On Wednesday, Microsoft announced the availability of Windows Internet Explorer 8. It can be downloaded in 25 languages at http://www.microsoft.com/ie8 starting yesterday.
“Customers have made clear what they want in a Web browser — safety, speed and greater ease of use,” said Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft. “With Internet Explorer 8, we are delivering a browser that gets people to the information they need, fast, and provides protection that no other browser can match.”
Internet Explorer 8 offers the best security protections among leading browsers: a study released today by NSS Labs indicates that Internet Explorer 8 blocks two to four times as many malicious sites as other browsers on the market today.
In addition to offering improved security and privacy protections, Internet Explorer 8 is one of the fastest browsers on the market today, beating other top browsers in page load time on almost 50 percent of the 25 top comScore Inc. Web sites. It also helps people save time while using the Web with easy-to-use new features, including the following:
Accelerators. Accelerators make it faster and easier to perform common tasks online by making Web-based services such as ESPN.com, Live Search and Sina available for use directly from the page people are viewing. Users can simply right-click a word or phrase and instantly map, e-mail, or share it.
Web Slices. Web Slices in Internet Explorer 8 makes favorite information from sites such as Digg, Yahoo! Mail, OneRiot, and eBay instantly available wherever someone goes on the Web.
Visual search suggestions. The Instant Search Box in Internet Explorer 8 enables rich, real-time search from sites such as The New York Times, Amazon.com and Wikipedia, as well as sites from people’s own Favorites and History, complete with visuals and detailed information that saves time.
“We are excited about Internet Explorer 8 for several reasons, including its ability to provide our customers with updates to eBay products using Web Slices so they can keep track of their buying activity while surfing the web,” said Matt Ackley, vice president of Internet Marketing and Advertising at eBay.
Lunascape 5.0 Alpha Genesis provides a shortcut to jumping between Google Chrome, Internet Explorer and Firefox, without running any of the actual browsers. In all fairness, the Lunascape browser does not deliver Google Chrome Beta, Internet Explorer 8, or Firefox 3.1, but its does manage to bring to the table the next best thing, all the underlying rendering engines used by Google, Microsoft and Mozilla.
Instead of juggling multiple browsers in order to adapt to interoperability issues or to websites optimized for certain browsers, Lunascape 5.0 Alpha Genesis allows the users to seamlessly switch between the Trident, Gecko and WebKit, rendering engines for navigation tasks.
Furthermore, the Lunascape developers claim that they have beaten Chrome, Firefox 3.0.1, Opera 9.52, and Internet Explorer 7, in terms of JavaScript performance.
The following is a snapshot of the "Select Rendering Engine" panel that appears when you first install the new browser:
Lunascape 5 Alpha is for developers only and it has its problems. On the other hand, it looks very promising and I might personally shift to it when it proves to be more stable and continue to be the fastest web browser in the world.
Test Your Web Design In 73 Browsers With Browsershots
If you have a web site or a weblog and you want to see how it looks like in different browsers and operating systems, then Browsershots is going to save you time and effort.
Browsershots makes screenshots of your web design in different browsers. It is a free open-source online service created by Johann C. Rocholl. When you submit your web address, it will be added to the job queue. A number of distributed computers will open your website in their browser. Then they will make screenshots and upload them to the central server here.
I think this one is currently the best, it's free and it generates screenshots of your web design on a wide number of Windows, Mac, and Linux browsers. Enter your address and press submit and after 10-45 minutes (depending on current loads) you'll get screenshots of your site as displayed on a variety of different Windows/Mac/Linux browsers.
It's available on other languages too and the one of the best things here is that you can enable Java, Flash and JavaScript.
FoxTab provides a new fascinating and elegant method for finding and selecting a tab in the browser. FoxTab is designed to be suitable for many types of users, those with only few tabs opened and those out there who usually have tons of opened tabs to select from.
The idea behind FoxTab is to provide new visual methods for quick tab switching. It's a cross between Mac OS X's Expose, Windows Vista's Flip 3D, and the thumbnail view in Google Chrome. When you've got a lot of tabs open in Firefox, this offers a quick way to jump to the page you want without having to eyeball the name of each one.
There are 5 layouts which you can choose from: Stack - Tabs are 3D-stacked one behind the other. Wall - Tabs are displayed on a wall (similar to a TV store). Grid - Tabs are aligned on a grid. Row - Tabs are arranged horizontally. Circle - Tabs are placed around a 3D circle.
FoxTab is an "experimental" add-on in Mozilla's directory, so you must be registered there to download it.
