Mozilla accuses Gamma of dressing up dictators' spyware as Firefox
Maker of spooks' fave FinSpy served cease-and-desist
Firefox-maker Mozilla claims spook supplier Gamma International disguises its spyware as the popular web browser - and wants it to stop.
The non-profit software foundation slapped a cease-and-desist demand on UK-based FinFisher developer Gamma. In the legal letter, Mozilla said its Firefox trademark is being violated and that …
'I still get on the phone for a $5k deal' - NetSuite CEO's anti-SAP mission
Interview Big cheese spells out tough world of Salesforce and other enterprise tech rivals
California-based Salesforce has been an unstoppable force in Software as a Service (SaaS) for 14 years. It pulled in $3.05bn in revenue last year, and just booted rival enterprise tech maker SAP from its slot as the world's number-one customer relationship management software (CRM) company.
But there’s another SaaS company that …
Amazon: Hard luck Microsoft, AWS will always be cheaper
We're in the driving seat and the only way is down
Amazon’s struck back at Microsoft camp over its "lowering" of its cloud computing prices by touting Amazon’s track record for saving money.
The etailer-turned-cloud-giant’s chief technology officer Werner Vogels yesterday claimed there had been 31 price reductions in AWS since the service went live in 2006 – seven years ago.
He …
Feds urged to probe four US cell big boys over Android holes
Updated Security threat means 'unfair and deceptive business practices'
The four biggest US cell networks could face a government probe, following allegations that security updates for Android smartphones have been held back, leaving millions of Americans vulnerable to hackers.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has formally asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to conduct an investigation …
Google tells Microsoft IE shops: We can help you with those 'legacy apps'
Offers Explorer users Chrome migration extension with long lists
Google is chucking Chrome at businesses whose applications are hardwired to Internet Explorer - and coupled its offer with a snub to Redmond, claiming its once-proud browser has become "legacy".
The Chocolate Factory today released the Chrome Legacy Browser Support extension that - with additional fiddling courtesy of your IT …
Foxconn must pay Microsoft for EVERY Android thing it makes
New deal to earn dosh from Google's labours
Microsoft will collect a royalty for every device built by Foxconn that runs Google operating systems Android or Chrome OS.
Hon Hai, the parent of the Chinese electronics behemoth, confirmed today it has inked a deal to license unspecified Microsoft patents on smartphones, tablets and TVs built by Foxconn that use Google's Linux …
Office 365 - what's in it for you? Speak your brains
Live Chat Navigate the features and licensing maze with Mary-Jo Foley and Team Reg
Microsoft Office is the planet’s most ubiquitous productivity suite and Word and Excel still set the standard on personal productivity apps.
The way the software suite is embedded in each office's day-to-day business means that with each new update, Microsoft finds itself struggling to convince people to upgrade. After all, the …
Teradata buffs Hadoop for the biz intelligence masses
Tools without the HDFS headache
Teradata has polished Apache’s Hadoop Big Data framework for business intelligence and added new tools for quicker and easier querying of massed data.
The data warehousing and BI giant has released Teradata Enterprise Access for Hadoop, which includes two new features: Smart Loader for Hadoop and its trademarked SQL-H.
Teradata …
Survey: FOSS biz fans aching for 'enterprise-class' support
6 in 10 suits would even pay for it
The absence of enterprise-grade support for free and open-source software (FOSS) is the single biggest pain point for business customers who are using it.
That’s according to a survey by data-centre automation company Univa, which found 64 per cent of respondents were prepared to pay for supported open-source software.
The …
Firefox 'death sentence' threat to TeliaSonera over gov spy claims
Mozilla may snub telecom giant's new SSL certs
Firefox-maker Mozilla could issue a "death sentence" to TeliaSonera's SSL business over allegations the telecoms giant sold Orwellian surveillance tech to dictators.
