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Customizing Gmail Background

Internet

Gmail now lets you use any picture you want as the background image in your Gmail inbox.

“Themes in Gmail are great—there are tons to choose from and they give your inbox a personalized look. But we’ve heard from many of you who thought it would be even better if you could give Gmail an even more personalized look and create themes completely on your own,” Google explained in a blog post.

Effective immediately, there’s a new link in the Gmail “Option” menu. Under “Mail Settings,” click on “Create your own theme” and you will be able to upload images.

WebOS 3.0 Beta Leaked

Internet

HP recently released its WebOS 3.0 SDK to developers. Devs who get a prerelease version of an OS are generally bound under a strict “don’t show people what we have” agreement, but that hasn’t stopped one from doing just that, sending PreCentral.net a copy, which they ran in emulation to put the OS through its paces. And it looks decidedly cool, reports Cnet.

“As one might expect from a beta of a touch-based tablet OS, the new version of WebOS, which is destined for HP’s announced TouchPad tablets and likely a new generation of Pre smartphones, looked something like iOS for the iPad in some ways (for better or worse).
That said, it also appears to have a few innovative features that improve over Apple’s implementation, such as a three-paned e-mail view, better organization of browser windows, and an excellent-looking notification system.

In addition, 3.0 interestingly abandons Google’s pervasive maps in favor of Microsoft’s Bing maps. The new map app, like most of the others, is seen in the video after the jump, and it’s impressive.”

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20053716-1.html#ixzz1JV54qs6U”

Dell Offer Streak 7 Tablet for £299 in the UK

Technology

Dell’s new feature-rich seven-inch Android™ tablet, the Streak™ 7 is now available in the UK. The sleek compact form factor preloaded with Dell Stage, Dell’s unique user interface, makes Streak 7 the ultimate entertainment hub for families and consumers craving a rich multimedia and web experience both at home and on-the-go. With a wealth of features, Streak 7 adds to Dell’s rapidly expanding mobility portfolio, which also includes the acclaimed Streak 5 pocket tablet.

Portable, passable and easily shared, the Streak 7’s smooth, fast performance makes Web browsing, video streaming and game playing an enjoyable experience. Its brilliant seven-inch WVGA touch screen with Gorilla® Glass makes Streak 7 ideal for watching movies or reading books and magazines.

In addition to a rich entertainment experience, the Streak 7 easily captures and shares life moments with the rear-facing 5 megapixel camera for high-definition stills and video recording. With a Wi-Fi + 3G model of the Streak 7 coming later this spring, capturing spontaneous moments with family and friends will be even easier.

Featuring Google’s™ Android 2.2 operating system, a dual core 1GHz NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor and full support for Adobe® Flash® Player, Streak 7 gives users access to more than 100,000 applications, games and widgets from Android Market™.

“Dell is continuing to create the very best in entertainment, mobile and gaming experiences,” said Aongus Hegarty, vice-president of Dell’s Consumer, Small and Medium Business unit for EMEA. “With Streak 7, families, students and mobile professionals will gather, share, and find new ways to interact and keep in touch.”

The new Streak 7 will feature Dell’s innovative Stage user interface, which provides a seamless and unified experience for accessing all your favourite content. Later this year, Dell will add syncing to Stage so people can keep their photos, contacts, calendars and other personal content synchronised across their Dell Stage-equipped devices, from tablets to PCs, connected through their home network.

The new Dell Streak 7 Tablet with Wi-Fi is available now, starting at £299 including VAT and delivery at http://www.dell.co.uk/streak.

Google Releases Page Speed Online

Internet

Google has released Page Speed Online, a tool for optimizing page speed. It evaluates the web page content, and generates suggestions to page loading speed, reducing page load times resulting in the decreased bounce rates and the increased conversion rates.

Page Speed Online offers the new ability for web developers to analyze the performance of webpages as displayed in smartphones. Today, a number of web sites maintain two different versions of their site content: one is optimized for larger screen real-estate and higher bandwidth available to desktops and laptops over corporate and home networks. The other is optimized for a smaller screen real estate and the content is generally lighter: potentially less JavaScript, smaller images and less text.

http://pagespeed.googlelabs.com/

Eye-Fi Announces New 8GB Wi-Fi Wireless SD Card

Technology

Eye-Fi Inc., makers of the world’s first wireless memory card, today launched the Eye-Fi Mobile X2, a new 8GB wireless memory card empowering cameras around the world with immediate uploading capabilities. The Eye-Fi Mobile X2 provides instant uploads anywhere by wirelessly connecting the camera to a mobile device, such as a smartphone or tablet, and is available for $79.99.

“Direct Mode helps us bridge the gap between classic digital imaging and the exploding world of mobile devices,” said Jef Holove, CEO of Eye-Fi. “With Direct Mode and our new Android and iOS apps, the pervasive connectivity of mobile is made available to existing cameras.”