Google Enters The Browser War With (Google Chrome)
Google launched today its own internet browser, Google Chrome, in a new challenge to Microsoft Internet Explorer and Firefox. The Chrome browser, designed to cope with the next generation of graphics and multimedia dominated web applications, was announced in a Google blog late Monday. It will launch initially for Windows machines in 100 countries, with Mac and Linux versions to come.
"So why are we launching Google Chrome? Because we believe we can add value for users and, at the same time, help drive innovation on the web." Google's Sundar Pichai said in a blog post.
The application can be downloaded for free and its code will be open source so no rights will have to be paid by anyone using or adapting the software. Chrome is Google's latest weapon in its bid to become the leader in all Internet areas. The latest major browser war was won by Microsoft when it won the battle for dominance in the 1990s against Netscape Navigator.
UPDATE (09/09/08): Thanks to Carsten Knobloch from Germany, you can run the browser directly from a USB stick by downloading the Portable Google Chrome. You simply unzip the package and start the browser. The portable Google browser is about 11MB, and additionally isolates web history, cookies and cache on the /profile/ folder on the stick. Knobloch's Chrome reportedly has been tested on XP SP3 and Vista SP1.
Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2: Adding New Features For Privacy, Security, & Crash Recovery
Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) Beta 1 for developers, released by Microsoft on March 6th 2008, offered some fascinating new capabilities. Yesterday, IE8 Beta 2 was released improving and adding some new features, such as:
Search suggestions: Search smarter with detailed suggestions from your favorite search providers and browsing history. See visual previews and get suggested content topics while you type in the enhanced Instant Search Box.
InPrivate Browsing: Keep Internet Explorer 8 from adding any sites you visit to Browsing History with InPrivate Browsing. Now you can shop for that special gift with confidence knowing your family won't accidentally find out.
Compatibility View: Internet Explorer 8's built-in Compatibility View button enables you to display websites that were designed for older browsers. Simply press the Compatibility View button if you see display problems on a website like misaligned text, images, or text boxes. It's located next to the Refresh button on the Address Bar.
Accelerators: Accelerators let you complete your everyday browsing activities more quickly and even discover new services. Start mapping, translating, emailing, and more in just a few mouse clicks.
Web Slices: Keep up with changes to the sites you care about most. Add a Web Slice and you won't have to go back to the same website again and again for updates on news, stock quotes, online auctions, weather, or even sports scores.
SmartScreen Filter: New security features help to protect you against deceptive and malicious websites which can compromise your data, privacy, and identity.
Automatic Crash Recovery: If a website or add-on causes a tab to crash in Internet Explorer 8, only that tab is affected. The browser itself remains stable and other tabs remain unaffected, thereby minimizing any disruption to your browsing experience. Also if one or more of your tabs do crash, your tabs are automatically reloaded and you are returned to whatever page you were on before the crash.
How to uninstall Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2
In case you wanted to go back to your Internet Explorer 7 in your Windows Vista, uninstall Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 by following these steps:
Click Start button, type Programs and Features in the Start Search box, and then click Programs and Features in the Programs list. (If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password, or click Allow.)
In the Tasks pane, click View installed updates.
Click Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2, and then click Uninstall.
If Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 does not appear in the Currently Installed Updates list, run the following command at an elevated command prompt:
Firefox Download Day 2008: To Set World Record For The Most Software Downloaded In 24 Hours
Mozilla is hoping to set a Guinness World Record for the most number of downloads of an application in a day, on the release of its Firefox 3 Web browser. There is currently no official Guinness World Record for the total number of downloads of an application in a day.
"This is the first record attempt of its kind so there is no set number. We'd really like to outdo the number of Firefox 2 downloads on its launch day, which was 1.6 million. Let's shoot for 5 million--the sky is the limit!", said Spread Firefox website.
There will be official participant certificates available for people participating in this campaign. A special form will be available on the Download Day Headquarters as soon as Firefox 3 launches and Download Day kicks off. Simply enter your name and select print for your very own certificate.
Firefox 3 Release Candidate 1 (RC1) had "fixes and improvements to platform features, to improve security, Web compatibility and stability", according to Mozilla. There are more than 175 million users of Firefox, which is available in more than 45 languages and used in more than 230 countries.
Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1: Promising New Features
Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) Beta 1 for developers, released by Microsoft on March 6th, offers some fascinating new capabilities. For example, it introduces two new features called Activities and WebSlices that extend the capabilities of the browser by interacting with other Web sites and services.
There are also a variety of other changes, including some much-needed additions, such as a feature that will restore crashed browser sessions and tabs like Firefox does. You also have the option to import your favorites from existing installed browsers when you first install IE8.
IE8 now includes a Developer Tools feature, which includes tools for HTML, CSS, scripting and debugging. Microsoft claims that the browser includes better scripting performance, and support for HTML5. And in the final version, although not this one, Microsoft claims that IE8 will have full CSS 2.1 support.
