Month: February 2006

Cellulosic Ethanol

“Cellulosic ethanol”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulosic_ethanol looks to be a promising alternative to fossil fuels. I haven’t heard much of it here, but apparently it’s very hot “in the valley.”:http://www.siliconbeat.com/entries/2006/02/26/ethanol_in_the_silicon_valley_spotlight.html From what I gathered: * It’s clean to produce. * It’s giving out less greenhouse gas when use. * It’s “energy effective.”:http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/13967129.htm

Box.net V2

I had the chance to try out version 2 of “Box.net”:http://box.net before its imminent re-launch, and I have to say it’s very well done.

Online storage, as a sector, doesn’t get your heart pumping. But it often irritates. Saving and loading files are such basic tasks that we tolerate very little roughness in the process. And thankfully, Box.net make it real smooth.

Of course, I’m still waiting for the desktop sync application, but the ability to drag-and-drop upload in bulk (multiple files or multiple folders) still makes it very usable. (It’s flash/java, and very fast)

Box.net drag-and-drop window

Box.net upload progress bar

Other highlights for me are

* the AJAX UI makes managing files very convenient
* livesearch for your files
* 1GB file size limit
* File RSS for collaboration

*Update:* It’s open for public registration now.

Rojo

I’ve been playing with “Rojo”:http://rojo.com for about a day. I have been exploring alternatives to “Bloglines”:http://bloglines.com for a while now, and this one looks promising. Basically, I need online feedreaders with tagging. And Bloglines doesn’t seem to be offering that anytime soon.

Rojo Screenshot

Read more after the jump.

Measure Map bought by Google

The good news broke this morning, via an e-mail from Jeff Veen and then “an announcement”:http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/02/here-comes-measure-map.html on the official Google blog. “Measure Map”:http://measuremap.com is now part of the G empire. The news is a bit surprising to me, because Measure Map is a very young service, unlike “Urchin.”:http://www.urchin.com/ But it’s quick, simple, blog centric, and […]