Google are taking over the world! We’re entrusting our data with a faceless corporation!

Some people worry about that, anyway, though I’m not one of them. I think Google offer a great range of free services that greatly enhance my online life - even if sometimes I feel left out as a European.

Today Google announced on their blog a great new service that should help make people much more comfortable with using Google - Google Dashboard. This can also be found through your Google account settings. What it gives you is a single page summarizing all the Google products you use, and what is kept on them.

So, I can see how many conversations I have stored in my Gmail, how many albums in Picasa, what’s in my Google Docs and so on. It covers over 20 products, including the aforementioned, Calendar, Web History, Orkut, YouTube, Talk, Reader, Alerts, Latitude and more. From here you can control all of that data too.

Perhaps the data that’s most eye opening is your search history - searching while signed in is associated with your account, and it’s all there! There’s even a calendar that shows your levels of search activity. It’s fascinating, in a narcissistic way, but even better you are put in control of it all. If you want to delete it, that’s easy. You can delete bits, or everything and “pause” history collection.

I think this Google Dashboard really makes you feel in control of your online life, and I would love to see sites like Facebook and MySpace follow suit. Cynics and conspiracy theorists probably won’t be convinced, but it certainly takes some of the wind out of their sails.

*Apparently there are some issues with data collection for Google Apps for Domains.

The 12th Annual Independent Games Festival is almost upon us, and has a huge selection of submissions to check out. There’s a record 306 entries, covering a huge range of genres. Lewie Procter at SavvyGames has completed part one of a ‘Pretend you are an IGF judge‘ series, which usefully brings together all the publicly available submitted games, so you can check them out yourself.

The sheer volume of games is pretty intimidating, but there’s sure to be tons of great stuff. I’ve already reviewed AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! — A Reckless Disregard for Gravity, which I love and Terry Cavanagh’s excellent Don’t Look Back is also there, alongside his upcoming and highly anticipated VVVVVV (no demo for this yet, sniff!).

While publishing giant Activision’s Modern Warfare 2 will break barriers by allowing you to be a brutal terrorist, these indie developers are proving that you don’t need to shock or ask ridiculous moral non-choices of your players to do something revolutionary with video games or story telling. There’s also a wealth of humor, weirdness and creative enthusiasm that I feel is lacking from many of the season’s big upcoming releases - which unless I’m forgetting something are all sequels. While there is certainly lots of good stuff to play, like Hollywood before it, the games industry seems stuck in a blockbuster-sequel cycle, making it seem difficult for genuinely new games to make their mark.

One of the most widespread problems people had with Snow Leopard when it launched was a compatibility issue in Mail.app (aka Apple Mail) which prevented messages being sent and even crashed the program in some cases. Nick wrote a guide to fixing these issues, so this obvious failing in Apple’s QA testing needn’t be too much of a hindrance.

That said, my first thought when I read about people having problems with Mail.app was: why are these people even using Mail.app? I’ve had my current iMac for around two years and I’ve never even run the Mail program. Not once. That’s because I use Gmail, a mail application that renders Mail.app and all other desktop email clients more or less obsolete.

For those of you still toiling in the dark with an email client, I know there is sometimes a good reason for that. If you’re trying to handle lots of different accounts, or if you need to connect to an Exchange server, it’s difficult to live without a mail client. But for the average home user and even for most home office users, webmail solutions will always be a better idea than clients. Here’s why:

Security and stability

Desktop email clients are inherently less stable than Gmail or other equivalent webmail services. Storing your data on a local disk (even if you backup) will never be as safe as trusting Google’s datacenters (which are, themselves never 100% safe: nothing is).

But perhaps more importantly, email clients generally rely on downloading message files (and often attachments) to your computer before you filter out content you don’t want. This means that the potential for spam and even malware finding its way onto your computer is significantly higher if you use a mail client application. Read the rest of this entry »

In this brave new world of the internet, the planet, we have been told, has shrunk. Yet for Google, it seems old geographical realities still hold true.

Google Voice sounds wonderful, but I’ve heard so much about this amazing service I can’t use that I’m beginning to hate it. And Onebox music search - it sure is lucky no one in Europe listens to music, or we might be a bit annoyed at Google’s new search feature we don’t have. Thanks for making these tools available everywhere, except in Asia, Australasia, Antarctica and Europe. What’s this all about? When did the US become the world?

North America only accounts for 15% of internet users, so when are the majority going to get some of this stuff? Europe’s a bigger market, and just as developed as the US. I’m surprised that a music search service should need any local restrictions - with streaming services like Spotify there are licensing issues, but search?

