Such a crash alert cannot be a surprise for a long time Windows user. This is how Windows has been traditionally handling unexpected application crashes.

Thankfully, Windows 7 may put an end to this unhelpful way of reporting errors. Following is an example Windows 7 Crash alert:

In Windows 7, one can expect an option to cancel the non-responsive part of the application and continue working. This was conspicuously missing in all the earlier versions of Windows. This is much better than killing the entire application and offering to restart, with an option to Debug which doesn’t make sense to most of the users.

Via Windows 7 News

Motivation behind Blue Spruce

IBM’s customers reportedly abhor lengthy and heavy applications installs. They are looking at rich applications providing the core functionality, delivered through the web browsers. Also, IBM is looking at collaboration between the application users and sharing of information, with Blue Spruce.

Components of Blue Spruce

Conceptually, Blue Spruce is made up of 2 components:

• Blue Spruce Client Toolkit
• Blue Spruce Web Server

Blue Spruce Web Server provides Conference Management and Real-time Application Synchronization facilities, thus facilitating interactive communication.  Also, the Server can subscribe to Push services, that can serve as data for the mashup components.

Blue Spruce Client toolkit provides the collaboration API that the application developers can use to communicate with the Web Server.  Also, the architecture will most likely be plug-in based, that enhances the extensibility.

Blue Spruce uses lots of open standards like - WebKit Open Source Browser Engine, HTML, Javascript, CSS, XMPP, Ajax etc. But it is clear that, Blue Spruce will NOT be “open source”, but “community sourced” meaning that the members of the community can contribute.

Blue Spruce in action

Right now, IBM is focusing on finance, health and “heavy industry” for their application development.  The Proof of Concept demos are mainly characterized by mashups (containing various audio, video and map components in a single page) and real-time collaborations by users across geographies, all within the scope of a browser.  These demos were performed on the Safari browser.

So, the Big Blue is again all set, to be noticed by the likes of Microsoft, Adobe and Google.

Presentation - IBM Blue Spruce Demo

Via ReadWriteWeb

BrowserShots takes in the web site URL and the list of browsers to test, that varies across Linux, Windows, Mac and BSD. Then the jobs are queued up, processed by distributed systems and results are uploaded as screenshot images. These screenshots can be downloaded by the web developer.

This is a really quick way of performing a smoke test on the web site, during development.

Via Smashing Magazine

In summary:

• UI Automation framework introduced with Windows Vista, has been greatly improved.  Now, the UI Automation and the legacy Microsoft Active Accessibility (MSAA) system combine together with a nomenclature of Windows Automation API
• Windows Automation API enables easy development of applications, that focus on accessibility
• Windows 7 will also have more accessibility utilities, out-of-the-box.  Also the existing On-Screen Keyboard and Magnifier utilities will be enhanced
• UI Accessibility Checker (AccChecker for short) and UI Automation Verify (UIA Verify) utilities, that are developed by the Windows 7 team, will be handy for developers to validate their applications and identify Accessibility problems, to eliminate them.  This will help to greatly improve the quality of accessibility utilities and make them compatible with the current and future tools based on Windows API

So, both the developers and end users can expect improved Accessibility features with Windows 7.

But, Don Reisinger of CNET News thinks otherwise. In his recent post, he discusses why Windows 7 might hit the shelves in 2009. In a similar note, Microsoft is working hard on making Windows 7 much lighter than Vista, particularly targeting the growing Netbook market and as an alternative to Linux.

Huge number of online storage services, some completely free and some free to a certain limit, have been burgeoning over the last few years. One such service worth mentioning is, Windows Live Skydrive. To use this service, you must sign up for a Windows Live account, which is a Single-Sign-On for all Windows Live services.

Key Features of Windows Live Skydrive:

• Part of Windows Live family.  Can bet on its existence and may not be withdrawn or given up
• Free storage space upto 25 GB
• Single File upload limit of 50 MB
• Simple user interface for Folder Creation and File uploads
• Embeddable links for Folders and Files
• RSS feeds for Public Folders

Skydrive, at the startup, provides the following folders with varying access levels - Documents, Public, Favorites, Shared favorites

But you can create any number of folders and assign suitable access level for each of those. You can choose to make the folder - Private, Public, Share with network (Windows Live), Share with selected people (email list)

Once a folder is made Public, you can also publish the RSS feed link for that folder. This is very useful when you frequently add documents and wish to have it available for the public. Also, the public folders and files can be embedded into web pages using the <iframe> HTML snippet that Skydrive provides.

With Skydrive, you can also create photo albums, add photos and share it with your friends.

Thus, Skydrive is ideal - if you are an active member of Windows Live community or looking for a quality free online storage service with good amount of space.

Currently the following filters are supported - News Content, Faces, Clip Art, Line Drawings, Photo Content

You can read more about the new feature, at the official Google post.

1. Seamless Incognito Browsing

One of the greatest strengths of Chrome, is its seamless incognito browsing mode. While in Incognito mode, any pages that an user visits does not make it to the browsing history and none of the details entered are saved for auto-fill. In short, Incognito browsing mode enables private browsing, especially suited for sensitive transactions in public computers.