With the launch of the Eye-Fi Mobile X2, Eye-Fi will be releasing its Direct Mode and accompanying iOS and Android apps as free upgrades to all existing and new Eye-Fi X2 cards. With Direct Mode, users can enjoy the best of the devices they already own, namely the quality of digital cameras and the ubiquitous connectivity of their mobile devices. The Eye-Fi card can now establish a direct connection to the mobile device by creating its own Wi-Fi network anywhere users capture memories, even if that is miles from a Wi-Fi hotspot. Whether they are hiking or at the beach, consumers can now send photos and videos directly from their digital camera to the Eye-Fi app on their smartphone or tablet, enabling them to back up, edit and share their memories in the moment.

“When we undertook a redesign of the Eye-Fi card line a little over two years ago, the new X2 card platform promised users the potential for new, exciting capabilities over time. Today we see another one of these revolutionary capabilities come to life: Direct Mode,” says Yuval Koren, co-founder and chief product officer of Eye-Fi.

Direct Mode benefits extend beyond device-to-device transfers. Whether users want to edit
their memories using the myriad of apps on their mobile devices, back them up on their home computer, or save them in a private Eye-Fi account, they now have the flexibility and control of where, how and when the media is stored, edited and shared.

Eye-Fi Mobile X2 is available for pre-orders immediately on Amazon.com, and available at Apple and Best Buy stores nationwide for $79.99 on April 17, 2011. Direct Mode will be available as a free upgrade to all Eye-Fi X2 cards later this week, along with accompanying free mobile apps for iPhone, iPad and Android devices. The Eye-Fi Pro X2 will be reduced from $149.99 to $99.99 starting this month.

For more information, visit www.eye.fi

Google Enables SPDY HTTP in Chrome Browser

Internet

Google has enabled SPDY HTTP in it’s Chrome Browser. “Google enabled SPDY for Chrome in mid-January 2011 in a limited way, but is now running Chrome with SPDY, which replaces portions of HTTP and adds a few features at 100% over its own servers.”, reports Conceivablytech.

“The result is a dramatically increased page load performance that only works between Chrome (as it includes SPDY support) and Google’s servers (which supports the features for Google sites.) In effect, Google sites should load much faster in Chrome than in any other web browser.

SPDY is designed to overcome the shortcomings of HTTP, which was first documented in 1995 and related to web content that was much simpler than what we are developing and consuming today. Both TCP and HTTP have evolved into a bottleneck of data downloads and are constantly under scrutiny how these protocols can be made much more efficient in today’s world.

Google said that it saw pageload times to improve by 44 to up to 64%”

Read more: http://www.conceivablytech.com/6696/products/google-chrome-gets-spdy-and-an-onscreen-keyboard

Linux OS Celebrates 20th Anniversary

News

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Linux Operating System, the Linux Foundation has produced an infographic and video showing the impact the open source operating system has had on the world.

Since its inception in 1991, Linux has grown to become a force in computing, powering everything from the New York Stock Exchange to mobile phones to supercomputers to consumer devices. The Linux Foundation is the nonprofit consortium dedicated to fostering the growth of Linux. Founded in 2007, the Linux Foundation sponsors the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds and is supported by leading technology companies and developers from around the world.

www.linuxfoundation.org

Free Linux Disk Encryption Tools

Technology

Linuxlinks has published “5 of the Best Free Linux Disk Encryption Tools” reviewing Linux encryption tools. For each application they have compiled its own portal page, a full description with an in-depth analysis of its features, screenshots, together with links to relevant resources and reviews.

Disk Encryption Tools:

loop-AES Encrypt disk partitions, removable media, swap space and other devices

dm-crypt Transparent disk encryption subsystem

cryptsetup Configures encrypted block devices

SD4L Hides complete file systems within encrypted regular files

TrueCrypt Used for on-the-fly encryption

Read more: http://www.linuxlinks.com/article/2011040308270275/DiskEncryption.html

Journalists Are Aggregators

Media

Journalists Are Aggregators Too (And That’s A Good Thing) reports Techdirt.

“A bunch of folks have passed along this blog post from the Zunguzungu blog, which notes that journalists are aggregating too. I don’t like the use of the word “thieves” here, as I believe (yet again) that it’s a misleading and wrong use of the term, but I believe the usage here is in comparing the claims of some journalists that aggregators are “thieves.”

