales are growing despite the […]
iOS4 Takes Over from MacOS
The past year has been a very, very good one for Apple – and particularly its iDevices – iPhone, iPad, iPod line of products. Apple has now passed Microsoft in stock value and is approaching the highest valued company in the World, ExxonMobil. And next years prospects are even better: Trefis Model of Apple Stock […]
Apple MacOS on Windows PC using VMWare Player
Yes, dear Readers this is a screenshot of Apple Mac OS 10.5.5 running on a PC laptop using Windows XP Service Pack 3 with 3.048GB of RAM and Core Duo 2 Intel P8600 CPU @ 2.40GHz plus the latest VMWare Player 3.1.3[the player inthe VM uses 2GB of the 3GB of RAM]. The how-to can […]
Antechinus JavaScript Editor
Oh no! Not another JavaScript editor. Well that may be a true statement. But finding a JavaScript editor that goes beyond color coding, smart editing with savvy Intellisense, and goodies like collapsible code/functions has been very difficult. Eclipse, Dreamweaver, Netbeans, Aptana Studio, and Komodo Studio are some top tier JavaScript editors. All have excellent editing, […]
Web Missing in Action
Web Missing in Action is comments about Web features that, due to the Microsoft-induced Deep Freeze on Web Innovation of 2001 to 2006, have never appeared in HTML, JavaScript, CSS or mashups in a standard way. Now that Microsoft is finally making amends in IE9 for not having kept its last century promises to implement […]
HTML5 Up and Running
This review is doing double duty. It evaluates the book HTML5: Up and Running by Mark Pilgrim from the O’Reilly Press while also doing review of the status of the HTML5 standard itself. Keep an Open Eye acknowledges that Mark’s HTML5 : Up and Running and also Diving into HTML5 have been invaluable resources for […]
FastStones Very Fast Image Browser/Editor
In web development scouring through hundreds of images is one of the biggest delay-in-game penalties. To avoid the problem, ye Editor uses a special directory scheme and reliance on a very fast image browser/editor. But ever since Jasc Paintshop Pro version 8 and ACDSee 10 passed their prime, ye Editor has been looking for a […]
Charting the US 2011 Budget
The NYTimes has done something about the US Budget and its huge deficits that is most commendable – it has made the sprawling size and growth of the US Federal Government budget understandable. Not Business Week, not Forbes, not the Wall Street Journal nor any other of the Titans of the Business Press have done […]
War for Developers
This blog has argued that Software Fragementation is occurring with 3 added levels of complexity in client software development: 1)the complexity of as many as a dozen new client OS platforms with new APIs and coding; 2)the added UI complexity of multi-touch screen and Wii/Kinect-like sensor state tracking + control; 3)the complexity of delivering offline […]
Client Software Development – 3 Added Degrees of Complexity
There is no doubt that the classic Computing World is fragmenting. No more the Wintel monopoly as it is losing its 90% market share dominance of the personal computing client scene to upstart Apple iDevices, Android smartphones plus a wave of RIM,Dell, Samsung, Archos and other tablets. The PC, even in laptop form, is no […]
Why Is Steve Jobs Helping Steve Ballmer?
