Innovations
Novell has introduced its own instant messaging client, Instantme 2.0, which works within the AOL Instant Messanger communications framework. Instantme is highly secure, using encryption and digital certificates. It also has built-in audio and video messaging capabilities. Novell claims it+s ideal for businesses as it provides a medium for -peri-shable+ responses – for that, read -won+t ever be dug out of your e-mail archives and used against you in court+. www.novell.com/instantme
We+ve all heard commuters shouting -Hi, honey, I+m on the train+ down their cellphones on the way home. Soon we could be
suffering -Hi, honey, I+m on the plane+ as we watch the in-flight movie. BAE Systems, an aerospace company based in the United Kingdom, has devloped a new system called CabinCall which will allow aeroplane passengers to use their own cellphones in flight.
The system routes the calls from the plane via satellite or terrestrial networks. With several airlines said to have expressed an interest, the system could start appearing in planes in 2001. Cabin crews will retain control of the system, meaning that calls can be prohibited during critical times such as take-off and landing and – one would hope – night flights.
Bango.net, a start-up in Cambridge, thinks the web would be easier to use if sites had numbers instead of words for addresses – and for people using cellphones and other primitive devices, or foreign languages, this could well be true. Bango is giving a million numbers away at www.bango.net. However, you have to hand over a valid e- mail address, and the number link must be used at least once a month.
Steve Jobs, Apple chief executive, took centre stage last week to unveil a new product range, but perhaps his most interesting comments passed almost unnoticed in the latest Business Week magazine. There, he was quoted as saying the Mac maker is working -on a handful+ of Internet appliances – cutdown computers which offer only Internet access, without the expensive memory or hard-disk requirements of general purpose computers. The new devices could start appearing next year, the magazine suggested. That would be quite a departure for Apple, which currently markets the iMac – which starts at R8 000 – as its simple solution for surfing the Internet. There is also a new range of iMac colours, waving goodbye to the likes of blueberry and tangerine, and saying hello to ruby and indigo.
What happened day by day during four critical months in 1940? The answer is now being revealed on the Battle of Britain History site, where the RAF is publishing the complete Fighter Command Operational Diaries for the first time. The site also includes background information and a regrettably small picture gallery.
www.raf.mod.uk/bob1940/bobhome.html
Mensa International, the society for people who have high IQs, has opened -the world+s first global ideas factory+ for inventors and entrepreneurs at www.mensaiqcapital.com