Midori OS – Microsoft’s future without Windows

Microsoft’s new experimental Operating System Midori- a non-Windows OS, has come out of its incubation phase and the project is transferred to Microsoft's Unified Operating System group for continued development. Midori is the code name for a managed code operating system being developed by Microsoft with joint efforts of Microsoft Research. This OS could spawn a new open-source programming language called "M#” (aka “M-Sharp”), a spin-off of existing C#.

Microsoft was developing the non-Windows Midori OS from 2008, when we thought it might have had something to do with a successor to Windows 7 which turned out to be something different, say, Midori. M# was reportedly developed alongside Midori in order to help build Midori as a lightweight OS free from the constraints of a Windows legacy built over decades. Reports say that this new extension to C# came out of Sing#, which is the system language of “Singularity” OS with everything being written in managed code then natively compiled. The basic idea of developing M# is to provide the lowest-level language ever.

WHAT”S THE DIFFERENCE?

MIDORI is an offshoot of Microsoft Research´s Singularity operating system. In this OS tools and libraries are completely managed code like a microkernel. MIDORI is designed to run directly on the native hardware (x86, x64 and ARM); will be hosted by a Windows process. MIDORI can be also seen as MICROSOFT´S answer those competitors who are applying "Virtualization" as a mean to solving issues within contemporary computing.

Also see : Is it an Era of "windows 8.1" ?

According to the documentation provided, Midori will be built with an asynchronous-only architecture that is built for task concurrency and parallel use of local and distributed resources, with a distributed component-based and data-driven application model, and dynamic management of power and other resources.

The Midori programming model will cope up with state management, which Microsoft admits in its documentation, is a challenge in Windows, by migrating APIs, applications and developers to a constrained model.

Unlike Windows, Microsoft intends for Midori to be componentized from the beginning to achieve performance and security benefits. It will be having strong isolation boundaries and enforced contracts between components, which will ensure that servicing one component will not affect others, while keeping overhead minimal.

It still seems unlikely that Microsoft will ever go commercial with a non-Window OS, but pieces of it could wind up in future iterations of Windows. According to insiders, the OS group will be making the final decision on which aspects of Midori will survive, and how far will it go on the OS roadmap. As we cannot say the time when MIDORI will be officially announced by Microsoft, but this will definitely make an impact similar or more radiant than that when Windows was launched in 1985.

Author : Iman Majeed Sources: zdnet & Joe Duffy's Blog

On Tuesday, December 31, 2013

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“Removable” Intel processor in new Mac Pro

According to the needs of the user, the processor in the new Mac Pro can be removed from the system and user can upgrade it.

Apple blogs on Friday reported that a teardown discloses that Mac Pro is socketed,  which means that the processor can be removed by the system and upgraded.

The Intel Xeon process which was installed in the Mac Pro socketed can be removed from the system if user wishes to upgrade.  In the past Apple products were not upgraded neither their parts were removable, but in order to be in the competitive market Apple has launched its strategy.

In addition to socket CPU, Apple has also decided to upgrade it’s RAM, Apple has opted of use of traditional RAM slots so that the user can upgrade.

It’s an opportunity for Third party accessory to make it compatible with Apple’s hardware. But the question is it would compatible with OS X operating system

Apart from that if the user has small size of Mac pro  user would be unable to add additional components .

What does Mac Pro has?

It has six high-speed thunderbolt dual ports, that allows a number of bandwidth

USB 3.0

2 Gigabit Ethernet inputs + HDMI 1.4 video output.

The above config make Apple to give title to Mac Pro as “Most Expandable Mac yet”.

Now, user can buy an Apple and can also upgrade it,..

Author : Aakar Gupte Source : Appleinsider

On Monday, December 30, 2013

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Lets know, What is 'Searchlet' ????

Tired of opening numerous Tabs for searching?? Don’t worry, a new Web app – Searchlet allows you to search instantly from four online references - Google, Wikipedia, the News and Dictionary by highlighting any text on any page without opening a new tab.