With Google Voice, obviously there will be differing telecoms law, but Google has presence everywhere and there seems to be no movement at all. As we follow events around the world with complete ease, the idea of waiting months for something just doesn’t fit. So come on Google, there’s a whole world out there, and we don’t like being ignored! One day, you might wake up and find we’re all using Bing.

One thing you can usually guarantee with Apple’s OS releases is that they will work properly. That wasn’t the case with Snow Leopard - released exactly two months ago today - and the compatibility problems that have dogged it hark back to Microsoft’s disastrous release of Vista. I’m not for one minute arguing that the functionality of Snow Leopard is as bad as Vista and the incompatibility problems are far fewer. But the number of problems being discussed by users on this site alone suggest that for the first time in Apple OS releases, they got it badly wrong.

Apple Mail in particular has caused a huge number of problems as the comments following a post I wrote addressing Snow Leopard incompatibility issues with it prove. Mike’s frustrations are typical of many:

Massive problems here. Mail crashes occasionally, Aperture crashes all the time, especially when trying to export. CS3 has crashed. I mainly see the crashing when going into the dialog boxes (i.e export etc). I am not going to go into work-arounds, that’s not my job, I paid a fortune for all of my apple gear to get away from this type of issue. Apple should have gotten this right before releasing it.

He’s absolutely right to be so angry. The least Apple users deserve is that Apple’s own software works with what was merely a revised version of Leopard. And as he found out, it’s wasn’t only Mail that caused problems. Adobe’s CS3 was a well publicized victim of Snow Leopard. Since we update programs on a regular basis here at Softonic, it’s been unavoidable for us to notice the large number of updates rushed-out by developers in the wake of Snow Leopard’s release and the volume of frustrated users finding that programs suddenly aren’t working anymore.

InformationWeek reported that at least 100 applications were incompatible with Snow Leopard on its release. Users at Wikidot are keeping track of those programs still incompatible including at the time of writing major packages such as Adobe After Effects and Adobe ColdFusion. And to complete the surreal Vista-esque scenario, there were even security issues on Snow Leopard’s release. We had the security hole created by Guest Accounts and a vulnerability in Java both of which put your Mac at risk of hijacking.

Don’t get me wrong. Snow Leopard was far less problematic than Vista on balance. Minor incompatibility problems are to be expected with completely new OS releases but Snow Leopard was hardly a revolution - it was merely a tweak of Leopard so it shouldn’t have been hard for Apple to get it right. That is, unless they rushed it out in advance of Windows 7 which seems like the most likely reason for the problems.

For many Apple users, the release of Snow Leopard will forever be remembered as the mark of the devil - 10.666. Let’s hope they get it right next time.

I’ve barely been able to think this week due to the Microsoft marketing machine going into overdrive. Mainstream, and even not-so mainstream media, have been singing the praises of the new operating system like it’s some kind of revelation.

In my humble opinion, it’s clearly not a revelation. It’s yet another blatant copy of Mac OS X by Microsoft and merely the final version of Vista that they messed-up so monumentally 3 years ago.

If you’re in two minds about whether to upgrade, here are 7 reasons not to believe the hype or make the switch:

1. Little difference to Vista

Yes, there are a few juicy new features such as the “Superbar”, Libraries and it’s quicker but it remains essentially Vista. As some people are already realizing, Windows 7 isn’t much more than a Vista Service Pack. If, Vista is Windows 6.0 then Seven is merely 6.1.

2. It’s expensive compared to other options

A cursory glance at other operating systems shows that Windows 7 is still very expensive. Ubuntu and other Linux releases are free, and Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard costs only around $75 and just $45 for a version upgrade.

Windows 7, depending on the version chosen, costs between $119.99 and $219.99 for the upgrade and between $199.99 and $319.99 full version.

3. XP and Vista work fine

XP was released in 2001 and remains a good option thanks to the service pack. Even though it’s 8 years old, it still remains the world’s most widely used operating system and almost completely dominates the netbook market. As for Vista, despite an awful start, Microsoft updates have served to clean up many of it’s problems if not solved the bloatedness and speed issues which plague it. If you’re happy with your current Windows, why change?

4. It’s still built on the same old insecure infrastructure

Compared with previous versions, Windows 7 is more secure, yes. But at the end of the day, it’s still based on the same old vulnerable NT kernel that Windows 3.1x was based on 17 years ago. It’s still also necessary to activate the firewall and make sure antivirus updates have been kept up to date. Other systems are more secure where to install anything you need to be the Administrator.

5. Upgrading XP requires a clean install

While Vista users can choose a convenient “Upgrade” option which takes less than 30 minutes to install Windows 7, XP users  - which is the vast majority of Windows users out there - have to perform a clean install. Even a brief glance at the BBC’s guide to upgrading to Windows 7 tells you that there is no way offices and general home users are going to go to the trouble - or even feel confident - to perform a clean install of a new operating system.

6. Incompatible programs

Windows 7 will be compatible with far more programs than Vista was on release and most major developers have been updated their software for it. But there will inevitably be tools or small business applications designed for particular businesses which don’t work well with it. The only solution to this is the XP compatibility mode only available in the more expensive editions.

7. Windows remains a closed system

Years ago almost everyone had Windows installed so interoperability wasn’t an issue. Now there are many users sharing Windows with Mac OS X and Linux. While these two operating systems have endeavored to facilitate coexistence, Windows hasn’t. Thus while Mac and Linux can access Windows files and install the two operating systems together, this is not the case in Windows 7, which still reads HFS or EXT3/4 natively.

Will you be one of those that sticks with what you’ve got and doesn’t upgrade to Windows 7? Do you think that Windows 7 is worth upgrading to? Have your say.

Testing a new version of Windows is like getting the keys to your brand new car and ride it for the first time… all shiny outside and spotless inside, with that unmistakable new car scent that only stays for a few days. After the first impression, you make yourself comfortable in the driver’s seat and begin looking at all the buttons, lights and knobs on the dashboard. After adjusting the wheel and buckling up, it’s time to start the engine!

This is when Windows 7, our new car in this short story, leaves the garage and hits the track. That is, it leaves Microsoft’s labs and factories to become part of our daily lives. And it’s our turn, as users of this operating system, to pay attention to every single detail about it: any hardware problems? Is it difficult to get used to? How does it behave under the harshest conditions? An in-depth analysis with one main objective: to get to know an operating system that will become an essential tool in our work.

This post gathers our first impressions of Windows 7, the latest version of the Microsoft operating system. Just like each driver has a different driving style, each Softonic editor has also a different personal perspective when it comes to test a new operating system. And this is what Softonic editors from very diverse nationalities and backgrounds think about it.

Vista was not that bad, but Seven is not that good either”

I’m a positive person, so my first impression was kind of hopeful. But as soon as the system loads - much faster than in Vista, I must say - this initial hope vanishes. My dear old classic Start menu is gone and UAC is still up to its old tricks. These two things, together with the system’s overall design and behavior, make me think about Seven as Vista in disguise: a new appearance, but no really outstanding new features. Of course, there are also positive elements, like a seamless compatibility with software and drivers. In short, any improvement to Vista is more than welcome, but Windows 7 doesn’t seem to be a truly revolutionary new operating system. It’s just what Vista should have been from the very beginning.

Iván Ramírez ( Softonic ES)

I hope Seven doesn’t have as many bugs as Vista”

Windows 7 looks very similar to Vista: there are transparency effects everywhere! It doesn’t seem that different from its predecessor, but at the same time, you can tell usability and performance have been greatly improved. Windows Media Player 12 is very similar to version 11, but includes new functions: now it’s a complete multimedia suite with which you can not only listen to your favorite music, but also browse photos, watch videos, rip CDs, sync data with portable devices and much more. I hope Seven doesn’t have as many problems and bugs as Vista.

Felipe Pessoa ( Softonic BR)

Read the rest of this entry »

This week is only about one thing in the computer world - the release of the Microsoft’s new operating system Windows 7. With the ghosts of the Vista release fiasco still haunting them, some are also questioning whether its success or failure could also mark a historic moment in the evolution of Microsoft. Will it be the operating system that restores some pride to the much maligned company and gets it back on track in the operating system world or could it spell the beginning of the end of Microsoft’s domination of the PC market?

One thing we can say with certainty is that it can’t be worse than Windows Vista. The only way is up for Microsoft in terms of operating systems which isn’t a bad place to start from. Vista was not only delivered two years late but caused all manner of incompatibility problems with third party software and hardware (including even Micrsoft’s own Zune!) and had users flocking back to Windows XP. It says something that one of OnSoftware’s most popular posts ever was a simple list of Vista themes for XP proving that users liked the look of Vista but hated the bloated Aero engine and frustrating functionality.

The timing of the release is also probably better for Microsoft. Apple have recently proved that they’re not immune to new operating system cock-ups with basic incompatibility problems surrounding the release of their latest operating system edition, Snow Leopard. And Microsoft executives must have breathed a sigh of relief when Google announced that its new operating system Chrome OS won’t be launched until mid-2010. However, Google have announced that they will be releasing the code for it later this year which could yet throw a spanner in the works for Windows 7. Read the rest of this entry »

This week will see the release of Windows 7, Microsoft’s latest push for control of your PC. As the launch date approaches, we’ll be posting lots of helpful articles, reviews and videos all about the brand new edition of Windows. To kick things off, here’s our first ever OnSoftware poll. Yeah, I can’t believe it either! So how do you feel about the new OS’s imminent arrival?

