Learning about Enterprise JavaBeans

If you're self-motivated to get to grips with enterprise-scale Java, there's a new CD-ROM-based course from Borland covering the use of Enterprise JavaBeans. Part of Borland's e-learning series, Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) Development Fundamentals is intended to be an interactive introduction to the features and benefits of this technology. Think of JavaBeans as special Java components, and the server-side Enterprise variety - part of the Java 2 platform - extends their scope, for example to work across networks in a distributed fashion. ...more

Gnome and KDE agree to share APIs

The desktop viability for Linux is to get a boost as the two leading desktop environments agree to work on a joint set of APIs to allow software vendors to easily produce programs for both Gnome and KDE. The Portland Project, run by the Open Source Development Labs and freedesktop.org, has announced the first technology preview for the new APIs and tools. ...more

New Google tools aim to sharpen up News coverage

Google has introduced a Sitemap protocol and new webmaster tools for Google News in order to improve both the 'freshness' of its coverage and to enable webmaster to determine precisely what content they want to appear on the news aggregation service. News Sitemaps tell Google exactly which articles to crawl for inclusion in Google News. The News Sitemaps XML definition lets webmasters specify a publication date and time for each article and to set keywords for each article that determine placement of the articles into the relevant sections on Google News. ...more

IWF launches a Wipe It Out campaign

Seventy-four per cent of UK companies would not report to the police an employee who downloaded indecent images of children, according to a survey by the Internet Watch Foundation. Of those, 38 per cent would not even go as far as to discipline or dismiss the employee. The IWF revealed the findings at the launch of its Wipe It Out campaign to stamp out the downloading and distribution of indecent pictures of children in the workplace. ...more

The Microsoft money machine keeps on turning

Microsoft has turned in its results for the quarter ended 30 September and they are powered by increased server sales. Strong performers for the quarter have been a 20 per cent growth in sales for Microsoft's Windows 2000 Servers, in particular the Windows 2000 Advanced Server, which doubled in sales, and a 30 per cent increase for the .NET Enterprise Server family. ...more