A particularly nice new feature, and one that I hope makes it into the final version of IE8, is the small Emulate IE7 button near the top of the screen. If there are any compatibility issues between IE8 and a Web site -- with a new browser, you never know -- just click the button, and it will fool the site into thinking you're running IE7.
WebSlices is among the most important features of IE8. WebSlices are something like RSS feeds on steroids. As with an RSS feed, you subscribe to changing content that you find on a Web page. But WebSlices are graphically richer and interactive. In addition, they will alert you when content in a specific portion of a Web page changes -- for example, a stock price, or the current high price on an auction.
Activities feature gives extra power to the Internet Explorer right-click menu. Hover your mouse over an item or highlight it, right-click and a list of actions appears. These include viewing the highlighted term in a map, translating it, blogging it, defining it and so on.
IE8 introduces some smaller features that may not be earthshaking, but that can be useful like making it Easier-to-identify domains. For example, some URLs are so long and complex that it can be tough to immediately decipher which domain you're currently visiting. In IE8's Address bar, only the domain (for example, fahad.com) is black; everything else is gray. That way, you can see immediately where you are.
On March 10, Mozilla released its latest beta version of the widely anticipated Firefox 3. Firefox 3.0 is dramatically faster than its predecessor and rivals -- the result of hundreds of performance improvements designed to make the open-source browser the best at running complex Web 2.0 applications, Mozilla Corp.'s chief developer said last week.
"We've been working on performance for a long time," said Mike Schroepfer, Mozilla's vice president of engineering. "Each beta of Firefox 3.0 got better. Beta 1 was better than Firefox 2.0, Beta 2 was better than Beta 1, and so on. Some of the big architectural changes [we've made] had begun paying off. Now we're at the point where we can turn the knob to get it to perform well."
Users say it's twice as fast as Safari, three times faster than IE. I have downloaded (Firefox 3 Beta 4) myself today and I tested it and I found it surprisingly even faster than (Firefox 3 Beta 2) let alone the latest version of (Firefox 2.0). Still alot of the Add-ons are not working on Beta 4 but this fact did not stop me from switching to Beta 4 ...
Firefox 3.0 Beta 4 can be downloaded for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux in 36 languages from Mozilla's site. Firefox 3.0 is expected to be released June 2008.
Mozilla is introducing Weave, a service that synchronizes your Firefox data (Bookmarks, preferences, customizations and passwords) between multiple devices (desktop, laptop, mobile). Weave is currently in its 0.1 version, so you can expect a few kinks here and there. It should look a little like Google Sync, but I hope that it will end up being better. Google's sync is nor perfect, some deleted links come back and so on. It is mostly OK however.
At the moment, Weave runs only on Firefox 3.0beta2 or higher.
This Brazilian designed car is a high-performance microsport car with seating for three side-by-side. Obvio O12E runs on any percentage of ethanol or gasoline in any combination of the two and also with NCG (natural compressed gas) and on electricity.
The integrated browser allows you to review movie and restaurant listings. With all the Audio and Video options included, you can watch movies, live news, sports, and business information anywhere you go in a Windows based Multimedia environment with Dolby 5.1 output in digital SPDIF format, with XM satellite radio.
O12 (Non-Electric) Specs:
Fuel economy of 12.5 Km/Liter (29.40 MPG) in urban driving.
Fuel economy of 17.3 Km/Liter (40.69 MPG) during highway driving.
Top speed of 100 mph with 115 HP
Top Speed of more than 160 mph with 170 and 250 HP´s versions.
Optional six speed manual gearbox.
O12E Specs:
Range: 200 – 240 miles without charge.
Acceleration: 0 to 60 <>
Top Speed: 120 mph
Charge rate: 30 minutes for 20 – 50 miles
Full Charge: 2 hrs (fast), 5 hrs (normal)
Electric Propulsion Drive system: 120 kW, 220 Nm, 13,000 rpm
Dimensions and weight:
Width: 1800 mm (71 in.)
Wheelbase: 2250 mm (89 in.)
Height: 1500 mm (59.0 in.)
Overall length: 3200 mm (126 in.)
Curb weight: 750 kg (1,648 lb.)
Tank: 50 liters (13.21 Gallons)
O12E targeted price will be US$59,000 - available in the last quarter of 2008. The non-electric version (O12) with the same body has a target price of US$28,000.
Nintendo Wii Enters the Arena Against PS3 & Xbox 360
(Link)
It's a warm winter already in the US, thanks to the game console war between Sony PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360. And now we have another challenger, Nintendo Wii which was launched yesterday.
