3 Reasons Why You Should NOT Upgrade to Windows 8

Today we look at the other side of the same coin- reasons why you should not upgrade to Windows 8. These are some fairly valid reasons, and if they do look like fairly big issues, then you might as well hold off, even though the cost of upgrading or buying Windows 8 fresh isn’t much.



1. Learning curve is steep: With the Metro UI, it is a case of both a boon and a bane. While it does put important information and your apps right up there, you do get somewhat confused as to how to get to the desktop. For most people, working their way around the additional layer of the interface may prove to be quite a learning curve. The concept of active edges is something that adds to the complication. But what may really confuse most people is the missing Start button once you actually trip your way to the desktop, and its absence creates a lot of unfamiliarity issues. The new landing screen UI and the ribbon interface introduced in several applications are rather unique, no doubt, and work towards making Windows 8 better for the touchscreen as well. But, some tweaks still need to be deployed. Maybe getting back the start button will help win back some old users.

2. Initial excitement about Metro UI: Yes, Metro UI looks brilliant. On the face of it, the colorful themes and the constantly updating tiles are very appealing, visually. However, do remember that for most tasks, you need to move away from the Metro UI and go to the desktop mode. Immediately, the utility of the UI fades away. Once the initial excitement about the unique user interface wears out, you will be left with a rather complex UI that needs to be pushed out of the way every time you log in to the PC. On a good day, someone who is more comfortable with the more traditional desktop will not use Metro UI often. On a bad day, abuses and swearing will be the order of the day. Plus, switching between the Metro and desktop modes is via only one button on the keyboard, and that is bound to confuse those users who aren’t techies.

3. The OS needs polishing: We always recommend holding off till at least one major service pack arrives for an OS. With Windows 8, you will regularly get patches and updates for the OS in the tune of 140MB to 160MB each. Device drivers would have been another aspect, but we are talking about patches that either solve a security breach or tweak something that will improve performance and compatibility in various scenarios. There is a lot of work still to be done before Windows 8 is stable and what you would call a polished OS. Good looks can only take you so far. If you are a sucker for a completely stable OS, then you might as well hold off for a while. Certain drivers and applications may not work properly on the new OS, as is fairly common, and some older hardware may have compatibility issues as well. It usually takes Microsoft about six months to one year to polish the OS into accepting wider compatibility and ironing out issues that users may report for specific issues. The biggest indicator of that is when the first major service pack comes out post the OS being available to consumers. Okay, Microsoft says that for the first time ever, Service Pack was released for Windows 8 even before it arrived on shelves. Which begs the question – how bad was the OS in the first place?

If you want an OS that will work seamlessly with all your applications and hardware, we suggest not upgrading to Windows 8 just yet. While most of the stuff may work fine, there is a chance that there will be that one app or device that could create an issue. And that will more than ruin the experience of upgrading. Hold on, and patience will pay off!

5 Reasons Why You Should Upgrade to Windows 8

To upgrade, or not to upgrade? A lot has been said about Microsoft’s latest desktop operating system, Windows 8. Some love it, others hate it, but surely almost everyone has considered upgrading from Windows XP, Vista or 7, whichever one you may be using at the moment.

Windows 8 brings significant advantages to those who are upgrading their PCs. The Windows 8 operating system offers a significantly different user interface straight up, but also offers improvements in performance, and doesn’t cost a lot of money to either upgrade or buy a new license.

Today, we look at the top five reasons why you should shift to Windows 8, on your PC or laptop.

1. Doesn’t cost much: Windows 8 does not cost a lot of money, unlike the previous OSes from Microsoft. If you have purchased a new laptop or desktop after May this year, you are most likely eligible for an upgrade to Windows 8. The cost for this upgrade would be Rs 699. If however, you are buying a full license of Windows 8 without linking to an upgrade, the cost for Windows 8 Pro will Rs 1999. Compare this to Windows 7 Home Premium, which cost upwards of Rs 5000.

2. Faster performance: On the same hardware, the system performance of Windows 8 is much quicker than its predecessor. Not to say that Windows 7 was sluggish in any way, but Windows 8 just takes the speed to the next level. Start-up times are shorter, and the general usability is quicker as well. If you happen to install Windows 8 on a Solid State Drive (SSD), then the experience will be better than delightful!

