Latest News in the category TheReg
A news aggregator from various RSS feeds, like technology, gaming, development and general news sites.
You know something's wrong when Clippy fills you with nostalgia for simpler times
It looks like you want to irritate Windows users. Do you want some help with that? There are some things that can't be unseen, including Microsoft posting a hand-drawn image of the company's infamous assistant, Clippy, on social media.…
2/5/2025
Workday erases 8.5% of workforce because of...AI
That's 1,750 positions about to join the employment queue and it's only February Workday is erasing 8.5 percent of its personnel under a restructuring scheme because… AI.…
2/5/2025
Palantir designed to 'power the West to its obvious innate superiority,' says CEO
Um, does anyone wanna switch seats? Palantir CEO Alex Karp says one of his aims when building the controversial spy‑tech company was to "power the West to its obvious innate superiority."…
2/4/2025
What does it mean to build in security from the ground up?
As if secure design is the only bullet point in a list of software engineering best practices Systems Approach As my Systems Approach co-author Bruce Davie and I think through what it means to apply the systems lens to security, I find that I keep asking myself what it is, exactly, that’s unique about security as a system requirement?…
2/2/2025
Even Windows 10 cannot escape the new Outlook
Microsoft fixes DAC woes and makes good on its New Outlook threat for Windows 10 There is mixed news for Windows users. Microsoft has released a patch it claims fixes the DAC problem. The bad news – for some users – is that the new Outlook for Windows app has reached Windows 10.…
1/30/2025
Canvassing apps used by UK political parties riddled with privacy, security issues
Neither Labour, Conservatives, nor the Lib Dems offered a retort to rights org's report The Open Rights Group (ORG) has raised concerns about a number of security issues it found in all three of the canvassing apps developed on behalf of the UK's three major political parties.…
1/30/2025
Citrix slated to axe its Technology Professional program
Advocates also cut as company focuses on 'priorities of our key customers' Citrix is winding up its Citrix Technology Professional (CTP) program, a move described as "a short-sighted decision that reflects a lack of vision for the future."…
1/27/2025
OpenAI's Operator agent wants to tackle your online chores – just don’t expect it to nail every task
Hello Operator? Can you give me number nine? Can I see you later? Will you give me back my dime? OpenAI on Thursday launched a human-directed AI agent called Operator that can use a web browser by itself to accomplish various online tasks, or at least try to do so.…
1/23/2025
British tribunal claim aims to take a bite out of Apple over App Store fees
Collective Proceedings Order seeks £1.5B from iGiant Seven weeks of court action began this week as a case over alleged breaches of competition law by Apple is heard at the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT).…
1/15/2025
Microsoft fixes under-attack privilege-escalation holes in Hyper-V
Plus: Excel hell, angst for Adobe fans, and life's too Snort for Cisco Patch Tuesday The first Patch Tuesday of 2025 has seen Microsoft address three under-attack privilege-escalation flaws in its Hyper-V hypervisor, plus plenty more problems that deserve your attention.…
1/15/2025
Allstate accused of paying app makers for driver data
Insurance giant sued by Texas for using surveillance without consent to jack up premiums, deny coverage Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Monday filed a lawsuit against Allstate Corporation and its mobile analytics subsidiary, Arity, alleging the American insurance giant conspired with mobile app developers to collect telematics data on millions of motorists without consent, in violation of consumer protection laws.…
1/14/2025
Oracle open source overlord calls it quits, leaves with big ol' pile of shares
38-year veteran Edward Screven led technology and architecture decisions since Sun merger One of Oracle's longest-serving senior team members, chief corporate architect Edward Screven, has announced plans to retire on a comfortable sum.…
1/14/2025
