Internet support

Adobe on Monday released the long-awaited AIR download for running Web applications offline, but Microsoft is readying an update to its Silverlight platform that it hopes will keep Web developers in its camp. Microsoft will release the first beta of Silverlight 2 "shortly," said Scott Guthrie, a general manager in Microsoft's developer division in charge of Web development, in his blog on Friday. Next week, the company is hosting its Mix '08 Web development and design conference in Las Vegas. Silverlight 2 is a ***

I fell in love with Zimbra's Ajax-style interface the first time I saw it. Slick, powerful, and much more extensible than Microsoft Outlook ever dreamed of being. There was just one thing I hated about the Zimbra experience: the browser artifacts around the application that made me feel like I was stuck in a Web site, rather than living in an application that just happened to leverage the power of the Web. No more. For the past few weeks I've been using Zimbra's new Prism-based Desktop. Verdict? It rocks. Take a look at the UI below: ***

AOL has been dragged into the Yahoo-Microsoft acquisition story, which with Google’s possible involvement now makes it an internet love rectangle, but they have their own fish to fry. At the Mobile World Congress 2008 in Barcelona they’ve announced their own open mobile platform, which will enable developers to build RIAs for mobile devices. The platform will become available to developers sometime in the summer and the applications built on the platform will work across most major mobile device platforms - BREW, Java, Linux, RIM, Symbian and Windows Mobile - but interestingly enough, Android is nowhere to be seen. ***

If you"ve got family and friends sprinkled about the globe, you know that the richness of these contacts loses luster if you can"t regularly keep in touch. Though there are excellent solutions out there--local-access calling cards, VoIP on the PC, VoIP phones from Vonage or Skype, and local-number services like Talkster (review)--they require your presence at home, new hardware, or wasting precious seconds with mile-long pin numbers or droning ads. Challenging the herd is EQO (pronounced "echo"), a communication service that offers a simple, fast, and affordable solution for international outreach on your cell phone. ***

We’ve written quite a bit about backups, from swapping backup strategies to protecting data in the cloud. We’ve also looked at a variety of file sharing and remote access solutions. But wouldn’t it be nice to just run one program to take care of all the ways you want to move around and manage your data? That’s the premise of BeInSync, who provide a sort of universal transport layer for your files. ***

Since I started synchronizing my e-mail inboxes a few months ago, I rarely even open my Outlook mail client. I much prefer seeing the messages sent to my ISP's POP account and those sent to my Gmail account together in my Gmail inbox. But I still have to open Outlook to view my calendar, which I've been using for years, even though I now put many of my nonwork appointments in Google Calendar, which I can access from my iPhone or any Internet-connected PC. I thought I found a free program that would let me synchronize the two calendars automatically. Synchronization Technologies' SyncMyCal claims to let you sync multiple Outlook calendars with your Google Calendar. ***

Adobe Systems on Thursday released the code for messaging software designed to connect back-end data sources to rich Internet applications written with its Flex development tool. Called BlazeDS, the software is a subset of Adobe's full-featured LiveCycle Data Services ES, which it will continue to sell to its corporate customers. BlazeDS will be made available for free under the Lesser General Public License (LGPL). Adobe will initially host the open-source project and next year plans to create a separate site to host BlazeDS and its ***

Google Gears, that nifty (beta) application that enables certain other applications to work in offline mode, now works with Google Calendar. In fact, we can’t really confirm this is true, cause we’ve tried it out and saw no such thing. However, Andy Beal of Marketing Pilgrim claims that when he fired up his Calendar this morning, it was Gears-enabled. He supports these claims with a suspicious screenshot which you can see below. Real or Photoshopped? You be the judge. ***

Update: I clarified some wording in the last paragraph to make it clear that the subscription price includes the hardware, not just support. I confess that, years ago, I was one of those people who was skeptical and somewhat uncomprehending when Linux seller Red Hat changed its pricing to a subscription model, charging for software updates and support over a set period of time. Traditional software companies charge for a license to use a particular piece of technology, but that doesn't work as well in the open-source domain, where getting access to the software itself is easy and free. Now, with many open-source software companies also offering subscriptions, the approach seems comparatively ordinary. So it should come as no surprise that Digium, which commercializes the ***

(Credit: Adobe Systems) Adobe released the public beta of its Adobe AIR runtime environment (previously codenamed Apollo) about a month ago. The software is designed to allow the development of rich Internet applications that work on any operating system. I"m sure that there are technical differences, but it seems a lot like an amped-up widget engine to me. Needless to say, AIR apps aren"t nearly as ubiquitous as Adobe Flash apps (yet), but there have been a few interesting recent developments. The most-polished AIR application so far is Adobe Digital Editions, software for reading, downloading, and managing e-books. ***

Microsoft"s Silverlight technology, launched at the NAB conference two weeks ago and pitched hard to developers at the Mix "07 conference this week, is being taken as a competitor to Adobe"s Flash. Since it is a framework for providing rich applications to the Internet browser, it is indeed that. But though Silverlight and Flash are competing technologies, Microsoft"s offering is different from Adobe"s in key ways. More than just a platform Silverlight is being pushed side-by-side with Microsoft"s Live services for developers. ***