Firefox has entered private browsing, in its recent release. Here is an early look at Firefox’s private browsing capabilities. Based on the first look, Google’s version of private browsing stands out due to these reasons:

• Auto-fill addresses work in the private mode too, for websites visited in the private mode. This appears to be missing in Firefox 3.1 Beta
• Firefox closes the current browsing session, before opening the Private browsing mode. This is not the case with Chrome, where both private and non-private sessions can co-exist

2.  Omni Bar

Firefox users are generally used to the address bar and a search bar at the right-top corner.  Chrome has tried to optimize space and made better use of the address bar.  Thus, the address bar has evolved into what is known as an omni bar.  Here, you can read more about the Google Chrome’s Omni bar.. Omni bar makes re-visiting web sites and searching for keywords across search engines, a breeze. This is another edge that Chrome has over Firefox

3. Smaller Navigation Bar + Collapsible Bookmarks Bar = More Browsing Space

Definitely, the first look at Chrome emphasizes the larger browsing space that it offers. The navigation bar with buttons and the address bar is too lean and the bookmarks bar can be toggled in/out using “Ctrl + B”. Thus Chrome has managed to achieve larger browsing space, without sacrificing any comforts

4. Task Manager to monitor Memory usage

This is a really handy feature that Chrome offers. It enables the user at any time to monitor

• Overall memory used by Chrome
• Memory used by each of the browser tabs
• Memory used by each of the plugins

This is extremely useful when the browser starts eating up more memory and helps the user to identify the culprit!

5. Minimal memory usage

Chrome definitely has an edge over Firefox, when it comes to memory usage. Chrome is very fast to load, consumes lesser memory per tab opened and deliver better overall performance. Though there are instances when Chrome crashes in the middle, time is still available to improve on its performance

6. Tab page with most visited, recently closed and recently bookmarked pages

Whenever a new tab is opened, Chrome shows the list of most visited pages along with the pages that were recently closed and bookmarked. This is handy to visit the web pages, that are often viewed

Chrome has certain areas to improve - especially reliability and customization. Also, I would love to see the “Save and Quit” option with Chrome, to retain the open tabs on next start. Keeping fingers crossed on Chrome extensions and other improvements!!!

Wikipedia Academy is a global, non-profit initiative that aims to train people to edit and contribute back to Wikipedia. Those who train are volunteers, who regularly contribute to Wikipedia. Enthusiasts can join any of the existing Wikipedia academies or start new ones.

Following are some of the ways to make Wikipedia better:

1. Use Wikipedia

I think most of us are already doing it. But for those who don’t, start actively using Wikipedia. For many keywords, Wikipedia generally tops the results in a search engine. But I would suggest users to search for keywords, right from within Wikipedia, to not miss the relevant information. A good way for Firefox Users is to choose the “Wikipedia Search” in the global search bar, when searching on keywords

2. Edit Content for Missing or inaccurate information

This is something really crucial. Many of us might find that some key pieces of information are missing or are inaccurate, when reading an article. But most of us leave it there, mainly due to the lack of understanding on Editing Wikipedia content. I would strongly recommend Wikipedia users to register themselves, so that they are eligible to edit/add content. Then the Wikipedia tutorial must give a great starting point - explaining the basics of Editing and Formatting content. Wikipedia has a strong version controlling mechanism, so drop the fear of “screwing up something” that already exists

3. Add Missing Content

How often you find that a search for something in Wikipedia yielded no positive results? This should be a trigger to contribute content to Wikipedia, if not anything else. Wikipedia provides a lot of tools like sandbox for novice contributors, to get started with publishing content. Here is the detailed information, on getting started with the First Wikipedia article. In addition to these, Wikipedia provides tons of resources to get going. Also make sure to refer Copyright guidelines and “Things not to write about in Wikipedia” before publishing the first article

4. Donate to Wikipedia, if possible

As many of us know, Wikipedia is a not-for-profit project. But, definitely the Wikimedia foundation needs money to keep things going and get started in new areas. So, if possible donate to Wikipedia and its growth!

5. Use Related Services from Wikipedia

Wikipedia is not alone. There are a lot more related services, that are provided by Wikimedia foundation. Here is a list of some Wikimedia projects. Make sure to use them appropriately, as per the need and reap the maximum benefits.

6. Contribute to Local Chapters

Wikipedia is currently available only in 250 of about 7000 languages. Local Chapters were started in an effort to localize the concept of Wikimedia across countries and provide the best possible information in each geography. If possible, try and contribute to the Local Chapters in your geography and spread the word about Wikimedia projects

Let us do our best to help Wikipedia grow and be useful to a lot more people, around the world.

In a related note, check out the post by Kiruba announcing the Wikipedia academy in Chennai.

Recently, OHA announced an addition of some key members into their group. Thus the support for Android platform and commitment to provide Android devices and applications, has dramatically increased. New additions to OHA include:

• AKM Semiconductor Inc.
• ARM
• ASUSTek Computer Inc.
• Atheros Communications
• Borqs
• Ericsson
• Garmin International Inc.
• Huawei Technologies
• Omron Software Co. Ltd
• Softbank Mobile Corporation
• Sony Ericsson
• Teleca AB
• Toshiba Corporation
• Vodafone

Of these, Ericsson, Vodafone, Toshiba and Huawei are significant due to their sheer size, market share and brand name. Here is the complete list of OHA members.  Now, Google appears to be reaping the dividends of an open source initiative.