Ever wanted yourname.it.com as a domain?

Source: it.com Domains. the .it.com domain suffix is now open to APAC.

The .it.com domain is now available to the Asia Pacific region (APAC) though a partnership with GMO Internet Group, the 1st ICANN-accredited domain registrar in Asia, and it.com Domains, the official operator for the .it.com domain registry.

The new suffix offers the opportunity to create short and easy-to-remember domain names, instead of settling for leftover domains in well-mined generic top-level domains (gTLDs), it.com Domains said, and comes with the prestige of the .com root as well as an affiliation with the technology sector.

Yutaka Kirihara, GM of Domain and Hosting Business Division at GMO Internet Group said: "We are excited about launching it com as we can offer more options to our customers, especially with the IT-related businesses. We hope to work more closely together moving forward to promote brand awareness and to enhance market position as well."

GMO Internet Group has the No. 1 market share in Japan*, and its domain registration service Onamae.com commands the No. 1 market share in Japan's domain industry, with more than 33 million domain registration records**.

Explore

Visit https://www.onamae.com/campaign/itcom/ to register a domain.

*https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/registry-reports

**https://www.gmo.jp/news/article/9057/

Emirates launches Arabic mobile site

Emirates has launched an Arabic version of its mobile site. Customers using the Emirates mobile site in any language can book flights, check in online, upgrade their class of travel, as well as view and download Apple Passbook boarding passes to their smartphone.

The Arabic mobile platform has been rolled out simultaneously across 15 countries in the Middle East and North Africa including the UAE, Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco and Sudan, among others.

Sheikh Majid Al Mualla, Divisional Senior Vice President, Commercial Operations Centre for Emirates said: “Mobile device penetration in the Middle East and North Africa is steadily growing and we have been seeing strong usage on emirates.com from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Egypt and Lebanon. In fact, almost two million people access emirates.com from those countries each month, and almost half of them access our site through their mobile devices. We saw a clear need for an Arabic mobile site which would allow us to significantly improve the customer experience.”

In addition to its newly launched Arabic mobile site, Emirates also has mobile sites in other languages such as Japanese, Chinese and Turkish. By the end of this year, the airline plans to roll out mobile sites enabled in additional languages, including Korean.

Earlier this year, after the overwhelming popularity of the Emirates App for iPhone, the airline extended its mobile App for the Android platform to serve its customers who use Android enabled devices. Emirates was also the first airline in the Middle East to launch an App for Apple Watch in April.

Aptugo creates the web software you want, no training needed

Aptugo, a software tool which helps people with no programming experience to create their own websites, is now in beta* and will be available from 2015, say its developers, also called Aptugo.

"Aptugo will reduce the gap between large and small companies. It doesn't require knowledge of programming at all," emphasised Gaston Gorosterrazu, Head of Aptugo. "At the same time, having some knowledge allows the user to extend what they can do with Aptugo, as it is designed with the idea to empower the user and take him a few levels beyond." 

The Aptugo software is targeted at small business owners and can help them to tailor-make web software such as an online video library. Traditional software development is expensive, may not deliver exactly as conceptualised, and takes months. In contrast, the Aptugo tool guides users into developing their own software, completing it in minutes, the company said. 

Source: Aptugo. The Aptugo software.

Other advantages include:

• Support for different programming languages 
• Ability to reuse the basic structure in future projects
• Optimised for speed: Websites built by Aptugo respond in 40ms to 150ms without expensive hosting infrastructure. The Aptugo website is built on Aptugo, and a reflection of the response times which are possible.

Gorosterrazu said the software should deliver more value than its cost. "It will be 100% free for non-profit organisations of any size," he said.

View a video of how Aptugo works here. In the beta stage, Aptugo is limited to producing web applications in PHP. The ultimate goal is to support the creation of applications for any platform and operating system, Gorosterrazu said.

Existing registered users from Asia Pacific include those from the Philippines, India, Indonesia, and then Australia, Gorosterrazu added.

*Beta software is not fully final, so some features may not yet work as advertised.