Citrix intros tablet access app

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

shareconnectAn app that lets you connect Android tablets and Apple iPads to business applications and networks is being introduced by Citrix.

ShareConnect lets people access and edit files using native desktop applications on business networks.And it can use business applications that require resource intensive functions running on an enterprise network.

Desktop applications, said Citrix, are optimised for tablets and open in full screen mode.  And you can use tablet functions such as swiping, pinching and zoom and can edit Microsoft Word files and the like.

The company said that ShareConnect also comes with 1GB of cloud storage from its ShareFile service.

The software is available for freedownload in Apple’s App Store and in Google’s Play store.

Jesse Lipson, a VP at Citrix said: “Not all data is stored in the cloud and many desktop apps are not fully functional through mobile apps.  With ShareConnect, users can access and edit files, use industry specific desktop apps, and even use their business neworks.”

Language goes West

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

Tower of BabelOne hour translation said it has released another version of WeST – software that can localise websites for other languages.

The software works by using lines of Javascript into a site’s template. It then counts the number of unique strings and gives translators an InContext interface, letting them translate directly onto the site.

The updated software also lets people based in other countries to access WeST, look at the translation and give their own feedback.

The company claims that it’s a cost effective way of providing local versions of websites without plunging much time and money into localisation.

One Hour Translation claims to be the fastest professional translation agency in the world and the largest online.  It has a community of over 15,000 translators and offers medical and legal transcription services as well as email translation, API and CMS translation plug ins too.

You can find more information on WeST by clicking here.

Phablets will beat tablets

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

cheap-tabletsPhablets are smartphones with screen sizes between 5.5 inches and seven inches. And, according to market research company IDC, 175 million of them will ship this year, beating the 170 million portable PCs expected to ship this year.

It’s a horrible word, phablet.

But next year the devices will ship 318 million units, more than the 233 million tablets IDC predicts will ship in 2015.

Melissa Chau, research manager at IDC, said Apple is expected to announce it’s entering the fray in the next couple of the weeks. And by 2018, she said, phablets will grow market share from 14 percent now to 32.2 percent then.

Average selling prices for phablets and smartphones are set to drop and will dominate the portable sector in 2018, with 75.6 percent of the market.

Tech companies start talking about hiring

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

Slaves_ruvumaApple, Google, Intel and Adobe have gone back to the drawing board to come up with a more reasonable deal with tech workers in a high-profile lawsuit over hiring practices in Silicon Valley.

The four were sued for conspiring to avoid poaching each other’s employees. Last month, US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California rejected a proposed $324.5 million settlement in the class action case, saying it was too low, considering what the four actually did.

Both sides have said they had resumed mediation but provided no additional details on the talks. They also asked Koh to set a new trial date.

The employees said that the conspiracy limited their job mobility and  kept a lid on salaries. The case, filed in 2011, has been closely watched because of the possibility of big damages being awarded. It also showed the antics of the likes of Apple’s Steve Jobs, former Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt and some of their rivals.

Koh cited “substantial and compelling evidence” that Jobs “was a, if not the, central figure in the alleged conspiracy”.

Jobs had previous form for setting up conspiracies which helped him and Apple at the expense of workers or customers. He was also named and shamed as the bloke who set up a conspiracy to make sure that customers paid more for ebooks.

Given the strength of the case against the companies, the plaintiffs should have got more money, Koh wrote.

Smartphone designers run out of ideas

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

Samsung rules the roostSamsung has just confirmed what many in the industry had thought – that there is nothing you can do to a smartphone which will make it much different.

Samsung unveiled new versions of its Galaxy Note smartphone to a loud sounding yawn from tech journalists.

To be fair there is nothing wrong with the phone,  at least not this time.  The new Galaxy Note 4 features a crisper, 5.7-inch display in a metal frame and accessories designed to attract gamers and an improved pen stylus and related software as a handwriting alternative to typing on a keyboard. It boasts easier to use multi-tasking features that take advantage of its large screen.

But really there is not much more you can do with a smartphone which has not already been done or would cost too much to be bothered with.

Samsung is pinning a lot on the Note, which came under a lot of mockery from Apple fanboys because of its size. Apple later realised that the large scale phone was popular and copied it in the designs for its iPhone 6.

However now the idea of a large smartphone has no novelty and users need something a bit more interesting to engage them.

Mobile phone analysts said that, while packed full of hundreds of features and many of the latest hardware specs, there is little in the Note 4 to excite new users.

Forrester told Reuters that all the phones could manage were incremental changes. Analyst Thomas Husson said Samsung needs to distinguish its devices from dozens of cheaper rivals and it could not manage it.

Samsung lost control of the Chinese market to Xiaomi during the April-June quarter. It continued to lose market share in other emerging markets, analysts say, undercut in part by rivals producing increasingly attractive products at much lower prices in the lower end of the market.

The company experience some major headaches with the Galaxy S5 which did not make the impact onto the market that users hoped.

The Korean electronics giant says it will get more aggressive on pricing and focus on a narrower set of products for its mid-to-low tier products.

