Software & Apps - Page 65

Some of you have been circumventing the default behaviour for Cortana searches in Windows 10, telling her to search the web with a browser other than Edge and/or an engine other than Bing. Microsoft is putting a stop to both as of today, in what it says is an effort to ensure the best possible experience.

"The result is a compromised experience that is less reliable and predictable," it explains in a blog post. "The continuity of these types of task completion scenarios is disrupted if Cortana can't depend on Bing as the search provider and Microsoft Edge as the browser. The only way we can confidently deliver this personalized, end-to-end search experience is through the integration of Cortana, Microsoft Edge and Bing - all designed to do more for you."

"Starting today, to ensure we can deliver the integrated search experience designed for Windows 10, Microsoft Edge will be the only browser that will launch when you search from the Cortana box."

At long last, Facebook is today releasing its new Facebook app for Windows 10 desktop as well as a Messenger app. On mobile, its Instagram app debuts.

The Facebook app is available now and features a smaller style layout than with the previous app, which was very in your face. This one is much more efficient for taking in a lot of information and navigating between different sections. As well, performance is much improved with snappy loading of images as well as between clicks. Feature-wise, it supports Live Tiles for at a glance updates, Reactions, stickers in comments, and you can share photos to it through File Explorer (click the Share tab at the top of the window), among other things.

The Messenger app is available now and of course features chat functionality, which is now separate from the Facebook app. Native desktop notifications are listed as a feature; in my brief experience, they're much more reliable than with the previous Facebook app. Live Tiles are also supported. Design-wise, it's now in line with the mobile app (complete with smaller font size), which happens to work well on desktop. As with the new Facebook app, performance is much improved.

Arguably the best Android Facebook wrapper app Swipe for Facebook gets even better today thanks to some major design changes as well as new features.

Changes in the new 3.0 release include major stability and performance improvements (the developer is awfully excited when describing just how fast this version really is), automatic day/night theming (so the theme will change from light to dark the longer the day goes on if you want it to), Material design (pro users only), new menus, copyable text, fingerprint authentication, and more.

The appeal of Swipe is it lets you use Facebook on your phone without the crushing demand the official app places on your hardware, thereby slowing the OS down and draining the battery quickly. The developer achieves this by 'wrapping' the lightweight Facebook website into a convenient app. If you'd like to give it a try, hit the source link.

Hand-off of tasks from mobile to desktop has become a bit of a blessing. It's easy to begin work, or even browsing Facebook, on your phone and simply start up where you left off on your larger and more powerful devices. For those that use various Apple devices, it's a natural element of those operating systems. And one that's sorely missed from Windows. Windows 10 might be getting similar functionality in the Redstone update coming this summer.

A user on Reddit seems to have stumble across what appears to be just that in the latest preview build of Redstone. A toggle was found nestled in the settings pane that would allow you to continue work on whatever device is running Windows 10, with Bluetooth, aside from using a cloud based solution like some applications and OS X do.

Though it's obviously limited to other Windows 10 devices, and could theoretically include the Xbox One, it's still a step in the right direction. You never really know or understand just how useful a future that is until you've migrated to an OS that doesn't fully support it. Just being able to select the mobile tabs in Chrome that I was perusing is quite nice, but this new take, with Bluetooth mind you, will be a much needed advancement for Microsoft.

Microsoft Office is already, arguably, the global standard for office suites, but that clearly isn't enough and even more functionality into its core. The latest insider preview build is letting you access AutoCAD files inside Visio and adding much better collaboration tools into the mix.

Build 16.0.6868.2048 for Office 2016 has been seeded to those in the preview program and seems to let you share and work on files while also chatting with them at the same time. You can make comments, talk about those comments, make changes, chat about those changes, highlight poor logic, chat about that poor logic, and review the entire project with someone from within Office itself. While chatting. The collaborative features are actually quite fascinating and make it easier to address changes that need to be made in real-time, from different parts of the world. Despite the sarcastic comments, it's actually quite nifty and very useful.

AutoCAD files can be imported into Visio and you can now add various elements to those files should you need to if you don't happen to have AutoCAD, giving you the opportunity to collaborate on those types of projects as well. These improvements, though slight, are only for the insider preview program and could be further refined, or even thrown out completely. The feedback they receive from the preview members should help, however. This is also only for Windows at the moment, Mac need not apply.

No more fussing with paid virtual private network (VPN) services to get your US Netflix or access blocked websites: Opera now builds one directly into its desktop browser.

The company says the new feature is a response to the demand for the service (24% of internet users have tried or are currently using a VPN), as well as a desire to offer something new for the web. No doubt much of that 24% will try out the new Opera and maybe even stick with it, if only as a secondary browser for the express purpose of accessing geographically restricted content.

