Yahoo extends e-mail search functions

Yahoo has announced the phased roll-out of new search functions for the company`s free Web-based e-mail service, reports CNET.

New features include the ability to search e-mail header, body and attachment content; display snippets or short excerpts with highlighted matches in search items; and view thumbnails of all the pictures and documents saved in an account.

The new search functions will be available today to a subset of Yahoo e-mail users, with general availability within the coming months.

The roll-out comes after Yahoo announced plans to overhaul its free Web-based e-mail service to make it work more like a desktop e-mail program.

There are rumours that Apple and Motorola plan to unveil a long-awaited mobile phone and music player next week that will incorporate Apple`s iTunes software, said a telecommunications industry analyst who has been briefed on the announcement.

The development marks a melding of two of the digital era`s most popular devices, the cellphone and the iPod, which has become largely synonymous with the concept of downloading songs from the Internet or transferring them from CDs.

Roger Entner, a telecommunications analyst with market research firm Ovum, said an industry executive had told him that the new phone, to be made by Motorola, would be marketed by Cingular Wireless.

Apple, Motorola and Cingular declined to confirm or deny the report but Apple did announce it would hold a major news event on 7 September in San Francisco.

McAfee has announced the availability of two hosted e-mail security services: the Secure Messaging Service for Small Businesses and the Secure Messaging Service for Enterprises, CNET reports.

The announcement marks McAfee`s entry into the enterprise hosted e-mail security arena.

Companies can reroute their e-mail to be filtered by McAfee and Postini with messages containing spam or viruses quarantined while the remaining mail is sent to the recipient.

Both McAfee services are based on the hosted e-mail scanning product sold by Postini of California.

Microsoft has released a beta of its next-generation Windows File System (WinFS), reports Vnunet.

A file system determines how data is structured and stored on a hard drive.

The WinFS file system promises to make it easy for the user to find and organise documents on the user`s file system regardless of their physical location.

Microsoft was scheduled to release WinFS as part of Windows Vista, but the technology was pulled from the forthcoming release last year August and will now be made available through an update in 2007.