Google points to a software update error that caused thousands of Gmail users to lose e-mail, contacts, and folders last Sunday, but for the unfortunates who were affected by the glitch, any explanation for an emptier inbox is cold comfort.

Thankfully, there are ways to save the contents of your e-mail account online and on your desktop, and I show you three of them in the video above. While I focus on Gmail specifically this time around, the principles are the same for any Web mail service that supports POP forwarding, as most of them do.

If you have a favorite technique I didn't highlight in this video, feel free to share it in the comments below. In the meantime, here are some useful links to get started.

• Backupify
• List of Gmail-supported POP mail clients
• Mozilla Thunderbird (Windows)
• Mozilla Thunderbird (Mac)

Originally posted at Crave

Hardware acceleration has become the holy grail of browser development in the past year, as the technology to increase browser performance by tapping graphics cards to help with Web site rendering has advanced from the theoretical to the practical. Despite Opera being a longtime developer and advocate of hardware acceleration standards, and the first major browser maker to demonstrate hardware acceleration in use, no publicly released version of Opera included the technology--until today.

Opera 11.50 (direct download) is a rough alpha, unstable, not for daily use, and limited to Windows computers, but it does have hardware acceleration. This means that JavaScript-based 3D rendering can be viewed using Opera, which basically means that highly complex, non-Flash-based in-site animation will be supported by the browser.

Opera promised in a blog post that its hardware acceleration will differ from its competitors. Unlike Internet Explorer 9's hardware acceleration--which is limited to Windows 7 and Vista, or Firefox 4's, which is fully available on Windows 7 and Vista but limited on Windows XP, Mac, and Linux--the way that Opera has built its hardware acceleration allows it to be used in full on any computer with the hardware to support it. This means that not only will Opera's hardware acceleration support Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7, Mac OS X, and Linux, but that Web-enabled televisions and devices such as smartphones will also be able to use it. Opera says that any device that uses the OpenGL ES 2 standard will work with it.

The current implementation of hardware acceleration in Opera 11.50 alpha is limited to OpenGL support. A Direct3D backend is planned for future versions and before 11.50 gets pushed to the public. You can see if your installation of Opera 11.50 alpha has the OpenGL hardware acceleration working by typing opera:about into the location bar, and looking to see if the "Vega backend" entry lists "OpenGL". If it says "Software," then your computer graphics card doesn't support OpenGL 2.x hardware acceleration.

Like most parents, I'm concerned that my kids get too much "screen time," what with the TV, computer, Wii, iPod/iPad, and so on. But if that time is spent reading, or at least flipping the pages of a book, I don't mind it one bit.

That's why I continue to be a relentless fan of children's e-books, which are increasingly abundant for iOS devices. Indeed, in the last couple of weeks alone, nearly a dozen new and noteworthy titles have arrived in the App Store. Here are the ones I think make for worthwhile screen time.

"Horton Hears a Who" and "The Cat in the Hat Comes Back": Two of my favorite Dr. Seuss titles just arrived in Oceanhouse Media's ever-growing catalog. Both on sale for $2.99, and in fact all the Seuss apps have been discounted from 25-75 percent off (this week only) in honor of Dr. Seuss' birthday.

"Jeremy Fisher: Buddy Edition": "The Tale of Jeremy Fisher" comes from Beatrix Potter, who, of course, is best known for "Peter Rabbit." I won't say this story has the same appeal, but it does offer an interesting gimmick: Buddy Reading, which leverages Game Center to allow a parent or other relative to read the story on one device while the child listens on another. Setup is a one-time hassle, but this could be great for the parent who travels a lot. The app costs $1.99; you'll need to buy it twice, once for each device.

"The Magic School Bus: Oceans": I've often found the "Magic School Bus" books a bit tricky to read aloud to kids, if only because of the heavy use of comic book-style word balloons. The app version ($7.99) solves that handily by highlighting each word as it's read aloud--and using different voices for each character. It also has photos, videos, a learning game, and interactive science lessons. Alas, it's for iPad only.

"The Penelope Rose": This decidedly girl-centric title ($6.99), also for iPad only, has a gimmick of its own: 3D artwork that doesn't require special glasses. Instead, you just tilt the iPad back and forth, which creates a very cool illusion of 3D. Beyond that, it's a beautifully illustrated fairytale about, well, fairies. And roses.

"Violet and the Mystery Next Door": Given the title, you might mistake this for another girls-only story, but there's appeal here for boys as well. The fourth book in the Violet series ($3.99) features choose-your-own-adventure elements and a big helping of interactive features.

Have you found any other children's e-books worth recommending? If so, turn the page (so to speak) and name them in the comments.

