Php - How to display first n words of a paragraph ...


Using this function we can extract first $lemgth words from  $string

<?php

function wordlimit($string, $length = 50, $ellipsis = "...")
{
   $words = explode(' ', $string);
   if (count($words) > $length)
       return implode(' ', array_slice($words, 0, $length)) . $ellipsis;
   else
       return $string;
}

?>

India's IT growth to slow down in 2009

INDIA--The global financial meltdown is expected to finally reach local shores this year, dragging India's IT and IT-enabled services (ITES) industry to its lowest growth in five years, according to IDC.

The research firm's local analysts said at its Directions conference Saturday, the overall growth of India's IT-ITES industry will crawl to 10.8 percent in 2009, generating revenues worth some 3,095.73 billion rupees (US$64 billion). Exports are projected to expand 11.2 percent to over 2,000 billion rupees (US$41 billion).

Last year, the Indian IT-ITES industry grew 14.4 percent with revenues of US$58 billion (2,790 billion rupees).

IDC India's country manager Kapil Dev Singh, said: "Though certain signs of a revival can be seen in the domestic market, spending is unlikely to pick up before mid-2010."

IT spending behavior would remain conservative throughout 2009, due to uncertainty in the economic environment, Singh said at the conference. "Several factors augur well for the Indian economy, such as a stable government at the center, economic reforms, buoyancy in the stock markets, and the fact that inflation and global oil prices are under control," he said.

Despite these positives, IDC predicts the hardware market to remain under pressure throughout 2009. The analyst firm expects the hardware and software segments to see a resurgence in demand only in the second half of 2010.

"The biggest [IT] spender today is the end-consumer," Singh said.

From 2009 to 2010, IDC expects high growth to come from verticals such as government, through various e-government initiatives currently underway, education and telecom. Between 2011 and 2012, sectors such as retail, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, would also join these high-growth verticals.

Enter "Growth Phase 2.0"
The domestic IT-ITES market growth projection from 2008 to 2013 is expected to moderate at 15.8 percent, compared to the average growth of 25 percent recorder between 2003 and 2008

Singh said: "This signals the onset of a new phase of growth, Growth Phase 2.0, that will be marked by moderate growth and a much larger industry base."

This growth phase will see IT vendors helping enterprises design and deliver "new age" services to their customers by leveraging the existing IT infrastructure.

IDC expects the ICT vendor community to offer innovative products and services in Growth Phase 2.0 that will be fundamentally different from the past in the way they are delivered and consumed.

"These shifts and changes in the technology-product-market landscape will be further shaped by the economic recovery through 2009 to 2010, and is expected to build up after 2010," Singh said.

Praveen Sengar, IDC India's senior manager of software and services and industry verticals research, said: "During these recessionary times, green IT is being sold to Indian companies as a cost-cutting measure."

Indian companies are fast embracing concepts such as virtualization, unified communications and cloud computing, in order to bring down their capital expenditure, he added.

Domestic market to grow faster
IDC expects the Indian IT-ITES industry to cross 5,281 billion rupees (US$110 billion) by 2013, with the domestic market growing faster than exports and will account for 41.9 percent of the overall market in 2013, compared to 31.7 percent in 2008.

Between 2008 and 2013, the India IT-ITES industry is projected to expand at an average growth rate of 13.9 percent with the domestic market growing slightly higher at 15.8 percent, compared to exports growth of 12.7 percent.

Singh said: "This changing trend signals increasing focus of enterprises to leverage capacities they have built up over the last few years."

Sengar added that the top five business priorities of Indian companies today are focued on cutting costs and expenses, increasing profit margins, improving customer service, gaining operational efficiencies and managing business risks.

Their top five IT priorities, on the other hand, are to improve access to relevant information, improve availability and performance of IT infrastructure, lower cost of underlying IT infrastructure, improve security of data and IT systems, and deploy applications that better fit the businesses processes.

Swati Prasad is a freelance IT writer based in India.

This article was originally posted on ZDNet Asia.

'Acid test' for Ubuntu on a netbook

At the end of last week I got the opportunity to start an "Acid Test" of the latest Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

One of my neighbors had seen my HP Mini-Note, and said that she thought something like that would be good for her. I was planning to talk with her about it in detail, to be sure that she knew what she would be getting, the advantages and limitations of such a netbook. However, before I had the time to do that, someone gave her an ASUS Eee PC! She came to me with it last Thursday, asking if I could configure it so that she could connect to my WiFi network.

It seems to be one of the original 701 models, the label on the bottom says "Eee PC 4G". It has very small screen (something like 7"), an equally small (Swiss German) keyboard, and a touchpad with NO buttons (!). It was loaded with a rather dated version of Linux, in German, some sort of Debian or Debian derivative, I didn't take the time to try to identify exactly what version it was. All of this might sound routine to those who have experience with the ASUS Eee PC, but this was the first one that I had every actually worked on.