To use Searchlet, all you need to do is to install it onto your bookmarks bar. You have to highlight a term and click on your Searchlet button, a sidebar slides onto the left of your browser page and shows you results. The sidebar is fast and unobtrusive. Its results are refreshed when you highlight new terms and it disappears as soon as you close it. Or right click and Add to Bookmarks/Favorites. After you have the bookmark, just click the “Searchlet” button and instantly search any page. When reading a page, highlight text you are interested in and click Searchlet. After that, you can highlight any text and Searchlet will instantly search for you.

Searchlet is a handy web app for all internet users who want to increase their work productivity by managing their browser tabs. It enhances the online web browsing experience and save the users from tab overload.

Searchlet creators are- Mark Fazzini and Spencer Simonsen. Both graduated from University of Florida and have their hands on experience in technology sales and web programming. They say having a tool like Searchlet not only increases productivity but also increase user’s impulse to gather new knowledge dramatically in fractions of second.

The duo claims that Searchlet can increase search speeds by up to 86%, a figure that they arrived at base on initial testing that looked at how long it took a user to highlight text, then open up a new tab and then navigate to Google, Wikipedia or to Wiktionary to perform a search. This process they found took about 10 to 15 seconds for each site. Using Searchlet reduced that time to only about four to six seconds.

The creators of Searchlet says that this web app can potentially earn revenue through advertising, premium resources and partnership but the startup’s current focus is getting Searchlet on as many bookmark bars as possible in order to improve its functionality. 

So, Searchlet seems to be very interesting, helpful and time saving app. Now, if you want to search anything, Go Searchlet!!

Author : Iman Majeed

On Monday, December 30, 2013

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Kullu Manali Trip : 'Worth Remembering Experiences'

Since my childhood, my father has always taken us to see and travel to different places in our vacations. Kullu Manali in Himachal Pradesh is one of those few places which have left its mark in my memory very vividly. The way it was chosen for our travel was also very interesting because it was left on us, the children to decide between Kashmir and Kullu Manali for the visit. We had actually halted on the path from which there were two different roads leading to each of these destinations. And it was Kullu Manali for us, because of the never seen snow and unusual names.

Interestingly, Kullu Manali is not entirely whole but comprised of two places, that is, Kullu and Manali. And they very well connected and are part of each other. It was summer, and the weather in Kullu Manali was still very cold, which is very different to what we feel in Mumbai. The cool breeze gave us an excellent start to our stay over there. We were surrounded all sides by huge mountains, varied nature and lots of adventures. Kullu being a valley, offered us worth remembering experiences in activities such as trekking, river rafting, mountaineering and paragliding. While exploring the place, we also came across some beautiful hand woven caps and shawls sold by some humble locals for their living. Manali was equally entertaining and beautiful. It consists of snow covered mountains, green fields, deodar and pine forests and some beautiful fruit orchards. It provides people with sports and activities like water Ballooning, Skiing, Jeep Safari and camping. Manali houses one of the best mountaineering institutes for trekkers and mountaineers.

Besides its natural beauty, Kullu Manali is also well known for well craved temples, Budhhist Monasteries and brilliant artistries. I have had one of the best experiences in Kullu Manali and it has given me memories I could hold on to all my life. I really hope that at least once again in life time I get to go there and build more wonderful memories and experiences.

Author/Traveler : Anvi Babaria

On Monday, December 30, 2013

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Google’s Chromebook is rising high

Google has earned a lot this year through its “Underestimated” Chromebook. Its sales figure suggests that it’s high time to take Google’s Chromebook seriously. Google's minimalist Chromebooks came from practically nowhere in 2013 to amass 21 per cent of all notebook sales and 10% of all computers and tablets leading into the festive season according to the report.

Earlier Chromebooks were a bit of a laughing stock. They were really underperforming single-purpose laptops that weren’t even good at the only thing they could do (that is, surf the webs). Nobody really looked up to them, despite their low price. Early sales were highly disappointing, and even some of the Google’s hardware partners looked like they were only doing this as a favor to Google. The whole project idea seemed doomed from the start.


