Stripey the Cub

February 8th, 2010 No comments

Our national animal is fighting for its life.

From around 40,000 at the turn of the last century, there are just 1411 tigers left in India.

If we don’t act now, we could lose this part of our heritage forever.

Speak up, blog, share the concern, stay informed… Every little bit helps.

Aircel has partnered with WWF-India to help save our tigers. Explore the site to know how you can help.

Watch this space for updates from Stripey, the tiger cub.

Get involved at www.saveourtigers.com

Categories: InfoPath Tags:

O3D from Google

February 8th, 2010 No comments

What is O3D?

O3D is an open-source web API for creating rich, interactive 3D applications in the browser. This API is shared at an early stage as part of a conversation with the broader developer community about establishing an open web standard for 3D graphics.

O3D is an open-source JavaScript API for creating interactive 3D graphics applications that run in a browser window—games, ads, 3D model viewers, product demos, virtual worlds. O3D extends the client-side software of a web application by providing features at the following levels:

  • System: O3D provides a browser plug-in that adds graphics capabilities inside standard web browsers on Windows, Macintosh, and Linux (TBP) platforms.
  • Content: Content for today’s web is in the form of HTML, image files, and video files. The Developer’s Guide provides information on how to create a fileconverter and loader for any 3D content. O3D provides a sample COLLADA Converter, which can be used to import files in the COLLADA format, an open standard for 3D assets that is supported by popular content creation applications such as SketchUp, 3ds Max, and Maya. Use this sample converter directly, or write your own converter and loader for other formats.

Samples are here

  • Code: O3D extends application JavaScript code with an API for 3D graphics. It uses standard JavaScript event processing and callback methods.
Categories: Google Tags:

PubSubHubbub

February 8th, 2010 No comments

Easily turn existing Atom and RSS feeds into real-time streams.

PubSubHubbub is a simple, open, server-to-server publish/subscribe protocol as an extension to Atom and RSS. Parties speaking the PubSubHubbub protocol can get near-instant notifications via WebHook callbacks when a feed they are interested in is updated.

The protocol is decentralized and free. No company is at the center of this controlling it. Anybody can run a hub, or anybody can publish or subscribe using open hubs. Below is the list of products at Google that have already adopted PubSubHubub– and more are on the way!

For More Info….

Categories: Google Tags:

Closure Tools (Labs)

February 8th, 2010 No comments

A JavaScript optimizer

The Closure Compiler compiles JavaScript into compact, high-performance code. The compiler removes dead code and rewrites and minimizes what’s left so that it downloads and runs quickly. It also also checks syntax, variable references, and types, and warns about common JavaScript pitfalls. These checks and optimizations help you write apps that are less buggy and easier to maintain. You can use the compiler with Closure Inspector, a Firebug extension that makes debugging the obfuscated code almost as easy as debugging the human-readable source.

A comprehensive JavaScript library

The Closure Library is a broad, well-tested, modular, and cross-browser JavaScript library. You can pull just what you need from a large set of reusable UI widgets and controls, and from lower-level utilities for DOM manipulation, server communication, animation, data structures, unit testing, rich-text editing, and more.

The Closure Library is server-agnostic, and is intended for use with the Closure Compile

An easy templating system for both Java & JavaScript

Closure Templates simplify the task of dynamically generating HTML. They have a simple syntax that is natural for programmers. In contrast to traditional templating systems, in which you use one big template per page, you can think of Closure Templates as small components that you compose to form your user interface.

Closure Templates are implemented for both JavaScript and Java, so that you can use the same templates on both the server and client side. For the client side, Closure Templates are precompiled into efficient JavaScript.

Categories: Google Tags:

Google Boot Camp

February 8th, 2010 No comments

Enlist in BootCamp for Google I/O

This year, we’re introducing I/O BootCamp, a new event happening the day before Google I/O. BootCamp is an opportunity for attendees to get a crash course in our major development platforms and tools before they head into Google I/O. BootCamp will feature introductory “101″ content, hands-on lab sessions, and community-led discussions.

BootCamp is only available to those who are registered to attend Google I/O. Since space is limited, we ask that interested Google I/O attendees please register at our BootCamp site.

To register for Google I/O, please visit code.google.com/io.

Categories: Google Tags:

Gmail Buzz?

February 7th, 2010 No comments

Scott noticed that when you create a label named “buzz” in Gmail, the app will tell you:

“Sorry, you can’t create a label named ’buzz’ (it’s a reserved system label). Please try another name”

Does anyone know what this could be? The label wasn’t always reserved, according to Scott, who says he had used the name buzz before.

Looking up the word “buzz” in Google, we get several definitions, like the following: “If a place is buzzing with activity or conversation, there is a lot of activity or conversation there, especially because something important or exciting is about to happen.” Other definitions include “a long continuous sound” and “a word, idea, or activity which has recently become extremely popular” and “If you buzz someone, you call them, usually using an internal telephone line or a buzzer.”

Categories: Google Tags:

Chrome OS Tablet Mockups

February 7th, 2010 No comments

Hot on the heels of the Apple iPad announcement, Google released some mockups for Chrome OS tablets.

“On tablets, the UI would be adjusted to handle larger touch targets. Initial explorations have maintained the same basic chrome layout, but enlarged the controls. Icons could be placed above tabs to provide larger, square targets. Panels would be placed along the bottom edge and could be opened with upward dragging motions,”explains Google.


Read more…

Categories: Google Tags:

Google People Hopper

February 7th, 2010 No comments

Google’s social network site Orkut has a new application that lets you morph one face into another. CalledPeople Hopper, it was broken yesterday but is working now. I’ve created a profile for this purpose (I deleted my real one a while ago) and morphed the first picture, Mr. John Cleese, into Tony Ruscoe below:

The interesting part here is that the intermediate steps themselves are other people from Orkut. Clicking on any face will take you to their profile. Nice here is that Google does some face detection, so you don’t need to work with perfectly cropped portraits. Beyond this, the general area of face search/ portrait comparison/ finding likely-looking faces might have some privacy implications in the future. Will Google Images be able to find your appearance twin in a couple of years – and would we want to be found?

Categories: Google Tags:

Google Chrome PageRank Checker

February 7th, 2010 No comments

was just trying to find out the PageRank of a couple of sites using Internet Explorer’s Google Toolbar, but something was broken. Google Chrome has a nice PageRank extension, though. As you can see in the screenshot, it’s helpful by immediately showing the actual value instead of just a green bar. A couple of times it reverted to zero after loading, but otherwise the values it was showing looked like they were the correct ones. (Considering it doesn’t look like it’s an offical extension, I’m not sure though how accurate the values are now, or will be in the future.)

Categories: Google Tags:

Page Speed Check Plugin

December 30th, 2009 No comments

What is Page Speed?

Page Speed is an open-source Firefox/Firebug Add-on. Webmasters and web developers can use Page Speed to evaluate the performance of their web pages and to get suggestions on how to improve them.

How does Page Speed work?

Page Speed performs several tests on a site’s web server configuration and front-end code. These tests are based on a set of best practices known to enhance web page performance. Webmasters who run Page Speed on their pages get a set of scores for each page, as well as helpful suggestions on how to improve its performance.

Why should you use Page Speed?

By using Page Speed, you can:

  • Make your site faster.
  • Keep Internet users engaged with your site.
  • Reduce your bandwidth and hosting costs.
  • Improve the web!

Getting started

  1. Install Page Speed.
  2. Run Page Speed against your web pages.
  3. Read about the Page Speed performance best practices.
Categories: FreeWare, Google Tags: ,