Given that no love has supposedly been lost between them, it is passingly strange that Apple’s Steve Jobs appears to be secretly helping Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer. What? Can’ t ye Editor see that Apple’s Steve Jobs has been applying a whupping to Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer for the past ten years. Just check the new multimedia […]
Sample of HTML5, jQuery, and CMS
The Levolor.ca Natural Woven Blinds page is an example of HTML5 with jQuery in the wild. If you click on the image you will see a lot of the sophisticated HTML5/CSS3 nifty tricks on display. There may be more life in HTML5/CSS3 than ye Keep an Open Eye editors figured. Here are some of the […]
AIR+Flash Retake the Client UI Screen
Adobe is rising because of AIR and Flash. Android, RIM, and all the other major smartphone and tablet players are embracing Flash because it gives them a compelling competitive advantage. Over 85% of websites use some Flash content. But more importantly Flash and AIR apps that run on the PC also run on most other […]
Apple Concedes Multi-touch Screens to Windows PCs
Apple’s announcement today, the new Lion 10.7 Mac OS X with Multi-touch confirmed that as a politician Steve Jobs would be hopeless in the current political climate. Here was Steve Jobs telling his audience that they, Apple, have studied the problem and multi-touch just does not work on vertical screens – so Apple will not […]
How Redmond Can Avoid A Windows Phone 7 Trainwreck
Diverse IT pundits agree on one thing – Windows Phone 7 to be announced on Monday is going to be a train wreck. The only question is how big and how fast. First, eWeek establishes why Windows Phone 7 will be way behind the state of the smartphone art with this ten point presentation. Now […]
Free JavaScript Widget Browser
Adobe has released its best Web Development program since Dreamweaver and its free. Adobe Widget Browser is a library for JavaScript and HTML5 Cross-Platform GUI Widgets. The price of admission is free with registering on Adobe Exchange. The payoff is a way to not only scan prospective Web GUI widgets for use; but to try […]
Online WordPress Theme Generator
With so many good WordPress themes available for free directly from the WordPress site – what is the advantage of an online WordPress theme generator beyond the novelty of it all. Well as it turns out, the way that Yvo Schaap has delivered his WPThemeGenerator proves to be quite useful: The way Yvo has setup […]
RIM Playbook Scores Bigtime
RIM scored very big with its new tablet, the Playbook. But first lets us clarify the biggest play for RIM – buying software developer QNX in the Spring of this year. QNX has been developing UI-based OS for a number of industrial clients and they have a not just a solid but GUI robust OS. […]
IE9 Tests Windows XP Users Loyalty:Update
Microsoft is certainly putting the Windows faithful to another testing. Vista was an excruciating trial; but now this [see screenshot below]. More than 50% of Windows users are on Windows XP and Redmond is ignoring if not insulting them. Now Redmond insists that the issue is that hardware acceleration for IE9 browser is unavailable on […]
PC Market Fragmentation
The PC market is seeing a profound split or forking in the road on how Computing is served to the public. It is heavy-creative versus mobile-utility usage – PCs vs Tablets. Marketwatch catches this trend and its implications for the broad PC markets. The result should see in the next 2-3 years a profound drop […]
Does Microsoft Get Kid Glove Reviews?
Microsoft’s Vista at the outset got kid glove reviews from many of the tech and business sites. See here for a symptom analysis. So PC users had to endure what was a beta-kludge update of Windows at higher costs for nearly two years. And as always is the case with Redmond … just wait until […]
IE9: Such a Disappointment
IEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE9, what a disappointment! It would not be so bad if Microsoft had managed expectations better. But the ACID3 scores going from 55% to 95%. And all the accelerated graphics routines. And the promise of Canvas, SVG, and HTML5 support. Shades of Windows 3.1 days when the Redmond boys won on glitz over substance[a foreshadowing […]
Google TV versus Apple TV
Its becoming abundantly clear that Apple TV and Google TV are two different things. See Gizmodo on AppleTV See TechCrunch on Google TV as delivered by Logitach It is clear that Apple is getting its iTunes rentals more TV and video busoness on a streaming only and rental only business modeland rental business. In contrast, […]
Touch Screens: NYTimes Approved
NYTimes has confirmed what a lot of smartphone and iDevice users have know for ages[in Gadget-speak that is more than a year] – touch screens work very, Very, VERY effectively, thank you. This blog has been saying so for a long time that touch screen plus gestures is the magic UI ingredient which will unleash […]
Linux Wins on the Desktop
Linux is poised to win big market share on the desktop with Google Android Linux. The proof is the spectacular success of Android smartphones in the market place where it has passed Apple in the latest quarterly sales numbers. There is a tidal wave of Android and Chrome Os[ also based on Linux] devices coming […]
Falls PC Hopes
Every year around August early September your Keep an Open Eye editor gets requests from friends and family to make recommendations regarding back to school PC purchases. This year, instead of the usual recommendations, PC Prospects looked different. First, Apple did with the iPad what Microsoft had failed to do with its tablets – deliver […]
HTML5 Hype
HTML is really getting hyped. This site is an example. But here is a very well crafted demo which makes the case. The demo uses exactly 5 statements in HTML5: <!DOCTYPE html> <canvas id=”theapt” width=”100″ height=”100″></canvas> and <audio id=”audio”> Your browser does not support the <code>audio</code> element. </audio> while all of the rest of the […]
Google Android Scales Consumer OS Peak!?
