Two More Ways To Hack Facebook’s Timeline Cover

Now we have five different tools that create Facebook timeline cover images, all of them appearing to be reformatted banners, screensavers or Twitter backgrounds.
Even if they are all recylcled, it’s still pretty cool considering only one week has elapsed since Facebook made the new timeline profile available to those who have the Developer application installed on their profiles.

We’ve previously covered three such tools: Coverize.me, Facebook Timeline Cover Creator and Facebook Covers. Today we discovered two more of them.

Fresh Facebook Covers has different 211 images, grouped into the following categories: popular, for girls, for boys, celebrities, TV shows, music, quotes, cute and random.
Like the other tools in this space, all of these covers have Fresh Facebook Covers’ web address stamped in the lower right-hand corner — do you want that in your profile?

On Fresh Facebook Covers, the button “download this cover” appearing beneath all of the images makes it look like you’ll automatically capture the image, but clicking on it simply opens up a larger version of the graphic a new tab. You have to save it yourself and then upload it on your own to your timeline.

Meanwhile, FacebookCovers.org contains 50 cover images and lists 16 categories, some of which don’t yet have anything in them.

These groups are labeled: abstract, animals, awareness, awesome, cute, funny, hearts, life, love, movies, music, people, quotes, sports, TV shows and video games.

To the right of each image on FacebookCovers.org there’s a button labeled “add to profile.”

Clicking on the link fires up a permission window asking your permission for access to your profile, but all that does is upload the chosen graphic to your photo albums. You still have to click on “change cover.”

Also, like the others we’ve covered (pun intended if you want), all of the images available on FacebookCovers.org bear the site’s brand name in the lower-right-hand corner.

It’s easy to erase that branding in any graphics editor, although it would be impolite of us to recommend that practice.

So, dear readers, have you tried out any of the applications for tricking out your cover image in Facebook’s timeline?

Apple's iPhone Event is Near: 5 Predictions

Apple will put an end to the rumors and introduce its next iPhone on October 4--it's already sent out invitations to an iPhone-specific event that will be held at Apple's Cupertino campus. New Apple CEO Tim Cook is expected to take the stage and make the big announcement.

This means we've got just one more week for some good, old-fashioned speculation. Here's what I think we'll see at Apple's upcoming iPhone event:

Prediction #1: The New iPhone Will Look
Different
Depending on which story you're reading, the next iPhone will either have a completely new design or be
 exactly the same, aesthetically, as the iPhone 4.

In other words, Apple has managed to keep the tech press guessing. But considering that Apple has gone 16 months without announcing a new iPhone, I would be surprised if the iPhone 5's design offers nothing new.

Prediction #2: Hardware Will be New, but Predictable

The iPhone 4 had a new design, but it didn't surprise us with its specs--it received the same A4 chip as the iPad. Following the same lines, I think the next iPhone will have the same dual-core A5 chip that debuted in the iPad 2.

I think we can probably look forward to a new camera--not only do rumors suggest that the next iPhone will have an 8MP camera, but Apple has a history of improving the iPhone's camera with each generation. To go with the new chip and camera, the next iPhone will also probably have 1GB of RAM--but Apple probably won't say much about this. After all, Apple doesn't usually spend a lot of time discussing specs.

Prediction #3: Hardware Isn't Everything

Rumor has it that the next iPhone will have software improvements, including expanded voice commands. The new voice commands--part of a feature reportedly called Assistant--are based on Siri, the virtual assistant software maker that Apple acquired last year.

This system-wide voice navigation system could be a standout feature that's exclusive to the iPhone 5, and a big focus at next Tuesday's event. Apple did make voice commands exclusive to the iPhone 3GS in 2009, so requiring an iPhone 5 for expanded voice commands isn't without precedent.

Bonus prediction: The event invitation includes a photo of the iPhone's maps application icon, which has me wondering if Apple will finally add turn-by-turn directions.

Prediction #4: A Cheaper iPhone

The use of the singular in the invitation ("Let's talk iPhone") has led pundits such as John Gruber to speculate that Apple will only launch one new iPhone, despite rumors to the contrary.

While Apple may not launch an iPhone 4S, it will still drop the price on its old iPhones--AT&T and Verizon iPhone 4's--as it has in the past. Low-cost, older-generation iPhones have proven to be very successful, and are one of the reasons AT&T far outpaced Verizon in sales in the second quarter, despite Verizon having the iPhone 4. I doubt Apple will give up that market.

Prediction #5: Sprint Gets Love

Between the Wall Street Journal's unnamed sources, Bloomberg's unnamed sources, and Sprint's internal memos telling employees to keep quiet, a Sprint iPhone 5 seems like a good bet.

T-Mobile, on the other hand, probably won't be part of Apple's announcement. When asked if T-Mobile would be getting the next iPhone, T-Mobile CEO Cole Brodman recently said, "To my knowledge, not in October."

When we talk about monitors, most of us would definitely think of the most common models that are sitting there, prim and proper on our desks. Well, AOC not only delivers said monitors, but they too know how some people feel about not getting enough viewing real estate whenever one travels. Guess this is why they have come up with what they deem to be the ultimate laptop accessory – a portable USB monitor that ain’t too small it might be deem useless, but is large enough to warrant more than a second look.

This lightweight and sleek 16″ monitor will boast a convenient built-in USB port which allows it to receive not only power, but also signal from the computer. Basically a single USB cable eliminates the need for you to tote around a power cord or VGA cable on your travels, now how about that? It isn’t only good for dual-monitor setups, but multi-monitor configuration as well.


Apart from being an extended display, this particular peripheral will also work great if you happen to need something more decent than an iPad for on-the-go presentations. With a 16″ form factor, it will be able to display a resolution count of 1,366 x 768, sporting 50,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, a brightness level of 250cd and a response time of 5ms. There is even a built-in Smart Stand that pivots out when required, but if you don’t need it, it will be stored flush against the back of the monitor.

