Google Tests Scripting Feature for Online Apps

Google will add scripting capabilities to Google Docs, allowing organizations to customize its online applications and automate tasks, the company said Wednesday.

Google plans to sign up about 1,000 customers over the next few weeks to test the feature, called Google Apps Script. It isn't saying yet when Apps Script will be widely available. Google Docs users can apply here to try it out.

It will be tested initially in Google Spreadsheets and extended to other Google Docs applications over time, said Jonathan Rochelle, product manager for Google Docs, in a press briefing at the Google I/O conference.

The scripting will allow organizations to build custom functions in spreadsheets, like translating figures from inches to millimeters, or translating text from one language to another. It will also enable applications to be linked together, allowing a user to send an email from within a spreadsheet, for example, or access a calendar from a list of addresses.

The company posted a video and some information about Apps Script in its Enterprise Blog.

The scripting should help Google to compete better with Microsoft's widely used Excel spreadsheet software, but it will also open a new front for security attacks and other potential issues.

"The nature of scripting is such that it could be easily abused," Rochelle acknowledged. "We want to make sure people can't make a mistake [such as] they coded something they don't know is happening."

Google will work to make it "bulletproof" before it's released to the public, he said. The company described it as "a puppy who's still in training," suggesting it has more work to do on it.

Google Apps Script is based on JavaScript, with object-based extensions added by Google, making it easy to learn, according to Rochelle. "It really is JavaScript, except there are certain things we don't let you do," he said.

There is not currently a way to import Excel macros, he said, but Google is considering that for the future. It expects Apps Script to appeal especially to systems integrators, who have been asking for it, he said.

Excel still has many more features and capabilities than Google Spreadsheets, but Rochelle argued that "user satisfaction" is a better measure by which to compare the products. "If 80 percent of people don't use the features then it doesn't matter" he said.

Several partners are at the show who offer integration services and develop add-on tools for Google Docs. Ed Laczynski, CTO of LTech, said his company has migrated "hundreds of thousands" of users from on-premise software to Google Apps. The company just released a tool that lets users download and backup their documents to a local disk.

Oracle is also in on the act. The company is about to release a beta tool that will let users of its Siebel customer relationship management software import and export data from Google Docs, said Dipock Das, a senior director with Oracle's CRM group.

 

Lawyer seeks trimmed prison time for Phil Spector

A lawyer for Phil Spector said in a court document filed Wednesday that the music producer maintains he did not kill actress Lana Clarkson and is not responsible for her death.

Attorney Doron Weinberg wrote in a memorandum to the sentencing judge, however, that Spector's prison sentence on a second-degree murder conviction should be 18 years to life in prison.

The court document asked that a sentencing enhancement for use of a gun be trimmed to three years, instead of the four requested by Deputy District Attorney Alan Jackson. The murder conviction alone mandates 15 years to life in prison.

Spector, 69, was scheduled to be sentenced Friday. He was found guilty April 13 in the shooting death of Clarkson at his home in 2003. Clarkson, who starred in the 1985 cult film "Barbarian Queen," died of a gunshot fired in her mouth as she sat in the foyer of Spector's mansion.

Weinberg had said the conviction would be appealed.

Weinberg also said in the court document that an account of Clarkson's death provided by Jackson in a memorandum last week was "based on conjecture, not facts."

Jackson had offered a theory of the shooting that was not proven by evidence at the trial, suggesting that Spector threatened Clarkson with a loaded gun as she attempted to leave his house and "the end result ... was Lana being shot through the mouth as she recoiled in fear."

Jackson suggested those facts could be deduced from the fact that Spector had threatened women with guns in the past in similar circumstances.

There were no eyewitnesses to the shooting. Weinberg wrote that his client "asserts, as he has steadfastly maintained since February 3, 2003, that he did not kill Lana Clarkson, and he is not responsible for her death."

In arguing for a lesser sentence on the gun charge, Weinberg disclosed that during a private conference with the judge over jury instructions before the verdict, prosecutors had argued "that the facts proven at trial could support the conclusion that the death of Lana Clarkson resulted from an accidental discharge of the weapon during a misdemeanor brandishing."

