Reports from blogs and OS X 10.8′s preview release schedule offer clues

Computerworld – Apple may release OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion earlier than expected, according to a report by a popular blog and clues found within the release dates of the three developer previews of the new operating system.

On Tuesday, AppleInsider, citing an unnamed source, said that Apple’s European arm was training new staff to answer queries about Mountain Lion. In the past, Apple has limited the training window, possibly to avoid leaks from the new staff about undisclosed features.

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AppleInsider speculated that the staff hiring and training may mean Apple will debut Mountain Lion at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), which opens June 11 in San Francisco.

The release dates for Mountain Lion’s developer previews also may hint at early availability.
Mac OS X Mountain Lion

Apple has shipped three OS X 10.8 developer-only previews so far, on Feb. 16, March 16 and most recently, April 18.

Those dates are ahead of the schedule Apple set last year when it fed developers a stream of previews for OS X 10.7, aka Lion, which went on sale July 20, 2011.

Mountain Lion’s trio of previews were 8, 15 and 25 days earlier than the first three Lion previews: The former is now more than three weeks ahead of the latter’s 2011 timetable.

If Apple keeps to the established pace and seeds one more preview to developers — Lion offered four last year, then a so-called “gold master” build before hitting the Mac App Store — Mountain Lion would go on sale June 25, with the gold master ready June 6.

That last date may be a tad early, as Apple opens WWDC the following week. It seems improbable that the company would preempt a ready-for-sale announcement at WWDC by releasing a gold master of OS X 10.8 several days earlier, entailing a risk that the news would leak.

Also in play are expected refreshes of Apple’s computers.

Most experts assume Apple will unveil new iMac desktops and MacBook Pro and MacBook Air laptops this quarter and next with Intel’s Ivy Bridge architecture. Ivy Bridge is Intel’s third-generation design of the Core clan, and the first to use a 22-nanometer manufacturing process.

Quad-core Ivy Bridge processors are now available to computer makers (Insider, registration required), and dual-core siblings will be ready to ship in the next few months, Intel has said.

The iMac would seem the logical line to get Ivy Bridge first: All models of the desktop now rely on Intel second-generation quad-core chips — unlike the MacBook families, where some models use dual-core processors — and the iMac is the longest in the tooth.

Apple last refreshed the iMac May 3, 2011.

If Apple uses WWDC to reveal new iMacs — or any other systems — it would be to its advantage if they were preloaded with Mountain Lion, not Lion.

Using the newest operating system would appease customers, some who will complain if Mountain Lion launches just after they purchase a new machine. It would also reduce the company’s fulfillment costs if, as expected, Apple announces Mountain Lion’s release date at WWDC, then includes any Macs sold subsequently in a free upgrade program.

Apple has used the WWDC keynote — the one part of the conference that’s open to non-developers — to pull the sheet off new Macs, although the last time it did was 2009.

Mountain Lion’s release date is still an Apple secret; the company has only said it will ship the upgrade “late summer.”

A June roll-out contradicts that timeline by at least a couple of months, but Apple has been known to beat its release estimates. In 2009, Apple shipped OS X 10.5, or Snow Leopard, on August 28, at a minimum days, at a maximum weeks, before the September target it had set earlier.

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As Lumia 900 launch looms, analyst says Nokia, Microsoft need BlackBerry users to switch to Windows Phone

Computerworld – Nokia’s Lumia 900 smartphones will reach AT&T stores on Sunday for $99.99, and one analyst said it could be the start of something big: Windows Phone as a market disrupter between the successful iPhone and Android phones.

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Windows Phone, Microsoft’s mobile operating system that’s used by Nokia in its Lumia line of smartphones, is so far a small portion of the smartphone market, less than 3%. Still, Forrester analyst Sarah Rotman Epps said in a blog Thursday that the smartphone market is “ripe for disruption … and every player in the ecosystem (other than Google and Apple) wants a third player to wedge between Google and Apple.”

Epps went on to argue that Nokia and Microsoft should try to convert every BlackBerry user to Windows Phone within two years. BlackBerry usage is declining and today makes up 8% of the global smartphone market. Grabbing those customers “would be a modest but achievable gain for Windows Phone,” she said.