The real problem, however, is that journalists are, by their nature, thieves of words. You can call it what you like; you can say “Possibly I am old-fashioned,” and talk about how “actual journalists are laboring at actual history, covering the fever of democracy in Arab capitals and the fever of austerity in American capitals” (Keller) or you can brag about the “148 full-time editors, writers, and reporters engaged in the serious, old-fashioned work of traditional journalism” (Huffington), but all this “old fashioned” stuff is just a way of covering over something really basic about what “actual” journalists “traditionally” do, all the time: write down what other people say. They can exercise editorial discretion in how they integrate and harmonize the various quotes they’ve aggregated. They can confirm, they can contextualize, and they can (very rarely) manage to witness something with their own two eyes. They can produce collages out of stolen scraps. And they should do these things. But at the core of the journalistic process is the act, inescapably, of taking other people’s texts, weaving them together, and then placing them under your byline (with appropriate citation) and profiting from the activity.”

Read more: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110408/14381713831/journalists-are-aggregators-too-thats-good-thing.shtml

Facebook Announce Open Compute Project

Media

Facebook have announced the Open Compute Project, an initiative to share the custom-engineered technology in its first dedicated data center in Prineville, Oregon. This advanced technology delivered a 38 percent increase in energy efficiency at 24 percent lower cost for Facebook, and the specifications and best practices behind those gains will now be available to companies across the industry.

“Facebook and our development partners have invested tens of millions of dollars over the past two years to build upon industry specifications to create the most efficient computing infrastructure possible” said Jonathan Heiliger, vice president of technical operations at Facebook. “These advancements are good for Facebook, but we think they could benefit all companies. Today we’re launching the Open Compute Project, a user-led forum, to share our designs and collaborate with anyone interested in highly efficient server and data center designs. We think it’s time to demystify the biggest capital expense of an online business — the infrastructure”

Inspired by the success of open source software, Facebook is publishing technical specifications and mechanical CAD files for the Prineville data center’s servers, power supplies, server racks, battery backup systems and building design. This technology enabled the data center to achieve an initial power usage effectiveness (PUE) ratio of 1.07, compared with 1.5 for our existing facilities, which fall into the “best practice” category as defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency*. Established by the Green Grid in 2007, PUE is an indicator of data center energy efficiency, and the lower the number, the better.

Facebook is releasing these designs as open hardware, aiming to encourage industry-wide collaboration around best practices for data center and server technology.

Advanced Micro Devices, Dell, HP and Intel are among the companies that co-developed technology with Facebook. In addition, Dell’s Data Center Solutions business will design and build servers based on the Open Compute Project specification. Synnex Corporation will also serve as a vendor for Open Compute Project servers, offering fully integrated and tested solutions based on customers’ specifications.

More information about the project, specifications and CAD files are available at http://opencompute.org/ Facebook Engineering page at http://www.facebook.com/Engineering

Glide Instantly Post Any Files Stored on Your Free Glide 30GB GDrive to Twitter and Facebook

Internet

Glide has launched new “social file posting” to Facebook and Twitter. Now post any files stored on your Glide GDrive including; photos, photo albums, music, music playlists, video, video playlists, documents, bookmarks, web content and more to your Facebook and Twitter accounts. Glide gives you 30GBs of free online storage to upload and sync files from all of your devices including desktops, laptops, tablets and smartphones as well as tools to capture and manage web content.
Glide’s new social posting tools do the work for you. Upload your files once and Glide’s automated compatibility engine formats your files for easy posting to Twitter and Facebook. Glide also automatically captures and converts web content into personal files that can also be posted. Glide’s automated device recognition makes sure that people who view your posts receive files they can access on different devices and networks.
The Glide Cloud operating system includes a full suite of productivity applications and web capture and conversion tools making it possible to create and edit content online including documents, presentations, photos, drawings and websites. This content can be shared securely and privately through Glide’s rights based collaboration tools as well as posted to Facebook, Twitter and Glide’s own social/private networking application Engage.
“Glide’s new social posting tool adds a powerful file synchronization, media management, collaboration and productivity backend to Twitter and Facebook enabling you to create, consolidate and manage files from all of your devices in the cloud and seamlessly share through your favorite social networks,” said Donald, Leka, Chairman and CEO of TransMedia. “By leveraging the Glide Cloud operating system Facebook and Twitter users now have a host of new features to significantly enhance these services for social and business use.”
Glide provides cross platform compatibility for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Android, Android Honeycomb, BlackBerry OS, BlackBerry Tablet OS (QNX), iOS, webOS, Symbian and Windows Mobile users based on automated device identification and file transcoding.

Glide: http://www.GlideLife.com
Glide Mobile: http://www.GlideMobile.com

Mozilla Lists Slow Performing Firefox add-ons

Internet

Mozilla the organisation behind has listed slow performing Firefox add-ons.

Mozilla said, “One of Firefox’s great advantages is its extreme extensibility. Extensions can do almost anything. There is a down side to this: poorly written extensions can have a severe impact on the browsing experience, including on the overall performance of Firefox itself. This article offers some best practices and suggestions that can not only improve the performance of your extension, but also of Firefox itself.”

Read More: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/performance/#addon-11