It's been a while since I brought you news of something frivolous in the online world, so here's something to make up for recent omissions. WhatDog is a web site that will identify the breed of a dog from a photograph. There's even a downloadable app, if you need to be able to identify dogs while you're away from your PC.

To get started, head to www.what-dog.net and upload a photo of your favourite unidentified hound. If you don't have one to hand, there's a collection of pictures on the site that you can use. Then just press the button and, within a second or so, the system will tell you the breed of dog in your photo.

Having tried the site on a few of my own dogs (including the cutie shown here), the results are pretty good although not always 100%. And believe it or not, the site is produced by Microsoft. Seriously.  Read More