Windows President, Steve Sinofsky’s article about Windows 8 on ARM, Microsoft shared a video demonstrating how the product looks as of now. During the demo, Microsoft showed what Office 15 will look like on a tablet and the Metro version of Microsoft’s Windows Live suite of applications. Here are the screenshots:

Microsoft Office 15 Word

Microsoft Office 15 Excel

Microsoft Office 15 PowerPoint

Microsoft Office 15 OneNote

Windows Live Calendar

Windows Live Metro Photos

Windows Live Metro Mail

I have been using Facebook Comments Box on this blogs for over a week now to test out and increase interaction on the site. For starters, I did like the amount of interaction from Facebook users. However, there are quite a few problems with Facebook Comments when it comes to moderation.

First off, the website where you can moderate Facebook comments (https://developers.facebook.com/tools/comments/) is down most of the time (or whenever I try to access it). It gets frustrating because it is the only way you can see new comments and trash spam or hide comments from users.

On the other hand, Facebook comments moderation in itself does not work most of the time and administrators have problems when marking a comment as spam or banning a user.

Overall, I feel that Facebook comments do provide a lot of ease for their users to quickly comment on a website. However, there is a lot of work to be done when it comes to administrating those comments. I will continue working with Facebook comments for some more time and see if there is any improvement with it before I decide to remove it for good.

What has been your experience while using Facebook comments? Have you had problems with moderating comments and administrating them? I am looking for some alternatives so please feel to suggest them (No Disqus Please).

When Microsoft showed Windows 8 on ARM there was a lot of enthusiasm. It was clear that Windows on ARM is Microsoft’s attempt of developing an OS for tablets that will consume less resources, have a long battery life, and provide a nice UI/UX.

One of the biggest concerns raised by critics was the presence of the traditional desktop in the tablet version. Like many, even I’d like to see Windows 8 tablets to not have the desktop UI. Office 15 shows why I don’t want the desktop interface on Windows tablets–it’s schizophrenic. Having to switch between the tablet and desktop interface is confusing and at many times annoying. Behind the intuitive Metro interface and Metro inspired apps lies the dormant ghost of Windows waiting to be unleashed every few hours when you use your tablet, haunting you as you hold that tablet.

Steven Sinofsky in his post about Windows 8 on ARM explains why the design decision was taken to include the desktop interface. Long story short, to give you the best of both worlds. Sinofsky and Microsoft believe that there are features and capabilities in Windows that users have become familiar with over the years and would want to have them going forward as well. Sinofsky explains:

[...] Enabling Windows to run super well on the ARM architecture is a significant engineering task. We undertook this work because when you look to the future you can see that so many of the capabilities that have been added to Windows over the years are things that customers will inevitably desire or require in the types of devices supported by today’s ARM-based products—changes in form factors and the desire for mobility only add to the scenarios and capabilities we all desire in our search for no-compromise PCs. While it is tempting to make bold statements about “starting over,” we believe in the evolution of technology assets when the foundation is strong. The foundation of Windows, the core, is the most solid, scalable, and secure one around. Our desire to deliver a no-compromise experience motivates our efforts. [...]

[...] The availability of the Windows desktop is an important part of WOA. The desktop offers you a familiar place to interact with PCs, particularly files, storage, and networking, as well as a range of peripherals. You can use Windows Explorer, for example, to connect to external storage devices, transfer and manage files from a network share, or use multiple displays, and do all of this with or without an attached keyboard and mouse—your choice. This is all familiar, fast, efficient, and useful. [...]

[...] Some have suggested we might remove the desktop from WOA in an effort to be pure, to break from the past, or to be more simplistic or expeditious in our approach. To us, giving up something useful that has little cost to customers was a compromise that we didn’t want to see in the evolution of PCs. [...]

Sinofsky does make a valid argument. The iPad does not have a file explorer and is tied to iTunes. Microsoft sees the tablet as a mobile computing device somewhere between the phone and a laptop. By keeping the desktop in WOA, Microsoft is letting the end-user have the familiarity of good ol’ Windows while on a tablet.

Sinofsky says that having the traditional Windows desktop on ARM will not result in performance loss. The other way to look at it is, because Microsoft can.

Earlier today, president of the Windows and Windows Live division, Steven Sinofsky wrote a lengthy article detailing Microsoft’s development of Windows 8 for the ARM architecture.

As I still go through the article (it’s so long that I printed a copy), there is a lot of information hidden in the 8,600 word article which I will share in subsequent posts. However, the biggest news is that viruses that affect Windows 7 (and even Windows 8) won’t be compatible with Windows on ARM. According to Sinofsky:

• WOA will not be able to run existing x86/x64 applications. In order to build applications for Windows on ARM, they will have to be developed using the WinRT architecture.
• Apps that have been developed for WOA, using WinRT, will be only available through the Windows App Marketplace. The marketplace will act as a checkpoint for rogue applications.