I decided to reload Linux from scratch, for several reasons - primarily because I couldn't get it to connect, perhaps because it didn't have WPA2 encryption, and I thought that if I was going to have to go to the trouble to update such an old Linux, I might as well reload it with something much newer anyway; also, the owner is not a native German speaker, and would prefer to have the system in English anyway; also, and not least, I had been looking for an opportunity to try UNR on a very average computer user, and both she and the netbook fit the bill.

I initially booted it using UNR on a USB stick, and it came up beautifully. The excitement and satisfaction on her face when she saw how much nicer it looked (and that it was in English) made the effort really worthwhile. After confirming that all the important bits worked properly, I went ahead and installed from the USB drive to the built-in 4GB SSD. As we had no interest in preserving the existing operating system, and I wanted to keep things as simple as possible for her, I simply let it overwrite the entire disk with the new UNR installation. It created a 3.5GB ext3 root partition, and used the remaining bit of the disk for swap. Everything went smoothly, and it was installed and running in well under an hour.

The "Acid Test" part came about because I did all of this on Thursday evening, and I was leaving for the weekend on Friday morning. So she was going to be on her own with it for the critical first few days. I don't like to do that sort of thing, but in this case I didn't have much choice, and she had a desktop system to fall back to in case it didn't work, so I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

When I returned Sunday evening, she said that she had been using it very happily. Startup and connection to the web via my WiFi had worked just fine, and general web browsing had been good. The only significant problem she had was that she wanted to watch some videos in Firefox, and I had not installed the Adobe Flash Plugin. What she told me was that when she tried to watch videos, it said a bunch of stuff that she didn't understand and which she found quite intimidating, so she didn't go any further on that. That confirms my skepticism about those who say Ubuntu (and others) "make it easy" to install Flash (and other packages) when necessary - I have always thought that many, or most, ordinary users would be afraid to try, even it if looked trivial to us "experts", and would most likely then retreat to Windows and say Linux was "too complicated" or didn't have everything they needed. I wish there was a "Mint Netbook Remix"... sigh.

Anyway, I installed the flash plugin packages, and of course then her videos played in Firefox just fine. She said that the sound was a bit odd - well, no surprise, considering the Mickey-Mouse speakers built into the Eee PC. I gave her a headset to plug into the audio jacks, and that solved that problem. (Hint: in this case, I avoid using a USB headset, because I don't want to confuse the Linux audio configuration even more.) I also gave her a USB mouse, so that she didn't have to fight with tapping on the touchpad.

So, now she has been using it for a couple more days, and she is as happy as a clam. She had no problem understanding and using the UNR desktop (which I still find unpleasant), so I suppose that means they have done a reasonable job of creating something for ordinary users, not experienced Linux administrators. I consider it to be a rather old, under-powered and limited capacity system, but she thinks it is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and could hardly be happier with it. I think that shows that what ordinary users are interested in is solutions, not the absolute latest, flashiest, fastest hardware.

She has now brought it back and asked me to install Skype on it. Again, despite my personal reservations (objections) about Skype, it is what it is and she makes good use of it to communicate with her friends and family in the U.S., so I have now installed that. The text and audio functions seem to work, but the video doesn't work yet - I suspect that the drivers for the built-in camera aren't loaded yet. If anyone has experience with this old Eee PC and can offer some tips on that, I would appreciate it. I will return it to her this evening, and I will advise her to use the free communications for Skype, but NOT to risk one cent of her money with them.

So, all things considered I would say UNR passed this initial Acid Test with flying colors. I'm sure that I will hear plenty more from her about it, and I will be watching to see how she gets along with it.

This article was originally posted on ZDNet UK.

RFID could be in all cell phones by 2010

All cell phones will come packed with an RFID chip by next summer — giving your phone the possibility of also becoming the keys to your car or house.

That was the prediction of Ericsson's vice-president of systems architecture, Håkan Djuphammar, speaking at the company's Business Innovation Forum in Stockholm on Tuesday.

He told delegates: "A year from now, basically every new phone sold will have [near field communication]. It's a two-way, bio-directional RFID communication link that makes this device work as a tag or reader."

Djuphammar said devices with RFID chips will have a secure environment on the SIM card, where "trusted identities" or "secure elements" can be downloaded. This will enable phones to take on other roles, such as the keys for your car or house, or a credit card or concert ticket. He said Ericsson is working with a utilities company that has 700 separate unmanned facilities and around 15,000 keys — a logistical nightmare it wants to eliminate via the use of RFID-enabled mobiles.

"They don't know really where those keys are, so they want to replace all the locks with RFID locks, put RFID-capable phones in the hands of all their personnel, and then they can control the access to these sites."

Using RFID in this way would enable a mobile to be assigned to open a door for a certain period of time only, meaning the company could better manage access to its facilities, while also replacing the hassle of dealing with thousands of physical keys.

