FB to launch Facebook Credits for Indian users from July 1

Facebook will introduce 'Facebook Credits' through which users can spend virtual currency across various games or applications they use on the popular website.

                                                                          

virtual currency, Facebook Credits is already popular among gaming enthusiasts in many other countries, including the US. 

"Facebook will introduce a new payment system Facebook Credits in India from July 1," a company spokesperson told media. 

Facebook Credits enables fast and easy transactions across games on the social networking site and would benefit about 2.5 crore Facebook subscribers in the country. 

The users would be able to enter their payment information once and can buy, earn and spend safely across various games or applications they use on Facebook. 

"Starting July 1, we will require all social game developers on the Facebook canvas platform to process payments through Facebook Credits," Facebook Platform Marketing Manager Deb Liu wrote on the company's official blog in January. 

This will also help various brands, which use the medium of Facebook to retail them goods through their social pages. 

"Facebook Credits is currently used in more than 350 applications from 150 developers, representing more than 70 per cent of virtual goods transactions volume on Facebook," Liu had said. 

Facebook Credits would also offer incentives such as early access to product features, premium promotion on Facebook, premium targeting for ads, and access to new co-promotion opportunities. 

Many developers such as Zynga, Playfish, CrowdStar , Digital Chocolate, PopCap and Arkadium have already adopted Facebook Credits for in-game virtual goods.

New Social Networking Website by Google........Google+ launched, takes on Facebook

Finally, the news we've all been waiting for close to a year now. Google last night unveiled the Google+ project, its counter-weight to try and balance the growing power of Facebook as a social network on the Web. Google+ allows users to share photos, videos, and more with their friends -- as it turns out, Circles -- a social layer added on Google search few months ago -- is now part of Google+. So let's see what's all the fuss about.

Rumours of Google working on its own social network first emerged as early as June 2010, when the tech media poured over the Facebook killer that Google was apparently building -- Google Me. It no longer goes by that name, Google's social networking layer over its primary search offering as of launch day is now known as Google+.

So what is Google+? Interesting question. And part of the answer leads us to believe it's much better than Google Buzz, the company's past major attempt at anything social.

Google+ isn't a social networking product, per se -- it isn't like Google Wave, an isolated product. On the contrary, Google+ is an extension of Google search itself, an added layer of social network to enrich your overall Google experience online.

The Google+ project is an assimilation of the following broad categories: +Circles, +Spark, +Hangout, +Mobile (further broken down into +Location, +Huddle, and +Instant uploads).

+Circles:
Powered by HTML5, +Circles lets you drag and drop your friends into different social circles -- siblings and parents in a circle called "Family," office colleagues in a circle called "Work," best buddies in a circle called "Best friends," and so on. Unlike Facebook, which primarily focuses on sharing information with all your friends, Circles in Google+ is more about sharing within well-defined groups for greater control over your audience and the long-term impact of what you share with them.

                                        

+Sparks:
An interesting approach by Google to re-imagine how people encounter and share quality content on the Web, Sparks is the core sharing engine within the Google+ project. It delivers quality content based on your interests -- movies, cricket, wayne rooney, etc. -- through various parameters and sources -- Google search, Google +1 button recommendations, and more. Here again Google+ diverges from Facebook -- where videos and photos are often shared in a chain -- by allowing every user to encounter content on their interest areas and share it with their social circles.

+Hangouts:
This is a combination of instant messaging and video conferencing features built right into Google+ through Hangouts. Although Google argues it's different from existing IM and video chats, I don't really see any difference -- apart from a cool interface. Do you?

+Mobile:
Probably the most important of the Google+ project, Mobile is where Google+ will explode very soon. And very smartly, Google+'s Mobile component focuses on three broad aspects, more than anything -- GPS (for location-based activities and labelled +Location), Camera (for uploading and sharing photos from your camera via +Instant uploads), and Chatting (ping friends and start texting with group messages through +Huddle).

There's an Android app for Google+ currently out on the Android Market that you can download and get started with. Google said an iOS app is also on its way soon.

As is evident from the videos, Google+ is part of a re-looked Google homepage, with a brand new menu bar at the top which has a +You button to launch Google+. More on that soon...