WordPress leader Matt Mullenweg exiles five contributors
WordPress.org accounts cancelled, dissidents told to fork off WordPress co-founder Matthew Mullenweg on Saturday deactivated the WordPress.org accounts of five members of the WordPress community, and justified his actions by saying it will encourage them to fork the open source content management system.…
1/14/2025
Google and Linux Foundation form Chromium love club
Right as Uncle Sam pushes for Chrome sell-off, eh? While Google awaits a decision about whether it will be required to sell its Chrome browser as an antitrust remedy, the search giant has joined with the Linux Foundation to announce an initiative to support the open source Chromium project upon which the Chrome browser depends.…
1/10/2025
Microsoft preps for a year of enterprise-impacting M365 retirements
Hey administrators – buckle up. 2025 is going to be a wild ride Administrators at Microsoft shops are in for a wild 2025 as Redmond prepares to deprecate and retire more than just support for Windows 10.…
1/9/2025
Haiku Beta 5 / In tests it's (Fire)foxier / It pleases us well
Simply the best FOSS desktop OS there is, outside of the Windows and Unix families Haiku still hasn't quite reached that magic Version One Point Zero line in the sand, in part because its developers are setting the bar much higher than that of any other FOSS OS.…
1/9/2025
Just when you thought terminal emulators couldn't get any better, Ghostty ships
HashiCorp co-founder's side project reaches 1.0 – er, 1.0.1 Ghostty is more interesting than it sounds, for several reasons: who wrote it, what it does, and the language it was written in are all more unusual than the ostensibly simple task it performs.…
1/8/2025
Microsoft's spat with ValueLicensing limps toward 2026 showdown
Legal tussle over resale of on-prem perpetual licenses kicked off four years ago The legal saga involving reseller ValueLicensing, Microsoft, and perpetual licenses continued through 2024 and is set for trial in 2026.…
1/6/2025
Honey co-founder's Pie Adblock called out for copying GPL'd uBlock Origin files
And, magically, a repo appears on GitHub with attribution Closed-source browser extension Pie Adblock was this week accused of copying code and text from rival uBlock Origin in violation of the latter's software license – the GNU GPL version 3.…
1/4/2025
Accenture wins £35M more UK tax work without competition despite promise to 'disaggregate'
System which went live in 2009 cannot be supported by another supplier, tax collector says The UK tax collector has handed Accenture an additional £35.2 million without competition on a £70.4 million contract which was never tendered.…
1/3/2025
It's been 20 years since Oracle bought two software rivals, changing the market forever
After lawsuits and poison pills, PeopleSoft and JD Edwards failed to resist the lure of Oracle's ambition Feature Twenty years ago next week, Oracle closed the $10.3 billion deal to buy HR and finance software specialist PeopleSoft after a fraught, drawn-out, hostile takeover.…
1/2/2025
Edgio bankruptcy results in endpoint change for Microsoft
That strange time between Christmas and New Year – perfect for changing production projects Microsoft left an unwelcome gift under the tree for .NET developers – an "unexpected" change to the distribution of installers and archives, which could hit production systems.…
1/2/2025
Microsoft investigating 365 Office activation gremlin
Says it's not sure what the issue is but points at admins tweaking licensing options It's not just you, there is indeed an activation problem in Microsoft 365 Office triggered by administrators making changes at the licensing level.…
12/20/2024
Guide for the perplexed – Google is no longer the best search engine
Seek and ye shall find Opinion Perplexity offers several advantages over Google as a search engine, making it a compelling alternative for many.…
12/16/2024
Doing business in US? Don't wait for state ruling on AI to act, warns former Senate chief of staff
Workday policy expert suggests NIST framework will save you trouble later The US House and Senate are unlikely to pass federal legislation on the use of AI in business, so users should focus their attention on a new NIST framework in lieu of state-level law, according to Workday's veep for corporate affairs.…
