ROUNDUPS
For the record 03 May
03-05-2002
by Ralph Averbuch
Electric Paper launches on-line assessment tool for IT literacy | Security loophole detected in Macromedia's Flash player
Electric Paper, the Dublin based e-learning company, launched Net Assess on Friday. This is the company's first on-line assessment tool for IT literacy skills. Net Assess is a self-contained system delivered over the Internet that the company says requires no additional software applications other than an Internet connection.
Sir Reg Empey, MLA, Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland has paid tribute to the work of the Information Age Initiative, a group formed in June to help increase the use of ICT by all businesses in Northern Ireland. The group also aimed to support the rapid development of the ICT sector and create an improved environment for the growth of a knowledge economy. Since the initiative began its work, the percentage of business with Net access has risen from 40 percent to 90 percent. Details of the initiative can be found at the Leapfrog Web site.
Fujitsu Siemens has reported a 42 percent increase in sales despite what it called "challenging market conditions." The company also claimed its sales figures indicate that it is the fastest growing hardware player in the Irish market, beating big-name competitors Dell, Compaq and Hewlett-Packard. Sales of notebooks in the Republic were up by almost 58 percent when market growth was a mere 3.7 percent, one of the highest growth figures in Europe. Fujitsu Siemens Computers is based in Park West business campus and employs 50 sales and marketing people.
Adobe Systems Incorporated, the maker of the popular graphics package PhotoShop, on Friday announced that it received a favourable verdict in its intellectual property case against Macromedia Inc. The US District Court of Delaware ruling found "willful infringement" of an Adobe patent. At issue is Adobe's reconfigurable tabbed palette patent, which is its method of displaying and working with multiple sets of information in the same area of the computer screen. The patent allows users to customise how the functions in the product are organised on their workspace. Adobe was awarded USD2.8 million in damages.
Erkki Liikanen, member of the European Commission responsible for Enterprise and the Information Society, spoke in Switzerland this week, where he praised the successes of eEurope. In June 2000, EU leaders adopted the eEurope 2002 Action Plan, marking their strong commitment to accelerating Europe's transition to the knowledge economy. Liikanen pointed to a number of achievements of the initiative, including accelerating the decision making process in key areas such as telecommunications and e-commerce regulation, and making the Internet top of the political agenda in all European countries.
The third XML Ireland SIG (Special Interest Group) is set to take place on 14 May in the Institution of Engineers of Ireland in Dublin. The SIG will review the position of XML related standards on the drawing board including EBXML, UBL, SOAP, and WSDL, looking at how their emergence will affect current business practices. Anyone interested in this free event can find out more at the XML Ireland Web site.
A security loophole has been detected in the way Macromedia's Flash player uses ActiveX. It could let someone enter and run code of their choice on susceptible computers, reports a security advisory note published by eEye Digital Security Inc. late on Thursday. Macromedia is already offering a new download of the player which it says fixes this flaw.
Dubliner Lee Thompson is leaving his position as commercial director of Yahoo UK & Ireland in June. Thompson says he plans to return to Ireland. Yahoo UK & Ireland managing director Martina King thanked Thompson for his contributions to the company and said he had been a valuable Yahoo executive for three years. Thompson joined Yahoo after managing the launch, sales and marketing for UK Plus, This is London, Soccernet and This is Money, all of which are Associated New Media Web sites.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 