"All sorts of things will be enabled by [RFID] — a small piece of technology, but with an ecosystem around it that opens up tremendous opportunities for innovation," Djuphammar added.

Mobile phones could also become instruments of fraud detection. Djuphammar said credit card companies could make use of mobile user location data and IP mapping to ascertain whether a transaction is taking place in the vicinity of the official card holder, thereby judging whether the transaction is likely to be genuine or not.

"In some countries, there's a lot of credit card fraud, so it is in the interest of the issuer to be able to match the position of the phone that belongs to the person who has a card. If the phone is close to where the card is used, the fraud risk is low. But if the phone suddenly moves away from where the card is used, the issuer can be alerted to check that particular transaction — it's most likely fraud, because now the phone and the card are separated," he explained.

Another example of leveraging location data is to create real-time road traffic maps generated by analysing the speed of the mobile phone base station hand-off to ascertain how fast cars are travelling. This data could then be sold to GPS device companies, enabling them to provide dynamic travel information to motorists.

Djuphammar said selling access to mobile user information in this way would open up new revenue streams in a "win-win" scenario for all parties involved — the end user, the operator and the broker who manages the sharing of that user data.

"That is a typical win-win, where the operators share their assets/knowledge through a broker and the GPS company can sell a service to the end user. The end user wins, the GPS service provider wins, the broker provider wins and the operator wins," he added.

This article was originally posted on silicon.com.

Teen spots alleged robbers on Google Street View

The world weaves odd, strangely patterned webs.

Last September, a 14-year-old boy told police in Groningen, Holland, that he had been knocked off his bike and robbed of some money and his cell phone.

What evidence did he have of his alleged assailants? Very little.

Six months later, the Associated Press reports, he was pootling around on Google Street View when he saw an image of himself--and of two males behind him, who, he seemed to remember, were just in the place where he was allegedly robbed.

Here's the evidence, blurred.

(Credit: Google Maps)

So he called the police again.

Paul Heidanus, a spokesman for the Groningen police, told the AP that the police had to make a formal request to Google in order to obtain the unblurred photo from Street View.

"The photo could provide an important contribution to solving a crime," he said.

The police subsequently arrested twin brothers, one of whom was allegedly recognized by Groningen's robbery squad.

But here's what I would love to know: what was the 14-year-old alleged victim doing on Google Street View six months after the alleged event? Why pick that moment to return to the scene of the alleged crime?

And, secondly, what was the kind and sensitive Street View driver doing at the time of the alleged incident? Did the driver really just miss it?

Firefox 3.5 almost here

Fans of Firefox's beta builds can now download Firefox 3.5 Release Candidate 2 for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The latest build contains bug fixes although, according to Mozilla's Director of Firefox, Mike Beltzner, these were minor stability issues corrected after the release of the first release candidate.

Belzner also addressed some confusion among the 800,000 or so beta users about Firefox's beta-naming conventions. When the beta moves into release candidate mode, he said, it takes on the name of the final version because if no further problems are found the RC build will simply become the public version.

In an interview with CNET earlier this week, Beltzner said that he expects Firefox 3.5 to be released to the public before the end of June. Although that gives Mozilla a week and a half from today, releasing two release candidates in one week could indicate that the final version could come as early as the beginning of next week.

Ad tech can recognize gender - age next?

A*Star's gender recognition system at work. (Credit: Leonard Goh/CNET Asia)

Singapore's Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*Star) has developed a gender-recognition system that could change the way advertising works in future.

The technology uses sophisticated algorithms to differentiate facial features of males and females. However, unlike Face Detection 3.0, which is used in point-and-shoot devices such as the Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR, the gender-recognition system can only detect faces that are facing the camera.

The A*Star-developed system was displayed at CommunicAsia 2009, held at the Singapore Expo. A representative at the agency's booth told CNET Asia that the technology is focused on advertising, so future digital billboards can detect the gender of the person looking at it and display the appropriate advertisement. The system can also track statistics such as the duration the viewer spends in front of the display.

A*Star also has an age-recognition system in the works, and its application is similar to the gender-based counterpart. However, Sony already has a similar technology for its Cyber-shot compact shooters, which can detect whether the subject in the frame is an adult or child.

At the moment, the gender-recognition system is still in beta-stage testing. The agency hopes to roll out a beefier version by year-end.

This article was originally posted on CNET Asia.

Battery-free LED flashlight recharges in 90 seconds

Light for Life uses ultracapacitor technology. (Credit: 5.11 Tactical)

Last year, 5.11 Tactical, which makes clothes and gear aimed at law enforcement officers (but sells to civilians), announced a new high-tech flashlight called Light for Life. Only recently, however, has it become available to order.

What's special about it? Well, the flashlight uses three LEDs, but its key component is Flashpoint Power technology, an ultracapacitor energy storage system from Ivus Energy Innovations.

