Google PC will start in seven seconds or less

MOUNTAIN VIEW (California), Nov 20 — New Google Inc software will start up a computer as fast as a television can be turned on, the search company said yesterday as it showed off its Chrome operating system designed for PCs that do their work on the web.

Google gave the first public look at its Chrome OS four months after declaring its intention of developing the PC's main software, a move that pits it directly against Microsoft Corp and Apple Inc.

True to Google's Internet-pedigree, the Chrome OS resembles a web browser more than it does a traditional computer operating system like Microsoft Windows, matching Google's ambition to drive people to the web — where they can see Google ads.

Google said the software will initially be available by the holiday season of 2010 on low-cost netbooks that meet Google's hardware specifications, such as using only memory chips to store data instead of slower hard drives, the current standard.

Netbooks running Chrome OS will only be able to run web applications and the user's data will automatically be stored on the web in the so-called cloud of Internet servers, Google executives said at an event at the company's Mountain View, California headquarters yesterday.

"It's basically a web browsing machine," said Altimeter Group analyst Charlene Li, referring to the netbooks powered by Chrome OS.

Such a machine is made for a world of near-constant, extremely fast web connection, without the type of software that made Microsoft famous, since most of the work would be done by big machines on the web which take directions and send information to relatively uncomplicated devices like a Chrome PC.

Sundar Pichai, vice-president of product management for Google's Chrome OS, said that computers running Chrome OS will be able to start in less than seven seconds.

"From the time you press boot you want it to be like a TV: you turn it on and you should be on the web using your applications," Pichai said.

Google said it is giving away the software for free, similar to its Android smartphone software, with the idea that improving the web experience will ultimately benefit its Internet search advertising business, which generated roughly US$22 billion (RM77 billion) in revenue in 2008.

"They're doing it to get further and further entrenched in whatever people are doing to go online, whether that's a browser, an operating system or in applications," said Todd Greenwald, an analyst with Signal Hill Group.

"If Chrome is the OS then the attach (access) rate on Google searches will be a lot higher," he said.

But analysts noted that the differences between conventional PCs and Chrome OS netbooks might give some consumers pause.

"If they view it from the conventional perspective, then it falls short," Gartner analyst Ray Valdes said of Chrome OS, citing its lack of compatibility with traditional software and its limited offline capabilities.

Google officials said Chrome OS netbooks will be able to provide some functions when offline, but that the product was primarily designed to be connected to the Internet.

But Valdes said if Google can deliver on the products' promises, such as fast performance, then consumers may view Chrome OS netbooks as distinct class of products with attractive benefits.

"I think that it's initially going to appeal to small subset of the general consumer population," said Valdes. "The question is can they build on that and expand that over time."

Google made the computer code for the Chrome OS available to outside developers yesterday, allowing developers to tinker with the software and potentially design new applications to run alongside it.

With Chrome, Google is seeking to challenge the dominance of Microsoft Corp's Windows, which runs on nine out of 10 personal computers.

The Chrome OS also challenges makers of traditional, desktop software, including Microsoft and its lucrative Office suite of productivity software, since Chrome OS only runs web applications.

Google's Pichai, noted during a demonstration yesterday, that Chrome OS-based PCs would be interoperable with web-based versions of software, such as Microsoft's online version of its Excel spreadsheet.

Google said all data in Chrome will automatically be housed in the so-called cloud, or on external servers, but also cached on the computer's internal hardware to boost performance.

If a person loses their netbook, Google engineering director Matt Papakipos explained, they can buy a new one, log in and within seconds have a machine with access to all the same data as their previous device.

"What really makes this a cloud device is that all the user data is synced back to the cloud in real time," said Papakipos. — Reuters

Cyber-spying on US grows

WASHINGTON - CHINA'S government appears increasingly to be piercing US government and defense industry computer networks to gather useful data for its military, a congressional advisory panel said on Thursday.

'A large body of both circumstantial and forensic evidence strongly indicates Chinese state involvement in such activities,' the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission said in its 2009 report to Congress.

The 12-member, bipartisan commission was set up in 2000 to analyse the implications of growing trade with China.

Beijing has begun to broaden its national security concerns beyond a potential clash across the Taiwan Strait and issues around its periphery, the 367-page report said.

China is the most aggressive country conducting espionage against the United States, focused on obtaining data and know-how to help military modernisation and economic development, it added.

The amount of 'malicious' computer activities against the United States increased in 2008 and is rising sharply this year, it said, adding, 'Much of this activity appears to originate in China.'

The commission said the Chinese government had placed many of its capabilities for computer network operations within elements of the People's Liberation Army. -- REUTERS

Google adds World Bank data

SAN FRANCISCO - GOOGLE is adding World Bank figures to Internet results in a bid to make hard facts about countries worldwide easier to find.

A 'public data' feature launched about six months ago with continually updated US population and employment figures will now also include World Bank numbers, Google search team product manager Ola Rosling told AFP on Wednesday.

For example, online searches for fertility rates in Europe or the gross domestic product of Somalia now trigger results pages topped with links to World Bank data presented in interactive charts for easy comparisons.

'There is a lot of noise in results for those that want to get to the raw data and not interpretations of the data,' Mr Rosling said. 'This is a first baby step toward solving the enormous problem of making numbers easier to find.'

Google added 17 World Development Indicators including child mortality rates; carbon dioxide emissions per capita; life expectancy; military expenditures, and economic data. People, businesses or governments can link online to Google public data charts or embed them in websites.