Attracting former BlackBerry users and a portion of Nokia’s Symbian users in China and India to Windows Phone “positions Nokia and Microsoft as a viable third platform and foil for Google-Apple hegemony,” Epps said. “In the dog-eat-dog smartphone market, viability in itself can be disruptive.”

Epps admitted that she is a strong supporter of Windows Phone and has used the OS on the HTC Trophy and Samsung Focus Flash as her personal phones. “I will say it loud and say it proud: I love my Windows Phone,” she wrote.

The coming Lumia 900, which she now uses as a review unit, is priced right at $99.99 to attract new smartphone users and to lure BlackBerry customers who are already paying their carriers for data plans. Since BlackBerry maker Research In Motion said it won’t have new smartphones soon, BlackBerry customers should be a prime target, she added.

Nokia and Microsoft have “built a great product,” Epps contended. In an interview, she said she likes the Lumia 900′s industrial design, including the slim form factor and a body that has a “satisfying tactile feel.” She said the screen resolution is better than the Trophy and has a front-facing camera that the Trophy lacks.

Epps said the Windows Phone interface uses live tiles that can keep her husband’s contact information and status right on the home screen, an example of how the OS lives up to its brand promise of “putting people first.” “I personally do feel a strong emotional connection with Windows Phone, and before that I had BlackBerry, so it’s the first phone I’ve ever really loved,” she said.

Some reviewers, including Walt Mossberg of The Wall Street Journal, pointed out a weak Web browser on the Lumia 900 among other concerns. “Overall, I consider the Lumia 900 a mixed bag,” Mossberg wrote. “Unless you are a big Windows Phone fan, or don’t want to spend more than $100 upfront, I can’t recommend the Lumia 900 over the iPhone 4S or a first-rate Android phone like Samsung’s Galaxy S II series.”

Epps agreed that Nokia, Microsoft and AT&T are not going to persuade an iPhone user to use Windows Phone, but maintained the Lumia 900 could attract BlackBerry and first-time smartphone buyers.

Nokia and AT&T have said they will promote the Lumia 900 in AT&T stores with more floor space and promotional signs than other phones and by training sales reps to show it off. To Epps, AT&T’s support is the biggest key to Lumia 900′s success, and Nokia has offered AT&T an attractive-enough profit margin on sales of the phones to promote it well.

“Carriers sell the phones they can make the most money on,” she said. “He who pays the operator sells the phone.”

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Proview Electronics has brought its legal battle against Apple to the U.S., accusing the company of using deceptive practices to acquire the iPad trademark.

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Proview is asking for damages and for Apple to permanently stop using the iPad trademark, according to documents filed with the Superior Court of California for the County of Santa Clara. Proview, which is struggling financially, is accusing Apple of fraudulently acquiring trademarks through a shell company called IP Application Development Ltd.

Proview is already in a protracted legal battle with Apple on the iPad trademark in China, and on Feb. 17 said the legal battle could spill over to the U.S.

Proview owns the iPad trademark in China and has asked courts there to bar Apple from selling the iPad tablet in the country. A Proview request for a legal injunction that would have forced Apple to halt iPad sales in its Shanghai stores was rejected earlier this week, while Proview won a battle in December in which a court in Shenzhen rejected Apple’s claims to the iPad trademark. That decision is being appealed by Apple in the Guangdong provincial high court, with a hearing scheduled for next week.

Apple did not respond to requests for comment. According to the documents, the defendants listed include IP Application Development, a U.K. company that Proview alleged was established by Apple with the sole purpose of acquiring the trademark to use for the iPad tablet. The company name was “deliberately chosen” because its abbreviation is iPad, according to the court filing.

Apple acted with oppression, fraud and malice, Proview said in the court filing. Proview is also seeking to cancel an agreement that transferred the iPad trademark to IP Application Development in 2009.

Proview offered an Internet appliance called iPad after acquiring the trademark in several countries between 2000 and 2003. However, the company fell on rough financial times due to the global economic crisis and after two top customers, Polaroid and Circuit City, filed for bankruptcy in the second half of 2008, according to the court filing.

In 2009, Apple registered IP Application Development, which acquired the iPad trademark in December of that year for APS35,000 (US$41,335) with the promise not to use it to compete against Proview’s products. IP Application Development ultimately transferred the trademark to Apple, which launched the iPad to much fanfare in 2010.

Proview is accusing Apple of fraud and intentional misrepresentation of facts to acquire the trademark, according to the court filing.

Computerworld – Google yesterday patched 15 vulnerabilities in Chrome, paying $6,000 in bounties to bug hunters who reported some of them, and updated the browser to version 16.

The one new feature in the upgrade that Google called out was multi-user synchronization of bookmarks, passwords and apps.

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Google last refreshed Chrome seven weeks ago on Oct 25. Google produces an update to its “stable” channel about every six to eight weeks, a slightly more flexible schedule than rival Mozilla’s every-six-week pace.

Six of the 15 vulnerabilities patched Tuesday were rated “high,” the second-most-serious ranking in Google’s system, while seven were labeled “medium” and another two were tagged as “low.”

Google paid $6,000 in bounties, or less than a fourth of what it laid out in October, to five researchers for reporting seven bugs. The eight other vulnerabilities were uncovered by members of Google’s own security team, developers who contribute to the open-source Chromium project — which feeds code to Chrome — or were ranked low and so not eligible for a bonus.

The company has paid just over $180,000 so far this year in bounties to outside researchers.

Several of the bugs, including a pair attributed to independent researcher Arthur Gerkis — who earned $2,000 for his work — were found using Google’s memory error detection tool, AddressSanitizer. Released in June, AddressSanitizer can detect a variety of errors, including “use-after-free” memory management bugs like those reported by Gerkis.

Four of the flaws were related to Google’s parsing of PDF documents — the browser includes a built-in PDF viewer, eliminating the need to launch Adobe’s free Reader application — while two others were found in Chrome’s processing of SVG (scalar vector graphics) images.

Per its usual practice, Google blocked access to its bug tracking database for all 15 vulnerabilities to prevent outsiders from obtaining details that could be used to craft exploits. Google typically opens up the database weeks or even months later, after it’s sure a majority of users have had their browsers upgraded by Chrome’s silent updating process.

Google usually includes only a handful of obvious changes in each Chrome upgrade, and held to that practice yesterday: The sole feature it touted was the option to add additional users to Chrome so that several people could use the browser on a shared Mac or PC, but keep their synchronized content — bookmarks, passwords, installed apps, and more — separate.

The multi-use sync debuted in early November in a beta of Chrome 16.
Chrome 16 allows multiple users
Chrome 16 can now separately sync bookmarks and passwords for several people who share one computer.

According to Irish metrics company StatCounter, Chrome accounted for nearly 26% of all browsers used last month, enough to pass Firefox and take second place behind Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE).

Another measurement firm, U.S.-based Net Applications, still had Chrome behind Firefox, but projections based on its data showed that Google’s browser would jump Mozilla’s no later than May 2012.

Chrome 16 can be downloaded for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux from Google’s Web site. Users already running the browser will be updated automatically via the browser’s behind-the-scenes service.

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I am currently engaged with mentoring some young technology start-up businesses.  What strikes me about these companies is that they spend the majority of their time utilising their skills to deliver their product.  They are agile, knowledgeable and very hungry to succeed and to create.

When do they find time to “learn” new emerging technologies?  They seem to have learnt it “on the fly” as they go along – such is the pace of technology at the moment.  With cloud computing, mobile computing and social media now becoming the current “bubble”, I realised just how easy it is for anyone in IT to become out of date quite rapidly.

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There is an old saying which says “use it or lose it” and I will add “use it, grow it and keep your eyes open to what is happening around you, always”.   In this process we must keep learning.

Stopping learning, even for a few months or a whole year can make a huge difference.  It is like being having a motor car – use it regularly and it works fine (sure it may need a little maintenance), but leave it parked outside for a year unused and the battery will be flat, tires a bit softer, oil a bit tired, the gas will have lost its vitality etc.  (Of course it does depend on where you park it – it may not even be there when you return!)

Learning is the same, especially in IT (and most other professions – like medicine, law, tax etc) we need to keep up to date, and even a few months “out of the game” will render us less sharp, and left with an uphill battle if we want to regain our status.

If “IT” is our career, then we need to learn on a regular basis, via personal learning, e-learning, books, attending classes, or as I am realising, by working with very sharp entrepreneurs who are leveraging the three technology areas listed above without even breaking into a sweat.

