Microsoft

Back in September of last year, Google unveiled an early look at an interesting (and rather hilarious) new project: Chrome Frame. What it does is take Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser and basically turn it into Google Chrome via a plug-in. Today, that plug-in has progressed enough that Google is graduating it to full beta status. “We think it’s really stable,” engineer Alex Russell tells us in noting the move to beta.

To use Chrome Frame, all a user has to do is go here and install the plug-in on either IE6, IE7, or IE8 running on Windows 7, Vista, or XP. For developers, it’s even easier to target these users: they just have to include a meta tag in their sites’ code and their pages will start to render in IE (with Chrome Frame installed) just as they would in Chrome itself.

“A bunch of big sites are using the tag,” Russell says. One that he singled out was WordPress.com. Anyone who visits a WordPress.com blog on IE with Chrome Frame installed will see it rendered in the Chrome-way — this includes TechCrunch.

So why would a user install Chrome Frame rather than just install Chrome itself? Well there are a few reasons, but the biggest may be that their place of work requires that they use IE for things such as an intranet. Or maybe they just prefer the configuration layout of IE. Chrome Frame doesn’t alter that at all, it simply makes webpages render as they would using some of the more modern web standards that IE doesn’t yet support. For example, you can watch YouTube videos in HTML5-compatible formats in IE with Chrome Frame.

When I asked about IE9, the latest build of Microsoft’s browser, Russell notes that it’s still more of a cut-down shell at this point so it’s hard to know if Chrome Frame will work with it. More importantly, he cites Microsoft’s much-improved adherence to web standards with IE9 as a reason that Google may not need to have a version of Chrome Frame for IE9. But again, it’s too early to tell.

“The goal of Chrome Frame and crhome is to push the web forward. It’s so that everybody can build their page once,” Russell says.

I also asked about mobile browser support for something like Chrome Frame, but Russell said that was more difficult. Part of the reason is that mobile devices are still constrained by memory (and lack of plug-ins), but he also notes that pretty much all the mobile browsers besides Microsoft’s are using WebKit or moving towards it, ensuring they’ll be standard-compliant. And in the mobile browsing world, Microsoft is a small player, not the force it is on the desktop.

Now that it’s in beta, Russell hopes that the move to a fully stable release will be pretty quick. While Google doesn’t count Chrome Frame users among the 70 million active Chrome users, they’re basically brothers from another mother. And Mama Microsoft can’t be too thrilled about that.

Office Web Apps — Microsoft’s free online version of its Office suite — is now available to users in the U.S., the UK, Canada, and Ireland via Windows Skydrive. To try it out, just head to office.live.com (you’ll need a free Windows Live account).

Office Web Apps is pretty impressive, incorporating browser-based versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote that look and feel very much like the desktop apps. They work in all modern browsers, and you don’t need to install Silverlight to use them, although some features work better with it installed. While the web apps don’t offer as much power and functionality as their desktop cousins, they’re at least on par with Google Docs, and if you have Office 2010 (which is being released to non-business customers next week) you’ll get seamless round-trip editing between the desktop and the cloud. (If you’re interested in learning more about cloud computing and how it enables web apps like this, check out our Structure conference in San Francisco later this month).

Let us know what you think of the Office Web Apps below.

(via Windows Team Blog)

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Microsoft Rolls Out Office Web Apps —

Microsoft rolled out Microsoft Office Web Apps on Skydrive to users in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Ireland yesterday. Users can login with their free Live accounts and create and edit Word 2010, PowerPoint 2010, OneNote 2010 and Excel 2010 documents in their browsers, and store them in the cloud. Users don't need an Office 2010 desktop license to use the apps, but the Skydrive version integrates with desktop versions of Office 2007 and 2010. There is also a beta version of Office Web Apps that can be deployed on-premise as part of Sharepoint.

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Features include:

• Drag and drop uploading from desktop to browser
• Real-time, multiuser collaborative document editing
• Version history
• Searching across documents, including documents shared by other users
• Read-only access from mobile phones

The Register reports Microsoft is not officially supporting Google's Chrome browser. However, we found that we were able to create and save documents from Chrome on a Windows 7 desktop.

This offering will doubtlessly bring comparisons with Google Docs. Office Web Apps feels quite similar, and is at least as functional as Google Apps.

The on-premise option, desktop integration, and the familiar features and interface of Microsoft Office, makes Office Web Apps a strong competitor against Google's Google Apps and ZoHo as they market their office in the cloud solutions to the enterprise.