The punishment would be an embarrassing blow to the company: it would effectively cut off HTTPS-encrypted websites verified by TeliaSonera from Firefox users, who …
Microsoft brings back Windows watch after Apple seeks 'flexible' bod
Wrap THIS round your appendage, Cupertino
Microsoft is working on a touch-enabled watch despite calling time last year on its earlier efforts. The revelation comes hot on the heels of rumours that rival Apple is working on an iWatch - which were further fuelled by Cupertino's posting of a job ad for a flexible display expert.
The Wall St Journal reports that Microsoft …
Dell axes IT channel middlemen, installs Windows in the factory
Wanna buy a Dell till? No need to pay that integrator
Microsoft has granted Dell the power to install Windows on specialised computers before they leave the factory - neatly bypassing the distribution channel.
Typically, customers buy these machines via an integrator, which provides the software with the kit.
But now Dell's hardware-building biz OEM Solutions can manufacture and …
Mozilla CEO exits just as Firefox mobiles roll out
Two years a long stint in Mozilla time
Mozilla's chief executive is stepping down amid a re-positioning of the managerial brass after barely two years into a mission to take Firefox mobile.
Gary Kovacs, appointed Mozilla's third CEO in November 2010, will vacate his position "later this year" with the Firefox shop now beginning a search for a brand-new chief …
Foot-long slab too big? Microsoft 'has a 7-incher' to stroke
Smaller Surface tab rumoured to chase iPad Mini sales
Microsoft will put a smaller, 7-inch Windows 8-powered Surface laptop-cum-tablet into production this year, according to insiders.
Shrinking the touchscreen slab wasn't part of Microsoft's strategy when the then-Windows chief Steven Sinofsky unveiled Redmond's own 12-inch Surfaces and similar-sized Windows 8 devices from PC …
Maggie Thatcher: The Iron Lady who saved us from drab Post Office mobes
Obituary Who loves their fibre broadband? Now you know who to thank
Baroness Margaret Thatcher, the former prime minister who worked alongside the world's first business computer and who privatised the UK's phone network, has died. She was 87.
When Britain's Iron Lady came to power in 1979, your average Brit had just one phone, which was fixed to a wall by a wire and connected to a network …
Office for Mac 2008 support umbilical chopped off
But you can buy it again, and keep on buying it
Mac fans wedded to Microsoft Office face a stark choice on April 9 – upgrade or continue running the unsupported Office for Mac 2008.
April 9 2013 is the date when Microsoft will stop providing new code and security fixes for Office for Mac 2008, which launched in January 2008.
Redmond is urging Mac users to take out an Office …
Tick-tock! 40% of PCs start Windows XP malware meltdown countdown
In 365 days, you'll be on your own against the hackers
With one year to go until Microsoft kills free support for Windows XP, if you haven’t got a migration plan in place it’s time to start doing something about it... but don't panic, say the migration experts.
One year from today, on 8 April 2014, Microsoft will stop fixing broken code and no longer release security patches for …
Gartner: RIP PCs - tablets will CRUSH you this year
Bad luck, Windows - you'll do better in 4 more years
PC sales are in terminal decline thanks to the continued popularity of tablets and there’s nothing an anticipated surge in ultramobiles can do to stop it.
That’s according to beancounters at Gartner, who reckon the outcome will be anaemic growth rates for Microsoft’s Windows in 2013 as Google’s Android blows the doors off. …
Google goes on the Blink in WebKit fork FURORE
Comment Diversity be damned: The view from Mountain View
When Opera Software killed its web browser's rendering engine Presto, and announced it will instead use WebKit, the company did so with the best intentions.
WebKit was a surefire bet: by mainlining the brain juice of Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari - the top dogs on the web and on smartphones - Opera hoped to break out of …
If Google got a haircut, a tie and a suit, would it be Microsoft?
Nobody ever got fired for downloading Chrome. Hmm
Prepare yourself. It's a new month, and that can only mean a tsunami of articles on the popularity of Internet Explorer, Chrome and Firefox will flood the globe's news aggregators.