A challenge to the growth of the fact-finding search service is that a lot of public data has yet to be made available on the Internet, according to Google. Mr Rosling sees that barrier eroding as more governments and agencies embrace Internet technologies. -- AFP

World's 1st iPhone worm

'This virus pretty much exploits people's laziness to change their password,' he said, according to public broadcaster ABC. -- PHOTO: AFP

SYDNEY - AN AUSTRALIAN student has created what is thought to be the world's first iPhone worm, which replaces the popular device's wallpaper with a picture of 1980s pop icon Rick Astley.

Ashley Towns, a 21-year-old technical college student who lives with his family near Sydney, said he concocted the worm, which can spread from phone to phone, to raise awareness about security.

'This virus pretty much exploits people's laziness to change their password,' he said, according to public broadcaster ABC.

Mr Towns' 'Ikee' worm swaps the popular smartphone's wallpaper with an image of Astley and the slogan 'Ikee is never gonna give you up' - a reference to the British star's 1987 chart-topper, Never Gonna Give You Up. The virus affects only phones that have been cracked, or jail-broken, to let users install applications not approved by manufacturer Apple.

Mr Towns said he had proved it was not hard to hack into an iPhone, and was not aware if he had broken any laws. The virus is easily removed by deleting a few files.

Experts warned the virus was already spreading in Australia and the same technology could be used to steal personal information. -- AFP

Solar station in space

A graphic illustration shows a system of space solar power system (SSPS) which consists of a large solar power generator and transmission panel. -- PHOTO: AFP

TOKYO - IT MAY sound like a sci-fi vision, but Japan's space agency is deadly serious: by 2030 it wants to collect solar power in space and zap it down to Earth, using laser beams or microwaves.

The government has just picked a group of companies and a team of researchers tasked with turning the ambitious, multi-billion-dollar dream of unlimited clean energy into reality in coming decades.

With few energy resources of its own and heavily reliant on oil imports, Japan has long been a leader in solar and other renewable energies and this year set ambitious greenhouse gas reduction targets.

But Japan's boldest plan to date is the Space Solar Power System (SSPS), in which arrays of photovoltaic dishes several square kilometres in size would hover in geostationary orbit outside the Earth's atmosphere.

'Since solar power is a clean and inexhaustible energy source, we believe that this system will be able to help solve the problems of energy shortage and global warming,' researchers at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, one of the project participants, wrote in a report. 'The sun's rays abound in space.'

The solar cells would capture the solar energy, which is at least five times stronger in space than on Earth, and beam it down to the ground through clusters of lasers or microwaves. These would be collected by gigantic parabolic antennae, likely to be located in restricted areas at sea or on dam reservoirs, said Tadashige Takiya, a spokesman at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). -- AFP

X-rays 'top scientific invention'

The public has voted the X-ray machine as the best invention, ahead of the Apollo 10 space capsule and Stephenson's Rocket.

Out of nearly 50,000 votes cast, one in five people named it for having made the greatest impact on the past, present and future.

Ten of the most significant objects in science, engineering, technology and medicine were selected for the vote.

Information on all the items is found at the Science Museum in London.

The first three positions were filled by medical inventions or discoveries, the X-ray machine being followed by the discoveries of penicillin and the DNA double helix structure.

X-rays provided the first possibility of looking inside someone's body without cutting them open - a massive medical advance.

'Laying patients bare'

The particular X-ray machine in question - the Reynolds machine in the Museum's Making the Modern World Gallery - was a "do-it-youself" experiment by a father and son who were so inspired by news of the discovery of the X-ray that they set about building the equipment in their own home.

Museum curator Katie Maggs said: "It's very inspirational to budding scientists to learn that an invention now declared the most important in world history could be pioneered by enthusiastic amateur inventors."

Professor Andy Adam, president of the Royal College of Radiologists, was delighted to learn of the result.

He said the X-ray machine had revolutionised medical practice and that the technology had now advance so much that we are reaching the era of the "transparent patient".

Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw said: "Any competition that pits the Apollo 10 spacecraft against Stephenson's Rocket, and the DNA double helix against the Model T Ford, is bound to provide talking points aplenty.

"The public's choice of the X-ray machine as the winner is testament to our insatiable curiosity to find out how things work."

The poll was conducted as part of the Science Museum's events to mark its centenary. The 10 objects form a special Centenary Journey trail through the museum galleries.

Crabs give sex for survival

Male fiddler crabs will happily defend a female neighbour against intruders - partly because the females will dole out sex in return. --PHOTO: AP

SYDNEY - IN THE world of fiddler crabs, the best form of protection is, apparently, prostitution, according to an Australian study published on Wednesday.

Researchers from The Australian National University in Canberra found that male fiddler crabs will happily defend a female neighbour against intruders - partly because the females will dole out sex in return.

'The fact that the neighbour comes over and helps to defend another territorial individual is pretty unusual,' said Michael Jennions, who helped conduct the study, the results of which were published in the journal Biology Letters.

Mr Jennions and fellow ANU researchers Richard Milner and Patricia Backwell studied the behaviour of fiddler crabs living in mud flats off the African country of Mozambique in October and November 2008.

Male fiddler crabs have giant claws to defend themselves, but the researchers wanted to see how female crabs - which only have two small feeding claws - protect their homes. Fiddler crabs are territorial and live in burrows. The researchers gathered crabs from distant parts of the mud flats and tethered them near new, occupied burrows.

In 21 trials involving male intruders, the researchers found that male crabs would scuttle over to fight off the invaders on a female neighbor's territory 95 per cent of the time. But in 20 trials involving female intruders, the males crabs only fought off the invaders 15 per cent of the time. That suggests the male crabs preferred to keep females nearby, largely because they will almost always have sex with their male neighbours, Mr Jennions said. -- AP