Entropy

Image via Wikipedia

Another info packed post with some exciting news making waves in the technology world.

• 3G iPhone update
• Vista - uptake inevitable
• Twitter rising
• Javascript curvy corners
• Worthy mentions

3G iPhone update

We have reported previously on speculation regarding the launch date of the 3G iPhone, now more information is starting to filter through. One hot topic drawing much attention is the price the new model will go on the market for. $199. While this price is contract dependant, it is still a hefty saving of $200. Apple are also expecting huge sales, with reports coming in that they have ordered 25million units to be manufactured by the same company, Foxconn, that put the first gen iPhone on shelves. 3 million of which will be ready for sale by the end of May.

the author of the story also says that the new phones will be available in “8-gigabit-memory and… 16-gigabit-memory” versions (for $399 and $499, respectively), so take that as you like. In addition to these discounts, the source says the new iPhone will be 2.5mm thinner than the previous iteration, although we understand that right after telling Fortune this information, the “person” burst into a cloud of rainbow-colored sparkles and went flying off into the night sky.

Vista - uptake inevitable

Let’s not beat around the bush on this subject. Vista has been a disappointment. I personally prefer it to Windows XP, but I am not the majority in this issue. XP is end of life with it being pulled from sale in the near future. Once this happens what choices do consumers have other than linux distros? You can order a new pc with Ubuntu, for example, installed. While Ubuntu is a worthy alternative, you must again remember about a corporate roll out of a new desktop environment. I know that companies have switched to linux over windows solutions, but the majority have been in the server market. We are talking about the average employee having to make the change and with that comes training (read expenses). I find Ubuntu quite easy to navigate and fx uses it on his laptop, but not everyone adjusts well. A computerworld article goes into more detail on this topic, while another reminds us about current uptake problems.

“They are sort of in a ‘caught between a rock and a hard place’ situation,” said Gray. Administrators may not want to move to Vista, but neither of the alternatives — the older XP and the not-even-officially-scheduled Windows 7 — is attractive, he said.

Twitter Rising.

Seen as pointless by some and indisposable by others, the stats don’t lie. Twitter usage is rising. I think the number of mashups using the API to do abstract things with what users are pumping into the system has a direct influence on the stats. Repeat users loyal to the service are also a big  influence in the increase of market share seen by Twitter, which is a healthy sign the site is gaining a strong foothold in the social network arena. fx and I were actually throwing around an idea for a Twitter mashup, so you might see something from us in the future putting a spin on what people are doing.

The chart makes the growth look impressive - and it is. However, to put things into context, the site ranked #439 among Social Networks and Forums last week and #4309 among All Categories of websites. Twitter’s size is notoriously difficult to measure as there are so many access points (mobile phones in particular). However, the website traffic data does give some idea of the rate of growth and also reveals that the service still hasn’t reached mainstream adoption.

Javascript curvy corners.

The rounded look of Web 2.0 designs can be a pain at the best of times. Most of the time you will need a few images combined in a bit of CSS to pull it off.  Being able to apply curvy corners on the fly is a huge step in the right direction, and Curvy Corners offer just that.

curvyCorners will automatically pickup style information from the DIV element. So for example if you give the DIV a 2px black border in a stylesheet then the borders will be automatically added to the rounded corners.

Worthy Mentions

Seeing as we have covered some news on Twitter, why not give you the Linux desktop options to make Tweeting easier - 6 Twitter clients for the Linux desktop and one for the road.

Twitter is a popular social networking utility that’s gaining popularity as a micro-blogging tool. Registered users can post messages — also called Tweets — via the Web interface, but many prefer to use desktop applications that offer additional functionality and move Tweeting out of the browser entirely.

Cool web stuff for April 2008 brought to you by WebKak - April 2008 round up of cool web stuff.

Well before we kick off with yet more cool web apps & stuff next month, it’s time for a round-up of the most popular posts for the month of April

Mighty Mouse Easter Egg

Since it’s Easter for a lot of people, and there are still things to be done, I don’t want to keep you waiting. Today, I just found an older picture of Apple’s Mighty Mouse, and I think it’s something great to see. Yes, it’s a hardware Easter Egg. No, this is not a fake image, is a picture made more than 2 years ago, but I guess this is still true today.

Image via Wikipedia

Apple have their next event where we can expect to hear about more glorious gadgets coming from their labs in about 2 months time. One of the gadgets we may hear about is the 3G iPhone, this would be the 2nd incarnation of the phone. The question I have - why hasn’t the 1st generation one gone main stream in South Africa?

The phone was originally launched in June of 2007 which is nearly a year ago. I understand that we are generally a bit behind with the introduction of new gadgets, but we have been pretty good lately with world wide release dates, only falling 2-3 months behind with most things.

Core Group are the primary distributor of Apple products in South Africa and have been criticized in the past regarding their pricing of the iPod. I would think that a product such as the iPhone would be high on the agenda of products to bring in to the country with a market that would more than likely bite at the idea of owning an “iPhone” - I would.

So now we are getting closer and closer to the 2nd generation of the iPhone. Most people agree that certain features being included in the new version should have always been in from the start, but the lack of features common to most other mobile phones has not stopped the iPhone from being a run away success in the rest of the world.

You can read more about the 3G iPhone over at engadget.

Image via Wikipedia

There are a bunch of tools available that help you track down a free internet hotspot, but LifeHacker has two we think are worth a look at.

The first is the newly published Free Wi-Fi/Hotspot Finder Google Maps mashup which will show you the closest hotspots based on the location you type in - allowing you to plan ahead. On this same site is a great app called wiPod which allows you to select the areas (in America) that you’re interested in and download those maps to your iPod for easy access.

The second Mashup is Hotspotr, which has a cooler name and a cooler interface but apparantly (according to LifeHacker) the maps are not as good. Naturally, we suggest you try them yourself –

• LifeHacker Original Post
• LifeHacker Hotspotr Post
• wiPod
• Hotspot Finder

Image by BallGame68 via Flickr

This release is aimed to fix the PSOD that some iPhone users experienced and a 501 error that developers were getting annoyed with.

The third beta version of the iPhone SDK includes Interface Builder, Xcode IDE, Instruments, iPhone simulator, frameworks and samples, compilers, and Shark analysis tool.

There are 3 different types of SDK packages as such, the Standard ($99), Enterprise ($299) and Free. Depending on what you plan on doing with the software you create will determine which package you will need. You can download the free version or register over at the Apple iPhone Dev site.