Computing

This section of the website is all about Computing. This can range from the various Operating Systems such as Microsoft, Mac and Linux to the hardware and software that we use all the time. Feel free to visit our forums to discuss Computing.

Latest News

IBM Flash Memory Breaks 1 Million IOPS Barrier

IBM has claimed a major breakthrough in flash storage, with a research project that's delivering data transfer speeds of more than 1 million input/output operations per second, two and a half times faster than the industry's fastest disk storage.

IBM's Project Quicksilver, announced Thursday, combines solid-state flash memory with IBM's storage virtualization technology. "Quicksilver improved performance by 250% at less than 1/20th the response time, took up 1/5th the floor space and required only 55% of the power and cooling," IBM says.

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Internet Explorer gets makeover

Microsoft has released the second "beta" or test version of its latest browser Internet Explorer 8 (IE8).

IE8 offers a few surprises compared to the initial beta version released in March. New features will include improved privacy and search functions, and ways to keep track of portions of web pages. The release debuts two functions that were not available in the March release. However, many in the blogosphere have noted that several of the improvements in IE8 have been available on other browsers for some time.

One feature new to the release is the "smart address bar". Microsoft senior product manager James Pratt pointed out at that 80% of the time, internet users were visiting sites they had been to before. To address that, the new release archives visited sites based on their titles as well as their addresses. That means a search in the address bar for words and phrases will find previously visited sites, as well as bookmarks.

Another new set of features makes web searching easier; search terms entered in the search bar at the top of the browser now instantly display potential results in real time as the search term is typed. Results are shown from user-defined search engines and websites, with rich visual content. For websites with changing content, such as items on eBay or status pages on Facebook, IE8's Web Slices allows users to keep up with the content without going to the webpage directly, accessible through the Favourites bar.

The new release also showcases Groups, which makes tabbed browsing easier. Tabs opened from the same page are colour-coded, making it easier to keep track of different tab groups. Tabs can also be moved around to different groups, with the tab taking on a new group's colour. Right-clicking tabs allows actions on the entire group, such as closing. Users will also be relieved to find that if they inadvertently close a tab, IE8 offers an option to reopen it. As with the earlier Beta release, the new version sports inPrivate Browsing mode, which leaves no trace of sites visited on the computer.

Behind the scenes, developers have made the browser more compliant with software standards, so that pages in IE8 will look the same as in any other browser. While IE8's tab Groups and the way it sorts results in the smart address bar are novel, many have argued that the release is simply catching up to other, existing browsers. IE8's inPrivate mode performs the same job as the Private Browsing mode available in Apple's Safari Browser, and the Web Slices function echoes Safari's Web Clips.

The "smart address bar" works much like the so-called "Awesome bar" in Mozilla's latest release of its Firefox browser, and Firefox has long had the ability to reopen closed tabs. However, Microsoft UK's Ian Moulster counters that IE8 was designed by studying what people need and want. Though some functions appear similar, he says, they have been implemented in more user-friendly ways.  "If you look at the way the features work, like visual search and Web Slices, nobody else does them in the same way, and many don't do them at all," he says. "I think if you add up the whole product across the board, it absolutely stands by itself in making the web easier and safer to use."

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Microsoft sees end of Windows era

Microsoft has kicked off a research project to create software that will take over when it retires Windows.

Called Midori, the cut-down operating system is radically different to Microsoft's older programs.  It is centred on the internet and does away with the dependencies that tie Windows to a single PC.  It is seen as Microsoft's answer to rivals' use of "virtualisation" as a way to solve many of the problems of modern-day computing.

Although Midori has been heard about before now, more details have now been published by Software Development Times after viewing internal Microsoft documents describing the technology.  Midori is believed to be under development because Windows is unlikely to be able to cope with the pace of change in future technology and the way people use it.

Windows worked well in an age when most people used one machine to do all their work. The operating system acted as the holder for the common elements Windows programs needed to call on.  "If you think about how an operating system is loaded," said Dave Austin, European director of products at Citrix, "it's loaded onto a hard disk physically located on that machine.  "The operating system is tied very tightly to that hardware," he said.

That, he said, created all kinds of dependencies that arose out of the collection of hardware in a particular machine.  If Windows ends up being less important over time as applications become more OS agnostic where will Microsoft make its money?  This means, he said, that Windows can struggle with more modern ways of working in which people are very mobile and very promiscuous in the devices they use to get at their data - be that pictures, spreadsheets or e-mail.  Equally, he said, when people worked or played now, they did it using a combination of data and processes held locally or in any of a number of other places online.

When asked about Midori by BBC News, Microsoft issued a statement that said: "Midori is one of many incubation projects underway at Microsoft. It's simply a matter of being too early in the incubation to talk about it."

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China surpasses US for largest number of web users

China now has the world's largest net-using population, say official figures.

More than 253 million people in the country are now online, according to statistics from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).  The figure is higher than the 223 million that the US mustered in June, according to Nielsen Online.  Net penetration in the US stands at 71% compared to 19% in China suggesting it will eventually vastly outstrip the US.

The development is significant because the US has had the largest net-using population since records of how many people were online started to be kept.  "This is the first time the number has drastically surpassed the United States, becoming the world's number one," said a statement from the CNNIC, the nation's official net monitoring body.

The 2008 figure is up 56% in a year, said CNNIC. Analysts expect the total to grow by about 18% per annum and hit 490 million by 2012.  About 95% of those going online connect via high-speed links. Take up of broadband has been boosted by deals offered by China's fixed line phone firms as they fight to win customers away from mobile operators.  China's mobile phone-using population stands at about 500 million people.

Despite having a greater number of people online, China's net economy still has a long way to go to match or exceed that of the US or even that of South Korea.  Figures from Analysys International said China's net firms reported total revenues of $5.9bn (£2.96bn) in 2007. By contrast net advertising revenue alone for US firms in 2007 stood at $21.2bn (£10.6bn).

UK ISP's to monitor internet activity

Five of the major ISP’s in the UK have announced that they will be monitoring and reporting users who download illegal music.

Quote from the BBC web site

[quote]The deal, negotiated by the government, will see hundreds of thousands of letters sent to net users suspected of illegally sharing music.

Hard core file-sharers could see their broadband connections slowed, under measures proposed by the UK government.

BT, Virgin, Orange, Tiscali, BSkyB and Carphone Warehouse have all signed up.

Geoff Taylor, chief executive of the BPI, which represents the music industry, said: "All of the major ISPs in the UK now recognise they have a responsibility to deal with illegal file-sharers on their networks."
[/quote]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7522334.stm

This move comes after Virgin started selling users internet activity to marketing companies and ads to the worrying trend in ISP’s monitoring your internet usage.