12/13/2024
Microsoft rolls out Recall for Intel, AMD-based Copilot+ PCs
More Windows Insiders get to see if the snapshotter is fixed Microsoft is widening the rollout of the Recall Preview to include Dev Channel Windows Insiders running AMD and Intel-based Copilot+ PCs.…
12/9/2024
Veteran Microsoft engineer shares some enterprise support tips
How to tell a customer they're an idiot without telling them they're an idiot Microsoft veteran Raymond Chen revealed another product support trick from within the corridors of Microsoft. This time, it's not about blowing on connectors but about avoiding casting some embarrassing shade on a customer's purchasing decisions.…
12/6/2024
Outlook is poor for those still on Windows Mail, Calendar, People apps by end of year
We're sure you'll learn to love the new Outlook for Windows app Microsoft is preparing to kill off the old Windows Mail, Calendar, and People apps by the end of this month and shift users to the Outlook for Windows app.…
12/3/2024
Microsoft preps big guns to shift Copilot software and PCs
IT admins be warned: 13,000 tech suppliers coming for your employer's checkbook Canalys Forums EMEA 2024 When Microsoft needs to make a market, it turns to the channel - a nebulous term used for resellers, distributors and an assortment of other independent third party suppliers that sell wares and services.And by goodness Microsoft needs more feet on the street than ever if it's going to appease investors desperate to see returns on the billions of dollars it's betting on Generative Artificial Intelligence.…
11/29/2024
Microsoft pulls text recognition from Photos app preview
OCR tech not quite ready for primetime, in this bit of Windows at least Microsoft has disabled the OCR functionality in its updated Photos app to "address some issues."…
11/22/2024
API error knocks PayPal, Venmo offline around the globe
It's fixed now, but aside from an error with the Braintree GraphQL API it's not clear what happened If you were planning on sending someone money via PayPal, or use it for business, we've got bad news: It's down around the world. …
11/21/2024
DoJ wants Google to sell Chrome and ban it from paying to be search default
Filing also suggests it sells Android, stops scraping content for AI without opt-out The US Department of Justice last night finally filed court documents proposing Google divest itself of Chrome – the most popular browser in the world by a huge margin.…
11/21/2024
BASIC co-creator Thomas Kurtz hits END at 96
Pioneering Dartmouth College mathematician died last week Obit Professor Thomas Eugene Kurtz, co-inventor of the BASIC programming language, has died aged 96.…
11/20/2024
Microsoft breaks timezones in Settings and calls on an unlikely ally for help
Control Panel hobbles to the rescue! As its Ignite conference kicks off, Microsoft is admitting there is another known issue with Windows 11 24H2. If you try to change the time zone, you might find it a challenge.…
11/19/2024
Microsoft unleashes autonomous Copilot AI agents in public preview
They can learn, adapt, and make decisions – but don't worry, they're not coming for your job Ignite Microsoft has fresh tools out designed to help businesses build software agents powered by foundation models – overenthusiastically referred to as artificial intelligence, or AI.…
11/19/2024
Will passkeys ever replace passwords? Can they?
Here's why they really should Systems Approach I have been playing around with passkeys, or as they are formally known, discoverable credentials.…
11/17/2024
Photoshop FOSS alternative GNU Image Manipulation Program 3.0 nearly here
Nearly 21 years since version 2.0 Version 3.0 of the GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is nearly ready for release. It has important new and long-awaited abilities – and you can try it now.…
11/15/2024
Microsoft Exchange update fixes security flaws, breaks other stuff
Flawed patch stops on-premises, hybrid server transport rules in their tracks for some Microsoft is pausing the rollout of an Exchange security update after it became clear that the patch could break transport rules for some customers.…
11/15/2024
Mozilla's Firefox browser turns 20. Does it still matter?
