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Category Archives: Web 2.0

TripTouch Launches the ‘Ultimate’ Travel Widget

 TripTouch-Logo

TripTouch is launching their travel widget for Netvibes and iGoogle.

The widget is updated automatically to the user location. It’s suitable especially for frequent travelers and / or travelers during a trip.

It features updated local information and services for more than 5,000 destinations worldwide.

The widget includes travel guides, activities, restaurants, current events, accommodation, transportation, weather, currency rates, nearby travelers and more. For many services online booking is available.

TripTouch

"We launched our travel homepage last November", says Gil Ruda, TripTouch’s co-founder and CEO "we’ve got good reviews and our travel community is growing. Now we thought that we could use our platform to serve our users and new audiences in more ways, and we’ve decided to develop a widget for start pages ".
Currently the TripTouch platform aggregates and integrates content from the best sources in the web: Wikitravel (travel guides), eventful (worldwide events) , Google maps, Kayak (transportation), Priceline (hotels), OpenTable (restaurants), Viator (activities), Sportsevents365, HostelWorld.

For more information, visit http://www.triptouch.com/widgets .

About TripTouch: TripTouch was founded in 2007 by Gil Ruda and Ron Mertens. TripTouch is based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

TripTouch LTD operates two web sites: www.triptouch.com (the travel home page) and www.cafetouch.com (internet cafe directory).

A New Facebook Software Helps You Enlarge Your Facebook Community!

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A new Facebook application developed by Researchers at the Technion’s Faculty of Computer Science, enables using a laptop computer, without being connected to the Internet, to detect Facebook friends who have also installed it. Imagine being stuck in an airport and still being able to network, chat, share files and directories, play collaborative games, or actually meet face-to-face with those previously "virtual friends". The Software enables one friend on Facebook to find another friend, or a friend of a friend, who happens to be in his or her vicinity. The Technion has applied for a patent for this innovative development.

A year ago, researchers from the Technion’s Faculty of Computer Science developed software that enables direct communication between computers and notebook computers using WiFi without an intermediary agent such as Internet service provider. The Technion researchers made the software available at no charge to computer users worldwide.

Back then, direct communication between computers was not widespread because it was very complicated, entailed a long process of data entering and clicking on many keys - so much that even professionals shied away from it. The Technion researchers’ new software also offers applications that did not exist previously.

The software was developed in the framework of the doctoral dissertation of Vadim Drabkin, Gabi Kliot and Alon Kama, under the direction of Prof. Roy Friedman of the Faculty of Computer Science. They built a user-friendly application platform that enables simple communication between computers in close proximity (a range of tens of meters or up to 900 ft). It can be used to transfer dozens of digital pictures from one computer to another in less than a minute, to carry on chats or to play multiplayer games, such as chess.

“For example, employees who go abroad on company business may be seated separately from one another in the airplane. With this software, they can work together on their presentation during their flight,” says Prof. Friedman.

The software is called WiPeer, and since it was published, 50,000 downloads have been registered.

inbox-sharing peersonalizer-blob

Now, doctoral students Vadim Drabkin and Gabi Kliot, together with students Lior Biran and Tomer Einav, also under the direction of Prof. Roy Friedman, have added a new development, called “Peersonalizer” (personalizing a network friend). Peersonalizer uses a technology that can be applied to social networking sites other than Facebook, like MySpace, Friendster and LinkedIn

“Students can thus expand their network of acquaintances on campus,” the researchers explain. “A businessperson waiting in an airport can meet a friend of a friend who is also waiting in the terminal for his plane and thus expand his circle of business acquaintances. Of course, it is possible to implement this functionality for additional social networks.”

In the future, it will be possible to use this method on WiFi-enabled mobile phones, such as the iPhone, without the need for an intermediary such as a cellular phone company. Additional planned features include the ability to search for nearby Facebook users based on profile matching. The technology can also be used for dating applications that utilize both proximity and social profiles.

The Technion-Israel Institute of Technology is Israel’s leading science and technology university. Home to Israel’s winners of the Nobel Prize in science, it commands a worldwide reputation for its pioneering work in nanotechnology, computer science, biotechnology, water-resource management, materials engineering, aerospace and medicine. The majority of the founders and managers of Israel’s high-tech companies are alumni. Based in New York City, the American Technion Society (ATS) is the leading American organization supporting higher education in Israel, with 22 offices around the country.

you can download the WiPeer from here.

