Jash's Blog

JoliCloud climbs to 1.0

jashsayani — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 15:33:27 +0000

While netbook was the ultimate gadget, a lot of Cloud based OSes were being developed and I had done a review of JoliCloud OS here. The OS has moved quiet ahead since the review and has now hit version 1.0. This version is stable, has build-in touch screen support and a whole new interface which is much more intuitive along with better performance and wider device support.

Some of the other features include use of HTML 5 for application launchers and a greater range of pre-installed applications with include Gmail and Skype. The App Directory is also expanded to over 700 applications.

When is it available? Right now! Just head to jolicloud.com and get the free OS!

Hulu announces Plus subscription

jashsayani — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 05:29:34 +0000

Hulu has finally announced its Plus subscription. News about Hulu Plus was out back in April and the service was anticipated to be announced in May. We did not hear anything about it in May but Hulu has now unveiled its Plus subscription service.

So what does Hulu Plus get you?

You can browse through the archive of all TV show episodes and watch any of them. Free users have restriction on the archive. With Hulu Plus, you can also stream video to your mobile device (by mobile device, I mean Apple device - iPhone, iPod touch or iPad) and to your TV. And of course, Hulu Plus users get the shows in HD.

Hulu is promoting the Plus service by listing popular TV shows and advertising the service as a Season pass for the shows. So if you use iTunes Store to buy TV shows then Hulu Plus can be a cheaper alternative for you…

Postbox Mail Client goes Express

jashsayani — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 20:55:25 +0000

Postbox was released last year as beta and had received great responses from users. It was the perfect E-mail client with all features you would ever need and an intuitive interface. However, when the product got out of beta, they set a price tag of $39.95 for the mail client.

Now the makers of Postbox have released Postbox Express. Yes, a free version of the Postbox mail client with stripped down features. But if you are just looking for a basic mail client with a great interface, then look no further. Postbox Express is here.

You can see a comparison of Postbox and Postbox express here.

Here is a preview of Postbox Express, fewer features with the same great interface.

The Eee Pad is a Windows 7 tablet

jashsayani — Mon, 31 May 2010 21:19:54 +0000

While everyone is fancying the iPad, other manufacturers are also coming up with tablets that are similar to the iPad. The Eee Pad is one promising tablet that was announced at the ASUS Press Conference. The Eee Pad is a tablet that would run on Intel Cure 2 Duo CULV processors with Windows Embedded Compact 7 Operating System and a battery lift of up to 10 hours. It would be released in 10 inch and 12 inch versions. ASUS would also roll out a dock for the Eee Pads which would allow mounting of the tablet on the keyboard, giving a notebook experience.

The Eee Pad has been given the price range of $399 to $499 and is expected to roll out in the first quarter of 2011.

Engadget has a hands-on with the demo here.

Google TV Announced

jashsayani — Fri, 21 May 2010 00:25:00 +0000

It was the third Google I/O and there were many exciting announcements. From the new 2.2 Android firmware to Chrome’s AppStore with rich web apps. But the one announcement that caught everyones attention was Google TV.

So What is Google TV?

Its the TV and web meeting together. In other words, the TV hooking up to the internet. In a way, this has been possible using gaming consoles like PlayStation, Xbox and the Wii. But Google TV will be a dedicated system into the TV that will let you search for TV shows and movies on your cable network and online. You would also get the capability to run Android apps on the TV and do things like updating your Facebook status and use twitter.

How do I get Google TV?

Google will start selling Google TV consoles with WiFi and Ethernet in them so you can hook the console to your existing TV and get internet connectivity along with Google’s TV system and ability to run Android apps. Google has also partnered with Sony and Logitech so they can manufacture “Internet TVs” as Sony calls them. These will have the Google TV system right out of the box, so you can just plug you TV in and connect to the web.

When?

Google TV will be available in Fall 2010 in the United States. Other countries will get Google TV in 2011 and Google TV will be made OpenSource in mid-2011.

Here is a video of Google TV:

Ubuntu Light is another Netbook OS

jashsayani — Fri, 14 May 2010 21:00:38 +0000

Netbook had become the most popular computer of the age. It was a new era in Computing. All manufacturers had all kinds of netbooks, from Acer aspire one to Lenovo to Sony Vaio P. This boom gave a rise to tons of new Operating Systems that make the “net”book more net friendly. In other words, make it rely on the cloud. So we started getting “Cloud OSes”. There came Google Chrome OS which I reviewed here, then JoliCloud OS which I reviewed here and many different Linux distros.

However, the sales of netbooks have now dropped from a whooping 641% to just 5% !! One of the reasons people believe is the Apple iPad. But even though the sales have almost vanished, we still have innovative OSes coming out. Canonical has come up with Ubuntu Light, which is a light version of Ubuntu as the name suggests. This is a Netbook optimized version of the popular Ubuntu OS. It boots up in around 7 seconds, has a beautiful interface similar to Mac OS and runs all your favorite applications.

Canonical is offering the OS to netbook manufacturers to be pre-installed on the netbooks. If you want to run this beauty on your netbook, you can get it from Canonical here.

So that was one more OS to make you netbook perform better and faster.

Hulu Plus subscriptions arrive in May

jashsayani — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 14:54:48 +0000

Hulu has been there for quite a while with lots of TV shows from various networks and now even some Movies. The way hulu ran was through Ad revenue from commercials. However, news has spread that hulu is now “expanding” their business by starting their much anticipated Paid subscription service. This is going to be called Hulu Plus, according to the LA times.

Hulu will continue to allow free access for the 5 most recent TV show episodes and will charge $9.95/month for access to older episodes. More details to roll out soon. Subscriptions starting late May.

Goodbye Gears….

jashsayani — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 20:19:52 +0000

Google was very innovative when they launched Google Gears. It allowed users to access all their data offline. Right from Gmail to Google Reader to Google Docs. Even third parties like Remember The Milk started implementing Gears to provide offline data access to users.

However, Google has announced that they are pulling out Gears support from Google Docs and would be implementing new ways to achieve offline data access, not surprisingly HTML5. They might soon remove Gears support for other products as well and use HTML5 to achieve the offline functionality.

So long Gears….

Sponsor: Doteasy web hosting

jashsayani — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:19:19 +0000

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April Fools 2009 comes true!

jashsayani — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 03:02:05 +0000

For April Fools last year, I had made a Photoshopped version of Apple’s homepage with a MacBook Tablet saying that it was shipping. It was a good April Fool’s joke and many people loved it, as it was discussed across many forums. Exactly after 1 year of that post, the device is now really shipping! The iPad. Well, its not the exact same device as it does not run Mac OS X, but runs a customized version of the iPhone OS, but we now have a tablet from Apple!

This year there is no April Fool’s joke. But you can enjoy by waiting for your iPads to arrive in the next 2 days… After they are out for a while, I’ll do a post on some good iPad applications that are out there. Till that time, have a nice month and keep reading the blog….