Light for Life recharges in just 90 seconds and shines at 90 lumens for 90 minutes per charge. The flashlight has three modes: bright (270 peak lumens), standard (90 lumens), and strobe, which is good for dance parties or scaring the neighbors' dog and kids (OK, I'm kidding, but you get the picture).

According to 5.11 Tactical, the 50,000-hour LEDs never have to be replaced and the flashlight is engineered to "offer 10 years of maintenance-free service under typical conditions." (You can recharge it up 50,000 times or one time a day for 135 years.)

I got a chance to play around with the thing at a recent event, and I have to say I was pretty impressed. It's lighter (16 ounces) than it looks, and it feels very durable. The one question I asked was: what happens when the power goes out and you have to recharge the thing? Answer: it comes with a 12V DC automotive charger, so you can use your car to charge it up in the event of a power outage.

The only drawback: Light for Life costs a whopping $169.99. But 5.11 Tactical says that when you add up the cost of all those D batteries over the lifetime of a battery-powered police flashlight, it's still a deal. And then there's all that good karma you get for not chucking those batteries into the garbage or landfill. It's hard to put a price on that.

Comments?

See one more photo after the break.

Light for Life in its charger.

(Credit: 5.11 Tactical)

10 widgets for Opera users to sing about

When Opera released its widget software development kit last year, there was little doubt that some cool applications would make their way to the company's browser. More than a year later, they indeed have.

I've been sifting through hundreds of Opera widgets that all work with the Opera browser for your Mac, Linux box, or PC. I've found 10 that stand out from the others. Opera users should definitely try these out.

10 Opera widgets

Brainkrieg Brainkrieg is a fun game that does its best to "exercise your brain." The tool gives you a variety of games to play that test your memory and help you think. The point of the game is to decrease your brain age. It's somewhat similar to Brain Age on the Nintendo DS, but the latter is a bit more sophisticated.

Brainkrieg helps you improve your memory.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Dotoo Dotoo is a to-do list widget in your Opera browser. You can create a host of to-do lists and access them all from within the widget. Adding tasks is as simple as pressing the "+" button under your list and inputting your task. It's not a sophisticated widget, so you won't be able to track your progress. But if you want to quickly add a few tasks, you should be happy with what you find.

Dotoo lets you create a quick to-do list.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Facebook Notifier Facebook Notifier gives you a listing of all your friends' recent status updates. You can't update your profile in the application, but you can easily access your profile with the links in the widget. It might not be the most useful app, but if you want to see what your friends are up to while you're browsing outside Facebook, it's a fine choice.

Facebook Notifier keeps you up-to-date.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Google ToolBar The Google ToolBar should be one of the first widgets you add to your Opera browser. The tool gives you quick access to (and search results in) Google search, Gmail, Reader, Finance, News, and much more. Almost every Google app currently available is featured on the toolbar. And since it's a widget, you can drag it around your browser to put it in the perfect spot while you're working.

Google ToolBar is a must-have.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

iTunes Widget Opera's iTunes Widget allows you to see the top songs, featured tracks, new releases, and top albums. You can also choose songs by genre. When you find a song you might want to buy, you can click on it. That will immediately open a Web page redirecting you to the iTunes Store, where you can view the song's listing and buy it.

Buy your favorite songs with the iTunes Widget.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Lyrics Now Lyrics Now is a useful widget that provides you with song lyrics in a matter of seconds. Simply input the name of the song and its artist, and Lyrics Now will do the rest. It displays the album cover and the lyrics. You don't need to click the arrows in the sidebar to scroll through the lyrics. Instead, you can hover your mouse over them to get the job done. It's a simple addition, but one that makes sense; who wants to hear a clicking mouse while you're listening to a song?

Lyrics Now helps you quickly find your favorite song lyrics.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Pandora If you're a fan of music, you'll love the Pandora Opera Widget. Once you download it and input your Pandora credentials, the widget displays all your stations in the familiar Pandora interface. You can listen to songs, tell the service which tracks you like, and check out other users' stations. It's a full-featured Pandora widget that works just as well as its site.

Pandora's widget is just like Pandora.com

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Panic Button Since it's Friday, some of us might be surfing the Web instead of working. That's where the Panic Button comes in. After you install it on Opera, you can place it on your screen while you surf the Web. Whenever you hear the boss coming, simply press the Panic Button, and it will open a new tab automatically. You can pick which site that tab directs you to. In the process, the Panic Button is hidden behind your active windows. It's a must-have if you don't want to get caught at work.

Hit the Panic Button when the boss is around.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Twitter Opera The Twitter Opera widget is a lightweight application that allows you to update your status, see what others are saying, and search Twitter. It's like having the full Twitter experience in a simple widget. I posted updates from the app, and like the site, it updated my stream immediately. I was really impressed by Twitter Opera.

