Internet

Google has discontinued it’s basic package according to Google’s enterprise blog, the basic Google Apps package is being dropped from today. Google will now offer businesses a single, $50 per user option that promises 24/7 phone support, 25GB inboxes and a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

“With this in mind, we’ve decided to make things very straightforward. Starting today for all new customers:
Individuals wishing to use Google’s web apps like Gmail and Google Drive should create a free personal Google Account, which provides a seamless experience across all of our web services on any device.
For Businesses, instead of two versions, there will be one. Companies of all sizes will sign up for our premium version, Google Apps for Business, which includes 24/7 phone support for any issue, a 25GB inbox, and a 99.9% uptime guarantee with no scheduled downtime. Pricing is still $50 per user, per year.

Please note this change has no impact on our existing customers, including those using the free version. And as before, Google Apps for Education will be available as a free service for schools and universities. Also, as the first cloud productivity suite with FISMA certification, we’ll continue to offer Google Apps for Government for $50 per user, per year. ”

Read more: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.ca/2012/12/changes-to-google-apps-for-businesses.html

You can now publish web content with Google Drive according to the Google Apps Developer Blog.

Google Drive Site Publishing

“Your app can now insert static web assets in a publicly shared folder, and then serve those files directly to users via file names in a relative path. Google Drive site publishing supports JavaScript, so it’s even possible to run a JavaScript Drive app directly from Drive.

Publishing from Drive is a simple, two-step dance: create a public folder and use a link to the root folder — the webViewLink — to publish its contents. You can refer to the Drive SDK documentation for full detail on how to work with public folders and content links, but basically the requirements are:

The folder containing site assets must be public. Assets added to public folders must also be public on the web.

Link to the files contained in the folder using the webViewLink (included in the folder’s JSON representation).

It’s important to emphasize the added simplicity provided by a webViewLink: using this link as a starting point, you can extend the path to any web asset in any subfolder without worrying about retrieving the exact file ID. What used to look like 0B2Gk2F2ImIBiaUkwY3JNX1JMaTg is now a recognizably cute path such as images/kittens.jpg. For the root path to the folder, we’ll display a list of files in the folder, or, if you have an index.html file in your folder we’ll load that as expected.”

To see Google Drive site publishing in action, cvisit this example site served from Google Drive at https://googledrive.com/host/0B716ywBKT84AcHZfMWgtNk5aeXM.

Evernote has added text-to-speech to it’s Evernote Premium Clearly Chrome extension powered by iSpeech.

“Oftentimes, great web articles and blog posts come to you when you don’t have time to actually sit down and read them. You may be working on something else or walking around your kitchen cooking. Now, you can keep doing what you’re doing and absorb the article at the same time. Open the link, click Clearly, then click the new Text-to-Speech icon. Moments later, Clearly will start reading the article aloud to you. It’s like instantly turning articles into podcasts.”

Read more: http://blog.evernote.com/2012/11/27/evernote-clearly-now-reads-pages-to-you-with-text-to-speech/

Box for Android 2.0 preview has been announced that that includes lots of new features.

Box for Android 2.0

Most notable in this release is the introduction of document preview capabilities on your mobile device, just like the preview you already love on the Box web app. Ever wanted to just peek at a document or flip through a slide deck without having to download the whole thing and wait for it to open in a third-party app? Now you don’t have to. Just stay right there on the file details screen and watch as the contents of the file get rendered right inside the Box app.

More than 75 different types of files can be previewed right on your Android device – Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, Excel spreadsheets, Adobe PDFs, Photoshop files, you name it!

Combine this with the ability to swipe left and right between files and you’ve got one very slick document browser. Since all the text is now readable (instead of just a file icon), finding the file you want doesn’t require you to open and close every file in a folder anymore. It works wonders on pictures, too – so now you also have a portable slideshow player for all those photos you’ve stored on Box!

Read more at: http://blog.box.com/2012/11/box-for-android-2-0-preview-arrives-on-mobile/

Pinterest has added Business Accounts to it’s service reports Liz Gannes writing on All Things D.

“On a site where people share pictures of stuff they want to buy, it makes sense that people who make stuff would want to share it themselves. And so Pinterest is full of businesses posting their own content and products.

The company is formally acknowledging this kind of use by adding business accounts. As of today, business users and normal users will have separate tools and terms.

What’s remarkable is that prior to now, commercial usage of Pinterest was prohibited, according to its terms of service.”

Read fill article at: http://allthingsd.com/20121114/pinterest-removes-ban-on-commercial-use-as-it-adds-business-accounts/

SugarSync, a premium service that lets you access, sync and share all of your files and folders across all your computers and mobile devices, today announced the public beta launch of SugarSync 2.0 – a completely redesigned and revamped version of its award-winning Cloud service. The new SugarSync 2.0 desktop, Web and Android apps are available for download now at www.sugarsync.com/beta.

SugarSync 2.0

“As more non-technical users incorporate the Cloud into their everyday life, we’ve made a point to work with our customers and understand what they really need. As a result, we went back to the drawing board and redesigned SugarSync from the ground up,” said Laura Yecies, CEO of SugarSync. “And while we have drastically simplified the use of the Cloud with SugarSync 2.0, we have kept all the unique power and functionality our existing users love – while also introducing even more powerful new features such as more flexible sharing and integrated search that users have been requesting, as well as an industry-first Cloud drive called “SugarSync Drive” that enables access to Cloud data right from your file system.”
Your Cloud. Your Way.

As the highest rated Cloud service, SugarSync remains committed to the features and functionality that have earned the company this status. SugarSync will continue to be the only leading Cloud service that doesn’t limit you to a single syncing folder. SugarSync will also still continue to support all platforms, including PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Android, Blackberry, Symbian, and Windows Mobile (with Windows Phone coming soon). And with SugarSync 2.0, the company has taken all the powerful features you love and merged them with a completely new design that makes it all even easier for anyone to use.

The new SugarSync design makes it even simpler to access, sync and share all of your digital stuff no matter where or how you are working – whether on your computer, mobile device, accessing via a Web browser, or wherever. SugarSync 2.0 also introduces the new “SugarSync Drive” capability, where users can see their entire SugarSync Cloud right in their file system. Setup is simpler than ever – just select what you want in the Cloud, and SugarSync takes care of the rest. No technical expertise required.

Your Cloud is Social.

Most Cloud services today, including SugarSync, make it easy to share large files and folders by simply sharing a link instead of a large file attachment. But for some, the process of generating that link is not intuitive. With SugarSync 2.0, the company is introducing simple drag-and-drop sharing. Just drag the file or folder that you want to share onto the contact that you want to share with. And if a folder that you’re sharing is not already in the Cloud, SugarSync will automatically upload it and make it ready to share. Want to share a file with your social media contacts on Facebook or Twitter? SugarSync has that covered, too. It really couldn’t be simpler.

Your Cloud is Big. And Now It’s Searchable.

SugarSync is often recognized as the best cloud solution, but it’s not the biggest (yet). And while other Cloud providers might want you to use only their service, SugarSync isn’t the jealous type, and understands that you might be using multiple Cloud services. But unlike every other Cloud service that requires you to put all your folders into one special Cloud folder/box, SugarSync lets you sync as many folders as you want.

We know that the more devices you use and the more you put in the Cloud, the tougher it can be to navigate. And many of you have been requesting a search feature to help you quickly find any file or folder in your Cloud. We heard you, and now with SugarSync 2.0 we’ve added powerful search functionality, so you can easily search all your folders and all of your data on all your computers and devices. You can even search all of the content that other people have shared with you, too. SugarSync just turned your big, unruly Cloud into something you can actually navigate and use.

Your Cloud Doesn’t Box You In.

SugarSync has never, and will never, box you in to a single folder. When other Cloud services make you move everything into a single folder, you forget to add important stuff to the Cloud, you forget where you saved things last, and you constantly doubt whether you’ll have access to important files. SugarSync lets you select any and all of your folders – even your general desktop – and it automatically and continuously syncs all your stuff, giving you the peace of mind that you’ll have what you need, when you need it.

SugarSync has repeatedly been recognized as the most powerful Cloud syncing service both by media – via their head-to-head reviews of SugarSync and the competition – as well by large global partners such as Samsung, Lenovo, Fujitsu, SanDisk, France Telecom-Orange, Korea Telecom, SoftBank and more who have selected SugarSync over the competition. And while millions of users in over 120 countries currently use SugarSync, the company realizes that there are hundreds of millions of people worldwide who still do not use any Cloud sync service.

“Adoption of file access, sync and share personal cloud services accelerated in the past two years. In 2010, 9% of US online adults were using file, media, and information syncing services; by 2012, 15% were using a file storage service for syncing and/or web access, which is two thirds increase in just two years,” according to a July 2012 commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of SugarSync: Personal Cloud Services Emerge To Orchestrate Our Mobile Computing Lives.

“While the Cloud has gained massive popularity over the past few years, the overall adoption of Cloud sync services has only reached 15% worldwide, meaning today’s Cloud services – such as SugarSync – have an incredible amount of growth opportunity ahead,” said Laura Yecies, CEO of SugarSync. “We don’t just want to be the best Cloud service – we want to be the best Cloud service that people are actually able to integrate into their day-to-day lives. We want to be your Cloud, which is why we work the way you work.”

Availability

The new SugarSync 2.0 desktop and Web apps are now available in public beta, and can be downloaded today for Windows and Mac. The new SugarSync 2.0 for Android app is also available today, and can be downloaded from the SugarSync 2.0 Beta page. Redesigned SugarSync 2.0 mobile apps for all other mobile platforms (iOS, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Symbian) will be coming soon, but the current SugarSync mobile apps will continue to work with the SugarSync 2.0 Web and desktop apps. New users get 5GB of storage for free, and can earn up to 32GB by referring other free users (you get 500MB for each new free user you refer). You can earn unlimited free storage by referring paid users, as SugarSync offers 10GB of additional storage – with no limit – for each new paid subscriber you refer.

About SugarSync

SugarSync is a free service that helps you sync your life. With SugarSync you can backup, sync and share all of your documents, photos, music and movies so that you can access them from your laptop, iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry, or any other device. SugarSync puts all your stuff at your fingertips from any other computer or mobile device, enabling you to do more with your stuff while on the go.

Launched in 2008 and based in San Mateo, CA, SugarSync currently has millions of users worldwide in over 120 countries. Brands such as Samsung, Lenovo, Fujitsu, SanDisk, France Telecom-Orange, Korea Telecom, SoftBank Mobile, Best Buy and more have selected SugarSync as a partner to bring Cloud services to their customers. For more information, please visit www.SugarSync.com, follow us on Twitter @sugarsync (http://twitter.com/SugarSync) or on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SugarSync

Today we have released a Skype (version 2.0) Preview for Windows Phone 8.

Two weeks ago, we announced that we were working hard on Skype for Windows Phone 8. Just like our bold new experience for Windows 8, the new Skype for Windows Phone will be fast, modern, and beautiful, while still delivering the best of what you’ve come to expect from Skype.

In this Preview, you’ll get all of the Skype basics in the new, modern design along with many of the new features such as integration with the People Hub and a combined contact list with buddies from Windows Live Messenger. Additionally, you’ll start receiving some call and message notifications – even when the app is closed and in the background.

Start by downloading the app now from the Windows Phone Store, and if you don’t have Windows Phone 8 – be sure to check out the range of new devices here.

Keep in mind that this release is still in Preview state which means that the experiences are not yet final.

We would like to hear your feedback. Discuss what matters on Skype Support Network or just comment in this blog.

Features available in the Skype for Windows Phone 8 are:

Skype contacts in the People Hub.
Start your next Skype conversation straight from the People Hub. You can call or start a chat from there to any of your friends on Skype.
Login with Microsoft or Skype account.

You can now sign into Skype with either a Skype or Microsoft account, making it easier to connect with friends. You can merge your Skype and Microsoft accounts on our desktop applications.

Connect with Messenger buddies.
When you have logged in with your Microsoft account then you can talk with your friends regardless if they’re on Skype or Messenger. You can merge your Skype and Microsoft accounts on the Skype desktop applications.

Always reachable.
You will now receive Skype calls and 1:1 chat messages even when the app is closed. Incoming call notifications and a Live Tile will notify you of missed conversations. The notifications work even when the device is locked.

Calls in background and call holding.
Skype calls continue even as you navigate to other apps on your phone. If someone calls you on your mobile number while you’re on a Skype call, you can now put the Skype call on hold and switch between the calls.

Visual refresh.
A new fresh, modern design that puts the people and conversations that matter most to you front and center.

Favorite contacts.
Now you can select the most important people and add them to a dedicated Favorites screen.
Visual notification of call being held by remote party.

See when the person on the other end of the call puts you on hold.
Presence in contact list.

Skype for Windows Phone now shows presence in the contact list. Skype for Windows Phone has 2 presence states “Available” or “Invisible”, legacy presence states are mapped to these.

As this is a preview release, then there are few known issues, which we are working hard to address.

Amazon.com, Inc. announced the launch of Cloud Drive Photos for Android app, making it even easier to upload, store, share and enjoy photos from Android phones and tablets. Android phone and tablet users can download the free Cloud Drive Photos for Android app to take advantage of Cloud Drive’s 5 GB of free storage, and have thousands of their photos at their fingertips in the Amazon Cloud. Users can purchase additional storage for as little as $10 a year for 20 GB. The Cloud Drive Photos for Android app is available in the Amazon Appstore or from Google Play, and you can learn more about the app at www.amazon.com/androidclouddrive.

Cloud Drive Photos app for Android

“Customers rely on their mobile devices more and more to capture the memories that matter to them,” said Russell Dicker, Director of Cloud Drive. They are taking photos at birthday parties, soccer games, and kids’ recitals every day on their Android phones and tablets. The Cloud Drive Photos for Android app makes it simple to save these memories into Cloud Drive and have them automatically available on your Kindle Fire or Android Phone or Tablet.”

It’s easy to save your photos from your Android device to Cloud Drive. Simply press and hold on a photo album on your Android phone, and select “Upload to Cloud Drive” to save existing photos from your device to the Cloud. Amazon Cloud Drive uses the same reliable and fast data storage infrastructure used by Amazon to run its own global network of web sites.

Android Cloud Drive features include:

All Your Photos, Wherever You Go: Save your entire photo collection in Cloud Drive and your photos will be available to enjoy on your Kindle Fire, Android Phones and tablets, or with any web browser.
Share Photos Through Your Favorite Apps: You can select photos directly from your Cloud Drive and share them through Facebook, email and many other apps.
Save to the Cloud: It’s simple to save photos to your Cloud Drive – simply press and hold on a photo or album and select “Upload to Cloud Drive” to save directly to the Amazon Cloud from your device.
Beautiful Photo Display: Your photos are displayed in a horizontal mosaic or vertical grid view, optimized for the screen size of your Android device.
Cloud Drive is already integrated into Kindle Fire HD, making it seamless to upload, store and enjoy your entire photo library. With Kindle Fire HD’s high-resolution screen, photos come alive in stunning high-definition, and the mosaic view arranges personal photos beautifully. Customers can also use their Kindle Fire to view their favorite photos on their TV using HDMI out, which enables you to connect an HDMI cable from your Kindle Fire to any device that has an HDMI port.

To learn more about Amazon Cloud Drive, visit www.amazon.com/clouddrive

WebPlatform.org is a collaboration between Adobe, Apple, Facebook, Google, HP, Microsoft, Mozilla, Nokia and Opera pool educational resources to create a comprehensive, frequently updated guide to creating HTML5 and other content for the open web.

WebPlatform.org will have accurate, up-to-date, comprehensive references and tutorials for every part of client-side development and design, with quirks and bugs revealed and explained. It will have in-depth indicators of browser support and interoperability, with links to tests for specific features. It will feature discussions and script libraries for cutting-edge features at various states of implementation or standardization, with the opportunity to give feedback into the process before the features are locked down. It will have features to let you experiment with and share code snippets, examples, and solutions. It will have an API to access the structured information for easy reuse. It will have resources for teachers to help them train their students with critical skills. It will have information you just can’t get anywhere else, and it will have it all in one place.

The founding members of Web Platforms Docs have all already provided a lot of content for the site to help get this effort off to a strong start. However, collectively, we’ve barely scratched the surface. We decided that it would be better to open up Web Platform Docs to the community as early as possible, so that everyone – including you – can help expand and refine the documentation, and ultimately define the direction of the site.

More info: http://blog.webplatform.org/2012/10/one-small-step/

Senior Engineering Director, Yossi Matias announced Google is retiring more online services including:

“AdSense for Feeds was designed to help publishers earn revenue from their content by placing ads on their RSS feeds. Starting October 2, we’ll begin to retire this feature—and on December 3 we’ll close it. Publishers can continue to use FeedBurner URLs powered by Google, so they won’t need to redirect subscribers to different URLs. For more information visit the AdSense Help Center.

Classic Plus is a Google Search feature that lets people upload or select images to use as a background on Google.com. Users won’t be able to upload new pictures starting from October 16, and we’ll turn the service off in November 2012. You’ll continue to have access to any images you’ve uploaded.

Google storage in Picasa and Drive will be consolidated over the next few months, so users will have five GB of free storage across both services. If you’re paying for storage, your free storage will now be counted towards your total. So if you buy a 100GB plan, it will give you 100GB of total storage instead of adding to what you already had. We believe this approach will make it much easier for users. For both free and paid storage, people at or near their current storage limits will have the same amount of storage after this change.

Spreadsheet Gadgets were designed to allow people to add customized features to Google Spreadsheets. But most popular gadgets have now been added directly into charts in spreadsheets. So we will slowly start turning off Gadgets in Spreadsheets next year.

Starting on October 15, we’ll stop issuing and displaying Google News Badges, as well as showing Recommended Sections. People can still tailor their Google News experience by adding custom sections or adjusting the frequency with which news sources appear.

We’ve merged Insights for Search into a revamped Google Trends. You can now see search trends and compare search volume patterns across specific regions, categories, time frames and properties in a single place: google.com/trends. We will no longer support Trends for Websites, which allowed people to compare traffic to and audiences of different websites.

Places Directory was an Android app that helped people find nearby places of interest. We’ve removed the app from Google Play and are taking down the Places Directory site because users can find everything in Google Maps for Mobile, which offers a much better user experience.

We introduced +1 Reports in Webmaster Tools to help publishers measure +1 activity on their pages. Given that webmasters now use Social Reports in Google Analytics to get a wider view of social activity (including +1’s), we’ll be discontinuing the stand-alone +1 Reports on November 14. Measuring social media remains a priority for Google Analytics, so stay tuned for future improvements.”

http://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/more-spring-cleaning.html

Dice Holdings, Inc. a provider of specialized career websites, and Geeknet, Inc. announced that Dice Holdings has acquired Geeknet’s online media business, including Slashdot and SourceForge.

“The acquisition of these premier technology sites fits squarely into our strategy of providing content and services that are important to tech professionals in their everyday work lives,” said Scot Melland, Chairman, President & CEO of Dice Holdings, Inc. “The SourceForge and Slashdot communities will enable our customers to reach millions of engaged tech professionals on a regular basis and significantly extends our company’s reach into the global tech community.”

The sites include:

Slashdot, a user-generated news, analysis, peer question and professional insight community. Tech professionals moderate the site which averages more than 5,300 comments daily and 3.7 million unique visitors each month.

SourceForge, a destination for technology professionals and enthusiasts to develop, download, review and publish open source software, much of which they use in their own organizations. Approximately 80 percent of its roughly 40 million monthly unique visitors are outside the U.S.

Freecode, one of the largest indexes of Linux, Unix and cross-platform software, as well as mobile applications generates nearly 500,000 unique visitors each month.

The acquisition builds on Dice.com’s rich history in providing the best content to help technology professionals succeed in their careers and reinforces the company’s commitment to deliver unique and valuable information to foster engagement in each of its communities.

Ken Langone, Chairman of Geeknet, added, “We are very pleased to find a new home for our media business, providing a platform for the sites and our media teams to thrive. With this transaction completed, we will now focus our full attention on growing ThinkGeek.”

Dice Holdings acquired the business for $20 million in cash. In 2011, the online media properties generated $20 million in Revenues.

Syncdocs is a new Google Drive app that automatically protects documents stored online. It encrypts files when uploaded to Google, and decrypts them when downloaded. Files are protected with the military strength AES 256 bit encryption. This means that only the authorized people get access to Google Drive files, anyone without the right password will only see the encrypted file.

“Security remains the biggest concern for anyone considering cloud,” says Donald Recsei, Syncdocs’ Marketing Director. “By automatically encrypting all sensitive material, Syncdocs gives individuals and businesses the confidence they need to take full advantage of the benefits of cloud computing.”

Syncdocs now also enables real-time collaboration between the new Microsoft Office 2013 and Google Docs. This lets users on the different platform work together in real-time. Google Docs can now also be accessed offline using Microsoft Office tools.

Syncdocs has a couple of other handy features, you can sync folders from anywhere on PC and network, it has seamless Windows integration making it easy to use, and it supports syncing multiple Google accounts simultaneously.

You can download Syncdocs from syncdocs.com