Let us know by voting in the poll below - and leave a comment to let us know why!

AVG Anti-Virus Free has been my antivirus of choice for the past five or six years. I like its ease of use, its moderation in system resources usage and the fact that it hardly shows any window or notification. I’ve installed and tried every single new version, including AVG Anti-Virus Free 9.0, which came out only yesterday and works really well – as usual.

But I have to say that this latest version includes also some annoying little features I didn’t like at all, chiefly regarding my browser configuration. For me, browser settings are untouchable and no program should be allowed to mess with that – not even my dear old AVG Anti-Virus. I hope this is not the beginning of the end for our relationship… well, as long as I have a way to revert those changes, it won’t be.

So, what does AVG change in your browser? First, the installer includes the AVG Security toolbar for the browser. There’s nothing wrong with this toolbar; actually, it’s actually a nice security addition for your browser. But if you don’t pay attention, you’ll also let AVG change your default search engine to Yahoo!.

Of course, if you did miss that option and let AVG change the search engine, you can always change it back to Google (or whichever you use) within the web browser. The funny thing is that AVG Anti-Virus will warn you as if it was some piece of malware trying to modify your browser settings!

All you have to do is click the icon on the system tray and confirm the change in the following dialog window.

Another thing AVG Anti-Virus changes – and this time, without letting you know – is the New tab page. Once the AVG Toolbar is installed, your New tab page will look like this: Read the rest of this entry »

Spotify continued adding to its service today by allowing users to download tracks directly from Spotify onto their hard drive. Of course, users have been able to purchase MP3 tracks for a few months now but only by right-clicking tracks and being taken to 7digital’s website. Now everything has been streamlined and can be done directly within the Spotify interface. From now on, users will see a “Buy” button (which annoyingly for many paid-up Premium members can’t be removed or deactivated) next to tracks which when clicked, allows you to enter card details.

Note that the new download purchase option will initially be available in the UK and Germany, France, Italy and Spain with Sweden, Norway and Finland following in a few weeks’ time. It’s not clear how much each track costs but Spotify say once purchased, you will be able to download them a further 3-5 times depending on the label. There is no DRM attached to tracks so they can be transferred to any external device and most tracks are in very high quality 256/320kpbs MP3 format. This all gives Spotify a distinct advantage over iTunes downloads which only allow 20 second previews and one download per song.

However, while I can see that this purchase option will appeal to free users of the service so that they can download the odd track they really like, it will surely appeal less to Premium users. Those that are already paying around $10 a month for ad-free listening will probably see no reason why they should stump-up extra cash just for the pleasure of owning tracks. Especially now that they can use Spotify on their iPhone or Android mobile and use the offline listening function to access music when no internet connection is available.

The latest version of Windows Mobile rolls out today, as Microsoft tries to put a spring in the step of its aging mobile OS. Windows Mobile 6.5, which we previewed back in February, is designed to freshen up the hopelessly dated shell, making it more touch-friendly and improving on the browsing capabilities within the operating system. But can Microsoft really expect to make ground on its plusher, faster, and more functional rivals, such as iPhone, Android and BlackBerry? It’s a big ask, but there are a few new additions that might help. In fact, I’ve counted six and a half.

Today screen - It’s actually called a ‘Home’ screen now, but this is still the page where everything begins in Windows Mobile. Revamped to make it more touch-friendly, the screen consists only of text headings for the various apps and tools. The shortcuts on the Home screen are much neater and more intelligent than previous versions of the Today screen in WM. Now you can even launch individual Internet Explorer favorites directly from this screen.

Unlock specific tools - The phone unlocking capabilities are much improved in Windows Mobile 6.5, making them much more akin to the likes of the iPhone and Android systems. You can now slide to unlock specific items such as messages and missed calls.

Honeycomb interface - The new honeycomb-style Start menu interface is the flagship feature of the new Windows Mobile. It’s a vast improvement from the archaic-looking menu screens of the previous incarnations, and has been designed specifically for touchscreen use. Icons are spaced out much more, and can be scrolled up and down rather than having to fumble between different screens. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a conundrum for you. Normally we’re full of hints and tips at OnSoftware but this is an appeal for help from you the readers and also a warning of the dangers of using  CCleaner. Basically, I’ve got myself into a lot of bother after an over zealous cleaning session with it and can’t start Windows on my Acer Aspire 1414. Since my CD/DVD drive is broken, I can’t use a Windows XP disk to boot so the only option available to me is to perform a Network Boot.