According to PC World article, Nintendo is trying to expand the gaming audience to new players and is positioning the Wii, which lacks high-definition graphics, as a console on which the whole family can have fun. At the center of this strategy is the "Wii-mote," a television remote-control-like wireless controller that includes motion sensing.
With the controller Nintendo wants to simplify gaming so that people who have never touched a console game might give it a go. In "Wii Sports," a launch title being bundled with the Wii, there are no complicated button sequences to learn. In a tennis game the Wii-mote is swung like a racket and in a boxing game thrown like a punch. Hold the remote in your hand and simulate bowling a ball and you've got the hang of the bowling game.
The console also features an online service called Wii Channel. It automatically downloads news and weather, includes a sticky notes-like message service that can be used between family members and allows access to the Internet through a version of the Opera Web browser. Game downloads are also included through an online store.
At $250 it's half the price of the cheapest of the two PlayStation 3 consoles and it is available in greater quantities than the PS3 during the crucial holiday season in the U.S.
No one wants Hell. The Internet domain name Hell.com failed to be bought via a live auction Friday, which organizers had hoped would bring bids of more than $1 million.
Another live auction will not take place until a year from now. However, interested buyers will have the opportunity to grab hell.com before then in ongoing silent auction, according to Moniker. Moniker is a unit of the brand and marketing company Seevast Corp.
"The world is still alive and well. Nobody is going to hell right now," said Seevast Chief Executive Lance Podell.
The owner put a minimum price of $1 million on the underworld's domain, confident of high interest after the salacious address, Sex.com, sold for about $12 million earlier this year. But there were no takers with bids failing to reach the reserve price.
Moniker was selling HELL.com on behalf of a group called BAT Flli LLC, whose founder Kenneth Aronson registered the name in 1995.
It's not the first time that Aronson has tried to sell HELL.com. He put the address on the auction block in April 2000, at a starting bid of $8 million.
According to the site, HELL.com is a "private parallel web" not accessible with a Web browser.
The auction on Friday included a list of domain names such as cameras.com, which pulled in $1.5 million. Sexeducation.com that sold for $120,000 and babies.net which went for $26,000.
Flowers.mobi, an address with the new extension for mobile devices, went for $200,000, while fun.mobi pulled in $100,000.
Just to show you a quick comparison between Heaven & Hell (web domains I mean), the following are their rankings according to Alexa.com
Starting from today afternoon (Pacific Time), everyone should go through Mozilla's main channels for download at getfirefox.com or mozilla.com to obtain Firefox, as this is the pathway Mozilla has optimized for the high volume of Web traffic.
Once FireFox 2.0 is released, Mozilla-supported festivities all the world over will begin. Visitors to firefoxparty.com can find a mashup of Google maps with parties represented geographically. Guest lists aren't exclusive; all fans have to do is sign up.
So far there are 446 parties with 3,717 people registered to attend. There are many in the U.S., but they also reach as far as the Maldives, Antarctica, Jordan and Uzbekistan.
Microsoft Releases Windows Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP
(Link)
Wednesday October 18, Microsoft released to the public Windows Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP, the latest version of Internet Explorer Web browser. Customers can upgrade and browse the Web knowing that the new browser provides a greater level of security and works well with the Web sites they visit.
“We listened carefully to our customers and are delivering a safer browser that makes the tasks they do every day much easier,” said Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of the Internet Explorer team at Microsoft.
Financial institutions and security vendors such as PayPal and VeriSign are lining up to support the newest generation of the browser and encouraging their customers to upgrade to Internet Explorer 7.
“Security is a top priority for PayPal, and we encourage our customers using Windows to download and use Internet Explorer 7,” said Michael Barrett, chief information security officer for PayPal Inc. “The new Internet Explorer 7 browser has significant security enhancements, including features that help customers protect their personal information when browsing, communicating and transacting online.”
“As the industry leader in Web site authentication, VeriSign believes that Microsoft’s new Internet Explorer 7 browser will help increase user confidence and help make consumers more secure when using the Internet,” said Tim Callan, product marketing director at VeriSign Inc. “VeriSign has always been on the leading front of offering the most current technologies to help secure consumers online, which is a concept that Microsoft brings to life with Internet Explorer 7. We encourage users to move to the new browser.”
Internet Explorer 7 delivers a new look and enhanced capabilities that make everyday tasks — such as searching, browsing multiple sites and printing — simple and fast. To help users do more with the browser, Microsoft is introducing users of Internet Explorer to tabbed browsing. With tabs, users are able to view multiple sites in a single browser window and easily switch from one site to another. In Internet Explorer 7, Microsoft extends tab functionality with a new feature called Quick Tabs, which provides an “at a glance” snapshot of all open tabs on a single screen, enabling easier and faster site selection and navigation.
Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP is now available in English and runs on Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows XP 64-bit Edition and Windows Server® 2003 Service Pack 1. Internet Explorer 7 will be made available in other Windows-supported languages over the coming weeks.
Sony Electronics announced Tuesday August 1st a GPS device that puts your pictures on the map.
Using time and location recordings from Sony’s GPS-CS1 GPS device and the time stamp from a Sony digital still camera or camcorder, photo buffs can plot their digital images to a map and pinpoint exactly where they’ve been.
The 12-channel GPS unit is 3-½ inches long, weighs two ounces, and is sold with a carabineer to easily attach to a backpack or a belt loop.
“Whether you’re traveling to the Seven Wonders of the World, or just wondering where to buy your next house, our new GPS device can track your journey,” said David Johns, product manager for digital camera accessories at Sony Electronics. “Adding a geographic context to your digital images helps organize and make use of your photos in entirely new ways.”
To arrange your pictures geographically, import the logged data from the GPS device, using the supplied USB cable, and then download the digital images to a computer. The supplied GPS Image Tracker software synchronizes the images on your digital camera with the latitude, longitude and time readings from the GPS-CS1 device.
Once synchronized, your photos can become virtual push pins on an online map by activating the Picture Motion Browser software bundled with the latest Sony cameras and camcorders released after July. You can easily add new photos and coordinates to the mapping web site, courtesy of Google Maps, and showcase years of globe-trotting.
The GPS-CS1 GPS device will be available next month for about $150 at sonystyle.com, at Sony Style retail stores.
Google Browser Sync for Firefox is an extension that continuously synchronizes your browser settings – including bookmarks, history, persistent cookies, and saved passwords – across your computers. It also allows you to restore open tabs and windows across different machines and browser sessions.
This extension works with Firefox version 1.5 and later. Currently, it doesn't work in the Mozilla Suite, Internet Explorer, or Opera. Google Browser Sync is compatible with all operating systems supported by Firefox 1.5.
Google Browser Sync keeps all your browsers in sync with each other, so it needs to send potentially sensitive information like your stored passwords, bookmarks, and browser history to the other computers where you've installed it. Also, once you install Browser Sync, you don't need to log in every time you start the browser to access this info. Therefore, someone who uses a computer where you've installed browser sync will have access to all the info you've chosen to sync across your computers. Any new browser settings they create, such as browsing history, will also show up on your other computers.
Talking about trusting your private data with Google ... hmmmm ....
Dubai 3D Browser: Attractive & Creative Way To Browse Dubai
(Link)
First ... Thanks to 3D-Freak for bringing to my attention this very amazing Dubai project.
Dubai 3D Browser is the full 3D modeling of Dubai. The Dubai municipality will provide the best tools to advertise your company in Dubai and all over the world. Now you have the power to reach and be reached. The unique Dubai 3D browser lets your company be seen in a dynamic manner. It will also advertise your company just like the real Dubai City, available from any place in the world. Each building, road, urban object is modelled in 3D for a better quality.
Dubai 3D will be available on internet, CD-ROMs and DVD-ROMs. On Internet, will be live browsing by clicking in the screen or by using the navigation menu. On DVD-ROMs, will be live navigation, walkinside real time.
Thumbstacks: Create Live Presentations On The Web
(Link)
Another cool idea that has been made a reality and free for all. With Thumbstacks.com, you can make presentations - like slideshows, or outlines - right in your web browser. When you're done, you can share your presentations with anyone, anywhere, just by sending them a link.
It all runs from the web browser. You can create your presentation, save it, modify it, update it, whatever - then click "publish" and a link will be generated to share it with everyone. I have tried building a presentation and I found it very easy to use.
This tool is good for unclassified public presentations. You might want to add it to your blog or website to make a short presentation about certain subject or to deliver certain idea. The tool does not include any animation features nor word arts or other fancy stuff. It offers only very basic editing features like changing font, size, color, and text alignment.
I don't think there is much to say about it. You can build a quick presentation without signing up, but you won't be able to save it unless you're signed in.
Google released today (Google Page Creator). It is a very easy way to create a very simple and professional looking home page. I thought first that you have to upload all the created pages to my dedicated server, but I found out that the pages are saved in Google server. Now I have the address (fahadinc.googlepages.com). Looks like it took (fahadinc) subdomain from my Gmail address (fahadinc@gmail.com).
"It's as easy to create a page on the Web as it is to create one on a word processor," Justin Rosenstein, the product manager for Google Page Creator was quoted as saying in a media report. You don't need to know HTML or use Javascript since pages are edited in a user's browser. Users are allowed 100MB of storage on the service.
