On Wednesday Google is sending 100.000 invitations to preview the new Google Wave.

The invitations go to Developers, the first who signed up and offered feedback, and selected customers of Google Apps.

If you are one of the lucky 100k, you are more then welcome to write an article about your impression on Technology Crawler

Microsoft has released Microsoft Security Essential in Beta today.

As Microsoft is not accepting more participants in the Beta program, you either have to wait for a final release...or, get a free download here ;-) If you choose the later alternative you will get the possibility to upgrade to version 1.0.1500.0 after the first Quick Scan. As Microsoft can can stop this hole in the sign-up process, you better be fast.

The installation is quite hazel free, though Microsoft recommends to remove other antivirus programs before the installation - performance issues I presume - but how wise is it?

The first "Quick" scan is announced to 'take several minutes' - a small understatement as it takes almost 1 hour , and better be prepared to use a similar amount of time to upgrade.

My first scan did not reveal any viruses or spyware, and now I am waiting for the new installation to finish, but  I decided to reveal the "alternative" to my readers before it is to late.

Good luck

This morning Danish national television, TV2, had a news article about the most expensive (0.5 bn US$) privately owned luxury yacht in the world.

'Eclipse' is owned by the Russian millionaire Roman Abramovich and according to the article it contains Laser shields, armor and defense against missile attack.

With the help from Technology Crawler, and marinetraffic.com, the article was immediately updated with a near real-time track-map of the route 'Eclipse' is taking. The ship is in Danish waters in order to complete an adjustment below the water line.

According to JaJah a beta release of the VoIP service via Twitter is released today - for a few lucky ones. 


It seems that Twitter is about to beat Facebook in the battle of being first in VoIP offerings

    

According to the MS Office Web Apps Team a technical preview of the Web Apps was granted a selected group of Windows Live users today.

The Windows Live Web services is scheduled for release in Q2, 2010 and will consist of Excel, Word, Powerpoint and OneNote capability in your browser

"If you weren’t one of the folks that received an invitation today, sign up for early notification about Office 2010 Beta and we will let you know when you can try it out too " - says the Office Web Apps team

For some reason 80 % of all software projects should have ended before they started.

For some reason 80 % of all PM's seem to take the same route as in the picture above - why?
I suppose it is the paradox in project organisation that the success criteria of the PM is to get from A to B according to the Business Case - and 80 % of the PM's do not seem be in a matrix organisation that ensure that only 20% of the projects are funded.

Am I wrong or do you have a better reason?  

Some techniques never get outdated no matter if you are using Lean/agile methodologies in software R&D environments or use more rigid methodologies in e.g. production environments.

One of these techniques are Peer Review - nothing "new under the sun", but the tool you choose to accommodate a bulletproof peer review can be of high importance to your success - and a fast ROI.

Callis - a Danish start-up, provides a state of the art MS Word plug-in, Callis Reviewer, that will make it work in your company from day 1. Using the latest Web2.0 technologies you get all the support to conduct collaborative peer reviews and benefit from the - always visible - status of a review.

Beside of the easy integration to your existing environment the package also include training material and functionality that will satisfy the most agile co-workers as well as the PM and QA managers.

Don't waste money, introduce Peer Reviews in your organisation now.

Not more then a week ago I called Google a "factory". The reason why I did that is the fact that Google have so much manpower that it enables the company to produce new services and features almost in the pace the users expect the company to. Last week I listed an incomplete (60+) number of Google services. This week a new Lab-service is introduced called Google Fast Flip.

"Google Fast Flip is a web application that lets users discover and share news articles. It combines qualities of print and the Web, with the ability to "flip" through pages online as quickly as flipping through a magazine. It also enables users to follow friends and topics, discover new content and create their own custom magazines around searches."


I do not think that my 'Technology Crawler' blog will be immediately redundant by this new introduction, but in time it can be a good alternative to get fast information about a subject from well-established news-papers/magazines compared to using RSS readers, e-mail agents, etc.


You almost get the look and feel having a paper in your hands, and by a stunning fast page flip you actually only miss the smell of a recently printed paper.


At the moment the only drawback is a limited number (39) of publishers willing to be part of the service, but if one of the papers/magazines are among your favorites, I can only recommend to give it a try.

Google Calendar has added a few new options to the 'add calendars' section. When you select 'browse interesting calendars,' you'll see the option to add public and religious holidays. There's also a new Sports section, and if you click the 'More' tab you'll see an option to add the birthdays of contacts in your Google address book :-)

The beauty of Google Calendar is that each of these items is added as a separate calendar. If you want to see your personal appointments without all the clutter, then just unselect the sports, holiday, and birthday calendars in your sidebar temporarily to make those appointments disappear.

Your own ISP for sure provide you with the possibility to measure your internet speed, but are they objective, and what good does it make to have a high speed to your ISP if the bandwidth from the ISP to the surrounding world is zero?
From time to time I use Speedtest to get an objective measurement - recommended!

Did you also stop counting the number of services that the Google "factory" is offering?

100.000 people (non-developers) can't wait getting there invite to join the community of Google Wave users the 30. September 2009. Well, probably and statistically some of us have to wait a little longer before a Google Wave beta is rolled-out.

But what is all the fuss about? is it just a great PR stunt?....I do not think so!
Take 10 min. to see the Google presentation video, and you will get an idea of what it is all about. In short it is an attempt to make a collaborative communication media using well known technologies as e-mail, chat, blog, document, social network, and less known/used 'web 2' technologies.

The 2 Danish brothers, Jens & Lars Eilstrup Rasmussen is heading the Google Wave project, as they did with Google Map, so from a technical point of view I am confident that they will make it a success, but..

The 'Wave' communication form can turn out to be to big a challenge for ordinary users to get used to, whereas the young generation of internet users probably will "surf on the Wave" because they are used to online, real time collaboration already. On the other hand, nobody thought that the older generation would "jump" on Facebook as first-time internet users!

For sure I can't wait to get hands-on experience with Google Wave, what about you?

Marine Traffic is an AIS mapping system using Google Maps to visualize global marine traffic. Get online, near real time, info about a vessel in your choice of area, including position, direction, speed, name, picture, etc. It is even possible to show the route the vessel has taken.

If you are looking for an alternative to you expensive licensed diagramming tool, e.g. MS Visio, you should take a look at the offer from Creately and take advantage of having this web-based service working for you in the cloud.