However, all of you who can't wait to get started with Google+, Google is keeping it an "invitation only" project for now -- remember Gmail and its deployment back in 2004? So yes, unless you have an invite, you'll have to wait to start using Google+. We expect a thread to go up soon in the forums where people will start trading invitations for Google+.

Here's more on Google+: https://plus.google.com

Google tweaks homepage design

On the same day it launched the Google+ project, Google unveiled a brand new design for its homepage interface, striving to give its users a more consistent online experience with the company's various products.


In an official blog update, Google spoke about the changes to its iconic homepage. Tabs like Web, Images, News, etc. which were marked in blue against a white background just a few days ago are now part of a black menu bar at the top, which also has a Sign in and Setting button. The Google logo itself has become smaller than before and links that previously sat immediately below the Google Search button are now pushed to the bottom of the page, giving the homepage a more cleaner, streamlined look.

new Google homepage

If you notice the redesigned Google homepage closely, the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button is alive and well, despite rumours to the contrary in the past week or so about Google booting it out in the near future.
Google isn't just stopping at remaking its homepage design. It promises to apply interface tweaks and design changes to other popular Google products like Google Maps and Gmail.

Needless to say, the latest Google homepage is a far cry from its very first design when Google started its service back in 1997. What do you think of Google's new homepage design? Love it or hate it?

Firefox Strategy Is a Recipe for Failure

Firefox 5 was launched as planned and on schedule this week--and also marked the "end of life" for support of Firefox 4. Mozilla's rapid release schedule, and the strategy to essentially make each new release a requirement to continue support paint Firefox into a corner where only loyal hobbyists can reliably use the browser.

The latest flagship version of the Mozilla Web browser comes a mere two months after the official release of Firefox 4, and also marks the end of official support for Firefox 4. From Mozilla's perspective, the "security patch" for Firefox 4 is to upgrade to Firefox 5. We can assume that in another couple months when Firefox 6 emerges, that Firefox 5 will suffer the same fate.

Firefox 4 launched two months ago today, and it is now obsolete.Were you hoping for a patch or update to address the security concerns with WebGL in Firefox? Well, if you are using Firefox 4, don't hold your breath. The "fix" for the WebGL issues in Firefox 4 is to upgrade to Firefox 5.

For consumers, it probably won't be a big deal. Firefox 5 is more like Firefox 4.1, or Firefox with some minor tweaks and updates. Compared with Firefox 4, Firefox 5 is the sort of update that many users would just automatically enable, and--if it weren't for the new version number--might barely notice. I know that Internet Explorer gets a cumulative update patch every Patch Tuesday, and it automatically installs on my PC and I never give it a second thought.

For companies and organizations, though, it is another story. The lasting, tenacious, endurance of Internet Explorer 6 is a testament to how stubborn some IT departments can be about moving to a new version of a browser.
Organizations interested in Firefox 4 might not even be done deploying the browser, and now it is already obsolete. Does Mozilla expect IT admins to halt deployment of Firefox 4 and switch gears to implement Firefox 5? Does Mozilla think that IT departments need to pick up the pace and rush deployment of Firefox 5 so they can get some use out of it before it is rendered obsolete by Firefox 6 in August?

One reader, AgentF, commented on my article about Mozilla's rapid release strategy to say, "One of the reasons I haven't fully adopted Chrome is because of the regularly scheduled major releases. It's hard trying to help out clients if they all have different versions of the software," adding, "The web doesn't drastically change every few months to warrant major releases."

Mozilla has shot Firefox in the foot. The result will be that Mozilla will continue to churn the market share of Firefox loyalists--Firefox 4 will plummet, and Firefox 5 will climb to the top...until Firefox 6. Rinse and repeat. Basically, the same percentage that use Firefox and switch from FF4 to FF5 will be the users likely to jump from FF5 to FF6.

The rest of the world--particularly companies--however, will shy away from the Mozilla browser because forcing users to upgrade every two months to keep up with the latest release just to maintain basic support and security updates is too much of a commitment.

Hulu Plus Hits Android in Fragmented Fashion

Hulu Plus is available for Android phones...well, six Android phones.

