ZOHO: Software as a Service

The future of Software would be in offering Software as a Web Service. This would allow Users to use Web based tools to edit, write, collect and publish online. Most of Internet Users has only seen a glimpse of this new reality via increased use of search engines, web-based social networking tools, image archives, blogs and online collaboration tools. But a lot more is coming in form of web applications offering flexibility, increased availability & affordability, less dependency, more usability and heaps of other rich features. In this Blog, I am going to discuss about the most popular web based Project from ZOHO.

Introduction

ZOHO is one of the brands from AdventNet, a software company started in 1996 focusing on building affordable software for businesses. ZOHO Services hosts wide array of online WEB based Office Productivity Suite and Collaboration Applications that runs in almost any Web Browser and can be accessed from anywhere in the world with an internet connection. Zoho believes in offering Software as a service (SaaS) which would have huge productivity benefits to individuals and businesses.

Technology Used

ZOHO requires nothing but a bare browser. To accomplish this, it uses AJAX and Javascript on the front end. This means it works with any web browser. On the backend it uses MySQl and Java. The Operating System used is Linux. The infrastructure is designed such that Services are always up and data is always backed up, secured and protected.

ZOHO Application Suite

ZOHO provides a complete suite of applications, not just for documents and spreadsheets. Its office type offerings include Zoho Writer(Word Processor), Zoho Sheet (Spreadsheet), Zoho Show (Presentation), Zoho Wiki (WYSIWYG wiki), Zoho Meeting (Web Conferencing), Zoho Notebook, Zoho Creator (to Create Online Database & Web Applications).

Zoho also offers web based Business tools such as Zoho CRM (Elegant & Affordable On-Demand CRM Solution), Zoho Planner (an online organizer with todo, reminders, and notes) and Zoho Chat (a group chat tool), Zoho Mail that includes an email client, shared documents, calendars and more. It also offers Utilities like Zoho Polls (for Surveys, Rating, Polling) and Website Monitoring Service.

ZOHO Application Features

• Zoho based Applications are Cross Platform, always up-to-date, require no physical purchase, no download, no installation and no setup.
• Zoho Applications have a polished AJAX (WEB 2) interface and are faster to respond.
• Zoho Applications are born with built-in collaboration abilities and with the potential to do many things not possible on the desktop.
• Zoho Applications are easily affordable (most of them are free), available all the time from anywhere in the world with an internet connection and a browser.
  
• Zoho Application supports Document Sharing (TAG), features are easy to find and readily exposed.
• Zoho Office supports keyboard shortcuts as you would expect in an offline application.

Is ZOHO Free?
So, how much does it cost? Like Google Apps, Zoho offers FREE Versions of its most of the web based services but hopes to tempt Business Users and Volume Buyers with subscription plans that sharply undercut Microsoft.

Conclusion

Despite of competitive services from Google Docs, Thinkfree and other players, ZOHO continues to dominate the web based application market. ZOHO has experience of five years in developing web based applications. With their expertise in this area, they are not only developing useful web-based services but continues to improve on what they already offer.

So What are you waiting for? Just visit zoho.com and establish a sign-in name and a password. Zoho recently allowed users to sign on to the Suite's various services with a single ID.

Zero Day Bugs exposed in IE & Firefox

Michal Zalewski, a computer security expert and white hat hacker published demos of four different browser vulnerabilities on the Full Disclosure mailing list. These Multiple vulnerabilities pertaining to cookie stealing, keystroke snooping, page hijacking, malicious downloading and content spoofing can be exploited by malicious people to compromise a User's System.

MSIE bait & switch vulnerability (page update race condition), has been rated critical affecting Microsoft's IE 6 and IE 7 (fully patched). This IE Vulnerability gives attackers a window of opportunity to run malicious Javascript to hijack the System. Firefox is not vulnerable. Click here for an online demo and technical details.

Firefox cross-site IFRAME hijacking bug was rated as a major vulnerability that could allow Malicious Coders to use Javascript to inject malicious code including keystroke snooping and content spoofing attacks, on pages that rely on IFRAMEs to diplay contents or store state data. Click here for an online demo and technical details.

Third Vulnerability targeting Firefox is realted to bypassing the Firefox file prompt delay. An attacker can download or run files without user's knowledge by using a sequence of focus operations that can be used ti bypass delay timers implemented on certain Firefox confirmation dialogs. Click here for an online demo and technical details.

Finally, the last vulnerability is a URL bar spoofing that affects MS IE 6 and could allow an attacker to mimic an arbitary site, possibly including SSL data. Click here for an online demo and technical details.

Mozilla is aware of both the Firefox bugs and Microsoft said the company's security team is looking into Michal Zalewski's claims.

Google acquired FeedBurner

Google has acquired FeedBurner, a Chicago-based company that provides media distribution and audience engagement services for Blogs and RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds. Feedburner provides an extensive feed and blog advertising network for online publishers to promote, deliver and monetize their content on the Web.

What it means for Google

Google feels that by acquiring FeedBurner it will be able to capitalize on the growth and expansion of its advertising reach. Google is a market leader of paid search advertising and has a huge network of websites already using Google's AdWords online marketing system which is the main source of revenue for Google. By having acquired FeedBurner, it can put ads in more than 400,000 RSS feeds that FeedBurner has and it can expand its AdSense Web site publisher network with the FeedBurner publishers. Google is planning to integrate FeedBurner's technologies with a number of its own products.

What it means for Avertisers
Google advertisers will benefit from an expanded ad inventory and ad distribution platform.

What it means for Publishers

Online Publishers and Bloggers would be able to insert Adwords into numerous user feeds, delivering contextual ads directly into the end users feed reader.

Links
FeedBurner FAQ
Official Google Blog