Twitter Opera gives you Twitter in a widget.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Wikipedia The Wikipedia widget is one of the most useful tools in the entire Opera widget listing. It's a simple tool--it only has a search box--but it quickly finds articles on Wikipedia that are relevant to your query. As you're typing, it even displays suggestions to help you in your search. When you finally query the widget, the Wikipedia article is displayed in a new tab. It's a great app.

Wikipedia in a widget is just as useful.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

My Top 3

1. Google ToolBar: The power of Google in a lightweight package.

2. Pandora: Listen to tracks while you work.

3. Twitter Opera: It's Twitter in a little widget. It doesn't get much better than that.

Google debuts Chrome for Mac, Linux

Google released Chrome for Mac OS X and Linux on Thursday, but only in rough developer preview versions that the company warns are works in progress.

"In order to get more feedback from developers, we have early developer channel versions of Google Chrome for Mac OS X and Linux, but whatever you do, please don't download them," Google product managers Mike Smith and Karen Grunberg said in a blog post, evidently trying to use a little reverse psychology. "Unless of course you are a developer or take great pleasure in incomplete, unpredictable and potentially crashing software."

Until now, Google's open-source browser has been a Windows-only product, and some Mac and Linux users have been clamouring for their own version. Google coders have been working to rebuild some Chrome components, such as its graphical interface and its sandbox that isolates different processes from each other, to move beyond just Windows.

Google offers three versions of Chrome: stable, beta and developer preview. The Mac OS X and Linux versions fall into this last category, the most buggy and least tested and complete.

The Flash plug-in will not work, for example, so watching videos is out of the question. Printing or bookmark management are not yet implemented; and privacy controls are not complete. Google said there are more than 400 bugs that need to be resolved.

Although they are released only for the experimental crowd, the new versions are a big step forward for the browser. First, the versions will plug into Google's auto-update service that automatically downloads new versions. Second, the products bear the Google Chrome brand, not just the Chromium label of the only incarnations available until now. And third, a much larger audience will be helping Google debug the code through automated crash reports of the new versions.

Not everyone can try the Mac and Linux versions, however. Google spokesman Eitan Bencuya said the Linux version is supported only in the Debian and Ubuntu incarnations of Linux, and the Mac OS X version only works on Intel-based Macs.

Google is not saying when the new versions will make it to beta status, much less stable. "It's unclear. This is a first step," Bencuya said.

After years of near-dormancy when Microsoft's Internet Explorer ruled the roost, the browser world again is on fire, fuelled by competition and a new generation of more interactive web applications. Mozilla is on the cusp of releasing Firefox 3.5, as is Apple with Safari 4 for both Windows and Mac OS X. Opera 10 is in beta, and even Microsoft is slowly starting to speed up with the weeks-old Internet Explorer 8.

According to Net Applications statistics, Internet Explorer remains at the top, with 65.5 percent market share in May 2009. Firefox has 22.5 percent, Safari 8.4, and Chrome has edged up to 1.8 percent since its launch in September.

All this variety means web developers have to test their sites to make sure they work with more versions. Because Chrome uses the WebKit engine for interpreting and displaying web-page coding, the same engine Safari uses, Google argues that Chrome should be similar. But Chrome uses a different engine for JavaScript called V8, and web-based JavaScript instructions are at the heart of much of the present proliferation of elaborate web pages and applications.

The browser challengers argue that having multiple browsers on the market means web programmers will aim more for supporting standards such as HTML (Hypertext Markup Language), CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and JavaScript. And indeed, Microsoft made a standards mode the default for IE8. However, varying interpretations of standard and varying degrees of support complicate the matter, and a large number of people have not upgraded from IE6, much less IE7.

This article was originally posted on CNET News.

What's up with Apple's laptops?

This week's keynote at the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference threw up few surprises.

A few developers nearly threw up their breakfasts as their on-stage demos failed to work properly but, by and large, there was nothing that hadn't been predicted or leaked.

The pleasant news was the reasonable pricing of Apple's operating system update, Snow Leopard. Largely about stability and performance tweaks, the upgrade will cost just $29, compared to $129 for previous iterations.

The mid-June launch of the new iPhone and the iPhone 3.0 software update (which also covers the iPod Touch) was broadly predicted.

The most interesting announcement was made towards the start of the keynote, with the unveiling of the new laptop range.

Apple released its new range of unibody aluminium MacBooks and MacBook Pros last autumn - yet already here was a significant upgrade.

The upgrade includes the usual speed bump for processors, storage space and RAM. It also features new battery technology that Apple claims will keep you going for around seven hours.

What was really interesting, though, was what wasn't announced.

Back in the late 1990s, one of the first things Steve Jobs addressed on his return to the company was Apple's confused and disjointed product portfolio. Until his return the company had a maelstrom of competing product groups with little coherence or governance.

Jobs soon rationalized the product strategy and cut the Mac into four segments: pro desktop, pro laptop, consumer desktop and consumer laptop.