Last month, Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry writing for Business Insider, called on Google to buy Salesforce.com to improve their enterprise penetration. "Google Docs just can't compete with Microsoft Office on features, and while it's better at collaboration, that advantage will vanish as Microsoft moves these features to the cloud," he wrote.

Many other analysts disagreed, citing Google and Salesforce's radically different corporate cultures. But it's precisely these culture differences that Google could potentially benefit from if it really wants to step up its game against Microsoft in the enterprise.

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Moscow Schools Follow Google and Promote Usage of Apple —

A short while ago the blogosphere and even traditional media were abuzz the decision of Google that from now on the employees of the internet giant may use operating systems from any developer but one - the exception being Microsoft. The reason is quite obvious: security concerns everyone seems to share about Microsoft. Of course there is also an underlying reason of the more and more visible competition between Google and Microsoft but this is not widely discussed yet so the reason claimed most frequently is still the security.

Of course in most cases choice of an operating system is a very personal decision as one needs to consider the applications to be used, the security of it all, the specific uses or even countries where you may need to use the computer with the OS. In many cases an operating system can also be determined by the IT department of the company you work in - and the decision becomes not that personal. In yet other cases your selection of the operating system may be influenced by the place you study in, like it will soon happen in the new schools in Moscow, Russia where tenders specifically demand suppliers to deliver Apple computers.

Here you need to understand that every time a new school is constructed in Russia, quite a number of tenders is involved to determine the best contractor and the best supplier for a specific job or a specific product (I won’t go into how ‘fair’ some of such tenders will be because corruption is a well-known problem for Russia and hardly the topic for this particular post). One of such tenders is the tender to select the computer equipment supplier for a school. And we have recently got to know that tender conditions for some of the newly-built schools in Moscow demand that the computers to be supplied should specifically be Macs.

Now at least a quarter of the new Moscow schools to be opened this fall for school children will be equipped with Mac computers, including MacBook laptops and Mac Mini desktops. There are also other items to be supplied, including printers, faxes or even other computers - but they all have unspecified brands so the supplier will have to come up with a suggestion that will be the most appealing to the city authorities. But one thing is certain: some Mac computers should be included in the quotation. For now Moscow government has not commented on the situation or why the authors of the tender documentation in the government have specifically decided to grant such favors to the US company.

An interesting part here is that Russian legislation demands that when a specific brand is given in a tender documentation, it should be accompanied by words “or a similar one” unless such supplied goods will simply not comply with the already existing infrastructure so it will be impossible to use the newly purchased goods in the existing environment. In this particular situation no mentions of equivalent products were made so the government definitely wants Apple to be used in the new Moscow schools. And the rumors are that in the future the number of such schools will only be growing so I would not be surprised if discarded PCs in existing schools will also be replaced by new computers manufactured by Apple as well.

The most lucrative thing for Apple is that this habit of using Apple right from the very first days with a computer at school will influence future buying decisions for the kids when they grow up and buy their first computers: unlike those people trained on Windows machines from the very beginning, they won’t have to deal with any fears or uncertainty involved in migrating to Mac OS as Mac OS will be everything they know anyway. And Apple will be winning a larger market share here so that our president willless lonely with his love to Apple.

Via (in Russian)

Office Web Apps, the free, cloud-based viewing and editing suite that Microsoft promised would be available to everyone, has opened wide its doors. It's a decent set of basic-plus editing tools, powered by SkyDrive's generous 25 GB of storage space. More »



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Microsoft has announced that the consumer versions of its new Office Web Apps–browser-based versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote–are now available to anyone who cares to check them out. They’re headquarted at office.live.com, and you need a Live ID to access them.

I wrote about the Office Web Apps when I covered Office 2010 a few weeks ago. Certain things about them are impressive–mainly the desktop-esque look and feel and much-better-than-average support for Microsoft’s own file formats. Overall, though, I found them frustratingly rudimentary: Years after Google and Zoho jumpstarted the category of Web-based suites, Microsoft is entering the market that lacks features as basic as the ability to move elements around on the page. They’re far more interesting as adjuncts to Office 2010–a pretty solid upgrade–than as a self-contained competitor to other online productivity packages. Maybe that was Microsoft’s intention all along.

If you give them a try, let us know what you think.

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Yahoo has laid off part of its search team as part of a new restructuring move, we’ve learned. Yahoo declined to comment on the number of people who were affected, but did confirm that there were layoffs in its Search group and gave us the following statement:

“Yahoo! remains focused on innovating the overall Search experience over the long-term, and the Yahoo! Search group is hard at work on some new experiences that we believe will convert Yahoo! users to Yahoo! searchers. To accomplish our new product objectives, we have decided that we need a different combination of talent and are making changes within the search group in order to more deeply invest in other areas of the group. “

Yahoo is, of course, outsourcing its search engine to Bing as part of a deal that was forged between Yahoo and Microsoft last year. It’s unclear if the layoffs are directly related to the deal, but it seems likely. Soon after the search deal was announced, Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz alluded to future layoffs as a result of the integration.

