Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on March 19, 2008 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

We realized that we’ve never really done an article diving deep into the history of browser stats even though we have shown you screenshots of browsers from long ago. Thanks to Net Applications we have about a year and a half worth of data to look at, and it is interesting to see the rise and fall of the different browsers.

We had aggregated so much information that even the most severe stataholics would probably start to feel queasy. Below we’ve got an overview of all the browsers wrapped up into one, and then we dive even deeper by breaking the stats down into the popular versions of each browser. To try and ease the nauseous feeling we decided to hide the actual numbers that were used to generate the graphs, but they are still available by clicking on the Details link located at the beginning of each section.

We’ll start by comparing the market share of each major browser, and then we’ll break it down into Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, Opera, and Netscape usage.

Note: The timeline for each graph is the exact same, but the market share percentages are scaled differently for each chart to make it easier to read. You can click the Details link to see what percentages make up each graph.

–All Browsers (Details)–

From this graph you can see that Internet Explorer still owns a huge chunk of the browser market share, but over the duration of the graph it has changed quite significantly. In the next month or two it will likely hit a 10% drop since August 2006, and about 5% of that has occurred in the last 6-months.

–Internet Explorer (Details)–

It wasn’t until December of 2007 that Internet Explorer 7 actually took over Internet Explorer 6 in usage, which is rather surprising. Maybe it is because so many people are sticking with Windows XP and not making the upgrade to IE7, but it looks like things are finally starting to pickup for IE7:

–Firefox (Details)–

When Firefox 2 came out in October 2006 it didn’t take long for users to make the jump from Firefox 1.5, and ever since then it has been rocking the house.

–Safari (Details)–

This obviously proves that Safari users enjoy playing with Beta versions of the browser, but don’t really adopt it until the stable version is available. In June 2007 Safari 3.0 Beta was made available by Apple, and in October it shipped with the OS X Leopard operating system. While in Beta it didn’t really affect the usage of other versions, but people made the upgrade rather rapidly once it was released. It’s been a hit ever since.

–Opera (Details)–

The Opera 9.x browser was first introduced in June 2006 shortly before these stats started to be collected. You can see from the chart that Opera 9.x usage has been increasing quite steadily even though the market share is still small. Considering the fact that until September 2005 you had to pay for Opera (or suffer with a built-in ad banner) I would say that they are doing pretty good.

–Netscape (Details)–

Late last year Netscape announced that they would no longer be developing the Netscape 9.0 version of their browser. Well, this might give us some indication as to why that is. The service we got our stats from didn’t even have anything on Netscape 9.0 presumably because the market share was so low. While Netscape 6.0 is currently the champ of all the versions available.

–Overview–

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed taking a look at all of the charts to see how your favorite browser has progressed over the last year and a half. If you haven’t gotten enough be sure to checkout our history of web browsers where we provide screenshots of browsers over the last 10+ years.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Microsoft’s Windows 8 developer preview greeted us with an interface steeped in Redmond’s new Metro style — its tile-centric start screen is sleek, fresh, and downright pretty. Imagine our surprise then, when the preview’s desktop default view punted us straight back to the contemporary “Aero” dressing of Windows 7. It’s not an ugly interface by any means, but shiny, translucent window frames are so last generation. Where’s the style? In the big M’s latest Building Windows 8 preview, of course. The MSDN blog’s latest Task Manager update shows the familiar feature in a clean Metro suit. Although Aero is still the OS’ default look, the Windows 7 basic theme has been substituted for a style heavily inspired by Metro’s clean tiles. The post doesn’t say much on the matter (nothing at all, in fact), but it’s nice to see the classic interface getting a facelift to match Microsoft’s new look. Want to see more? Hit the source link below, it’s got all the Metro window frames you could ask for.

Update: This post originally misstated that the updated Basic theme was a new style, but in fact, it is already available in the Windows 8 developer preview.

Windows 8 desktop interface swaps classic theme for Metro, gets with the times originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Oct 2011 08:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This article was written on January 12, 2011 by CyberNet.

Windows only
There are all kinds of great video players out there such as VLC and GOM, but when it comes down to appearance I have to give Splash Lite the credit it deserves. You can see what I’m talking about in the screenshot above, but that only gives you a glimpse of how polished the app actually is. Everything from the settings to the main interface is thoughtfully assembled to give you, the user, the best experience possible.

If you’re reading this article the chances are good that you’ve heard of VLC before, and know that it is popular for the wide range of video formats that it is able to playback. Splash Lite doesn’t support quite the list that VLC does, but it’s no slouch by any means. Here’s a list of features and supported video formats that can be found in the free “lite” version of Splash:

• Supported video formats: AVI, M2T, MTS, M2TS, MKV, MKA, MOV, MP4, MPG, TS, M4V, VOB, DIVX, XVID, WMV, MBT
• H.264 video decoding hardware acceleration
• Subtitle support
• Stereo or 5.1 channel audio output
• Media Center Remote Control support
• Aspect ratio settings
• Multicore CPU support

As you can tell by the name, Splash Lite, there is an older brother called Splash Pro that includes some uniquely awesome features, but it also has a $20 price tag attached to it. I’m sure for most of your video watching needs will be fulfilled by the free Splash Lite version, but you can always take a look at the features page if you’re wondering what kind of additional stuff you’d get with the upgrade.

