Computing Unplugged - What the heck is a megapixel?

[ZATZ Publishing]

A MEMBER OF THE ZATZ MAGAZINE NETWORK

September 28, 2003 INSIDE THIS ISSUE What the heck is a megapixel? This week's news

NEW! 40 powerful tips, insider tricks, and sneak peaks into the future of Outlook and Exchange Across eight chapters, we've included 40 separate articles from OutlookPower Magazine in this powerful ebook. We cover topics that range from maximizing your ability to manage contacts to protecting yourself against spam and viruses, to a whole load of time savers. Plus, there are a bunch of very informative reviews and a very special, exclusive sneak peak into the future of Outlook and Exchange Order today! Only $19.95

STOP THOSE AD WINDOWS FROM SHOWING UP ON YOUR DESKTOP You're working on your computer, minding your own business. And bam! Suddenly something weird shows up. It's not an email. You're not even browsing the Web, so you know it's not one of those annoying Web pop-ups. What the heck is it? Someone just stuck an ad in the middle of your screen. Shoot The Messenger's an amazing little program. It's the sheriff that completely bans those bad boys from ever showing up on your machine again. It takes about two minutes to install, and Shoot The Messenger's on guard instantly, all the time. Plus, click here to learn more about how Shoot The Messenger safeguards your IM sessions.

YOUR FIRST DIGITAL CAMERA
What the heck is a megapixel?
By David Gewirtz

Last week, I wrote a quick piece about getting started with digital photography. The response from readers was absolutely astounding. In fact, I believe we've gotten more letters about that short article than any other we've ever published (except, perhaps, my political commentaries, which managed to piss off 49.9% of the U.S. population).

There were so many questions, comments, and great ideas that we've probably got material for a year's worth of tips. In fact, we've started talking about spinning out a digital camera publication just because of that response. If that's something you're interested in, send me a note at address@hidden and let me know.

Needless to say, I can't answer every question this week. Next week, we're going to flip back to PDA coverage for a review of some new, hush-hush devices that are pretty exciting. We're also going to continue our discussion of megapixels and camera choice. That said, I suspect we'll be adding more and more digital camera coverage, because it's clearly a topic that's got you interested.

Sifting through the letters, the biggest theme was one of confusion. Many of you asked what camera should you buy and many others told me you were confused by all the specs. Rather than going through individual cameras and recommending them (they change each week), I'm going to help you understand what makes these cameras tick.

The place to start is megapixels.

Since the megapixel count is a simple number, and that number seems to correlate to price, it seems easiest to choose based on this measure. In reality, you'll also want to choose a camera based on its optics, menu system, available storage, responsiveness, and picture quality.

Today, however, we're going to talk megapixels.

Understanding pixels
Let's start off by defining a pixel. The word "pixel" is actually a shortened form of the phrase "picture element." A picture element is, in the computer world, basically a dot. As you know, computer screens (and digital camera images) are made up of grids of dots. Today, a typical computer screen has 1024 dots across by 768 dots down, although older screens have less and gamers often punch their screens up to higher resolution.

Each dot, or each pixel, contains color information. Let's take a look at a simple picture, shown in Figure A.

FIGURE A

Here's an example of how pixels contain color information. Click picture for a larger image.

You can see the original image in the upper left side of the figure. When the image is enlarged, you can see each individual pixel, and you can see that each pixel is basically a square (some devices use slightly different shapes) containing color information.

For lots more about megapixels, click here to read the rest of the article.

NEW NAME. SAME GREAT HANDHELDS. The name palmOne was chosen following interviews with a broad spectrum of Palm customers, partners, employees, naming consultants and industry influencers. When people inside and outside the company reflect on Palm's essence, three ideas emerged consistently: the company's heritage as a pioneer in handheld computing, Palm's worldwide leadership, which it has retained despite an influx of competitors; and the conviction that Palm always would place customers first, thereby delivering what matters most to them. Continue to palmOne.com

COMPUTING UNPLUGGED NEWS CENTER
This week's news
Want to get the very latest mobile and wireless news? The Computing Unplugged News Center is updated every day with news of product releases, industry info, tips, techniques, and pointers to great mobile and wireless resources on the Web. Here's this week's news:

IBM rolls out wireless middleware upgrades
Internet News reports that concern over data security in enterprise wireless networks is not the obstacle blocking the adoption of pervasive and mobile computing systems as IBM announced new wireless middleware upgrades. IBM is rolling out Extension Services for WebSphere Everyplace, the flagship middleware is designed to ease the porting of applications and services to pervasive devices.