Since then, additional products have come and gone with relative degrees of success and failure (such as the MacBook Air and Cube, respectively) but the four segments have remained steadfast as the foundation of the company's Mac strategy.

Today's MacBook announcement clearly leaves one of the most commercially successful segments of the strategy in recent years looking distinctly bare: consumer laptop.

The migration of the 13-inch aluminium MacBook to the MacBook Pro brand leaves just one MacBook in the consumer laptop category - the white plastic model that was first released way back in 2006.

This means the category in need of an overhaul. There are a number of options here.

Apple could leave it as it is, or reintroduce additional plastic models. They were hugely successful but are both long in the tooth from a design perspective and lack the more 'green' recyclable aluminium and glass elements.

Another option is for Apple to introduce a new range of MacBook computers. Given the smallest MacBook Pro now features a 13-inch screen, we may soon see a range of smaller computers.

I suspect one of the reasons for the transition of the MacBook into the Pro family was the lack of differentiation between the ranges. This may well be more of a problem going forward.

There is a current trend of computing that may fit into this category and that is the so-called netbook.

I've written before on the unlikely prospects for an Apple-branded netbook. Both CEO Jobs and acting CEO Tim Cook dismissed the idea while admitting they had some "interesting ideas" for the product space.

Rumors have abounded over various consumer-targeted offerings for Apple, and given yesterday's announcement, the time may be coming where the company shows its hand.

This article was originally posted on silicon.com.

Microsoft will soon unveil free virus software

A man walks by the logo of Microsoft in a shop of Brussels in this September 17, 2007 file photo.

BOSTON Microsoft Corp is getting ready to unveil a long-anticipated free anti-virus service for PCs that will compete with products sold by Symantec Corp and McAfee Inc.

A Microsoft spokesman said on Wednesday that the world's biggest software maker is now testing an early version of the product with its own employees and that it will "soon" make a trial version available via its website.

Shares of Symantec and McAfee, the top two makers of security software, tumbled in November after Microsoft disclosed plans to launch the service as investors worried that they will lose sales to the free product.

Microsoft has said that it will only include basic features for fighting viruses, which would likely make it comparable to the least-expensive products sold by Symantec and McAfee.

Their top selling products are security suites that come with features include encryption, firewalls, password protection, parental controls and data backup.

Japan prepares robots to take over the kitchen

By Anna Yokoyama

TOKYO - They've got ones that clean, and others that pour drinks, so it
was only a matter of time before Japanese inventors came up with robots
that can cook.

Various prototype robo-chefs showed off their cooking skills at the
International Food Machinery and Technology Expo in Tokyo this week,
flipping "okonomiyaki" Japanese pancakes, serving sushi and slicing
vegetables.

"We all know that robots can be very useful. We want to take that
utility out of the factory so that they can be used elsewhere," said
Narito Hosomi, president of Toyo Riki, manufacturers of the
pancake-cooking robot.

Japan has one of the world's fastest aging societies and experts say
robots can help care for the growing number of elderly, and fill in for
the lack of young people willing to take on jobs as chefs, cleaners or
caretakers.

Masanori Hirano of Kyoto-based robot lab Squse, which came up with an
android sushi waiter, said robots could help manage the stress
associated with fine dining establishments.

"If a human does this job, it can be stressful. And if so, they can
leave the work to the robot," he said.

Japan is home to almost half the world's 800,000 industrial robots and
expects the industry to expand to $10 billion.

Tomio Sugiura, president of Sugiura Kikai Sekkei, which manufactured the
vegetable-slicing robot, saw a robot in every home in the near future.

"Nowadays, almost every family has a car. In the near future, every
family would be having a humanoid robot that can help out various things
at home," he said.

A year later: Is MobileMe finally worth $99?

Let me begin this by saying that I'm a stingy guy. In high school, I bought a hair clipper and adopted a buzz cut largely to save cash by not having to go to the barber. I will also stop dead in my tracks to pick up a penny.

So for me, spending $99 a year on Apple's MobileMe, a service that basically does Web e-mail, contact syncing, photo hosting, and file storage, was a hard sell--especially after its bad start. This week, however, Apple finally got me to take the plunge. Why? It's starting to add genuinely useful tools for Apple hardware owners, with the promise of more to come.

On Monday, the company demoed a new tool for MobileMe subscribers called "Find My iPhone" that lets you both find a lost (or stolen) iPhone, as well as remotely wipe its contents. You can also get it to ring and vibrate for two minutes straight, which can be a huge help if it's stuck between couch cushions or buried deep within a bag. Anyone who's been late to work, or had a near-heart attack from trying to find a lost phone can appreciate how this service alone may be worth a Benjamin.

Then there's the upcoming iDisk iPhone and iPod Touch application that lets you access files you've stored in your MobileMe online storage. This in itself is not groundbreaking, but if you're an iPhone or iPod Touch user who is already using MobileMe's online storage, it's a nice bonus. Apple is advertising this as a way to show off presentations and get at important business documents, but I'd argue that it's a great way to extend the limited storage on the iPhone by keeping some of your music and videos on MobileMe instead. If you've got a Wi-Fi connection, you can stream both.