Making Social Games And Social Community

 image Friends

While it seems like there aren’t many fresh-minded, dynamic and young spirited companies left around, a new young and decisive start-up named FUN Development Games arises and does some great stuff.

FUN launched their new website and product this week. The product – a social gaming platform, offers some good and innovative news to the players on the net. it’s free- to- use, download- based and therefore faster and more stable than other web-based games, holds a large variety of games (which grows rapidly since the guys in FUN are constantly working on new games), very user friendly, multi –lingual (for the moment English and Hebrew) and enables a huge number of players to meet up while playing.

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The company’s offices are located in the eastern industrial park of Hod-Hashron near Tel Aviv. Among its employees you may find developers, graphic designers, content and marketing personnel. Co-Founders are Avi Kenigsberg and Ran Sibony.

Kenigsberg, the product manger and CEO of the company, owns a vast experience in network game development. Among other companies he worked for, he was one of the three co-founders of InterLogic , the company behind the brands Play65, Gammon Empire and Play89 –all websites and application which changed the way the gaming world looked like. After starting it, Kenigsberg became the CTO of InterLogic, which was sold 18 months after its establishment.

Kenigsberg claims, that even before he started-up FUN, he knew exactly who would join him and work in it – the best people in their fields. The company, according to him, is aiming at being the leading site for interactive games. From his experience, the innovation brought by AllFun is huge – all that is left is discovering it.

Sibony, VP Marketing and Business Development of FUN, has a long term experience of business consultants and development as a senior business consultant of ZOOZ and also owns a business consultant firm. The majority of his efforts is now invested in promoting AllFun and distributing it over the net. According to him “AllFun is the hottest new thing in the gaming world. Players are constantly looking for a place to play, with friend, on-line, everywhere and for free”

Sibony says, that so far the company has used owners’ finance, and now after launching, it is about to search for fund raisers, mostly for marketing and development purposes.

The people in FUN believe that in a short while, they will reach the critic mass of players, so that you will always find someone to play with on AllFun. To keep up the high quality of the product and most importantly, the good spirit – the company’s employees are spending much time on playing. What a way to go through a work day!

Make Your Meetings Quick And Easy To Schedule

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ScheduleOnce is a dead-simple web 2.0 service that helps you find a time for your meeting with absolute accuracy across all time zones and daylight saving changes. The service is specifically designed for those hard-to-schedule meetings with multiple time zones, many invitees and different calendar systems.
ScheduleOnce is based on a patent-pending method that converts timeframes with absolute accuracy across any combination of time zones and daylight saving changes. When scheduling meetings with ScheduleOnce you can rest assured that all invitees receive the correct time, anytime in the year and anywhere on the globe.

Why do I need ScheduleOnce? I just email my invitees about the meeting…

…and they email back, and you send another email, and then there’s a phone call, and someone’s canceling at the last minute, and… With ScheduleOnce you find the optimal time to meet fast and with no hassle.

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Why do I need ScheduleOnce? I can use a facebook event…

A facebook event only tells you which of your invitees will make it. ScheduleOnce helps you find the optimal time for the meeting, and you’ll know in advance who’s free to participate.

Why do I need ScheduleOnce? I’m already using outlook…

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Daylight saving time started in most of the US this Sunday. It starts in Europe on the 30th and ends on the 29th in Australia. Everybody’s moving their clocks, and if you have a virtual meeting with anyone who’s outside your time zone, you could be in a mess. ScheduleOnce is the only tool that solves this problem, and converts times with absolute accuracy.

You can Watch the introduction video, and sign up to the service. from my opinion and Regardless of the calendar system you use, ScheduleOnce can make your meetings quick and easy to schedule then any other service.

Special Interview with Streamsoft CEO, Michael Iron

Israel On Blog: Hi it’s nice to have you hear on Israel-On-Blog

Michael Iron: Thanks, it’s great to be here.

Israel On Blog: We hear you are very busy at Streamsoft these days

Michael Iron: Yes, we are busy preparing our launch of the Streamsoft player. It’s an exciting time for us. The online video space is very hot and so is the P2P landscape and we believe we will have a major impact on both.

Israel On Blog: First some personal questions for our readers.

Michael Iron: Please go ahead.

Israel On Blog: How did you get started in this business?

Michael Iron: I’ve wanted to be a high tech entrepreneur since I was ten years old.  When I had the idea, it was classic high tech mode: I got my team behind me, got some investors and went straight to the garage.

Israel On Blog: Where were you educated?  Did you study technology?

Michael Iron: I studied computer science at Tel Aviv University but I value ability over formal education. The important thing in our business is execution.

