Archive for the ‘IT World’ Category

One billion applications in Android Market

Wednesday, August 4th, 2010

AndroidMarketAccording to the AndroLib site, the users of the online apps store Android Market have downloaded from the store various applications more than a billion times. The counter situated on the site shows that every single moment about one hundred applications are downloaded from the catalogue.

Now more than 93,000 apps for Android are on the Android Market servers. Till the end of the year the number of applications for the mobile platform from Google in the Android Market will exceed 100,000 items. Only in June the range of products in the Android Market increased by 15,000 positions and following the results of July this figure reached 20,000 apps.

Android apps developers from 9 countries intensively add products to the store and according to the present day tendency mobile phone applications development will only grow.

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QR code + mobile apps = ads, games and the key to the Internet

Monday, June 28th, 2010

japanese-qr-codeThe QR code is a popular two dimensional barcode which has already stepped over the trade market boarders and has become actively used in everyday life. Mobile phones equipped with cameras capable of scanning and decoding a 2D barcode as successfully as specialized scanners. The popularity of such mobile phones began in Japan and then spread to other continents and countries and together with this popularity the fashion for QR-code has spread as well.

The QR code first appeared in magazines, on bus stops, business cards and simply on any object about which you may need information. A barcode is only coded information. It can be about everything and not only about goods at the market. The maximum volume of QR code data is about 3 Kb, which allows coding of small images. Mobile software specially developed for QR codes decoding will easily reflect the corresponding image.

It is not surprising that the first who started using the QR code were quirky marketing specialists. They used it in advertising where an address, phone number and other information about a company were coded. For example, a simple situation: the advertising billboard with the QR code square. Inspired by the advertisement and wishing to buy the product or service of this company, the consumer simply focuses the camera of his mobile phone on the barcode, the gadget decodes it and the phone numbers and other requisites are automatically saved into the address book. The user needs just press the green button on the phone and he doesn’t have to dial the number himself.

qr-codesThere is one more example. The barcode can be used for meeting the opposite sex. You need to place the QR code with your personal information somewhere on the foreground. And then the interested person can focus his mobile phone on your barcode and get all the necessary information for further relationships.

Recently the usage of the QR code has been acquiring more and more global and cultural character. Mobile phones a re becoming the most common tool for getting the access to the Internet, which opens new horizons of using barcodes on mobile phones as the so-called ‘physical hyperlinks’.

Together with the web the QR code can easily contain the data for searching the information on the Web, i.e. having decoded the content of the barcode, the mobile phone uses this information for Google searching, Google Maps or various social networks. In this way, the QR code turns to a special hyperlink connecting the real object with the information about it on the Net.

The practical example of barcode usage as a hyperlink from real objects to the internet resources can be the project www.semapedia.org. This project deals with connecting the articles in Wikipedia with the places in the real world. In fact, the QR code usage is limited only by imagination. Thus, all you need is new business ideas on using the QR barcode and mobile apps developers who will be able to help you with the technical issues.

qr-code-mobile

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Hackers have cracked iPad

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

hacked_iPadThe AT&T company has found a gap in the iPad security system. The owners of the latest Apple’s gadget have sent the corresponding notification about the leakage of e-mail addresses. The group of hackers announced that it was able to crack users’ devices connected via the authorized wireless access. AT&T claims that the given vulnerability has already been eliminated.

According to Gawker, the hackers got the personal information of 114,000 iPad owners. Among them there are dozens of managers of leading companies, show biz celebrities, politicians. In particular, according to the preliminary information, the e-mail addresses of top-managers of New York Times Company, Dow Jones, Condе Nast, Viacom, Time Warner, News Corporation, HBO, Hearst have come to the hands of the hackers. The account of Chief of the biggest helicopter squadron B-1 William Aldridge has been also cracked.

AT&T is an exclusive partner of Apple. One of the business partners had reported the vulnerability in the security system several days before the incident.

Probably, in future iPad application developers will offer in their products additional functions for protecting personal information.

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Microsoft confirms that Windows Phone 7 is based on Windows CE

Friday, May 14th, 2010

Win_mobileOliver Block, one of Windows CE developers, wrote in his diary that participants of the last conference devoted to integrated systems in San Jose asked him the same questions. They were interested if CE was killed by its developers going forward to the ARM-platform, or if developers were using Visual Studio and whether all Windows Embedded products were based on different SKU.

Mr. Block thinks that programmers who specialize in apps development for Windows Mobile and many others ask such questions because:

• Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Tools are still integrated in Visual Studio 2005 only, and they disappeared in the 2008 version.

• Visual Studio 2010 does not support the Smart Device development (it was created to motivate the development of native and .NET CF-applications for Windows CE and Windows Mobile / Phone).

• The long waited release of the next version of Windows Embedded CE was postponed for several times.

• It is not clear, what technologies were used in Windows Phone 7.

So Oliver Block has given us the direct answer: Windows CE is not dead. He has said that developers are working on Windows Embedded Compact 7, which soon will be released, and Microsoft will support its for the next 10 years at least.

We believe that Windows Embedded Team is making a lot to add new features and new tools to support all these new functions. Does it look like a dead product? Definitely it is not!

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The year 2010 will be the year of Android

Wednesday, November 4th, 2009

Not so long ago smartphones and communicators were niche products that simple users didn’t even pay attention to. But the operating systems has been developing and at present such phones offer a wide range of options for business–users as well as for usual users who prefer exchange SMS or visit social networks.