Splash Lite Homepage (Windows only; Freeware)

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on April 26, 2007 by CyberNet.

Tutorial Thursday

Microsoft’s newest operating system, Windows Vista, offers a really unique feature called ReadyBoost. The goal of it is to use a USB drive or memory card to increase the amount of memory that your system has to use. The results of adding a memory card or flash drive to Vista for memory usage can actually be quite astonishing.

One of the main problems is that you typically need a high-speed device because Microsoft wants to make sure that you get the most out of ReadyBoost. None of the memory cards or USB drives that I have laying around actually met the requirements for ReadyBoost, and every time I tried to use it I would receive this warning: “This device does not have the required performance characteristics for use in speeding up your system.”

Have no fear though, because you can use almost any USB drive or memory card with ReadyBoost! Although you may not receive optimal performance from it if the card doesn’t meet Vista’s standards.

Here’s how you can enable ReadyBoost on Vista for any memory card or USB drive:

1. Insert your USB Drive and choose the ReadyBoost option when prompted. If you’re not prompted you can always go into Windows Explorer, right-click on the device, and choose Properties.
   
2. Check the box that says Stop retesting this device when I plug it in. Press Ok.
   
3. Now you’ll need to open up the Windows Registry, which can be done by opening up the Start Menu and typing regedit. If you get prompted by the User Account Control just select the option to Continue.
   
   Note: I realize that editing the registry might be something you’re weary about doing, but if you stick to the instructions you won’t have any problems.
    
4. Browse the tree on the left side of the Registry Editor making your way through the “folders”: HKLM (Local Machine) -> SOFTWARE -> Microsoft -> Windows NT -> CurrentVersion -> EMDMgmt

   One of the keys listed should be your USB Drive. Find it and click on that item (the names might look a little weird but you can probably recognize your drive).
   

5. Double-click on the Device Status entry on the right side and change the value to 2. Press OK.
   
6. Change both the ReadSpeedKBs and WriteSpeedKBs to 1000 by double-clicking on each of their names. Press OK.
   
7. Now open up Windows Explorer, right-click on your device, and choose the Properties option. You should now see the option to Use this device, and once you pick that you can choose how much memory can be used by ReadyBoost:
   

That’s all there is to it! The reason why this works is because we’re telling Vista a small little lie. We’re saying that the device is actually faster at reading and writing than it actually is, which means that in the long run we may not see all of the benefits that ReadyBoost actually offers. At least you are able to play around with it and be your own judge whether it improves the performance of your PC!

Source: Windows Vista Magazine

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on October 04, 2006 by CyberNet.

Mozilla has released version 0.3 RC1 of their calendar products called Sunbird and Lightning.

Mozilla Sunbird is a standalone calendar application that is great for people who do not want to use Mozilla Thunderbird. Compared to Lightning it does require more memory to run and does not integrate itself with other email software that you may use.

Mozilla Lightning, on the other hand, is an extension for Mozilla Thunderbird that will let you access the calendar features from within Thunderbird. This doesn’t integrate itself very well at this time (such as with the address book) but they plan on improving that for future releases.

Here are the download links:

• Sunbird 0.3 RC1 (Linux, Mac, and Windows)
• Lightning 0.3 RC1 Thunderbird Extension (Linux, Mac, and Windows)

Here’s what’s new (since 0.2) in Sunbird 0.3 – Release Notes:

• New storage architecture handles calendars with hundreds or thousands of events more responsively.
• More intuitive interface shows you more of what you need, and less of what you don’t.
• Redesigned preferences allow you to easily customize Sunbird for your needs.
• Add-ons support allows you to extend Sunbird’s functionality with extensions, themes, and language packs from [addons.mozilla.org].
• New Windows installer makes it easier than ever for Windows users to install Sunbird.
• Better printing gives you more ways to print your calendars. Mac users can now print as well!
• 24-hour views show you your entire day, not just a few hours.
• Reliable alarms ensure you are notified about events or tasks.
• Improved localization support means Sunbird can easily install, enable, and disable language packs, and Lightning is mostly localizable as well.
• Vastly improved reliability makes it much more difficult to lose data.
• Many performance improvements

Here’s what’s new (since 0.1) in Lightning 0.3 – Release Notes:

• Basic handling of events received in email allows you to easily add iMIP events to your default calendar.
• Reloading network calendars is now possible.
• The Agenda view rolls over at midnight.
• 24-hour views show you your entire day, not just a few hours.
• Reliable alarms ensure you are notified about events or tasks.
• Improved localization support
• Vastly improved reliability makes it much more difficult to lose data.
• Many performance improvements

News Source: Mozilla Calendar Blog

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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