Articles about windows 10
Windows 10: What is it good for? Microsoft pitches to devs ahead of Creators Update
Microsoft briefed developers on the updates to the Windows 10 platform at an online Developer Day in preparation for the Creators Update, set for release later this year.
The Windows 10 story is long and complex. In 2012 Microsoft released Windows 8, intended to bring the operating system into the mobile era, where apps are …
SQL Server on Linux? HELL YES! Linux on Windows 10? Meh
Once the second biggest enemy of Linux (SCO Group takes top honours), Microsoft is positively giddy about not just supporting Linux but actually building tools that run Linux in Windows and about putting previously Windows-only software on Linux.
You can run Ubuntu inside Windows 10, install CoreOS and Docker containers inside …
Vivaldi and me: Just browsing? Nah, I'm sold
Some time late last year, without most of us really noticing, the Vivaldi browser became genuinely, startingly useful.
I’d met the Opera Software founder Jon von Tetzchner two years ago when he unveiled Vivaldi's technical preview. Jon has always one of the more thoughtful and engaging founders you meet. But what was he doing …
Microsoft foists fake file system for fat Git repos
To lighten the burden of massive Git source code repositories, Microsoft has created a virtualized file system that allows developers to interact with large codebases without sending excessive amounts of data across the network.
Git (when not applied to people or animals) refers to a distributed version control system for …
Tablets become feebleslabs as sales spiral down
The tablet computer market has slumped into “spiraling decline”, according to box-counter IDC.
The firm defines tablets as either a “slate”, like the iPad, or a “detachable” that offers a first-party keyboard like a Microsoft Surface device.
The firm's totted up all the sums from a year's worth of its Worldwide Quarterly …
Microsoft's device masterplan shows it's still fighting Apple
In its advice to the manufacturing community, Microsoft has said it wants PC builders to focus on quality and features that differentiate PCs from Macs. It's also seeking to migrate high-end features, and AR, into cheaper kit.
Redmond's Channel 9 blog recently posted the WinHEC presentation made in Shenzhen to dozens of local …
Cerber tops Windows 10 ransomware charts
Net scum behind the Cerber ransomware have been pounding enterprises infecting more corporate machines than any other, according to Microsoft.
Some 2114 infections have been discovered from December to January on corporate endpoints operating Windows 10 Enterprise, an operating system that Microsoft boffins says breaks the …
Imagine a ChromeOS-style Windows 10 ... oh wait, there it is and it's called Windows Cloud
Microsoft's latest Windows Insider build, released on Friday for participants in the software preview program, contains a reference to a new Windows SKU called Cloud.
Microsoft declined to comment on what Windows Cloud might be, but after the name was spotted and revealed on Twitter, veteran Microsoft watcher Mary Jo Foley …
'Grey technology' should be the new black
My dad seems to have a propensity for breaking the all of the kit we’ve given him to allow us to have a trans-oceanic video chat pretty much any time either of us wants. Apple’s Facetime came along just around the time I moved to Australia. Skype wasn’t far behind. Between these two we’ve been able to keep our relationship going …
Microsoft's Cloud UI brings Windows full circle
Microsoft is said to be developing a cross-platform shell to bring the desktop Windows antiques to non-PC devices of different shapes and sizes.
According to rumours whispered into the ear of Windows Central, the project is called the "Composable Shell", or CSHELL. Or if this is a mishearing – quite plausible – a Compostable …
Huawei could rescue Amazon's Alexa from the smart home
Analysis
Huawei’s upcoming launch of a smartphone incorporating Amazon’s Alexa virtual assistant will mark a new phase in one of the most important battles for the modern internet experience.
Voice-activated assistants - which use powerful AI engines to deliver detailed, context-aware and personalized answers to users’ questions – are …
Solaris 11.next plan brings continuous delivery of OS upgrades
Oracle has released a little more detail about the future of its Solaris operating system, after last week suddenly revealing a planned version 12 would be canned.
In a new post, the company says “Oracle Solaris is moving to a continuous delivery model using more frequent updates to deliver the latest features faster, while …
The rise, fall, and rise (again) of Microsoft's killer People feature
Microsoft has removed the much-anticipated "People Experience" from current beta builds of Windows 10, and will release it later this year instead of this spring.
News of the postponement accompanied the latest bleeding edge code drop, build 15014, which appeared yesterday. Released into the "Fast Ring" of the Windows Insider …
Windows 10 networking bug derails Microsoft's own IPv6 rollout
A bug in Windows 10 is undermining Microsoft's efforts to roll out an IPv6-only network at its Seattle headquarters.