The two steps ensure that a WOA device (primarily tablets) will not be as easily affected by the plethora of viruses that exist today.  Talking about the issue in the article Sinofsky says,

Our focus on delivering a new level of security for consumers using WOA is paramount. In one public event, we were asked if we would “make it easy for existing viruses and malware to run.” Now you can see the answer is decidedly, “no.”

I spoke with Windows hacker Rafael Rivera (of Within Windows fame) and he believes that unless a user roots his WOA device, his device is theoretically safe from virus infections. For Microsoft, Windows on ARM (WOA) is another version of Windows akin to Windows Server, Windows Phone or Windows Embedded. Microsoft is also expected to bundle their antivirus/antimalware tool–Security Essentials–with Windows 8.

There has been a lot of discussion about Windows 8, Metro-style apps, Intel vs ARM, etc., from the time Windows 8 Developer Preview was released at //build/ last year. A lot of the discussion and debates have to do with unclear communication and secrecy from the Windows team at Microsoft. For example, what exactly is the deal with Windows on ARM devices? Are they going to be a hard cutoff from today’s Windows and not have a desktop experience at all, or will they have a desktop experience? Will the desktop experience be open for all developers or only certain developers (like Microsoft Office) to provide signed apps for ARM which use a restricted desktop?

(Ed: On February 9, Steven Sinofsky posted details about Windows on ARM on the Building Windows 8 Blog, so some of the secrecy has been taken away. However, the points made here are in fact reinforced by the details revealed in the post.)

Those discussions and speculations aside, I truly believe Windows 8 is a huge opportunity for developers. In this post, I will tell you why I believe so. First of all, some math: According to Canalys, there were 415MM PCs sold in 2011. This is after accounting for a decline in sales per original projections! Even though smartphones have exceeded the number of PCs sold, that PC sales number is still a very large number.

Now, let’s assume that those 415MM PCs are split 60-40 with regard to sales to businesses vs. consumers. Taking a round number of 400MM PCs a year gives us about 160MM PCs sold to consumers a year. I am ignoring business PCs for now because let’s face it – they are not going to Windows 8 for some time, and even if they do, there is a strong likelihood of them turning off Metro via IT policies. Consumers on the other hand, won’t have the ability to turn it off, and all new PCs will ship with Windows 8 (Intel or ARM).

In early February, GigaOm reported that Google is working on an entertainment device, Stacey Higginbotham cited an FCC application filed by Google claiming the development of an entertainment device. The FCC application explained that the deice will connect to WiFi networks and pair home electronic devices over Bluetooth.

Companies test various products and not a lot was made out of this report until the news about Google poaching Apple’s Senior Director of Product Integrity. This was a clear sign of Google’s intentions to take hardware more seriously, it could’ve been just about working with Google TV OEMs but it appears to be more than that.

Amir Efrati reporting for the Wall Street Journal says Google is working on a home entertainment system. Piecing the three developments together, it does look like Google will be launching a hardware product. Though Google has Google TV for the living room and Apple has the Apple TV, Microsoft has eclipsed both these companies and currently rules the next-gen living room entertainment market with the Xbox 360 and Kinect.

Like Microsoft and Apple, Google has a music service and a phone platform, getting these to work together and offer an integrated home entertainment system seems like a no-brainer.

Today is a rather momentous day for the crowd-funding website Kickstarter. Elevation Dock – a stunningly well designed iPhone dock, broke LunaTik and TikTok’s record for the highest amount of funding for a single project, and also became the first project to raise more than a million bucks from Kickstarter.

Elevation Dock is a high-end iPhone dock that is designed with the kind of precision and care that would make even Apple proud. It is precision engineered from solid billets of aircraft grade aluminum, and then hand buffed, glass bead blasted, electro-chemically micropolished, hard anodized and sealed. Elevation Dock features a unique low friction connection that allows hassle-free single handed undocking; all you need to do is pull the phone up. Even more impressively, Elevation Dock works equally well on iPhones with or without a case. Elevation Dock adheres to Apples design principles to the T, and in doing so makes Apple’s own iPhone dock look cheap and shabby. It is simple, elegant, drop dead gorgeous, and intuitive to use.

It is worth noting that the previous record holder on Kickstarter was also an Apple related project. Scott Wilson managed to raise $942,578 for his iPod Nano watch. The TikTok project also paid meticulous attention to design and construction. The iPod watches were engineered from premium material, and were both beautiful and convenient.

Elevation Dock is the first to reach the $1 million mark; however, its reign at the top will be fairly short lived. Indie video game Double Fine Adventure, which was announced earlier today, has already shattered the record for the most funds raised in 24 hours with more than $800,000, and it still has 33 days to go.

