Alan Buckingham

Bing's "Friends Photos" is not new, but today Microsoft's search engine rolled out a major update to the service that MK Li, program manager of Bing Social, termed as an "experience which makes it easier to scan, discover and explore your friends’ photos".

So what has Microsoft added? For one, a new look and interface. The service now displays in the "Modern UI" type of format, much the same way as Windows 8 and Windows Phone. The search results in a tiled interface that, according to Li, "marries design and performance, making it faster and more seamless to browse your friends’ photos".

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I swear I fully expect to awaken one morning to find someone with a large camera strapped to his or her back standing at the foot of my bed. At this point my home may be the only place the Google Maps team has not gone. Give credit where it is due -- the Google Maps team is nothing if not intrepid and has gone down the trails of national parks and under the waves in places like the Great Barrier Reef, as well as covering the standard road-fare.

Now the team has ventured into the NFL arena, starting with Lucas Oil Stadium, home of number-one overall draft pick Andrew Luck and his Indianapolis Colts team.

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The big day continues for Microsoft's Office 365 division. Earlier we learned that the service will be deployed in the state of Texas, adding 100,000 new government employees to the list of users. Now, Microsoft informs about an upcoming launch event, although few details are available.

In a very brief post, Kirk Gregersen, Office 365 general manager explains: "Virtual Launch Event on Wednesday, Feb. 27" to "celebrate the availability of a major new release coming to Office 365 for businesses".

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BitTorrent has launched an app for sharing large files, but this time it is not the latest Hollywood release. Yes, I know the service is famous for being a source of piracy, but the peer-to-peer service is also a good way to share and distribute legitimate files -- Linux distros, for instance. Now the distribution service wants to add a bit more legitimacy to the resume by adding a way for users to share large files in the course of everyday work life.

Today BitTorrent announced the beta release of SoShare, a service that users can access to share files with one another that are larger than those that the typical email service would permit. Quite a bit larger as a matter of fact. Catherince Meek says users can "send up to a terabyte of data in one transfer".

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In a stunning win for Microsoft, Texas will deploy Office 365 to more than 100,000 state employees.

Today's news comes on the heels of a recent win by the company when it nabbed the government of the city of Chicago. Now, in a joint statement, the two entities wanted to proclaim love for one another.

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Microsoft announced last year that it would be killing off its Windows Live Messenger service -- part of a complete overhaul of the Live suite that also included the recent death of my beloved Live Mesh. We also knew that the cause of death for Messenger would be ruled "purchase of Skype". Now, today, all of this has become just a bit clearer.

Microsoft's Parri Munsell has elaborated on a few details -- the biggest one being that "the upgrade from Messenger to Skype on Windows desktop will start on April 8". The statement comes with an asterisk though and that caveat reads "with the exception of mainland China where Messenger will continue to be available".

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Google, in conjunction with LG, released the Nexus 4 on November 13 2012 and it has largely been difficult to get ever since. At the time of writing the Google Play store claims the device will ship in "1-2 weeks". However, Google would like to help out potential customers who are looking to get the handset a bit sooner and, to that end, the company has created a way to get a Nexus 4 today.

The search giant has launched a finder web site to aid you in locating a Nexus 4 close to home. Of course, this means the locations of T-Mobile stores around you, but at least you learn where the device is actually in stock. Customers can choose from distances ranging from five to fifty miles, depending on how far you wish to drive to grab your new phone.

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Over the years the little network within my humble abode has grown. It started as a way to connect a laptop and a desktop, but has since become a conglomeration of multiple devices -- a desktop, three laptops, an HTPC, a home server and even three smartphones. Not to mention that the Blu-ray player, DirecTV DVR and Netgear NeoTV are networked. It all comes together in a combination of ethernet and WiFi connections that are controlled through a router in the home office on the third floor of our old restored Victorian, an extender which resides in the entertainment cabinet in the living room -- sorry, "parlor" since it is a Victorian -- on the first floor and a network switch in the basement.

