Skype 4.0 for Windows Brings Back Compact Screen, Group Contacts
eBay's Skype VOIP telephony business adds some improvements to the second beta of Skype 4.0 for Windows, including the return of the compact screen and group contact capabilities. Reintroducing features from Skype 3.8 seems retro, but Skype needed to make the moves to keep its over 300 million users happy. Such improvements could lead new VOIP and telephony customers looking for free messaging and collaboration apps to Skype in a time of financial distress. - Skype on Oct. 1 will launch the second Skype 4.0 beta for Windows with
improvements to the way users view and access their VOIP conversations, as well
as better instant messaging alerts. Skype 4.0 Beta 2
will be downloadable here beginning Oct. 1.
The move follows criticism from users after eBay...
Visual Basic Guru Moves to Microsoft`s “Oslo” Team
Paul Vick, a principal architect on Visual Basic, is moving over to Microsofts broad software modeling initiative known as “Oslo.” Vick, who helped Microsoft deliver its popular VB tool set, will now help produce Oslo, which is expected by some to be as big a deal for Microsoft as .NET. - Perhaps as evidence of how important Microsoft's quot;Oslo quot; modeling strategy is to the future of the company's development strategy. Paul Vick, a principal architect of Microsoft's Visual Basic, is moving over to take a role in building out the Oslo declarative language.
Visual Basic is perh...
Broadband Rollout May Skip Financial Crisis
With billions already borrowed to bring high speed lines to consumers and billions more still needed to expand wireless broadband ambitions, will a deep credit crunch dent those plans? Maybe, but at least one economist thinks -- with or without congressional action -- tech may still skate on the financial crisis. -
The telecommunications sector was not spared in the Sept.
29 market meltdown, raising questions about what a prolonged economic slump
would do to the nation's broadband rollout. With billions already borrowed to
bring high speed lines to consumers and billions more still needed to exp...
Analysts See Mixed Picture in Spending on IT Hardware, Infrastructure
While the worries on Wall Street and the nations credit crunch have had the most impact on the financial sector and the banking industry, analysts are not sure how much IT departments will cut back on their purchases of desktops, notebooks, storage array and server systems in the coming year. - As the U.S.
stock market continues to fluctuate and Wall Streets biggest firms wait to see
if a bail out packages arrives at their doorstep, theres the question of what
will happen to IT budgets as credit becomes scarce and worries mount about the
overall health of the economy.
While analysts b...
Wall Street's 'Colossal' Risk Management Failure
IT experts say the current Wall Street crisis may be a financial heart attack that warns of more serious problems ahead for the industry. Risk management controls have faltered in grand fashion, according to a well-known RSA data security executive. Consumer-oriented IT companies may face problems selling newer, faster products that aren't absolutely necessary to have, such as updated iPods. - The largest U.S.
financial debacle since the weeks and months following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New
York and Washington
has left no U.S.
business unaffected. The IT industry, meaning all sectors of the software,
hardware and associated services businesses, is certainly not immu...
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