It doesn’t matter whether you are going to go portrait or landscape with the display, since the foldable stand supports both configurations. Those who have a penchant for model numbers will make do with e1649fwu, so calling it a simple “portable USB monitor” makes a whole lot more sense (and is easier on the brain and tongue). With a serious looking black piano-polish finish on the bezel, there is also a hard glass screen that delivers superior protection.

If you are interested, AOC’s portable USB monitor will set you back by $139, although I do not see it listed on the official website just yet.

iPhone 5 tops many a mobile-phone shopping list

Though yet to be released, the iPhone 5 is already on the shopping list of more than 40 percent of those polled by InMobi.

In a study released yesterday, the mobile ad network discovered that 41 percent of mobile users in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada will buy the new iPhone, with 50 percent of those planning to pick one up within the first six months of the phone's debut. If those numbers hold true, the iPhone 5 would become the most successful product launch yet from Apple, according to InMobi.

Apple has an iPhone event planned for next week, at which the tight-lipped company is widely expected to unveil the iPhone 5.

Further, the new iPhone could easily shake up the battle between Apple and Android by boosting the market share of iOS to 41 percent from its reported 27 percent in June, the study said. A small survey conducted in early August by Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster found similar results, prompting the analyst to forecast that the iPhone 5 could double Apple's market share.


The iPhone 5 is also expected to steal business from other platforms as it's being eyed by 51 percent of current iPhone users but 27 percent of Android owners and 52 percent of BlackBerry users. Some of the new features that consumers are hotly anticipating in the new iPhone include better battery life, faster performance, higher screen resolution, and stronger phone service, InMobi said.

Though most people may be expecting Apple to unveil a totally new phone at next Tuesday's event, past reports have claimed that the device will just be a revamped iPhone 4 with a few improvements but the same basic features. Even if such rumors prove true, a new "iPhone 4S" will scoop up business from 11 percent of current iPhone users, 11 percent of Android owners, and 28 percent of BlackBerry customers.

As a mobile ad network, InMobi has seen an increase in ad impressions for iOS, particularly in iPod Touch devices. Including all of its mobile devices, Apple currently holds the leading share of impressions on InMobi's network at 29 percent.

Though demand for its mobile devices is still running hot, Apple's iOS has seen its once dominant lead in the smartphone OS market overtaken this year by Android. InMobi points to iOS as the top dog on its network, but fellow mobile ad network Millennial Media has been tracking Android in first place since shooting past iOS early this year.

iPhone 5 hardware spec check

With Apple now on the record about an October 4 iPhone event, analysts are reaffirming their prognostications about the phone's hardware--and adding an item or two to a growing list of specifications.
Chris Whitmore, Deutsche Bank Equity Research, said in a research note Monday that he expects an iPhone 5 with aluminum unibody construction, better camera, and a slightly larger screen size. No big surprise there.
Ashok Kumar, an analyst at Rodman & Renshaw, said on Tuesday he expects better graphics silicon--not unlike the big performance increase that Apple boasted about for the iPad 2.
Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster probably had the most intriguing speculation this this week, saying today he expects speech-based features for the iPhone.

So, without further ado, here are the iPhone 5 upgrades expected:

• More memory: Possibly 1GB of memory, twice the amount in the iPhone 4.

• Higher-resolution camera: likely 8-megapixel versus current 5MP.

• Near-Field Communication (NFC): for virtual wallets. Possible but not certain.

• Voice control: speculation says new tech will allow voice navigation.

• Improved graphics: similar to Imagination's PowerVR SGX543 graphics silicon used in the iPad 2.

• Dual-core Apple A5 chip: a virtual certainty that the iPhone 5 will get a boost in chip performance.

• iOS 5: new iOS with iMessage, tabbed browsing and lots more.

• 3G: Qualcomm chipset that will allow connection to both CDMA and GSM networks.

But Apple will need to pick up the pace on new phone introductions next year, according to Rodman & Renshaw's Kumar. "The last iPhone came out 16 months ago. Meanwhile rivals are updating products every three to four months," he said.

Conspicuously absent from the list of iPhone 5 specs is 4G. But Kumar says that 4G on Apple devices won't come any earlier than 2012.

How To Hack The Cover Image In Facebook’s Timeline

The Facebook timeline profile is not even a full week old — for developers — but those who’ve have made the switch can see the need for serious bling in the cover image that takes up half of the screen. The first turnkey offering we’ve seen is Cover Creator.

So Facebook Covers offers Facebook users who have the timeline profile the options of creating their own cover images, choosing from already-created images in several categories, or creating a photo collage of people on their friends lists selected by the user.

The myFBCovers.com site and Cover Creator app were created by GraphicFlash, which was also responsible for Facebook banner creator myFBBanners.com. Banners will no longer be part of Facebook profiles after the switch to timeline, so the company turned its attention to cover images.

Facebook Covers allows users to choose their own image and resize, flip, or rotate it to create their cover images.

Categories listed for the premade cover images are: abstract, anime, cars, celebrities, companies and websites, drinks, games, holidays and celebrations, humor, love, movies, music, nature, pets and animals, photographs, quotes and sayings, random, schools, sports, support and causes, and TV shows.

And the Create Collage Cover option incorporate friends chosen by the user into a photo collage that can be used as the cover image for their new timeline profiles.

Considering how early Cover Creator has come out, and the fact that it’s first in the space, the app is pretty decent.

Further down the road, we’d expect to see a lot more customizability. For now, GraphicFlash’s early entrance into the cover image space seems like that ought to help the vendor take leadership of this particular product category.