Also See : Foot prints by Google

Chromebooks somehow went from being irrelevant to actually making a sizable dent in the laptop market and in the business market. Amazon this week informed that two out of its three best-selling laptops during the holiday season were Chromebooks.

We all are aware of the limitations of Chrome OS, until very recently there wasn’t a great deal you could do with a box equipped with it if you didn’t have WiFi available. But, that’s now changed; you can work offline even if only in a limited fashion. There are more areas where you can catch free WiFi, making that limitation less serious as time passes by.

There’s a more important point behind this though: Chrome OS has blown right through the sort of market penetration that Apple's Mac OS was getting in the 90s and Microsoft thought of that as a threat and quite rightly too. For the overall success of Microsoft’s Windows which is based upon network effects. Everyone prefers to buy Windows because everyone wants to buy Windows. And that is true then everyone develops for Windows and so the question closes. Why would you move to any other operating system if you couldn’t get the programs you wanted to run? But Chrome is improving on its OS and is giving a tough competition to Microsoft.

It looks like Microsoft’s supremacy is now on stake. The near monopoly Microsoft has had for some 20 years looks like it’s about to be broken. Over the years Google has created a more varied ecosystem of hardware partners that includes virtually all major laptop manufacturers, including the likes of Lenovo (though only for education), HP, Toshiba and Acer. With the $1,300 Pixel, Google even designed its own high-end Chromebook. What the Pixel did, though, was to show that Google was fully backing this project, which definitely helped the ecosystem and potential business customers to light up the idea.

It shows Chromebook is the new beginning for Google and eventually Microsoft is getting squeezed. Seems like Chromebook is the Christmas cum New Year gift for Google.!!

Author : Iman Majeed

On Sunday, December 29, 2013

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Secure Snapchat???

The popular photo sharing Android and iOS app, Snapchat may have some security issues that need to be immediately addressed, according to Gibson Security which is a group that claims to have hacked Snapchat’s API, which is currently not publicized. There are two exploits, the find_friends exploit and the Bulk Registration exploit.

Find_Friends

The first of the two takes in a set of phone numbers and can match them to a username if that is enabled by the user being found or not. This could even lead to spam. When the phone number matches the record of a Snapchat user, the hacker will get a record that includes the username, its associated display name, and whether the account is private or not.

Bulk Registration

The second exploit is the Bulk Registration which sounds exactly like what you would think: it creates thousands of Snapchat accounts, which then would make it easier to run the find_friends exploit even faster.

With this, anyone can build an exact clone of Snapchat's API and stalk the popular app's alleged 8 million users. Snapchat names, aliases, and phone numbers can be discovered and harvested via the Snapchat Android and iOS API — even if the user's account is private.

The Security team had presented the issues to Snapchat in August saying anyone can save media that is sent to them, create a database of usernames and phone numbers and connect names to aliases and then to social media accounts. It could even hit a user with a denial-of-service (DoS) attack but these issues are still not addressed and warn they pose serious threat for users.

Gibson Security group explained that the problem could have been fixed earlier with just ten lines of code, but Snapchat ignored their warnings and they felt they had to act. Gibson cautions that both scams and stalking are possible as a result of the security breach which is being overlooked by Snapchat. Hackers could use the phone numbers that they use to uncover the actual identities of users as well as their general locations. They could even use the data gathered to create a profit-making database wherein Snapchat users’ phone numbers and social media profiles could be purchased by anyone providing only the individual’s Snapchat username.

But Snapchat dismisses any concern regarding security hole.  Snapchat says it has recently added additional counter-measures and continues to combat spam and abuse, adding that the hack sounded 'impractical'.

There are no details on how these counter-measures work, such bad IP blocking, rate limiting or automated systems that scan suspicious activity that may be someone trying to match names and numbers. This vagueness could keep the new barriers from being evaded, but it doesn’t offer much comfort to users.

Let’s see whether it is really safe snapping or not.

Author : Iman Majeed

On Saturday, December 28, 2013

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Siri—Apple’s New Photo Navigator??