Okay, a slight exaggeration; but the announcement this last Thursday that Google Android [a Linux variant] has won the top spot among smartphone OS may be a precursor of what is to come. This Fall, a wave of Android slates, netbooks, pads and tablets are going to arrive on the scene – and change the […]
HTML5: Implementation Status – Summer 2010
As one peers more closely at HTML5 standards and developments, three conclusions come to the forefront: 1)The revisions in HTML5 are broad and deep – Canvas, SVG, CSS3 and multi-touch gestures will change fundamentally how the Web is visualized, displayed and interacted with . The <audio> and <video> tags plus the Apple vs Adobe tussle will […]
HTML5: Canvas Demo
The following is a demo of the HTML5 <canvas> tag in operation: If you cannot see this nifty demo try any of the following: 1 2 3 or 4. Now some other nifty Canvas demos and references: HTML5 Canvas cheat sheets – very helpful for using <canvas> scripting. BillMalone – detailed example of using canvas […]
HTML5: Web SQL Database
SQLite is one of the most popular databases that you may not know about. It is used in every Firefox, Skype, McAfee, and Solaris instance. It is also used on Apple Mac computers and iPhones. Adobe, Google and Mozilla use SQLite for Web related applications. Google’s local data storage engine, Google Gears, uses SQLite. But […]
Google Outages II
Previously Keep an Open Eye reported persistent Google outages of several minutes. Some readers complained that the provider, Rogers.com in this case, was having DNS problems. Well the latest recurrence of a Google search outage would seem to belie that fact. First, note that the latest Chrome 5.0 browser is being used in all cases […]
Web Enabling Encryption
One of the major security problems is that data on the web often runs naked. This is due to two reasons – 1)the HTTPS protocol can be more difficult and costly to implement and 2)there is a notable performance hit to be taken in most situations. Network World is reporting work done at Stanford University […]
Web Limits
Ye Keep an Open Eye editor just positively relishes what the Web allows – quick confirmation of facts and dips into expert knowledge through Google, Wikipedia, NewScientist, theEconomist, and just browsing the books at Barns and Noble or Amazon websites. But there is a growing word of caution about the effectiveness of the Web that […]
Exploring HTML5: Aside, Header, Footer, Section Tags
Following Steve Jobs hints, Keep an Open Eye has invested a lot more time in HTML5. Here is a curious discovery derived from sessions at W3schools and Quackit [try them you will like them]: There is an explosion of what could be construed as structural tags in HTML5 – <article>, <aside>, <header>, <footer>, and others. […]
The Kin is Dead, Long Live the Kin
Keep an Open Eye could not find the official announcement, but there were several hundred confirmations that Microsoft’s Kin is dead as a product. The best coverage to be found on the demise of Kin is from Engadget – What Killed the Kin. Here are some of the salient points: It seems that after doing […]
Google Outages: Cloud Computing Implications
For the past half year at least, Google Search and often all of Google services have been “out” – just not available while other search engine and Web services such as Yahoo, Bing, Ask, Yahoo Mail and others are up and running. This has implications for Cloud Computing adoption. It also has to be of […]
HTML 5 DevTools: Sencha Touch
EXTjs is now Sencha -and I am not sure the new moniker is much ahead of the old name. But EXT.js uhhhh.. Sencha really knows how to turn out good JavaScript code. If you are into Java web development, EXT.GWT is very strong, gets Java to JavaScript and is well worth the look. On the […]
1000th Post at Keep an Open Eye!
The previous Aptana Studio 3 post is our 1000th! Keep an Open Eye would like to pat itself on the back for its coverage of Web and Software Development for the past 5 years. Okay, that done, get on with the Sencha story!