5 things we want to see from the iPhone 5

                                               Features that will take the iPhone from good to great

The iPhone 5 could be announced as soon as October 4. Since it will be the first big announcement from new CEO Tim Cook, we can expect Apple to pull out all the stops to make the event as spectacular as possible. Still, though, all eyes will be on the iPhone's new features and capability. There is plenty of speculation already buzzing about the tech information highways about Apple's new smartphone, but these are the things we hope to see included on iPhone 5.

1. Wireless charging to go along with wireless syncing
We already know the new iPhone using iOS 5 can sync wirelessly with your computer. This basic functionality was announced at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June. You won't have to plug in that quirky Apple iPhone cable to move music, movies, and pictures back and forth between your phone and computer. Simply bring your iPhone nearby and let the operating system and iTunes automatically do the work for you. It sounds pretty neat, and will go a long way toward making iPhone use more convenient.
In addition, we hope the iPhone will support wireless charging. The HP TouchPad had this capability. You just place the TouchPad on its charger and juice back up without needing to actually plug in any cables. While that might not sound like a big deal, wireless charging makes using your iPhone around the house infinitely more flexible. Since you won't use wires to sync your iPhone, it would be awfully nice to go completely cord-free to keep your iPhone charged as well.

2. Improved camera
The operating system included on the iPhone 5 will have some seriously nice features for iPhone photographers. An automatic rule-of-thirds overlay will provide visual cues to making your photos more dynamic and interesting. The new iCloud service will make your photos automatically available across your Apple devices, giving you faster, more convenient access to pictures no matter what gadget you happen to be using. You'll also be able to use your volume button as a shutter release, access the camera from the lock screen, and enjoy improved auto-focus.
With all these cool photography enhancements, we really hope to see the iPhone get some serious camera improvements. While the high quality of iPhone photographs has never been about raw megapixels, an improvement in resolution would still be a good thing. Purportedly leaked iPhone 5 photos demonstrate aperture close to that of point-and-shoot cameras. Some flash improvements wouldn't hurt, either. Essentially, though, we'd like to see the iPhone 5 camera take a step closer to being a good, universal camera for family use, completely obliterating the need to carry a point-and-shoot camera in addition to our smartphone.

3. Unlocked out of the gate

It took Apple quite a while to release an unlocked iPhone 4 to the general masses. It wasn't until June this year that you could pick up an unsubsidized iPhone, leaving you free to use it with any carrier. The ability to choose your own service provider is nearly ubiquitous throughout the rest of the

world, but Americans are typically chained to a given contract when they initially buy the phone.

On behalf of travelers and carrier switchers alike, it would be awesome if
the iPhone 5 came out of the gate unlocked. We've heard rumors that
The iPhone 4 has left big shoes to fill
companies like Sprint may also carry the iPhone 5. If enough carriers already have their own iPhone 5 access, an unlocked iPhone simply makes sense.



4. Near-field communication
Near field communication (NFC) is a relatively new technology that provides wireless communication between two devices. The concept behind NFC is that you have an inanimate object, like a card, poster, or label, and a gadget which serves as a reader. Objects targeted by the reader don't need power to be read, which is what would allow the target to be embedded in just about anything you can imagine. The target gets its power from the reader itself, extracting power from the wireless signal. Once the target is turned on this way, it can send data back to the reader. It might sound like scanning barcodes, but NFC will be much more flexible and secure. You can do a lot more with this kind of communication method than you could with a simple barcode.
Google just released its Google Wallet service, which allows your cellphone to replace participating credit and debit cards. The service is still in its infancy, but Google Wallet won't be the only NFC payment service to crop up. As NFC becomes more popular and attainable among retailers and businesses, it will become increasingly common to accept payment through a smartphone instead of an obsolete plastic credit card. This technology is something that the iPhone 5 should be helping pioneer. NFC will continue to spread in industry, and the iPhone needs to be able to say "there's an app for that."



5. A little brother

Could an iPhone nano be in the works?

                                                                                                                                                                      

Our final wish for the iPhone 5 is, essentially, a little brother. Since the cost tiers for iPhone models are proportional to its internal storage capacity, a smaller iPhone based on cloud storage seems like it would be the least expensive option. That's what the rumored iPhone nano is all about. Working hand-in-hand with iCloud to keep files on the internet and streaming the content to your phone, the iPhone nano would obviate the need for big onboard memory.

The smaller, less-expensive iPhone nano wouldn't be for everyone, of course. Some people really do need reliable internal memory on their iPhone. That being said, cloud storage is pretty hip and convenient, and more options are always a good thing.

In Defense of the New Facebook

Not a fan of the revamp? Give Timeline and the other new features a chance -- but keep Facebook clean on privacy controls, too.
By Eric Mack, PCWorld Sep 26, 2011 8:11 pm

Shortly after Mark Zuckerberg unveiled a major overhaul to Facebook at the company's f8 conference last week, some informal surveys and Facebook chatter found many users are not fans of the changes. But are Timeline, media integration, and the introduction of Open Graph apps really that bad?

I personally can't wait for Timeline to roll out on my Facebook account. Mark Zuckerberg said at f8 that the redesign to the user profile section will compile past posts, pictures, and activities to help show "the story of your life." Zuckerberg may be overselling the concept a bit, and it remains to be seen how well the underlying algorithm picks and chooses compelling moments from my past activity, but Timeline is a long-overdue upgrade that will finally make profile pages actually provide a user profile.

Right now, profiles are anchored by a user's wall -- a disorganized stream of consciousness from me, people I know, and people I don't really know. Click the "Info" tab to get a more traditional user profile, based on static information gathered at some point in the past from a single questionnaire. A huge social network like Facebook can do better than that and now it is. Timeline could finally deliver a constantly-updating, algorithm-based profile. Hasn't every Tumblr blogger wished sometimes to automatically update their feed without taking all that time to actually synthesize their thoughts and write?

