Strong reception for Google Wave

Industry experts have given a broadly positive reaction to Google Wave.

Still in development, Google Wave is a browser-based tool that mixes e-mail, with Instant Messaging and real-time online collaboration elements.Harry McCracken, of Technologizer.com, wrote: "It's one of the most ambitious services that Google or anyone else has cooked up".

Google Wave is currently only open to developers interested in building applications for the tool. Google Wave co-creator Lars Rasmussen wrote on the official Google blog: "A wave is equal parts conversation and document, where people can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

"In Google Wave you create a wave and add people to it. Everyone on your wave can use richly formatted text, photos, gadgets, and even feeds from other sources on the web. They can insert a reply or edit the wave directly.

"It's concurrent rich-text editing, where you see on your screen nearly instantly what your fellow collaborators are typing in your wave." The technology has been described as e-mail for the 21st Century, a rival to Twitter and to Microsoft's collaboration software, Sharepoint.

Jordan Golson, writer for GigaOm.com, said Google had a poor track record of making a business out of any of its products, other than search. "Maybe it will work. Maybe Wave will take over the world. But, with the notable exceptions of Gmail and search ads, Google has a poor track record with product launches.

It is really, really good at vanity exercises, though." MG Sieglar, a reporter for Techcrunch, said the tool "drips with ambition".He wrote: "Wave offers a very sleek and easy way to navigate and participate in communication on the web that makes both e-mail and instant messaging look stale."

The announcement of Wave, together with the development of tools like Twitter and Friend Feed, point to the genesis of the real-time web, in which communication, search, collaboration, and the bridge between offline and online blurs into a contemporaneous mix.

Ben Parr, from Mashable.com, who tested a preview of Google Wave, said: "Our initial impression of Google Wave is a very positive one. "It's already got certain aspects, like navigation, absolutely right. With some great third-party apps and greater customization, Google Wave could actually match its hype."

Source : BBC

ORACLE BUYS SUN

Oracle agreed to buy Sun Microsystems for about $7.4 billion in cash, swooping in after the server maker's talks to be acquired by IBM failed.

Oracle will pay $9.50 a share, 42 percent more than Sun's closing price Friday. Oracle plans to make Sun a profitable part of its business and said the purchase will add $1.5 billion to operating earnings, excluding some items, in the first year.

The takeover moves Oracle, the world's second-largest software maker, into the market for server and storage computers, pitting the company against IBM and Hewlett-Packard. Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison also gains Sun's Java programming language and Solaris operating system, which work with its top-selling database program.

"They're really going to zero in on just the most strategic part of Sun's hardware business," said Heather Bellini, an analyst at UBS AG in New York, with a "buy" rating for Oracle's shares. "They'll end up making the company much better-run."

Excluding Sun's cash and debt, the deal is valued at $5.6 billion, Oracle said in a statement. Sun had about $2.6 billion in cash and marketable securities, and about $700 million in long-term debt at the end of 2008. Oracle has about $11.3 billion in cash and marketable securities.

Sun, based in Santa Clara, Calif., rose $2.46, or 37 percent, to close at $9.15. Oracle, based in Redwood City, Calif., dropped 24 cents, to $18.82.

Sun's Java technology lets developers write programs that work across operating systems and on a variety of devices. The software has been installed on 800 million desktop computers and also powers 2.1 billion mobile devices.

Sun's Solaris competes with Linux and Microsoft's Windows software. While Sun offers versions of Solaris and its MySQL database program free to developers, the company makes money by selling service, support and software updates. Sun boosted software sales by 21 percent in the quarter through Dec. 28 and said in January that it projects revenue from those products to reach more than $600 million a year.

Oracle had sales of $22.6 billion in the latest fiscal year.

Oracle President Safra Catz said the company plans to operate Sun at "substantially higher margins." She declined to provide specifics.


Source: The Washington Post

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