Oracle scales back plans for Java 8
Oracle is moving to drop a major component from its upcoming Java 8 release, in an effort to get the flagging Java development process back on track.
The component, known as Project Jigsaw, was an addition to the language that would have allowed Java developers to write and distribute programs as modules. It would also have made it easier to scale the Java platform to more types of hardware, ranging from large servers to small embedded devices.
On Tuesday, Mark Reinhold, chief architect of the Java platform group at Oracle, wrote in a blog post that despite repeated promises that Project Jigsaw would be included in Java 8, it is no longer feasible to have the technology ready in time for that version's planned September 2013 ship date.
"Steady progress is being made, but some significant technical challenges remain," Reinhold writes. "There is, more importantly, not enough time left for the broad evaluation, review, and feedback which such a profound change to the Platform demands." Read more...
Qualcomm sees smartphones pushing demand toward end of year
Qualcomm has lowered its forecast of global cellular device shipments for 2012 due to a gloomy economic outlook, though it expects device sales to surge in the fourth quarter because of upcoming products, a likely reference to Apple's iPhone and Microsoft's Windows 8 tablets.
The mobile chip company reported results for its fiscal third quarter on Wednesday, posting revenue and profit up significantly from a year earlier but down from the previous quarter. Revenue hit US$4.63 billion, up 28 percent year over year and down 6 percent sequentially, while earnings per share were $0.69, up 13 percent from a year earlier and down 46 percent from the previous quarter.
Citing more cautious forecasts by economists, Qualcomm said it was lowering its forecast for global shipments of 3G and 4G devices in the current calendar year to between 875 million and 935 million. But that outcome would still represent an increase of 14 percent from 2011, assuming the results come in at the midpoint of the forecast, the company said. Read more...
Zoho links its office suite with Google Drive
Zoho has integrated its cloud-hosted office productivity applications with the Google Drive online storage service, Zoho said in a blog post.
The integration lets Google Drive users open their files using the Zoho Office applications Zoho Writer, Zoho Sheet and Zoho Show -- word processor, spreadsheet and presentation creation applications, respectively.
Users can also edit the documents and save them back to Google Drive. It's also possible to create brand new documents with the Zoho applications and store them in Google Drive. Users can also collaboratively edit documents. Read more...
Office 2013 shifts security focus from devices to identities
Business users may find the productivity-boosting potential of Office 2013 tantalizing; its ties to the cloud and support for devices beyond PCs means on-the-go users are never far from their important documents. IT admins, on the other hand, may feel more wary than excited by Microsoft's move to untether its ubiquitous productivity suite from the desktop because it represents a significant shift from traditional end-user security.
Microsoft summarizes the nature of the shift pretty well in a security overview of Office 2013: "[This release] makes a fundamental change from computer-centered identity and authentication to user-centered identity and authentication. This shift enables content, resources, most recently used lists, settings, links to communities, and personalization to roam seamlessly with users as they move from desktop, to tablet, to smartphone, or to a shared or public computer." Read more...
Canonical equips Ubuntu with desktop Web apps
Canonical is adding a new feature to its Ubuntu operating system that will allow desktop users to access popular Internet services without opening a browser window. Instead, a Web page can be accessed as a desktop application.
Using this feature, a Web page "will feel like an application on your device," said Pete Goodall, Canonical product manager. "We want to make the line between desktop apps and Web apps a little less distinct."
Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth plans to demonstrate the technology, called Ubuntu WebApps, at the O'Reilly Open Source Conference held this week in Portland, Oregon. Ubuntu WebApps will first appear on the upcoming 12.10 release of Ubuntu, code-named Quantal Quetzal. Read more...