Information Architects have just released the 2008 version of their ‘map’ of the Web that looks and reads like a subway map. You can either take a look at the clickable online version or the downloadable PDF one. It may be useful to compare it to the 2007 version to see how their opinions of whether sites are moving ‘up’ or ‘down’ have changed or to see what new sites are on there and which ones dropped off.
Mozilla is working on a mobile version of Firefox. Unfortunately, it probably won’t see the light of day until end of this year. Well it’s about time. I was wondering why this was taking so long.
In case you don’t already run Firefox on your computer, get with it already. Just click the image link above and pull it down. You won’t regret it. The thing that really makes FF so much more than just a web browser and more like a platform are the slew of extensions available for it. I’ve got easily over a dozen extensions that improve my browsing experience, makes me more efficient and adds tools that I can’t live without now. After all, I blogged this entry directly in FF using an extension called ScribeFire, which rocks BTW.
UK buyers of services can rejoice with the opening of SetYourRate.com, a new online services marketplace with services up for sale from professional services like accountancy to fun leisure activities such as pole dancing lessons. Personally, I’d pay for a pole dancing watching activity!
Because service sellers can remain anonymous, registrants can use the site to attract moonlighting opportunities while others use it to market services in the hope of building a client-base to ‘go it alone’ with their own business. Many students advertise their skills to help fund their studies – an attractive and potentially lucrative alternative to pulling pints at the Students’ Union (just not as fun).
First you could outsource to India, then China but now people can outsource to the UK! Too bad of that darn language barrier…
Recently, I have been evaluating a new product, PacketTrap, which integrates a number of network management tools into a common graphical user interface. It also contains a number of useful reporting features that can be accessed using a gadget driven dashboard. Some interesting things you can run with PacketTrap are Ping Scan, SNMP Scan, WMI Scan, TFTP Server, Syslog, Whois, Wake on Lan, DNS Audit, and several others. A few days ago I used the product to assist in identifying then fixing a problem with a network infrastructure switch – not the easiest of things to sort out in the middle of the day – especially when users just want to get on with their work. PacketTrap does a great job and in my opinion should be on every technicians radar.
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Don’t spend your weekends mowing the lawn or waste your money paying a landscaping service. A LawnBott robotic lawnmower maintains your grass at a constant height for you, leaving you—and your wallet—free to do more important things. LawnBott even charges itself and will mow at your pre-programmed times.
Sounds like any old robotic lawn mower for sale out there right? Well, this mower is the new Bluetooth-compatible model will maintain a lawn up to 38,000 sqare feet and navigate slopes of up to 30 degrees, and it has a rain sensor that sends it back to its charger when it detects rain but now you can program it from any Bluetooth-compatible cellphone or PDA.
Through Bluetooth, the homeowner can program which days of the week and what hours of the day the LawnBott needs to come out of its charging base and cut the grass. At the end of its work cycle, the LawnBott will go back to its charging station and take a nap while it recharges, ready to come out again for the next cycle.
Safety and security are further enhanced with the LB3500 through a higher sensitivity, free-floating, 360° bumper shell, blade stop proximity sensor, and an on-board alarm system should an unauthorized user pick up the Lawnbott.
Suggested Price: $2899.99
Most technology news you may read this week is tied up with reports from CES – the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and the GizmosforGeeks team have been hard at work reporting on all the juicy new gadgets. I haven’t been so lucky to visit and instead have been at work at the office trying to sort out a number of technology issues – however a few interesting things have popped up. The new Everex Cloudbook, a potential challenger to the Asus eee PC is promised to hit the shelves in Walmart by the end of this month – in the USA at least. The UMPC is an ideal machine for the non-technologist, and indeed for the technologist, with its no-nonsense low-cost approach offering just the applications that are really required – I really believe the UMPC, personified by the ASUS eee PC, will be successful.
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A whopping seven Logitech products were named as 2008 CES Innovations award winners for excellence in design and engineering including the new Logitech Harmony One advanced universal remote which won in the Home-Entertainment Accessories category.
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As IT Security Geeks, one of the vendors the Geeks had to visit was Yoggie Security Systems. Yoggie’s Gatekeeper Pico was described as the “next generation of Internet Security” and is a Linux-based (520MHz computer) USB key-size security tool with 12 built-in security applications. Yoggie also has a Gatekeeper Pico Pro which is designed to off-load installed security software from your PC that extends corporate-level security to mobile laptops.
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CES 2008: Gatekeeper Pico – Hardened Linux in a USB ShellRead More »
First off, Happy New Year – the title should really have read “the technology fortnight in view” but frankly not a lot happened in my technological world over Christmas (except for a frightening increase in blobs of plastic lying around the place), and anyway – who’s counting? To kick off 2008 I found a great tip if you’ve ever lost the switch to classic view or switch to category view section in Windows XP, here it is: Classic View and Category View in Windows XP Control Panel. By the way did you hear about or take part in the Highlet campaign? It was fun while it lasted but hopefully, I’ve written The last word on Highlet … for now anyway. I also read on the news that a major high street retailer is filing a profit warning due to poor sales over Christmas. I wonder if this could have anything to do with an increase in online sales? Possibly.
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TechShout wrapped up their top 10 Tech and Gadget Gifts for Christmas yesterday including three gaming gadgets (Microsoft Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Sony PSP), a couple of cameras (Sony Handycam DCR-SR100 and Nikon Coolpix S1 Digital Camera), a couple portable audio devices (Apple iPod Touch and Sansa Shaker MP3 player) as well as a few other gadgets including Logitech Wireless DJ Music System, Sony DVPFX810 Portable DVD Player and the Brando MP4 Watch.
While it’s hard to feature all the top gifts compressed into 10 items, TechShout tried and did a nice job. Two tech and gadget gifts that are notably missing though are GPS units and Digital photo frames. Both types of products sold amazing amounts of volumes this Christmas season, at least in the states.
Read the entire TechShout article here.