In the meantime, be sure to check out my previous e-book posts: 5 amazing iPad e-books for kids, 5 more amazing e-books for kids, and 5 fabulous holiday e-books for kids.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Opera Software and London-based phone maker Inq Mobile have penned a deal to preload Opera Mini 5 browser on several Android smartphones, as well as feature phones.

The U.K. will be the first to receive the models this month, followed by Australia and other European, Asian, and North American markets (Canada) in which Inq Mobile operates.

Opera Mini is known for speedily compressing and rendering Web pages through its proxy servers, an asset for feature phones in particular. In addition, the browser features tabs, bookmark sync, and a password manager.

Originally posted at Dialed In

Microsoft's Internet Explorer saw a boost in market share during February, while Mozilla's Firefox dropped, according to new numbers released by the Central Intelligence Agency and analytics firm Netmarketshare.

The shift can be attributed to a re-balancing of Internet users by location, which gave China a healthy boost, while taking away market share percentage from countries that had originally weighed in heavier, such as the United States and part of Western Europe.

"In February, the C.I.A. released new data on how many internet users per country there are. It shows a large increase in the global percentage of Chinese users and a decrease in the global percentage of users from the U.S., U.K, Germany, France and other developed countries," the report said. "These geographic shifts in internet usage have an significant impact on the global usage share numbers starting in February."

For IE, that impact amounts to 63.26 percent on Windows machines, up from 62.40 percent the previous month. Meanwhile, IE8 jumped up 1.03 percent, with IE9 gaining a modest .10 percent, and the IE9 beta topping 2.09 percent of Windows 7 machines. As for Firefox, the browser dropped by a little more than 1 percent to fall at 21.74 percent of total Internet use.

Alongside the numbers, Microsoft announced that the release candidate of IE9 had been downloaded 11 million times since its release in early February. A Microsoft representative told CNET that number includes upgrades from the beta and Web downloads. Combined with previous download numbers of the IE9 beta, the total tally is 36 million, which Microsoft says tops combined downloads of the IE8 beta, and its release candidate.

Net Marketshare said that country-level reporting has been unaffected by the change, and that the adjustment will correct inaccuracies with its reports. The company also reported that the new CIA numbers had impacted Mac and iOS Internet use reporting, causing slight dips despite neither platform losing users.

Originally posted at News - Microsoft

Impulse buyers, beware. Loopt is jumping on the deal-a-day bandwagon, pushing alerts for deeply discounted goods and services in its location-aware social-networking app for iPhone (iOS) and Android.

Loopt's new "Reward Alerts" program, announced today in time for next week's South By Southwest technology and music conference, will push notifications for instantly redeemable deals.

However, to keep its daily deal from being a dime a dozen, Loopt will push a few high-value deals at various times throughout the day. Deals are based on your location, possibly down to the city block if the provider wants, and begin and end in a flash. Discounts will be first come, first serve, and businesses can choose the quantity and time limits.

For example, Southwest Airlines will give away 10 round-trip tickets for the first 10 people to redeem them at South By Southwest. Microsoft will reward first responders with Kinects.

The rest of us will get our first opportunity with the deals in mid-to-late March. Loopt hasn't yet announced a general launch date. When it does, you'll be able to start receiving alerts by updating the Loopt app and turning on Rewards in the application settings.

Location-aware companies like Loopt and others have long had their eye on delivering deals based on one's surroundings as a form of advertising, but it took the meteoric ascent of Groupon, LivingSocial, Yipit, and others for the model to gain ground. Thanks to Groupon's purported $800 million profit, business owners are quick to climb on board with adverdeals.

Now all Loopt needs to do, Loopt CEO Sam Altman told CNET in a phone interview, is teach phone owners to anticipate and respond to push notifications for right-now deals.

Starting today, Evernote's popular note-taking app for iPhone and iPod Touch will have more than a few new features and enhancements.

The design is cleaner in Evernote 4 as a whole, and changes include everything from a revamped home screen and note-taking screen to new capabilities--like removing attachments you no longer want or need and adding multiple images at a time to a note.

Notes now appear in snippet form to provide greater context for text-based or mixed-media notes. More photo real estate is also visible for picture notes as the thumbnail view gives way to a full-width slice (pictured at right).

New notes are now controlled by the plus sign navigation button, which triggers a split-screen view. You'll enter your text in the top and attach or record multimedia (up to 90 minutes of audio) and tags in the bottom. If you're browsing for something specific, added filters allow you to respectively view all the photos, attachments, or maps.

Evernote has even more plans for future iterations of its app, including shared notebooks and formatting notes within the app.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas