Smartphone OS Comparison

Every OS in the market has its own share of strengths and weaknesses. I believe in the "whatever floats your boat" school of thought when it comes to choosing a smartphone. Still, evaluating the popular platforms looked like a good idea to me. I have given points to each platform based on the following factors:

Features - The rating in this section is based on the support offered to technologies such as NFC, USB-OTG (On The Go), FM transmitter, and stereoscopic display.

User Interface - Here, the contenders get points for user friendliness. Lesser the magajmaari, better the score.

Aesthetics - It's all about eye-candy these days. An uncluttered and seamless look helps in getting a better score. Originality wins brownie points as well.

Optimisation - If the OS is optimised, it runs smoothly even on a CPU under 800 MHz and with 256 MB of RAM. If not, it requires dual cores and a gigabyte of RAM.

Battery Life - Do I really have to explain this one?

Apps - This is about the number of apps available for each platform.

Freedom - Includes aspects such as file sharing, customisation, file management, and the availability of mass storage mode.

Here's the scorecard. Note that all scores are on a scale of 1 to 5. The top scorer in each category has been circled in red.

As you can see, there's no clear winner. However, BlackBerry has lost the contest by a big margin because of its average performance across the board. Android is good, but suffers badly from dismal battery performance and due to its resource-hungry nature. Surprisingly, the black sheep of the OS family, Symbian, turns out to be the most mature OS by virtue of getting the basics right - all thanks to the Belle update. Its fans need not celebrate though, as it has no future.

Source:Techtree

iPhone 4S, the most expensive in India; why so?

The new iPhone 4S is creating a nationwide buzz with the telecom operators Airtel and Aircel opening the device for pre-booking in India. The pricing of the new iPhone 4S has certainly taken the Apple fans in India by surprise. The 16GB variant, which is the lowest model of the iPhone 4S, has been priced at whopping Rs. 44,500, while the 32GB model is available for Rs. 50,900. Currently, the 64GB model has been listed as the ‘sold out’ at the Aircel website.

With price hovering around Rs. 45k, the iPhone 4S could be the priciest iPhone launched ever in India. Considering the pricing of the iPhone 4S in other nations, it could be the costliest iPhone 4S in the world right now. The official carriers of the iPhone 4S in India, Airtel and Aircel, have also not given any respite to the iPhone enthusiasts. None of them has yet announced any bundled offers with the new iPhone 4S.

It's notable that the iPhone 4S was launched at the same price as the iPhone 4 in the U.S. And this time Apple had been the quickest to bring its device to the Indian market, which is approximately a month. With India already bearing the brunt of price rise, it’s unlikely that people will shell out more than Rs. 40k for this device.

It’s learnt that the iPhone 4S is available at much lower price tags in other countries and even you can get a factory unlocked iPhone 4S for Rs. 43,100.

Shopyourworld.com is offering factory unlocked 16GB iPhone 4S for Rs. 43,100

Meanwhile, check out a comparison between iPhone 4S’ India price and global price:

Region	Price in USD	Price in Rs.
India	$868	Rs. 44,500
Hong Kong	$655	Rs. 33,559
Canada	$627	Rs. 32,124
Singapore	$685	Rs. 35,096
UK	$ 775	Rs. 39,707
US	$649	Rs. 33,251

*except India, the prices for other regions are of factory unlocked iPhone 4S
*prices are exclusive of taxes

It’s quite surprising to see Apple keeping the price of the iPhone 4S highest in India. The iPhone 4S is certainly a top-end smartphone with various new and improved features. But are you willing to pay Rs. 45k for a locked iPhone 4S, especially when you have other options to get it at lower price?

VIA-thinkdigit

Facebook acquires MailRank

Ayear-old, mail prioritizing tool, MailRank, has been acquired by the popular social network, Facebook, according to a blog post on former's site. "We’re thrilled to announce that MailRank's co-founders will be joining Facebook in December!" states a post on MailRank's blog. Facebook, with this acquisition is looking at strengthening its position in the smartphone arena. MailRank, like mentioned above, essentially is a mail prioritizing tool that sets up the user's mail list on a priority basis, placing the most important mail right at the top. 

The announcement on MailRank

Team MailRank, according to the post will assist Facebook in solving technology issues, an area they specialize in and in turn, better support the platform of 800 million users - Facebook. MailRank has also stated on its blog that when with Facebook,  it will discontinue the private beta of MailRank for Outlook to get complete focus into the new project at hand. 

At the moment, financial details of the deal between Facebook and MailRank haven't been disclosed. 

World's first Win 8 malware 'bootkit' to debut next week

A security researcher said that he has developed malware for Microsoft's forthcoming Windows 8 operating system that is able to load during boot-up when it's run on older PCs.


Peter Kleissner said Stoned Lite – as the latest version of his bootkit is called – doesn't bypass defenses that will be available to people using Windows 8 on newer machines.


Specifically, he said in a series of Twitter messages, it doesn't work against PCs using UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface), which is being held out as a replacement to Bios ROM firmware. Stoned Lite also doesn't attack a low-level security feature known as Secured Boot, which scans boot drives for invalid signatures prior to starting up.


A previous boot kit – which Kleissner called Stoned – works on Windows 2000 through Windows 7 and is able to load before Windows starts by attaching itself to the master boot record of a targeted PC's hard drive. Stoned Lite is able to do the same thing for Windows Server 2008 and Windows 8, the Vienna-based developer and researcher said. It works by bypassing the Windows User Account Control, and with a footprint of just 14KB, it can easily be unleashed from a USB or CD drive.


Kleissner said he plans to release further details at next week's Malcon conference in India.


Microsoft's announcement in September that it planned to use UEFI was almost immediately met with suspicion from open-source boosters, who claimed the feature could make it impossible to run systems such as Linux and FreeBSD on computers that had adopted the alternative firmware. Microsoft has denied such claims, but many critics still aren't convinced.


Whatever the merits of that argument, the inability of Stoned Lite to penetrate UEFI and Secured Boot are the strongest endorsements to date that the features work as advertised. At least for now. ®


This article was updated to clarify UEFI and Secured Boot.


Source

25 Worst Passwords of the Year 2011 – Compiled List by SplashData.

Even in 2011 people are so predictable in choosing their passwords and use shockingly weak passwords to protect their accounts. Password management application provider SplashData released a list from files containing millions of stolen passwords posted online by hackers. The list contains the 25 worst passwords of the year. ‘Password’, ’123456′, ‘qwerty’ are in the list of worst passwords of the year. If you see your password on this list, please change it immediately.

List of Worst Passwords of the Year 2011

1. password
2. 123456
3. 12345678
4. qwerty
5. abc123
6. monkey
7. 1234567
8. letmein
9. trustno1
10. ragon
11. 
    
    
    
    
     baseball
12. 111111
13. iloveyou
14. master
15. sunshine
16. ashley
17. bailey
18. passwOrd
19. shadow
20. 123123
21. 654321
22. superman
23. qazwsx
24. michael
25. football

There are numerous password generator and password manager softwares available that helps a user organize passwords. Google’s new resource ‘Good to Know‘ provides security tips including how to select a safe password or keep their online accounts secure. And for those who are very weak at remembering passwords can use OpenID to use an existing account to sign in to multiple websites, without needing to create new passwords.

Aakash Tablet’s Commercial Version Gets 3 Lakh Pre-Orders.

Aakash tablet – World’s cheapest tablet in the world costing about Rs 3,000, has received about 3 lakh pre-launch bookings for its commercial version that goes on sale later next month. A subsidised version of the much hyped cheapest tablet in the world from India made by UK-based Datawind, is already being distributed free in schools and colleges. Aakash’s retail bookings exceed India’s estimated 250,000 tablet PC market, dominated by Apple, Samsung and Reliance.

Datawind has supplied about 10,000 tablets to the government’s National Mission for Education at a price of Rs 2,250. The devices are being used by students from colleges such as the IITs, RECs, BITS Pilani, Teri University and others.

Aakash, in its next version, will be upgraded with a capacitive touch screen and a processor with double the speed. Datawind plans to supply an attachable Rs 400 keyboard, turning the device into PC-lookalike at Rs 3,400. The government is also considering a proposal to procure the next lot, called Aakash 2, with a faster 700 MHz processor, albeit at the same price. Tuli says there have been invitations from other nations for their digital inclusion programs, seeing India’s success.

Pre-Book / Order Aakash Tablet

TRAI asks telcos to block violators

TRAI’s 100SMS/day move to ward of unwanted callers was extended, with additional 100 SMSes after almost a month. Soon after, it faced yet another challenge when telemarketers started using international servers to send pesky messages. TRAI had disclosed that it has no control over messages that came from servers overseas. However, that did not deter TRAI trying to find a solution for this problem, with the other telcos in support. TRAI now asks telcos to find and block violators using international servers, reports Business Standard.

Block violators (Image credit: Getty Images)

"The operators have been asked to track Internet from servers outside India, which is being used by telemarketers to send unwanted messages. Telemarketers are playing a cat and mouse race. They are going one step ahead than what we do," TRAI Chairman, R.S. Sarma told reporters on the sidelines of the National Telecom Summit, 2011 on Friday.

Reportedly, subscribers of the National Customer Preference Registry (previously called the National Do Not Call Registry) have complained that unwanted calls/messages don’t seem to halt. Moreover, such pesky calls are usually related to real estate. The unwanted messages market is said to be worth more than Rs. 335 crore and service operators sell bulk packages of such SMSes.

YouTube, IPRS lock-in a licensing agreement

Popular destination for online videos, YouTube locked-in on a deal with the Indian Performing Rights Society (IPRS), a non-profit making company looking after the copyrights for artists in India. The deal would now mean that the artists, who's content feature on YouTube will be able to earn their revenue off it. Artists, in this respect would mean songwriters, music composers and music publishers. With digital content growing by leaps in bounds, both in usage and popularity, this deal shows promise. The deal invariably means that the creators of original content will be rewarded with this revenue. 

Now rewarding original content creators

An official statement received in this respect reveals that while YouTube has locked-in on agreements with several music labels in India, before, this is the first time it has signed a deal with a collection society in the country. Earlier, YouTube only earned revenue when advertisements were displayed against its partner’s videos. This revenue would then be shared by its partners. 

According to a statement provided by the CEO of the IPRS, Rakesh Nigam, "We are extremely delighted to do this deal with leading video site like YouTube, as this association will benefit our publishers/music companies, author and sister societies. As more users get online, consumption and monetization of music will increasingly happen on the internet and YouTube will drive it.”

This deal follows YouTube's similar deals with ASRAC in Japan, KOMCA in Korea, CASH in Hong Kong, MUST in Taiwan, APRA-AMCOS for Australia/New Zealand, FILSCAP in the Philippines, and COMPASS in Singapore.