Posts

Showing posts from April, 2008

Use Live Search via SMS on Vodaphone in India

Image
You are out with your friends and have a need to find something (e.g. chinese restaurant in the vicinity)… what do you do? call a friend? or if ur uber geeky, launch a search using GPRS on live or google… what if ur somewhere between the geekdom and dummyzone? You search for stuff by sending SMS and getting results over SMS as well.. this is SMS Search for Vodafone customers in India powered by Live Search. Vodafone subscribers can simply type in their query as a SMS text message on their mobile handset and send to 55060 . . this SMS search will set you back by 30 p/ query (all inclusive) making it cheaper than ur regular SMS at Rs 2/ SMS! However, note that this search is not comprehensive. It appears that it is delivering only city specific information e.g. “Chinese restaurant delhi”… the local search/directory information is available in 8 major cities including Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune and Ahmedabad with 21 more cities expected to go live

OpenXML wins ISO Standardisation and gets Better with Community

The FINAL verdict on ISO standardisation is out and OpenXML is now an ISO standard. This standardisation process (that has consensus at its heart) has given an overwhelming endorsement (with 86% of voting national bodies) for ratification of OpenXML as an ISO standard. The ISO standardisation process has strengthened the OpenXML standard making it much better than ever before. What is even better is that OpenXML is now in stewardship of the community and NOT “owned” by any company. The real motives  behind the protectionist “Open Source” (what a fallacy) lobby now stands exposed.. A lot of countries changed their votes from “No” to “Yes” after their comments were addressed during the Ballot Resolution Meeting process. While the LITD 15 Committee at the BIS didn’t endorse the OpenXML standard but the positive endorsement of various industry bodies and India’s leading IT companies prove that OpenXML has opened up a huge business opportunity for everybody! It has the potential to become