Open Web Application Security Project

1The Open Web Application Security Project or OWASP, an open and free community around the globe, was purposely created to focus on improving the quality of security of application software. They wanted to make application security accessible or within reach to help people and organizations be informed of application security risks. Practically all are welcome to join this project. Everyone is invited to render participation for the welfare of those would be at risk with the ignorance of application security. They have an open source license and all their materials are available for free access. To make sure of the availability and continuous support for their work, they have the service of OWASP Foundation which is a 501c3 non profit charitable organization.

Web Application Form Design

Input elements should be organized by a logical group so that your brain can process the form layout in chunks of related fields.” –HTML: the Definitive Guide
It is quite rare in the Web application that doesn’t even make an extensive use of its forms for data input and configuration. But not all the Web applications use their forms consistently. Variations in the alignment of the input fields, in their respective labels, calls to action, and even their surrounding visual elements can support or impair different aspects of the entire user’s behavior.

About OpenSource.gov

OpenSource.gov provides its users a timely and tailored translation, reporting and analysis on the foreign policy and national security issues from the Open Source Center and all its partners. Featured are all the reports and translations from thousands of publications, television and radio stations, and Internet sources around the world. Also among the site’s holdings are a foreign video archive and fee-based commercial databases for which the OSC has negotiated licenses. The OSC’s reach extends from a hard-to-find local publications and video to some of the most renowned thinkers on a national security issues inside and outside the US Government. All the accounts are available to US Government employees. They register today to see what OpenSource.gov has to offer.

Web Application Components

1. Servlet – A servlet is a web component, managed by a container, that generates dynamic content. Servlets are small, platform independent Java classes compiled to an architecture neutral byte code and can be loaded dynamically into and run by a web server. Servlets interacts with web clients thru a request response paradigm implemented by the servlet container. This model, the request response  is based on the behavior of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP).

2. JSP – Java Server Pages are text files that contain text to be output (usually HTML or some such) and special directives, actions, scripting elements, and expressions that are used to generate results dynamically. Java Server Pages are textual components. They go through 2 phases: 1. a translation phase, and 2. a request phase. The Translation is done once per page. Then the request phase is done once per request. The translation phase occurs when Resin takes a look at the JSP page, reads it in, and creates a Servlet. And this needs to be done once only.

(Source:Caucho)

Yahoo:Version 1.0 Y!OS

(Photo Source:Yahoo)

Version 1.0 of what is being called Y!Open will be released at an unspecified time later this year, and will include a development environment for several properties, which includes a social “activator” and graph engine, an events engine, and a single profile for users. The activator engine handles combining the different relationship groupings, such as the Yahoo Mail e-mail address book, Yahoo Messenger contacts, Flickr friends, Yahoo 360, and Yahoo Mash. Yahoo will be careful to protect user privacy and won’t apply the information without user consent.

User Interface Engineering

By Ava

We give you the first of the Web series, the Web 1.0 applications. It is basically monolithic in nature. It is made up of HTML, only making use of amateur interface of a page-based model. This particular program is known to frustrate users seeing that it is far from being simple and easy to navigate. There are times when certain online applications could be made out using Flash but we all know that has its own dominion that is not a part of other web sites.
Flash offers a wider range of designs and is much more fun to make use of but because of its isolation, it is often rendered to be very limited in terms of functionality.

Flickr

By Ava

Yahoo offers the entire surfing population an access to a graphic or visual dominion at a much easier navigation scale compared to everything and anything else that came before it. For the first time the components of a Flash program and the user friendly nature of an Ajax is merged to create an HTML based program. The easy uploads and easier theme designs made Flickr an instant hit among the art world seeing that they are now able to share their creations in a much more tolerant not to mention popular market in the web. Flickr just changed the face of web applications forever.

Hulu the Fan Insider

Fan InsiderFan of Hulu, then why not get updates on your iPhone and keep tabs on your favorite videos as they become available. The app is designed to work well with the iPhone and look-alikes but as they say,
nothing works like the real thing. It is not in anyway affiliated to the video sharing site though as is made apparent by their description and is considered as an external app. Apple has pushed through with plans to support third-party apps as part of their support for the many people who not only support their products but have a knack of coming up with more creative apps and at a faster rate than their developers can. Read more…

Adobe Wises Up – Competes with Google Docs Sort Of

Adobe ConnectAdobe, the creator of the well renowned PDF file format has wised up and come up with the idea of going online to get their company some profit from the many people who want their documents converted to PDF format for distribution on the internet. Adobe’s PDF files are very much robust security wise and in other areas which makes the file secure and more amiable a format to send through the internet.
They have their own website that allows corporate companies to get monthly batches of files/documents for conversion to the PDF format that can come out from the basin $14.99 going up as volume increases. Adobe’s products have been in use for a long time and has become one of the most trusted in terms of document formats asides from the famed Microsoft Office formats. Read more…

Skype Admits it Knew About Screening

Skype, one of the net’s best VoIP providers admits through its president their knowledge of the screening process the Chinese government exacts on their system which scans for specific sets of keywords and other indicators that prevented specific content from being let through. This is according to their contract with the Chinese government that had very strict and specifically defined screening procedures to their search engine to which a program did all the dirty work. This gives credence to rumors of censorship of the Communist state that through TOM, the Chinese company that handled their local business had been given access to their API which were copied onto their own servers and made to process the screening of SMS messaging to prevent specific thing s form getting through. Read more…