3. Equally comfortable with touch and the keyboard+ mouse combo: The Windows 8 user interface seems to be walking the perfect balance between being compatible with touchscreen devices and on a conventional laptop with a keyboard and a trackpad/mouse. The idea was always clear - this OS will work on a tablet as well as a laptop. We will see a rise of hybrid devices - ultrabooks that also offer touchscreens.

4. More secure out of the box: It is said that “this is the most secure Windows ever”, but that is usually said for all new OSes. But, let us examine the evidence here. Secure Boot will prevent the OS from booting up on any device that isn't signed up by the OEM or by Microsoft. All apps downloaded from Windows Store go through a thorough process of ensuring that they are clean. NSS Labs claims that Internet Explorer 10 is blocking 99% of malware headed its way, something no version has done till now. Surely, the potential security benefits should be enough for you to upgrade!

5. Reset & Refresh: Windows users are well versed with the pain of reinstalling Windows, be it because of bloating over a period of time, or because of some driver/application issue. With Windows 8, the problem has been solved to a huge extent. You can use the Reset feature, which will restore the PC to the exact factory settings as out of the box. This is the alternative for reinstalling the OS, as we are used to. The Refresh feature, on the other hand, retains some settings, files and Metro apps, but removes the rest of the software, applications and changes that may have happened recently. This feature is the alternative for the “Restore to an earlier date” setting that we had seen on Windows versions till now.

SQL Azure - Focus on your application. Not the infrastructure.

SQL Azure delivers cloud database services which enable you to focus on your application, instead of building, administering and maintaining databases. SQL Azure (formerly SQL Server Data Services and later SQL Services) is a cloud-based service from Microsoft offering data storage capabilities. SQL Azure allows relational queries to be made against stored data, which can either be structured or semi-structured, or even unstructured documents. SQL Azure features querying data, search, data analysis and data synchronization. SQL Azure uses Microsoft SQL Server as a backend, but it exposes only a subset of the data types — including string, numeric, date and boolean. It uses an XML-based format for data transfer. Like Microsoft SQL Server. SQL Azure uses T-SQL as the query language and Tabular Data Stream (TDS) as the protocol to access the service over internet.

Cloud Computing & its Services

Cloud computing is location-independent computing, whereby shared servers provide resources, software, and data to computers and other devices on demand, as with the electricity grid. Cloud computing is a natural evolution of the widespread adoption of virtualization, service-oriented architecture and utility computing. Details are abstracted from consumers, who no longer have need for expertise in, or control over, the technology infrastructure "in the cloud" that supports them.

Cloud computing describes a new supplement, consumption, and delivery model for IT services based on the Internet, and it typically involves over-the-Internet provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources. It is a byproduct and consequence of the ease-of-access to remote computing sites provided by the Internet. This frequently takes the form of web-based tools or applications that users can access and use through a web browser as if it were a program installed locally on their own computer.

Cloud Computing Services:

Cloud computing is broken down into three segments: “software”, “platform” and “infrastructure”. Each segment serves a different purpose and offers different products to businesses and individuals around the world.

 

Software as a Service (SaaS) is the service based on the concept of renting software from a service provider rather than buying it yourself. The software is hosted on centralized network servers to make functionality available over the web or intranet. Also known as “software on demand” it is currently the most popular type of cloud computing because of its high flexibility, great services, enhanced scalability and less maintenance. Yahoo mail, Google docs, CRM applications are all instances of SaaS. With a web-based CRM all that employees need to do is register and login to the central system and import any existing customer data. The service provider hosts both the application and the data so the end user is free to use the service from anywhere. SaaS is very effective in lowering the costs of business as it provides the business an access to applications at a cost normally far cheaper than a licensed application fee which is possible due to its monthly fees based revenue model. With SaaS user need not worry about installation or upgrades.

