Take Back the Web

Three things on Firefox today:
The first relates to security. It transpires that the security weaknesses in Internet Explorer that Chinese hackers apparently used to compromise Google are so bad that now entire countries are advising people not to use Internet Explorer. Incredibly, the security flaw affects IE6, 7 and 8 on Windows 7, Vista, XP, Server 2003 and Server 2008, which doesn't leave anywhere to hide really. There has never been a better time to switch to Firefox or Chrome. Or even to Linux for that matter...

The second is that reports are emerging of Firefox challenging IE's dominance, saying that in Europe, IE has 45 percent market share but "Firefox is a close second at 40 percent." Once we add in Chrome, the Mozilla-based browsers have already exceeded IE's market share in Europe. With France and Germany recommending users move away from IE and Mozilla calling Firefox 3.6 the best browser in the world, I'd watch the browser stats closely over coming months.

Thirdly, Firefox has been able to do full-screen video for a while now, but to have it native in the browser is another thing:
"Current Firefox 3.6 pre-beta 1 nightlies now feature a full screen option for videos embedded using the tag like the natively supported Theora encoders. Just right click on the video and select Full Screen. While on full screen, press Esc to return to the normal view."

Even better is the fact that the supported video filetype is OGV, the open video format and my format of choice. Exciting things on the roadmap for Firefox 4.0 as well, including two features from Google's Chrome ('tabs on top' and separate processes so one hung window doesn't crash your whole browser.) This is a good example of what is essentially a fork contributing back into the main project. Diversity makes us stronger folks.

Edit: Oh dear. "Researchers have created attack code that exploits a zero-day vulnerability in Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) as well as in the newest IE8 -- even when Microsoft's recommended defensive measure is turned on." Link

Koha 3.2 : The next step

We're about to implement two exciting features in our library: RFID and self-check. It's not common for school libraries to use RFID, but as the cost comes down and there is more support for what it can do I'm sure it'll become increasingly popular. Once you make the transition from a 'dumb' tattle-tape security system to and RFID system, you can have a lot more fun with your items. One of the projects I'm hoping to get students involved in this year is to integrate an RFID reader, Koha and a touchscreen so students can walk up to a screen, place a book in front of it and have Koha pull up reviews of that item or recommendations based on that title.

When our Librarian and I started talking about self-check, my first thought was 'Oh... I wonder if Koha can support it?' I hadn't heard anything on the lists about it so I was prepared to start looking for some developer funding, but sure enough, it's one of the features Koha has that isn't widely known.

Below is Jo Ransom and Chris Cormack's presentation on Koha 3.2, due out in the next little while. I'm really looking forward to the upgrade: there are a whole lot of new features including enhancements to the federated search feature in Koha.

Koha 3.2 : The next step

View more presentations from jransom.

Obama AND John Key embrace open source

Never one to be left behind, John Key has followed Barack Obama into the open source world. Last year, it was announced that the Whitehouse now runs on open source CMS drupal, while recently we learnt that "Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Horizons Regional Council and NZ Post will all begin trialling the use of Linux desktops in February" (ZDNet). Some very nice news from the highest levels.

LCA2010 presentation

2GB of free cloud back up

Good news for lovers of the cloud: Ubuntu 9.10 comes with 2GB of free cloud backup and storage! Install the client and sign up for the free account and Ubuntu One scans your files for changes and uploads any new or changed files to your cloud drive. So most of your backup problems disappear, but you can also access your files from any computer in the world. If you've got Ubuntu on your work computer and your home computer (like me), you can access the same file from two different locations. For instance, you can be working on a file at work, finish up for the day and head home. By the time you've logged on, the files have synced and you can open the same file and carry on at home. Now that's living in the cloud.

Chromium OS launched

Exciting times for Linux geeks. Google has open sourced its disruptive operating system Chromium. Essentially it's a lightweight operating system that contains just enough to power a browser (which is where Google sees us doing just about everything in the near future). The way Google have been able to achieve a boot time of 7 seconds is to strip out everything that is not essential to running a browsers. Anyone who's used computer before is probably familiar with the way operating systems get slower and slower over the life of the device. This is quite convenient for peddlers of locked in operating system, because it means you're more likely to pay for an upgrade, but the root cause is often sloppy programming of third party software. What often happens is that programmers put parts of their code into the boot process so that it run all the time. Why? Because if 50% of their programme is running constantly, when you actually start that programme, it appears to load faster. So the program looks like it's nice and fast, but what it's actually doing is choking your entire computer. Not good in the long run.
With Google's 7 second boot and Ubuntu's goal of a 10 second boot in its next release, it looks like speed is going to become on of Linux's hallmarks in the years to come. It may just be the tipping point for an increasingly impatient market.
More on the Chromium OS:

Record and play back classes

One of the difficulties still facing educators (who have embraced ICTs or not) is the problem of making learning resources available to students who are not physically present in the classroom. Traditionally this has happened through the use of copied notes, and more recently through electronically captured and distributed resources. The problem with this is the fact that the majority of the intangible 'magic' of learning happens in the discussion and questioning that surrounds the resources. This 'magic' has been difficult to capture, except in a monolithic, podcast or video podcast which is not searchable or integrated with the notes, handouts and presentations being used.
Enter Synote. Synote is a web-based teaching tool that allows one to record video and audio of a class, run it through voice recognition to transcribe the conversations, then make it available for others to play back. Fast forward the video and the transcript fast forwards too. And it's available for full text search too.