More Media, More Sharing
I suspect that Facebook's efforts at integrating media services like Spotify and Netflix into the network won't go down exactly as intended. I don't expect to spend much time simultaneously watching or listening to something with my Facebook friends. Perhaps that will happen in the youngest demographics, but I'm more excited about the prospect of Facebook as the ultimate discovery engine for music and other media. This is why social is supposed to be so exciting, right? The capability to tap in to your network to recommend new tunes and TV shows is something all media services try to integrate. Few have succeeded because they lack the critical mass of users that Facebook has.

The promise of other Open Graph apps only expands this universe of opportunities to collaborate, discover, and share. Need a jogging partner on short notice, or a recipe recommendation from a friend whose tastes you trust? Soon it could all be within reach in one place.

Creepy Factor?
But isn't all this a little bit scary? What about privacy? Do I really want the world to know how many times I listened to Pit Bull and Nicki Minaj last week?

Yes, Facebook continues to cultivate an ever-increasing creepy factor. I don't like Mark Zuckerberg's apparent disdain for the very concept of privacy. This is why the backlash seen in the past week is good. It helps keep Facebook and Zuckerberg in check by raising important concerns, boosting the public's awareness of possible issues, and pressuring Facebook to include all sorts of opt-out and privacy controls.

As PCWorld's Jared Newman points out, this is just the latest in a string of backlashes against changes to Facebook that shove us into sharing more of ourselves on the social network. There was a freak-out when the feed of friends' status updates and activities first debuted, and now it's the heart of the network. Facebook is going to keep pushing us to be more public, and we should keep pushing back, but so far the benefits have outweighed the costs for most users. These new changes are a particularly strong shove, but I don't think we've neared the point of being pushed off a cliff just yet.

Canon 24-105mm Falls From the Sky, Punch a Hole in the Roof Worth $4,300

Canon users know how tough an “L” type lens and personally I know since I have one. A report dated September 2nd, Debbie Payne from Northern Carolina heard a loud crash on the roof, upon looking into he found a crushedCanon 24-105mm L lens on the ground while staring up was a 9-inch hole in her roof.

The Petaluma police department are now investigating on how the lens fell from the sky and trying to found who owns the meteor-like Canon L lens.

Accordingly, the Canon 24-105mm weighs 1.5lb and punching a hole on the roof in that impact –will obviously tell that it comes at hundred or thousands meters above.

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 L IS USM Lens is listed for $1060 on Amazon.com, while the roof damage it incurred is estimated at $4300. That’s $5300 plus liability if the lens owner will be found.

Our wild guess, was someone on a hot air balloon or aircraft such open helicopter accidentally dropped the lens while changing the camera lens.

Source: San Jose Mercury News and NBC Bay Area

NTLDR is Missing Solution to Fix it

How to fix NTLDR is Missing press any key to restart

This problem some time occurs when Ntldr file is deleted or corrupt some how.NTLDR is the boot loader for all releases of Microsoft’s Windows NT operating system up to and including Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. NTLDR is typically run from the primary hard disk drive, but it can also run from portable storage devices such as a CD-ROM, USB flash drive, or floppy disk. NTLDR can also load a non NT-based operating system given the appropriate boot sector in a file.

Here is a solution if you have NTLDR is Missing problem in your windows XP

Steps

1. Insert Windows XP installation CD then boot from CD-ROM
2. At the option screen choose Repair option by pressing R key
3. Choose the location of the installation of Windows you want to repair by pressing the corresponding number ( mainly 1)
4. Enter the administrator password when prompted ,if you dont have used password press enter
5. Then Enter the following command
6. here ‘D’ is the drive name of cd-rom it can be differnet on your system so choose according to it
7. COPY D:\I386\NTLDR C:\
8. COPY D:\I386\NTDETECT.COM C:\
9. Eject the Windows XP installation CD then type: exit TO restart your windows
10. Done

Line 7 and 8 are using simple copy command to copy your NTLDR and NTDETECT.COM file to your c: drive.

Facebook 'Timeline' Tells the Story of Your Online Life, Lets Apps Mine Historical Data

Facebook has been all about socializing and sharing content. However, this interaction has a time-bound aspect to it. Your set of friends and colleagues today might be different from a few years ago. Your activities, likes, preferences and social status will definitely change through time. With this in mind, Facebook has been cooking up a new profile interface that will not only feature what you've been up to lately, but the entire span of your life — at least the parts that are online.

At the recently-concluded Facebook f8 conference in San Francisco, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressed the developer community with a barrage of new features. Perhaps most notable is the introduction of what could be the biggest overhaul of Facebook profiles yet. The new feature, called Timeline, will be a collection of all relevant updates that your account has had from the beginning until the present. Timeline actually goes beyond Facebook's beginnings, and tries to plot your life even before the dawn of social networking.

"It's how you can tell the whole story of your life in a single page," Zuckerberg says. Let's just hope Timeline shows the right things.

          TechCrunch's Greg Kumparak explains how to activate the developer preview



Your Life, In One Page
Timeline is mostly a collection of photos, status updates, liked items, shared items, and friend connections. What is relevant here is that Facebook is showing developers and users the site's potential in connecting the dots — whether these are in the present or in the past. Facebook will initially choose which content will appear in your timeline, which you can then tag, hide or edit as you please.

The web interface of Timelines can be viewed in different ways, such as yearly or monthly, Either will be optimal depending on how active a user is on Facebook. Timeline is currently in developer preview, though, so not everyone can see their account's Timeline until Timeline rolls out for all users on September 30. However, anyone can sign up to be a developer, and any user can trigger Timeline activation with a few setting tweaks.

