Practical Technology

for practical people.

December 22, 2011
by sjvn01
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Apple loses one in its iPad tablet war with Samsung

Take a long look at the two versions of Samung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 on the right. One, says a German court, violated Apple’s iPad intellectual property (IP) design and thus couldn’t be sold in the European Union (EU). The other one is fine and dandy and can be sold. Can you tell the critical IP differences? Try to work it out before this story’s end.

As you may recall, Apple managed this summer to get the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 banned from being sold in the EU (European Union) because its design looked too much like an iPad. That was a dumb decision. Any tablet has to look pretty much like any other tablet. Now, though, it appears that the tide has turned against Apple. The German court has preliminarily decided that Samsung’s revised design no longer violates Apple’s iPad design.

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December 21, 2011
by sjvn01
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Which Tablet has the Best Display?

We all have our own ideas on what looks good on a tablet display and what doesn’t. Unlike most of us though Dr, Raymond Soneira, president of DisplayMate, the world’s leading display and display tuning company, has more than just an opinion. He has a long, well-respected history of scientifically analyzing what separates great displays from good ones. When Soneira talks, I listen.

So when Soneira turned his attention to the latest generation of popular tablets–the Amazon Kindle Fire, Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet, and the Apple iPad 2–I paid attention.

After all, as Soneira writes, “A key element in the success of all Smartphones and Tablets is the quality and performance of their display. There have been lots of articles comparing various smartphone LCD and OLED displays and technologies, but almost all simply deliver imprecise off-the-cuff remarks like “the display is gorgeous” with very little in the way of serious attempts at objective or accurate display performance evaluations and comparisons – and many just restate manufacturer claims and provide inaccurate information, performance evaluations and conclusions.” Soneira objectively evaluates the display performance of the tablet display based on extensive scientific lab measurements together with extensive side-by-side visual tests using DisplayMate Multimedia Edition for Mobile Displays and other tools.

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December 19, 2011
by sjvn01
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Review: Chrome, the Sweet 16 Web Browser?

Mozilla, bless its heart, keeps trying to make Firefox relevant again with its speedy update schedule, but it just hasn’t been working out. Google, on the other hand, with its new Chrome sweet 16 release keeps getting better than ever.

No, there’s nothing new in capital letters in this release. It’s just faster than ever, and includes a couple of nice, useful improvements. Under the hood, as always, there are several important security improvements.

If you haven’t tried Chrome yet, here are the basics. The Chrome Web browser has a minimalist interface. Instead of a tool-bar, the basic interface has a combination address and search bar, the Omnibox, at the top with tabs above that. The handful of visible control buttons consist of Back, Forward, a combined Stop/Reload button, and a preferences wrench icon. That’s it.

If you add extensions, they’ll appear as icons on the right of the Omnibox. If you like having lots of tool-bars and endless interface tweaking power, Chrome is not for you. If you want a clean, fast Web browser Chrome is for you.

That’s not to say you can’t add a lot of extra stuff to Chrome. The whole point of a Chromebook, for example, is that you can do pretty much anything you need to do on a computer with just a Web browser and a bunch of cloud-based applications and extensions. To find these with Chrome, head over to the Chrome Web Store.

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December 18, 2011
by sjvn01
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Google wants you to buy a Chromebook: Should you? (Review)

Judging from all those Chromebook ads you’ve been seeing pop up on every tech. Web site known to man. Google really, really wants you to buy a Chromebook. Should you?

I like my Samsung Chromebook, but it looks like not many people fell in love with these Chrome OS powered netbooks. So, Acer and Samsung have reduced their price from a high of $499 to $299 and Google started banging the advertising drum for Chromebooks. So, should you let the new price tempt you into getting one?

I say yes.. My Samsung Series 5 Chromebook, which I’ve been using for months now, is the perfect grab and go laptop. It’s weights just over three-pounds, the battery lasts for about ten hours, and the lightweight Linux desktop with a Chrome Web browser interface is all I need for work out of the office.

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December 15, 2011
by sjvn01
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Google Zeitgeist 2011: It’s Apple’s World

Every year Google takes a look at what we’ve been searching for on the Internet in 2011 in its Google Zeitgeist list. A lot of it shows that we love our dumb stuff. For example, Rebecca Black, whose fame rests entirely on one awful song and video, Friday, was the number one search. Looking deeper into the lists you’ll see that when it comes to technology, we couldn’t get enough of Apple.

On Google’s master list of the 10 fastest-rising global queries, you’ll find three Apple subjects represented: the iPhone 5 (whoops!), Steve Jobs and the iPad2. Of technology-related subjects, only Google’s new social network, Google+ and the hot new game Battlefield 3 placed higher.

You might think Apple got so much attention because of Steve Jobs’ death. You’d be wrong. While Jobs death placed him ninth on the overall search list, the Fastest Rising Technology list was filled with Apple searches.

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December 15, 2011
by sjvn01
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OwnCloud: An open-source cloud to call your own

Everyone likes personal cloud services, like Apple’s iCloud, Google Music, and Dropbox. But, many of aren’t crazy about the fact that our files, music, and whatever are sitting on someone else’s servers without our control. That’s where ownCloud comes in.

OwnCloud is an open-source cloud program. You use it to set up your own cloud server for file-sharing, music-streaming, and calendar, contact, and bookmark sharing project. As a server program it’s not that easy to set up. OpenSUSE, with its Mirall installation program and desktop client makes it easier to set up your own personal ownCloud, but it’s still not a simple operation. That’s going to change.

According to ownCloud’s business crew, “OwnCloud offers the ease-of-use and cost effectiveness of Dropbox and box.net with a more secure, better managed offering that, because it’s open source, offers greater flexibility and no vendor lock in. This makes it perfect for business use. OwnCloud users can run file sync and share services on their own hardware and storage or use popular public hosting and storage offerings.” I’ve tried it myself and while setting it up is still mildly painful, once up ownCloud works well.

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