Software & Apps - Page 109

Microsoft have outlined their vision for a single ecosystem of Windows, the vision will include phones and PCs and was outlined by Microsoft's president of the Windows Phone Division, Andy Lees who spoke at a keynote address during Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference on Tuesday in Los Angeles. Lees explains that there are key trends that are fundamentally changing the world of devices and form factors.

Lees, talking about Microsoft's first Windows 8 demo at CES said:

Mozilla's Firefox development team appear to be working faster than ever lately with a new alpha (Aurora) build 7 now available, less than a month after Firefox 5 Final was released to the masses. They sure are chewing through version numbers of late.

The new 7.0 Aurora (alpha, 7.0a2) build brings what looks to be a decent amount of new features and improvements. with reported optimizations including a faster startup time, faster rendering performance and less memory usage. The new build also has an improved sync manager for syncing up your bookmarks and passwords effortlessly and instantly with your other devices.

Other benefits include better font rendering When GPu acceleration is enabled and some new web and server tools that allow developers to build performance tests directly into the browser.

Just after the magical release of Skype 5.5 for Windows which included deep Facebook integration (why do I feel dirty saying that?), they've just launched their new solution for Apple. Skype 5.2 for Mac is now available and seems to be much better equipped than the 5.1 version that was released back in November of 2010. The new video is not only capable of group video calls (which was available in the November beta) but also share their screens during that call.

Screen sharing is already available for free on a one-to-one Skype call, but the new ability to share documents, photos, presentations and whatever else you choose with multiple people in a single session really makes the product shine. The downfall? To take advantage of the group video calling and screen sharing function, one or more call participants must have a Skype Premium subscription.

These subscriptions cost between $4.49 and $8.99 per month, with a day pass available for $4.99 if you only use it every now and again. The call control bar now includes video when you multi-task during a video call, this allows you to still see the person you're Skyping as well as being able to hang up or mute the conversation when you're engaged in a different program. Skype have also made it easier to find your most active conversations under "Recents" which is found in the sidebar and they've also added a "History" section where users can see those who are not as active.

As well as having just rolled out their Cloud based Office 365 service, Microsoft has just kicked out Service Pack 1 for Office 2010. This pack includes all public updates right up until now along with a handful of unreleased fixes which help improve stability, performance and security.

Here are some of the highlights :-

Following nearly 2 months of worldwide security mayhem which began with the breach and temporary (but painfully long) closure of Sony's PlayStation network, the hacker group responsible, "LulzSec" has indicated that it finally plans to withdraw its aggressive hacking antics and disband.

This group has certainly made quite a shattering impact in performing several high-profile security breaches and DoS attacks against the likes of Sony as mentioned, Nintendo and even the US Senate and FBI. Their hacking adventures have resulted in company costs well into the 10s of millions.

Having done wonders for their own egos and making sure they don't push it too far by ending up in a court room, it appears their intensive hacking spree has ended, with the announcement "After 50 days of mayhem, the LulzSec boat has apparently sailed its final hacking voyage" accompanied by a torrent named '50 Days of Lulz' posted on Pirate Bay; the contents of which had a mass of sensitive information including 550,000+ user details for the Battlefield Heroes Beta which were apparently provided ''to selflessly entertain others'. That torrent has now been removed from the site.

A few days ago Adobe released updated models of two of their tools, Flash Builder and Flex have been updated to version 4.5.1, boosting mobile application development support. The updated products support development of applications for various tech, Android, BlackBerry, RIM PlayBook and Apple iOS-based devices. The new upgraded versions of Flash Builder and Flex now cover all major mobile OSs for the first time with Flash Builder 4.5.1 and Flex 4.5.1.

Adobe said in a statement:

Tax time is nearly here, but this year is a bit different - smartphones. There are now numerous apps out there to help you all by using your fingers to do the work. First up we have my Tax which was developed by a chartered accountant. my Tax allows you to calculate your annual personal tax for 2009, 2010 and 2011; PAYG, GST and FBT; and salary sacrificing. my Tax also includes a loan calculator, a tax rates summary, pay calculator, a BAS calculator and a CGT calculator. PDF reports can be generated and printed directly from your iOS-based device.

Mozilla is ahead of schedule with Firefox 5 and have decided to release it early. It will be released "officially" on June 21st. Firefox 5 doesn't include any GUI changes with the design interface remaining identical to Firefox 4. Most plugins should have no issue working with the new version.

As June begins to roll toward an end, AMD are kind enough to release the next major monthly update with 11.6 WHQL. AMD report that this unified driver has been updated to provide enhanced level of power, performance, and reliability. The AMD display driver version is updated to 8.861. There are a few highlights of the 11.6 WHQL release:

Google have today released a new stable release of Chrome which they say brings improvements in security, privacy and graphics to the 160 million Chrome users. Chrome is now more secure thanks to enhancements that Google have made to their Safe Browsing technology. In addition to protecting users from certain malware and phishing websites, Chrome now warns you before downloading some types of malicious files.

The guys and gals over at Futuremark have thrown together a new update for 3DMark 11 that comes in at just under 17MB. The main happenings behind the update are just some upgraded compatibility features.

Windows President Steven Sinofsky has given the first live demo of Windows 8 at the D9 conference in Southern California, and it makes one hell of a statement. The first impression is the complete overhaul of the UI. Everything is touchscreen crazy but with the familiar feel of a Windows Phone 7-based handset. The Windows 8 homescreen is a bunch of tiles that lead to each app. Each tile displays information (such as weather, email, etc) and can be touched (or clicked) to go into it.

Google have just announced that the Chrome OS beta has hit R12 release 0.12.433.38 which includes Chrome 12 Beta, new trackpad, new flash player and several "stability and functional improvements over the previous release". This new release includes various security fixes:

Ready for some truly different news today? Look no further than the following HTML 5 music experience based on the Arcade Fire song "We Used to Wait." "3 Dreams of Black" is Google's latest music experience for the browser, written and directed by Chris Milk and developed by a few of the talented lot at Google. The song, "Black," comes off the album ROME, presented by Danger Mouse and Daniele Luppi, the track features Jack White and Norah Jones vocals and is soon to be released on the record label Parlophone/EMI.

Microsoft are doing a bang-up job on Windows 8, every week theres a new feature leaked and nearly every single one has sounded like a great idea and really adds to the upcoming Operating System. Today we have the "Roaming Option" which looks like it allows a user to link their Windows account to their Windows Live account.

Acer have launched their first 10.1-inch tablet running Windows 7 which provides the mobility of a tablet with the power and familiarity of Windows 7 - I introduce to you the Acer Iconia Tab W500.

A screenshot of the new Task Manager for Windows 8 has been leaked from Windows 8 build 7850. The new Task Manager is obviously not fully functional at this early stage in the Windows 8 game but we can still tell from the leaked screenshot that is is far different to the previous Task Managers in Windows 7, Vista and XP.

A build of Windows 8 has leaked and will become the first accessible build of the new Operating System from Microsoft that will be available to the public. Everyone has seen the leaked screenshots, as partners with access to Windows 8 builds on Microsoft Connect are slowly leaking stuff out - but this will be the first leak that anyone will be able to download.