Data as a Platform

But more than users showcasing relevant points in their life, Timeline is more of a platform that apps can use to mine data stored throughout a user's history. Apps can showcase data from a user's profile and that of their friends, such as music preferences, places visited, recipes cooked and a lot of other information in a time-bound format.

With all this information, there is bound to be the issue of privacy. With a time-bound depiction of your online (and sometimes offline) life, there is always the risk of showing too much of your life to the wrong people. But, for Facebook, profiles are all about telling your story. Timeline is perhaps the best way to showcase your life story — in one single page. And, if a person's life is the sum of all his experiences, will Timeline be the online equivalent of a person's lifetime?

Hack Your Way Into Facebook's New Timeline Feature

Most users will have to wait a few weeks before they get to see Facebook’s most drastic changes to the service since the company was founded, but you can use a developers' workaround to gain access to the Timeline feature right now.

Developers already have access to early beta versions of the new features.
Luckily for users eager to try out the revamped Facebook, becoming a developer is a simple process that shouldn’t take you more than 5 or 10 min.

Facebook's new Timeline view

Facebook announced the updates Thursday at the company’s f8 developers' conference.

Step-by-Step Instructions
Here’s how you do it

First, log into Facebook and enable developer mode. The easiest way to do this is to just type “developer” into Facebook’s search box and click the first result. It should look like this

You’ll have to retype your password and allow the developer app basic access to your account before you see a screen that looks something like this.

This is the basic developer page. We’re going to convince Facebook we’re real developers and create an app that uses its new “Open Graph” tech. Don’t worry, it’s not nearly as hard as it sounds.

Now, create a new app by clicking the button in the top left corner. Nobody but you will see the app, so the information you enter doesn’t actually matter. Just create an app name and namespace (the latter needs to be all lowercase), agree to the terms and conditions, and create the app. Now you should arrive at the app’s main setting screen, as shown below:

Click on the link labeled “Open Graph” on the left (not shown here) to open up the Open Graph Getting Started page. To get started with Open Graph, you’ve got to fill in an action your app can do and an object for your app to interact with. This can be any verb and noun. (For instance, my fake app fulfills my lifelong dream of fighting a robot.)

After you’ve created your action and object, click the Get Started button. This will drop down the first of three pages of settings but, since no one will see them, they shouldn’t matter. Quickly click through them to create your app. When you’re done, you should see a page like this:

You're In!
Congratulations, you’re now a Facebook developer on the cutting edge. Just wait a few minutes for your new developer status to filter through the system. Then return to the Facebook homepage where you should find an invite for Timeline at the top of the screen.

Be warned that the new Timeline is a little bit buggy, and not everything Zuckerberg promised in Thursday’s keynote has been implemented yet, but if you want to get a handle on Facebook’s new features early, or try out the new Spotify app, or just gain bragging rights with your friends, this should be your golden ticket.

Some things to note: Even though you now have access to the Timeline, it still won't be your default homepage. To get back to your timeline view you'll need to surf to http://www.facebook.com/YOURNAMEHERE?sk=timeline, switching out the YOURNAMEHERE part with your facebook username, or just bookmark the timeline page when you get to it.

If you decide to take the plunge, keep in mind this is a developer beta so expect to see bugs. There are also no guarantees that an accident won't happen that briefly makes all your profile information public. So the risk is yours if you try Timeline.

Gmail ‘ready to tackle Microsoft Outlook'

Google’s Gmail service is finally mature enough to challenge Microsoft’s Exchange Online and other online email services, according to analysts Gartner.

Five years after it launched, Google’s Gmail for business is finally ready to worry Microsoft, according to leading analysts at Gartner.

The verdict, announced in advance of a summit Gartner is holding in London tomorrow, cites Gmail’s growing influence, with more than 5,000 major contracts with businesses.

Cloud-based email is claimed to be more secure and easier to access remotely than traditional email, which is typically run through a server owned and stored at a company’s premises.

Microsoft has recently launched Office 365, its own cloud-based version of its popular Exchange email server. At the time, commentators suggested that the Windows maker had held off launching such a product until there was a credible threat from Google.

"The road to its enterprise enlightenment has been long and bumpy, but Gmail should now be considered a mainstream cloud email supplier," said Matthew Cain, research vice president at Gartner. "While Gmail's enterprise email market share currently hovers around one per cent, it has close to half of the market for enterprise cloud email.”

Mr Cain conceded that cloud email still only accounts for less that four per cent of the overall enterprise email market, but said it was likely to be more than half the market by 2020. He also said that only Google and Microsoft were currently in a position to provide cloud-based business email services.

Rivals, including Novell GroupWise and IBM Lotus Notes/Domino, have lost market momentum, Gartner said, noting that network giant Cisco closed its cloud email effort.

Google, however, continues to be resistant to feature requests that would be applicable to only a small segment of its customers, Gartner said. Banks, for example, may require surveillance capabilities that Google is unlikely to build into Gmail because the company is seeking mass adoption.

"The intense competition between Microsoft and Google will make both vendors stronger and enable them to apply cloud expertise to other enterprise cloud endeavours," Mr Cain said. "The rivalry will make it difficult for other suppliers to compete directly in the cloud email and collaboration space."


Search Engine Submission - AddMe

iPhone 5 Production Delays Reported

iPhone 5 production could be behind schedule, it has been reported, with the tear-shaped design seemingly causing manufacturing issues.

9to5Mac said that it had heard that there were problems on at least one assembly line with the production of the iPhone 5.

Unnamed sources confirmed to the website that there would be two new iPhone models -- an iPhone 4-alike and an iPhone 5 -- and Apple expects to have 10 million on hand at launch, likely to be October 7.

