Adobe has released a security bulletin today, APSB08-11, to address multiple vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player 9.0.115.0 and earlier, and 8.0.39.0 and earlier, that could lead to the potential execution of arbitrary code remotely. Additionally the update includes DNS rebinding attack and cross-domain policy countermeasures.

It is strongly recommended to update to the newest Adobe Flash Player version, 9.0.124.0!

Google isn’t just talking about hosting applications in the cloud any more. They’ve launched Google App Engine, an ambitious new project that offers a full-stack, hosted, automatically scalable web application platform. It consists of Python application servers, BigTable database access and GFS data store services.

At first blush this is a full on competitor to the suite of web services offered by Amazon, including S3 (storage), EC2 (virtual servers) and SimpleDB (database).

However,Unlike Amazon Web Services’ loosely coupled architecture, which consists of several essentially independent services that can optionally be tied together by developers, Google’s architecture is more unified but less flexible. For example, it is possible with Amazon to use their storage service S3 independently of any other services, while with Google using their BigTable service will require writing and deploying a Python script to their app servers, one that creates a web-accessible interface to BigTable.

The service is completely free during the beta period, but there are ceilings on usage. Applications cannot use more than 500 MB of total storage, 200 million megacycles/day CPU time, and 10 GB bandwidth (both ways) per day.

One current limitation is a requirement that applications be written in Python, a popular scripting language for building modern web apps (Ruby and PHP are among others widely used). Google says that Python is just the first supported language, and that the entire infrastructure is designed to be language neutral. Google’s initial focus on Python makes sense because they use Python internally as their scripting language.

Virgle

Google announces a joint project with the Virgin Group that aims to establish a permanent human settlement on Mars (http://www.google.com/virgle/index.html). This operation has been named Project Virgle. it also includes videos of Richard Branson as well as Larry Page & Sergey Brin on YouTube , talking about Virgle.

Dajare

Google launches Dajare in Japan (google.co.jp), with the mission of "organizing the world’s laughter."

gDay

Google announces gDay in Australia (http://www.google.com.au/intl/en/gday/press.html), a new beta search technology that will search web pages 24 hours before they are created.

Google Dialect Translation

Google announces Google 사투리 번역 (Google dialect translation) for translating regional dialects of Korean to and from Standard Korean.

Gmail Custom Time

Around 11:00 p.m. EST March 31, 2008, on the newer and older version of Gmail, but not in the basic HTML version, in the upper right corner, next to Settings, a link appeared labeled, "New! Gmail Custom Time". The link led to a 404 error before April 1st CST. It now leads to their latest hoax, Gmail Custom Time . The page claimed a new Gmail feature had been added that would allow people to date stamp their emails in the past, allowing for all sorts of mischief. Users would be limited to 10 Custom Times a year to minimize the number of fraudulent emails. Clicking any of the three links at the bottom of the page brought the user to a page indicating that Gmail Custom time was, in fact, their April Fools prank for 2008.

Google Calendar is Feeling Lucky

Google added the "I'm Feeling Lucky" button to its calendar feature. When you tried to create a new event, you were given the regular option of entering the correct details and hitting "Create Event," and also the new option of "I'm Feeling Lucky" which would set you up with an evening date with, among others, Matt Damon, Eric Cartman, or Angelina Jolie.

Google Wake Up Kit

Google launched their "Wake Up Kit" as a calendar notification option. The option sends a series of increasingly aggressive alerts, starting with an SMS message to your cellphone, and ending with a bucket of water dumped into your bed, which would then flip over, tossing you out (all using apparently free equipment).

Google Docs

A little easter egg was added, where a user can click the file menu and directly under new document is "New Airplane" which immediately opens a copy of a Google branded paper airplane