Weinberg said given that suggestion, the additional term for gun use should be reduced to the minimum of three years.

Time Warner to spin off ailing AOL

Time Warner announced plans Thursday to spin off its troubled AOL Internet unit by the end of the year, bringing to a close one of the most disastrous corporate mergers in history.

The US media-entertainment giant said its board had approved a separation from AOL, formerly known as America Online, to make it an independent, publicly traded company.

"We believe that a separation will be the best outcome for both Time Warner and AOL," Time Warner chairman and chief executive Jeff Bewkes said in a statement.

"We believe AOL will then have a better opportunity to achieve its full potential as a leading independent Internet company."

Time Warner said that before the spin-off goes ahead it will purchase the five percent in AOL owned by Internet search and advertising giant Google, which paid one billion dollars in 2006 for the stake.

Time Warner owns the remaining 95 percent of AOL, which saw its heyday as a provider of dial-up service in the early days of the Internet but has been losing ground as consumers switch to high-speed or broadband services.

Once the proposed separation is complete, Time Warner shareholders will own all of the outstanding interests in AOL, according to the plan.

Time Warner said it aims to complete the separation, which will have to be approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission, around the end of the year.

An independent AOL would be free to focus on growing its Web brands and services and its advertising business, according to Time Warner.

"This will be a great opportunity for AOL, our employees and our partners," said AOL chairman and chief executive Tim Armstrong, who was hired away from Google in March to run the division.

"Becoming a standalone public company positions AOL to strengthen its core businesses, deliver new and innovative products and services, and enhance our strategic options," Armstrong said.

Time Warner merged with America Online in 2001 at the height of the dot-com boom, with AOL using its inflated stock as a currency for the transaction.

But the marriage of old and new media behemoths baptised as AOL Time Warner quickly went sour as the benefits promised to shareholders failed to materialize.

AOL was valued at more than 150 billion dollars when the ill-fated merger was announced but its worth collapsed dramatically as the dot-com bubble burst.

Time Warner was forced in 2002 to massively write down the value of the Internet unit and the AOL name was removed from the group's corporate title in 2003.

In the years since the merger, AOL weathered an accounting scandal and was relegated to being just one of the divisions in Time Warner's empire, which includes Time magazine, Warner Bros. studio and the CNN and HBO television networks.

Billionaire corporate raider Carl Icahn once described the merger as a "colossal mistake."

AOL is currently the number four Web gateway after Google, Microsoft sites and Yahoo! and has been trying to refashion itself recently as a popular one-stop portal.

Time Warner shares were down 0.96 percent in New York at 22.78 dollars

Microsoft revamps search engine, dubbed "Bing"

Microsoft Corp is revamping its search engine to counter the dominance of Google Inc in the web search and related advertising business.

The world's largest software company, which is still in talks with Yahoo Inc over a potential partnership, has long been determined to play a major role in the lucrative web search market after watching upstart Google take a stranglehold.

Microsoft, which has been testing the search engine internally under the name Kumo for several months, plans to introduce the new service, re-christened "Bing," over the next few days, with a full launch next Wednesday.

Advertising Age reported earlier this week that Microsoft was planning a $80 million to $100 million ad campaign to promote Bing. Microsoft declined comment on the report.

The Redmond, Washington-based firm has lots of ground to make up. Last month Google took 64.2 percent of U.S. Internet searches -- up half a percentage point from the month before -- handling 9.5 billion out of a total of 14.8 billion searches.

Yahoo was a distant second with 20.4 percent of searches and Microsoft third with 8.2 percent, both down slightly from the month before, according to data firm comScore.

Both Google and Yahoo have recently introduced new features in their search engines to attract users, making Microsoft's task even harder.

Telstra - Nine new SME apps

Telstra has released a raft of online software applications, available to Australian SMEs with the Telstra T-Suite software-as-a-service platform, says WebWire.
 