But let's get back to the basics. Is the rest of the service worth the cash? Not in my mind--and a big, fat no if you're using it for the Web apps alone. Let's break it down:

(Credit: Apple)

For Web e-mail: No
On the iPhone and iPod Touch, you get messages as soon as they're sent. On the browser, however, it's missing a lot of features that competitors like Yahoo and Google have had for years. Both of those services are free, and between Gmail's labs, and Yahoo's just-introduced apps platform, MobileMe's Web mail feels rudimentary. It also drives me nuts that the service logs you out after 15 minutes of activity. This isn't my bank account, it's my e-mail.

Web storage: Maybe
If you're a Mac user, MobileMe's iDisk storage explorer looks the same, but on the browser it's missing really important things like search and file previews. If you don't know where the file is stored, you have to hunt it down, which is a pain.

Also, despite the fact that you can view photos and videos in other parts of MobileMe, the only way to view those file types from your browser is to download and open them from your hard drive. Most of today's Web storage providers may charge for the kind of space Apple is offering, but they've built in search and preview features that rival the desktop experience.

For all its faults, though, you get a generous amount of storage for what it costs. You can also allocate space away from other parts of the MobileMe service to increase your limit without purchasing additional storage from Apple.

(Credit: Apple)

Contact/calendar management and sync: No
When MobileMe first came out, management and syncing of your contacts and calendars was major selling point, but since then Google has put the heat on Apple with the release of Google Sync. This free product syncs calendars and contacts from any Google account, and sends any changes over the air, which is exactly what MobileMe does. The one big difference is that Apple's solution lets you sync contacts and calendars without wiping out existing data.

But even there, Apple's own data syncing is flawed. When I did my first sync to MobileMe, I chose to merge my existing contacts from Mac's Address Book app and my iPhone (something it does on iTunes every time I sync my phone). Instead of finding the obvious dupes and ignoring them, it made duplicates of all my contacts. Apple is also further cannibalizing the appeal of this feature by letting users subscribe to LDAP directories, and CalDAV/hosted calendars as part of iPhone OS 3.0. If you're someone who's already using services with these data channels, there's no reason to pay for MobileMe since you can set up your phone to sync up to them.

MobileMe's online galleries look great, and are one of the most polished parts of the service.

(Credit: CNET)

Photo/Video/Site hosting: Yes
While I'm a big proponent of sites like Flickr and YouTube, Apple's hosted galleries are really nice. They're simple and beautiful, and there are no ads or distractions. Sure, they're not as social, and you're limited in storage by how much you've paid for, but if you're trying to send a photo album to friends and family it's a really elegant solution. This is especially true if you're using Apple's iPhoto, which lets you publish and make changes to your Web albums from its software.

As for the Web hosting, though, I'm not sold. To make a hosted site you need to use Apple's iWeb or another piece of Web publishing software. There is not a way to build or maintain a site from Me.com alone, which means if you want to make edits from a computer without the software, you're hosed. This is unfortunate considering how many tools are out there that let you do this right from the browser. Apple may add this to future versions, but for now it's a feature you can't fully use without software.

So will Apple add more features to MobileMe later this year? I think so. If the company releases a Netbook, you can bet a major selling point is going to be MobileMe, since it's on track to replace hard drives and software with Web apps and virtual storage.

At least that's its potential. The problem will always be that MobileMe is treated less as a useful suite of Web services, as much as a direct link to specific Apple hardware and software. It's great to have a tightly-knit ecosystem, which is what made Apple such a success to begin with. I just wish it meant that its Web apps got the same kind of attention as their software counterparts. In the case of MobileMe, it's just not there yet.

Manage your social life with these apps

Managing social network profiles is getting more difficult. As we sign up for more services, we need to split our time between multiple sites. But with the help of social aggregators, we can limit those issues. The following tools do a fine job of keeping your social life in one spot, helping you to monitor it more efficiently.

I should note, though, that these won't be your path to social networking bliss. Some folks find aggregators too overwhelming. They believe these resources only complicate matters. You might agree after trying some of these tools.

I should also note that Facebook Connect--Facebook's single sign-on service that competes with OpenID--might soon match these aggregation services. Users can already bring some items with them to Facebook. It might only be a matter of time before the service allows users to pull full social network feeds into Facebook.

Social network aggregators

Atomkeep Atomkeep is designed to help you sync all your profile information across multiple social networks. When you change your profile information on the site, all the networks you sync with it will be updated automatically. So, if you're moving to a new home, you can go to Atomkeep, change your address, and it will update that information on Facebook, Bebo, and other social networks. The site is in private beta, so you'll need an invite code to try it out. For a full CNET review of Atomkeep, click here.