Apple has patented a system which would allow for voice-based tagging and retrieval of photographs stored on iOS devices, according to sources. The patent application was first made back in March this year that would allow for “a method for tagging or searching images using a voice-based digital assistant”, i.e. Siri. It is a "Voice-Based Image Tagging and Searching" which connects voice with pictures saved on an iPhone.

Apple is planning to widen the scope of Siri - its hit-and-miss personal voice assistant

On Saturday, December 28, 2013

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A cool smartfone with "wireless charging"....yup, "i-phone 6" it is !

After the enormous success of IPhone 5S and iphone5C, Apple Inc. innovators has rolled their ideas and deployed into I phone 6.

Apple would release its Iphone 6 in the market around the month of May 2014. Apple is targeting to capture market with its rival Samsung hence it’s to be known that Samsung galaxy S5 would be therein market in mid of the year 2014 thus Apple has decided it’s strategy to capture market with Iphone 6.

On Friday, December 27, 2013

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Annavaram – The second Tirupati

I initially was making trips to  Visakhapatnam  in A.P.  to spend my holidays.  Some time it was extended to Arku  Vally, the another beautiful place, near vizag. It is always a nice experience to  cross  a series of dark tunnels and bridges to reach that place from Visakhapatnam  while travelling  by train  . But once I visited Annavaram which is hardly 130 km from Visakhapatnam, on Rajahmundry – Vijaywada route, and now   it has became  a spot of  regular visit  to satisfy the  agony of seeing the scenic beauty and  spiritual place   to ask for peace of mind to the super powers. The historic back ground is also non-ignorable.

The Mandir was constructed with a view of  row of Eastern Ghats , the river Pampa encircling  Ratnagiri  and a distant view of Bay Of Bengal ( 11 KM ). It is  said that there is a underground passage in the hills and was used by the then kings to attack  the enemy from  both sides. And  also the Andhra revolutionary late Alluri seetharama Raju  had some  secret  shelters for himself and followers in the hills ranges , to fight the British Rule.  The front of   temple  designed as  a chariot with four wheels,  indicate that the juggernaut moves on  the  wheel of time and  moves forward for  ever.  Mandir is at the top of the Ratnagiri hill about 300 ft above sea level and  there are about 450 stone steps  to reach on the top

Anna means “ what you desire “  and Varam means Godsend. The believe is that the diety will fulfil one with whatever one desires.  Ratnagiri was the son of Meruvu, the lord of hills ( who,  with his consort  Menaka  got blessing for two sons from Lord Vishnu  -  Bhadra & Ratnakar . Bhadra  became  Bhadrachalam, after pleasing Lord Vishnu , where Lord Shri Rama permanently settled) pleased  Lord Vishnu  by his penance and Lord Vishnu permanently settled as Veera Venkata Satyanaranaswamy. Ratnakar came as Ratnagiri.

The main idol is a combination of three LORDS.  Lord Brahma at the bottom , Lord Shiva in the  middle,  Lord Vishnu at the top. The image of lords forming  the trimurthis - Lord Brahma - the creator, Lord Shiva - the destroyer and Lord Vishnu - the protector  , is the unique  attraction, which representing the supreme power of the entire universe and is believed that worshipping in this temple will be beneficial of 108 times visit to Tirupati.  There is a flood of visitors  daily and as said ,that more than 5000 devotees are visiting  Annavaram, per day. There are huge numbers of yagya pit and about 1500 worshippers can offer puja at a time. Worshippers  mainly worship for  wealth, education, prosperity, relief from trouble and  sickness, success in business etc. There are shrines of Ramalaya, Kanak Durga  and Vana durga on the way to top and it is believed that they  still  roam around the Mandir premises in the night for guarding the Lords  or Lords’ premises.  