As well as a larger screen and thinner, rounder body, the iPhone 5 will have a larger screen than the iPhone 4 and is said to be "impossibly" light by 9to5Mac's source

                              iPhone 5 will be 'fairly different' -- report

Meanwhile, more cases supposedly for the iPhone 5 have been leaked. After a Chinese vendor claimed it had its hands on cases for the iPhone 5 earlier this week, Stuff now claims to have some additional images of cases for the next-generation device originating from Essex-based Fonegadgets.

The cases seem to confirm a larger screen, tapered edges, a thinner design, with volume buttons in the same place as on the iPhone 4 but looking more like the iPhone 3GS volume controls, as well as a tapered, tear-drop like design.

Though we can't confirm that these cases are the genuine article, they do seem to tally with the best other evidence we have about the design of the next-generation iPhone. Hopefully we'll know for sure very soon.

Facebook.com email address for sale on eBay

One of the first @facebook.com email addresses has already raised over £300 for charity on eBay

Facebook has announced a revamp of its Messages feature 

An invite for a new @facebook.com email address is on sale for charity via eBay, and has already raised more than £300. Posted by the news site allfacebook.com, the auction has attracted nearly 40 bidders with five hours to go.
The proceeds from the sale will go to the Susan G Komen for the Cure charity, which says it aims “to save lives and end breast cancer forever by empowering people, ensuring quality care for all and energizing science to find the cures”.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg showcased the ‘next generation messaging system’, which includes allowing users to have an @facebook.com email address, at an event in San Francisco on Monday. He said: “Email is too slow, email is too formal. There is too much friction, like the filling in the subject line when people send an email.”
Zuckerberg stressed that the site’s new messaging system, which will combine Facebook’s instant messaging system, SMS, Facebook messages and email in one place, would allow people to reply seamlessly across multiple devices to different types of messages
The new messaging system is only live to those with an invite at this stage, and Zuckerberg said that it will be rolled out slowly across the next several months. The eBay auction is the first to offer one for sale.

How To Get Fans To Click Facebook’s New ‘Share’ Link

Your posts gain visibility as people forward your content to their friends.

Facebook news feed updates now display a “share” link that lets users repost that update to their friends.

Posts forwarded at least once display a tally of reshares next to a link labeled “view shares.”

That tally has a way of motivating people to read your post and forward it on, especially as the total number of reshares goes up.

The more shares you get, the more impact your marketing efforts have.

So you’ll want to ask people to share your posts but do so diplomatically to avoid annoying people.

Here are some examples of how to encourage people to share your posts:

Promote applications: “Check out the fun new game we’ve installed on our page and click share so your friends can play too.”
Shop at your store: “We just launched our new line of purses. Check them out here and click share to show them off to your friends.”
Tout your site: “We’re streaming a concert from our offices on our website. Click through to watch and hit share so your friends can hear this awesome new band.”
Sales: “Today only: two for one tee-shirts on our website. Click share and your friends will thank your for their cool new clothes.”
Giveaways: ”You and your friends can get caffeinated together for free. All you have to do is click share on this link to get coupons for a free coffee at any of our stores”

Uses these strategies and soon you’ll see your messages traveling further across Facebook than ever before.

First Look: Apple Thunderbolt Display

The Apple Thunderbolt Display may just be the most clever display ever.

The Apple Thunderbolt Display may just be the most clever display ever. Macworld Lab received our new display Friday morning, and we immediately set out to test the new features.

The Apple Thunderbolt Display connected to a MacBook Air. A Thunderbolt RAID array (the Promise Pegasus R6, right), and a FireWire      800 RAID array (the Promise SmartStor DS4600, left), are connected to the display.



The $999 Thunderbolt Display’s specifications are impressive, but not much different from Apple’s 27-inch LED Cinema Display () released last year. Both feature LED backlit displays with a resolution of 2560-by-1440 pixels, the same brightness rating of 375 cd/m2, MagSafe power connector for charging a laptop, and three USB 2.0 ports. The Thunderbolt Display has a FaceTime HD camera, while the Cinema Display has an iSight camera.

The Thunderbolt Display (right foreground) has more connectivity options than the Cinema Display (left background)


What’s new—and what’s really exciting—is the addition of a FireWire 800 port, a gigabit ethernet port, and (of course) a Thunderbolt port to the back of the display. You get all of these extra ports, and at the same time, you have fewer cables to string to your Mac—the Mini DisplayPort and USB 2.0 connector cables on the Cinema Display have been replaced with a single Thunderbolt connection.

The Thunderbolt and MagSafe cables (front) from the Thunderbolt Display.
 In the background are the MagSafe, Mini DisplayPort,
 and USB connectors from the Apple 27-inch Cinema Display

f you, say, have a FireWire 800 hard drive, you can connect it to the Thunderbolt Display. That hard drive is then connected to your Mac via Thunderbolt. Ethernet and USB work in a similar way.

MacBook Air and Thunderbolt Display

The Thunderbolt Display, which was originally announced in July at the same time as the new MacBook Air, should be most attractive to owners of 2011 MacBook Airs, bringing some seriously fast I/O connections to Apple’s smallest laptop. Never before has the MacBook Air been able to use gigabit ethernet or FireWire 800 external devices. Before the Thunderbolt Display, connecting a MacBook Air to a wired LAN required an optional USB-to-ethernet connector, and external drives were limited to        

pokey USB 2.0 transfer speeds.

The 2011 MacBook Air uses the Eagle Peak Thunderbolt controller, which offers two 10Gbps bidirectional Thunderbolt channels and supports one DisplayPort connection.

To test the new features, we connected the MagSafe and Thunderbolt connectors from the Thunderbolt Display to a new 13-inch MacBook Air. We connected to our LAN using the display’s ethernet connector. The connection showed right up in our Network system preferences.

The ethernet connection on the Thunderbolt Display appears in the Network system preference as Display Ethernet


We then connected a Promise Pegasus R6 array to the Thunderbolt port on the back of the display. The drive mounted automatically on the MacBook Air’s desktop. Next, we connected the PromiseSmartStor DS4600 RAID to the FireWire 800 port on the back of the display. Again, the drive mounted on the desktop automatically.

