Windows Home Server v2 “Vail”
We Got Served has a bunch of information on next Windows Home Server OS.
“Want to know more about Windows Home Server Vail? The all-new version of WHS v2 has just hit the preview stage and We Got Served is loving it! You can find a huge preview of all of Vail’s new features here in our Vail Preview Deep Dives, as well as walkthroughs, top tips and a couple of hidden secrets revealed along the way! Over at WGS Forums, thousands of experts and enthusiasts are sharing their thoughts on Vail – why not join them?”
Update: Executive Summary of New Features
- Based on Windows Server 2008 R2, 64-bit CPUs required
- Significantly improved console (now “dashboard”) and remote website UI
- Remote website customizable out-of-the-box
- Remote website compatible with mobile devices
- Remote website can stream and transcode music and video on the fly
- Homegroups
- Server can back up its operating system files and client back ups
- Client restore OS can easily be written to CD, DVD, or USB
Source: We Got Served – WHS Vail Preview
Skype to introduce free 5-way Video Conferencing next week
Windows PCs will get the feature first. And while it will be free initially, Skype may start charging for it and “other upcoming features in three or four months,” according to Yahoo! News.
Apple Axes (Semi) Popular Music Service Lala
Well, this is depressing. I actually used Lala, and the iTunes credit reimbursements are definitely going unused. Well executed buy out and shut down, Apple.
“Four months after buying Lala Media's popular online music service for a reported $80 million, Apple is pulling the plug on the 5-year-old site.”
Netflix for your Wii!
XBox 360 and PS3 owners have been able to stream movies and televisions shows via their Netflix subscriptions for a while now. Finally, the Nintendo Wii is jumping on the Netflix bandwagon.
Online streaming of Netflix titles on the Wii will require users to insert a special Netflix disc (free by request with your Netflix subscription), similar to the PS3 implementation, and an active internet connection accessible to the Wii.
Get Your Masters in Vampire Literature
After stumbling across the post on Neatorama's website, I thought perhaps it was a belated April Fool’s joke. So, after applying some of Baylee’s famous Google-Fu I checked, The Guardian (UK paper), io9, and (of course) I visited the university's site. Oh god, it's really real. And that's not all.
The Masters program, which Dr George will be teaching, will start in the Fall of 2010 and will gather “experts” from around the world to examine how vampires in all their assorted flavors relate to us, and of course the various meanings that we can pin to these creatures within literature, art, music, etc. Wherever Vampires are found (literature, music, and art) experts determine their meanings... all of which will ooze information on social standings, gender roles, technological development, and the list goes on.
FlashHacker
Ever since I plugged in a spare 15" monitor into a $5 PCI video card so that I could throw instant message chat and music players off my main display I have found the expansion of desktop real-estate very useful. With most mainstream video cards supporting at least 2 monitors by default multi-monitor use seems to be growing more more and more popular. One little quirk of multi-monitor use has been any fullscreen viewing of flash videos. When playing a fullscreen flash video the slightest click on a second monitor exits the fullscreen flash mode, making it less than optimal to catch up on episodes of Alf while updating Yaysoft news. For the last several versions of Flash there have been how-to guides using a hex editor to custom edit the file needed to wrangle Flash to suit your needs, but alas I have been too lazy to implement these changes. Well thankfully along came blogger Jmaxxz who has written a nifty little script that will edit most current versions of flash quickly and painlessly. Enjoy!
BIND9 on Windows 7
I recently got tired of the poor quality of DNS service my U-Verse residential gateway was providing. Web pages would intermittently 'time out' with no real explanation of why. After some troubleshooting I determined that the U-Verse box simply wouldn't respond to a DNS lookup request. I also would rather not deal with the search pages that OpenDNS provides, and I didn't want to let Google know every single domain I visit. So I decided to run a DNS service on my desktop computer. Since I work with Linux-based utilities all day long, I decided to go with one that I'm decently fluent with. BIND9 is the staple DNS service of the internets, but installing and configuring it on Windows isn't exactly intuitive, however.
Gmail adds new features
Yesterday, Google's think tank for Gmail improvements, Gmail Labs, released its latest volley of upgrades to the popular web based email service. The handful of changes have been quietly added to improve the overall Gmail experience. The search mail bar now uses the familiar Google auto-complete as you type your search. YouTube videos can now be previewed withing an email. Custom Label colors and the ability to plan upcoming vacation responses during planned days have also been added. For the full breakdown of the Gmail Labs project, visit the offical blog.