For non-mobile computers, March followed the trend emerging over the past 12 months: growth for Chrome, a drop in use of IE and Firefox stuck in a …
Paypal struggles free of VMware lock-in, goes with OpenStack
Deed heeds its need for speed
Paypal is floating thousands of its servers on open-source OpenStack and sidelining VMware to become faster than smaller competitors at building payment apps for the cloud.
eBay’s payment arm hopes for tens of thousands of nodes – half its current total - running on OpenStack by the summer. Paypal is understood to be replacing …
Blighty's revolutionary Cold War teashop computer - and Nigella Lawson
Geek's Guide Nuclear missile with your sponge finger, sir?
The Victorian offices were bulldozed long ago for a stack of flats and mirrored offices, and there's not a single indication to the significance of this site - or what happened here.
This isn't the scene of a lost battle, and the bones of a missing Plantagenet king do not slumber beneath the car park serving the offices.
Sixty- …
Next from Microsoft: 'Blue', the Windows 8 they hope you don't hate
Vid People are used to a blue screen with Windows, right?
Windows Blue - the supposedly leaked sequel to Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system - will apparently look a lot more like Windows Phone 8 and allow users to further personalise their computers.
Copies of what appears to be build 9364 of Windows Blue are circulating on peer-to-peer file-sharing networks; once the alpha-grade …
ARM's new CEO: You'll get no 'glorious new strategy' from me
Past performance no guarantee of future success, though
ARM Holdings is the kind of quiet success story Britain excels at, and really the sort of thing the data-fiddlers of Silicon Roundabout should aspire to be doing.
ARM doesn’t wrangle data and pass it off as a business model. It designs patentable processor technology that has turned US, Japanese and South Korean electronics …
How to survive a UEFI BOOT-OF-DEATH on Samsung laptops
Matthew Garrett reveals the software surgery needed
Former Red Hatter Matthew Garrett, who cleared Linux's name when the open-source kernel appeared to cause shiny new Samsung laptops to destroy themselves, has offered a survival guide to avoid similar catastrophes.
Nebula programmer Garrett this week warned that Samsung laptops may brick themselves if the computer's UEFI …
Boffin road trip! The Reg presents Geek's Guide to Britain
Geek's Guide to Britain Brains that made Britain exposed, mapped and viewed
Which country is credited with designing more than half of the world’s most important inventions. Is it Germany, home of the VW? Japan, birthplace of the Walkman? The US, land of NASA and Google? No: Britain.
Scientists, engineers, architects and inventors in Britain have made their mark on the world with trains, jet engines, …
Brit web biz waves white flag in Python trademark bout
Veber flees snake pit of online attacks and death threats
UK website hoster Veber has binned its bid to exclusively trademark the word “python” in Europe following talks with the Python Software Foundation (PSF).
In an agreement described by both sides as “amicable”, Veber will also rebrand its hosting and online backup service that it had called Python. The British company and the PSF …
Reg live natter with GNOME superstar Miguel de Icaza
Live Chat Let your fingers do the talking ...
If anyone is a paid-up member of the open source club, surely it is Miguel de Icaza.
He helped found the GNOME UI and desktop beloved by millions and claimed to be the most popular desktop environment for GNU/Linux and UNIX-type operating systems.
For GNOME, De Icaza earned the MIT Innovators under-35 award in 1999, beating …
ARM head legs it from core body: CEO Warren East retires
Just as Microsoft forks Windows 8 from Intel
ARM Holdings' chief executive Warren East is stepping down after nearly 12 years leading the British tech success story.
East, 52, is retiring on 1 July, 2013, and will be replaced by 45-year-old ARM president Simon Segars, processor core designer ARM confirmed this morning.
East said in a statement: “It has been a privilege to …
Microsoft issues manual on Brits to Cambridge exports
No guns, dead dogs, or realtors allowed. Welcome to the Third World
The US Army prints one to acclimatise troops serving in Britain instructing corn-fed GIs on how to avoid going about insulting HM The Queen.
Now, Microsoft has produced a field manual for US staff serving at its Cambridge research facility on the etiquette, foibles and slang found in our British Isles.