According to Redmond's principal network engineer Marcus Keane, the software giant is struggling to move over to the decade-old networking technology due to a DHCPv6 bug in Windows 10, which made it "impossible …
Wintel part deux? Microsoft Azure first for Intel Clear Linux
An alliance that dominated the PC industry is entering the world of fluffy white stuff and open source: Microsoft Azure is the first public cloud to include an Intel initiated and container-oriented Clear Linux OS.
The Wintel union loosened with the rise of Linux - runing on x86 - and the fall of the PC as peoples' primary …
Microsoft posts death notices for Windows 7 sysadmin certifications
In the same week that Microsoft's German tentacle declared Windows 7 a security horror that no business in its right mind would continue to use, the company's also announced it will axe some certification exams for the operating system.
Microsoft's educators have announced that certs for Windows 7 configuration, plus the the …
Microsoft Germany says Windows 7 already unfit for business users
Microsoft Germany has argued that Windows 7 is no longer "fit" to be used in business.
A post we've shoved through two online translate-o-tronic services states that Windows 7 “can no longer keep up with the increased security requirements” of the mid-2010s.
Markus Nitschke, head of Windows at Microsoft Deutschland, is quoted …
Windows 10 Anniversary Update crushed exploits without need of patches
Microsoft says its Windows 10 Anniversary Update squashes more exploit delivery chains than ever.
The August updates brought in a series of operating system security improvements including boosts to Windows Defender and use of AppContainer, designed to raise the difficulty of having zero day exploits execute on patched systems …
Windows 10 memory management changes to give Hyper-V more headroom
The Register's virtualization desk is back from holidays, just in time to report changes to desktop Hyper-V before they go completely stale.
Desktop Hyper-V is a Windows 10 feature that offers users the chance to create and run virtual machines on the Windows desktop, a task for which plenty instead turn to Oracle's free …
Now that's a Blue Screen of Death: Windows 10 told me to jump off a cliff
Pic
By now, Windows 10 users have grown accustomed to the photos and inspirational quotes from Microsoft adorning their lock screens.
Usually, they are just pleasant landscape or architecture pics, with a randomly selected line or two of text to accompany them. Other times, however, they can be a bit unnerving.
For Reg reader …
Congrats, PC slingers. That's now FIVE straight years of shrinking sales
Santa's sack was bulging over Chrimbo, but it wasn't due to PC-shaped presents – computer sales slipped again in the final quarter of 2016, capping off five consecutive years of market shrinkage.
According to data from Gartner, shipments to distributors and retailers fell 3.7 per cent year-on-year to 72.6 million units. The …
New Windows 10 privacy controls: Just a little snooping – or the max
Microsoft has built an online dashboard of privacy controls in an attempt to soothe lingering anger over Windows 10 and its ability to phone home people's private information.
The new web portal lists some of the personal data that is collected from PCs and devices and sent back to Redmond, and allows people to somewhat limit …
Sundown exploit kit weaves Edge hack hole
Authors of the Sundown exploit kit have integrated a since patched and limited Microsoft Edge vulnerability from a security firm's public proof-of-concept.
The addition of the twin bugs (CVE-2016-7200 and CVE-2016-7201) means unpactched users of one of the world's most unpopular web browsers are likely to be targeted by a wide …
It's now 2017, and your Windows PC can still be pwned by a Word file
Microsoft has begun its 2017 with the release of four updates to address security holes in Windows and Office, while Adobe has posted fixes for more than three dozen vulnerabilities in Flash and Reader.
Microsoft's January patch load includes:
MS17-001, a fix for the Edge browser to address a flaw that would let a malicious …
Citrix buys Unidesk for massive Microsoft Windows rollouts
Citrix is updating its decades-old relationship with Microsoft, targeting Windows 10 and the cloud.
The company has announced its acquisition of Unidesk – founded in 2007 and inventor of what it calls layering - to streamline corporate rollouts of virtual Windows applications at scale.
Layering is a container that wraps up …
Microsoft's Blue Screen of Death dead in latest Windows 10 preview
Redmond has released Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 15002 – one of the biggest updates to its cloudy operating system – ahead of the release of the Creators Update later this year.
There's a whole host of upgrades and additions in the new build, but one that will be immediately noticeable to developers is the axing of the …
Too much landfill, too little purpose: CES 2017
In the nearly 25 years since last walking the showfloor at the Consumer Electronics Show, the video game industry spun off its own show - E3 - while once-dominant television manufacturers now find themselves consigned to an ever-shrinking footprint with the Las Vegas Convention Centre.
