Latest Technology News

The development suite that will come with the new XP kernel-based Windows Embedded standard -- which entered beta on Wednesday -- will indeed allow virtual OS instances to run as virtual machines on developers' desktops.

A Microsoft spokesperson confirmed to BetaNews yesterday evening more details about the roadmap the company announced in April concerning future editions of Windows for embedded devices. On Wednesday, the company announced Windows Embedded Standard, which will give small device manufacturers a way to enable Internet Explorer 7 and Terminal Services-based implementations of applications such as the Office suite, implemented on thin handhelds and even the consoles of printers.

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Innumerable Web sites have been inviting readers to rate and comment about articles and blogs for ages already. Now, Facebook has added a considerably rarer function: Users can give "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" to ads.

Judging from a particularly sophisticated example given by Facebook founder Rob Webb, Facebook members will also be able to leave feedback about why they like or dislike an ad, either by choosing a reason from a drop-down menu, or by creating a new reason not already on that list.

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Restrictions have reportedly been loosened in the nation of Turkmenistan, the Southernmost nation of the former Soviet Union, and private citizens are gradually -- about 20 per day -- being connected to the Internet.

As a result of a development plan put forth by President Gurbanguli Berdymukhammedov, Turkmenistan has been moving toward becoming connected. Previously, only government employees, diplomats, and employees of major international corporations were allowed access to the Internet. But after Berdymukhammedov rose to power in 2006, he put repeated emphasis upon improving the nation's information infrastructure and social standing. In 2007, the first Internet cafe opened, and several dozen followed.

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It was widely reported today that the European Commission approved the buyout of "widget maker" Trolltech, by Nokia. What isn't widely known is that Nokia has acquired something of real substance...and maybe even Nokia doesn't know it.

A statement from Brussels this morning indicates that the European Commission has completed its review of the proposed acquisition of embedded Linux development tools provider Trolltech by wireless device giant Nokia, a deal announced last January. It's clearing the acquisition, under the theory that should Nokia decide to limit Trolltech to producing tools only for Nokia equipment, one less tools provider in the market won't be much of a loss.

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Time Warner Cable is being hauled into court by a Los Angeles city attorney over complaints of Internet and e-mail outages, TV line-up changes, and service delays. This while the head of TWC's regional office was given the heave-ho.

"Hundreds of thousands of Los Angeles residents were ripped off," said City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo in a statement. The city's lawsuit -- which accuses Time Warner Cable of creating "major havoc and distress" -- could cost the cable company tens of millions of dollars in civil fines.

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Yahoo said it will join CBS' Audience Network on Wednesday, continuing the close relationship of the two companies.

With the addition of Yahoo to the list of outlets from which its off-air programs are streamed, CBS claims it will reach about 92 percent of US Web households -- by far the most of any content provider.

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While Wal-Mart seemed to be firmly in the HD DVD camp early in the format war, it's now gearing up for a nationwide promotion to drum up interest in the format war's survivor.

With HD DVD out of the way, the world's largest retailer is now turning to Blu-ray and marketing it aggressively, even though the price of its players may be out of reach for a significant portion of its budget-conscious consumers.

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An academic study charting the daily mobility of people based upon their mobile phone data has raised ethical concerns regarding privacy and nondisclosure.

The study was conducted by Northeastern University and recently published in the journal Nature. Cell phone usage data from a private European mobile phone carrier was used as the primary dataset for the study. Both the carrier and the nation in which the data was gathered were not named.

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Emerging from a public beta process which began last September, the Lotus brand once again represents a suite of general purpose applications...and it doesn't look to make much money from that just yet.

The game is officially joined. Up to now, the leading full-release application suites supporting OpenDocument Format have been the open source OpenOffice, Sun's commercial StarOffice, and Corel's commercial WordPerfect Office. We know the next version of Microsoft Office, currently code-named "Office 14," will support ODF optionally the way WordPerfect Office does now.

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Korea's fine against Intel ends a two-year-long investigation by the Korean Fair Trade Commission into allegations of abuse of Intel's dominant position in the CPU market.

On Wednesday, the Korean FTC announced it will fine Intel 26 billion won ($25.4 million USD), for giving rebates to two Korean computer manufacturers in exchange for promises from them not to purchase chips from rival AMD.

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Based upon the SearchMonkey platform, Yahoo users can now enhance their searches with developer-created apps.

The enhancements (there were 39 available as of 1:00 pm EDT today) available in Search Gallery highlight specific sites in results such as public domain book text from Feedbooks, Last.fm song and artist information, and Yahoo Local data.

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Last month's shareholders lawsuit filed against Yahoo has revealed the existence of a poison pill to defend the company against hostile takeover -- one which investor Carl Icahn is now publicly working to have extricated.

There is little question that, over Microsoft's history, fortune has smiled upon it, and it's often ended up getting its way anyway, sometimes despite itself. If Microsoft's intention by even considering a Yahoo deal was to eliminate one major roadblock between it and Google in the online advertising and search space, walking away from the deal last month may end up achieving the same objective, if investor Carl Icahn has his way.

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The official release notes are now live on Mozilla's servers, along with Release Candidate 2 of the organization's next Web browser, which was published yesterday.

Download Mozilla Firefox 3.0 RC2 for Windows from FileForum now.

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While much of the buzz surrounding Apple's annual developer event has been about the iPhone, news reports indicate the company may also debut the newest release of its operating system at WWDC.

Hints of the next major OS upgrade first surfaced in the iPhone SDK, where Mac OS X 10.6 is reportedly referred to within the code. Additionally, Apple's invitation has dubbed this year's WWDC "a landmark event in more ways than one," suggesting that the iPhone won't be the sole topic.

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Verizon has announced it will be rolling out 60 new channels to the
FiOS TV lineup region-by-region beginning in July, at least 25 of these will be HD.

Verizon today claims FiOS will have between 52 and 65 HD channels, depending upon the subscriber's region. Some of the FiOS channels to receive the HD upgrade are Lifetime, Animal Planet, TLC, Science Channel, and Smithsonian Channel, as well as five new channels from Starz and Showtime.

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