Redmond is reported to …
HOT SWEATY RACKS blamed for Outlook.com, Hotmail MELTDOWN
Firmware cock-up cooked servers in data-centre oven
Microsoft has admitted a dodgy firmware upgrade cooked its servers and knocked its Hotmail and Outlook.com email services offline for 16 hours.
In a postmortem examination of the disaster, the Windows 8 giant said a software upgrade for its data centre equipment - an update that had worked successfully in the past - failed …
Microsoft unveils even more tempting Kinect offering: Open source
This has people up in arms, in a good way
First it was developer tools, then Kinect for the PC, now Microsoft's given hackers a shot at the Kinect code under an open-source license.
Specifically, Redmond has now released samples of the Kinect code under an Apache license to serve as a template for hackers building apps for the hands-free motion controller that's been …
Outages plague Hotmail and Outlook users
'Taking longer than we thought to fix', whimpers Redmond
Microsoft's spanking new Outlook.com and creaking Hotmail service are experiencing prolonged outages around the world.
Hotmail and Outlook.com users are complaining they are either unable to access email or unable to see all their email messages.
The problem seems to have initially affected cloud storage service SkyDrive, too, …
UK Serious Fraud Office queues up to probe HP's Autonomy allegations
...using Autonomy's own software
The UK Serious Fraud Office has told The Register it is investigating allegations of accounting irregularities at Autonomy, the Brit software house gobbled by HP for $10.7bn in 2011.
In November last year, Hewlett-Packard claimed Autonomy "outright misrepresented" its value in the months before its acquisition, causing HP to …
1 in 7 WinXP-using biz bods DON'T KNOW Microsoft is pulling the plug
Survey - Redmond so busy pushing Win 8, some IT directors didn't get the memo
A large number of Microsoft customers are in for a rude awakening on 8 April 2014.
With less than 400 days to go, 15 per cent of those running Windows XP are still unaware that that’s the date Microsoft finally turns off all support for its legacy PC operating system, according to a recent survey.
After 8 April next year, …
Uni profs: Kids today could do with a bit of 'mind-crippling' COBOL
Forget Lua, time go to old skool
Want a guaranteed job in IT? Learn COBOL, even if it cripples you mentally – that’s the advice of university profs teaching tech.
Ignore, for a second, the fact COBOL doesn’t feature in the top 20 of languages developers are using in anger today. Those in charge of setting university IT curricula reckon there’s no better …
HTC slays Nokia's two-headed Android patent dragon in Germany
'Another major setback' chortles mobe rival
Nokia has lost a patent-infringement lawsuit it brought against rival phone-maker HTC. Nokia was upset about the way HTC's Android phones talked to Google app stores, claiming the communication ripped off its protected technologies.
A German court ruled HTC did not infringe the Nokia-owned patent EP0812120 – called the ’120 …
'Mainframe blowout' knackered millions of RBS, NatWest accounts
Bankers blame hardware fault, sources point to IBM big iron
A hardware fault in one of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group's mainframes prevented millions of customers from accessing their accounts last night.
A spokesman said an unspecified system failure was to blame after folks were unable to log into online banking, use cash machines or make payments at the tills for three hours on …
Amazon CTO: Big Data? An unfortunate, 'catchy phrase'
Technology Frontiers Beyond relational versus NoSQL
“I love that the world is data intensive... unfortunately, it’s called 'Big Data',” says Amazon’s chief technology officer Werner Vogels, who went on to describe BD as "a nice catchy phrase".
Did the CTO of a company in the top tier of those generating and storing billions of objects through retail sales and cloud service just …
'Brit Bill Gates' was powerless to stop HP's Autonomy acquisition
Lynch suggests HP mega-bucks forced marriage
Mike Lynch didn't fall out of love with Hewlett-Packard, it was HP which didn't know what it wanted.
So says "Brit Bill Gates" Mike Lynch, who has even suggested HP's initial advances under then chief executive Leo Apotheker were unsolicited - possibly even unwanted - and that he was powerless to stop the acquisition.