According to the company, the T-Suite applications will be available to lease online for a monthly fee without expensive upfront licensing fees, meaning businesses can preserve vital cash reserves during the current tough economic climate.

Telstra adds that Australian small businesses in all industry sectors will be able to generate employment agreements and manage everyday staff issues with easy-to-use HR processes and templates from Workforce Guardian that are updated online to reflect changes in employment law.

McAfee, EMC team up vs Symantec in online backup

McAfee Inc, the No. 2 computer security company, plans to team up with EMC Corp to offer online PC backup services, and announced the acquisition of a company that protects ATMs against hackers.

The company plans to offer consumers unlimited Web-based backup for personal computers with EMC Corp's Mozy division for $50 to $60 a year, Executive Vice President Todd Gebhart said at a McAfee's analyst meeting on Friday.

Earlier in the day, McAfee said it would pay $33 million to buy Cupertino, California-based SolidCore Systems Inc, adding products that help companies protect ATMs, cash registers and other point-of-sale systems used by retailers, along with multifunction printers and other specialized computer devices.

It would pay another $14 million if SolidCore's business meets certain financial targets.

SolidCore's products are used by more than 100 financial institutions and in more than 15,000 retail stores, McAfee said.

McAfee Chief Executive Dave DeWalt said he would continue to look to make small- and mid-sized acquisitions of products that the company can cross-sell with existing products.

"I think people here would expect three or four more things like SolidCore," said Cowen & Co analyst Walter Pritchard.

McAfee said it expects the acquisition of SolidCore to be slightly dilutive to profit, excluding items, in the current quarter, ending June 30, which is when it expects the deal to close.

The company plans to introduce the PC backup service in the second half of the year, making it a late player into a market dominated by bigger rival Symantec Corp, its partner EMC and privately held Carbonite.

A few years ago McAfee beta tested a backup service that it hoped to launch, but ditched plans to bring that to market.

DeWalt reiterated his comments from a Thursday interview with Reuters, saying that business had improved in May from April. "So far, good pace. We are on a roll here," DeWalt said.

Shares in Santa Clara, California-based McAfee rose 27 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $38.30, while the Nasdaq Composite Index was little changed.

Google Pulls Trademark Restrictions for U.S. Ads

Google is loosening its grip on trademarks included in advertisements through its AdWords service. The search giant said Thursday it will allow companies to place the terms of a trademark in the copy of text advertisements.

"Under this policy change, advertisers will be able to create more specific, less generic ad copy targeted to narrowly tailored landing pages," said Deanna Yick, a Google spokesperson. "Users and consumers shopping online will have more options and relevant choices."

The move will bring Google's policy on the use of trademarks in ad text more in line with the industry standard, according to Dan Friedman, a representative from Google's Inside AdWords team, in an official blog post.

Companies with certain criteria will be able to use trademark terms in ad text in the U.S. even if the company doesn't own the trademark or doesn't have approval from the trademark owner.

"For example, under our old policy, a site that sells several brands of athletic shoes may not have been able to highlight the actual brands that they sell in their ad text," Friedman said. "However, under our new policy, that advertiser can create specific ads for each of the brands that they sell."

In Hot Water

While Google says it's doing companies and users a favor, brand advertisers may think otherwise.

Google's move may land the company in more hot water and put the company on the defense against potential trademark lawsuits similar to one already filed against the company.

On Monday, FPX LLC, also known as Firepond, filed a class-action complaint against Google for using trademarks it owns, including Firepond and Firepond CSQ.

In court documents, Firepond says it has suffered and has been injured in its business and property and the damage it has suffered is both economic and non-economic in nature.

"Google's change in policy is further indication of the company's failure to honor and respect the right of federally registered trademark owners," said Scott Kline of Andrews Kurth LLP, one of the law firms representing Firepond. "Even competitors Yahoo and MSN are willing to take down infringing links upon notification of a federally registered trademark. We are disappointed by the change in policy, but believe it only serves to strengthen our client's claims."