Skype's business model is taking a distinct eBay shape. The latest software from the Luxembourg-based Internet telephony specialist, acquired by the online-auction king in 2005, enables users to offer services over the company's Internet voice and video network. Skype 3.1, which was released on Wednesday for Windows PCs, includes a feature called SkypeFind that lets users list and rate local businesses. It also includes a beta version of Skype Prime, a "marketplace which brings together those people who have expertise or knowledge to sell with others who are seeking advice and happy to pay for it," according to the company. ***

SIPphone is launching a service called Gizmo that allows people to make Internet phone calls without having to use a traditional software client. Using a downloadable flash plug-in, SIPphone's Gizmo Project lets consumers simply type a number into a special field and click a call button to connect. The plug-in lets people call most landline or mobile phones from anywhere in the world using any Internet browser. Gizmo is different from Internet-calling applications such as Skype in that its basic service doesn't require a traditional software download or account registration. ***

Yahoo and Microsoft have announced a deal that will allow interoperability between their instant messaging services. The project should let both companies take on AOL, which dominates the IM world with its AIM product. While all three companies have worked together in the past, most of the progress toward interoperability has been on the corporate side. The news, first reported in the Wall Street Journal, was met with delight by many bloggers, who welcomed any effort that supports messaging systems that talk to one another. ***

Vonage, a provider of Internet-based calling services, is testing wireless routers, a sign the company is on the verge of debuting a mobile offering. The ongoing customer trials involve a new Linksys Wi-Fi router that Vonage could market along with its calling plans, according to an e-mail sent to customers and seen by CNET News.com. Vonage has in the past acknowledged that its customers are also testing a handset equipped with a Wi-Fi antenna and radio. With the special router and handset, individual customers would be free to roam about their home or office, untethered from a modem or phone jack and without a connection to a laptop or desktop computer. ***

Conventional wisdom has it that the telephone network will evolve away from old-fashioned circuit switching and be replaced by voice over IP. Investors have ponied up to the bar to fund VoIP companies; most major telecom manufacturers have largely abandoned development of new circuit-switching and time division multiplexing (TDM) products. But before we nail the coffin shut on the legacy of the digital telephone technology that was so widely hailed two decades ago, let's examine the strengths and weaknesses of VoIP. In looking at VoIP as a technology, it's important to distinguish between the cost of building or running a network and the price a service provider charges. VoIP benefits from the Internet's pricing model. There is rarely a charge for usage or for distance. The incremental price of a call thus seems to be free. ***

ICQ is taking a step back to simpler times. The popular instant messaging service owned by America Online on Monday released a slimmed-down version, called "ICQ Lite," that targets first-time users with its simplicity. The service is smaller, with a 1.7MB file size compared with the standard 3.6MB. But most notably, ICQ Lite comes with fewer of the bells and whistles than its full-featured ICQ cousin. "ICQ Lite appeals to consumers who have never used ICQ before, as well as long-standing ICQ users who don't always need all the options of the full-featured ICQ," Ariel Yarnitsky, co-general manager of ICQ, said in a statement. ICQ Lite focuses on the basic elements of instant messaging such as real-time text exchange and a search engine for other ICQ users. The software lets people send messages to cell phone users via SMS (Short Message Service) and transfer files, and it offers multilingual support. ***

Oracle is revamping its database and e-commerce software to include analysis tools designed to help managers and executives make business decisions. The database software maker traditionally sold its analysis software separately but has decided to integrate that software into its database and e-commerce products to make it easier for companies to analyze their data, an Oracle executive said. Oracle later this month plans to update its application server with two data analysis tools built in. Oracle Discoverer and Oracle Reports allow businesses to generate and view simple reports on corporate data, such as quarterly sales figures by region or date. ***

Upstart SilverStream Software is beefing up its family of e-commerce software to avoid being crushed by giant competitors such as Microsoft and IBM. SilverStream this week unveiled a new strategy to provide businesses all the software they need to build and run e-commerce Web sites that connect to customers and partners. The strategy is similar to other contenders, such as Allaire and Bluestone Software, which are trying to compete against software heavyweights such as Oracle, Sun-Netscape Alliance and BEA Systems in the red-hot e-commerce software market. Like many of its competitors, SilverStream has historically sold application servers, technology often described as the operating system of e-commerce Web sites. Application servers run business software and handle transactions, such as Web surfers' requests to buy products online. ***

SAN FRANCISCO--Four years ago, Microsoft scrambled from behind to catch up with the "Internet gold rush" as chairman Bill Gates explained it. Today, the company spelled out plans to cash in on the next prospecting dream: e-commerce and Web development software. Microsoft executives, including president Steve Ballmer and senior vice president Paul Maritz, today unveiled new development tools and programming interfaces designed to make the company's forthcoming Windows 2000 operating system more attractive as a Web development platform, the company said. Windows is wildly popular with big companies as an operating system for PCs and smaller networked servers. But as the Web technology battleground shifts from client PCs to servers, Microsoft finds itself once again battling Sun Microsystems' Java programming language. ***