MacBook Pro and Thunderbolt Display
The new MacBook Pros, iMacs, and Mac minis use the Light Ridge Thunderbolt controller, which offers four bidirectional Thunderbolt channels and supports two DisplayPort connections.

A 2011 17-inch MacBook Pro connected to the Thunderbolt Display (left). The Promise Pegasus R6 array is connected to the Thunderbolt Display, while the Cinema Display is connected to the Pegasus R6.


We connected the Thunderbolt Display to a 2011 17-inch MacBook Pro and were able to mount the two RAIDs, connect to the LAN through the display’s ethernet port, and connect an LED Cinema Display’s Mini DisplayPort connector to the second Thunderbolt port on the Promise Pegasus R6. The display was instantly recognized and we were able to drive two 27-inch displays along with the MacBook Pro’s built in display—that, my friends, is a lot of screen real estate.

Our MacBook Pro setup, with the Thunderbolt Display (right), a Cinema Display (left), and a Promise Pegasus R6 (next to the laptop)


The Thunderbolt Display requires OS X 10.6.8 or later, and a Thunderbolt-equipped Mac. The Mac Pro is the only line of Apple’s computers that has yet to be updated with Thunderbolt.

Windows 8 and OS X Lion: How Do They Compare?

Windows 8 is far from ready, but the developer preview gives us a chance to see how it compares to Apple's OS X Lion.

It’s still far too early in Windows 8’s development cycle to pit the nascent OS against its fully baked competition. But Apple’s recently released OS X Lion offers the most recent competing view of what a PC operating system should look like in the age of the smartphone and tablet.

I like to think I’m platform agnostic: I game on a Windows desktop, I work on an Ubuntu desktop, and I recently picked up a MacBook Air to replace an aging Windows laptop--and to complete the set, to be honest.

Lion has been my first real taste of Apple’s take on the desktop OS (I’ve owned iPads and iPod Touches), and I’m liking what I’m seeing: It’s a decidedly modern OS, blending lessons that Apple has learned from iOS into a form that makes sense when you have a proper keyboard and pointing device available.

That said, my admittedly limited time with Windows 8 has been something of an eye-opener. There’s still quite a bit of time before it’ll see the light of day, but Microsoft’s vision of the future of operating systems reflects the company's time in the mobile arena, and the culture war it has arguably lost in light of Apple’s meteoric rise in popularity.

So how do the two OSs compare?

                           Let's get it started!



Judging a Book by Its Cover
Mac fans are legion, so I’m sure that plenty of people out there are willing to explain why a brushed-steel wrapper on absolutely everything is the pinnacle of design. The uniformity bleeds down from the frame right onto the user interface, without much in the way of customization options--barring third-party utilities, of course. I’m not much of a stickler for this sort of thing (function over form, always), but I find Windows 8’s colorful aesthetic so much more ... well, pleasant.

Bright and inviting aren’t words I like to ascribe to operating systems, or any other tool. But they’re apt here. Given the choice between Apple’s staid minimalism and the lively interface Microsoft has whipped up, I’m going to gravitate toward something that’s a little more lively.

Beauty Is Skin Deep
But looks aren’t everything, and the Metro interface will be the biggest hurdle for onlookers to get over--whatever your platform of choice.

It’s important to understand that Microsoft hasn’t simply shoehorned a desktop OS into a tablet product. The company has created an operating system to address the sea change in technology we’ve witnessed over the past few years, and it's kind enough to bring archaic, touch-free platforms along for the ride.

As the PCWorld editor charged with covering desktop PCs, I view a touch-centric OS from the leading developer of PC operating systems as the sort of thing that will get me looking over my résumé. But Windows 8 isn’t about ditching the mouse and keyboard so much as it is about addressing the way we use technology today.

                            Lion's Launchpad makes it easier to, well, launch your apps.


Lion is taking steps in the right direction: You can see hints of Apple’s future (I hope) in the Launchpad, which borrows heavily from iOS. Applications are condensed into icons, with numbers giving you a bird’s-eye view of anything that needs your attention. Windows 8 goes one step further: Tiles are much more useful, doling out information at a glance, instead of forcing you to dive into a particular app to see what messages or notifications await.

Finding Your Stuff
File trees and folders are archaic. They hark back to a time when finding a specific photo or a particular track off an album required remembering where you put it. Today, search is king. And I thought it couldn’t get easier than Command-Space on the Mac, which brings the focus over to the Spotlight search bar.

Windows 8 offers the same functionality, but divvies results up into Apps, Settings, and Files, and rolls some extra functionality into the mix: A search for “cake,” for instance, will point to any files on the device, and with a tap (or click) I can extend that query to Facebook, Twitter, or locales nearby--it turns out there are quite a few bakeries in the area.

It’s All About the Apps
Windows 8‘s tiles, while attractive, are ultimately unwieldy. Sliding through the list of colorful icons is pretty cool the first few times. But should your collection of Metro apps start to grow, you’ll be stuck with page after page of animated tiles to flip through and organize.

A few pinching gestures make sifting through tiles a bit more efficient, and you can group preferred applications together and simply shunt the rest to the far right of your Start Screen. But a time will come when you’ll have too many tiles and Metro apps to manage efficiently.

As Windows 8 is still in its early stages, I can only imagine that a superior method of navigation is on the way--iOS didn’t get folders to corral apps until version 4, after all.

Making the Right Gestures
Not much of a contest here: When it comes to multitouch-friendly shortcuts, Lion’s trackpad gestures come out ahead.

                              Apple's trackpad gestures may seem arcane at first, but they work.


