Web services development - News, Features, and Slideshows

News

• The good, bad & ugly of Dropbox authentication error

  Online storage service Dropbox made an embarrassing error Monday, turning off password authentication for millions of users.

• Four Safer Ways to Pay Online

  Who has your private info? Who knows, given how common <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/229301/are_you_a_data_breach_victim_heres_what_to_do.html">security breaches</a> have become. And credit card information is one of the most common types of <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/227255/protect_your_data_from_the_breach_epidemic.html">personal data</a> we volunteer online. So what can you do to minimize credit card fraud? Well, you can't stop the break-ins, but here are four ways to keep your funds out of the hands of the bad guys.

• Facebook facial recognition: New technology, old problem

  Facebook, oh Facebook. Will you ever learn?

• A decade later, W3C finalizes CSS 2.1

  The World Wide Web Consortium has updated its widely used specifications for formatting the look and feel of Web pages, a standard known as CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).

• Cloud storage services keep data safe and accessible

  Your PC's hard drive may have half a terabyte of data on its platters, and you might not remember the last time you backed any of it up. In all likelihood, though, you use only a few gigabytes' worth of files on a regular basis. With a combination of cloud-storage services, you can keep that data backed up and synced among all of your computers automatically, and access your most essential files whenever you want.

• Software AG buys in-memory specialist Terracotta

  Software AG has entered into an agreement to acquire Terracotta, which will allow the software vendor to develop more advanced cloud services and increase the performance and scalability of its business software management tools using Terracotta's in-memory technology for Java, it said.

• Microsoft regearing .Net for easy concurrency

  Microsoft is building two new additions to its .Net framework that should make it much easier for programmers to utilize all the cores of a multicore processor.

• Moving to the cloud isn't for everyone: What to consider

  Turning to Internet services instead of in-house servers appeals to companies seeking lean, mobile operations. The "cloud" is a hot buzzword, but moving the bulk of your infrastructure and data there isn't right for every business. Most small companies plug along with a mix of on-site and off-site hardware and software. For some organizations, maintaining in-house servers is crucial.

• Does Chromebook hardware-as-a-service make sense?

  Google made an interesting hardware-as-a-service proposition to businesses Wednesday with the introduction of the Chromebook. The Web-centric and laptop-like device will launch next month with support from vendor partners Samsung and Acer.

• Google launches discovery service for its APIs

  Developers wishing to embed into their own applications some of the Web services that Google offers should take a look at a new directory service the company has launched.

• How to make your small business paperless: A success story

  When I started teaching viola and violin years ago, I brought all the books my students used along with me, just in case the kids forgot theirs. Then the kids became more advanced, and I had to carry more books. I also sent them each home with a practice chart for the week. The studio grew, and I printed out more and more weekly charts.

• Turn Amazon Cloud drive into desktop-accessible storage

  As you may recall, Amazon recently unveiled its new Cloud Drive service, which provides 5GB of free online storage. (Elsewhere I explained how you could bump your limit to 20GB for under a buck.) The only downside? To access it, you have to use Amazon's Web-based interface. It's not bad, but not nearly as convenient as, say, a local hard drive.

• Google +1 = Social overload

  I'm not sure how to say this, but I'm starting to think I might be antisocial.

• Oracle releases Java mobile development framework

  Oracle has released a mobile client and associated framework, nearly two years in the making, to help developers quickly build Java applications for industrial mobile devices.

• VMware buys WaveMaker, aims to ease app development

  VMware said on Tuesday it had acquired WaveMaker, the creator of open-source software that lets non-developers build Java Web applications.