Last year, Facebook introduced a new feature on the social networking site called "Live Ticker" which displayed a live activity stream of your Facebook friends. Facebook Ticker was hated by a lot of users and also led to a few Facebook scams including the one where users were duped into believing that they could stop posts from showing in Facebook Ticker.

In the past, we wrote about different ways to hide the Facebook Live Ticker. However, Facebook now allows users to hide the Live Ticker easily with the recent changes they have made.

If you are looking to hide the Facebook Ticker in your Facebook feed, you can now simply click the UP arrow key on the Ticker to hide the Facebook Ticker from view. Once that is done, you will no longer see the Ticker on your feed. If you want to see the Live Ticker again, you just have to click on the down arrow key and it will show up again.

Also Read:

• Boost Your Small Business on Facebook
• Express Your Life with Timeline Movie Maker
• Access Facebook on Any Mobile Without GPRS or Internet Connection

However, one must note that hiding the Ticker will only hide it from view. There is no way to stop your posts from showing up on all your friends profile so don’t forget to stay away from Facebook scams which tell you that you can stop your posts from showing up in the Live Ticker.

It appears that Google has had a change of heart, and has finally decided in favor of launching its own cloud storage solution to compete with the likes of Dropbox, Box.net, SkyDrive, and iCloud. The Wall Street Journal believes that Google is very close to launching Google Drive, something that users have been anticipating and demanding ever since Gmail launched with a gigabyte of storage. In fact, Google was almost ready to launch a similar product called GDrive, way back in 2008. However, Sundar Pichai, the current SVP of Chrome and Apps, managed to get the product dumped with a bizarre argument that files are outdated. According to Steven Levy’s “In the Plex”, Pinchai believed that “Files are so 1990”.

“You just want to get information into the cloud. When people use our Google Docs, there are no more files. You just start editing in the cloud, and there’s never a file.”
– Sundar Pinchai

Google’s entry into the cloud-storage arena is long overdue. Both Microsoft and Apple have compelling products in this segment, which are already (or soon will be) tightly integrated with their own ecosystem. Google, on the other hand, has allowed third-parties like Dropbox to take control of the Android ecosystem. What makes the prolonged lack of an online backup solution from Google surprising is the fact that Google is well known for having access to ginormous quantities of cheap storage. In fact, Google already offers plenty of storage to users in the form of Gmail, Google Docs, and Picasa. What it has been lacking so far is an integrated solution to unite its assorted services.

Like its competitors, Google will be opting for a freemium model. The basic storage plan for Google Drive will be free, with additional storage available for purchase. It will be interesting to observe how Google prices its new product. If it retains the current model of charging $5 per year for additional 20 gigabytes, and $20 per year for 80 gigabytes, it could very well demolish its competitors. It is also likely that at some point, Google will bundle Drive with Google Apps for Android, which should give an instant boost to its user base.

Dropbox famously turned down a nine-figure acquisition offer from Apple. Now, with Google, Microsoft, and Apple setting their sights on the cloud storage market, it will have its work cut out. However, if Dropbox manages to retain its focus on innovation and superior customer service, it will prove to be a tough competitor to beat.

As per schedule, the stable release of Google Chrome 17 is here. The biggest new feature is omnibox pre-rendering. Google already tries to autocomplete URLs for you as you begin typing in the omnibox, which is Google’s fancy way of referring to Chrome’s addressbar. However, in the latest version, Google will also begin to load the suggested URL in the background, if it believes that you are very likely to visit that website. This creates an illusion of speed by loading the website in advance. The technique itself is not new. In fact, Google’s infamous Web Accelerator heavily relied on pre-fetching to speed up web browsing, and Chrome already pre-fetches some of the search results on Google.com.

While pre-fetching of content is a great feature for most consumers, it does have its share of disadvantages. If you have a tight data cap, the last thing you want is your browser to waste your bandwidth by loading pages you might not even want to visit. It will also create headaches for webmasters by registering fake hits that will increase bandwidth and server resource consumption, besides messing up analytics. Netscape had earlier experimented with pre-fetching, but it allowed the webmasters to be in control.

The other major new feature is called “Safe Browsing”. Going forward, Google will cross check all downloaded executables against a whitelist of publishers and files. If it doesn’t find a match, it will attempt to determine if the download is safe or not by leveraging a complicated machine learning algorithm. It is worth nothing that this feature sends data about the file along with your IP address to Google. After two weeks, any personally identifiable information (such as IP address) is deleted, and only the file URL is retained on Google’s servers.

Chrome 17 also fixes a grand total of 20 security vulnerabilities. Google awarded a total of $10,500 to security researchers for the discovery of these potential security threats. You can learn more about the security issues patched by Google over here.

The new release can be downloaded from google.com/chrome. However, Chrome users on the stable channel should be automatically updated to the Chrome 17 during their next browsing session.