If you're the lucky enough to own one of six particular Android phones, you may now enjoy Hulu Plus on the go.
An app for Hulu's premium streaming video service, which costs $8 per month, is now available from the Android Market, but only for the Nexus One, Nexus S, HTC Inspire 4G, Motorola Droid II, Motorola Droid X, and the Motorola Atrix. "We expect to add to the number of Android smartphones and will be making additional device announcements throughout the year," Rob Wong, Hulu's director of product management, wrote in a blog post.
The limited launch is reminiscent of Netflix's partial Android app release last month. At the time, Netflix said that Android lacked a standard set of playback features across all Android devices, although the company previously blamed platform security issues.
Hulu's not saying why its own Android app rollout begins with only a half-dozen devices. Except for the Nexus One and Nexus S, the devices that Hulu supports are different from the ones that Netflix supports at this time.
I guess that's an argument for going pure Google. But with Netflix and Hulu both launching in limited fashion, it's clear that Android needs a standard solution to make media companies happy, especially as the number of Android tablets grow. If they can't stream media from major sources like Netflix and Hulu, they'll have a tougher time answer the question of why you'd buy one instead of an iPad.

Rootkit Infection Requires Windows Reinstall, Says Microsoft

Microsoft is telling Windows users that they'll have to reinstall the operating system if they get infected with a new rootkit that hides in the machine's boot sector.
A new variant of a Trojan Microsoft calls "Popureb" digs so deeply into the system that the only way to eradicate it is to return Windows to its out-of-the-box configuration, Chun Feng, an engineer with the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC), said last week on the group's blog .
"If your system does get infected with Trojan:Win32/Popureb.E, we advise you to fix the MBR and then use a recovery CD to restore your system to a pre-infected state," said Feng.
A recovery disc returns Windows to its factory settings.
Malware like Popureb overwrites the hard drive's master boot record (MBR), the first sector -- sector 0 -- where code is stored to bootstrap the operating system after the computer's BIOS does its start-up checks. Because it hides on the MBR, the rootkit is effectively invisible to both the operating system and security software.
According to Feng, Popureb detects write operations aimed at the MBR -- operations designed to scrub the MBR or other disk sectors containing attack code -- and then swaps out the write operation with a read operation.
Although the operation will seem to succeed, the new data is not actually written to the disk. In other words, the cleaning process will have failed.
Feng provided links to MBR-fixing instructions for XP, Vista and Windows 7
Rootkits are often planted by attackers to hide follow-on malware, such as banking password-stealing Trojans. They're not a new phenomenon on Windows.
In early 2010, for example, Microsoft contended with a rootkit dubbed "Alureon" that infected Windows XP systems and crippled machines after a Microsoft security update.

At the time, Microsoft's advice was similar to what Feng is now offering for Popureb.
"If customers cannot confirm removal of the Alureon rootkit using their chosen anti-virus/anti-malware software, the most secure recommendation is for the owner of the system to back up important files and completely restore the system from a cleanly formatted disk," said Mike Reavey, director of the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC), in February 2010.
Since then, Microsoft has added a check for the Aluereon rootkit to all security updates so that when the malware is detected, the updates are not installed.

BCA Syllabus - KSKV Kachchh University

BCA Syllabus - 1st and 2nd Semester - CBCS

BCA Syllabus - 3rd and 4th Semester

Chek Out Your Programming Abilities

Click here and check out you programming abilities...

SYBCA March 2011 Examination Result - KSKV Kachchh University

Click Here to View Detail Result

Click Here to View Top 10 Students

Nokia Unveils N9 Smartphone Using MeeGo

Nokia unveiled Tuesday its new N9 smartphone that runs the MeeGo operating system, and is being marketed as a "pure touch screen" device without buttons.
The N9 will launch later this year, and the company will release later the device's pricing and availability in various markets, Nokia CEO Stephen Elop said at a company event in Singapore.
Nokia said in February that it would establish a future smartphone strategy around Microsoft's Windows Phone 7, to help the company compete against Apple's iPhone and handsets using Google's Android operating system.
The company said it would still put out during the year a smartphone with MeeGo, a Linux-based OS developed in collaboration with Intel.
The Windows-based product is scheduled to ship later this year, Elop said. Nokia had earlier said the product would ship by the fourth quarter.
Nokia also restated its commitment to the Symbian operating system at the event. The company said it will start shipping Nokia N8s, E7s, C7s and C6-01s with the new Symbian Anna software update in July. By the end of August, existing owners of these devices can also download Symbian Anna. Over the next 12 months Nokia plans to bring up to 10 new Symbian-based smartphones to market.