Yahoo previously held a major round of layoffs last spring, when it cut 5% of its staff, or around 700 people.

So, since I haven’t carried an iPhone around with me for more than a week and I got an up and close look at the iPhone 4 today here’s my list of the pros and cons of iPhone 4 vs. the Sprint EVO or Verizon’s Incredible (the two best Android-based phones out there).

1. Screen quality. iPhone wins, but only slightly over the EVO.
2. Multitasking. All of them do it, but Apple’s system is a LOT easier to figure out and manage. That said, AT&T’s new data plan pricing has left a very bad taste in my mouth. I’m going to have to use the iPhone 4 for a month to see how much data I actually end up using now that I can do things like use Waze for traffic at the same time as playing music on Pandora, or watching live streaming videos from Ustream, etc. The iPhone should be miles ahead here, because of its superior OS, but is only slightly ahead because AT&T is dragging down the experience for me.
3. Battery life. HUGE win for the iPhone 4, which gives up to 40% longer talk times than the 3GS, which is already giving me at least 40% better battery life than the EVO.
4. Application choice and quality. A slight win for iPhone 4. Overall I like apps on the iPhone better and there definitely are more to choose from. 225,000 according to Steve Jobs today. But there are some apps on Android that are better. Google Voice and Google Maps are two of them, which are pretty dramatic. I keep getting complaints from developers about the Apple approval process, too.
5. Feel in pocket. iPhone 4 wins here. It’s thinner and since it’s glass on both sides more pocket compatible.
6. Voice quality. The EVO is a LOT better than the iPhone 3GS, but I wasn’t able to try it out today for a phone call, so we’ll need to wait until June 24th for that.
7. Sexiness. The iPhone 4 wins here big time.
8. Carriers. The iPhone 4 LOSES here big time. AT&T has dead zones where none exist on my routes around the San Francisco Bay Area on Sprint or Verizon.
9. Video and camera. The iPhone wins here by quite a bit. The focusing on the iPhone is better. The quality seems like it is better, but I’ll need to do a head-to-head after June 24th to really know that for sure. The video features are FAR superior on the iPhone, especially the new editing features. I will buy the iPhone for these features alone, so for a video geek like me these are a huge deal. My wife, though, uses the iPhone camera a lot more than I do (I have a pro camera, she doesn’t and she takes a lot of pictures of the kids), so it’ll be interesting to see what she does with this.
10. Video games. The iPhone is already ahead here by a long shot and with its new gyroscope we should see even more apps for the iPhone that are cool and now that Zynga is bringing its games to the iPhone Apple has widened its lead. Yeah, yeah, I’m sure all the haters will remind me it doesn’t play Flash games but, sorry, that train has left the station and isn’t coming back.
11. Tethering. The EVO lets you share your phone as a wifi hotspot and lets other devices use its data plan to get on the Internet. This is wildly cool and how I get my family’s iPads on the Internet when driving in the car. Apple didn’t say a thing about tethering today and I’m hearing rumors that the iPad won’t tether with the new iPhone. So, this is a major feature in the EVO camp. Plus, AT&T’s new data plan restrictions really bug me.
12. Synch and services. Here Android kicks Apple’s ass. The iPhone has to be physically plugged into a computer and connected to iPhone to synch it. With the EVO I never have connected it physically to a computer. I just entered my Gmail address and password and all my contacts, all of my calendar items, all of my email, and all of my applications just showed up. This is a MAJOR advantage to the Android system.

So, will I start using an iPhone again? Yes, but I have the luxury of being able to afford two devices and I’m definitely keeping the EVO if just for the tethering. If I could only afford one? I’d go with iPhone 4 over the EVO. Mostly because the OS is nicer to use (hard to explain all the ways this is so in a short post, so you’ll have to wait for a longer post after I get mine), the video features, and the battery life is dramatically better. But I totally understand why many of you will ignore those advantages because AT&T sucks so much. If voice quality is more important to you than all the toys, the nicer OS, or the video chat, then definitely go for the Sprint or the Verizon.

To the second part of this question. Does Nokia, MIcrosoft, or RIM have a chance to get into the game?

Well, let’s look at the strength’s of each company.