What are your experiences of keeping yourself in the best shape you can?

Along with the usual performance and speed enhancements, some other Google products are also heavily integrated, such as Instant and Instant Previews as well as the +1 button for Google Plus. Image results are much more vivid thanks to a new image carousel that lets users swipe through results.

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Google also promises that services like Google News and Calendar are easier to find and operate within the new Apps menu.

Hopefully the update of this app, free to download from iTunes now, will go much more smoothly than the uneasy initial release of the Gmail app for the iPad and iPhone earlier this month.

However, much like the Gmail app, the Search app still looks like a glorified version of just using Google in a browser. Sure, there are definitely some visual enhancements that one comes to expect from iPad apps in general.

But it’s still not really on par with the bounty of features and attractive graphics seen on Bing’s app for the iPad. Nevertheless, this is still a move in the right direction and reflects that Google is taking building for iOS more seriously these days.

without Jobs that Apple must be ready to handle.

The passing of Steve Jobs impacted everyone in unexpected ways, and rightly so. There is no denying his genius, his ability to see what customers wanted, and his unflagging demand that Apple would sell no product that wouldn’t give those customers exactly what they wanted. With Jobs gone, the focus turns to how Apple will fare going forward without that genius.

I have stayed out of the speculation about Apple without Steve Jobs, but a conversation I had yesterday drove home where I think Apple is at risk. That’s what conversations with smart people can do (thanks Patrick Moorhead).

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There is no question that Apple has a lot of talented people to continue producing outstanding products. The same folks that Steve Jobs led so successfully are still there, and Tim Cook is an effective leader by all accounts. While discussing this with Patrick one thing hit me that might impact Apple in the future.

Of Steve Jobs’ many strengths overseeing Apple’s product development, his refusal to release products that didn’t live up to his expectations is legendary. There are stories told about Jobs killing products just prior to launch, sending the team back to the drawing board to start again. Jobs would not follow the standard industry practice of releasing a product that didn’t fully meet customer’s needs, and then fixing it later. There is no doubt this is a reason Apple’s products have been received so well by customers.

With Jobs gone, even with the outstanding design team at Apple and all of the great engineers, it is not clear who will step up in two areas. Firstly, is there anyone at Apple that can recognize a product that is not quite good enough to the level that Jobs did? More importantly, does anyone have the moxie to kill such a product late in the development cycle and send the team back to the drawing board?

Perhaps Tim Cook is the man to do that, but frankly there are very few executives in business possessing what it takes to be willing to stop a product after incurring great expenses producing it for launch. Few executives will be willing to admit internally “we are wrong, this is not good enough”. More importantly, few executives in business have the ability to do this without demoralizing the talented team that produced the inferior product, instead energizing them to do it again, better.

Steve Jobs did all of those things at Apple, and the company’s reputation and product lines reflect that. Apple didn’t become one of the largest companies in the world by accident, it was a direct result of offering superior products. If that slips even a little, the company will be at risk for a drop in reputation, and a subsequent loss of faithful customers.

Hopefully Tim Cook and all the executives at Apple will be willing to do what it takes to prevent compromises in the company’s products. Steve Jobs tormented Apple’s competitors for years with his refusal to produce products “just good enough”. This is the big risk to Apple without Jobs; that everyone will be afraid to step up when necessary and say “it’s not good enough for our customers”.

More importantly, someone must have what it takes to stand up to the product team, senior executives, and the board to justify eating the expense of starting over. It may seem to be just common logic, but in business this is very, very difficult to do. Steve Jobs was one of the very few in business that could do that. This is Apple’s biggest exposure without Jobs.

Do you own a first-generation iPod nano bought between September 2005 and December 2006? If you answered ‘yes’ then you could be eligible for a free replacement thanks to a manufacturing defect that could result in the diminutive music player overheating.

Apple is recommending that owners stop using their iPod nano and check to see if they are eligible for a replacement unit, free of charge. Not all first-generation iPod nano units are affected – entering your serial number here will tell you if your device is affected.

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Note: Only units with a black or white plastic front and a silver metal back are affected. Later iPod nano models with a metal front and back are not affected.

If your iPod nano is affected, you will be instructed to send it back to Apple. You will receive your replacement unit within 6 weeks.