The nearby sites to watch are Kakinada sea beach , a Shakti pith at Samalkota ( near Samalkota Rly Station ),  Shiva Lingam in this temple is nearly 9 ft. height and upper  part is seen at the first floor  and the early morning sunlight falls on the Linga. The deity of Siva is known as Bhimesvara Swamy    There are nearly 800 ancient scripts on the walls of the temple.  As per local   belief, the Siva linga at the temple was  an act of  the god Surya.

Very easily reachable by train from  Howrah , Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi, Bangalore and is situated  on the way to vizag-vijaywada route. Very frequent bus service is also available from vizag, vijaywada and  Hyderabad.  But  it may be convenient , if staying at vizag, to take a cab  to start at the early morning and back in the same day. Hotel fecilities and arrangement for staying at  Mandir premises  are also there. Lunch is an important  factor  for the visitors and in the age of globalisation , food choice has also taken a sea change shape all over the country. In the mandir premises,  one can have beautiful and simple  hot samber rice and nice card rice  to avoid outside hotel food.

Author/Traveler : Dipankar Roy

On Friday, December 27, 2013

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Bangkok - "Krung Thep"

My first trip abroad had started with Bangkok, the capital of Thailand. Even though, it has been years since I have visited it the wonderful experiences and memories I have received are still very fresh and vivid in my mind. 
We had been to Bangkok in the months of May-June and the climate was beautifully sunny and rainy at the same time.We stayed in Bangkok for 4 whole days enjoying every bit of entertainment it gave us.

One amazing thing we realized as soon as we stepped in Bangkok that we are going to be  eating  plenty, filling our stomachs because there were incredible food stalls in almost every corner of the city attracting us with its mouth watering aromas.

On Friday, December 27, 2013

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Paramount 10 Apps of 2013

The year 2013 was best for the innovation in Mobile Apps world. We have come across two gigantic mobile rivals iOS and Android.  

The release of the OS and Apps was on frequent basis, the competition to show the innovation was at the pinnacle. iOS came up with iOS 7.0 and upgrades where as Google also release its KitKat version in Android 4.4.  

On Thursday, December 26, 2013

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TOP 7 GADGETS OF 2013

As the countdown begins for the New Year-2014, we all are waiting for new gadgets. But before 2013 ends Edictogram brings you a flashback of the top best gadgets of 2013 which you surely enjoyed using them. 

Let’s have a quick look on the gadgets which ruled 2013 according to their popularity.

7. NOKIA LUMIA 1020

One of the most awaited gadget of 2013 Nokia Lumia 1020 which was unveiled on 11th July 2013 is the best Windows Phones one can get that acts as both, a top quality camera (41 megapixel camera with Xenon flash) and a smart phone (internal is Qualcomm Snapdragon with dual-core 1.5GHz processor, 2GB RAM, 32GB on board storage, 2,000 mAh battery). This 41-megapixel camera phone is an LTE-enabled, high-definition Windows Phone 8 smart phone with the best camera (it has Xenon flash instead of LED) that any smart phone out in the market today offers.

The Nokia Lumia 1020 is a game changer when it comes to the camera that delivers sophisticated capability of zooming, and a secondary video camera that's great for recording video and capturing still images. Nokia developed a lot of great apps especially the Pro Camera app. This app has many great features that allows users a great deal of granularity over the image, so that you can control everything from the white balance, manual focus, ISO, shutter speed (exposure time).

For those who are not as technical and don't need a lot of controls, there are some other great apps such as the Nokia Smart Cam app (Best Shot, Change Faces, Action Shot, Motion Focus and Remove Moving Objects), which is good for users who take photos because it offers options to select the best photos. It offers good video recording too. Its image stabilization is wonderful for still shots because the camera stays put even when you move; oversampling offers accurate and vibrant colors really.

Nokia Wireless Charging Case comes in black or yellow. With this case there's no need for plugging and unplugging for power. This form of fitting the wireless charging cover offers full access to touch screen and buttons. Just put it on a Nokia wireless charging accessory and the rest it knows its work.

This is one of the remarkable inventions of Nokia till date.

