Tech News and gift ideas for Nerds from Nate, Phil, and James.
Tech News Links:
- Netflix announced the availability of their app for Windows Phone 7. Yelling and screaming ensued in the comments below for the lack of availability on the Android platform. It is possible that Microsoft developed this app for them. Also some harsh words about the Xbox Live Gold subscription required to USE the Xbox version.
- http://blog.netflix.com/2010/11/xbox-and-windows-7-mobile-phone-news.html
- Android Tablet #Fail! http://gizmodo.com/5686161/
- Objective-Basic compiler for the Mac launches 11/09/2010. How will this be received? Marc Hoffman (RemObjects), for one, prayed for our souls.
- http://www.objective-basic.com/
- F# goes Open Source under the Apache2 license. The mono project plans to include F# as part of it’s core package. http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2010/Nov-11.html
- Kinect released and hacked within 2 days! Has Linux, mac, and windows drivers even written in C# https://github.com/JoshBlake/OpenKinect/tree/master/OpenKinect/ and http://www.adafruit.com/blog/2010/11/10/we-have-a-winner-open-kinect-drivers-released-winner-will-use-3k-for-more-hacking-plus-an-additional-2k-goes-to-the-eff/
- Petzold GIVES AWAY his Windows Phone 7 book! http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_press/archive/2010/10/28/free-ebook-programming-windows-phone-7-by-charles-petzold.aspx
- There were shortages in all of the launches of WP7 in every country. While that may sound like the phone is flying off the shelves (and it kind of is), the bigger problem is that there was just way too few devices for the launch! http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/microsoft-more-windows-phone-7-stock-due-in-the-coming-weeks/7941
- Windows Phone 7 Jailbroken 7 days after release! While the jailbreak does not feature an outside app store or anything like that it does allow root access to the file system and allowed native code to be run on the platform. This hack was performed on the emulator months ago, but that used techniques that were not possible on the phone it’s self. http://veryrite.com/2010/11/15/microsoft-windows-phone-7-wp7-jailbreak-hacked-to-access-full-file-system/
- A major update to Process Explorer (v14) was released 11/16/2010. This includes tabbed information display, network / disk monitoring, aggregate CPU usage for a process tree, etc. http://blogs.technet.com/b/sysinternals/archive/2010/11/16/update-process-explorer-v14.aspx
- Nov 9 2010, Google launches its Instant Preview feature, thereby allowing users to click a button to see a popup screen shot of the highlighted link. Interestingly, Lycos has had this for a while, despite the fact that nobody knew Lycos was still around. The Google preview, while not as easy to use, is more useful in that it does not require a Lycos search to operate it.
- New devices to support Microsoft Lync (what’s this about?): http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/18/jabra-debuts-six-touchscreen-paired-headsets-designed-for-micros/
- Hulu, a web-based TV service launched their premium service 11/18/2010, but slashed the price by 20%, down to $8 to compete in the TV wars with Netflix. Unlike the existing free service, the new premium service provides HD content and is available on non-PC devices, such as PS3 and iPhone. Between Hulu, Netflix, Google TV, Sony 3D TV and Microsoft Kinect’s application diversity (thanks to rapid hacking), we can expect some very interesting paradigm shifts in media and entertainment in the next year.
- Soon-to-retire Microsoft chief software architect Ray Ozzie warns Microsoft that a coming “dawn of a new day” will usher a post-pc computing era for which Microsoft has not prepared, but for which its rivals have.
- Novell will be acquired by Attachmate ($2.2 billion) and CPTN Holdings, a consortion of companies lead by Microsoft (450 million). 882 of its patents will go to Microsoft. PlateSpin virtualization is one of their hot commidities. Mono will continue as-is under Attachmate, according to Miguel de Icaza.
- Acer announced 3 tablet PCs for early 2011, 7” and 10”, Android and Windows 7.
- http://www.betanews.com/article/Acer-announces-Android-and-Windows-tablets-for-2011/1290538700
- Amazon pulls servers for WikiLeaks :: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2373692,00.asp
- WP7 device hack available and gone! ChevronWP7 was created and pulled in just a few days. Microsoft in talks with the writers to allow more homebrew.
- Comcast vs L3 news.
One week before the release of Windows Phone 7 in the US, we talk with MVP RIchard Thomson about the Windows Phone 7 platform. We discuss Engaget's review of the device as well as developer perspectives in programming for the platform.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/19/windows-phone-7-in-depth-preview/
In this episode Joe McBride talks to us about BDD (Behavior Driven Development) and why you would use a BDD framework.
Links:
Show Recorded: October 14, 2010
In this show we discuss Agile Development with Project Manager Bruce Nielson. We'll talk about factors for successful projects and how Agile can help bring those factors.
Show Recorded: September 30, 2010