Unfortunately it's only available with the developer build, but presumably it will be offered publicly before long. To grab the developer build, head here; VPN can then be enabled easily in the options menu on PC or Mac.

As reported last week, Apple has quietly retired its QuickTime software. While most don't use it anymore anyway, an important group still does: Adobe software users on Windows, which are now left hung out to dry.

The Adobe Creative Cloud team describes the situation as "unfortunate", and says it doesn't yet have an estimated date for when Adobe will have its dependencies worked out.

"There are some codecs which remain dependent on QuickTime being installed on Windows, most notably Apple ProRes. We know how common this format is in many worfklows, and we continue to work hard to improve this situation, but have no estimated timeframe for native decode currently."

In an 'it's about damn time' move, Apple is rumored to be in the process of renaming OS X to MacOS, which might be announced during its WWDC event later this year.

Apple talked about how it concluded product life spans for an Earth Day promotion, the company wrote: "years of use, which are based on first owners, are assumed to be four years for MacOS and tvOS devices and three years for iOS and watchOS devices" as determining factors, reports TNW.

TNW reports that it expects Apple to rename iOS to 'phoneOS' in the near future, with the 2017 iPhones - but I find that quite disturbing. Could Apple mature its smartphone OS and name it 'phoneOS'? Let us know in the comments, below.

Microsoft is making some changes to the usual BSOD page, which itself has been updated with Windows 8 and now Windows 10. The information contained on it, and what can be gleaned through logs anyway, can already tell you what happened with a quick search on Google (or, dare we say, Bing?). But now they want to make it a little easier, with QR codes.

This new system isn't quite active yet, but when it does go live, presumably with the next big release planned this summer, it'll connect the QR code seen above with a page that that'll explain, hopefully in easy to read terms, what happened and why. This could make it much easier to pin down problems with your build because things do happen and go wrong unexpectedly. Right now the landing page is generic, however.

Microsoft is on to something here. The information that you usually get is not always easy to sift through or investigate for everyone. Information can always be found, it's definitely out there, but the ease of use demonstrated here could make for a much easier and more convenient troubleshooting time. Not to mention it'd be far easier for customer support.

Apple recently pulled multiple Reddit apps from the App Store, apparently due to its wariness of not safe for work (NSFW) content. Narwhal, Eggplant, and Antenna -- among many other apps -- were pulled.

Many apps have since been restored after removing their NSFW options; the official Reddit app doesn't seem to have ever been removed, although it was required to axe its "Safe for Work Browsing" toggle. With this, it's clear Apple wants Reddit app makers to avoid custom options on that front and to leave it up to Reddit account settings instead, possibly because having such a toggle implies said NSFW content exists.

"This is a feature we previously refined with Apple's help. We were surprised by the notice," said a Reddit employee under the username ggAlex. "We just resubmitted our build. We were not informed that Apple would be removing other apps. We were very upset to see that they did. Honestly, if we were interested in getting rid of 3rd party apps (which we're not), this would be the stupidest possible way to accomplish it."

We already saw at BUILD 2016 that Microsoft has big plans for the future of Windows 10. Preview builds are already gaining the ability to play with Bash and Visual Studio 2016 is looking mighty fine. A new public roadmap points towards some new previously unannounced features that look very interesting.

The majority of these new features are business focused and also look to bolster cross-platform connectivity, but it also speaks to a more fluid user experience of the type that Apple has been pioneering. Except here it's a bit more productivity focused and not geared strictly towards consumption of media. It isn't a sign of more mobile devices taking over Windows, but instead of the recognition that we're inherently more mobile in how we interact with technology and this allows us to switch in a way that makes sense. Or potentially it eventually will. Have to start somewhere.

After struggling in recent years against the dominant Google, Mozilla has decided to give in somewhat and dedicate a six-person team to develop a radically different browser. The shocking part: Tofino, as it's called, is using an outside project Electron, which in turn is built on the Chromium foundation (which powers Chrome). With this move, Mozilla joins a long list of companies that have adopted Chromium, most recognizably Samsung and Opera.

Mark Mayo, senior vice president of the Firefox project says internal resistance to the shift has been vehement, to the point he's surprised the project got off the ground at all. No doubt it helps that the long-term plan is to adapt the company's proprietary Gecko technology and so replace Electron and Chromium, according to Mozilla engineer Kyle Huey.

Chrome accounts for 47 percent of browser usage; Safari sits at 13 percent, and Firefox at 9 percent, according to StatCounter.