Speaking …
Upstart Aerospoke flings NoSQL ninja star into data-centre rings
Ouch! Right in the topology
A NoSQL startup is upping its game with a feature update allowing biz types to share data across multiple data centres.
Aerospike has released Enterprise Edition 2.6 with the addition of star topologies. The architecture allows one data centre to simultaneously replicate information to multiple data centres – a move the company …
HP shareholders bay for blood in $19 BEELLION writedown aftermath
Updated Calls to boot two board veterans and auditor next month
Hewlett-Packard investors are rearing up against Meg Whitman’s board, demanding senior heads roll over several multi-billion-dollar failed acquisitions, including HP's 2011 $11bn buy of Brit software company Autonomy - which it wrote down to the tune of $8.8bn late last year.
The Autonomy writedown at the tail-end of 2012 was HP …
Best Buy takes axe to touchy Windows 8 PCs - lops $100 off price
Sit down, Surface, you don't count
Best Buy will slash $100 off the price of touchscreen Windows 8 PCs.
From Monday the US retail chain will cut the cost of Sony, Acer, Toshiba, Dell and HP touch-driven laptops plus two models of Samsung's all-in-ones to shift stock.
You can see the full range of discounted gear here. Best Buy’s discount will not apply to …
Hadoop Hive stung into action, swarms around SQL
More relational, more useful to humans, we're promised
Hortonworks has unveiled the Stinger Initiative, a project to make Hadoop’s Hive data warehouse friendlier with SQL and faster.
Hortonworks has also unveiled two accompanying Hadoop projects, which it’s submitted to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) in the hope they become community-supported projects. They are a runtime …
PSF warns on angry trademark attacks: Python coders, this is not our way
Hacktivism and threats 'not who we are or how we act'
Python fans have been chastised over their attacks on a tiny web host embroiled in dispute over the Python trademark in Europe that saw the police called in.
Top officials from the Python Software Foundation have urged civility and restraint in the dispute, saying death threats and hactivism against the web hosting company - …
Xamarin chucks Apple fruit at Microsoft mobe wobblers
Apple iOS development extended to Visual Studio
Microsoft wobblers tempted by the fruit of Apple's mobes can now indulge themselves from the comfort of their preferred development platform.
Cross-platform development start-up Xamarin has updated its development framework allowing Microsoft devs to build native iOS apps using Visual Studio. You could already build apps for …
Ubuntu's Shuttleworth embraces tablet terror: Our PC biz will survive, too
Linux man's roadmap munches tab, phone, PC, TV
Ubuntu spaceman Mark Shuttleworth is embracing the full horror of tablets and smartphones, calculating they’ll do little harm to his Linux distro’s PC business.
Shuttleworth yesterday announced a fondleslab-friendly Ubuntu interface for tabs ahead of next week’s Mobile World Congress (MWC). The first tabs running the UI will be …
Python-lovers sling 'death threats' at UK ISP in trademark row
Cops called after venomous vigilantes 'DDoS site, scream down phone at staff'
UK webhosting outfit Veber has called the police after fending off abuse in the wake of its attempt to trademark "python" in Europe. The small biz said it came under fire from fans of the popular Python programming language.
The firestorm appeared to have been ignited by a Python Software Foundation (PSF) blog post on 14 …
Wind-up bloke Baylis winds up broke, turns to UK gov for help
Africa radio man says Brit inventors need more patent protection
Trevor Baylis, the brains behind the wind-up radio and a shoe-powered phone charger, has called on the UK government to back Blighty's inventors.
And he is reported to be selling his one-bedroom self-designed house on a River Thames island in Twickenham after failing to convert his creations into a mountain of money.
He told …
Top Firefox OS bloke flames Opera for WebKit surrender
Why we'll never switch from Gecko, says Mozilla CTO
A top bod at Firefox-maker Mozilla has ruled out replacing its web browser's brains with WebKit - and lamented Opera’s surrender to the web engine favoured by Apple and Google.
Opera revealed last week that it will eventually dump its own web browser's engine Presto after 18 years for the one-two-punch of WebKit - the open- …