Sync all your accounts in Atomkeep

(Credit: Screenshot by Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Digsby Although Digsby is installed on your desktop and isn't quite a Web tool like the others in this roundup, I thought it appropriate to include it, since it does require the Web to work and it aggregates all your social network data in one place.

Digsby provides a three-pronged approach to aggregation: instant messaging, e-mail, and social networks. You can sign in to practically any IM program in Digsby, including AIM, Yahoo IM, and others. If you're a Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or Hotmail user, you can also use Digsby to manage your in-box. But its integration of social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and LinkedIn is quite appealing. The tool alerts you when you receive updates on your networks. Its news feed gives you constant updates about what your friends are up to. And when you want to update your own status, you can do it in Digsby without going to the individual social networks. But beware that right now, Digsby only works with Windows PCs. The company is promising Mac OS X and Linux support in the near future.

Get all your Facebook alerts on your desktop with Digsby.

(Credit: Digsby)

FriendBinder FriendBinder is a new service that's currently in private beta. You'll need to sign up on the site to get an invite. Once you start using FriendBinder, I think you'll be happy with what you find. In a matter of minutes, you'll be able to update your FriendBinder status and see what all your friends are up to on a variety of social networks.

FriendBinder is quite similar to FriendFeed. You add all the social networks you use to your profile and watch as your friends' updates pass by. When a friend posts a Flickr photo, for example, FriendBinder lets you view it in the same window. Even better, you can update your Twitter and Facebook statuses right from the site. It makes monitoring and updating your social networks easy. You'll have no trouble performing all your basic social activities on the site. I really liked it.

FriendBinder lets you update your status on Facebook and Twitter.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

FriendFeed FriendFeed is the best social-network aggregator in this roundup. After you sign up, you're immediately asked to add all the social networks you belong to. Once complete, your FriendFeed is populated with your updates from a wide array of sites, including Twitter and even Netflix. You can add Flickr photos to your Feed, give users updates from Facebook, and more. It's a great way to communicate.

FriendFeed also lets you subscribe to other users' feeds. When you do so, you'll be able to see what updates they're making across all the social networks they belong to. You can comment on those updates, "like" them, or share them on other social networks. FriendFeed even lets you join groups with like-minded people. It's a great service.

FriendFeed has a great design.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Lifestream.fm Lifestream.fm is a useful app. After you sign up, it makes it easy to add your profiles from a slew of sources, including Facebook, Twitter, and Netflix. When complete, the site will populate your profile with all your updates across those social networks.

But when you start using Lifestream, you quickly find that, once again, it can't quite stand up to FriendFeed. Its design is a little suspect and I had trouble getting my Twitter account to work on the site. Those issues took away from an otherwise useful service.

Lifestream has updates on what's going on in your life.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Ping.fm Ping.fm lets you add all your social networks to the site and update them from the Ping.fm pages. The sheer number of sources you can update is incredible. From FriendFeed to Twitter and Bebo to Facebook, you can update your status practically anywhere on the Web with Ping.fm. And updating that status is quite easy. You need only to choose the service you want to update and you're all set. It's a good way to get all your work done in one place.

Ping.fm has a variety of social networks to choose from.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Pulse Plaxo's Pulse is somewhat useful for monitoring what your friends are up to on all their social networks. Once you sign up, the site lets you "connect" with others by asking for your e-mail address and password. It claims that it doesn't save your password. When you go to the Pulse page, you'll find a listing of all the recent updates made by friends on social networks. Although the site does support other social networks, I found that my stream was dominated by Twitter updates. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I would have liked more diversity.

Overall, Pulse is a fine tool. I liked having the option of grouping connections by family, friend, or business. I also liked how easy it was to add my social network profiles. It's worth trying out.

Get updates on those folks you follow in Pulse.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Profilactic Profilactic is quite similar to FriendFeed. When you sign up for the site, it asks you to input all the social networks you currently belong to. It doesn't have quite as many options as FriendFeed, but it's close. If you want, you can also add blogs to your stream, so followers can see what updates you're posting to your site.

You won't be able to see what your friends are up to unless you become friends with them on Profilactic. Considering it's substantially smaller than FriendFeed, you might have trouble finding friends to connect with.

Profilactic helps you customize your streams.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)

Spokeo Spokeo isn't nearly as useful as many competing products, but it does a fine job of aggregating all your friends' updates across multiple social networks, including Facebook, Pandora, Digg, and others.

When you first sign up, Spokeo asks you to input your e-mail address and password. It then uses that information to find all the social networks you are registered with. Once complete, it finds all your friends on those services with public profiles and lists their recent activity. Unfortunately, you'll only see previews of what they've added. I tried clicking on Flickr photos and couldn't open them. I also didn't like that Spokeo sends so many e-mail updates. I don't care if someone is searching for me. And I don't need to know its friend search is complete. Consider Spokeo a last resort.

Spokeo shows previews, but you can't open those pictures.

(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)