Microsoft Bridges PHP and .Net with New PHP Toolkit

Another step in Microsoft's goal for better interoperability. They have released a PHP Toolkit for ADO.Net Data Services. As its name suggests, the toolkit enables PHP developers to connect and leverage the various services offered in ADO.Net Data Services.

ADO.Net Data Services are relatively new to the .Net Framework, enabling a number of different data sources — relational databases, XML files — to be exposed via a REST-style interface.

How it Works
The Toolkit includes a tool called PHPDataSvcUtil, which connects to the ADO.Net Data Services, generating a proxy class for each EntityType. These class definitions are then used by the PHP client application to access data through the Data Services, including the ability to add, edit delete or browse records and connect to the service.

PHP Toolkit Architecture

The Toolkit isn't tied to an operating system, so it can be installed on Windows or Linux. It requires the PHP extensions for XML, XSL and CURL be installed.

Protocol and Authentication Support
Both the JSON and AtomPub protocols are supported which means the toolkit can be used with Windows Azure. It does not however, support the Azure authentication out of the box, so some work is required there. Out of the box, basic authentication is supported and it can be modified to support other schemes.
ADO.Net Data Services are supported in Visual Studio 2008 SP1 and Visual Studio 2010 including both consuming and creating data services.
Microsoft and PHP
This is just one of a number of open source projects that Microsoft is supporting in their Interoperability Bridges and Lab Center. Other PHP projects include an SDK for Azure, PHP Samples for Silverlight, Web Slices and Accelerators and a SQL CRUD Application Wizard.
The PHP Toolkit was developed by a company named PersistentSystems Ltd and was funded by Microsoft.  Pick up your copy of the PHP Toolkit on Codeplex now.

Source:http://www.cmswire.com/cms/web-development/microsoft-bridges-php-and-net-with-new-php-toolkit-005378.php

HTML 5 Affect Websites, Development

With the final HTML 5 specification due to ratify this summer, it seems like the language has already become part of the landscape. Where could it take us and what obstacles lie ahead?
HTML 5 Clears House

With the news last week that Microsoft is shifting its focus from Silverlight to HTML 5, and that Adobe is making Flash HTML 5- (and iOS-) friendly), the last pieces of the jigsaw have fallen into place for the dominance of HTML 5 as the future of web technology and web development.

Just about every release we see these days touts CMSes as supporting HTML 5, every mobile site is packing HTML 5 features and the hype will only continue to grow. All this for a highly immature technology that has beaten industry giants and their alternatives — it has to be doing something right.
All the Right Moves

The next generation of web sites will certainly look better than their current counterparts (if coded properly). Media will play smoothly across any device, be it iPad, PlayBook or Android phone. Business users could move to an all-cloud environment via in-browser document editing. They can also use drag and drop just like on the desktop, making the browser more like the comforting UIs of old.

With some neat extensions, font use could go wild on the web, which is a bit of a double-edged sword. Templates and design tools could become dramatically easier to use and, with templates like Boilerplate, all of your HTML 5 features can run happily in browsers all the way back to IE6, for those who, for whatever legacy reason, can't upgrade.
Sticking Points Ahead

There are, of course, a few potholes on this road. The three leading browsers aren't quite compatible, nor do they offer a universally identical experience yet, and there are many ways for one or other of the players to muck things up. At least Microsoft is promising big things for its Internet Explorer 10 browser, the site for which promises and demonstrates all kinds of HTML 5 goodness.

There are also areas where HTML 5 is lacking, such as in adding objects over video, working with webcams and so on. These can be fixed, over time, but leave holes in the portfolio that third parties can exploit — which may be good in the short term, but make for fragmentation later on.
Thank the Mobile Future

Whatever sites end up looking like, the good news is that, whatever device you happen to browse them on — be it an iPhone, iPad or Android — HTML 5 should help produce an equal, egalitarian experience. The success of these devices seems to be what has really pushed HTML 5 to the fore — if we were still creaking along in an all-desktop world, things would be years behind where we are now.

For developers, life gets made a little simpler, without a million platform tweaks to worry about, and they can concentrate on the important things such as user experience and progressing with cleaner code. That does ignore the massive amount of sites rewrites and refreshes that the industry faces, but for coders, as long as they're getting paid, it should all be good.

Source: http://www.cmswire.com/cms/web-engagement/how-will-html-5-affect-websites-development-010910.php

Google Maps, Street View Show Recovery Progress at 9/11 Ground Zero Site

Friends we all are aware about 9/11 incident of USA, I have found something really interesting about Google maps and Street View Show Recovery Progress at 9/11.. We all aware that Sunday, Sept. 11 marks the 10th anniversary of the most destructive terrorist attack on the United States soil when two hijacked passenger jets were deliberately crashed into the World Trade Center's twin towers, killing 2,819 people. On the same day, another hijacked airliner crashed into the U.S. Defense Department’s massive Pentagon building in Washington, D.C. Yet another was flown into the ground at Stonycreek Township, Pa., after captive passengers tried to retake control of the plane. Nearly 3,000 people died in the planes and on the ground in the 9/11 attacks.

Read More:http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Cloud-Computing/Google-Maps-Street-View-Show-Recovery-Progress-at-911-Ground-Zero-Site-853916/

Chinese Regulators Renew Key License For Google

BEIJING—Chinese regulators renewed a key license for Google Inc., suggesting that authorities continue to accept the way the U.S. Internet giant has restructured its local operations to stop censoring its own Chinese-language search results.
Wang Lijian, director of the news office of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, a main Internet regulator, said the government renewed for another year the Internet Content Provider license that Google uses in China, a license required of all locally operated websites.
China regulates Internet content in part through issuing licenses and overseeing companies like Google and its chief Chinese competitor Baidu Inc. Authorities also block or limit access to websites based overseas.
Google scaled back its China operations last year after a public spat with authorities over its concerns about censorship and hacking, announcing that it would stop filtering its content as required by local regulations. The move caused users to fear the company would discontinue its Chinese-language services entirely, or that the government would retaliate by banning its websites within the country.
Instead, Google began redirecting users from its Chinese domain address, Google.cn, to a website in Hong Kong whose search results Google doesn't filter.
Foreign companies aren't allowed to own Internet content licenses directly in China. The license Google uses is owned by a Chinese partner. Authorities are believed to have given the license an approval last year, also.
The fact that Google's overseas Web services have remained accessible in China was already a sign that regulators had accepted the Hong Kong workaround. Google continues to earn revenue from Chinese advertisers seeking to reach users abroad.
But the government continues to censor the search results of Google's overseas sites for users inside the country, and access to the overseas sites and to its Gmail service have become increasingly unstable for users in China, causing Google's share of traffic and revenue in the country to fall.
Google continues to use its mainland Chinese address for music and certain other services, without redirecting users to Hong Kong. But uncertainty remains for its online map services, which Google is still in talks with the regulators about, a Google spokesman said.

Source:-http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904836104576556203077777200.html