Google Maps API

The Good and Great folks over at Google Map and Yahoo Map released their Map API's that allows you to roll your own "interactive, draggable, zoomable, maps (with satellite immagery)."

Yesterday, Google released an API for Google Maps and today Yahoo has released an API for Yahoo Maps. (That’s the spirit :-) )

The Google Maps API is based on JavaScript, which makes life pretty easy, since you don't need to worry about installing software. You can directly run JavaScript in just about any web browser. Knowledge of XML and XSL helps to build a rich user interface, but it's not required. Google Maps currently supports Firefox 0.8+, Mozilla 1.4+, IE 5.5+, Safari 1.2+, Netscape 7.1+, Opera 7+, but E 5.0 is not supported.

There are several limitations to the Maps API:
1- It doesn't provide a geocoding service; that is, you have to provide it with longitude and latitude. This means you need to rely on third-party geocoding tools to get longitude and latitude for an address.
2- It doesn't include a routing or driving directions service.
3- The Google Maps API key is restricted to generate maps only for URLs (website or a local host). You need to have a web server even for development.
4- The key you receive is only valid for a single directory on your web site.
5- It can be used for commercial purposes, but it should be available to end users for free.
6- It can be used on a site that is password protected, but consumers should be able to sign up for a password without charge.

At the same time Yahoo Maps API offers free access to Yahoo's SmartView Technology that will allow developers to create customized maps by overlaying content onto an existing Yahoo map,including weather reports, vacation photos,news,etc etc

*** I think we should expect a IDE /Web User Interface from Google from where we can easily drag and zoom maps onto our applications….....

Google Desktop 2

AUG 22,
Google Inc. has announced Google Desktop 2 (beta), a free downloadable application that combines desktop search with an intelligent sidebar that learns the user's habits and interests.

Intelligent enough, this is more like personal web assistant that learns about your habits and interests to identify and present web pages, news stories, and photos that it thinks you will be interested in."

Built on Google's desktop search technology the software include major new features, such as a Sidebar that provides desktop access to a variety of personalized information including email, news, weather, photos, stocks and RSS and Atom news feeds. Sidebar appears as a small vertical window on the side of a user's screen that includes a series of "live" content panels.

Additional features include a scratch pad to type and save notes and a quick view of recently or frequently visited websites.

And the Outlook Toolbar enables Microsoft Outlook users to search all of their Outlook email directly from an embedded search box and results list, without having to leave the application and apart from searching the Web, Google will trawl PC program data like Word, Excel, Adobe PDFs and instant messages.

Apart from all this ,GoogleIM is also available now.

open-smiles

Paul Murphy: Whether you prefer Linux, BSD, or Solaris is immaterial when the choice is Unix or Windows. If you work with Red Hat the enemy isn't Sun; and if you work with OS X, the enemy isn't Linux. For any Unix, the enemy is Microsoft.

64 bit Windows, many years from now
With the release of 64-bit Windows, the roadmap for future operating-system upgrades has become more congested. It's taken four years for a reluctant industry to adopt XP; the signs are that 64-bit Windows won't win hearts, minds and desktops much faster.

Sun Microsystems has released Solaris as open-source software, a move that's central to the company's plan to regain lost relevance and fend off rivals Red Hat, IBM and Microsoft.
The company on Tuesday posted more than 5 million lines of source code for the heart of the operating system--its kernel and networking code--at the OpenSolaris Web site. However, some source code components, such as installation and some administration tools, will arrive later.
But competing with Linux is tough. Though Linux is not as mature in many regards, Solaris work is concentrated at one company, whereas Linux has a fully fledged community of open-source programmers. Participants come not just from universities and Linux sellers such as Red Hat and Novell, but also from server sellers IBM and Hewlett-Packard, chipmaker Intel, and database maker Oracle.

open-Portals and CMS

Liferay released its much awaited 3.5 version Liferay Portal 3.5.0.New features include hot deployable themes, portlet instancing, built in support for Sun JSF and MyFaces, friendly URLs, and much much more! Many new JSR 168 complient portlets are also incorporated for eg--

Navigation Portlet -The Navigation Portlet allows you to display the navigational structure of a portal page. Its features a GUI console for editing and adding the nodes,hence Liferay renders the navigational structure accordingly.
Other Good Portlet is..
Portlet Aggregator - which provides flexibility for laying out portlets. Instead of being constrained to placing portlets under one, two or three columns, you can now mix and match.

So more is in the Look and Feel part too :-)

open-news

Dated August-9-05

Novell is to move its SuSE Linux Professional
to a community-driven development process with a project called OpenSuse.
The move follows the strategy of RedHat's Fedora.
Novell will still distribute its SuSE Linux Enterprise Server under its current
go-to-market strategy, again mirroring RedHat's strategy. Novell says that unlike RedHat's Fedora, which it believes is technically focussed, SuSE Linux will be focussed on non-technical end-users. Novell currently trails market leader RedHat for market share in the commercial Linux distribution space.

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A panel of high-profile industry players weighed on whether the world will ultimately turn to open source as a means for solving its software needs, with
the overriding view being "yes."

In the next five to 10 years, the open-source movement will transform the software business, according to several top industry executives speaking at the AO 2005 Innovation Summit at Stanford University.

IBM has begun participating in open-source Java project Harmony and intends to contribute code to the initiative, according to a Big Blue executive.

In the past week, IBM has dedicated an employee to working with the proposed
open-source project, which is being done at the Apache Software Foundation.

At this point, IBM's participation is limited to thoughts on design, but the company likely will contribute code to the project.

Harmony(a opensource java project)was launched in May to create an open-source edition of Java Platform, Standard Edition (Java SE), the software needed to run Java programs on desktop PCs.

Some Advancements goes here too--

IBM urges Sun to make Java open source .
Sun reluctant to make Java open source .
Apache eyes open-source Java project .
IBM buys open-source Java outfit Gluecode .