PC Performance Clinic Blog

Google Inc. has recently announced that their previewing a new offering known as Google Voice which is basically a hosted suite of application that is designed to provide a variety of phone related services. For instance the new Google Voice is designed to mainly offer a single number for your office and home land line phones and even your cell phones. The services also offers a single message depository  for all the voice mail messages linked to your phones and it also creates a transcript of all the messages with the ability to record and store calls online.

A Google blog post which was written by a Voice product manager said that the new application can improve the way you use your cell phone. It also said you can get transcripts of all the voice mails and archive including the search of all SMS text messages that you receive and send. You can even use the service to make low cost international calls and access Goog-411 directory assistance easily. These applications are an offshoot of the Grand Central service which was purchase by Google during the previous year. One number for life was the motto for Grand Central service which had tools to easily reach the person regardless of which number you dial of the person. Users and analysts were since then waiting to seen how Google would plan to use this technology again.

Therefore Google with an expansive mode regarding new business ventures it has developed their Google Health Service by recently unveiling the Google Power Meter service. This seemed to be a good time to introduce Google Voice according to Dan Olds who is the analyst at Gabriel Consulting Group. He further said that Google is making its way into different fields which is distinctive for them but not for mother other companies in economic troubled times, and Google has never failed to cut against their gains which has often paid of for the company. Their move into telecommunications might be the right business line which diversifies their revenue stream according to Dal Olds. Although the service is currently free, Google might easily make their move to charge users a small fee as the set of features increase.

Dal Olds also said that with the lives of people becoming increasingly complicated through different communication devices, a number of phone numbers to memorize and even multiple voice mail systems to check Google Voice can prove to be a handy service for all the overworked or for the newly connected. The service comes with a number of handy features which would simplify communication ability of the user. He said that the ability to have all their different numbers centralized over a single number can prove to be very helpful. Additionally the facility to have messages delivered through the web in audio and text format is also helpful for those who are always on the go and cannot find ways to access their cell phone. According to the blog entry, users of the Grand Central would avail the instructions in their inbox over the few days on how they can get started with the new Google Voice service.

There has been a recent upgrade to the new mobile maps tracking system of Google Inc with hopes to prove it would be able to track people on the go as efficiently as it would search for information on the web. This new software would be soon released throughout that would enable people with mobile phones or some other wireless devices to automatically share their whereabouts with friends and family.This new feature is named as Latitude, expands thorough a tool that was introduced in 2007 to offer mobile phone users the ability to check their own locations thorough Google maps with just a press of a button. Steve Lee the product manager for Google said that this would add a social flavor to the Google maps while making it more fun to use. However, as it might also raise up privacy concerns, Google is trying its best to avoid a reaction as it would require every user to manually turn on this tracking software while also make it easy to turn off or limit the access to this service.

Additionally Google also promises not to retain any of the information about the movements of the user. This means that just the last location that is picked up by this tracking system would be stored on the computers of Google. This latitude software plots a location of the user which is marked by a personal image on Google’s map and so by relying on the cell phone towers the Wi-Fi connection or the global positioning system can be used to deduce their location. This system can follow the travels of people in the United States and also in other 26 countries.

It is left up to the user to make the decision of who can monitor their locations. This social mapping approach is much similar to the service that is already offered by Loopt Inc which is a recently established company located near the Mountain View headquarters of Google. The service of Loopt is compatible with around 100 different types of mobile phones.

Therefore in order to get started, the Google Latitude would work on a the BlackBerry devices of Research in Motion Ltd and other devices that run on Symbian software or the windows mobile of Microsoft Corp. this software would also work on T-Mobile phones that run on Android software of Google and would eventually work on iTouch and iPhone of Apple. However to widen the appeal of the software, Google would also offer a version which can be installed on even a personal computer.

Steve Lee said that This PC access is specifically designed for those people who don’t have a mobile phone with these features and still need to track their children or someone special. Additionally people who use this PC version could also be watched when they are connected through Wi-Fi or the Internet. Google can plot the location of a person within a few yards when using if the person is using GPS or can be off by a number of miles when relying on the transmission of cell phone towers.

Yes people! You have heard something strange, but right! There is a company having sued Google, Apple, and Microsoft together. This company is none other than Cygnus systems, Inc. It’s one of the networking companies (Michigan-based). Cygnus got in to the jubilant mood after suing Google, Apple, and Microsoft for having violated a patent that was recently awarded to it. This patent consists of access and navigation of files that are based on ‘representational thumbnails’. The products such as Cover Flow feature of Apple, Chrome Browser of Google, and Vista of Microsoft have been cited with regard to infringement.