Transfer digital pictures to digital locket
Nokia announced that it's planning to launch new products that will let consumers take pictures from camera phones and transfer them onto tiny digital lockets and bracelets. According to News.com, the new devices, Medallion I and II, are designed for storing, wearing and showing off images transferred wirelessly from a cell phone or computer.

Opera Browser for Sony Ericsson P800 adds improvements
Opera Software has released version 6.2 of the Opera browser for the Sony Ericsson P800 smartphone, improving the way some complex pages render on the handset's small screen. News.com says that the new browser adds improvements to Opera's Small Screen Rendering (SSR) technology, which reformats standard HTML Web pages on the fly so that they can be viewed in a single vertical column, with no side-scrolling needed.

Techneos Enterprise Solution released
Techneos Systems announced the release of the Techneos Enterprise Solution for Palm Powered handhelds and smartphones. The Techneos Enterprise Solution is an integrated software suite that allows organizations to design, deploy and manage mobile data collection projects with Palm handhelds.

VizSync supports synchronization with FileMaker runtimes
VizSync, Inc. announces that the latest Windows PC release (version 1.7 beta and version 1.7.1 beta of VizSync Date Book) of its VizSync conduits support synchronization with FileMaker runtimes. VizSync allows direct synchronization from custom multi-user FileMaker Pro applications to the Palm organizer's four native applications.

AirStation 54Mbps Wireless USB Adapter-g ships
Buffalo Technology announced that it is shipping its AirStation 54Mbps Wireless USB Adapter-g (WLI-USB-G54). The WLI-USB-G54 is a device that provides high-speed network connectivity with a range of up to 410 feet.

Wireless Printer Kit
AmbiCom released a new wireless product, which allows users to send printer data across a wireless communications link. The virtual cable is based on a Bluetooth system-on-chip technology developed by Microtune. The AmbiCom Wireless Printer Kit has a suggested retail price of $69.99.

GoodLink 2.1 available for Treo 600
Good Technology announced the availability of GoodLink 2.1 on the Handspring Treo 600. GoodLink 2.1 delivers cradle-free, real-time synchronization for wirelessly connecting users with Microsoft Exchange and other vital enterprise information.

WebSphere Micro Environment for Tungsten line
IBM announced a range of product enhancements and partnerships designed to transform the way enterprise applications are delivered to wireless devices. This month, developers will be able to make use of extended Java functions on Palm devices via IBM's WebSphere Micro Environment. Optimized for Palm's Tungsten line of handhelds, this is the result of an ongoing relationship with Palm.

WebSphere gets stripped down
IBM sketched out its long-term vision for pervasive computing and announced updates to a stripped-down version of its WebSphere software, which can run on small devices. ZDNet says that IBM also announced partnerships with software companies that are designed to help businesses better manage mobile devices employees use, such as PDAs (personal digital assistants) and mobile phones.

Nvidia gets into handheld market
Nvidia introduced a new brand name called GoForce for its new product line of graphics chips for the handheld market. News.com reports the company also unveiled the flagship product in the family, the GoForce 2150, geared to make cell phones and handheld computers better at taking digital pictures and playing games.

Dell gets ready for holidays
News.com reports that Dell is preparing to unveil a new consumer-electronics plan under which it will sell a portable music player and a line of LCD TVs under its brand name for the holidays.

W3C to investigates after patent verdict
As a result of the Web browser patent verdict against Microsoft, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is investigating whether the claims in the patent infringement lawsuit brought by Eolas Technologies and the University of California could require changes to both the current and future HyperText Markup Language specifications.

DEMOobile wrap-up
Here's a wrap-up from last week's DEMObile conference. The Wilmington Morning Star has a rundown of some of the collest products introduced at the conference.

CFG-Connect connects with Outlook, handhelds
Capital Fulfillment Group (CFG) is pleased to announce CFG-Connect, a new application that integrates CapitalDIRECT, CFG's real-time, online fulfillment management system, with Microsoft Outlook. CFG-Connect will enable users to place and manage orders quickly, with information populated directly from their Outlook database. In addition, individuals with Palm handhelds and Blackberry handhelds will be able to use CFG-Connect to turn their personal contacts into CapitalDIRECT contacts.

New wireless game from Paragon Software
Paragon Software announced a new wireless game =96 RifleSLUGs-W: Wild Web=20 Wars. RifleSLUGs-W is a sequel of the popular game series RifleSLUGs and=20 RifleSLUGs-II for Palm OS. RifleSLUGs is a reincarnation of well-known PC=20 strategy games concept. It is a step-by-step strategy game in which two=20 armies of slugs (red and yellow) battle for existence.