Last month, the Windows 10 Twitter app offered up a dark mode, and now the whole OS is doing it. If you're a Windows Insider, you can grab the new 14316 build and try it out for yourself now. Note that some UWP apps won't be affected by dark mode.

That's far from all: also included is notifications customization (choose priority level and amount of notifications per app), native Bash support (for you Linux lovers), more cross-device Cortana syncing, a 'Find my phone' feature (locate your phone with your PC), a slew of bug fixes, and much more.

If you want the nitty gritty, hit the source.

Microsoft's new Action Center UI is official and sounding more exciting than ever.

Coming not just to Windows 10 PCs but to Windows 10 Mobile, as well as Android, it will sync all devices, so dismissing a notification on your PC -- whether for a text or something else -- will also dismiss it on your phone. You can do the inverse too on Android, either the old-fashioned way or through the Cortana app -- no Windows 10 Mobile handset required.

Nintendo has launched an app for Android and iOS in the US and Europe that lets you interact with your Mii and your friends' Miis. Miitomo, as it's called, features Mii creation, customization, photography, and social media sharing.

Also included: a minigame called Miitomo Drop where you 'drop' your Mii and depending on which platform it lands, you win a given prize (sometimes clothing). Drop costs coins which can be obtained through in-app purchases.

Miitomo can be downloaded here for iOS users and here for Android users.

Microsoft's new desktop app converter ensures that tons of legacy programs will now be folded into the Windows 10 UWP platform.

At its Build 2016 conference, Microsoft unveiled a new tool that will change everything. The "Project Centennial" app converter allows developers to easily convert legacy Win32 programs into Windows 10 compatible apps. This means that .exe and even .msi files used on older OS like Windows 7 can be seamlessly transformed into the AppX format used by Windows 10, and then be put on the Windows Store.

This is Microsoft's answer to essentially bringing over existing apps to the Windows Store, ensuring the storefront continues to grow. It's also a means of building up the Universal Windows Platform and solidifying Redmond's plan for a unified ecosystem. Microsoft didn't reveal an official release date for the Centennial App Converter, but it'll be available soon to members of the Windows Developer Preview Program.

The Snapchat team is looking to revolutionize online communication further with its Chat 2.0 update. One of the goals with it is to make speaking and video chat a seamless transition from text chat; one tap will now do the trick. But it goes further than that.

"You can start by sending a few chats, and when your friend shows up, start talking or video chatting instantly with one tap," they explain. "Your friend can simply listen if you want to sing them a song, or watch if you have a new puppy to show them. If they aren't there, you can quickly send an audio note to say what you mean. And sometimes, a sticker says it best."

"What we love most about the new Chat is how easily you can transition between all these ways of communicating - just like you do in person. When that's possible, you aren't texting, calling, or video chatting... you're just talking. We've been working on this redesign for a while - we can't wait to hear what you think!"

The much-hyped iOS 9.3 update hasn't gone smoothly on older devices (specifically, the iPhone 4S, 5, 5C, and 5S; and the iPad 2, third- and fourth-generation Retina iPads, and the iPad Air), preventing users who forget their Apple ID passwords from activating their devices.

As such, they've pulled the update and in the meantime, they advise you try to reset your password or disable the Activation Lock feature via iCloud.com or by connecting your device to a computer with iTunes. Another option is to downgrade to 9.2.1 by clicking Update or if that fails, Restore, but be warned: this may erase your data.

A new version of the update has been released for the iPad 2, so users should be good to go on that front. The rest of you will be taken care of "in the next few days."

Windows 10 Insiders get the benefit of some major enhancements to the Maps app today, namely to search, but also navigation and interface, among other areas.

For search, there's the new ability to conduct and view multiple searches simultaneously (e.g. see nearby hotels and restaurants at the same time, or see multiple directions at the same time), with the option to view them separately if need be. Algorithms are improved, too, which closer and better results.

Regarding the interface and navigation, navigation buttons are now at the top of the app on desktop and at the bottom on mobile, making everything more intuitive whatever device you're on; labels are now found directly on the map; elements can be hidden or shown at will; public transit routes are easier to follow with more precise instructions and an improved design, and Cortana will give you instructions when enabled.

Twitter is retiring the Tweetdeck standalone app, supposedly to "better focus on enhancing your TweetDeck experience." As of April 15, it will be a web-only application, although as Twitter reminds, Chrome users can pin it to their desktop by following these instructions:

Things get a little smoother between Twitter and Tweetdeck, too: if you log in to Twitter.com, that will also keep you logged in at Tweetdeck.com, so there's no need going forward to keep switching back and forth. This change will be slowly rolled out over the next few weeks about.