The Blackberry App World is an application that you install on your blackberry device.  Once installed, it acts just like on the iPhone, letting you browse the many categories and download applications and games directly on your device.  Put more of your life on your BlackBerry smartphone! Download BlackBerry App World for free to load up your BlackBerry smartphone with games, social networking, online shopping, personal productivity, organization tools and other fun and functional apps. It’s your world – bring more of it with you with BlackBerry App World!

App World will be a great place for developers to publish their work and make an extra buck selling their applications.  It should help RIM stay on top of the threat the iPhone has become and keep its users satisfied with an acceptable number of applications available in many categories.

You can get started directly on the Blackberry site.

Windows Foundation Server provides you with a dependable and affordable technology foundation for running your business applications as well as sharing information and resources. Being based on Windows Server 2008, you can run not only core infrastructure, terminal services and identity management solutions for your business – you can support you core LOB applications built on the simplicity and technical capabilities that Windows Server 2008 provides.

Windows Server 2008 is a great way to get your first Server 2008 in your business, especially if you have no servers in your infrastructure yet.  It will allow you to grow and use the best technologies right away. It is limited to 15 users, so  the recommended applications are the following:

• Core Infrastructure:  Windows Server Foundation is an excellent option for use with single or multiple workloads, such as file sharing, print sharing, networking, Terminal Services, remote connections, and other common server roles. Also, Windows Server Foundation can be used for Internet Web services and as a Web server platform for intranets and extranets where user authentication is required.
• Active Directory:  Windows Server Foundation can be used as an Active Directory server or domain controller, and can also join a domain as a member server or domain controller (but the 15 user limit still applies across AD scenarios)
• Terminal Services (Remote Desktop):  Windows Server Foundation is also ideal for multiple-user computing, such as sharing Microsoft Office or using Terminal Services.
• Line of Business Applications (LOB):  Your line of business applications that are built for the Windows Server 2008 family can be deployed on your server. If they have the “Certified for”, or “Works with” accreditation for Windows Server 2008 Standard, then they will be supported on Windows Server Foundation, as well as being able to deploy many third party software which is currently available for Windows Server 2008.

Server Foundation is probably a great server solution for the above-mentionned applications, but the 15-users limit might be reached pretty quickly if you plan on expanding.  Microsoft’s Small Business Server 2008 might be a better solution if you want to get all the bells and whistles without the huge price tag.

as an enhancement, but that’s really just a matter of how you use your browser.  Whether it will help you get things done faster, is up to you.

Microsoft’s site offers a nice tour of features and lets you download the lastest version.  I have yet to give the final version a try.. I must confess, I still use IE6 sometimes.  I have never upgraded to the dreaded IE7 because every time I have come across it, I noticed weird page renderings and an incredibly slow performance.  However, if I must upgrade to something better eventually (assuming I can’t use my beloved Firefox…), then I would choose Internet Explorer 8 over previous versions easily.

I have read in quite a few places about people who will wait for a while before upgrading because they want to make sure the bugs are fixed.  Well, I have to agree, but this shouldn’t be something to stop you from trying it on a test machine or in a virtual environment.  There are still fixes coming out for IE6 after all ;-)

All things considered, if you are going to upgrade to it eventually and don’t need previous versions for compatibility issues with a specific application or website, then upgrading shouldn’t be a problem.

One of the commercials brings forward the impressive marketing budget that was used by Microsoft to promote Windows Vista. It says that maybe they should have used that money to fix the major problems found in Vista instead of promoting it. I’m not going to say whether that’s true or not.. but I still prefer Windows XP.. by far! ;-)

The point of this article is that I read about the impressive numbers behind those ad campaigns. Microsoft’s advertising budget for Windows Vista is the well known $300 million. Lindsay Blakely from Bnet has posted an article about Apple’s numbers and where she found them. Apple’s Fiscal year ends in September and in its SEC Filings, the numbers are very clear. it turns out that Apples budget is even bigger than Vista’s. Apple spent a colossal $486 million on publicity in its last fiscal year. That’s half a billion dollars on advertising! With that budget, it’s almost impossible you didn’t see the vista-bashing commercials or at least iPod ads.

Microsoft, however, has a much bigger advertising budget when all their business units are combined. Including Windows, Office, Xbox and everything else, Microsoft’s ad budget was $1.2 billion for 2008. This would mean that Vista alone was about 25% of the entire budget.

]]> http://www.techforlunch.com/comparing-advertisement-budgets-from-apple-and-microsoft/feed/ 0 http://www.techforlunch.com/adobe-flex-will-become-flash-platforms/ http://www.techforlunch.com/adobe-flex-will-become-flash-platforms/#comments Mon, 17 Nov 2008 18:24:39 +0000 Pascal Roy http://www.techforlunch.com/?p=247 I’ve been following the development and the evolution of Adobe Flex ever since it first appeared as a beta, but its marketing has always been uncertain.  The way it was referenced and named was sometimes inconsistent and the name itself made it a little difficult to search for in some cases.

