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Yahoo Messenger Version 8 for Windows, which can be downloaded here, launched out of beta today.

The key new feature of Messenger 8 is that it is open to third party developers to create widgets that work within the client. Yahoo is reporting that 180 plugins have been created in the last month since the platform was opened.

The five most popular plugins are:
Pando: Easy, fast and reliable way to share large files – even folders – with friends, up to 1 GB at a time.
YEmote: Access ALL the secret and hidden Emoticons quick and easy. Click animated smiley to be insert automatically into your text.
Yahoo! Greetings eCard: Browse from a selection of eCards to send to your friend while chatting.
iTunes: iTunes remote for Yahoo! Messenger. Note: you need to have iTunes installed in order to use this plug-in.
Eazibo: The best way to interactively and instantly make flowcharts or diagrams, share photos and make annotations with your friend online connecting. It’s called “Instant Graphics.”

Yahoo Messenger is the second largest IM network after MSN, and even though Yahoo and MSN have announced interoperability (and continue to expand the beta group testing it), there’s still clearly a level of competitiveness between the two teams.

Download: Yahoo! Messenger

P.S. I tried the a new feature of YM wherein you can chat with friends using the Windows Live Messenger, unfortunately it seems that its not yet being implemented by either Microsoft or Yahoo.

A bit late… anyway the latest stable release of WordPress (Version 2.0.4) has now been released. There are a lot of security and bug fixes with this one (more than 50 of them). I will update my blog later on.

Link: Release Notes | Download

*Update : Just finished updating my blog

If you want a robust compression software then this one shouldn’t be miss.

In order to thank everyone who voted for us and made it possible for us to win this prestigious award, we are offering the WinRAR 3.51 single user license non upgradeable version this Sunday the 30th of July 2006 from 00:00 until 24:00 CET for absolutely FREE

Source: Neowin Forum

*Update. Seems like the site is being hammered. Anyway, you need to fill up a form t get the free license key. You can find it here.

Great news has arrived for anyone who programs with Microsoft tools and a Microsoft language: the MSDN is now free to download.

The download itself comes in three ISO images totalling about 1.6 GB. 

Link: MSDN

Intel has finally launched their new ‘Core 2 Duo’ and ‘Core 2 Extreme’ series processors this afternoon from their headquarters in California. Conroe desktop chip availability is set for ‘early August’ with the mobile Merom version arriving later on that month. Here’s a quick rundown of the desktop chips with prices listed in USD (sorry no PP prices yet):

Desktop Chips

• Core 2 Extreme X6800 - 2.93GHz - $999
• Core 2 Duo E6700 - 2.66GHz - $530
• Core 2 Duo E6600 - 2.40GHz - $316
• Core 2 Duo E6400 - 2.13GHz - $224
• Core 2 Duo E6300 - 1.86GHz - $183

Preliminary benchmark results are handing the processor crown back to Intel, with a middle of the road E6600 Core 2 Duo chip giving an overclocked AMD FX-62 a run for its money. AMD tried to upstage the Core 2 Duo launch by detailing its new 4×4 and K8L platforms, which promise to close the processor performance gap before the end of the year.

Benchmarks: Tomshardware | Anandtech | Techreport
Links: Arstechnica | CNet News | Reuters | Updated Intel Price List | Core 2 Duo Home

Title says it all. Virus researchers at Finnish security vendor F-Secure discovered the Netscape.com hack during research work around cross-site scripting vulnerabilities on social networking sites and said the attack was obviously the work of Digg fans. In the cross-site scripting attacks, visitors to Netscape.com encountered JavaScript pop-up alerts with comical pro-Digg messages and, in some cases, were redirecting Netscape.com visitors to Digg.

“Attackers (who are obviously fans of Digg) have used the XSS vulnerability to inject their own JavaScript code snippets into pages on the website, including the homepage,” said a note posted by F-Secure anti-phishing researcher S.G Masood.

Netscape released a statement this afternoon stating that the vulnerability had been patched and that visitors are once again safe browsing the site.

Link: F-Secure

This was being discussed in PinoyPC and P.L.U.G. I just want to share it with you. IF all goes well, the country will get its first open source bill, courtesy of Bayan Muna Rep. Teddy Casio. (more…)