Welcome to this website designed to provide access to a wealth of on-line information and resources gathered duting my research and teaching.

The search giant launches a system with web links appearing as soon as characters are typed into the query box.

The search giant launches a system with web links appearing as soon as characters are typed into the query box.

Google speeds up its internet search engine by launching a new product, Google Instant, that displays results as soon as users type in queries.

'Streaming results' will save two to five seconds on every 25-second query, says search executive Marissa Mayer – but SEO people may be less happy

Google unveiled a new version of its search engine on Wednesday night: Google Instant, which produces results before you have finished typing and offers suggestions for what you wanted to look for.

Marissa Mayer, the company's vice president of search and user experience, said that until now, each search typically lasts 25 seconds - 9 seconds of typing, 1 second in which the query reaches Google, is processed and sent back, and 15 seconds during which the user considers which search result to click on.

But with Google Instant the average search will be shortened by two to five seconds per query - which, given the billions of people who use the service every week, would mean 11 hours of searching saved every second.

The service began being rolled out to users in the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Russia on Wednesday evening.

However, like the playful logos shown off by the company over the past two days - on Tuesday a set of animated balls which evaded the cursor, and on Wednesday a grey logo which changed colour as you typed - the new system will only be available on modern browsers: Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8, Firefox 3, Google's own Chrome, and Apple's Safari. You will also have to be signed in to a Google account to get the results.

Older browsers, and users who are not signed in, will not see the auto-completing results.

Mayer acknowledged that the idea that the search engine might know what you're looking for before you finish asking it - in fact, which will begin offering results as soon as you type a letter - seems so bizarre that 10 years ago it was the subject of an April Fools' Joke by a large company. The company in question? Google.

"In 2000 we thought the idea of being able to search before you typed was so weird we made it our April Fools joke," Mayer, one of Google's longest-standing employees, noted. "Just 10 years later we're seeing that it's actually possible."

Users who begin typing will be able to get completed words from a single letter by hitting the tab key, or choosing from a list that will be presented as they type. The letter "w" begins a search which includes "weather" - one of the most common searches.

Mayer showed it off by typing "SFmoma wom" and was presented with a result for the painting "woman with a hat" at the museum - without hitting the return button. "The results are just streamed straight to you without you hitting the return key."

She added: "We're really excited about what Google Instant means for search - faster search, and providing results in real time before you've even had the opportunity to type your query."

But the impact could be dramatic on another group who have previously relied heavily on Google's old search results page. "Search engine optimisation" (SEO) experts have built a gigantic business from analysing what results appear for a particular set query, especially to Google.

However the new system, with its live updates of queries, means that it will be more difficult for SEO analysts to work out which results will do well from which query, because the results will keep changing as the user types. It will also be harder to examine the results mechanically.

The update also poses a challenge to Microsoft's Bing search engine, which has been very gradually growing its proportion of total search engine traffic - though it has now taken over providing the search results for Yahoo, meaning that it can claim 25% of US search traffic. Bing is struggling to generate profits for Microsoft: analysis of its results suggest it is spending roughly as much money as it is generating.

Danny Sullivan of Searchengineland, who monitors developments at Google and other search engines, commented that the requirement to be signed in "is sending up my alarms, because is this also just part of monitoring more?"

Google's chief executive Eric Schmidt suggested in an interview in August that "As you go from the search box [to the next phase of Google], you really want to go from syntax to semantics, from what you typed to what you meant."

In a blogpost, Mayer said that the capability will be rolled out to more countries and other platforms in the coming months.

• Google
• Search engines
• Bing

Charles Arthur
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

A survey shows a majority of web users have suffered cybercrime, but many respondents were themselves less than honest.

Premises across Europe, including a Swedish university, have been raided by police in a piracy crackdown

Google's logo shifts this week – a swirl of balls, then a grey emblem that colours as you type – are something more mysterious than the usual doodle fun

After teasing millions on Tuesday by turning its logo into a swirl of balls that would avoid their mouse, Google on Wednesday seemed to go the other way - offering a plain grey logo which only changes colour to the normal blue, red, yellow, blue, green and red once the user starts typing.

Experienced Google-watchers believe that the change of logo – and of the "favicon" which appears in the address bar where the web address appears from a "G" to a tiny globe when viewed with Google's Chrome browser (though not others) – points towards changes that the search giant is due to announce in San Francisco later.

Among the expected announcements are more search results per page, "live streaming" results which will update as people type, and changes which may make it harder for people to fool its indexing system and push undeserving pages higher.

On Tuesday Google was evasive – rather like its logo – about the purpose of the "bubbles" version, saying only that it is "fast, fun and interactive, just the way we think search should be."