Windows 8’s gestures rely on the touchscreen: pulling up the Start button with a swipe from the right, or reaching the application bar by swiping up, for example. That’s all fine, but those of us without touchscreens are back to right-clicking the mouse or pressing keyboard shortcuts.

There’s nothing particularly wrong about that, but I must admit that my time with Lion has made me a believer in gestures. Carving what amounts to arcane runes onto my trackpad is an efficient way to jump across multiple desktops and applications, or to flip back and forth between Web pages in Google Chrome. In addition to being awesome, of course.

And the 'Winner' Is…?
My MacBook Air isn’t going anywhere--the Windows 8 PC experience is still dependent on Samsung, Toshiba, Dell, and the rest, and my confidence in their ability to deliver a laptop that’s portable, powerful, and (relatively) inexpensive runs thin.

But once my time with this developer preview slate draws to a close, I’ll certainly be downloading the build that Microsoft is making available, and spending a few months watching this OS develop.

I have a bit of a bias here--I just like new things. But I haven’t been so excited for something as mundane as an operating system in a long time.

We have more Windows 8 news than you can handle.

Facebook to Let Users Update Twitter Accounts From Its Site

Facebook is becoming more user-friendly with Twitter as it tries to step up its game and defend against the growth of full-featured Google+.

People with accounts on both Facebook and Twitter have been able to update them both simultaneously for a long time -- but from Twitter to Facebook, and not the other way around. That’s about to change.

Facebook says it will soon let you send your status updates to Twitter, a feature it previously only offered for the Facebook pages curated by businesses, bands, celebrities and other public figures. Soon, average users will be able to update both social networks at once from Facebook,says ZDNet.

The upcoming feature is part of Facebook’s new Subscriber functionality, which lets you adjust the amount and type of activity you see from friends, follow the public updates of people on Facebook who are not your friends and opt-in to share your public updates with people you don’t know but who might be interested in you.

The latest news likely is meant to coincide with F8, the Facebook Developer Conference, which will be held Sept. 22 in San Francisco.

Wanna get started once the feature is rolled out? Here’s how you do it, according to Facebook’s September update of its Subscribe for Public Figures document.

Go to facebook.com/twitter and link your profile or page to your Twitter account. Once you link your accounts, your Twitter account will be updated every time you post a public update to Facebook. Only posts whose privacy you set to Public using your inline controls are eligible for this.

Consider this: Twitter’s 140-character blips don’t feel quite right on Facebook, which lets people post longer updates. Also, frequent Twitter updates are right in line with the ethos of the site, while they can be annoying on Facebook.

But going the other direction -- from Facebook to Twitter -- might be appealing if for no other reason than providing content for people who struggle to keep their Twitter stream interesting for fickle followers who can unfollow you on a whim.

How to Download and Install Windows 8 Into a Virtual Machine

Here's how to download and install the Windows 8 Developer Preview into a virtual machine on your PC.

We've shown you how to go about installing the new Windows 8 developer preview on a brand-new hard drive or a partition of your existing hard drive--that's easy.

However, most of you probably just want to check out Windows 8 without making a commitment to installing the OS on its own separate drive (or drive portion). No problem! You can still fiddle with the new OS in an environment that's much easier to remove once tinkering time ends, thanks to the power of virtual machines--applications that let you run a virtual PC inside your PC (cue Inception music).

Go grab VirtualBox and install the default package. Once you're finished, you'll open right into a fresh copy of the application. This is where you'll begin creating your system inside your system.

To start, click on the giant New button in the upper-left corner of the app. Give your virtual machine a clever name and select Windows 7 as the operating system. Make sure that your choice of OS (32-bit or 64-bit) matches whichever version of Windows 8 you downloaded.

Click Next, and you'll be taken to a screen that asks how much memory you'd like to devote to the virtual operating system. The 32-bit version of Windows 8 requires 1 gigabyte at minimum, and the 64-bit version requires 2GB, but the more RAM you can give the virtual OS, the better it will run. Click Next once you've made your choice.

Leave the "Virtual Hard Disk" options and subsequent "Create New Virtual Disk" options exactly as they are, unless you think you'll need to access your virtual hard drive in a separate virtual machine application. You can select either a "Dynamically allocated" or "Fixed size" virtual hard drive based on your personal preferences--we suggest you use the "Dynamically allocated" disk on our installation. On the next screen, make sure that your virtual disk has at least 16GB allocated to it for the 32-bit version of Windows 8. The 64-bit version needs a minimum of 20GB.

Once you're ready, click Next to create your virtual machine.

When your new virtual PC is ready, it will appear in VirtualBox's list of available machines (powered off at the moment, we note). Highlight it and click the big Settings button. If your system supports hardware virtualization, you can give your virtual machine access to additional CPU cores via the System submenu. If you don't know whether your CPU supports hardware virtualization, you can check for yourself on Intel and AMD's websites. For Intel processors, look up your own processor model and check for virtualization under "Advanced Features." For AMD processors, look up your processor model and look for a feature listing called "AMD Virtualization Technology."

Now click on the Storage submenu and then on the Empty line underneath "IDE Controller." Click on the little CD icon next to the CD/DVD drive listing, and select the option, Choose a virtual CD/DVD disk file. Scroll for the Windows 8 .iso file you previously downloaded to your actual (not virtual) system and load that up. Now click on the big OK button at the bottom of the overall Settings window.

Cross your fingers and click on the big Start button to load your virtual machine for the first time. If all has gone well, the first thing you'll see is an annoying pop-up message that tells you about your keyboard and mouse capturing options. Ignore it. VirtualBox will boot and go right into the Windows 8 installation mechanism. Now take a breath: You've made it past the tricky part. And before you know it, you'll be fiddling around in Windows 8's funky new user interface faster than you can say, "Virtualwho?"

Now have fun in Windows 8!