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Opera Unite was going to change the Web, according to the hype from the Norwegian browser maker. Despite only being available for a number of months in a beta separate from the main Opera build--and the Internet looking more or less like the same place in the aftermath--the release of Opera 10.10 beta for Windows, Mac, and Linux indicates that Unite is about to become a standard Opera feature.

Unite is basically a peer-to-peer system designed through the browser, but its API allows users to create feature-rich apps using only HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. By default, Unite comes with … Read more

Converber provides an incredible amount of options as a unit converter. With a simple layout and an impressive collection of units, this program will be helpful for school and everyday life.

We dove right into the program's intuitive and simply laid out interface, with two main menus of conversions front and center. We would have liked a more robust Help file, perhaps with definitions of the more obscure conversions, but were able to fully utilize the program nonetheless. At first we didn't believe the program description boasting over 1,200 conversion units, but we quickly learned it was … Read more

Basic Inventory Control helps populate and track a business' products. With a fundamental set of tools to accomplish this goal, even novices will step right into this useful program.

The program's very plain-looking interface pushed us into experimenting, since its Help file and Tutorial were vaguely worded and directionless. Thankfully, the inventory manager is broken down into a few simple commands for creating and tracking inventory. The success of the program hinged on building up a product database. After we'd given all our stocks a name, product number, and price, we were free to manage our inventory. Ordering, … Read more

MConvert quickly calculates complex mathematic formulas. By performing this difficult task users can ensure accuracy and save time.

We instantly started converting our facts and figures thanks to the program's intuitive layout and its well-marked command buttons. We imagined all the practical home and school possibilities while choosing between dozens of everyday and scientific conversions ranging from temperature conversion, distance, volume, mass, time, currency, area, and more. We were relieved to find all the guesswork taken out of conversion, since the program lists all possible alternatives (for example, the currency converter lists dozens of monetary units, while temperature lists … Read more

In a corporate blog post this week, Microsoft Vice President Horacio Gutierrez promoted the idea of a "harmonized, global patent system," in which all the nations adopt common standards for processing and approving patent applications.

Properly done, patents approved in one country could become enforceable in other countries, as is the case with copyrights under the terms of the Berne Convention.

I really have no problem with harmonization if it is properly done, but I think it would be tremendously difficult to achieve good results. The reality of patent protection is radically different from that of copyrights because … Read more

Civilians recruited by Russian language social networking sites and using Russian Mafia-associated botnets perpetrated many of the cyberattacks on Georgian government Web sites during the five-day Russian-Georgian war in 2008, according to a recent report.

However, while the cyberattackers appear to have had advance notice of the invasion and the benefit of some close cooperation from a state organ, there were no fingerprints directly linking the attacks to the Russian government or military, according to the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit (US-CCU), an independent nonprofit research institute that produced the report.

Much of the material in the report was already … Read more

Microsoft on Thursday said the next version of Office for Mac will arrive by the 2010 holiday buying season, and it added that the new version will include a version of Outlook.

Outlook for Mac will replace Entourage, the current e-mail and calendar program in the Mac Office suite. Although it will still differ from the Windows version of Outlook, it will add support for more Exchange features, such as public folders and rights management features.

Office for Mac had a version of Outlook in its pre-Mac OS X days, but Microsoft switched to the Entourage program with Office for … Read more

Updated: At 2:50 p.m. we added links for Opera 10 beta 3 with Unite, and added a statement from Opera about the crash logging feature.

Opera 10 beta 3 was released Wednesday for Windows, Mac, and Linux users. With a strong European following, the preview version has been able to keep this popular alternative browser competitive by offering page rendering quality comparable to Google Chrome, while offering a robust list of features.

Opera is touting the stability and performance enhancements in the third beta, but in casual testing it appeared to have the slowest JavaScript engine when compared … Read more

SUPERIOR, Colo.--If you remember the scene from Pixar's "Wall-E," in which a rocket ship on its way to humankind's space station blasts through a debris field of abandoned satellites, you may have wondered if anyone on Earth is working to prevent that from becoming reality.

The answer is yes.

Here in this small town not far from Boulder, Colo., the Secure World Foundation (SWF), a nonprofit unassociated with any government, is thinking about that kind of issue, as well as several others related to the fair use of space, and succeeding at getting its analysis … Read more