portal

Good news for Yahoo: a new survey finds that customers are more satisfied with Yahoo than the other search engines and portals.

According to the University of Michigan's American Customer Satisfaction Index, Yahoo's score in the index rose 3.9 percent over the past year to 79 while Google's score fell 3.7 percent to 78.

But it's hard to really get a read on things because the survey combines two different categories: search engines and portals. No question, Google by far leads the pack when it comes to search and it is not a portal. … Read more

A few weeks ago, we told you about Leaflets, an iPhone-friendly portal that presents a series of small Web applications on a single page. It turns out there are many more portals like this out there, and uPhoneHome is one such site. Instead of having to sign up to use the site like you do with Leaflets, uPhoneHome doesn't require a log-in at all. You can go ahead and add all kinds of iPhone-friendly Web apps to this page (everything from Facebook to Meebo), and arrange them by date added, categorically, or even alphabetically. The one downside is that … Read more

Ian Howells, Alfresco's chief marketing officer, did some analysis of the company's customer and user community, and I found the results interesting. I've been hearing rumblings for some time that Windows increasingly serves as a great evaluation platform for open source, but most companies use Linux when they're serious and want to go into production. Ian's data confirmed this, and more. (Zmanda has published data that corroborates our findings.)

First of all, the Alfresco data shows that Windows is plays a healthy role in the open source ecosystem. (In the graph, Windows = green, and Linux = blue, in case you can't see it well.) We have plenty of companies going into production with open-source Alfresco sitting on top of closed-source Windows. From my work with SugarCRM, JasperSoft and others, I know the same holds true for them. I don't suspect that this is going to change anytime soon.

Windows plays a large role because it's the OS sitting on the most desktops. But when customers are serious about production, the majority favor Linux. Again, I think you'd find very similar results were you to talk with MuleSource, Funambol, SugarCRM, etc.… Read more

We've been hearing reports of lag and downtime issues involving Yahoo and several of its properties Friday morning: Yahoo's instant messaging client has been on and off, a reader reported that the Flickr photo-sharing site was down (worked fine for me, though) and the Yahoo main home page and Yahoo News portal have been fickle as well. Some CNET editors and writers encountered similar problems when testing the sites out; others found them to be working fine; still others reported unusually slow load times but no downage.

We've put out a request to Yahoo for comment but … Read more

It's one of the most worn-out cliches of all action movies: the laser beam alarm system. But if they've been around for so long, why they haven't become household staples in today's security-obsessed society?

The latest example comes from Arizona-based company Ionatron and its "Portal Denial System" (sounds so RoboCop). Created for the U.S. government, it fires a stream of "laser-induced plasma" across any entryway, though SCI FI Tech says the operator has the option of making it lethal or "less lethal." Come to think of it, maybe it'… Read more

Sun launched an open-source project around its Java System Portal Server 7 on Wednesday, following through on its stated plans to eventually open source all of its software products.

Called OpenPortal, the software is available under Sun's Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL).

The project's goals are to expose Sun's portal software to developers and create modular components that can be combined with other open-source projects, according to Sun. There are already existing Java servers which are open source.

The software complies with the JSR 168 and OASIS Web Services for Remote Portlets (WSRP) standards.

On Tuesday … Read more

AOL began beta testing a new look for its portal this week. It allows for more personalization and highlights relevant local information like traffic and gas prices, video content, e-mail and search. The redesigned site is randomly being exposed to about 5 percent of AOL's users during the test. The new version of the site should be widely available this summer. Meanwhile, AOL also launched an updated version of its portal in Canada and launched a new portal in India.

Claria, the company known for its abandoned Gator pop-up advertising business, has completed work on a new "personalization engine" that serves both Web surfers and advertisers.

The company earlier this week completed work on PersonalWeb, software that generates recommendations for content based on a user's search history and preferences. PersonalWeb was built using the Axon Personalization Platform, which the company said this week is being licensed to partners.

If, for example, a person starts going to Web sites to get news on the Chicago Cubs, the Axon software will create a widget with Cubs news and recommendations … Read more

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to that club you were thrown out of, they come up with another way to keep you behind the rope.

Touted as a "non-invasive" approach to checking ID, iris scanners rely on pattern recognition of the image reflected from the iris's convex cornea--which, when converted into a digital template, will give you away every time.

The problem with conventional iris scanners is that they require the subject to hold still and submit. Now, a new-fangled unit produced by Sarnoff Labs in New Jersey can reportedly identify up … Read more