MobileVB supports Palm OS 5
AppForge announced MobileVB 4.0, with support for Palm OS 5 running on Palm Powered mobile devices. MobileVB is a mobile and wireless development tool that integrates into Microsoft Visual Studio. With the addition of Palm OS 5 support, Microsoft developers can create mobile applications using their existing tools and knowledge and deploy those applications on more than 90 percent of the leading mobile and wireless devices.

SupportSoft teams with IBM
SupportSoft announced an agreement with IBM that provides product integration and co-marketing for IBM's Device Management Solutions with SupportSoft's Mobile Device Management Suite. IBM's Device Management Platform, part of IBM's WebSphere Everyplace Server Service Provider Offering software, incorporates IBM Tivoli's device management technology. The integrated solution features a customer service analyst interface and a communication platform, to enable carriers to more easily diagnose and solve problems on their customers' PDAs, laptops or mobile phones.

Wireless email solution
Corsoft announces the launch of Aileron 5.0, its wireless email solution for Palm OS handheld devices. Aileron uses a multi-tiered architecture, optimizing network bandwidth and greatly reducing the typical download time for each attached document. Aileron Enterprise Server provides secure and native access to corporate mail servers like Microsoft Exchange.

Palm OS 6 coming in December
PalmSource has announced at its developer seminar in Munich that the next version of its operating system, codenamed Sahara, will be ready on December 29. Brighthand says that Palm OS 6 will offer many features business want, like support for Web services and accessing Microsoft Exchange and Lotus email servers.

KeySuite 2.1 released
Chapura released KeySuite 2.1, an update that allows Palm Powered handheld owners who use Microsoft Outlook to manage their information from Outlook Calendar, Contacts, Tasks and Notes. New features include support for all Outlook Calendar recurrence patterns on the handheld and a Smart Look Up feature enables individuals to find information in KeyNotes quickly by searching each word in the first line of every note.

PalmSource names new member to its board of directors
PalmSource has announced the appointment of P. Howard Edelstein to its board of directors. Edelstein is president and chief executive officer at Radianz, an independent company with the world's largest Internet Protocol-based network for the global financial services industry. Edelstein joins PalmSource board members, Chairman Eric Benahmou, John B. Shoven, Satjiv S. Chahill, Robert J. Finocchio, Jr., Jean Louis Gasse and David Nagel.

News from European Developer Conference
PalmSource welcomed Palm OS developers at its European Developer Conference. During his opening keynote talk, PalmSource President and CEO, David Nagel, launched a new German Palm OS software online store with Pdassi, announced the number of Palm Powered devices sold worldwide to date surpassed 30 million, and honored four Palm OS developers with Powered Up Awards.

Borland licenses PalmSource SDK
Borland Software Corporation and PalmSource announced that Borland has licensed the PalmSource software development kits (SDKs) and will support Palm OS development in the Borland C++BuilderX Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and latest Borland Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) solutions for C++.

Mobile Development Kit for Domino
Solution Planet announced the first public pre-release (version 0.5) of nsf-on-air -- the Mobile Development Kit for Lotus Notes/Domino. nsf-on-air is a Mobile Development Kit (MDK) that is used to create elements that translate the views and forms of a nsf-database to WML pages used on mobile devices.

Access your PC from your PDA
TERA Technologies launched its ezPCaccess product family at DEMOmobile 2003 today. You can get the The Palm edition of ezPCaccess, which allows access to your office or home PC from any Palm OS based PDA device. This edition also features an interface for Microsoft Outlook. There's also a Web browser edition available.

Advertise in Computing Unplugged
Each week, Computing Unplugged reaches over 275,000 highly mobile readers. Our editorial and news content reflects a broad mix of interest areas from handheld computers to PDAs, from GPS devices to digital cameras, from robotics to WiFi, and even more. If you'd like to bring your message to the inner-circle of power communicators, feel free to contact us at address@hidden.

Unsubscribing from this mailing list
This weekly announcement is delivered to you as a free service from Computing Unplugged Magazine. To be removed from the list, simply click here.

Copyright © 2003, ZATZ:Pure Internet Publishing, a unit of Component Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved.

Computing Unplugged is an independent publication of ZATZ:Pure Internet Publishing, a unit of Component Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved. Component Enterprises, Inc. ZATZ, the ZATZ logo, and Computing Unplugged are trademarks of ZATZ Publishing, a unit of Component Enterprises. All other brands and product names are trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective holders.