HP debuts green batteries
Boston Power debuted its Sonata battery technology in 2007, as a safer, more efficient alternative to standard lithium ion batteries. Boston Power promises Sonata batteries can charge 80% in 30 minutes, and have an average lifespan of three years.
Hewlett Packard took an early interest in the startup, and late last year officially announced that it had adopted Boston Power's technology for its own line of notebook batteries.
Nvidia gives PhysX to PlayStation 3 devs
Nvidia yesterday announced that it will be offering its PhysX SDK for free to registered PS3 developers. The technology generates real-time physics in games by calculating the trajectory of objects, their angles of collision, and their impact force. By using it, developers can make sure that in-game object interactions are unique every time, instead of re-using a standard animation each time.
The technology has been used in more than 150 games on PC/Mac, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii, including the Gears of War series, Mirror's Edge, and Unreal Tournament 3.
Mozilla's mobile browser experiment finally enters beta
Download Mozilla Fennec Beta 1 for Windows from Fileforum now.
It's looking more and more like Mozilla is ready to really do this: Late last night, the organization posted the first public beta of the browser that could end up being "Firefox Mobile." It still goes by the code name Fennec, and the first beta is testing whether touchscreen mobile users will be willing to have literally all their browser functions be placed off-screen, if it makes room for more elements of the Web page.
From MIX '09: Microsoft embraces PHP, debuts Silverlight 3
If there really is any release news regarding Internet Explorer 8 from Microsoft this morning in Las Vegas -- and we expect there will be -- it will probably come during the opening minutes of Corporate Vice President Scott Guthrie's keynote this morning. He'll need IE8 to demonstrate everything else on his plate today, and if IE8's not ready for RTM, that fact may as well be stamped on everything he shows. "5-D" wouldn't save Silverlight 3 if that's the case.
Stay in touch with Betanews for live commentary in sync with Scott Guthrie's two-hour keynote session this morning.
Big Microsoft announcements due today from MIX 09: Silverlight 3, maybe IE8
At a two-hour keynote address to the MIX 09 conference in Las Vegas scheduled for noon EDT / 9:00 PDT today, engineers from Microsoft are expected to make this a very busy day for Web application developers. Attendees have been told to expect the first betas of Silverlight 3, the company's Web video and functionality platform, which in this edition may include support for three-dimensional controls and graphics.
There does appear to be a prominently veiled curtain in front of what will likely be the big news of the day, even if there's nothing behind it. If there is something behind it, it will very likely be the public release of Internet Explorer 8, which will introduce greater standards compliance, a private browsing mode, and a somewhat faster execution engine -- more than doubling the speed of IE7.
As the Kundra turns: Old theft plea surfaces
They call our president No-Drama Obama, but that's certainly not the case with his pick for federal CIO, Vivek Kundra. Last week's FBI search of his former DC office and arrest of the fellow serving as acting city CTO doesn't appear to have anything to do with Kundra, but a 1996 criminal case certainly appears to.
The case, which resulted in probation before judgment (a Maryland construct allowing defendants to plead guilty but perhaps avoid problems associated with having a conviction on their records), involves a theft of something of less than $300 value. According to the court record, the citation for stealing whatever-it-was was issued on June 25, 1996. Kundra was levied fines and fees totaling $555, $400 of which was suspended. And what was it, exactly? Multiple press outlets are angling for that detail, though neither Kundra's reps nor representatives of Kundra's then-lawyer have yet commented. The best unfounded speculation in the blogosphere is "a garden gnome," though considering the records show Kundra to have been 6'1" and 140lbs at the time, I personally hope it was an emergency cheeseburger.
Notes-to-Exchange migration tool gets Microsoft Exchange Online support
Binary Tree has now updated its widely used systems administration tool for migrating users from IBM Lotus Notes to the more prevalent Microsoft Exchange messaging system. The new CMT Universal 2.7.1 supports not just on-premises editions of Exchange, but also Exchange Online, a component of the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS).
The new version of CMT Universal was pre-released for some specific customer engagements, including a migration by Goldleaf Financial Solutions. The update has already been used to migrate more than 100,000 users to BPOS. The latest release of the software also brings refinements to the e-mail and calendaring systems, such as a new capability that lets users tell the difference between calendar entries created in Microsoft Outlook and migrated calendar items.
Maryland city under blogger siege, says outgoing mayor
Salisbury, Maryland is not small-town rural America in the traditional sense. The college town stands in the middle of the Delmarva peninsula, halfway between an urban sprawl of Atlantic beachside resorts and miles of farmland, acting as a waypoint for travelers bound for Ocean City, Rehoboth, and Dewey Beach.