Unsinkable Apple hits Selfiegate iceberg

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

Der Untergang der TitanicHistory says that Apple’s share price should be going sky high right now buoyed by the expected launch of a new iPhone6 and whipped to a frenzy by its free publicity provided by the Tame Apple Press.

However, the company shares are suffering their worst day and one brokerage warning of a stock downgrade unless its new products show better promise for profit growth.

Shares of the smartphone maker slumped four percent as users realised that the company’s iCloud was not the safest place to store their snaps. Apple has done its best to say that its security was not at fault in its Cloudgate boob, which saw naked snaps of Hollywood stars appear online, however evidence is mounting that is not the case.

It seems investors are starting to realise that Apple has not introduced a new product since the iPad in 2010 and is not expected to create anything brilliantly new with its coming iPhone.

It has been thought that an increasingly desperate Apple would unveil a version of a smartwatch next week but even the technology for that has been done to death as Jobs’ Mob’s own version was constantly delayed.

Pacific Crest Securities analyst Andy Hargreaves said unless next week’s shows massive incremental profit opportunities, he was likely to downgrade Apple’s rating.

Apple needed a security flaw in its iCloud exposing like a hole in the head. Apple wants its clouds to become repositories of sensitive home and healthcare data, and payments and financial information too.

Security experts have been warning for ages that Apple’s cloud is not up to snuff security wise and the current breach just proves how untrustworthy it is.

Facebook feature stuffs up your phone bill

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

shockThe phone companies are rubbing their hands with glee thanks to Facebook’s decision to autorun movies on their news feeds.

Facebook introduced a system where your films of cute cats, guilty dogs, pigglets being thrown into sausage machines and people being beheaded play automatically as you scroll down.

While that is not a problem for those on home broadband, it has been a major killer for mobile users.  Reports are coming in from the US where smartphone users are maxing out their data plans because their phones are downloading movies they are probably not even looking at.

Consumer finance site MoneySavingExpert.com, said it had “seen many complaints from people who have been stung with data bills after exceeding their monthly allowance and who believe it to be because of Facebook autoplaying videos”.

It is not that difficult to fix as the autoplay feature can be switched off but it is not as if Facebook, or anyone else is rushing to tell users.Tap your “Settings” button and then scroll down and click “Facebook.” From there, click “Settings,” “Auto-play,” and then choose “Wi-Fi only” or “Off.” On Android, bring up the Facebook app and go to your account settings. Click “App Settings,” and then choose ‘Auto-play only on Wi-Fi’ or ‘Off.’

 

Intel re-ARMing

Posted on September 4, 2014 by - News

rearm 2It seems that Intel has decided that in the long term its rival ARM has the right idea. We revealed that in the Eye a couple of weeks back.

Intel’s Brian Krzanich told the Citi Global Technology Conference that while ten years down the road the company will continue to get a bulk of its revenue from PCs and servers, a significant part of its revenue will come from mobile, Internet-of-Things and other emerging market segments.

To do that it will need to come up with some ultra-low-cost devices that will still need computing and communications capabilities.

That will mean working out a way to “take our silicon leadership and our architecture down into we talk about parts that may only cost $0.50 and have comms, CPU, everything down there and can run on small batteries.”

Although this is the normal “internet of things” style talk, it is the first time that Chipzilla has given the world its coming vision. In this case it is a super small chip which can run an entire computer’s services for less than 50 cents.

Intel has stayed out of the cheap chips market because the margins are incredibly small, but it is starting to look like it has realised that the Internet of Things will mean low-margin, micro-controllers and other low-cost chips. This will make it difficult for Intel to maintain its traditional 60 percent mark up.

Krzanich said that in a decade, Intel is definitely going to be a broader company across the much broader spectrum of computing. He is also not predicting the death of the PC or the server any time soon.

 

Server makers to cut out middle men

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

server-racksA report from Gartner today suggested that original design manufacturers (ODMs) are set to cut out brand vendors in the global X86 server market.

It estimates that sales of servers by ODMs directly to customers will be worth $4.6 billion by 2018, representing 16 percent or so of the market.

The traditional route to market had OEMs hiring ODMs and selling branded goods. But Gartner reckons that the manufacturers are changing their business models to directly target “hyperscale” customers, that is to say to data centres.

Data centre operators prefer ODM supplied kit because the machines are cheaper and they can customise systems.

Naveen Mishra, a research director at Gartner, said: “Direct engagement with hyperscale data centres is the biggest contributor to ODM growth.”   He said that ODM success is right now restricted to server but he thinks that similar technologies, such as storage, will follow suit.

The ODMs are largely based in China and Taiwan so can make cost efficiencies that can’t be replicated in other geographies.  They are also aggressive on pricing.

Kyocera floats solar panels

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

solarsJapanese giant Kyocera said it is cooperating with Ciel et Terre to create what it claims will be the world’s largest floating solar panel power plant.

Kyocera, which makes ceramic knives as well as solar panels and a heap of other kit, said construction will start this month on two installations on lakes in Japan.  One planned for Nishihira Pond will generate 1.7MW while the other at Higashihira Pond will churn out 1.2MW.