The "Grey Wednesday" logo is also interactive, which hints that Google is going to change the way it organises its search results. It has already experimented with self-updating results, which change the order of results as people type their search query, using a technology called Ajax which is more commonly seen on its Google Maps page: there, it dynamically updates the page as the map is moved around or the user zooms in and out.

The search results pages already incorporate Ajax technology in the left-hand column, where you can choose form results including "Everything", "News" and "More" - the latter offering an Ajax-style dynamic update when clicked.

As "A Googler" suggested on Twitter, the "boisterous" doodle of Tuesday might indicate that it's "excited about the week ahead".

The announcement at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in San Francisco will include high-level speakers including Marissa Mayer, the Vice President of Search Products & User Experience, the Director of Product Management Johanna Wrigh, the "Distinguished Engineer" Ben Gomes, and Google Senior Staff Software Engineer Othar Hansson.

Mayer in particular has been outspoken about Google's intention to push real-time search: in an interview with The Guardian last year she noted:

""We think the real-time search is incredibly important and the real-time data that's coming online can be super-useful in terms of us finding out something like, you know, is this conference today any good? Is it warmer in San Francisco than it is in Silicon Valley? You can actually look at tweets and see those sorts of patterns, so there's a lot of useful information about real time and your actions that we think ultimately will reinvent search.""

However, the use of Ajax for Google results will be limited to modern browsers; it won't work older browsers such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6, which despite being a decade old is still widely used in corporations and organisations, including the National Health Service. Users of Internet Explorer 6 were unable to see the animated Google of Tuesday, or today's "colouring" logo.

That means though that people who use Google on newer browsers - including more recent versions of Internet Explorer, the Firefox browser, Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari - at home may be disappointed when they get different results at work. That may work in Google's favour as it tries to push its Chrome browser into greater visibility with organisations.

• Google
• Google doodle
• Internet
• Search engines
• Digital media

Charles Arthur
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Marc Cieslak takes a look at the new tablet and clamshell computers taking on the Apple iPad at this year's IFA technology conference.

Marc Cieslak takes a look at the new tablet and clamshell computers taking on the Apple iPad at this year's IFA technology conference.

Join Aleks Krotoski, Keith Stuart and GameBrief.com's Nicholas Lovell on Tech Weekly for a games special.

The panel bring you the latest on the 13-year struggle to take Duke Nukem Forever from idea to release – is a mysogynistic, two-dimensional games character relevant in today's more mature gaming culture? There's also a round-up of the headlines from the Edinburgh Interactive Festival: is 3D a gimmick, and is the games industry suffering from a post-modern identity crisis? And the team look back at 2010 with their business analysis of the UK games industry.

Also on this week's show, Jack Arnott speaks with Stephane Gravel, producer at Beenox, who are responsible for the mutli-layered universe in the latest adventure for Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions.

Don't forget to ...

• Comment below
• Mail us at tech@guardian.co.uk
• Get our Twitter feed for programme updates or follow our Twitter list
• Join our Facebook group
• See our pics on Flickr/Post your tech pics

Aleks KrotoskiKeith StuartJack ArnottScott Cawley

A web-based game designed to provide rice to the developing world has a facelift on its way to integrating with social networks.

Scientists at Northumbria University say they have carried out the first rigorous scientific analysis of dance moves that make men attractive to women.

Scientists at Northumbria University say they have carried out the first rigorous scientific analysis of dance moves that make men attractive to women.

Computer maker Hewlett Packard (HP) has filed a lawsuit against its former head Mark Hurd in an attempt to stop him joining database software maker Oracle.

Computer maker Hewlett Packard (HP) has filed a lawsuit against its former head Mark Hurd in an attempt to stop him joining database software maker Oracle.

Hewlett Packard files a lawsuit against its former head Mark Hurd to try and stop him joining database software maker Oracle.

High definition (HD) video is being used to assess how wave energy devices will affect the ecology of coastal areas.

The new Google service will bring the web to TV screens – the announcement comes a week after a new version of Apple TV was unveiled

Google will launch its Google TV service, which it intends will bring the web to TV screens, in the US this autumn and around the world next year, its chief executive, Eric Schmidt, said today.

In its sights will be a slice of the £117bn global TV advertising market – which it will want to add to its online advertising revenues, which totalled $22.9bn (£14.94bn) in 2009.

The announcement, just a week after Apple's chief executive, Steve Jobs, unveiled a miniaturised version of his Apple TV, which lets people rent films and TV shows, and stream content from YouTube, shows that the television set has become the new battleground for the two companies, which are also competing for market share in the smartphone and tablet computer markets.

On the latter topic, Schmidt told the closing session of the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin that Google will announce partnerships later this year with computer companies making tablet computers rivalling Apple's iPad, and that they will use Google's new Chrome operating system for computers rather than its Android product, which has been used so far on smartphones and a slew of tablet computers announced at the IFA show.