Israel On Blog: What are your professional passions?

Michael Iron: I love to create products that people like to use.

Israel On Blog: How do you manage the company and staff, we hear that you are hiring top notch developers these days?

I am a macro manager.  I am the guy in charge of vision, and I hire people who are independent self starters and best of breed in what they do.  We are a team of MVP’s.

Israel On Blog: Describe a typical day at Streamsoft.

Michael Iron: The work environment is conducive to creativity: we’ve a beachfront office; we come in on bicycles, shorts and sandals.  There’s a healthy lunch. But not to forget – everybody works like hell and deadlines are strict

Israel On Blog: Thank you very much for your time, Michael Iron, CEO of Streamsoft.

Michael Iron: Thank you for giving us the opportunity to talk Streamsoft and our team.

Tersus - The Easy Way to Create Web Applications

Tersus 

Tersus is best for building rich web applications. Since Tersus employs AJAX techniques "under the hood", you don’t need to master different languages (like JavaScript and Java) and complex client/server integration techniques to building web applications with rich, responsive user interface. With Tersus, a single person or a small team can quickly accomplish what would normally require a larger team and at least twice the effort.

But Tersus is a general purpose platform that can be used to develop a variety of software solutions. The Tersus technology has already been used successfully to develop a range of software solutions, from small tactical applications to high-end, mission critical systems.

With Tersus you can develop any of the following:

  • Stand-alone applications
  • Integrated solutions (we call these Appligrations™ = "application of integration")
  • Back-office server-side systems (with no GUI or minimal GUI)
  • Enterprise 2.0: Client-server web applications with rich browser interface
  • Mixture of automatic processing and human interactions
  • Asynchronous, event-driven processing (e.g. message based)
  • Composite applications assembled from any combination of built-in components, self developed components and Web Services
  • Tactical rapidly developed application
  • Enterprise scale and distributed systems

Cool Features

  • Building and running a first web application within minutes
  • Online validation of your application model
  • Using any HTML page as part of your application
  • Using external web services as built-in building blocks
  • Automatic deployment from the Tersus Studio
  • Visual Debugging
  • Not only English – support for any language
  • Model Exchange for sharing libraries, modules and applications

To develop an application with Tersus, just draw a diagram of your application. The Tersus Server will automatically execute the diagrams, taking care of all that is required to "bring your application to life".

Tersus development is 100% visual. No coding or scripting is needed. The diagram of the application (called "the model") defines it all: screen layout, rich client side behavior, and server side processes.

You can easily create your screen layout by dragging display elements (buttons, tables, fields …) into the model.

Here is an example of what a Tersus model looks like:

Behavior is added by drawing process diagrams inside user interface elements.

The following diagram defines what happens when the user clicks the ‘Delete’ button:

In this example, pressing the delete button brings up a confirmation dialog. If the user confirms, the record is deleted from the database.

Processes can contain sub-processes. By zooming into a sub-process, you can see its behavior.

Click here or on the image below to see zooming in action:

 

Tersus Studio the Tersus development environment contains a palette of building blocks you can use to create your own applications.

Built-in building blocks include:

  • Data types (like Text, Number and Date)
  • GUI elements (like Buttons and Text Area)
  • Mathematical functions (like Add, Substract and Multiply)
  • Database actions (Insert, Update, Delete and Find)
  • Document handling actions (actions for things like generating PDF documents, sending email messages or reading XML and Excel files)
  • Application modules (like ‘Authorization’, a ready-to-use module for managing users and permissions)

You can add your own building blocks to Tersus. Basic building blocks are implemented in code (Java or Javascript), while composite ones are modeled with Tersus.

Below is a screenshot of the palette of building blocks (focusing on database actions):

About Tersus Software Ltd.

Tersus Software Ltd. is a privately held company founded in May 2003 by Ofer Brandes, Youval Bronicki and Joel Barel.

The vision of Tersus is to fundamentally change the way software is created and maintained. Instead of coding or scripting, developers draw diagrams of their applications (called "models"), which define everything: screen layout, rich client side behavior, and server side processes.

Develpoment becomes simpler, and more people can take part in it.

To make this vision a reality, Tersus has developed the Tersus Visual Programming Platform, an innovative development and execution platform that enables users to easily create enterprise web applications by drawing visual diagrams instead of writing code.

The platform is released as open source.

For organizations seeking the benefits of agile application development, Tersus provides a commercial enterprise version of the Tersus platform, together with supporting services (technical support, training and consulting services).

AJAXed with AWP