Move Is Pro-Consumer

Others, however, believe the move by Google is pro-consumer. The Computer & Communication Industry Association said Google's change will be good for consumers.

The change aligns Google's policy more closely with current industry standards on sponsored search text, said CCIA counsel Matthew Schruers. "By allowing ad text to make references to others' trademarks -- a practice permitted and encouraged by trademark law -- Google's new policy will improve consumers' ability to find products online and to obtain better information about the products they want to buy," he said.

Paul Levy, counsel for Public Citizen, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit public-interest organization, said it's a modest step in the right direction.

"Generally speaking, it seems to me that modifying their procedure so that it is easier for those that have information to communicate to consumers that they have Web sites in which they may be interested, enabling them to communicate more truthful information about what is in those Web sites, is a good thing," Levy said.

"I would also say that I'm particularly glad Google is not in retreating but rather is moving forward with the AdWords program that provides potential for increased competition for comparable goods and services," Levy added. "My regret is that they are not allowing use of keywords for direct-competitor ads."

Citrix Leverages Amazon’s Cloud

Citrix has pushed out a cloud solution called Citrix C3 Lab so its followers can use Amazon's EC2 and S3 as part of their standard technology infrastructure and prototype cloud projects.

Citrix says C3 Lab is the first of several ways it plans to leverage Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Citrix dreamed up Citrix Cloud Center (C3) last year. It's a bunch of Citrix gear packaged and marketed to the cloud service provider market. This week it added XenApp and XenDesktop so service providers can deliver Windows applications and desktops as a service.

C3 Lab is supposed to provide an inexpensive, preconfigured environment that starts with access to Citrix XenApp alongside key Citrix C3 technologies such as Citrix Access Gateway and Citrix Repeater.

Users will be able to test application compatibility and staging and gain experience of the AWS cloud. Other C3 products and scenarios are supposed to be added over time.

As a help there are C3 Lab Blueprints of guidelines and best practices available for testing virtualization, security and application services in a cloud environment.

 

The C3 Lab will be made available for public use as a set of Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) in EC2.

The only charges will be Amazon's.

XenServer, a key component of C3, will soon be enhanced with a new distributed virtual switch add-on that Citrix say will enable secure, multi-tenant, highly scalable public clouds. The switch will partition network traffic on a per-application basis, with resource and security guarantees, and offer full visibility into and control over inter-VM traffic both within a server and virtual network overlay.

A technological preview should be available for a free download on June 1.

At the same time a partner program will kick in designed to give hosted service providers the "right to use" Citrix products as the underpinning of their delivery infrastructure along with flexible monthly "active subscriber" pricing and licensing.

See http://community.citrix.com/display/cdn/Citrix+C3+Lab.

Terminator Salvation game released for iPhone, iPod touch

Gameloft on Thursday announced the release of Terminator Salvation for the iPhone and iPod touch. It costs $10.

Terminator Salvation follows the storyline of the upcoming blockbuster movie starring Christian Bale. It's the latest in the long-running Terminator series, in which John Connor leads the human resistance against Skynet and an army of Terminator robots.

Previewed by Macworld in April, the Terminator Salvation iPhone game pits you against T-800 Terminators, tanks, motorcycles and drones controlled by Skynet. You get an assault rifle, shotgun, grenade launcher, chaingun and other weapons to take down the enemy robots.

Terminator Salvation requires iPhone 2.2.1 software update.

Not-for-Sale Twitter Is Expanding Search Functionality

In recent days the spotlight has been on Twitter and rumored acquisitions of the micro-blogging company by contenders such as Apple, Google and Microsoft. Twitter's founders, however, have pulled the plug on the speculation, saying the San Francisco-based company is not for sale.

"No. We are not for sale," Biz Stone, Twitter's cofounder, told ABC's The View host Barbara Walters after she asked about the acquisition rumors.

While Stone and cofounder Evan Williams put the acquisition rumors to rest, Twitter Vice President Santosh Jayaram discussed Twitter Search and its future.