A former exec believes in the non-profit's mission, says the battle lines have changed Mozilla's Firefox browser clocked its second decade over the weekend, an event celebrated by Mozilla Corporation CEO Laura Chambers.…
11/13/2024
Mozilla Foundation crumbles as third of staff cast off
Firefox overlord to 'revisit' advocacy mission The Mozilla Foundation is laying off about a third of its staff. The non-profit org, which oversees the corporation that develops the Firefox web browser, insists it will continue its advocacy mission, though its approach may change.…
11/6/2024
Classic Outlook explodes when opening more than 60 emails
Don't do that, or risk a memory error Microsoft has confirmed that opening too many emails at once in Classic Outlook could result in the application displaying an error before crashing. But don't worry; there's a registry change to fix it.…
11/5/2024
Bitwarden switches password manager and SDK to GPL3 after FOSS-iness drama
Open source tool chooses to become more open than ever Fear not, FOSS fans. Bitwarden isn't going proprietary after all. The company has changed its license terms once again – but this time, it has switched the license of its software development kit from its own homegrown one to version three of the GPL instead.…
11/4/2024
Bitwarden's FOSS halo slips as new SDK requirement locks down freedoms
Arguments continue but change suggests it's not Free Software anymore The Bitwarden online credentials storage service is changing its build requirements – which some commentators feel mean it's no longer FOSS.…
10/24/2024
Here's a NIS2 compliance checklist since no one cares about deadlines anymore
Only two EU members have completed the transposition into domestic law The European Union's NIS2 Directive came into force on January 16, 2023, and member states had until October 17, 2024, to transpose it into national law. Yet many organizations still don't meet the required standards two years after it was approved.…
10/24/2024
Vivaldi gives its browser a buffing, adds a dashboard
Everybody needs more widgets in their life, right? Vivaldi has updated its eponymous browser – it now has a refreshed user interface and a dashboard packed with widgets.…
10/24/2024
SuperHTML is here to rescue you from syntax errors, and it's FOSS
Author would like to see a switch back to plain old static HTML. Us too Developer Loris Cro reckons his LSP language server for HTML is a world first, and that the absence of such tools up to now has had grave consequences for the web.…
10/23/2024
Socket plugs in $40M to strengthen software supply chain
Biz aims to scrub unnecessary dependencies from npm packages in the name of security Security-focused developer Socket announced on Tuesday it has connected with another $40 million in funding to further its efforts to safeguard the software supply chain.…
10/22/2024
Want to feel old? Excel just entered its 40th year
More senior than Windows itself, and still runs the world Microsoft Excel, the true successor to the throne of COBOL. Version 1.0 was released on the last day of September 1985, four decades ago.…
10/22/2024
Productivity suites, Exchange servers in path of Microsoft's end-of-support wave
Less than a year to go – is your enterprise ready for the change? Office and Exchange Server have joined Windows 10 in a march to obsolescence, with less than a year until support is cut for 2016 and 2019 versions.…
10/16/2024
Indonesia orders Apple, Google to take down Chinese bargain app Temu
Plus: Infosys stops sending job offer emails; Singtel outage; Australia to require ransomware payment reveals Indonesia's government last week ordered Apple and Google to remove Chinese e-commerce app Temu from their app stores.…
10/13/2024
Give your work an AI-powered boost
Level up your productivity with Gemini for Google Workspace Webinar Staying productive in today's fast-paced work environment requires innovative tools.…
10/9/2024
Thunderbird for Android is go – at least the beta is
A traditional-style rich email client – but for tablets MZLA, the company behind the Thunderbird email client, is finally putting its mobile email client app into beta testing – but it's a lot more mature than that sounds.…
10/9/2024
Epic judge orders Google to let rivals set up app stores
Chocolate Factory vows to appeal A US court has ordered Google to refrain from a wide variety of business practices the web giant uses to bolster its Play Store, as a consequence of its December 2023 antitrust defeat against Epic Games.…
10/7/2024
Office 2024 unveiled for Microsoft 365 refuseniks
For the IT professional who has to take work home The Long Term Service Channel (LTSC) version of Microsoft Office 2024 is being joined by a version aimed at consumers and small businesses that want to avoid paying subscription fees.…
10/4/2024
Google Cloud to help India export its Digital Public Infrastructure
Bundles free government apps to help digital diplomacy – and maybe find some new customers Google Cloud will help India to spread its Digital Public Infrastructure – the suite of government apps it offers to help other nations – through the development of a "DPI in a box" tool.…
10/4/2024
Bank of America app glitch zeroes out people's balances
What would you like the power to do? Not having an heart attack would be nice Some US customers using the Bank of America app to keep an eye on their accounts got a shock Wednesday morning when their checking and savings accounts were unexpectedly empty or out of date.…
10/2/2024
AWS must fork out $30.5M after losing P2P network patent scrap
No one really wins when a troll, sorry, assertion entity scores a victory A Delaware jury has determined that Amazon Web Services infringed two networking patents and now owes the current patent holder $30.5 million. …
9/30/2024
World Wide Web Foundation closes so Tim Berners-Lee can spend more time with his protocol
Who wants to join his so Solid crew? After fifteen years of fighting to make the web safer and more accessible, the World Wide Web Foundation is shutting down.…
9/30/2024
Extracting vendor promises won't fix cybersecurity. Extracting teeth might
One branch of tech has learned to work together to solve the near-impossible. Now it's our turn Opinion To say cybersecurity is mostly very good is like saying Boeing's Starliner parts mostly work – true, but you're still going to be sleeping in the office. Moreover, it's questionable whether either are getting any better.…
9/30/2024
Recall that Recall recall? Now Microsoft thinks it can make Windows feature palatable
AI screengrab service to be opt-in, features encryption, biometrics, enclaves, more Microsoft has revised the Recall feature for its Copilot+ PCs and insists that the self-surveillance system is secure.…
9/27/2024
Campaigners claim 'Privacy Preserving Attribution' in Firefox does the opposite
Tracking alternative is less invasive than other methods, but is opt out by default Privacy activist group noyb has filed a complaint against Mozilla over a "Privacy Preserving Attribution" feature that was quietly enabled in the Firefox browser following a July update.…
9/25/2024
Apple ropes off 4 GB of iPhone storage to house AI models
Carve-out expected to get larger over time, too Apple's on-device AI model, dubbed Apple Intelligence, will require 4 GB of device storage space, and more at a later date. That's about the size of an HD movie, for now.…
9/25/2024
Microsoft on a roll for terrible rebranding with Windows App
If you hadn't guessed, that's the artist formerly known as Remote Desktop Microsoft's breathtaking ability to rename things badly carries on with the Windows App, a hub to stream Windows from a variety of sources.…
9/20/2024
Disney kicks Slack to the curb, looks to Microsoft Teams for a happily ever after
Definitely not punishment for someone leaking internal data Updated There's no fairy tale ending for Slack at entertainment behemoth Disney following reports that the Salesforce-owned messaging service will be ditched in favor of Microsoft Teams.…
9/20/2024
Microsoft unveils Office LTSC 2024 for users that remain stubbornly offline
What do you mean you don't want Copilot and Microsoft 365 services? Microsoft has released what could be the penultimate perpetual licensed version of Office.…
9/18/2024
Python in Excel goes live – but only for certain Windows users
Mac and Android loyals: you can look, but no calculation for now Office power users, rejoice: Python in Excel is now generally available - provided you have the right license and machine. …
9/18/2024
IBM scores $45M zinger from Zynga in patent wringer
Big Blue’s Prodigy from the 1980s comes back to haunt FarmVille giant IBM's patent farm has yielded another bumper crop, with a Delaware jury awarding Big Blue $45 million in damages from mobile games maker Zynga. …
9/17/2024
The empire of C++ strikes back with Safe C++ blueprint
You pipsqueaks want memory safety? We'll show you memory safety! We'll borrow that borrow checker After two years of being beaten with the memory-safety stick, the C++ community has published a proposal to help developers write less vulnerable code.…
9/16/2024
Unity scraps hated runtime fees, hits devs with subscription hikes instead
Insert coin to continue Unity has decided to scrap its hated runtime fees and return to the old ways of billing, along with making some considerable price hikes.…
9/12/2024
As major web browser makers snuggle up to AI, these skeptical holdouts remain
Chatbots, generative models 'in many ways the next step in the surveillance economy' Web browsers now commonly sport AI services provided by on-device or cloud-based models. However, a few holdouts remain convinced it's a bad idea.…
9/10/2024
ServiceNow moves its backend off MariaDB to homebrew Postgres
Xanadu release also adds a Pro tier, along with lots more AI SaaSy workflow vendor ServiceNow has opted for a different database to back its applications, and will introduce it this week along with the new "Xanadu" release.…
9/10/2024
Apple accused of hoodwinking UK antitrust cops
Mac maker denial of Safari self-preferencing called out by OWA Apple appears to have misled the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in a regulatory filing that attempts to downplay competition concerns, according to Open Web Advocacy (OWA).…
9/5/2024
GNU screen 5 proves it's still got game even after 37 years
First major version in two decades is worth getting to know GNU screen is included in most Linux distros, but newer, fancier tools such as tmux often outshine it.…
9/3/2024
Microsoft partners beware: Action Pack to be retired in 2025
Windows giant continues march away from on-prem and into a cloudy future Microsoft is to discontinue the Microsoft Action Pack and Microsoft Learning Pack on January 21, 2025, sending partners off to potentially pricier and cloudier options.…
8/28/2024
Under pressure from Europe, Apple makes iOS browser options bit more reasonable
Cupertino quits screwing around with defaults – for those in the EU Analysis Apple has agreed to change the way it implements web browser choice screens and browser capabilities to comply with Europe's monopoly-busting Digital Markets Act.…
8/24/2024
Feds, US states sue RealPage for building rent-hiking software for landlords
Algorithm just a fancy way to collude using private info, prosecutors say The Justice Department and the Attorneys General of eight states in the US on Friday filed a civil antitrust complaint against real estate service firm RealPage for providing landlords with software that maximizes rent at the expense of renters.…
8/23/2024
LibreOffice 24.8: Handy even if you're happy with Microsoft
Mature, stable – and can rescue corrupt files The second LibreOffice release of 2024 is here, with additional spreadsheet functions, improved presentation layouts, better searching, and more.…
8/23/2024
Chrome dumped support for Ubuntu 18.04 – but it'll be back
Complaints about lack of notice plus an inquiry from El Reg prompt U-turn by web giant Google Chrome 128, released on Wednesday, does not function without intervention on Ubuntu Linux 18.04 LTS "Bionic Beaver," and Google initially had no plans to fix it.…
8/22/2024
Microsoft rolls out one Teams app to rule them all
That annoying requirement to switch between home and work accounts has finally gone Microsoft has released a unified Teams app, doing away with the requirement to have one app for work or education and another for personal use.…
8/21/2024
Open source biz promises to slash bills with observability-as-a-service in the cloud
AWS first, others to follow VictoriaMetrics has become the latest open source company to offer a hosted product, claiming around five times the savings for customers.…
8/20/2024
Apple is coming to take 30% cut of new Patreon subs on iOS
You don't get to be the biggest business in the world by being nice Patreon today said Apple will soon take a 30 percent cut of new subscriptions bought via its iOS app.…
8/12/2024
It's all drying up: Microsoft to erase 3D Paint from digital store
Unloved multi dimensional doodler set for axe as its predecessor gets an AI update Microsoft has hammered home a final nail in the coffin of its Mixed Reality adventures with confirmation that Paint 3D is to be ditched once and for all in the not-too-distant-future.…
8/12/2024
Twilio's Segment SDK challenged with wiretapping claim
Mobile app analytics software said to surreptitiously snarf data Twilio, a communications service provider, was sued on Thursday based on allegations that the developer's Segment software siphons data from mobile apps without consent.…
8/9/2024
Apple tries again to make EU DMA officials happy – with new fees
Meanwhile, UK watchdog contemplates breaking Cupertino's WebKit rule Apple this week revised its alternative contractual terms for devs selling apps in the European Union – a revision that was immediately dismissed by critics as more "malicious compliance."…
8/9/2024
Anaconda puts the squeeze on data scientists now deemed to be terms-of-service violators
Academic, non-profit organizations told to start paying up – or else Updated Research and academic organizations are just now finding out that they will have to pay for software made by Anaconda, when for years these groups were under the impression it could be used at no cost.…
8/8/2024
AMD hopes to unlock MI300’s full potential with fresh code
Devs invited to ROCm out with FP8 precision, quantize to their heart's delight AMD today released the latest version of ROCm, claiming the improved software will bring about strong performance boosts for its Instinct GPU family.…
8/6/2024
WordStar 7, the last ever DOS version, is re-released for free
The preferred tool of Arthur C Clarke, Anne Rice and George R R Martin Before WordPerfect, the most popular work processor was WordStar. Now, the last ever DOS version has been bundled and set free by one of its biggest fans.…
8/6/2024
Chrome Web Store warns end is nigh for uBlock Origin
Will you see the Lite? Back in June, Google's Chrome Web Store began alerting users of uBlock Origin who had developer-oriented versions of Chrome that the popular ad-filtering extension could soon stop working.…
8/6/2024
Google paying to be default search on phones is totally against antitrust law, judge rules
Web giant to seek second opinion after bench labels biz 'a monopolist' in DoJ win Google's payments to make its search engine the default for smartphone browsers and elsewhere broke US antitrust law, a federal judge ruled Monday.…
8/5/2024
What AI bubble? Groq rakes in $640M to grow inference cloud
In the gold rush, be the one handing out the shovels Even as at least some investors begin to question the return on investment of AI infrastructure and services, venture capitalists appear to be doubling down. On Monday, AI chip startup Groq — not to be confused with xAI's Grok chatbot — announced it had scored $640 million in series-D funding to bolster its inference cloud.…
8/5/2024
Stock-trading apps fall under the feet of stampeding panicking investors
They're doing you a favor, probably best not to look today As stock markets suffered a bit of a wobble today, share-trading apps and sites fell over as investors barreled in to see how badly their portfolios had been hit.…
8/5/2024
Anaconda's Python-for-Excel escapes Azure Cloud, heads for your PC
Badger, badger, badger your CIO to let you use this, perhaps Anaconda, the maker and distributor of data science tools, has unleashed a public beta of Anaconda Code that enables Python code to be run locally within Microsoft Excel.…
8/5/2024
Atlassian softens its cloud-first approach for remaining on-prem customers
Happy to have 'em go hybrid as it wises up to the enterprise Fresh from moving its smaller customers off its server-based products onto and into its cloud, Atlassian has softened its cloud-first approach after recognizing that its larger customers can't or won't go there in a hurry – if ever.…
8/5/2024
DARPA suggests turning old C code automatically into Rust – using AI, of course
Who wants to make a TRACTOR pull request? To accelerate the transition to memory safe programming languages, the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is driving the development of TRACTOR, a programmatic code conversion vehicle.…
8/3/2024
Skype goes ad-free, which is unusual for Microsoft
Feedback prioritized, unless it's about a feature customers really miss Microsoft has announced an ad-free update for Skype, now headed to testers in the company's Insider program. However, this update is unlikely to appease users who are still missing features previously dropped from the once-premier chat app.…
7/31/2024
No love lost between Apple and Nvidia as iGiant chooses Google chips for AI training
Things are getting Tensor between Cupertino and Nv Apple has detailed in a research paper how it trained its latest generative AI models using Google's neural-network accelerators rather than, say, more fashionable Nvidia hardware.…
7/30/2024
W3C says Google's cookie climbdown 'undermines' a lot of work
While some celebrate, the World Wide Web Consortium Technical Architecture Group is not happy The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has published a blog criticizing Google's climbdown over the deprecation of third-party cookies, declaring that the move "undermines a lot of the work we've done together."…
7/30/2024
How deliciously binary: AI has yet to pay off – or is transforming business