This is a great opportunity to get that old iPod nano that’s languishing in a drawer for a few years refreshed.

Locks in leadership with stock grants that vest in 2013 and 2016

Computerworld – Apple last week awarded six senior executives $60 million each in stock contingent on them staying with the company through mid-March 2016.

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In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last Friday, Apple said it had granted 150,000 restricted stock units to each executive. At the close of trading Friday, the options were worth just over $60 million.

With Apple shares down slightly on Monday, the options were equivalent to about $59.8 million as of 2 p.m. ET.

Restricted share units are not given at the time of the grant, but instead are awarded when they vest. The shares will be worth their then-current price, which could, of course, be dramatically different than their value Monday.

Half of the shares vest in June 2013 and half in March 2016, assuming the executives remain with Apple.

Those awarded the grants included chief financial officer Peter Oppenheimer, general counsel Bruce Sewell and senior vice presidents Scott Forstall, Philip Schiller, Bob Mansfield and Jeffrey Williams.

Forstall heads Apple’s iPhone software group, Schiller is Apple’s chief marketing officer, Mansfield leads the company’s hardware engineering efforts, and Williams is the head of operations, responsible for the work once done by now-CEO Tim Cook.

Eddie Cue, another senior vice president who oversees all online work at Apple — including the App Store and iCloud — was awarded 100,000 restricted stock units that vest in September 2014 and September 2016.

In September 2011, Cue was given a grant of 100,000 shares when he was promoted to senior vice president.

CEO Tim Cook already has his stock options: In August, after he took the CEO position when co-founder Steve Jobs stepped down, the Apple board of directors awarded Cook one million shares that vest in August 2015 and August 2021.

Cook’s grant is worth approximately $399 million at Monday’s stock price.

Enjoy the new Bing on Android, but not WP7

If I hadn’t read it on Microsoft’s own Bing blog, I wouldn’t have believed it. The Microsoft Bing team has just released the new Bing for Mobile app for iPhone and Android… but not for Windows Phone 7 devices.

Wow. Just wow.

Maps/List Split View: Provides a dynamic way to synchronize a list such as business listings and directions and a map in a single view making it easy to see the location of what you’re searching for. Also works for driving directions and transit.

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      Deals: One-stop deal shopping and convenient mobile phone access for local deals from more than 100 deal providers across the US.

Transit/Real-Time: The Android app now features transit routing/real-time transit and news– all features that were previously only available on m.bing.com.

You can get the updated Bing app. on the general Android Market, Verizon customers can get it here, and Apple iPhone users can pick it up at the iPhone App Store. Windows Phone users can… ah… well “We’re working to release the same consistent experience for RIM and Windows Phone 7 devices in the future, and will share more details as they become available.”

Isn’t that comforting?

I can understand being slow about RIM. Blackberry’s papa company, is sinking fast, but not to support your own operating system with a major update to your mobile search engine app.?

What’s even more troubling is that Microsoft comes right out and says, “Rather than tightly binding functions into a mobile client, we want to embrace the drive towards exposing our functions via an HTML5 experience. In order for search to advance, engines need to be able to call functions that are currently ‘hiding’ in apps so we can better help people get done what they are trying to get done. Using HTML5, our goal is to build a mobile experience that leverages the unique capabilities of the different platforms including camera support and voice search, while making the functions the apps can provide consistent across the platforms and – in the future – callable by engines to help people get from searching to doing.”

Read that again. This application is meant to be more platform independent than most mobile applications thanks to its use of HTML5. In other words, Bing for Mobile app is meant to be easy to port from one operating systems, to another, like, well their very own Windows Phone operating system. But, no, instead Microsoft put bringing its newest Bing app to its own platform on the back-burner.

Former Microsoft executive and current VMware president Paul Maritz is credited with coming up with the phrase “eating your own dog food” while he was at Microsoft.That is to say a company must use its own products before you can anyone else to buy into them. Microsoft seems to have forgotten that lesson.

Seriously, if Microsoft’s own developers can’t be troubled to make Windows Phone 7 a priority, why in the world should independent software vendors (ISV)s? In turn, why should users consider it seriously. If you like Microsoft’s Bing search engine and you can get the best experience with it on an Android smartphone or an Apple iPad or iPhone, why would you buy a Windows phone?

Amazing. Simply amazing.