Google’s technology is evolving quite rapidly and search is not the only place where the company is making big strides. The pace of technological innovations has placed Google ahead of every other major company in a highly competitive market. Not to say that the niche players are sleeping, but with its demonic size and sky touching stock prices, buying out competition is not a problem for Google. In web advertising, Google is already the undisputed leader, the doubleclick acquisition even irked many a competitors and industry watchers alike. Not so long ago, Google announced a bunch of new features at its Google Searchology event, then at the Google I/O it was Google Wave and now it’s Google Translator Toolkit. Read more…

The Microsoft ASP.NET Chart Control

We were looking high and low for an easy to implement and lightweight chart control for an on-going ASP.NET web application. We got down to working with  our best friend, the Google search to look up for the available options. There were many third party Chart Controls available and some were really fancy and good-looking. They were rather bulky and wore exorbitant price tags though, and the two factors made them look less attractive. After short listing, we finalized one of them thinking it was the best solution, though I wasn’t too keen on it since it lacked luster and sent information outside the application each time to generate charts. But it worked well, was free and better than most other alternatives we had come across. We tried the product, made a demo application and finalized it for use within our application. This was just, till the client questioned the free status of the product and for how long it would remain so.

That sent us scurrying back to Google search. My colleague, an eagle-eyed developer (who had suggested the other option as well) with an uncanny knack for Googling up the right stuff surprised us with an even better solution this time- the perfect chart control that we could use with complete ease! One look at the charts the Microsoft ASP.NET Chart Control could generate and I was an instant fan!

After a long drooling over the charts that the control sprang up (erm, yes), I got around having it set up to check its feasibility in the application. After a demo to the client and a clean chit from the developers, and it was clear that this was the chart control we were going to use in our application.

It’s unbelievable how effortlessly we can use the Microsoft ASP.NET server control (for free) with C# and ASP.NET 3.5 to enable rich browser-based charts. The control provides a useful addition to your standard ASP.NET toolkit of functionality, and enables you to easily add richer visualization and data workflow scenarios to your ASP.NET applications. The web chart supports many types of charts amongst which are Area, Bar, Column, Doughnut, Line, Pie, Radar and many more. And, they are very good looking. The best part is, it’s a .NET control so it makes sense to opt for it over the bulky third party tools.

Features supported

• Multiple chart types supported
• Data series, chart areas, axes, legends, labels, titles, and more
• Data binding
• Built-in data manipulation and formulas
• Comprehensive chart appearance, such as 3D, lighting, perspective, and more
• Events and customizations Read more…
  

Google Wave Logo

Everyday we surf the web to explore new things which are happening on the web and once in a while we do come across things that really make us interested. First it was Microsoft’s Big Bang with “Bing” and now it is Google’s turn to create wave with their new product “Google Wave”.

Google unveiled “Waves” at Google I/O, which is Google’s web developer focused conference. It was presented in front of 4000 strong developer community and the success of the event can be gauged that by the end of the conversation all of them were completely mesmerized and gave it a long and hard applause. All the developers present were provided with the credentials of demo account for which they will be submitting their feedbacks. I wish we could have been there and have a sneak into the live demo! We have already applied to Google for a Developer Preview and hope they will oblige. The product would be officially launched by around the end of this year. Read more…

BING Logo

Out comes a new search interface/algorithm set/a real new search engine from Microsoft. Slated in as the “next big thing in search” may be just after Wolfram Alpha, searchers are getting a new option to search on. Will it be exciting? Will it satisfy users’ queries in a better manner? Let’s have a look whether Bing is a bang or just its alternate meaning – a heap of pile.

In a hasty move, Microsoft launched its official search engine christened as BING. Although the company announced that the new search engine will be made available by June 3, the full-fledged unexpected release of the beta version of the search portal has left industry analysts amazed. The question on everyone’s mind is – why Microsoft launched Bing two days prior to the officially announced release date? But there aren’t any answers.

Whatever the reasons are, the fact is that Bing is here to make a bang and challenge the supremacy of the search giant i.e. Google. Moreover, in the near future it is going to replace Live which is at present the main search engine of Microsoft. Additionally, those who are contemplating Bing to be a Google killer kindly reset their expectations. Microsoft too has stated that it’s a fresh (re)start for them in the search domain and the improvements will continue to be rolled out. It looks like they are in no mood to dethrone Google, at least not right now. As far as the name is concerned, Bing is definitely a better name than “Live Search” as we all know that whatever results search engines display are not live but an assortment of their huge database. Read more…