Schmidt said the Google TV service, which would allow full internet browsing via the television, would be free, and that Google would work with a variety of programme makers and electronics manufacturers to bring it to consumers.

But Google does not envisage becoming a programme producer in its own right, as that does not fit its model – which is to use other people's content rather than to create its own. The only content that Google produces itself is Street View, which has been the source of a number of privacy complaints in various countries.

"We will work with content providers but it is very unlikely that we will get into actual content production," Schmidt told journalists after his speech.

Google TV will consist of software written by Google embedded into hardware made by other companies: in the US, Schmidt said, it will launch on three products – an HDTV set and a Blu-ray player from Sony, and a set-top box from Logitech. Google will also run a marketplace for small apps to run on Google TV. The content will use Adobe's Flash Player, used on video sites such as YouTube and Vimeo. Demonstrations of the TV at the show suggested that it will look like a simplified computer interface, with widgets offering information about the weather, time and calendar, but also with links to web browsers, Facebook, email and YouTube.

However, there is still doubt about how easy it will be to integrate content intended for viewing on a computer with that for a TV set. Google's own guide for developers says that "all input devices for Google TV will have QWERTY keyboards" but adds that "users needs interactions that are fast and easy to do – at a distance, with one hand, in the dark." It also hints that people may be able to control the screen via a mouse, but admits that "mouse control is difficult" on a TV set that is on the other side of the room from the user.

• Google
• Television
• Apple
• Digital media
• Advertising
• Internet
• YouTube

Charles Arthur
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Mark Hurd, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, has joined Oracle as a 'co-president'

Oracle has hired former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Mark Hurd to help lead the database software maker in a pivotal moment in Oracle's 33-year history.

Oracle and HP are longtime partners, but Hurd's appointment as co-president of Oracle underscores the growing fissure between the Silicon Valley heavyweights and stems from Oracle CEO Larry Ellison's belief that his friend Hurd was railroaded out of a job at HP.

Oracle already had two presidents.

One of them – Charles Phillips, a former Marine and investment banker who was with Oracle for seven years – is resigning to make room for Hurd. The other, Safra Catz, Oracle's former chief financial officer, is staying.

Ellison said that Phillips wanted to leave in December, but that Ellison asked him to stay through the integration of Sun Microsystems.

Phillips was in the news earlier this year when pictures of him snuggling with his former mistress appeared on billboards around the US. Ellison said Oracle will miss Phillips' talent and leadership but that he respects Phillips' decision to leave.

Oracle said in a statement that Hurd will also serve as a member of the board of directors. He will report to Ellison.

Ellison praised Hurd's tenure at HP and said no other executive had more relevant experience.

"Mark did a brilliant job at HP and I expect he'll do even better at Oracle," he said. "There is no executive in the IT world with more relevant experience than Mark. Oracle's future is engineering complete and integrated hardware and software systems for the enterprise."

HP and Oracle have worked together for 25 years. The relationship is straining because Oracle now competes in one of HP's biggest businesses, selling the servers that power businesses' back offices.

Hurd's new job is evidence that Oracle plans to push harder into more areas where Oracle's and HP's businesses overlap.

The latest moves amount to little more than management maneuvering involving business celebrities, with Hurd and Ellison being two of the biggest names in technology, and Hurd's ouster from HP being one of the great dramas in Silicon Valley history.

In hiring Hurd, Oracle doesn't necessarily get everything he knows. Part of Hurd's severance package from HP which could top $40m (£26m) includes a confidentiality agreement that restricts what he can tell a future employer about internal HP dealings.

Still, what Oracle is getting is Hurd's ability to steer a sprawling technology company and find ways to make it even bigger. HP cleared $114bn in revenue in its last fiscal year, while Oracle had nearly $27bn.

Hurd is being tapped as Oracle undergoes a similar transformation to the one he spearheaded in his five years atop HP.

Hurd resigned from HP a month ago following a sexual harassment investigation. The investigation unearthed inaccurate expense reports connected with Hurd's outings with his eventual accuser, an actress and HP contractor named Jodie Fisher.

She claimed that her work helping organise HP events dried up after she rebuffed Hurd's advances.

Hurd, 53, who is married with two children, denies making any advances on Fisher. Hurd also insists he didn't prepare his own expenses and didn't try to conceal his outings with Fisher, which often included dinner after the events Fisher helped organize and that Hurd attended.

Ellison loudly came to Hurd's defense.

He called HP's decision to oust Hurd the worst personnel decision since Apple forced out Steve Jobs 25 years ago. Ellison said the HP board's decision to publicly disclose the harassment claim against Hurd amounted to "cowardly corporate political correctness", as the board had found that Hurd didn't violate the company's sexual harassment policies.

HP has emphasised that its board voted unanimously for Hurd's resignation.

• Oracle
• Hewlett-Packard
• Computing
• Technology sector

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds