Rdio teams with Shazam to bring full songs to more locations
Are you a music fan? If so, then you have no shortage of solutions for both computer and mobile device. Everywhere from Pandora to Spotify offers an alternative for your PC or mobile device. Plus there are even apps that can identify a track you hear on the radio in a matter of seconds. Shazam is one of the ones that fall in the latter category.
Shazam, like SoundHound, identifies songs, while Rdio plays them for you. The two entities are joining forces in more locations now. "Now anyone with the Shazam app for iOS or Android can listen to entire songs after tagging them by clicking the 'Listen Free on Rdio' link", the music discovery service tells us.
CyanogenMod 10.1 release Candidate 1 is available NOW
After many nightlies and a couple of stable monthly builds, the team of developers behind CyanogenMod, one of the most popular custom green droid distributions, announced the first release candidate for CyanogenMod 10.1. The latest stable build is based on Android 4.2 and arrives just under six months after Google rolled out the second Jelly Bean iteration.
"The 10.1 branch is quickly approaching the point where a 'final' build is due", says the team of developers responsible for the project. "This will be one of (if not the last) milestone releases before a 10.1.0 is pushed out. These builds will appear as they complete the build process".
ColdFusion becomes latest Adobe attack vector, again
I feel as if I can write an "Adobe security flaw of the week" column. The company seems to be a target for every hacker on earth, with Flash and Reader leading the way. Last week Reader was under attack. Now this week brings a new security flaw, and also a new (or old) target in the form of ColdFusion, the Adobe web application development tool.
The developer has issued a security advisory letting customers know that some are vulnerable to this latest flaw. ColdFusion users who have restricted public access to the CFIDE/administrator, CFIDE/adminapi and CFIDE/gettingstarted directories are safe. However, those who have not taken these steps are vulnerable.
Google Translate for Android 2.7 adds 16 more languages (but not Klingon -- yet)
Google Translate for Android 2.7, a major update, is available. There’s one new feature -- support for the website’s Phrasebook feature -- and an extension of the app’s camera-input feature to support an additional 16 languages.
The app is basically an extension of the Google Translate website, allowing users to translate both text and speech between more than 70 different languages.
Live fast, stay protected
Independent testing organization AV-Comparatives has released its latest performance tests evaluating the impact of security software on system performance. It carried out the tests on a 64-bit Windows 7 system and measured a number of everyday activities including copying files, installing and uninstalling applications and launching programs as well as running the PCMark 7 benchmarking suite.
The results of these tests have been used to produce a system impact score measuring how much difference the various antivirus programs make compared to having no security installed at all. This makes for some interesting reading.
PlayOn makes cord-cutting even easier with Google TV
Since purchasing the Vizio Co-Star several months ago, I have become a fan of Google TV. I even considered using online services to "cut the cord". With my Amazon Prime subscription and network TV sites I will miss little. What stops me? The NFL and those networks. The league stubbornly refuses to move into the future, where other professional sports already reside, while many network websites block the Google device.
Today, PlayOn makes the barrier in front me even smaller. This is a huge move for MediaMall software. The company announces it brings full service to Google TV free of charge. It does so because of the slight that Google's living room solution has been shown by networks. "We’ve decided to make PlayOn completely free on Google TV. Why? Well, Hulu and the Networks have been discriminating against Google TV owners by not creating apps that enable folks to watch their content on Google TV", the company tells us.
If Windows Phone users have SkyDrive, why screw them over?
Late yesterday, Microsoft announced that Windows Phone 8 users from all over the world can now finally take advantage of the complete photo and video backup feature offered by its smartphone operating system. This comes a tad over six months after the Windows Phone 8 release in late-October, last year. A little too late, wouldn't you agree?
Previously, users from a number of regions were constricted to use a dumbed-down backup feature that only allowed automatically upload of low-resolution pictures (no video support) straight to SkyDrive. "We just started to light this up, so be patient if you don’t see it right away. The change could take a few days to roll out around the globe", Aaron Sauvé, Microsoft senior program manager says.
Spotify 'nightmare' is more of a sleepless night
Spotify is the world’s most popular streaming music service with some 24 million active uses, around 6 million of those paying a subscription for premium services. I use Spotify all the time; it’s a great way of finding and sampling new music, and the company’s deals with major labels go a long way to legitimizing the streaming model.
Yesterday though, Spotify acted to change its website player after a Dutch developer released a Chrome extension that allowed MP3s to be downloaded from the site. Google removed the Downloadify plug-in from its site before Spotify applied the fix to the player, which now uses an encrypted format.
Microsoft kinda fixes IE 8 security hole
Last week, Microsoft's Internet Explorer made news, but not in the way the company should like. The "browser you loved to hate" becomes the target of a zero-day security flaw, which already is being actively exploited. Version 8 of the browser, which runs on all iterations of Windows going back to XP, is the target. Windows 8 customers are safe, as the latest operating system ships with IE 10.
The flaw allows an unauthenticated remote attacker to exploit this vulnerability and execute arbitrary code on a targeted system with the privileges of a targeted user. If the user holds elevated privileges, the attacker could completely compromise the computer targeted.
Uh-oh, Skype, Viber 3.0 goes desktop
Mobile VoIP provider Viber has broken new ground by releasingViber for Desktop 3.0 for Windows and Mac, extending its existing mobile service beyond the mobile-only Viber 3.0 app to desktops and laptops.
The new desktop build provides all the functionality currently enjoyed on the mobile app, including free voice calls, photo messaging, text chat and location-sharing with other Viber users, but also adds support for desktop-to-desktop video conferencing too.
Check5 tracks files, folders in real time
Launch a program, collect an email, visit a website -- just about everything you do on a PC results in some kind of change to the files on your PC. And normally the low-level details of this won’t interest you in the slightest, but there will be occasional exceptions.
Maybe you think you’ve been infected by malware, for instance. Perhaps you’re wondering what an installation program is adding to your system. Or you might just want to know why your hard drive activity light is flashing, all the time. But whatever the reason,Check5 can help, by monitoring any folders of interest and showing you, in real time, exactly how their contents are changing.
I wish more companies had no exit strategies
I was with a friend recently who has a pretty exciting Internet startup company. He has raised some money and might raise more, his product is in beta and it’s good. It solves a difficult technical problem many companies are struggling with. We argued a little over the name of the product. Of course I thought my suggested name was better or certainly cleverer, but then he said, “It doesn’t matter because we’ll probably sell the company before the product ever ships. It may never appear at all.”
His company will exit almost before it enters. This is happening a lot lately and we generally think it is a good thing but it’s not.
Windows Azure: Cloud-hosted virtual machines done right [review]
Some of Microsoft's greatest battles aren't being fought in the open, contentious field of constant public opinion and media coverage. If there's one thing Microsoft has always done better than the competition, it's blowing open new areas of opportunity and running with the ball on the sly. Apple and Samsung can keep their tactical flags limited to consumer electronics; Microsoft has far greater potential as a rising star in the cloud arena. The war started with its drive to push email to the cloud with Office 365, and the next leg of battle sits in the helm of Windows Azure and XaaS dominance.
If you're under the impression that we are not yet in the era of massive, prevalent 'big data', you're wildly mistaken. Our data needs are already climbing to astronomical levels, with IBM stating that 90 percent of the data in existence today was created in just the last two years. Not surprisingly, much of these growing data needs are being tossed into virtual environments whether it be on-premise in a VMWare or Hyper-V driven route, or my personal favorite: cloud-hosted virtual machines.
Amy Hood replaces Peter Klein as Microsoft CFO
During last month's fiscal third quarter 2013 earnings call, Microsoft revealed that Peter Klein would step down as chief financial officer. Today, the company announced his replacement: Amy Hood, who currently is CFO of the Business division. She assumed that role in January 2010.
CEO Steve Ballmer describes Hood as an "instrumental leader" who helped "lead the transition to services with Office 365" and to bring strong financial results.
openSUSE Education says 'get a Li-f-e'
If Linux is good enough for the International Space Station, why not your school computers? The developers over at openSUSE must think so, today releasing Li-f-e (Linux for Education) 12.3-1.
I confess to not being familiar enough with Linux (go ahead, beat me with a stick -- or with words in comments). But a reader complained this week about BetaNews' rather absent coverage of the open-source operating system. He's absolutely right about that. Reporters here tend to write about what they use, and we don't have a Linux lover currently on staff. Please pardon my light treatment of the news, in place of someone more qualified.
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