Calculating ROI of neural networks turns out to be rather complicated Feature The tech industry's enthusiasm for artificial intelligence software – a conveniently amorphous term – has yet to generate much of an economic windfall.…
7/30/2024
Latest update for 'extremely fast' compression algorithm LZ4 sprints past old versions
New release does something you might have thought it already did The new version of the high-speed compression algorithm LZ4 gets a big speed boost – nearly an order of magnitude.…
7/30/2024
Meta's AI safety system defeated by the space bar
'Ignore previous instructions' thwarts Prompt-Guard model if you just add some good ol' ASCII code 32 Meta's machine-learning model for detecting prompt injection attacks – special prompts to make neural networks behave inappropriately – is itself vulnerable to, you guessed it, prompt injection attacks.…
7/29/2024
A blueprint for hybrid working
Partner Content Hybrid working is an increasingly important component of a successful modern business strategy.…
7/26/2024
Apple Maps escapes orchard into web browser wilds
Chrome and Edge on Windows can now join the fun Apple has introduced its mapping technology to devices outside its ecosystem with a web version that works in Chrome and Edge on Windows PCs.…
7/25/2024
Adobe exec likened hidden cloud subscription exit fees to 'heroin', says FTC
Read the unredacted complaint against Photoshop giant and its software plans Adobe's controversial billing practices and punitive fees for those terminating their subscriptions early follow from the software titan's addiction to revenue, the FTC has said.…
7/25/2024
X.org lone ranger rides to rescue multi-monitor refresh rates
X11 isn't dead while people still keep working on it It isn't quite XKCD 2347, but it's close. At least one developer is still working away on the X.org codebase with an effort to improve variable refresh rate support in several different OSes.…
7/25/2024
Mistral Large 2 leaps out as a leaner, meaner rival to GPT-4-class AI models
It's not the size that matters, it's how you use it Mistral AI on Wednesday revealed a 123-billion-parameter large language model (LLM) called Mistral Large 2 (ML2) which, it claims, comes within spitting distance of the top models from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta.…
7/25/2024
OpenAI’s GPT-4o Mini is indeed small – like its lead over rivals in certain tests
Plus: Meta Euro model drama; Mistral and Nvidia find NeMo; and more AI Roundup OpenAI has made available GPT-4o Mini – a smaller and cheaper version of its GPT-4o generative large language model (LLM) – via its cloud.…
7/19/2024
Thunderbird is go: 128 now out with revamped 'Nebula' UI
Give it a try, if only in case you lose your webmail account Following the new ESR version of Firefox, upon which it is based, the latest Thunderbird is out too – with a fresh new look. …
7/18/2024
Is Teams connector retirement a tweak to fit EU laws, or a sign of price rises to come?
Customers debate reasons behind move, say halo of Teams has slipped now Copilot is here Analysis Arguments over the retirement of Office 365 connectors within Teams shows no sign of abating, with some users pointing to the EU-forced unbundling of the product, while analysts are wondering if this a sign of a new, pricier, era for the application.…
7/15/2024
Honey, I shrunk the LLM! A beginner's guide to quantization – and testing it
Just be careful not to shave off too many bits ... These things are known to hallucinate as it is Hands on If you hop on Hugging Face and start browsing through large language models, you'll quickly notice a trend: Most have been trained at 16-bit floating point of Brain-float precision. …
7/14/2024
Game dev accuses Intel of selling ‘defective’ Raptor Lake CPUs
High-end processor instability headaches, failures pushed one studio to switch to AMD One game developer says it's had enough of Intel's 13th and 14th-generation Core microprocessors, calling them "defective."…
7/13/2024
New Outlook set for GA despite missing some key features
Classic Outlook for Windows shuffles a little closer to the end of the road The new Microsoft Outlook will hit General Availability on August 1, and Microsoft is not backing down on the move away from COM (Component Object Model) add-ins.…
7/12/2024
Google can totally explain why Chromium browsers quietly tell only its websites about your CPU, GPU usage
OK, now tell us why this isn't an EU DMA violation – asking for a friend in Brussels Running a Chromium-based browser, such as Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge? The chances are good it's quietly telling Google all about your CPU and GPU usage when you visit one of the search giant's websites.…