It is also, according to the city's mayor, a "city under siege" by bloggers.
Twitter folk preyed on (again)
Abuse of Twitter users is getting to be such a regular thing than a wiser journalist would write a macro for the story, though for once they're not being duped into revealing their passwords. That said, Rik Ferguson at Trend Micro is reporting today that a site sharing a name with a brand-new iPhone application for the popular microblogging service has a nasty little malware payload waiting for the unwary.
The application, TweetFollow, was released just last week. It is safely available from its developers at b1te.com, as well as from Apple's apps store. It is not, however, available from tweetfollow.com, which instead has a JavaScript infection called, in Trend Micro parlance, JS_IFRAME.AKK. The domain was registered on December 31, 2008 to John Dennis of Netus Group, with whom Betanews has left a message requesting clarification concerning a) how the site is connected to the TweetFollow application and b) why the site has JavaScript cooties. We'll keep you posted.
Swedish dread over looming IPRED copyright law
TorrentFreak and other peer-to-peer-interested sites are taking a hard look at a controversial law that will make it easier for copyright holders to get personal information on people they claim are infringing on their rights. Despite massive public disapproval, rules based on the EU's Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED) goes into effect on Wednesday, April 1. (No fooling.)
The law, which permits the rights holders to petition the court for the names of people associated with IP addresses via which infringement is alleged to have occurred, will also increase penalties and eventually criminalize large-scale infringement. In a recent poll, 48% of Swedes said they believe the new law is wrong, with just 32% approving. More memorably, Rikard Falkvinge, chairman of Sweden's Pirate Party and co-leader of the Facebook protest, castigated the digital literacy of the legislation's authors, telling TorrentFreak that "These laws are written by digital illiterates who behave like blindfolded, drunken elephants trumpeting about in an egg packaging facility."
Discovery says it thought of the Kindle first, wants royalites
Discovery Communications, best known for its Discovery Channel cable network and related retail stores, is also the holder of a rather comprehensive e-book patent filed nearly ten years ago. The company has taken legal action against Amazon.com for infringing upon that patent with its popular Kindle e-reading device.
The patent (#7,298,851) was granted in November 2007 to Discovery founder John S. Hendricks, and includes everything from the content delivery method (both through the Internet and through a connection to Cox cable box for video) all the way down to the operating system of the reading device (Menus include virtual shelves labeled "books in your library," and "books you can order.") Page 26 of the patent also includes a method of printing books on demand.
Cisco's servers should stay away from HP and IBM, analysts say
In unveiling Cisco's long rumored Unified Computing System (UCS) data center initiative on Monday, Cisco CEO John Chambers said that while he "respects" Cisco's newfound competitors in the server market, they have created "silos" in the data center.
Later in the 90-minute event, Gary Moore, Cisco's senior VP for advanced services, took pains to maintain that Cisco's new architecture can be integrated to interoperate with "legacy systems." Moore said customers have been telling Cisco, "Don't make me throw away my investment, or I'm not going to go to you!"
The heat is on: Latest Google Chrome closes the gap with Safari 4, Firefox 3.1
Download Google Chrome 2.0.169.1 for Windows from Fileforum now.
For the first time in...forever, speed and efficiency are becoming factors in determining the quality of Windows-based Web browsers, in a race for excellence that has never been this competitive. Last week, when we tested the five leading Windows-based development browsers, what was then the latest version of Google Chrome scored a solid second place in speed and performance tests on the browsers' respective JavaScript interpreters. Apple's Safari 4 for Windows was out front and pulling away, and the new Firefox 3.1 Beta 3 was making it a three-way battle.
Adobe results weak, but makes its Q1 targets
The first quarter of 2009 was, as predicted two weeks ago, soggy for Adobe Systems, which on Tuesday reported revenue of $786.4 million for the period ending February 27. That's under the company's original Q1 estimate of $800-$850 million, but a shade above the revised prediction of $783-$786 million.
According to president and CEO Shantanu Narayen, demand for CS4 continues weak, though awareness and interest in the product family is still high. (Random fact: Suites account for 68% of CS4 revenues.) To attempt to convert that interest to sales, the company said it will extend its introductory pricing on CS4 until April 30.
Google releases new 2.0 beta of Chrome browser
Download Google Chrome 2.0.169.1 for Windows from Fileforum now.
Today, Google has made the latest beta of Chrome available for download, promising a 25%-35% speed boost over the latest stable version, and speeds nearly double that of the original Chrome beta, according to two Google benchmarks.
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