Practical Technology

for practical people.

August 31, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Chromebooks Live!

I’ll be the first to admit that while I like Chromebooks, I own a Samsung Series 5, Chromebooks also have serious problems. Still, the Chromebook is far from being dead.

My fellow ZDNet writer, Scott Raymond argues that the consolidation of WebKit, and Chromium open-source Web browsers source code trees means the end of a need for Chromebooks–and by extensions other lightweight laptops. Specifically, Raymond argues, “If we had the Chrome browser on an Android tablet, why would we want a Chromebook? For the price of a Chromebook you could pick up an Android tablet with a keyboard that connects via dock or Bluetooth. You would have the same functionality, plus the added capabilities of Android.”

Why would I want a Chromebook? Because, while I like tablets a lot-I currently own and use a first generation iPad and a Nook Color–I also like having a single-unit, lightweight laptop.

More >

August 30, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Google and OpenDNS join forces to speed up DNS

What do you think the number one source of traffic is on the Internet today? E-Mail? Not even close. Conventional Web sites? Not way! Porn!? No, believe it or not, it’s not that either. The single biggest source of traffic on today’s Internet is Netflix. Its videos, and those of other video sites, require their users to have not only very fast Internet connections, but fast and accurate pointers to the closest and fastest Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) sites. That’s where Google, OpenDNS, and some of CDNs hope to improve things with the Global Internet Speedup initiative, a worldwide effort to improve Internet speeds and enable faster access to information.

According to this new Internet consortium, “The Global Internet Speedup enhances the way communication within the Domain Name System (DNS) is handled. The Internet has evolved from simple text-based pages to bandwidth intensive services such as video streaming, real-time communications and rich social networking that have become indispensable parts of our everyday lives. The DNS plays a critical role in delivering content fast, acting as one of the first pieces of the routing infrastructure that helps users get to content quickly and is the cornerstone for every major CDN. CDNs and other large Internet services typically direct the user to the nearest content server based on the location of the user’s DNS server rather than the location of the user themselves. This routing may result in slower Web page load times and decreased Internet performance if a user is not located near their DNS server.”

More >

August 29, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Firefox 6: A Firefox too far? (Review)

I used to love Firefox. For many years, it was the best Web browser around. Then, it got old and cranky. The good news is that Mozilla got serious about improving it. The bad news is that everyone else, even Microsoft with Internet Explorer 8 in 2009, did too. The other Web browser developers have caught up and surpassed Firefox. Worse still, the last few versions of Firefox haven’t been that good. Firefox 6, the newest version, is better than Firefox 5, but it’s not that great either.

Like most modern Web browsers, Firefox 6 has a “less is more” style interface. If that’s not to your taste, and I confess I like having real menus, Firefox does make it easy to bring back a more traditional Web browser interface.

Firefox also now supports, ala Google Chrome Web browser, pinned tabs. With these I can always have my favorite Web sites ready to go in tabs kept pinned to the left side of the tab bar.

More >

August 29, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Red Hat’s biggest enemy? VMware

Let’s play a game. Who do you think Red Hat’s biggest enemy will be in a few years? Will it be Microsoft, Linux’s traditional enemy? Could SUSE, the number two business Linux distributor, make a try for the top? Might Ubuntu’s Canonical make its big break into corporate Linux? All good guesses, but Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst, is pretty sure that Red Hat’s biggest competitor in 2016 will be VMware.

I know, I know, you’re thinking, “VMware? VMware!? The king of virtualization? A company that doesn’t even have an operating system or a middleware stack?” Why not Oracle? I mean Oracle makes no bones about wanting to take Red Hat on… and bury then.

Whitehurst, knows all that and has good reason for seeing VMware as Red Hat’s real rival in the decade to come. At LinuxCon in Vancouver, British Columbia explained his reasoning to me.

More >

August 28, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Defending Against the Apache Killer

Apache, the open-source Web server, is the most popular Web server on the planet. It’s also as safe as safe can be. Well, usually it is. An old, unfixed security hole has come back to haunt the Apache webmasters in the form of a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack tool: Apache Killer.

You may have already heard about this, and ignored it. I mean, in a world where every day brings a new security hole announcement but the Web keeps working anyway, many people have taken to a “Who cares” attitude. That’s usually a mistake. And, when it comes to Apache Killer, it could be a business-killing mistake.

More >

August 26, 2011
by sjvn01
0 comments

Apple iPad design – it’s been done before (images)

In Germany, Apple currently looks like it may win a legal battle to keep Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 from being sold in the European Union. Their reasoning? The Galaxy Tab looks too much like the iPad.

Excuse me? The iPad just looks like a freaking tablet to me. It also appears that Apple doctored the Samsung’s image to make it look even more like an iPad.

Come on Apple, aren’t you a little big to be throwing fits like this? Just because, Android now has 20% of the market, do you really have to try to keep potential competitors out of the marketplace by suing them? I think not.

Besides, let’s get real, a tablet is a tablet, and I’ll now show, there’s nothing new about your tablet format—especially if you consider how often the idea’s been kicked around in toys and fiction,

More >