6. APPLE iPAD-AIR

The iPad Air is Apple’s attempt to make the iPad disappear. The result is an unusually slim, lighter and faster fifth generation iPad tablet. It was announced on 22nd October, 2013 and was released in space grey and silver colors on November 1, 2013. A well crafted gadget of Apple at its best. See More

5. GALAXY GEAR SMARTWATCH

Samsung Galaxy Gear is an Android based Smartwatch produced by Samsung Electronics. It was unveiled on September 4, 2013 and released on 25th September, 2013. The device serves as a companion for all Samsung Galaxy Smart phones and tablets.

• Hardware

The Galaxy Gear is powered by a single-core 800 MHz Exynos system-on-chip, and contains a 320 pixel square-formed Super AMOLED touchscreen display. Its band contains a 1.9 megapixel camera with a Back-illuminated sensor and 720p video recording. The Galaxy Gear also includes 4 GB internal memory, 512 MB of RAM, a gyroscope and an accelerometer. The device contains a 315 mAh battery; the device itself does not contain a charging port and must be placed inside a special Micro USB-equipped charging case, which contains an NFC tag which is used for the initial setup of this device. The Galaxy Gear is designed to IP55specifications with dust resistance and protection from short-term exposure to water jets.

• Software

The Galaxy Gear uses an Android 4.2.2-based OS with a minimalistic interface and gesture-based navigation. To pair the Galaxy Gear with a smart phone or tablet as its host device, the NFC tag which is inside the Gear's charging cradle is used to trigger the installation of the Gear Manager app, which uses the Bluetooth to coordinate the pairing process and perform further communication with the device. The camera app can take photos or record videos up to 15 seconds in length.

So, this is Samsung’s Smartwatch which is truly Style over Substance.

4. GOOGLE GLASS

Google Glass is a wearable computer with an optical head-mounted display (OHMD) that is being developed by Google in the Project Glass research and development project. Google Glass provides information in a smart phone that can communicate with the Internet via natural language voice commands. It was released in February 2013. See More

3. SONY PS 4

PlayStation 4 is a video game console from Sony Computer Entertainment. It is the successor to PlayStation 3 which was announced on 20th February 2013, it was launched on 15th November 2013. It competes with Nintendo's Wii U and Microsoft's Xbox One. See More

2. MICROSOFT X BOX

The Xbox is a video gaming brand created by Microsoft. It includes a series lined up of video game consoles developed by Microsoft, as well as applications, streaming services, and an online service, Xbox Live. The successor to the Xbox 360 and Microsoft's Xbox One. See More

1. CHROME CAST

Chromecast is a digital media player developed by Google. This device, which is a 2.83-inch (72 mm) dongle, which plays audio and video content on a high-definition television by streaming it via Wi-Fi from the Internet or local network. Users can select the media to play on their television from the Google Chrome web browser on a personal computer or from a supported app on their mobile device.

Hardware

Chromecast contains the Marvell 88DE3005 (Armada 1500-mini) system on a chip. Radio communication is handled by Azure Wave NH–387 Wi-Fi which supports 802.11b/g/n (2.4 GHz). The device has 512 MB of Micron DDR3L RAM and 2 GB of flash storage.

Software

• Software Development Kit

Google released a beta "Google Cast SDK" to allow developers to make their applications compatible with Chromecast. Developers must create a "sender" app for Google Chrome, iOS or Android to send the media, along with a "receiver" page that appears on the Chromecast device to play the content.

• Operating System

Chromecast runs on simplified version of Chrome OS.

Features

Measuring 2.83 inches (72 mm), Chromecast plugs into the television's HDMI port and the power is supplied by connecting the device's micro-USB port to an external power supply or a USB port. The device can be connected to the Internet through a Wi-Fi connection to the user's home network. Chromecast can work in two ways and both of which can stream content to a television. The first way is that it employs mobile and Web apps. The second, called "tab casting" which can mirror almost any content displayed by the web browser Google Chrome running on a personal computer.

So, all in all it’s small and cool.

So, this was the closure post from Edictogram to enjoy the tech - moments of 2013.

Author : Iman Majeed

On Thursday, December 26, 2013

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