Twitter Search will be used to crawl information from links by Twitters to analyze and then index the content for future use, Jayaram, a former vice president for search quality at Google, told Webware. Currently Twitter Search is only used to search words included in tweets, but not words in links.

Along with its new crawling functionality, Twitter Search will also get a ranking system. When users do a search on trending topics -- the top-10 topics people tweet about, which get their own link on the Twitter sidebar -- Twitter will analyze the reputation of the tweet writer and rank search results partially based on that.

Changes Expected

Updates to Twitter's search functionality were expected, since Twitter has access to a lot of data and needs to find a way to get revenue. Twitter's founders also hinted about such functionality when they first announced Twitter Search.

"Twitter teaches us new and amazing things every day, and a big lesson learned is that search is so much more than a box and a button," according to an official Twitter blog post. "As public tweets fly in from around the globe, we analyze them to detect when certain words or phrases occur with higher frequency."

The company added that the trending phrases surfaced on the Twitter home page as its updated throughout the day, and are a compelling if rudimentary way to explore a collective global consciousness.

Attractive for Buyers

With all the links to Web sites of interest to Twitters, the company and its search capabilities are attractive to potential buyers because it can help users find information about what is happing in real time.

There have been several examples of the effectiveness of Twitter already. When a US Airways flight made an emergency landing in New York's Hudson River, the first photo to hit the Internet was through Twitter because a passenger on a nearby ferry took a photo of the aircraft in the water.

Another example was the terror attacks in Mumbai. People caught up in the attacks used Twitter to alert friends and family that they were safe.

Jayaram also personally benefited from Twitter real-time search while at Twitter's San Francisco office on March 30. He said Twitter engineers noticed an earthquake trending upward and seconds later the building began shaking, he told Webware. An earthquake struck 60 miles outside San Francisco and tweets about the earth rumbling hit Twitter's office before the quake did.

SugarCRM Chief Steps Down

The CEO of open-source customer-relationship-management software vendor SugarCRM has stepped down.

John Roberts, who cofounded the company in 2004 with Clint Oram and Jacob Taylor, will be replaced on an interim basis by Larry Augustin, a board member and former CEO of Linux systems vendor VA Linux. The company did not give a reason for Roberts' departure, except to say that he was pursuing other opportunities.

SugarCRM makes software that sales and service departments can use to keep track of current and prospective customers. The company boasts more than 5,000 customers, who can either host the SugarCRM software themselves or buy it as a service from one of the company's partners. SugarCRM competes with industry giants Microsoft and Salesforce.com.

In a blog post, Augustin said he had taken over as interim CEO, effective Wednesday, while the company searches for a permanent chief executive.

"I have an immense amount of respect for the founding CEO, John Roberts," Augustin wrote. " Few people have taken a company from concept to major growth the way John did at Sugar."

Star Trek game beams onto iPhone, iPod touch

Electronic Arts (EA) on Thursday announced the release of the Star Trek game for the iPhone and iPod touch. It's available from the App Store for $5.

Just in time for the premier of the new motion picture that "reboots" the legendary science fiction franchise with a new cast reprising the roles of "Classic" Trek characters Kirk, Spock, Scotty, Sulu, Uhura and Chekov, the Star Trek iPhone game lets you pilot the U.S.S. Enterprise on a mission to seek out and … destroy your enemies.

Spock and Kirk make appearances as you journey through space and time, battling ships from alien races including the Klingons, the Romulans and the Cardassians. You will battle Khotak elite fighters, the Bird of Prey and Vor'cha Battle Cruiser, listen to music from the original Star Trek soundtrack, and more.

Star Trek: The Mobile Game requires iPhone 2.2.1 software update or later.

Google CEO doesn't see problem with his Apple role

Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt is taking a government inquiry into his role on Apple Inc.'s board in stride, expressing confidence that the probe won't find any evidence that the ties between the two companies throttle competition in mobile phones and other technology fields.