According to the research company In-Stat, the competition in the OS market is shifting from software basic capabilities to functionality and ‘user’s experience’ which the phone can provide.  Smartphones and communicators will develop not only at the programming level but also at the hardware level – sensor screens with high resolution, high-quality cameras, communication tools.

In-Stat supposes that the next year will pass under the Android sign. According to the research statistics, in 2014 more than 400 mln smartphones will be sold in the world and more than 300 mln of them will have a built-in MACEK accelerometer. Today about 52% of the device production costs go to a touch screen, a processor, software, license fees and communication modules (2G, 3G).

The present leader in the market of smartphone platforms Symbian will lose its position taking the pressure from the side of Maemoplatforms, Android apps, BlackBerry application developmetn and iPhone mobile development.

Professionals from EleganceIT have more than ten years of experience in the sphere of Android, BlackBerry and iPhone software development. If you want your project to be done in due time, within the agreed budget and of high quality, you have to trust it to EleganceIT mobile application programming company.

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Posted in IT World, Mobile Development | 4 Comments »

Nearshoring vs. offshore IT outsourcing

Thursday, September 10th, 2009

Belarus gets the 5th place in the list of the best exporters of IT services

At first sight it seems that nearshore and offshore IT outsourcing are the same models of software development. Nevertheless some principles of nearshore partnerships can play a key part in successful cooperation with foreign specialists.

So, fists of all a customer gets the work done by people in neighboring countries. It means that geographic nearness allows easier and less expensive traveling and communications. Moreover there are some commonalities between the cultures, so business partners can avoid misunderstandings that can appear between people who are separated not only by thousands of kilometers but also by completely different cultural patterns.

The second corner stone is statistics. Experts can tell you about cultural differences and other intangible things as much as they want, but some figures will explain you everything much better. This year Outsourcing Association in the counties of Central and Eastern Europe announced Belarus the fifth country in the list of the best exporters of IT services in CEE. Here is the Top-10 of CEEOA:

1. Ukraine – $ 530 millions,
2. Romania – $ 410 millions,
3. Hungary – $ 375 millions,
4. Poland – $ 350 millions,
5. Belarus – $ 310 millions,
6. Czech Republic – $ 300 millions,
7. Bulgaria – $ 250 millions,
8. Serbia – $ 157 millions,
9. Estonia – $ 105 millions,
10. Slovakia – $ 90 millions.

So, now European countries have two significant reasons to choose Belarus (outsourcing to Belarus) as the main nearshore partner to provide IT services.

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Posted in IT World, Software Development, Unknown about Belarus | 4 Comments »

GooglePhone Wins World Leading Positions

Thursday, June 25th, 2009

New generation of mobile phones arises into the market. Most famous representatives of this generation are new mobile phones developed on Android platform created by Google Corporation.

The first GooglePhone’s name is G1 Smartphone or HTC Dream produced by HTC and Google. It was on sale in October 2008. And only one year later in February 2009 new GooglePhone was presented. Its name is HTC Magic and this Android smartphone has new outstanding design and new functions.

magic

The success of Google Phone is considered very high. That’s why HTC made decision not to stop and create one more GooglePhone called HTC Hero. The first pictures of this phone are already available.
The tendency of GooglePhone creation didn’t pass by major mobile phone producers. Samsung produced its version of GooglePhone called Samsung i7500.

google-phone-samsung-gphone
Motorola is going to edit at least two Android-smartphones. One of them is Motorola Calgary.
And Australian phone producer Kogan is planning to present its version of GooglePhone to the end of 2009. It will be Kogan Agora and its modified version Kogan Agora Pro.

Kogan_Agora
As we can see, iPhone has got really serious competitor. The popularity of GooglePhones grows every day. More and more software development companies start new services – Android application development. The reason is obvious, Google Android is open platform made on Linux. It guarantees free development of applications. Developers have all rights to create and upload their Android application wherever they want. Of course, there exist centralized resource Android Market, but Google unlike Apple is not taking part of profits from selling application. Only developers and mobile operators get all the money from application downloads. This fact confirms that GooglePhone is becoming more attractive for leading mobile application developers.

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Where is Belarus?

Thursday, April 9th, 2009

Is this a region of Russia or what? People from all over the world often ask such thing. But maybe in some years such question will disappear at all. Every month Belarus become more popular among counties where software development is one of the key industries. The location in the center of Europe makes the country as well the center of IT outsourcing in Europe. Educational system makes it possible to have high level specialists in all fields of information technology. The range of services is also very wide. There is everything to satisfy the partner: from web development and design to mobile application development and custom solutions for all kinds of business and spheres of life. The advantages of Belarusian outsourcing are clear.

Low costs. The costs are 10 times lower that in the USA. In today’s not very calm atmosphere of world financial crisis it’s reasonable to pay attention to proposed rates.

Highly educated professionals. What can I say… Education plays important role in the life of Belarusian society. Government is interested in training professionals because incomes from contracts in the field of IT amount great part of county’s budget. Without having any minerals there is no other way to increase income of the country.

Convenient access. The capital of Belarus is situated in two hours flying from Frankfurt or London. All the companies use modern communicational facilities, so access to them is not a problem at all. I don’t think that you leave your office to see your partners every day. Why do we need Skype, Voip, messengers and so on then?

Workforce stability. According to analytic data, average Belarusian software development company keeps partnerships stable with its personnel, turnover rate of about 10%. So you will work with the same specialists till the end of the project if you don’t want to change them of course…

It’s up to you to decide where to go to find a reliable partner for your business. But would you really like to go to India for something else than seeing Taj Mahal?

Posted in IT World | 3 Comments »