Platform as a Service (PaaS) offers a development platform for developers. The end users write their own code and the PaaS provider uploads that code and presents it on the web. SalesForce.com’s Force.com is an example of PaaS. PaaS provides services to develop, test, deploy, host and maintain applications in the same integrated development environment. It also provides some level of support for the creation of applications. Thus PaaS offers a faster more cost effective model for application development and delivery. The PaaS provider manages upgrades, patches and other routine system maintenance. PaaS is based on a metering or subscription model so users only pay for what they use. Users take what they need without worrying about the complexity behind the scenes.

There are basically four types of PaaS solutions – social application platforms, raw compute platforms, web application platforms and business application platform. Facebook is a type of social application platform wherein third parties can write new applications that are made available to end users. The CRM solutions provided by the companies are examples of business application platform. Developers can upload and execute their applications on Amazon’s infrastructure which is an example of raw compute platform. While the Google provides APIs to developers to build web applications which is an example of web application platform.

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is delivery of the computing infrastructure as a fully outsourced service. Some of the companies that provide infrastructure services are Google, IBM, Amazon.com etc. Managed hosting and development environments are the services included in IaaS. The user can buy the infrastructure according to the requirements at any particular point of time instead of buying the infrastructure that might not be used for months. IaaS operates on a “Pay as you go” model ensuring that the users pay for only what they are using. Virtualization enables IaaS providers to offer almost unlimited instances of servers to customers and make cost-effective use of the hosting hardware. IaaS users enjoy access to enterprise grade IT Infrastructure and resources that might be very costly if purchased completely. Thus dynamic scaling, usage based pricing, reduced costs and access to superior IT resources are some of the benefits of IaaS. IaaS is also sometimes referred to as Hardware as a Service (HaaS). An Infrastructure as a Service offering also provides maximum flexibility because just about anything that can be virtualized can be run on these platforms. This is perhaps the biggest benefit of an IaaS environment. For a startup or small business, one of the most difficult things to do is keep capital expenditures under control. By moving your infrastructure to the cloud, you have the ability to scale as if you owned your own hardware and data center.

Adobe Flash

Adobe Flash (formerly Macromedia Flash) is a multimedia platform used to add animation, video, and interactivity to web pages. Flash is frequently used for advertisements and games. Flash manipulates vector and raster graphics to provide animation of text, drawings, and still images. It supports bidirectional streaming of audio and video, and it can capture user input via mouse, keyboard, microphone, and camera. Flash contains an Object-oriented language called ActionScript.

The Adobe Flash Professional multimedia authoring program is used to create content for the Adobe Engagement Platform, such as web applications, games and movies, and content for mobile phones and other embedded devices. To explore about flash & its functionality, please follow the following link:

1. Flash Tutorial for Beginners
2. Flash CS3 Tutotial
3. Flash CS5 Help

Sixth Sense Technology

This Post contains details about Sixth Sense Technology. It contains introduction, components, working & application of Sixth sense technology in the form of pictures. Please go through pictures for better understanding.

Surface Independent Interactive Computer System

SiiCS is a wearable portable device that can convert any surface into an interactive touch screen and users can interact using natural finger gestures. SiiCS can recognize many objects from the real world and extract related information from the internet and either display it on the object itself or speak it out to the user in case of Visually impaired people. SiiCS derives its motivation from MIT Sixth sense technology, Microsoft surface and Nintendo Wii. The difference here is that SiiCS is dedicated to Visually impaired people and handicapped people apart from regular users.SiiCS represents the intersection of the Computer Science most significant concepts like Human Computer Interaction, Surface independent computing, Machine Vision & Object detection, Gestural computing and Text to speech systems. SiiCS is winner of Microsoft Imagine Cup Software Design Accessibility Innovation Award 2010 and is still in the pre beta stage.

Features:

1. Portable, scalable and wearable device
2. Can convert any surface into an interactive touch screen
3. Users can interact with real time data and information using natural finger gestures.
4. Can detect real world objects and project their information from the web onto their surface such as bing search results, wikipedia definition, its amazon rating and popularity etc.
5. Can operate computer screen using a finger in the air, users can draw on any surface, zoom in zoom out things etc.
6. Supports multi user interaction at the same time.
7. Watch the following video for more information about SiiCS: