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After painfully long updates between IE6, IE7, and IE8, Internet Explorer 9 was given notice it's successor is on the way. IE10 will bring CSS3 support, HTML5 support, and a few W3C APIs.
Typical for Microsoft, they were pretty tight lipped about the future of IE except to take a potshot at Chrome (and also Firefox) nothing that faster cadence (releasing more versions more often) does NOT mean more progress. True, but ideally it means more frequent security updates so...
The amazing thing about this preview was that IE10 (and therefore the version of Windows 7 running on the demo rig) was written to run on ARM. Exciting news.
We just told you about Amazon's new Cloud Player music streaming service. To sweaten the deal Amazon is running a promotion. If you buy an MP3 album from the Amazon MP3 Store, you get 20 GB of stroage free for one year from the date of purchase. After one year is up, you will drop down to the free 5 GB plan, and you will never be charged.
Get the full details here.
Simply upload your music to Amazon's servers and play them via the web or via Android. The new service dubbed Cloud Player works with the current Cloud Drive service which allows users to store any data up to 5 GB for free.
Google and Apple are rumored to be working on their own cloud-based players, but with the launch of Cloud Player, Amazon is the first to market.
Cloud Player works extremely well with the Amazon MP3 store, but can also handle music from post-DRM iTunes as well as other unencrypted music sources.
Cloud Player does not blow your mind, but rather gets the job done simply. Hopefully, this is an early release with more features to come.
Learn more about Amazon Cloud Drive and Amazon Cloud Player.
Many people know O'Reilly produces some of the best computer books in the world. Even better, they sell DRM-free e-books in a multitude of formats supported by many different e-Book Readers.
Today only (March 22) the typical Deal of the Day isn't just 50% off a particular book, but rather 50% off the entire e-book catalog with some of the proceeds going to aid Japan relief efforts.
Use the discount code -- DDJPN -- at checkout.
via Download Squad
Today I went on thesaurus.com and searched “ninjas”. The computer told me, “Ninjas cannot be found.” Well played, ninjas. Well played.”
via limlam8 via drapetomania
It's the sports situation every boy dreams about. You know, full-count in the bottom of the ninth or inbounding the ball down by two with 2.3 seconds left.
Imagine standing at the free-throw line in the last game of the season of your senior year with a chance to put your team up by one. Make the shot and play 3.3 seconds of defense to win the game. Think you can handle the pressure?
What if I told you the win would break a 310-game conference losing streak streching 26 years? How about the pressure now?
Ryan Elmquist is no stranger to accomplishment. Perfect ACT. Landed a job at Google. Helped the CalTech Beavers win a basketball game. In the last game of his career, Elmquist, sank his freethrow with 3.3 seconds left ending a losing streak that started before he was born.
"When you're president of Caltech, you witness scientific breakthroughs, Mars landings, and any number of other memorable events. Storming the court with Nobel laureate Bob Grubbs will certainly rank high on my list of Caltech memories."
--Dr. Jean-Lou Chameau, President, California Institue of Technology.
A win is a win. Unless a Nobel laureate storms the court. Then it's a WIN.
The following is an excerpt from an article written by James Bennett. It is a joke that should be in the preface of every LEAN book written. Read why we do things the way we've ALWAYS done things.
There’s an old joke, so old that I don’t even know for certain where it originated, that’s often used to explain why big corporations do things the way they do. It involves some monkeys, a cage, a banana and a fire hose.
You build a nice big room-sized cage, and in one end of it you put five monkeys. In the other end you put the banana. Then you stand by with the fire hose. Sooner or later one of the monkeys is going to go after the banana, and when it does you turn on the fire hose and spray the other monkeys with it. Replace the banana if needed, then repeat the process. Monkeys are pretty smart, so they’ll figure this out pretty quickly: “If anybody goes for the banana, the rest of us get the hose.” Soon they’ll attack any member of their group who tries to go to the banana.
Once this happens, you take one monkey out of the cage and bring in a new one. The new monkey will come in, try to make friends, then probably go for the banana. And the other monkeys, knowing what this means, will attack him to stop you from using the hose on them. Eventually the new monkey will get the message, and will even start joining in on the attack if somebody else goes for the banana. Once this happens, take another of the original monkeys out of the cage and bring in another new monkey.
After repeating this a few times, there will come a moment when none of the monkeys in the cage have ever been sprayed by the fire hose; in fact, they’ll never even have seen the hose. But they’ll attack any monkey who goes to get the banana. If the monkeys could speak English, and if you could ask them why they attack anyone who goes for the banana, their answer would almost certainly be: “Well, I don’t really know, but that’s how we’ve always done things around here.”
This is a startlingly good analogy for the way lots of corporations do things: once a particular process is entrenched (and especially after a couple rounds of employee turnover), there’s nobody left who remembers why the company does things this way. There’s nobody who stops to think about whether this is still a good way to do things, or whether it was even a good idea way back at the beginning. The process continues through nothing more than inertia, and anyone who suggests a change is likely to end up viciously attacked by monkeys.
I have a feeling some of the recommended cameras on Ken Rockwell's site may be changing soon, and that is good news for everyone. To go along with all the other announcements, Canon is giving consumers new pocket cameras.
- Canon PowerShot SX230 HS
- Canon ELPH 500 HS
- Canon ELPH 300 HS
- Canon ELPH 100HS
All four cameras get Canon's new HS system for better pictures in low-light situations. The cameras use a high-sensitivity sensor like in a DSLR to record better images in low-light, and this is the same system employed in the PowerShot G12 and PowerShot S95 except with a smaller sensor for compactness.
The Canon PowerShot SX230 will replace or sit just above the older PoweShot SX210 IS in the compact super-zoom range allowing 28-392mm equivalent range or 14x optical zoom. It can also record full 1080p HD Video with dynamic image stabilization. The camera finally adds a GPS sensor to record the locations of your photos.
The Canon ELPH 500 takes on a new model name and replaces the PowerShot (Digital ELPH) SD3500 IS bringing the ELPH name to the forefront from the 35mm film days. Like the SD 3500 IS the camera shoots 4.4x optical or 24-105mm equivalent with a fast f/2 lens when shooting 24mm for great low-light performance. The ELPH 500 packs a slew of new features controlled by the same touchscreen system as the SD 3500 IS including Super Slow Motion Movies, High-Speed Burst mode, Low Light mode, and Smart Auto for intelligent scene detection. Finally, for those desiring some control over their compact, the ELPH 500 offers Av and Tv modes to control your aperture or shutter speed.
The Canon ELPH 300 replaces the PowerShot SD 1400 IS as the supe-compact, mid-featured camera. The camera features the more traditional control of a Canon PowerShot rather than the touchscreen interface. The lens is more traditional lacking the fast f/2 wide aperture of the ELPH 500, but if you have owned any PowerShots you know what the lens is capable of. This camera should outshine with the new CMOS sensor behind the lens. The lens has 5x optical zoom or 24-135mm as well as Super Slow Motion Movie and High-Speed Burst mode. This is the smallest, lightest recent camera Canon offers (the SD780 IS is the smallest compact).
The Canon ELPH 100 brings the HS system to those on a budget. It gets most all of the features above except with a 28-112mm lens. For the value, this is a great little point-and-shoot camera.
Well, unless you have deep pockets these new lenses probably will not affect you, but feel free to go out and rent. The first two are improvements of super-telephoto lenses the EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM and the EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM. Both get improved elements for better images specifically reducing chromatic abrasion as well as newer and improved IS systems. Each lens is also lighter and more durable than the lens they replace, but at $9,500 and $12,000 respectively the audience is limited.
The EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS II updates the kit lens for the Digital Rebel lines, but there are no enhancements in the optics or usability. DPreview.com reports only cost savings for Canon with no changes for the end-user.
Finally the EF 200-400mm f/4L IS USM Extender 1.4x telephoto zoom lens for those looking beyond the reach of the standard 70-200mm zooms offers a much faster and lighter substitution for the EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM lens. The new lens features f/4 throughout the zoom range as well as a built in Extender giving 280-560mm effective focal length.
