Microsoft Office Mobile for iOS quietly launches in the US, requires Office 365 subscription

After rumor upon leak suggested Microsoft was cooking up a release of Office for iOS, you’d think its arrival would be celebrated with streamers and cake. Making a rather low-key entrance, the app is now available to those with a small-screen iOS device and an Office 365 subscription. You can create new Excel and Word files from scratch, or view and edit spreadsheets, docs and Powerpoint files stored on Microsoft’s cloud services, or pinned to emails. Offline editing is also possible, as long as you’ve recently viewed or edited the file. You’ll also be able to see any files you recently accessed at home if your computer is running Office 2013 . You’ll need an iPhone or iPod touch running iOS 6.1 (there’s no iPad version just yet), and the app is limited to the US at the moment, but head to the iTunes Store source link for the full feature list. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] Update: Check out our hands-on . Filed under: Cellphones , Internet , Software , Mobile , Apple , Microsoft Comments Source: iTunes Store , MS Office News blog , MS Office Technical blog

Read more here:
Microsoft Office Mobile for iOS quietly launches in the US, requires Office 365 subscription

New OS X uses Windows file sharing by default

@darth News about the new release of OS X, ” Mavericks ,” is trickling out as developers and other WWDC attendees post information about it to the Internet. However, hidden a bit down in Apple’s OS X Mavericks Technology Overview document is an interesting tidbit: SMB2 is replacing AFP as the default file sharing protocol for OS X. AFP— Apple Filing Protocol —has a long pedigree that stretches all the way back to the Mac’s early days (and even a bit before that). Contemporary AFP piggybacks on top of TCP/IP for transport, but it supports a few Mac-specific things that other network file protocols don’t, like type and creator codes. These don’t matter as much as they used to, but OS X’s HFS+ file system supports a pretty rich amount of metadata, and AFP transports and preserves that metadata. But AFP isn’t particularly friendly to non-Apple systems, and no operating systems other than OS X support it natively. This wouldn’t be such a big deal, except that one of OS X’s killer features, Time Machine, only works over a LAN with destinations that support AFP. This is at least in part because of Time Machine’s reliance on Unix hard links, and also in part because it has to be able to ensure that any OS X files with HFS+ specific metadata are correctly preserved. This in turn means that third-party Time Capsule devices have to rely on reverse-engineered implementations of AFP to continue functioning, and OS X updates occasionally break third-party Time Capsule devices, sometimes for weeks. Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Originally posted here:
New OS X uses Windows file sharing by default

Killer Instinct returns as an Xbox One exclusive title

That’s right, folks. Killer Instinct is making a return to consoles. When it arrives, the title will be exclusive to the Xbox One . “We listened, and Killer Instinct is back, only on Xbox One” said Microsoft Game Studios VP Phil Spencer. No word on an exact release date, though, so we’ll bee keeping an eye out for those details. Follow our liveblog for all of the latest news from E3 2013. Filed under: Gaming Comments

Read this article:
Killer Instinct returns as an Xbox One exclusive title

Xbox Live will offer two free games per month starting July, includes Assassin’s Creed 2 and Halo 3

Kicking off Microsoft’s announcements, the company has said that Xbox Live will start offering free Xbox 360 games for its paying members, starting this July. In the run-up to the Xbox One’s launch, you’ll be able to pick up two titles each month, gratis — if you’re an Xbox Live Gold member. If it sounds familiar, it’s because it sounds faintly similar to what Sony’s PS Plus has offered its subscribers, albeit in a limited run. The Live UI on the older Xbox 360 console will also be getting a refresh, catching up with the more modern styling we’ve seen teased on the Xbox One. Follow our liveblog for all of the latest news from E3 2013. Filed under: Gaming , Microsoft Comments

View original post here:
Xbox Live will offer two free games per month starting July, includes Assassin’s Creed 2 and Halo 3

The NSA Mines an Insane Amount of Data From Every Tech Service You Use

Wow. Nothing is sacred. The Washington Post has discovered that the NSA and FBI have teamed up to tap into the servers of nine US tech companies—Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Apple, you name it—and have extracted e-mails, photographs, audio, video, documents and connection logs. They basically have free reign to take whatever they want. And they’ve been doing it since 2007. Read more…        

See more here:
The NSA Mines an Insane Amount of Data From Every Tech Service You Use

Microsoft says IE10 owns the coveted ‘most energy efficient browser’ title

Ever been concerned about the energy consumption of your web browser ? Us neither, but that hasn’t stopped Microsoft from ballyhooing that stat to sway you in favor of Internet Explorer . According to the latest tests it commissioned from Fraunhofer USA, IE10 uses up to 18 percent less power in browsing, Flash and HTML5 tasks than its main rivals, Chrome and Firefox. The company claims that translates into more than just boon for your battery life. Redmond goes so far as to say that if every single Chrome and Firefox user switched to IE10, it would save enough energy to power over 10,000 US homes for a year (translation: Google and Mozilla are hurting the Earth). We can’t and won’t vouch for the authenticity of that statement, but we do know that’s a lot of users we’re talking about. Filed under: Software , Microsoft Comments Via: Techcrunch Source: Microsoft

Read More:
Microsoft says IE10 owns the coveted ‘most energy efficient browser’ title

iPhone 4, iPad 2 Get US Import Ban

Bent Spoke writes “The U.S. trade agency has banned the import of older Apple iPhone and iPad models due to the violation of a patent held by Samsung (PDF). ‘The president can overturn the import ban on public-policy grounds, though that rarely happens. Apple can keep selling the devices during the 60-day review period. … Apple pledged to appeal the ITC decision. The underlying findings will be reviewed by a U.S. appeals court specializing in patent cases. … The decision could mean fewer choices for AT&T and T-Mobile customers who want to get an iPhone without paying the higher cost of the iPhone 5. Samsung told the commission that Cupertino, California-based Apple could drop the price of the iPhone 5 if it was worried about losing potential customers. All of the iPhones are made in Asia.’ It’s getting so complicated we need a scorecard to keep track of who’s winning these offensive patent battles in the smartphone coliseum.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Taken from:
iPhone 4, iPad 2 Get US Import Ban