For a long time, Microsoft Office has been the reigning champ of office suites, but that doesn’t mean the free alternative, LibreOffice, isn’t worth considering. Let’s take a look at how the two compare, and if it’s finally possible to ditch the paid option for the free one. Read more…
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Battle of the Office Suites: Microsoft Office and LibreOffice Compared
With Apple’s next big iPhone event right around the corner , the rumor mill is churning at full speed. On September 10th, we’ll know if Cupertino’s nextcbig thing really is the long-fabled “budget iPhone.” For the moment, it’s still anyone’s guess, but here’s everything we think we know about the elusive iPhone 5c. Read more…
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iPhone 5c Rumor Roundup: Everything We Think We Know
In a tomb near Siirt in southeast Turkey, archaeologists believe they may have just found the oldest gaming tokens ever after dating them back to a whopping 5, 000 years young. Read more…
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Archaeologists Just Found the Oldest Board Game Tokens Ever
First time accepted submitter jradavenport writes “I’ve been keeping a log of the health of my MacBook Air battery for the past year, taking samples every minute I use the computer (152, 411 readings so far!). This has allowed me to study both my own computing/work habits, but also the fascinating rapid decay of battery capacity. Comparing it to my previous 2009 MacBook Pro, the battery in this 2012 Air is degrading much faster.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Studying the Slow Decay of a Laptop Battery For an Entire Year
With several companies developing technologies that can turn any surface into a touchscreen , it should be widely available soon. Those who want to try it out before it’s cool, however, should look towards Ubi Interactive’s software that combines the talents of Microsoft’s Kinect for Windows sensor and a projector. So long as the software’s installed on a Windows 8 computer, the sensor tracks and detects movements users make on the projected image. Interactions are the same as any tablet or smartphone, including launching icons by tapping on them and expanding areas with pinch-to-zoom. Merely a concept in 2012, the software is now available on Ubi’s website with prices ranging from $149 to $1, 499, depending on the display size and the type of customer support. Sounds like even an Average Joe can nab one, assuming they already have a projector and one of Microsoft’s $250 motion / voice detectors. Filed under: Misc , Microsoft Comments Via: CNET Source: Kinect for Windows , Ubi Interactive
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Kinect app that turns any surface into a touchscreen now available, starts at $149
A team of scientists using the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton space telescope have discovered a weird dead star , which hides one of the strongest magnetic fields in the Universe. Read more…
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The Mysterious Magnetar WIth an Insanely Strong Magnetic Field
Dawn Kawamoto writes “Cisco’s CEO John Chambers dealt employees a blow Wednesday, saying the networking giant would cut 4, 000 workers from the payroll. Not quite a death blow, but this 5 percent cut could leave some employees gasping. Chambers took the knife to Cisco last year, cutting 2 percent of its workforce.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Cisco Slashes 4,000 Jobs
I’ve been hoping that the compact but powerful new Mac Pro, recently announced by Apple, would come in at about the same price as the current model.
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The Mac Pros are "going to be expensive"
William Ward Google developers have confirmed a cryptographic vulnerability in the Android operating system that researchers say could generate serious security glitches on hundreds of thousands of end user apps, many of them used to make Bitcoin transactions. This weakness in Android’s Java Cryptography Architecture is the root cause of a Bitcoin transaction that reportedly was exploited to pilfer about $5, 720 worth of bitcoins out of a digital wallet last week. The disclosure, included in a blog post published Wednesday by Google security engineer Alex Klyubin, was the first official confirmation of the Android vulnerability since Ars and others reported the incident last weekend. Klyubin warned that other apps might also be compromised unless developers change the way they access so-called PRNGs, short for pseudo random number generators. “We have now determined that applications which use the Java Cryptography Architecture (JCA) for key generation, signing, or random number generation may not receive cryptographically strong values on Android devices due to improper initialization of the underlying PRNG, ” he wrote. “Applications that directly invoke the system-provided OpenSSL PRNG without explicit initialization on Android are also affected.” Apps that establish encrypted connections using the HttpClient and java.net classes aren’t vulnerable. Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments
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Google confirms critical Android crypto flaw used in $5,700 Bitcoin heist
Microsoft has announced that Windows 8.1 will be arriving on 17th October (well, in the US, anyway), confirming an earlier rumor of a mid-month launch. For some reason, the company’s specified an exact time of 12am on October 18th in New Zealand, which is 4am PT or 7am ET on October 17th. The free update will begin hitting your local Windows Store from that time, as well as “at retail and on new devices” on the 18th, depending on the market. Check out our hands-on for an idea of what to expect from the update. Filed under: Desktops , Laptops , Tablets , Software , Microsoft Comments Source: Microsoft
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Microsoft confirms Windows 8.1 launching October 17th