Hasta La Gadget!

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

Last week’s Switched On discussed how Lion’s feature set could be perceived differently by new users or those coming from an iPad versus those who have used Macs for some time, while a previous Switched On discussed how Microsoft is preparing for a similar transition in Windows 8. Both OS X Lion and Windows 8 seek to mix elements of a tablet UI with elements of a desktop UI or — putting it another way — a finger-friendly touch interface with a mouse-driven interface. If Apple and Microsoft could wave a wand and magially have all apps adopt overnight so they could leave a keyboard and mouse behind, they probably would. Since they can’t, though, inconsistency prevails.

Yet, while the OS X-iOS mashup that is Lion exhibits is share of growing pains, the fall-off effect isn’t as pronounced as it appears it will be for Windows 8. The main reasons for this are, in order of increasing importance, legacy, hardware, and Metro.

Continue reading Switched On: Desktop divergence

Switched On: Desktop divergence originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 31 Jul 2011 18:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This article was written on August 20, 2007 by CyberNet.

Microsoft Monday

Bill Gates is known as the World’s richest man (although he was recently de-throned), yet most people really don’t know a whole lot about the name and face behind Microsoft. Today’s Microsoft Monday is all about Bill and some little known facts about him. We’ve also included a photo that shows the Microsoft team in 1978, and details about where everybody is now. I’m sure Gates wasn’t expecting his team would eventually leave and get into jobs like cattle ranching or creating the Cabbage Patch Doll, but they did!

Little Known Facts about Bill Gates

• William Henry Gates was born on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington.
• His SAT score was 1590. The top score for the test is 1600.
• By the age of 17, Gates had sold his first computer program, a time-tabling system for his high school, for $4,200.
• Gates told his university teachers he would be a millionaire by age 30.  He became a billionaire at age 31.
• While at Harvard, Gates co-wrote Altair BASIC, which became Microsoft’s first product.
• He met his wife, Melinda French, in 1987 at a Microsoft press event in Manhattan while she was a worker for the company.  They would go on to get married on New Years Day in 1994.
• In 2002, Bill Gates was considered more idolized than Chinese Communist leader Mao Tse-tungin a poll of teenagers in Hong Kong and China.  The survey was conducted by the City University of Hong Kong.
• He is currently having a building named after him at Carnegie Mellon University, called the Gates Building of Computer Science.
• Bill Gates earns $250 every second; that’s about $20 million a day and $7.8 billion a year!
• If he drops a thousand-dollar bill, he needn’t even bother to pick it up because in the four seconds it would take him to pick it up, he would’ve already earned it back.

Source

Where are they now?

This photo shows the early team that made up Microsoft in 1978. We know Bill stuck around, but what happened to the others? Everybody you see pictured except Gates, eventually left Microsoft (although Paul Allen is still a senior strategy advisor) .

• Pictured above is Bob O’Rear who was Microsoft’s Chief mathematician. He left Microsoft in 1993 and then went on to be a cattle rancher.
• Another example is Bob Greenberg who was a programmer. When he left Microsoft in 1981, he went on to help develop Cabbage Patch dolls!
• Marla Wood was a bookkeeper and left Microsoft in 1980 and then sued them for sex discrimination. Now she describes herself as a “professional volunteer.”
• Jim Lane was a project manager and left Microsoft in 1985, and eventually went on to own his own software company.

Source

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Bill Gates CES Keynote From EngadgetBill Gates Falls to 3rd Richest ManOriginal Microsoft Crew Reunites For PhotoCyberNotes: Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Facts and Photos of Bill Gates’ House

Sadly, Twitter integration wasn’t part of the package when we checked out Windows Phone Mango at the end of last month. The feature has finally been rolled out in the latest developer build of the forthcoming mobile operating system, and WinRumors has taken it for a spin on video. Thrill at the simple setup process through Windows Live. Gasp at integration with the People and Me hubs. Stare in stunned silence at the threaded conversations. All that and more in the video after the break.

Continue reading Windows Phone Mango Twitter integration shown off, hashtagged (video)

Windows Phone Mango Twitter integration shown off, hashtagged (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jul 2011 14:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nielsen: Android accounts for 39 percent of smartphones in the US, Apple is the top device maker originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jul 2011 09:55:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Windows Phone developers are getting one step closer to the fresh, fruity tang of Mango’s RTM build with a newly released SDK update. The one month-in-the-making “Beta 2 Refresh” tweaks the previously issued Windows Phone SDK 7.1 and is available now for download, packing an improved profiler, locked application platform APIs, an emulator-based screen cap feature for your apps and a “peek at the Marketplace Test Kit.” Microsoft’s also thrown devs an extra bonus and will be pushing an OS update, Build 7712, to manually upgraded Mango phones. Sounds sweet, but it’s too bad this hot number won’t be ready in time for your app-building, beta hands.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in.]

Microsoft releases Mango SDK Beta update for developers originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jul 2011 16:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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