CNET reported, "With Page Creator, the company has drawn a distinction between Web sites and Web pages, saying that a page is a single document with its own Web address, whereas a site is a collection of pages with a common subdomain, or the xxxxxxx.com portion of the URL. "During this initial testing period, people can create only pages, not sites." Google said. "
In order to be able to start working on this new tool, you need to sign in using your Gmail account. If you don't have one, well ... you need to have one! Hmm, I wonder if Google Page Creator is going to be as popular as Yahoo's GeoCities, MySpace, or other free web page creating tools.
And in case you are wondering, web pages created using Google Page Creator will never receive any preferential treatment of any kind in Google search results according to Google.
Update (Same Day): Looks like Google temporarily suspended signing up new accounts for its Web site hosting service due to heavy demand. "Due to heavy demand, we are unable to offer new accounts for today," Google said on the Page Creator site. Suspending signing new accounts in the first the service is released? Google should have known better and should have been better prepared.
Fahad Inc. Net Created By Microsoft Office Live Basics Beta
(Link)
Click Above For Larger Image
Just yesterday I received an invitation from Microsoft to sign up for the new Office Live Beta. I was attracted to give it a try since with Microsoft Office Live Basics, you can create a Web site for free with the following services included:
Your own domain name (for example, www.domainame.com)
Easy-to-use design tools
Five e-mail accounts
Web site traffic reports
But in order to be able to use this new beta service, you need to have the following:
1- You need to be based in the US. 2- You need to provide a valid credit card (although the service is free)! 3- You need to use Internet Explorer 6 (FireFox or other browsers will not be allowed to access the tools). 4- You need to have a Micosoft Passport account in order to login.
I hated switching from my FireFox browser to IE, but I had no choice. I was able then to register for my free domain name (www.fahadinc.net). Then I was able to play with the tools of creating a basic website for small businesses. Just in less than 5 minutes, I was able to create (www.fahadinc.net). The domain name was working the next day!
The tool is "nice" but I hated the way Microsoft is forcing other users to use their internet explorer, apply for their passport account, and provide credit card information for what is supposed to be a free tool.
Torpark 1.0: Turn Any Internet Terminal Into A Secure Connection
(Link)
I have tried it myself and I liked what I saw. You can download TorPark for your language, and put it on a USB Flash keychain. Plug it into any internet terminal whether at home, school, or public. Run Torpark.exe and it will launch a Tor circuit connection, which creates an encrypted tunnel from your computer indirectly to a Tor exit computer, giving the appearance of having the Tor exit computer's IP.
This is how it works according to TorPark website:
"Torpark is a fully configured combination of Tor (The Onion Router) and Mozilla's browser technologies. Both programs are in the zip files, fully configured. Just unzip them to a flash drive and run the setup file. This won't work for a CD because Tor needs a local directory to write to. Since you don't want to leave tracks on the computer you are using, Tor is set to write to their local directory. And since a CD can't readily be written to, the program will terminate. Once you are running, it may not bring up the start page correctly the first time, just hit the "Home" button. We would also like to encourage all non-Chinese to allow Tor servers to run on their internet connection."
I encourage you to try it .... You can download it for your own language. I should mention that Torpark 2.0 is coming soon.
An alpha version of Firefox 2.0 should be released as a public beta next month. Although part of the long standing roadmap for the open source browser, the timetable was confirmed by the publication of the minutes of the Mozilla.org staff meeting held earlier this month.
While the team say that the alpha will not be feature complete, among the improvements slated to appear are better access to History and Bookmark pages, improvements to the tabbed browsing and other user interface enhancements. The team also hopes to fully integrate RSS functionality so that adding feeds is a smoother process than the current rather hit or miss method.
Mozilla website showed the following roadmap for FireFox (this is, as always, subject to change):
FireFox 2.0a: To be released Q1 2006 (pre-feature complete alpha) FireFox 2.0b: To be released early Q2 2006 (feature complete beta) FireFox 2.0rc(s): To be released late Q2 2006 FireFox 2.0: To be released late Q2/early Q3 2006 (Final Release) FireFox 3.0: Earliest release Q1 2007
Mozilla Released Final Version Of Thunderbird 1.5 Email Client
(Link)
Mozilla on Thursday released version 1.5 of its Thunderbird email client, touting a raft of new features aimed at both security and usability.
The new Thunderbird offering comes some six weeks after version 1.5 of Mozilla's Firefox browser debuted. Some of the new features made available in Thunderbird today are common to both new pieces of software.
Like Firefox, Thunderbird now features an automated update tool, where previously users had to download point upgrades manually. This may reduce the amount of data which needs to be downloaded for each update.
The email client can also now handle podcasts and has improved general support for RSS. Those with limited storage space will enjoy the new ability to delete attachments from stored email.
