Computers

Bond god Jeffrey Gundlach, who runs DoubleLine Capital, told TheStreet.com's Chris Ciaccia that he now owns Apple in his portfolio. Gundlach famously shorted Apple's stock last year and called it going to $425 a share on CNBC when it was trading around the $560 level in November. From TheStreet: "We bought it at $405 the first time, and I think our average cost is below $425. I said Apple would go below $425. I wasn't committed to buying it, but I think Apple is an interesting play," Gundlach said during the interview. Gundlach told TheStreet that the tech giant's stock is "sorta cheap" and that he "sorta" likes Apple. Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook.Join the conversation about this story »

On June 7, a comedy about two 40-somethings becoming interns at Google hits theaters. Liz Gannes of AllThingsD recently got a chance to attend a screening of the movie, "The Internship." Her take: "It's a two-hour commercial for Google." "The Internship" is positive toward Google, but still feels authentic, Gannes said an interview with director Shawn Levy. For example, Google either sent or verified and approved every computer screen and white board featured in the movie. Levy wanted the movie to be as accurate as possible, even in the small details. Google co-founder Sergey Brin even has a couple of cameos. At one point, he's seen on an elliptical bike wearing "bizarre neon green slippers." But Levy stressed to Gannes that they didn't pay Google, and Google didn't pay them. "I've been very impressed with how much autonomy they've given us creatively," Levy said. "They were just really happy, because the movie was funny, and it had the spirit that they were hoping for." Head on over to AllThingsD to check out Gannes's Q&A with director Shawn Levy. SEE ALSO: Being A Google Intern Is So Funny, Hollywood Made It Into A Comedy Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.Join the conversation about this story »

At Google I/O we learned that a stock Android version of the Galaxy S4 is coming, and now HTC may follow suit. Rumors suggest that HTC has a build in its pipeline for an HTC One running the standard v...

SAP, the legacy business software behemoth that is now definitely, totally, 100 percent A Cloud Company, has just lost the man who made it so. Lars Dalgaard, who joined SAP when the German-U.S. giant bought his company, SuccessFactors, in late 2011, has quit to become an investor. He will, however, stay on as a cloud advisor to SAP. The news came out on Friday as part of a flurry of SAP announcements. Another of those also relates to a departure – that of human resources chief Luisa Delgado, whose responsibilities will be taken on by CFO Werner Brandt – but the big non-quitting-related news is that SAP is consolidating its business to better reflect its newfound cloudiness. SAP’s cloud “go-to-market” strategy will now all be under the purview of Bob Calderoni, CEO of Ariba (alongside SuccessFactors, one of SAP’s major cloud buys of the last two years). And development will all be under the control of technology chief Vishal Sikka. SAP is pitching this new structure as an innovation accelerator, but does it finally signal a streamlining of the company’s sprawling and often confusing portfolio (a condition I like to call IBMitis)? Yes! And no. As Sikka said on a conference call today: “We see an opportunity to not only consolidate and streamline the portfolio, but bring incredible efforts… to transform that in the power of the cloud. We will get into areas that are truly unprecedented – applications for new industries that weren’t possible before [such as] healthcare, banking, oil and energy.” Which is nice, but – as co-CEO Jim Hagemann Snabe chipped in – SAP has “a lot of commitments” to its existing customers too, and “we’re a company that stands by our commitments.” This may be interpreted to mean we should expect some redundancy within the portfolio to continue for a while yet, in order to keep those with more old-school SAP systems in place happy. As for SAP’s ongoing cloud strategy, co-CEO Bill McDermott promised that Dalgaard’s exit would lead to “zero business disruption”: “Our cloud DNA is now embedded across 65,000 minds and hearts and it’s become the soul of SAP. While it’s nice to have one evangelist for the cloud, it’s even better to have 65,000. “Lars took us from $20 million in terms of revenue to a $1 billion run rate in the cloud. Now it’s about scale because everything is cloud. No other company has gone through this transition so fast – it literally happened in 12-15 months under his leadership.” McDermott added that Dalgaard had been having “open conversations” with him and Hagemann Snabe for some time about his plans to downgrade his role to that of advisor, and “we were happy to accommodate him because we think the world of the guy.” Speaking of SAP’s thorough cloudiness, the company also announced on Thursday that it would deliver its products – including, of course, those on the in-memory HANA platform — on VMware’s newly-re-announced vCloud Hybrid Service IaaS platform, as well as vCloud Suite. This will allow for fully managed services on-premise, in the cloud and in hybrid deployments. Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.AWS Storage Gateway jolts cloud-storage ecosystemCloud computing 2012: a pessimist’s guideInfrastructure Q2: Big data and PaaS gain more momentum

One thing you will not see in Disney’s own Carousel of Progress is a huge crowd of people being led around an amusement park by their iPhones.  But that is exactly what you will see when you visit any one of Disney’s theme parks.  So what is it that is so interesting on all of these iPhones?  Disney theme park tourist apps.  Where to go, what to see and even how long it will take. I can attest that the following are the best apps out there for a Disney trip after field testing on a recent visit to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla. Before you go: Trip planning with ebooks You should first look to see if your local library has any up to date ebooks that you can borrow. I was able to check out a couple of titles before our trip to Disney World began. Additionally there are several titles available on Amazon and iTunes for your Kindle and iBooks app. One of my favorites is The Unofficial Guide Walt Disney World ($9.99 Kindle, $9.99 iTunes).  Being able to read and bookmark travel guides on my iPhone saved me from packing heavy books in my carry-on. Guidebooks are better as apps Beyond electronic books you will also find some great informational guides in the App Store. One provider in particular, TimeStream Software, has a couple of iPhone apps published under the title of Notescast that you will find have the same insightful information as the best-selling books.  The difference is that the apps are much easier for navigating and finding what you are looking for when you are in a hurry inside the various parks. In particular their Walt Disney World Secrets ($1.99 iPhone) is a great supplement to any ebook you may already have in your library. Searchable maps of nearby attractions Both Apple and Google have decent satellite and regular maps of the parks in their mapping apps.  However, you will find that specialized maps that include the ability to annotate the maps with interactive pins that highlight nearby attractions will help get you to where you want to be.  VersaEdge’s Disney World Magic Guide ($4.99 Universal) does exactly this by including the wait times alongside the location.  Seeing the wait times on the map may change where you are headed in the first place.  The app also comes with a database with details about the attraction as well schedule for your dinner reservations.  This is something that neither Google nor Apple has in their maps. Avoid waiting in line There are two things you will want to keep track of when visiting Disney’s attractions: wait times and FastPass times. While VersaEdge’s Disney World Magic Guide will show you the wait times on a map, what it does not do is show you are the times that the next FastPass is available.  FastPass is Disney’s way of controlling large crowds by allowing everyone a chance at getting to ride their favorite rides at least once.  But FastPasses do run out.  Knowing that the next FastPass for SpaceMountain is for 9 p.m. when it is just 11 a.m. is a good indication that you had better run over to Tomorrow Land and get one before they run out.  And the busier the park is, the more likely the FastPasses will run out. Disney’s own My Disney Experience – Walt Disney World (Free, Universal) proved to have the most accurate and up-to-date FastPass information in each park.  Disney’s app also has the current wait times, maps and database of attractions.  While it did not have FastPass information, I did find that VersaEdge’s Disney World Magic Guide was more responsive while looking up nearby park information. Have some fun too Not every app is about managing your time and keeping track of where you need to be next. One of the fun apps will help you find the Hidden Mickeys ($7.99, Universal) all around the resort. You may have seen the book of the same title in various bookstores for about the same price, but the app is much better than the book.  Unlike the book, the app will show you how close you are to each hidden Mi

Apple's next iteration of iPhone software, iOS, is going to look tremendously different than all previous versions, Mark Gurman at 9 to 5 Mac reports. Gurman, one of the best Apple reporters on the planet, says the new software is going to be overhauled by lead designer Jony Ive. It's going to strip out a lot of the gloss and glitz that has defined the iPhone's software until now. In meetings with Apple employees, Ive has explained the decision to change the look of the iPhone by saying that some of the iPhone's current design elements will not stand the test of time, according to Gurman. Steve Jobs and iOS leader Scott Forstall were big fans of creating digital replications of real life objects in the iPhone's software. Thus, we have a "Notes" app that looks like a notepad. And we have a "Game Center" app with an illustration of green felt, replicating a Vegas gaming table. Ive thinks those elements will look dated in the long run, so he wants to create something that's cleaner, more true to the iPhone, and timeless. He also told people that he thinks the iPhone's software lacks unity. Using the aforementioned examples, you have a yellow notepad app, then a green and wood gaming table, then a calendar app that's silver, blue, and white. Ive is going to unify the built-in Apple apps, giving them black, white, silver colors, says Gurman. While Ive plans to redesign much of the iPhone software's design, he plans to leave the essential elements of how the iPhone works intact. Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook.Join the conversation about this story »