1. Nokia has a ton of market share in low-end markets. That still gives it a powerful voice brand to build off of. Will it matter in the high end game? I don’t think it will, but I’m sure I’ll have lots of Nokia employees telling me why it does.
2. Microsoft has the Xbox and their new phone is coming from the same team. Wired also explained how Microsoft’s Kin and a bunch of services give it a leg into the game. I don’t buy that horseradish, but I can see how many of you will.
3. RIM has the best keyboards and best integration with Microsoft Exchange (still). Corporate IT folks care about both of these. Even Mark Zuckerberg carries a Blackberry to do email on. Until Android matches the keyboard quality RIM is safe. The first Motorola Droid has a dreadful keyboard. Will the next one have a good enough keyboard to let RIM’ers switch? We’ll have to see.

Anyway, Apple is still on top of the mind share mountain and that’s a powerful place, indeed, to be. Look for Apple’s sales and profits to continue to go up. I’m buying three (one for Patrick, one for Maryam, and one for myself).

What do you think?

The Windows 7 Service Pack 1 public beta is coming this July, Adobe Reader and Flash Player encounter another critical vulnerability, and MythBusters' Adam Savage talks about his workflow for tackling a problem. More »



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Last week, comScore released its U.S. Online Video Rankings for April 2010. We noted that Vevo in particular saw big growth in its first couple of months on the Web.

But as Clickz this morning wrote, social networking site Facebook has shot up the rankings, too. With 41,335,000 unique U.S. viewers in April alone, the site is no match for Google Sites (which includes YouTube and Google Video), as the leader of the ranking for top online video properties in the United States boasts a combined viewership of more than 136 million users per month.

Facebook is climbing the rankings fast, though: comScore pegged its number of unique U.S. viewers at 13.3 million in April last year, so that means its viewership more than tripled in a year, according to the audience measurement firm.

Thus, Facebook has quietly nestled itself in the number 5 spot, just behind Yahoo Sites, Fox Interactive Media and Vevo. According to comScore, Facebook videos currently draw a bigger audience than known names like Microsoft, CBS, Hulu and Viacom.

Even if surprisingly few videos get viewed by users on average (5.6, compared to 96 on Google Sites and 24.7 on Hulu), the site seems poised for growth in this segment. With more than 400 million active users, the site could soon surpass Yahoo and Fox as one of the leading video destinations on the Web as far as the United States goes, and will likely fight a hard battle with Vevo for the number two spot in the rankings.

And as Clickz points out, a lot of the video content currently available on Facebook comes in the form of embedded YouTube units, but comScore counts views of those to Google Sites, so Facebook’s role in delivering video content to users is larger than the numbers actually suggest.

It would probably also help to stop hiding the ‘video’ page under the ‘Photos’ tab, which makes zero sense to me.

Windows Live Wave 4 isn't even in beta yet, but Microsoft's marketing department is already using it to attack Apple's products and services. When the software giant unveiled Windows Live Essentials Wednesday, it merely showed off what was coming over at WindowsLivePreview.com. Apparently, the site contains more than just a preview: towards the bottom of the page there's a comparison of Windows 7 and Windows Live to Snow Leopard, iLife, and MobileMe.

The software giant is only now publicly pitting Windows Live against iLife because the client applications and Web services will actually stack up to Apple's offering, at least according to Microsoft. Sharp readers will remember that Microsoft has attacked iLife with Windows Live before; in September 2009, a set of internal retail marketing slides leaked, and one underlined that Microsoft's offering is free and Apple's is not.

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At Microsoft, there's a thin line between a tablet and a slate — Microsoft released this week a Community Technology Preview test build of its Windows Embedded Compact 7 product -- and introduced yet more murkiness into the "which operating system is best for which form factor" debate. I have a (tiny) bit more clarity about the company's latest guidance now (I think)....

It's no secret that Google has ambitions of becoming an Enterprise productivity suite powerhouse; perhaps one day taking over the top spot from Microsoft. As Google's President, Global Sales Operations and Business Development Nikesh Arora told us at TechCrunch Disrupt a last week, Google hopes for Apps to be a billion dollar revenue stream in three to four years. But one challenge has been convincing businesses that a move to the cloud promises security. And some early Apps users have even questioned the security of the suite, which includes e-mail, calendaring, document sharing and chat applications. To mitigate these concerns, Google has released a white paper to give enterprise customers greater transparency into Google's security practices, policies, and technology involving Google Apps. And of course, the white paper is also intended to also assure current and potential clients of its "strong and extensive security infrastructure." Google has even created a special portal about privacy and security for the educational institutions that use Apps.