Monthly Archive:: March 2013

"An early build of Windows Blue, the next version of Windows, has leaked online. Build 9364 has been made available on file sharing sites and includes some of the new changes that Microsoft is building into its significant Windows 8 update. Leaked screenshots show that the company is bringing smaller Live Tile arrangements to its Start Screen, along with greater control over the color personalization options. Other improvements include a number of new options in the Windows 8-style settings screen. SkyDrive options are present, which appear to show greater integration and control over device back ups and files. There's also an app settings section that surfaces options to change default apps and information on app sizes." Very welcome improvements - but unless there's significant speed and performance improvements, this is all for naught. Update: Woah, a 50:50 split view! They are listening! Update 2: Steve Troughton-Smith details that the split can be any size, and that you can also split three and four applications.

Paul Thurrot: "Tipped off by a reader, I checked my System log in Event Viewer today and what did I find but a stack of pending updates for all of the core apps in Windows 8. I'm not 100 percent sure this is what I think it is. But if we're right, it looks like 18 of the core apps in Windows 8 are about to get updated. Or, almost all of them." Foley confirms it. By far Windows 8's weakest link, so I'm hoping this is true. Especially the Mail application is dreadful.

"European Union regulators are examining the contracts Apple strikes with cellphone carriers that sell its iPhone for possible antitrust violations after several carriers complained that the deals throttled competition." Well paint me red and call me a girl scout.

"But a powerful new type of computer that is about to be commercially deployed by a major American military contractor is taking computing into the strange, subatomic realm of quantum mechanics. In that infinitesimal neighborhood, common sense logic no longer seems to apply. A one can be a one, or it can be a one and a zero and everything in between - all at the same time. Now, Lockheed Martin - which bought an early version of such a computer from the Canadian company D-Wave Systems two years ago - is confident enough in the technology to upgrade it to commercial scale, becoming the first company to use quantum computing as part of its business." I always get a bit skeptical whenever I hear the words 'quantum computing', but according to NewScientist, this is pretty legit.

Time for a correction - unlike what we linked to earlier, there's no official CyanogenMod position on whether or not they're going to support the Galaxy S4. "This morning, a comment from a CM collaborator on XDA was taken to be as an 'absolute' in regards to support of the S4. He offered the opinion of four TeamHacksung maintainers, their frustrations and lack of interest in supporting the S4. What's seemingly lost on those reading this is that his comments as an individual do not speak for CyanogenMod as an organization. As for the team's stance on the S4, there isn't one at this time, and most definitely won't be one before the device is sold at retail."

The Verge on the new version of Apple's Podcasts application: "For starters, Apple has removed the universally-panned 'tape deck' UI element that could be found when playing back a podcast." An angel got its wings today.

Change platforms. Whenever you can. Ever since I got into computing, I've lived according to a very simple adage: change platforms all the time. For reasons I won't go into, the importance of this adage was reaffirmed today, and I figured I'd share it with you all - and hopefully, get a few of you to follow this adage as well.

"An incident at the annual Python developer conference has led to allegations of sexism, death threats, the firings of two people, and - apparently - multiple DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) attacks." Absolutely bizarre.

Countries are starting to get into the patent business; countries like France and South Korea are setting up patent entities to protect domestic companies. "Intellectual Discovery presents itself as a defensive alliance: if a South Korean company finds itself targeted in a lawsuit, for instance, it can access the patents being compiled by Intellectual Discovery to hit back." I support this. If, say, a small Dutch company were to come under unfair patent aggression by bullies like Apple and Microsoft (quite likely these days), I damn well expect my government to protect them from it. If you can't fix the system, work with it. As simple as that.

"Microsoft today announced via its website the general availability of the Windows Embedded 8 family of operating systems. Extending Windows 8 technologies to a spectrum of edge devices, Windows Embedded 8 helps enterprises capitalize on the Internet of Things with the platform to capture, analyze and act on valuable data across IT infrastructures." So, this is NT-based, and not CE-based, right? Even though I'm currently researching and writing about Psion and Symbian, I'm dreading the day I have to sort through the mess that is Microsoft's mobile and embedded systems. Just check the page for Windows Embedded 8, and look at those names. The heck?

Nokia has gotten an injunction against HTC in Germany over a patent on a power-saving feature in Qualcomm chips (?!). Nokia's response illustrates why the company started its recent patent offensive: "Nokia is pleased with this decision, which confirms the quality of Nokia's patent portfolio." If nobody buys your phones and your business is failing spectacularly, you have to promote something else of value to paint yourself as an interesting acquisition target. Patents it is, then. If you can't compete, litigate. Update: HTC's statement is pretty damning.

"The Minuum keyboard, through its simplicity, improves your touchscreen typing. Existing keyboards leave you barely enough screen to interact with your apps, and you can't enjoy typing on them. Minuum eliminates the visual clutter of archaic mobile keyboards by adapting the keyboard to a single dimension." You have to watch the video. This is yet another example of a strength of more open platforms - like Android - that often gets overlooked: the ability to experiment with core aspects of the operating system. Whenever someone says there are no Android-exclusive applications, they conveniently overlook things like this. No other platform has stuff like this, and I certainly miss this experimentation on my 8X.

In an unexpected turn of events, we're seeing 'FUD' being spread about Microsoft, for once. Lots of articles on the web highlighting how the support lifecycle for Window Phone 7/8 and 8 is to end in July 2014, as if WP8 devices won't be getting any updates beyond that point. This already seemed unlikely early to me, and with my magical unicorn powers of, you know, common sense I already made the assumption that this only applies to versions 7.8 and 8.0 - not 8.5 or 9.0 or whatever the next version will be. WMPowerUser shares my unicorn powers: "On the other hand the OS support date is reset with any never version of the OS, so a Windows Phone 8.5 or 9 update in November 2013 would bring along its own 18 month of security updates. Microsoft has already promised all current Windows Phone 8 handsets will receive the next major version of the operating system."

The SkyOS website went offline last week following the expiration of its domain name. SkyOS was a thing way, way back in the day, but fizzled out due to disinterest from its lead (and only) developer. It's definitively gone now - I used to have virtually every release from 2.x onwards on discs here, but I threw them all out a few years ago. If you're feeling nostalgic, peruse our SkyOS news archive.