Technology holds the key to automating many of the repetitive and arduous tasks associated with housekeeping. It’s why products such as Nest, an intelligent thermostat that automatically adjusts the temperature in your home, have proven so popular. The next phase, it would seem, is building a human interface based on voice commands. Being able to simply walk through the front door and say, “turn the sprinklers on outside” would be pretty useful, but what if your house could also talk back? Tom Coates has taken the first step to realizing this utopia by building a Twitter feed for his San Francisco home. The ‘House of Coates’ account now posts regular tweets based on the temperature, lighting and weather, or if a plant needs watering outside. Just so you know, the Bedroom Light is now on. — House of Coates (@houseofcoates) May 24, 2013 It even mentions Tom when action needs to be taken. One example includes the line: “Hey @tomcoates, I just noticed some movement in the sitting room. Is that you?” Now, this setup isn’t designed to give Coates the ability to issue new commands and tasks. Instead, it’s just a rather novel way of receiving notifications about the state of his home, or chores that need to be completed. What’s really clever is that it uses conversational language; something that anyone can understand and interact with. It’s just hit 68 inside – that’s rather lovely. I’m pretty sure Tom will be happy about that.#Twine — House of Coates (@houseofcoates) May 23, 2013 Coates has a number of sensors scattered around his home to help identify and track all of this information. These include several Belkin WeMo switches to help control the lights, as well as a Twine device to track temperature and moisture. He then programmed all of these gadgets to trigger automated online actions using If This Then That (IFTTT), a free Web tool that can react on Facebook, Evernote, LinkedIn and a whole host of other services based on rules pre-set by the user. It’s not just brilliant, but a great bit of fun too. Even if you dislike the idea of having your own personal Jarvis from Iron Man, the Twitter feed is well worth checking out. We promise it’ll put a smile on your face. Image Credit: JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP/Getty Images

A Google security expert who has clashed with Microsoft in the past over how it discloses Windows security flaws is at it again. Tavis Ormandy, an information security engineer at Google, has found what he's calling "a pretty obvious bug" in Windows 7 and Windows 8. On Monday, Ormandy posted detailed information about it to Full Disclosure, a mailing list for security experts. Ormandy said he's written code that hackers could use to take advantage of the Windows flaw—known in security circles as a "working exploit". He isn't releasing it to the public, but is making it "available on request to students from reputable schools." This means other security researchers, not college students. Ormandy first published details about the Windows bug on Github, a site that lets developers collaborate on projects, in March. But he hasn't said whether he's reached out to Microsoft, which is standard procedure in these situations. Microsoft says it's aware of Ormandy's latest Windows flaw and is investigating. "We have not detected any attacks against this issue, but will take appropriate action to protect our customers," Dustin Childs, a group manager in Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing unit, told Business Insider in an email. We've reached out to Ormandy to see if he contacted Microsoft before his May 17 post to the Full Disclosure list. We've also reached out to Google for comment. As Windows security flaws go, this isn't a major one because hackers can't use it to take control of machines over an Internet connection. Still, because so many people use Windows, Microsoft will probably fix this bug soon. Security researchers usually contact the vendor first before they talk publicly about a bug they've found. But Ormandy and Microsoft have a rocky history. In 2010, Ormandy discovered a previously unknown bug in Windows XP's Help and Support Center, and posted a working exploit to the web five days after telling Microsoft about it. Hackers quickly figured out how to use it, and began attacking Windows XP PCs. Microsoft, which released an emergency fix for the bug, wasn't pleased. This sparked a big IT industry debate about how long researchers should wait after informing a vendor about a security flaw before going public with it. Ormandy, in a post to his personal blog last week, warned security researchers that Microsoft typically reacts to bug reports with "great hostility" and is "very difficult" to work with. They should only submit reports anonymously, he said. Please follow SAI: Enterprise on Twitter and Facebook.Join the conversation about this story »

Your move, Google, Facebook, and Twitter.

Crest Financial Limited, which owns more than 8 percent of Clearwire Corp. stock, is urging stockholders vote "no" on Sprint Nextel Corp.'s latest offer for the Bellevue company. "Crest reiterated that it opposes the Sprint-Clearwire merger because it believes that Clearwire would be better off if it remained a stand-alone company. Sprint's new offer of $3.40 in cash per share still significantly undervalues Clearwire — based on several measures — and was devised by Sprint in a way that unfairly…