AllPeers, a company based in the UK, has developed a peer-to-peer tool for the open source browser, which it claims is "the best thing to happen to Firefox...since Firefox."
"AllPeers is a free extension which combines the strength of Firefox and the efficiency of BitTorrent to transform your favorite browser into a media sharing powerhouse," states the company Web site.
The extension is will be available "soon", according to the company, which has posted screenshots on its Web site showing the tool's interface.
I think this is going to be a big boost for Mozilla FireFox and it will make even more people switch to this wonderful web browser. I signed with my email to be notified when "AllPeers" is available for download ... :)
The Inventor of the WWW Is Finally Blogging!
(Link)
"I am going to try this blog thing using blog tools. So this is for all the people who have been saying I ought to have a blog.", said Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web!
Tim did not expect his first blog to be overwhelmed with 455 comments in only one week period. He then decided to turn the comments off on his first blog. He then added:
"I can't answer them all, but I would point out one thing. I just played my part. I built on the work of others -- the Internet, invented 20 years before the web, by Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn and colleagues, for example, and hypertext, a word coined by Ted Nelson for an idea of links which was already implemented in many non-networked systems. I just put these technologies together. And then, it all took off because of this amazing community of enthusiasts, who have done such incredible things with the technology, and are still advancing it in so many ways."
In his first blog, Tim said: "In 1989 one of the main objectives of the WWW was to be a space for sharing information. It seemed evident that it should be a space in which anyone could be creative, to which anyone could contribute. The first browser was actually a browser/editor, which allowed one to edit any page, and save it back to the web if one had access rights ... Now in 2005, we have blogs and wikis, and the fact that they are so popular makes me feel I wasn't crazy to think people needed a creative space".
The first Web site Berners-Lee built (and therefore the first Web site) was at http://info.cern.ch/ (which has been archived) and was first put online on August 6, 1991. It provided an explanation about what the World Wide Web was, how one could own a browser, how to set up a Web server, and so on. It was also the world's first Web directory, since Berners-Lee maintained a list of other Web sites apart from his own.
Mozilla Released Final Version Of FireFox 1.5 Web Browser Today!
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The final version of the Mozilla Firefox 1.5 web browser finally arrived. Packed with a new homepage (mozilla.com for Firefox and Thunderbird), the new version comes after only three release candidates.
Firefox 1.5 promises a better web experience, faster browsing, improved automatic updates, improved tabbed browsing and pop-up blocking, stronger security and more.
Possibly one of the first features that users will notice is the ability to move and rearrange the tabs simply by a drag & drop operation.
Automated update to streamline product upgrades. Notification of an update is more prominent, and updates to Firefox may now be half a megabyte or smaller. Updating extensions has also improved.
The browser also got a "Clear Private Data" feature provides an easy way to quickly remove personal data through a menu item or keyboard shortcut.
Improvements to product usability including descriptive error pages were added, redesigned options menu, RSS discovery, and "Safe Mode" experience.
Firefox 1.5 includes better accessibility including support for DHTML accessibility and assistive technologies such as the Window-Eyes 5.5 beta screen reader for Microsoft Windows. Screen readers read aloud all available information in applications and documents or show the information on a Braille display, enabling blind and visually impaired users to use equivalent software functionality as their sighted peers.
And finally, the browser adds support for Web Standards including SVG, CSS 2 and CSS 3, and JavaScript 1.6.
Kill Bill's Browser & Explorer Destroyer: FireFox War Against Microsoft's Internet Explorer!
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Four friends and full-time political activists from Worcester, Massachusetts have launched two pro-Firefox websites - Explorer Destroyer and Kill Bill's Browser.
A few days ago Google announced that they would pay $1 for each referral to Firefox with Google Toolbar (currently available only for U.S. Publishers). According to the four activists, Google set the stage for Firefox to literally "take back the web" and go from 11 percent of browsers to over 50 percent.
Explorer Destroyer has some free scripts that one can put on their website to encourage users to switch to Firefox from Internet Explorer. The scripts will detect whether a visitor is running Internet Explorer, and if they are, it will either show a splash page telling them to switch or it will put a big switch banner at the top of the page. If one signs up for Google's referral program, he/she can make $1 for each person that switches.
Killbillsbrowser.com is a parody site with jokes about Internet Explorer, but it's also a medium to convince people to switch. The site has the colors of Quentin Tarantino's film Kill Bill and lists 13 reasons, like "Mozilla has never made a talking paperclip" and "Your computer won't spend its free time telling the world about Viagra soft tabs" - why people should switch to Firefox.
Now the question is ... Would IE fight back? And if yes, how?
Flock Browser Developer Preview 0.5pre: 13 Things You Should Really Try With Flock!
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click above for larger image
Now this is really great news people! Flock Browser Developer Preview 0.5pre has been released! It is still somewhere between alpha and beta, but you still can download it and give it a shot! It is a great browser and very useful tool for bloggers and "flickrs". If you want to see how the new browser looks like, click at the above picture to view a larger one. Here's a list of thirteen things you really should try with Flock:
The Star button
Tagging
Favorites Manager
History Search
Most Frequently Visited / Most Recently Added
Multiple favorites toolbars
Feed discovery
Feed catching
On the Fly Aggregation
Blog Editor
Blog This!
Flickr topbar
The Shelf
Read more details about the above features by visiting:
This device is perfect for those who are paranoid and obsessed with their data and web security. StealthSurfer is a Windows PC compatible key-sized USB device that is preloaded with the following softwares:
Firefox - a popular high-speed browser with enhanced security
Anonymizer - offers anonymous surfing, complete network security and IP masking
RoboForm - a "one-click" form-fill with secure user ID/password management application
Thunderbird - for portable POP3/SMPT email, news groups, RSS feeds, and blog access
All softwares are configured and integrated for optimum privacy. When using StealthSurfer, all your sensitive Internet files such as cookies, history, and cache are stored on the StealthSurfer device instead of your computer.
You can buy the USB from StealthSurfer site direct at:
I'm surprised how come I haven't noticed this article by PCWorld. It was published back in July 2005. It is very interesting article that lists the best 100 products in 2005.
Congratulations Mozilla FireFox for being the top product of 2005 and also Google Gmail for being in the second place! Let me highlight some of the other "interesting" winners:
1. Mozilla Firefox Web Browser 2. Google Gmail Web Mail 7. Seagate USB 2.0 Pocket Drive Portable Hard Drive 16. Google Search Engine 28. Mozilla Thunderbird E-Mail Program 51. Flickr.com Photography Site 70. A9.com Search Engine 76. Google Desktop Search Desktop Search Tool 87. Internet Archive (Archive.org) Web Site 88. Opera 8 Web Browser 95. Garmin StreetPilot C330 GPS Navigation Device
Thursday September 15, 2005 ... Mozilla released SeaMonkey 1.0 Alpha!
SeaMonkey is a Suite developed from the codebase of the previously successful Mozilla Application Suite. Internally, much of the core code is shared with the current Firefox 1.5 Beta 1 browser, but from the outside, it represents the look and feel that long-time Mozilla and Netscape users have learned to love.
The SeaMonkey Suite includes web browser, email client, web page composer and a feature-rich IRC chat application.
Note that SeaMonkey 1.0 Alpha does not presently include official SeaMonkey artwork, as the SeaMonkey project is still open to logo submissions from its community. The new logo will be selected from these submissions and integrated into the upcoming SeaMonkey 1.0 Beta, which will be the last version before SeaMonkey 1.0 ships later this year. The current suggested logos can be viewed at:
Portable Mozilla Firefox web browser Portable Mozilla Thunderbird email client Portable Mozilla NVU website editor Portable Mozilla Sunbird Calendar
All the above applications can be installed and run from your own USB Drive! All your browser cookies, passwords, emails, and personal calendar can be with you anywhere and accessable using any PC! I have tried the four applications from Mozilla and run them from my (SanDisk 2GB Titanium USB Drive) ... and they all work like advertised! There is also Portable OpenOffice which I haven't tried yet. Maybe I will try it sometime in the future.
I strongly recommend that you try those applications ... I found them very interesting and and powerful!
Internet Explorer 7: Now in Beta Testing for Developers!
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The first stage of the beta process for Internet Explorer 7 has begun—developer testing! The latest version of the world’s most popular Web browser has been released for technical evaluation, feedback, and testing by software and Web site developers. (Source: Microsoft Website)
Wow! It is about time! When people start diverting to (Fire Fox), (Avant) and other web browsers ... IE7 comes along! I can't wait to lay my fingers on it and see if it any better than the current browsers.
The Bio Computer-On-a-Stick with LCD is a USB Flash Drive equipped with Onboard Fingerprint Authentication as well as an Onboard Operating System featuring a full suite of Microsoft Office-compatible applications. With its own LCD to guide through fingerprint setup and operation. The Bio Computer-On-a-Stick also boasts the powerful Mozilla Firefox Web Browser, Evolution email, and Yahoo & MSN compatible Instant Messenger for superior Internet connectivity
Plug the Bio Computer-On-a-Stick into your PC or Laptop and instantly transform your old environment into a new and powerful secure workstation - without a hard disk!
I've been using this browser for a couple of days and so far I love it! You really should try this one ... it has so many cool features that are not available in Microsoft Internet Explorer. Thanks to Marwan for letting me know about it!