In a media session held Thursday before Google's shareholders meeting in Mountain View, Schmidt said he hasn't considered stepping down from Apple's board because he doesn't view the maker of the iPhone, iPod and computers as a "primary competitor." He echoed that sentiment when a shareholder later asked him to step down from Apple's board to avoid further government scrutiny.

Google attorney Kent Walker confirmed the Mountain View-based company is in talks with the Federal Trade Commission about whether its overlapping board relationships with Apple violates federal antitrust laws. The inquiry was reported by The New York Times earlier this week.

Both Schmidt and former Genentech CEO Arthur Levinson are directors at Google and Apple.

Walker told reporters that Google is "comfortable" that it doesn't generate enough revenue in the same markets as Apple for Schmidt's and Levinson's dual roles on the companies' boards to violate antitrust law.

Google makes most of its money from online advertising driven by its market-leading search engine. But it is the chief architect of an operating system called "Android" that already runs some mobile devices similar to the iPhone. Android also is going to be in some low-cost computers, called "netbooks," later this year.

Schmidt, who joined Apple's board in 2006, told reporters he always recuses himself from all Apple board discussions involving the iPhone, but doesn't avoid talks about any other subject.

Cupertino-based Apple and Google also both make Web browsers that are vying to lure users away from Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer and the Mozilla Foundation's Firefox. As its YouTube video site expands, Google also conceivably could clash with Apple's iTunes store.

The shareholder who asked Schmidt to quit Apple's board during Google's annual meeting thinks the interlocking board relationships eventually will cause headaches for Google.

"There is no reason for it because it isn't adding any value for shareholders," said Brandon Rees, a representative for the AFL-CIO's holdings in Google. "There is really nothing to gain and a lot to lose. We don't want Google to become an antitrust devil like Microsoft did."

Schmidt scoffed at a similar analogy during his session with reporters, asserting "there is no comparison" between Google's behavior and Microsoft's attempts to stifle competition in the computer software market during the 1990s. Microsoft's tactics eventually triggered an antitrust battle that forced the software maker to change its ways.

Still, the FTC inquiry is one of several signs that the government is taking a closer look at Google and its increasing dominance in Internet search and advertising. Last year Google scrapped a proposed Internet advertising partnership with Yahoo Inc. to avoid a legal battle with the U.S. Justice Department.

Before retreating, Schmidt had repeatedly predicted the Yahoo alliance would withstand antitrust scrutiny.

Now, the Justice Department is reviewing a proposed legal settlement with authors and publishers that would expand Google's digital library of books. Regulators are responding to complaints lodged by some librarians and consumer activists who are worried the proposed settlement will give Google a digital monopoly on millions of books.

A federal judge in New York recently granted a four-month extension to object to the settlement, setting a new deadline of Sept. 4.

Schmidt predicted the book settlement will lead to a "fundamentally good outcome" by giving more people around the world a better chance to buy and read out-of-print works.

He also said Google understands it's more likely to attract government scrutiny because of its dominance of Internet search and its sheer size. By some measures, Google now processes more than 70 percent of U.S. searches, helping it to generate nearly $22 billion in annual revenue.

"Information is incredibly important and we should expect governments around the world to be interested in what we do and hold us to the principles we have articulate," Schmidt said, referring to Google's corporate motto to "do no evil."

The Google shareholder meeting was a mostly amiable affair, just like the previous four that the company has held since its August 2004 initial public offering. This year marked the first time that neither of Google's co-founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, appeared on stage with Schmidt to take questions. Brin also missed the 2007 meeting because he was getting married then, but Page was on hand.

Spammers flood Internet with trick flu emails

Cyber crooks are capitalizing on influenza fears with torrents of email promising "Swine flu" news but delivering malware or dubious offers for potency drugs or penis enlargement.

"Zombie" computers infected with a dreaded Conficker virus that became an online scourge this year are among machines being used to spew flu spam crafted to trick email recipients, according to computer security firm Trend Micro.

"The thing making it worse is the misinformation out there about swine flu," Trend Micro threats research manager Jamz Yaneza said Thursday.