Office 2010 SP2 Beta Released

Posted by David Bernstein

 You may or may not know that Office 2013 is finally out and that Microsoft is pushing you to upgrade along with Windows 8. But for the rest of us who are “happy” with Office 2010 there is a new service pack on the way and you can test it out for yourself now if you can’t wait.

Microsoft has released the beta version of Service Pack 2 for Office 2010 that will fix some issues as well as help with performance. Although they haven’t listed exactly what it will do or fix, it is meant to improve compatibility with Windows 8, Windows Server 2012, and Internet Explorer 10 as well as bundle some unreleased fixes into the service pack itself.

We are not sure when the final service pack will be released but the beta is set to expire on December 31st of this year so we assume the final will be out before then. Service pack support for Office 2010 ended in July of last year and support for Office 2010 itself is set to go through October 2015 for mainstream support and up to 2020 for extended support.

Windows Live Messenger soon to be dead

Posted by David Bernstein

Instant messaging has been around for almost as long as the internet and is one of the most widely used forms of communications today, especially when it comes to chatting with friends while at work. There are many instant messaging clients out there and many have been around for as long as we can remember. Many people even use multiple clients or a client that supports multiple types of IM connections.

Now it seems as though the ever popular Windows Live Messenger is going to be dying off and being replaced with Skype since Microsoft recently purchased the company and is pushing the Skype service with Windows 8. And speaking of the number 8, April 8th will be the day when Microsoft starts the phase out process.

How it will work is that you can download Skype and sign in with your Messenger ID and click on upgrade and it will uninstall Windows Live Messenger and get Skype up and running for you. Whether or not the migration will go smoothly when it comes to contacts and so on remains to be seen. English speaking countries will be migrated first and the whole process should be finished by the end of April.

Personal Computer sales taking a dive

Posted by David Bernstein

Just recently people would be talking about how many computers they had in their house and how they could not live without them. Well today that doesn’t appear to be the case since PC sales are on a downward spiral which is not good for PC manufacturers and this is because of the growing popularity of smartphones and tablets but more recently by government budget cuts in China.

Market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC) has been keeping an eye on this trend and is reporting that global personal computer shipments may decline even more than the 7.7% that was predicted before for the first quarter.  China is responsible for more than one fifth of the world’s PC shipments but these budget cuts and anti-corruption measures are having an effect on shipments and sales. Even Intel who makes a large majority of PC processors is feeling the pinch with sales down 6% from last December.

So if this trend continues it could either mean higher prices because of less supply or lower prices because of less demand. Then again you might be one of those people who gave up their PC in favor of your smartphone or tablet and don’t care either way!

Evernote is the latest victim of hackers

Posted by David Bernstein

Evernote is an online or cloud based personal organizer that allows you to set reminders and notes for whatever you like and sync the information between your computer, smartphone and tablet. So you can set a note on your phone and when you get to work the reminder will be there waiting for you.

This attack on Evernote has resulted in users having their usernames, emails and passwords stolen from a database that was accessed by the hackers. So if you are an Evernote user you should change your password right away. They are saying that users passwords are encrypted so the attackers would have to do some extra work to actually get to the stolen passwords but it’s still recommended that you change your password just to be safe. Evernote says that credit card information was not stolen because it’s not stored on their servers.

It’s estimated that Evernote has around 50 million users storing things such as notes, lists, reminders, web pages and itineraries in its cloud based system. Facebook was just attacked a week ago and other companies such as Apple, Microsoft and the New York Times have been victims of hackers recently as well.

Facebook News Feed update on the way

 Posted by David Bernstein

Facebook has many features that you may or may not use or even know about… or care about. But one of their more popular features called News Feed is getting a face lift. Facebook will be unveiling their new News Feed look on March 7th at their Menlo Park campus.

News Feed is the Facebook feature that updates stories and posts from your friends such as status updates, links, photos, videos and so on. It’s the feature that is most used and the first thing you see when you log in.

Facebook had originally been talking about new designs for the Timeline features but now it appears that they are focusing on their News Feed for now. These new changes will be taking place in the mobile versions of Facebook as well.

Part of the reason may be because they have just acquired Atlas from Microsoft which is a digital advertising company and now will be better suited to target advertising to Facebook users while using the News Feed feature. News Feed is where Facebook makes most of its money so it makes sense to update this before any other feature.

Outlook.com to replace Hotmail

Posted by David Bernstein

If you are one of the hundreds of millions Hotmail users and are used to the interface you have been using for years then get ready for a change. Microsoft is doing away with Hotmail and switching everyone to Outlook.com. They are doing this to push their Windows 8 style and way of doing things and Outlook.com does resemble the new Windows 8 look.

Microsoft beta tested Outlook.com last July and got a lot of feedback on what users liked and didn’t like. If you want to make the switch now all you have to do is log in to your Hotmail account and click the button to upgrade. If you don’t want to upgrade now then you will be forced to this summer. But don’t worry because all of your Hotmail items such as messages, folders, contacts, and rules and so on will remain intact so there will be no need to redo anything.

There will also be some cool new features once you switch over so it may be worth your while. Some things you will be able to do include sending huge email attachments, take advantage of cloud storage, connect with social networks, enjoy better spam filtering, see fewer ads and take advantage of Skype integration.

 

Adobe Flash patch released to fix critical vulnerability

Posted by David Bernstein

If you are running Adobe Flash on your computer, which you most likely are, there is a new patch just released to fix a security hole in the software. Without the patch there is a chance that a hacker can crash your system or potentially take control of it. This patch even applies to Mac, Linux and Android devices.

So far there have been attacks targeting aerospace companies via infected Microsoft Office documents by way of phishing scam emails. These documents have embedded SWF Flash Player flies in them which can infect your computer. And of course there are other ways to infect your computer such as having some malicious code on a website that utilizes Flash which can cause just as much damage.

This latest fix brings the most current version of Flash for Windows and OS X to 11.5.502.149 and the latest Linux version to 11.2.202.262. If you are an Android 4.x user then you need to be at 11.1.115.36 or 11.1.115.37 for Android 3 and earlier users. You can go to http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/ to download the latest version and get yourself up to date before it’s too late.

Secret Google Wireless Plan in the Works

Posted by David Bernstein
 

It appears that search giant Google may be planning an experimental wireless network at its Mountain View location. This speculation has started because Google has filed an application with the FCC for a radio station for an experimental radio service which will be located at their site.

This is leading people to believe that they are building a super-fast wireless network. The application shows that the system will have 5 to 10 base stations mounted on walls or ceilings and antennas also mounted on walls and directed towards buildings. Google plans to test up to 50 base stations and 200 user devices during a 2 year period.

The wireless experiment will use frequencies allocated to the Educational Broadband Service and the Broadband Radio Service, some of which Clearwire is using for its own mobile broadband service. Google could potentially work with Clearwire to deploy strong indoor coverage without interfering with existing cellular networks. This type of setup could allow people to access the internet on their mobile devices without using their cellular carrier’s signals but it most likely will be some time before we see anything that looks promising for us end users.