Adobe Flex will retain it’s name as a particular application but, from now on, the marketing for it will be as part of the Adobe Flash Platform.  Adobe has announced this new name for the product line as well as a few other things that will be official at the MAX Conference this week.

Adobe Air version 1.5 will be available featuring much better performance and memory handling.  The new version will support Flash 10 and webkit.  There will also be a new encrypted database which is a huge plus for corporate applications.  To go along with Air, Flex 4 (a.k.a. Gumbo)will be demonstrated which should be an even better and more powerful product than before, but also more accessible to newcomers.

Adobe Catalyst (a.k.a. Thermo) has been in the works for a long time now and aims to close the gap between Designers and Developers.  It creates a two-way bridge between files created in Adobe’s Creative Suite products such as Photoshop , Illustrator, and Web apps built in Flash or AIR.  Mobile flash will also be something in demonstration, allowing developers to port their applications on to mobile phones.

We should also see the new — and really really long awaited — 64-bit flash player for Linux.  This just shows the wide adoption for flash and its already very impressive lead in the RIA world.

I personally can’t wait to see the new version of Flex Builder, version 4, and all it’s new features.  I’m not a full-time developper so anything that makes building easier will be very welcomed and will certainly help Adobe to secure it’s lead as the RIA developper’s choice.

Enter the new Microsoft Store.  Just like the Apple iStore,  Microsoft’s Store allows you to shop, purchase and download applications and games to your PC.  There is a variety of titles available and the list is sure to grow over time.  Right now, you could get any version of Windows Vista, Microsoft Office or even Windows Server 2008 and CALs.  The great advantage of buying software this way is that you can start downloading and installing right away.  No need to pay for shipping and wait for the package to finally arrive.  There are a number of items which still require shipping, such as Xbox 360 consoles and other hardware like mice and keyboards.

As of today, the Microsoft Store is available to US Customers.  It was already tested and deployed for European and Korean Customers.  We can expect that availability to grow with time to reach more markets.

Last year, Facebook had a reported $450 million of funding to expand and operate.  That money was raised from various sources and their CEO said that they should be able to run on that amount for a couple of years, even if they didn’t go public until 2009.  It seems that the incredible numbers generated by the Facebook Phenomenon costs much more than they had anticipated.  There’s no doubt that Facebook is growing at a breathtaking pace. A year ago, according to Comscore, they had just 74 million unique monthly visitors and 35 billion page views. Today those numbers have grown by 118% and 74%, respectively, to 161 million unique visitors and 61 billion page views per month.

The hardware that is required to respond to such a huge amount of requests is pretty impressive.  At this rate, they are spending an estimated $100 million a year on about 50,000 servers just for growth absorption.  Then, there are the regular operations costs, such as facilities and electricity.  Their electricity bill is probably somewhere near the $1 million a month according to experts and the bandwidth costs should be near $500,000/month.  Facilities (office space and datacenter) are close to $15 million per year and if we add up their 750 employees, payroll is at least $10 million per month.

Revenue, on the other hand, was about $265 million last year.  This could have been enough if the userbase remained stable, but at the rate it’s growing right now, that won’t nearly be enough for the years to come.  There are a couple of problems with the way things are right now:

• The user base is growing very quickly because Facebook is now translated by users to many languages and because the site is now accessible by international users.  The problem with those users is that they are not an added value for advertisers.  The reality is that more users, does not mean more ad revenue for Facebook.  There are currently 3 international users for every US-based user on Facebook.  If the international users keep growing and Facebook cannot monetize them, then costs will surpass revenue in the very short-term.
• The economy isn’t helping either.  If Facebook wants to get more funding from investors, they will probably have to start looking for it right now because there might not be any investors interested in them later.
• The US-Based users are not growing as fast as they should.  MySpace is holding many of those users and at the currect growth rate, it would take 18 years for Facebook to overtake MySpace.

I’m not too worried about it right now, but if things remain the way they are now, Facebook might have to take drastic measures to stay alive.  If it becomes a pay-site, it certainly won’t be as popular.  Idealy, they will need to find a way to monetize all of their international users.  This would balance out the rapid growth dictated by those users and allow Facebook to maintain its expansion as it is going right now.

]]> http://www.techforlunch.com/facebook-is-growing-fast-maybe-too-fast/feed/ 0 http://www.techforlunch.com/happy-birthday-google/ http://www.techforlunch.com/happy-birthday-google/#comments Sat, 27 Sep 2008 20:18:19 +0000 Pascal Roy http://www.techforlunch.com/?p=236 It was approximately 10 years ago that Google became the search engine we all know today. It was not always the way it is right now, but the philosophy was there from the beginning.

Google has put up a really cool timeline that any fan will find very interesting. You’ll find a plethora of facts about Google’s history, many that you may already know, but certainly many that you may have missed. My personal favorites are the list of all the logos that graced the Google Homepage over the years and the screenshots of the many variations of the homepage.

