Unapologetically opinionated views on technology, in the office and out
Simon Bisson is a freelance technology journalist. He specialises in architecture and enterprise IT. He ran one of the UK's first national ISPs and moved to writing around the time of the collapse of the first dotcom boom. He still writes code.
Mary Branscombe is a freelance tech journalist. Mary has been a technology writer for nearly two decades, covering everything from early versions of Windows and Office to the first smartphones, the arrival of the web and most things inbetween.
How about the Google apps?On the one hand, everyone complains about fragmentation with multiple devices and multiple resolutions and not every phone getting Android updates; on the other Wired says device makers who do Android things that aren't phones aren't getting the OS love - they want the marketplace and updates and device certification and a framework for making sure apps can be compatible.
For Lady Ada Lovelace day (celebrating women in technology), I always like to write about not so much one specific woman in technology but about women generally. It's not just how do I choose, though that's hard: it's that by randomly picking some of the women I've talked to recently I feel I can point out the breadth of what women are contributing to tech.
A second screen for your laptop. Reading email attachments in the cloud on your Symbian phone or watching a presentation on the phone while you talk on the phone.
Microsoft is in the same rush to ship Windows Phone that it was to fix its search engine by launching Bing. Microsoft veterans on both teams have told us (separately) of an unrivalled sense of urgency and purpose.
While Internet Explorer 9 may have had the limelight on MIX’s second day, Microsoft also made significant moves towards data accessibility with further announcements around its Open Data Protocol, and the release of the second CTP of its Codename “Dallas” data set marketplace.Asking the questions, “How do you enable many experiences?
Because the wireless Internet is currently a choice between affordable and ubiquitous (pick one - especially when roaming), I can't assume I'll always be able to get online to get files from our server.
The 'Bloom box' fuel system that Silicon Valley is fussing about isn't free energy or perpetual motion; it's a clever way of storing the energy from gas (natural or biogas) in solid oxide fuel cells more efficiently than a gas generator (although when they say it's far more efficient than the US electrical grid that's not saying much, as that emits considerably more CO2 than the UK national grid and loses more of it in transmission).
Steve Ballmer was right when he told the Search Marketing Expo that Google's biggest advantage is having been good enough before anyone else. But I think there's something Microsoft doesn’t get about Google culture.
As we predicted, you won't be able to upgrade existing Windows Mobile 6.5 devices to run Windows Phone 7 - because they don't meet the list of criteria.
Why HP and Cisco broke up - or the future of network hardwareCisco calls it an 'evolving partner landscape'; so what do you do when a partner evolves into a competitor?It wasn't likely that Cisco and HP could stay BFFs when HP bought 3Com, who makes network hardware and when Cisco made moves into HP territory with unified communications and high-definition video conferencing.