KIC E-News -- -Volume 3 Issue 1

January 5, 1999

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KIC E-News Summary

IN THE NEWS:

K'nechtology Inc.

Over the past few months, K'necht Image Consultants has reorganized itself into K'nechtology Inc. and there's more to it then just a new name.

With the new name comes a new focus. We have an increased focus on connecting business with the right technology and approach for successful Intranet and Internet projects, while maintaining our original focus on the corporate image and technology.

What does this mean to you? Simply better service and a more knowledgeable staff to serve your Intranet and Internet needs. Services now include hardware architecture, software solutions, in addition to the current services of information architecture, web site design, staff training and Intranet & Internet implementations.

Gecko (aka Navigator 5)

Netscape took advantage of the opening session of C|Net's Builder Live - New Orleans '98 to make public it's developer version of it's new browser, currently code named "Gecko".

Netscape promises that this browser will meet all the W3C's standards (A relief to all web developers). This next generation browser is not just a simple upgrade to Navigator 4.5, but a complete rebuild from the bottom up.

What is even more surprising is that the entire browser now fits on a single floppy disk (1.4 meg vs. 14-18 meg for version 4.5). K'nechtology Inc. is now busy testing the browsers and so far, so good.

No date was announced for the public version, but expect it early to mid 1999.

COMMENTARY:

C|NET BUILDER LIVE CONFERENCE - New Orleans

From December 6th to 9th some of the greatest Internet/Intranet minds gathered in New Orleans for the semi-annual C|NET Builder Live Conference.

As usual, the conference brought together the latest Internet/Intranet technology to an international collection of web designers, builders and producers.

Unlike past conferences a central theme was missing. However, this didn't stop the conference from delivering on its promise to be a premier web conference. On the contrary, the diverse range of topics helped expand everyone's knowledge.

If one dominant theme ran through the conference, it was the need for standards. Several sessions dealt with the problem of cross browser incompatibilities. One session that stood-out was a panel discussion between several members of the Web Standards Project (Glen Davis, George Olsen and Shane McCarron). Web Standards Project (http://www.webstandards.org) is applying pressure on the software manufactures to make sure their browsers are compliant.

With this in mind, Netscape released the developer version of its next generation of browsers "Gecko" (See story above).

Alan K'echt @ C|NETExpanding beyond the technology issues, were several sessions addressing issues that included information architecture and building web sites for International markets. The latter (which was presented by Alan K'necht) drew a standing-room-only crowd and promises to expand into a special interest group.

Also during the conference KIC E-News was on the lookout for the latest technology. Some items that caught our attention included:

All of these products were either announced during or just prior to the Web Builder Conference. KIC E-News is now in the process of arranging reviews of these products.

PRODUCT REVIEW

Reality Studio by Live Picture

Platform: Windows 95/98 NT 4.0
Web Site: www.livepicture.com

If you're looking to use the web to sell your product, then Live Picture's Reality Studio just may be the answer you're looking for.

This software package allows your web site visitor to view your product from all possible angles and even to control the views. Through a special algorithm, Object Modeler stitches your photos together seamlessly. Then a web site visitor using a Java based viewer (a plug-in is also available for higher quality results) can simply click and drag on the image to rotate it to all possible angles. If they want to see what the bottom looks like, they simply rotate the object.

One of the other modules PhtoVista allows you to create 360-degree vistas. The web site visitor even has the option to zoom in on any object in the vista. Using Reality Studio, multiple vistas can easily be connected, allowing you to create virtual tours (think of a house and your ability to view each room and to travel from room to room).

During our tests the software performed flawlessly while using the provided test image files. However, when we substituted our own images (taken with a digital camera) the quality of the final output was lower. (See http://www.knechtology.com/multimedia/dawsons/index.html). We made several other attempts with the digital camera, but were unable to replicate the quality achieved by Live Picture's sample files. KIC E-News believes that better results might be obtained through the use of transitional photos and a scanner. Unfortunately, time constraints prevented us from testing this theory and we have been unable to confirm this with Live Picture.

Even with these limited results, this product delivers on what it promises and it's potential to help businesses sell products on the Internet (I-commerce) is unlimited.

Ratings:
   Installation - 4.5 out 5
   Ease of Use - 4.0 out of 5 (some modules are easier to use then othes)
  Quality of output 3.5 out of 5 (See above) Overall 4.0 out of 5

For more information on any topic covered in KIC E-News or if you have a product you would like to see reviewed, please e-mail us at answers@knechtology.com or by telephone at 416.855.6351.

Please feel free to circulate KIC E-News to your friends and colleagues. Commentary is always welcomed and should be directed to answers@knechtology.com.

If you would like to find out more about K’nechtology Inc. please visit our web site at www.knechtology.com.