Parts are getting old however -- in the past year I had to buy a new router and replace my daughter's laptop. Recently, more things have become unreliable. My home server, which ran FreeNAS died recently. It was housed in an old tower PC that had once been our desktop. Our HTPC has grown old, despite having been upgraded with new video and audio cards and additional RAM. The Netgear NeoTV is not as reliable as it once was.

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Microsoft has killed off a bunch of products lately, moving forward to new and "improved" platforms, even making changes to company logos. The concept isn't foreign in the tech industry -- everything changes, almost daily. Yesterday Live Mesh died, soon Messenger will follow it to the grave. Today Microsoft reminds us that Windows 7 RTM's days are numbered.

It is not that we didn't know this day was coming -- the company gives plenty of notice about these things. The irony here is that many businesses are just now moving to the platform from XP. Hopefully most had the foresight to move all the way to Windows 7 Service Pack 1, or later. That version of the operating system will enjoy much more life before being shut off. Microsoft's Stephen Rose points out "mainstream support continuing until January 13, 2015, and extended support continuing until January 14, 2020".

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Let me preface this by telling you that I have never had an actual problem with Verizon service -- sort of, but I will elaborate in a bit. The network is fast, works everywhere I go and the customer service is stellar. However, and you knew there had to be a but, Google would be wise to, under no circumstances, let Big Red get its hands on another Nexus device. The wireless company can simply not handle the responsibility.

I know this because I have a Galaxy Nexus from Verizon and it is an endless source of frustration and regret. Trouble started from day one and continues to day....well, today.

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Mozilla announced back in October that it would release a Metro Modern UI version of Firefox. At the time, the company released a "preview" version that was code named "Elm" which was an offshoot of the Nightly builds that the company produces for those users who wish to live on the bleeding edge of technology.

The day has finally arrived where that test build has graduated to an actual Nightly build. Yesterday evening Mozilla's Asa Dotzler announced that "preliminary Metro Firefox development work arrived at mozilla-central, the source code repository that feeds the Firefox Nightly channel".

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It's a wild week for Microsoft's Surface Pro team. There was the big release, with lines forming at Microsoft stores, reviews being posted all over the web and then news the tablet sold out at all locations. Not too much can be read into the latter at this point -- we do not know how much stock was actually available.

More are coming. In an overnight announcement, the Surface team lets everyone know that Microsoft is "shipping additional units of the 64GB SKU to Best Buy, Staples and Microsoft Store now. We are shipping 128GB SKU later this week to retailers, with some units available by the end of the week. Our priority (and that of our retail partners) is to fulfill orders from customers who made a reservation first. Canada is following a similar timeline but may take an extra few days to start arriving".

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As far as web browsers go, Opera never seems to get enough love. But it has a dedicated following of avid users who seem suddenly to appear whenever you say something bad about the software. Now that following has grown, and Opera plans to reward them with a new engine.

Today CEO Lars Boilesen proclaims a milestone: "On the final stretch up to 300 million users, we have experienced the fastest acceleration in user growth we have ever seen". While that is certainly a big step for the company, and worthy of a pat on the back, Opera browser still remains far behind its competitors.

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Microsoft has made no real secret that it prefers you to buy an annual license for software, as opposed to purchasing a non-expiring version. Office 2013/365 is the first real example of that, but will surely not be the last. Since the products' release, the company has pushed out PDF guides to help guide you along.

Now the push continues with a video version of those "Quick Start" guides. Earlier today the Office team announced the release of five videos in a new series that will give users a head-start on the new app suite.

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I love my Dropbox account. Or, I should say that I love the idea of my Dropbox account. I will be the first to admit that I honestly do not use it very much. I work from home and rarely have reason to share files. My wife, however, uses that account on an almost daily basis. She shares school files with her students via Dropbox. In other words, it is a business tool -- even for someone who simply teaches Spanish to grade school kids one day per week. Now, the company has made it an even more useful business tool with a host of new features announced today.

In prefacing the announcement, Dropbox representative Emil Ibrishimov takes a second to brag about the fact that "people at over two million businesses and 95 percent of Fortune 500 companies are using Dropbox -- from law firms working with their clients to international businesses staying in sync across the world".

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