I remember back in 1997-1998 when I first used Google and became hooked in no time because the results were so much more accurate than the other search engines. I used to be a Metacrawler fan because it allowed to search multiple engines using a single query. Back then, when you were searching for something, you usually had to try a couple of search engines before finding what you were looking for. When Google came along, it quickly became a one-stop shop for most of my queries. Things were even clearer when Google was added to the Metacrawler list of engines. Google’s results always came out on top and with the most accuracy, so just like many interner users, I ended up just going directly to Google to search.

Since then, Google has added an enormous number of features, bought software and made it its own etc.. Google is even a verb and is used to describe avid users: “Googler”. We have certainly come a long way from th Beta iteration.

As I was writing this, I thought I would give a quick visit to Metacrawler and found that it’s pretty good on the results. I used to take a long time to get results because it kept waiting for slower search engines, but it seems to be much much faster now. I think I just might use it more often when google doesn’t return what I’m looking for the first time.

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Chrome, is Google’s new Open-Source browser, which has been in the works for the last 2 years now. It combines a minimal design with sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer, and easier.  It offers many features that are very interesting.  Here’s a quick list of new features:

• One Box for Everything: Web search. Web history. Address bar. Suggestions as you type. One unified box serves all your browsing needs at the top.  You simply type in that box and results begin to appear as you go.
• New Tab Page: Every time you open a new tab, you’ll see a visual sampling of your most visited sites, most used search engines, and recently bookmarked pages and closed tabs.  I like this feature very much.
• Application Shortcuts: Use web apps without opening your browser. Application shortcuts can directly load your favorite online apps
• Dynamic Tabs: You can drag tabs out of the browser to create new windows, gather multiple tabs into one window or arrange your tabs however you wish — quickly and easily.
• Crash Control: Every tab you’re using is run independently in the browser, so if one app crashes it won’t take anything else down.
• Incognito Mode: Don’t want pages you visit to show up in your web history? Choose incognito mode for private browsing.
• Safe Browsing: Google Chrome warns you if you’re about to visit a suspected phishing, malware or otherwise unsafe website.  That’s not really new, but it’s implemented directly in the browser.
• Instant Bookmarks: Want to bookmark a web page? Just click the star icon at the left edge of the address bar and you’re done.
• Import Settings: When you switch to Google Chrome, you can pick up where you left off with all the bookmarks and passwords from your existing browser.  That’s also a vey common feature, but it would have been silly to leave it out.
• Simpler Downloads: No intrusive download manager; you see your download’s status at the bottom of your current window.
• V8 Engine: A better, faster and more robust Javascript engine, designed by the guys at Google.

Giving Google Chrome a test run is certainly the best way to see and experiment with all the features and the somewhat different interface.  The approach and presentation are excellent but there are naturally some things missing right now.  Keeping in mind that this is still a Beta version, there are some applications and sites that simply do not run with Chrome. Toolbars and plugins are also not available yet, so functionality is limited for power users.

If you are still using Internet Explorer, giving Chrome a try in something you should really go ahead and do because you are probably not surfing as fast and as easily as you should.  If you are a Firefox user, then it all depends on what your surfing habits are, but it doesn’t hurt anything to give Chrome a try anyway!  I’m sure that many features in Chrome will get their Firefox plugin equivalent in no time, but the speed of a browser is pretty difficult to replicate in a plugin.

Chrome is built with Google Gears, so there should be version for all platforms eventually.  Right now, it’s only available for Windows.

USB 3.0, also known as SuperSpeed USB, will have many significant improvements over it’s predecessors and peripherals that make use of the new standard should become available sometime late in 2009 or early 2010.  Here are some of the improvements that are described in the release:

• Higher transfer rates:  This is a given because that is basically what everyone is looking for, especially if you transfer large files to/from an external drive for instance. USB 3.0 should be able to transfer at a whooping 4.8Gbit/s (614MByte/s) making it 10 times faster than it’s little brother, USB 2.0.
• Simultaneous read/write:  USB 2.0 and 1.0 are only capable of doing one-way operations at a time, resulting in much slower transfers.  With USB 3.0, Not only is the raw transfer speed faster, but it also goes both ways at the same time so you can copy to AND from a hard drive at the same time.  The only problem will be that your USB 3.0 cable will be faster than the hardware it is connected to.
• Higher Power Output: Many devices get their power from the USB cable or simply use the cable to charge themselves.  With USB 3.0, the power output will go from 100 milliamps to 900 milliamps.  We should be able to charge our devices faster and connect bigger devices without having to use an external power adapter.
• Backwards Compatibility:  We should be able to use a USB 3.0 cable with older USB 2.0 devices.  Not only will it work, but some newer features like the power consumption control will kick-in.
• Power consumption: USB 2.0 used a polling method to verify if a device was sending data to the computer and if it needed power.  This means it was an “always-on” process and consumed more energy than was required.  USB 3.0 will us an Interrupt-driven protocol to ensure your devices get only what they need, when they need it.

The standard for USB 3.0 is not yet 100% complete and this article certainly does not cover everything that is new, but it is a pretty good summary of what most end-users will be looking for in USB 3.0.

I am very eager to see all my devices become USB 3.0, but that means I’ll have to get a bunch of new toys to play with!