The companies have turned to floating installations because of shortage of space on terra firma in Japan.  But there are many reservoirs throughout the country which can be used for floating power plants.

The floating solar platforms were developed and patented by French company Ciel et Terre.

Plants on water have the advantage that they generate more juice than ground mounted and rooftop systems because they are cooled by water.  They also have the benefit of reducing reservoir evaporation and preventing algae growth.  The platforms are recyclable and the floating platforms are designed to withstand typhoons.

IT ready for Big Data

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

clouds3A survey of 100 IT decision makers from top dollar firms has revealed that enterprises are more than dabbling their toes in the ocean of Big Data.

Syncsort, which is in the Big Data business itself, said that 62 percent of its respondents will optimise their enterprise data warehouses by sending data and batch workloads to Hadoop.

And 69 percent of the people it polled said they expect to make their enterprise wide data available in Hadoop.

Meanwhile just over half of the respondents are likely to spend between five to 10 percent of their budgets on Big Data projects.

Over seventy percent of the respondents work for companies with turnovers of over $50 million plus.

It seems that the IT guys don’t have problems proving the benefits of Big Data to the senior suits that authorise the buys.  It appears from the survey that less than 25 percent of those polled have problems allocating budgets to their Big Data plans.

Teradata snaps up Think Big Analytics

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

doshAnalytic data company Teradata has bought Think Big Analytics.

The reason it’s bought the company is for its Hadoop and big data consulting capabilities, it said in a s statement.

Teradata didn’t say how much it paid for the firm, but said Think Big’s team will stay in place.  It will continue to use the Think Big brand.

CEO Mike Koehler said it is Teradata’s third buy in six weeks. All, he said, will help to achieve its goal of being the market leader.

“Think Big’s consulting expertise enhances Teradata’s capability to advise customers on the best way to leverage diverse, open source big data technologies to grow their businesses,” he said.

Think Big, said Teradata have heaps of experience with a number of Hadoop distributions including Hortonworks, Cloudera, and MapR.

Firm makes 3D food printer

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

candyA start up said it will make a 3D food printer that will be able to churn out sweets.

3D Ventures aims to make the machine cost less than $500 and the first product in its range, dubbed Candy, will not only make cookies, but even print chocolates.

How will it work? The company says that people can design food on their PCs and then transfer it to an SD card.  The dispenser can be filled with semi-solids.

3D Ventures is aiming to fund the machines with Kickstarter money. A rep said: “It is a great way to spend time with family, and with Candy, users know exactly what is going into their food and can make it look any way they like.”

He added that the company wanted to turn 3D industry “on its head” by selling it at a great price.  It’s aimed at impulse buyers, and professional confectioners.

Tere’s a video all about it here.

 

Google gets into Quantum Lolcats

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

OgleSearch engine Google has decided that it wants to get into the business of working out if cats are potentially alive or dead.

It has created a research team led by physicist John Martinis from the University of California Santa Barbara to build new quantum information processors based on superconducting electronics.

Dubbed the Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab, the whole thing is a  collaboration between Google, NASA Ames Research Centre and the Universities Space Research Association (USRA) to study the application of quantum optimisation related to artificial intelligence.

The idea is that by having an integrated hardware group, the Quantum AI team will now be able to implement and test new designs for quantum optimisation and inference processors based on recent theoretical insights as well as our learnings from the D-Wave quantum annealing architecture.

It will also be able to have someone who can feed and stroke the cats, which may or may not be alive.

Google has become more interested in artificial intelligence in recent years, probably because human intelligence seems to be suffering in the US as the nation stops teaching science in favour of a theory that someone’s invisible friend created the universe 6,000 years ago.

In January, Google bought privately held artificial intelligence company DeepMind Technologies, which says it all, really.

 

Woe never ends for Renesas

Posted on September 3, 2014 by - News

renesas-chips (1)Japanese chipmaker Renesas is still in trouble and might have to make even deeper cuts to its organisation.

The outfit has just finished a restructuring and is focusing its business on the automotive and industrial sectors and has pulled it back into the black after years of losses.

However Renesas Chairman and CEO Hisao Sakuta said that the company still had too many people and he expects people to quit.

Renesas was hit hard by the March 2011 earthquake which shut a key chip plant for months and sent customers looking for other suppliers.  The company was rescued by government-backed funds but had to sell an integrated chip factory in northern Japan to Sony.  Renesas SP Drivers will be sold to Synaptics for $475 million.

Renesas has so far cut more than 10,000 jobs and racked up $3.3 billion in cumulative net losses over the last four financial years.

It had its fifth round of a voluntary early retirement programme in September which was taken up by 361 employees.  So far the group work force had shrunk to 27,200 as of end-March from 42,800 two years earlier.

Last week, Renesas unveiled a chip using new technologies that it aims to eventually apply to autonomous driving, which merges together feeds from cameras fitted to the car to create a 3D image and can detect pedestrians within several meters of a vehicle.

Test shipments of the chip begin this month, while full production and supply will likely begin in 2016, Renesas said. It is also developing technologies that will enable valet parking of a car by itself, without a driver inside.