MVTECH MVTECH (January 28, 2005)

By Kristine D. Dworkin

Explaining the weather

As an early tsunami warning system for the Indian Ocean is being discussed, a local company has already had a hand in helping scientists study such natural disasters.

Silicon Graphics (SGI) has a presence in major meteorological research, weather institutions and forecasting centers around the world, powering programs involved in earthquake research and disaster prevention.

The company's technologies are part of earthquake and tsunami simulations, volcano studies and earth sciences. Continued development of such technologies as SGI's supercomputers will help make it possible to not just understand weather phenomena but aid in disaster prevention.

For more information on SGI's meteorological innovations, visit: www.sgi.com.

Donations for tsunami victims

Software maker Veritas told its workers the company would match every monetary donation they make to tsunami relief through the Red Cross.

The company has pledged more than $200,000 to match the donations of its approximately 4,000 employees located around the world.

"I think it's our duty to step forward and help. This is just the beginning," said Cecily Joseph, executive director of the Veritas Software Foundation. "This effort is a reaction to the disaster but as rebuilding begins, we will all need to look for more opportunities to help."

To make an online donation to the Red Cross, Veritas recommends going to www.redcross.org/donate/donation-form.asp.

Doing taxes is a snap

Believe it or not, taxes can be done in minutes and for free. Financial software maker Intuit has unveiled some new online tax preparation options to make tax filing simple and easy.

First up is SnapTax, an online service geared toward 1040EZ filers. It's free to prepare and print, and it takes less than 30 minutes to complete.

For those with more detailed returns, there's a simplified version of Turbo Tax for the Internet. The tax jargon has been stripped away, leaving users with common terms and simple English questions to work with. The service also includes a "Custom to You" option that allows the product to adjust to the user's unique tax situation.

Check out SnapTax at www.snaptax.com and TurboTax at www.turbotax.com.

Manage your photos with Picasa

Are you a budding digital photographer in need of a cataloging system? Google has a way to help you find and organize all of those photos on your computer's hard drive free of charge.

It's called Picasa. The software automatically detects photos on a computer and adds them to a consolidated collection. Photos are dumped into one bucket, sorted by date and can be quickly pulled from date ranges or events as requested.

It doesn't matter how they got on your computer either. Whether they're transferred from a digital camera or sent as e-mail attachments, Picasa can detect images and add them to a photo collection. Picasa initially cost $29 but it became a free download after Google acquired the company last year.

Try out Picasa at www.picasa.com.
"MVTech" is a roundup of news from Mountain View's high-tech industry. Please send news items, comments and suggestions to Kristine D. Dworkin at mvvoicetech@yahoo.com.

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