Nokia designed the N9 as an "all screen" phone with a 3.9 inch display that covers most of the front side of the device. No home button is built on to it. Instead, users navigate back to the home view by simply swiping across the edge of the phone's screen.
People want more screen on their phone, and want to be able to use their phones when on the move, said Marko Ahtisaari, Nokia's senior vice president for design. That requires the phone to offer better one-handed use, and the ability to view all information at a glance of the phone, he added.
The N9 features an 8-megapixel camera. It also uses near-field communication technology. During Tuesday's demo Ahtisaari showed that the device can easily synchronize with a Bluetooth headset, simply by having the phone touch the earphones.
The phone will come in three colors: black, cyan and magenta. There will be two versions available with storage at 16GB and 64GB.
The design of the N9 will be carried forward to other smartphones from Nokia, Elop said.

Upgrade Your Motherboard

The motherboard is probably the most complex PC component to upgrade, but modern operating systems and standards have taken much of the pain out of swapping in a new one. (Even so, ancillary issues such as software activation make the task of upgrading a motherboard more annoying rather than less.)

Before choosing a motherboard, you need to understand the purpose of the system you're upgrading or building. Will it be small in volume? If so, you'll want to use a micro ATX or mini ITX board. Are you planning to overclock? Then you'll want to in­­corporate a board that offers robust voltage regulation and good cooling over those voltage regulator modules (VRMs). Looking to build a minimalist office PC? Make sure it has built-in video output connectors and low cost.

Other complications exist, particularly if you're upgrading an Intel-based system. Intel now has four active socket formats: LGA775, LGA1156, LGA1366, and (the latest) LGA1155. If you will be upgrading your existing processor, too, confirm that your new motherboard has the correct socket for it. Upgrading an AMD CPU is a little easier: Most socket AM3 boards support all AMD CPUs.

Also, check the size and capacity of your existing system, if you are upgrading. If the case supports ATX motherboards, anything ATX-size or smaller will fit. If you have an older BTX-format case, it will probably support ATX motherboards, too, but you should check with the case manufacturer to make sure. And finally, Extended ATX (eATX) motherboards are somewhat larger than ATX boards; they are fairly rare and are usually workstation-class boards that support more than one processor.

Upgrading Tips

Here's a basic walkthrough of a motherboard upgrade.

1. Set up a workspace, and make sure that it provides you with adequate lighting. Also, be sure to give yourself enough room to lay out tools and parts. Good lighting is especially critical if your case has an all-black interior.

2. Prior to disassembling the system, back up the contents of your hard drive.

3. Collect all CD keys. De­­activate or deauthorize any applications that you activated previously. This includes iTunes and Adobe professional apps (such as Photoshop and Premiere CS5). In addition, be sure to uninstall or deactivate any games that required activation.

4. Determine which parts need to be removed. You may have to take out the power supply unit (PSU) or hard drives to make motherboard re­­moval easier. If you have to remove the PSU, take care to disconnect all power cables first. The ATX12V (a small four- or eight-pin connector) is easy to overlook.

5. Take out all cards, the CPU fan, and all memory. If you're not upgrading the CPU, you can leave it in the socket for the moment.

6. Pior to removing the old board, disconnect all wiring, ?including the Serial ATA connector.6. Disconnect all wiring. Double check: Did you really disconnect all wiring?

7. Remove all the screws holding the motherboard in place. Usually, a number 2 Phillips screwdriver will fit the screws. Place the old board in an antistatic bag.

8. Check to confirm that all of the mounting nuts are firmly screwed into the case. Sometimes, these nuts will come out or become loose when you remove the motherboard screws.

9. Remove the ATX I/O shield, and store it with the old motherboard.

10. Don’t forget to remove the old ATX I/O shield, and install the new one in its place.10. Install the ATX I/O shield for the new board. This step is crucial: It's frustrating to have screwed in the new motherboard and only then realize that you forgot about the I/O shield.

11. Are you using an exotic cooler? If so, it may require that a special support plate be attached to the underside of the motherboard.

12. Line up the I/O ports with the holes in the ATX I/O shield. Then align the screw holes with the motherboard mounting nuts on the interior of the case.

13. Carefully screw in the mounting screws. Do not overtighten them. If you have an electric screwdriver equipped with an adjustable clutch, set the clutch to the minimum setting. If your electric screwdriver doesn't have a clutch, use a hand screwdriver instead.

Before reattaching the wiring and cables, reinstall any storage devices (like this hard drive) that you removed earlier.

14. Reinstall the power supply unit, if you removed it earlier. Also reinstall any storage devices that you may have removed.

15. Reattach all of the wiring and cables that you disconnected earlier: front panel connectors, USB wiring for the USB case connectors, power cables, wires for the case fan, and so on. If your case allows you to route wiring behind the motherboard, do so now.

16. Attach the power cables, taking care to connect both the main and the ATX12V cables.

After installing the new motherboard and memory and reattaching the power cables, add back the CPU cooler and lock ?it in place with the fan clips.

17. Install the CPU (if you had to remove it earlier) and the memory. Don't install the CPU cooler until after you've installed the memory and the power connectors.

18. Plug in the data cables and the power connectors to the storage devices.

19. Reinstall any cards you may have removed. If you're installing a high-performance graphics card, make sure that you attach the PCI Express power connectors.

20. Connect wall power, the video cable, the mouse, and the keyboard, and give the system a test boot. If nothing happens, make sure that the PSU switch is on.

21. When you boot the system (assuming that you're using Windows), you'll need to wait while Windows ac­­counts for all of the new motherboard devices. Your keyboard and mouse may be unusable during this time.

22. Once Windows has logged all of the devices, you will have to reboot.

23. Take the motherboard CD and install the new motherboard drivers, network drivers, video drivers (only if you're using integrated graphics), USB 3.0 drivers, and so on. You may need to reboot several times.

24. Once you've done all of this, check to see whether Windows needs to be reactivated. If so, first try activating over the Internet. If this fails, call the toll-free number listed in the Activation Window. If you do activate over the phone, be sure you tell Microsoft that you're installing this copy of Windows on one system. This is just an upgrade after all.

25. Reinstall and reactivate any needed applications.

26. You should be set to go.

76% of iPhone owners plan to use Apple's iCloud, 30% interested in iTunes Match

Mike Abramsky, analyst with RBC Capital Markets, revealed on Monday the results of a new proprietary survey of 1,500 respondents conducted between June 7 and 14. The poll found that 76 percent of iPhone users said they are "very" or "somewhat" likely to use Apple's iCloud service, which would amount to 150 million users.


If Apple were to have 150 million iCloud users, it would be competing with services like Google's Gmail, at 200 million users, Yahoo, with 300 million registered users, and Twitter, also at 300 million.

iCloud was unveiled earlier this month at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference. The free service will become available this fall, replacing Apple's existing MobileMe product.

The survey also found 73 percent of iPhone users indicated they are "very" or "somewhat" likely to use iMessage, Apple's new proprietary chat service, similar to Research in Motion's BlackBerry Messenger. Abramsky said the results show Apple is likely to enhance the loyalty of existing iPhone users, as well as its 60-million-plus iPod touch users.

"Because it stores user data, iCloud, along with iTunes is expected to enhance loyalty and stickiness of Apple's customers, helping defend against threats from Android, helping grow a defensible install base of users who continually upgrade to next generation Macs, iPhones, iPads, and iPods," Abramsky wrote.

In addition, the survey also found that 30 percent of iPhone users said they are either "very" or "somewhat" likely to spend $24.99 on the new iTunes Match service. Through iTunes Match, Apple will scan a user's library of songs, including those ripped from their own CDs, and match the tracks up with the library of 18 million songs available through iTunes, even upgrading them to high-quality 256Kbps AAC audio files.

Abramsky said the survey suggests that Apple could earn a "nominal" $1.5 billion per year in revenue, or 1 percent of annual revenue. Assuming that the gross margins associated with iTunes Match are around 10 percent, which is in line with iTunes content sales, he would also expect the service to have a nominal impact on Apple's earnings per share.