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.