Cygnus is said to have sought permanent injunction and conventional damages which would prevent any infringement taking place further. At the same time, it’s also mentioning that such big 3 might not be sole companies after which it would go.

The patent into picture is US 7,346, 850, known as ‘System and method for iconic software environment management”. The abstract of this patent goes on to describe ‘a system and method to store, navigate, and access files present within operating system via usage of graphical thumbnail that would represent video display pertaining to active document inside active application’. To put it simple, patent awarded to Cygnus describes features identical to Apple’s Finder and Windows Explorer- Such applications make use of scaled-down previews for representing actual documents which have been browsed by PC users. This patent also includes things such as file icons which dynamically update for reflecting changes to contents of respective documents, along with ‘Speed Dial’ feature of Opera. This feature presents easy-access websites’ visual dashboard. Complaint by Cygnus also cites iPhone’s ‘accompanying iconic file preview and access functionality’ and tab thumbnails of Safari browser.

There are certain discrepancies with regards to this complaint by Cygnus, however, like targeting Google, that doesn’t actually make software ‘inside the OS’. Apart from all this, its claim stating that its patent has been infringed by Google by manufacturing, selling, using, and presenting Chrome web browser of Google for sale is a bit weird. At present, Google Chrome is being offered in the form of a download with respect to Windows Vista and XP SP2, absolutely free-of-cost.

Cygnus had filed the patent on 8^th of June, 2001 in the form of continuation of one of the applications which was filed on 12^th of June, 1998. This patent was, however, granted on 18^th of March, 2008. Since then, Cygnus has lost no time in applying a ‘lawsuit strategy’ for recovering a prize of damages sufficient enough to have compensated plaintiff with regards to infringement which has taken place. Noteworthy is the fact that Cygnus is seeking loads of retroactive damages since date of infringement.

Google, Apple, and Microsoft aren’t likely of being the sole targets of Cygnus if the lawsuit is capable of getting anywhere. Several other products and companies like Opera, iPhoto, Adobe, Windows Mobile, even web services such as Flickr might all go on to infringe upon certain broad terms within Cygnus’ patent.

Google Chrome is a web browser that has been built with an open source code and it has been developed by techno giants Google. The name of the web browser has been developed from graphical user interface frame of the browser. Chromium is the name given for the source project and it has been released by BSD license. User interface of chrome is not very polished and looks a little distracting. The beta version of Microsoft windows was released in more than 43 languages. It has been released in order to compete with Mozilla firefox. The releasing announcement was made on 3^rd September and a comic released by Scott McCloud was sent to the journalists and the bloggers explaining all the features and motivations of the new browser. The main goals behind the design were to improve the security, stability and also speed compared to other existing browsers.

Chrome has a lot of extensive changes in its interface and it was assembled into 26 code libraries of Google even for third parties like Netscape. Chrome will download updates of the blacklists and it will warn the users if they are attempting to browse any harmful sites. The security is good and offers great service to the users. Google offers a service called as safe browsing API that will maintain the blacklists and it will notify the uses to be aware of any harmful softwares. Chrome will have a specific tab that will fit into a process and it will prevent malware of installing itself. The allocation process of the tabs is a little complex. Chrome has a protected mode which is also used by Windows Vista and also Internet explorer 7. Plugins like Adobe flash player is not standardized and it is not sandboxed as a tab. Chrome supports Netscape plug-in application programming interface. Chrome does not have any extension systems like XP install architecture. Incognito is an option where the browser cannot store any history or cookies from the site that has been visited.    

Chrome offers great promise and is considered as the new face of internet browsing. Chrome uses DNS prefetching that will speed up the website lookups. The user interface is very extensive which includes back, forward, bookmark, cancel options, refresh, go and many more. It is a lot similar like Safari and the location settings are like the ones of internet explorer. The design is characterized by minimize, maximize, and also closing window are based on the Windows Vista version. The tab will start appearing in the title bar when the window is not maximized. When it is maximized, the title bar will disappear. The bar will be displayed at the topmost portion of the window. Chrome can be maximized in a standard windows application. Omni box is the URL that will appear at the top of every tab. It will be a combination of all the functionalities of search box and the URL box. The overall rating of Chrome is pretty good and it has succeeded to be a little more innovative and also updated.