Unfortunately, I have no idea how to do this which is why I’m appealing for help. Why on earth the bios won’t let me boot from a USB drive I have no idea but it’s a glaring error by Acer. The problem started after using CCleaner to uninstall programs, clean the hard drive and “fix” the registry. On restarting, my Acer Aspire booted as far as the Windows XP logo before going straight to the blue screen of death and now won’t even let me start in Safe Mode. The Acer bios gives me only one other boot option - a Network Boot - which I’ve been unable to figure out. A search on the internet reveals network booting involves a scary world of PXEs and DHCP which I’ve found very hard to understand. All that I know is that I have to connect my Acer laptop to another laptop with an ethernet cable!

The blue screen of death error code I’m getting is a “C000021a (fatal system error) The session manager initialization system process terminated unexpectedly”. It’s clear that the problem is related to the session login part of Windows startup i.e. the bit where you click your username and enter your password to use Windows. I don’t see why this should stop me at least starting in Safe Mode but if I ever do get it started again, I’m going to remove the session manager completely. Beware all those that currently use it and CCleaner at the same time. Read the rest of this entry »

Operating system, web browser, office suite, media player… Microsoft had everything covered, except for a security application. A few months ago they surprised us with Microsoft Security Essentials, their first attempt at developing a stand-alone security application for home use. Today, Security Essentials has come of age, leaving the beta stage behind and launching its first final version.

It seems that the three months of beta testing have been as calm as a millpond. At least that’s what you infer from the differences between the beta and the final versions, which are basically none. Microsoft Security Essentials features the same clear, easy-to-use tabbed interface and pretty the same tools and functionality.

Microsoft Security Essentials includes three types of scans: Quick, which scans those areas in your system that are most likely to get infected; Full, which scans your whole computer; and Customizable, which lets you select which specific folders and files should be scanned. Read the rest of this entry »

The problem

The more digital content we store on our computers, the more important reliable backup solutions become. For example, my iMac has about 50GB of music and photos on its primary disk drive. While much of the music could probably be replaced, any photo not yet uploaded to Flickr would be lost forever if that disk failed. So, like many other Mac users, I use Time Machine to maintain a secure copy of all my files, albeit on a potentially unstable portable hard disk in the same room as my Mac.

It was this potential unreliability of my Time Machine disk that got me interested in online backup options. What could be better than being able to backup to a remote server, safe in the knowledge that should any disaster befall my Time Machine disk, everything would still be OK. At least, that was the theory.

Solution found!

After some research and a little help from OnSoftware, I settled on Mozy - generally regarded as being a great online backup tool. I signed up for the $4.95/month unlimited backup plan: I thought (and still think) that $5 a month is a pretty good price point for total piece of mind. After setting up my account - a really simple process - and installing the Mozy desktop client - also a breeze - I let Mozy get to work on its initial backup. It was about eight hours after this that I spotted the main flaw in Mozy’s design: you have to complete an entire backup in one go right at the beginning, without any interruptions whatsoever. You can’t go restarting your Mac (not that I did), and you can’t lose connectivity for even a short time, which seems to have happened to me.

Around this time, my Mac was acting a little weird. I’d narrowed the problem down to a graphics driver error, but the truth is that my Mac was freezing from time to time. This meant that every time the driver error reared its ugly exception, I’d have to start from scratch on the Mozy backup. That’s not Mozy’s fault, nor is the occasional eccentricity of my ADSL connection. But Mozy could come up with a way of resuming backups, even for the initial backup process.

In order to be fair, I tried running Mozy after I’d fixed the driver issue and done a clean install, to see if it performed better under optimal conditions. Left overnight, I expected Mozy to be up to about 25% when I checked it in the morning. Unfortunately, Mozy had failed for some unknown reason at some point during the evening… all I could do was start it again. Then it failed again during the day. So I canceled my account, disappointed by a product that I’d been planning on loving.

Two things Mozy could do to win me back

Find a way of resuming backups. When backing up 100GB of data, it’s just ridiculous that an interruption causes the whole process to be canceled. Building a decent file index at the beginning of the backup operation should allow for Mozy to pick up where it left off, and then look for changes after the initial backup is complete.

Clearer error messages. One of the biggest problems I found was that when Mozy’s backup process failed, the information available about what had happened was very limited. More information, on the web side of the user interface, if necessary, would make it easier to diagnose and fix problems preventing the backup from working properly.