The world has changed substantially over …
Microsoft goes retro with Vista, Zune-style Windows Neon makeover
Mockups of Microsoft's "Project Neon" redesign have been leaked – we're sure by accident. Neon, as we reported last year, is an attempt to steer Windows away from the "flat" look that has dominated UX design in recent years, and make the system friendly for augmented or mixed-reality users.
In the mockups, Aero-style …
MacBook killer? New Lenovo offering sexed up with XPoint booster
Lenovo has a ThinkPad T570 notebook computer coming out which will be able to use Intel Optane 3D XPoint memory as a cache.
XPoint is the faster-than-flash, slower-than-DRAM non-volatile memory being produced by Intel and Micron. Optane is Intel's brand, QuantX is Micron's. An Optane cache should be faster than a cache using …
Folders return to Windows 10's Start Thing
Because it’s not complicated enough already, Windows 10’s Start menu will support folders in a forthcoming release.
The Windows 10 Redstone 2 release, also dubbed the “Creators Update”, will allow apps to be nested, much as with Windows Phone 8, and the mobile edition of Windows 10. The update is expected around April, and …
The Register's Top 20 Most-Commented Stories in 2016
Brexit and Windows 10 stories dominated reader discussions in 2016.
It’s no surprise that the departure from the European Union of its second biggest economy should be a major talking point. It was the biggest political shock in the UK since 1945, few UK readers are unaffected, and it most likely terminates a political project …
Twas the week before Xmas ... not a creature was stirring – except Microsoft admitting its Windows 10 upgrade pop-up went 'too far'
Microsoft's marketing boss Chris Capossela has confessed the infamous your-Windows-10-upgrade-is-ready pop-up that tricked so many people into installing the thing was a step "too far."
Speaking on this week's Windows Weekly podcast on Twit.tv, Capossela was asked to list his low points of the year for Redmond (it's 17 minutes …
Windows 10 nags, Dirty Cow, Microsoft's Linux man love: The Reg's big ones for 2016
Systems got bigger and more removed from ordinary mortals during 2016 as West Coast tech firms centralised more and more computing on server farms.
Google, Facebook and Microsoft wanted us to slap on virtual reality goggles and ask artificial intelligences to serve our voice-activated commands.
Cars, lorries and taxis minus …
Eating Brotli will improve Edge's inner health says Microsoft
Microsoft's announced it will adopt the Brotli compression algorithm that Google open-sourced last year in future versions of its Edge browser.
Google gave Brotli to the world in September 2015, pointing out that it is compatible with the venerable “Deflate” algorithm but also offers a compression ratio somewhere between 20 …
Microsoft scores nearly $1bn non-compete contract with US military
Updated
Satya Nadella’s team will be smiling today after the US Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) – the IT wing of the Department of Defense (DoD) – awarded his firm a five-year $927m support contract.
The deal will give the US military “access rights to Microsoft’s proprietary (closed-source) code” when it is “required to …
Smartphones crashed, Samsung burned: Mobile in 2016
End-of-Year Round Up
The mobile landscape this year was dominated by an air war of far greater importance taking place over the players’ heads.
Giant telcos went shopping for giant media companies, while Silicon Valley continued to work to destroy the value of both pipes and content, mostly by trying to queer the regulatory pitch. Down below, back …
Ham-fisted: Chap's radio app killed remotely after posting bad review
A US ham radio software developer has admitted a support staffer disabled a customer's copy of its application after he posted a negative review online.
The owners of HRD Software today told The Register they have since reinstated the user's license, claiming the revenge move was made by an outside support staffer.
Here's …
London's Winter Wonderland URGENTLY seeks Windows 10 desk support
The annual Christmas kitsch fest that is Hyde Park's Winter Wonderland in London is desperately seeking two desktop bods to provide IT support for Windows 10.
The job ad, which was posted today, reads: "We are URGENTLY seeking candidates for 2 X Desktop Support Engineers for a short term contract opportunity based at Hyde Park …
Microsoft's Edge to flush Adobe Flash in Windows 10 Creator’s Update
Microsoft's signalled it will join the crackdown on Adobe Flash in the forthcoming Windows 10 Creator’s Update, which won't even bother loading the pesky plug-in whenever possible. For sites that rely on Adobe's hellspawn, Edge will go all Clippy on users and ask if they really want to run it or would rather fire it into the …
Microsoft quietly emits patch to undo its earlier patch that broke Windows 10 networking
Microsoft has sneaked out a patch to get Windows 10 PCs back online after an earlier update broke networking for people's computers around the globe.
Since the end of last week, systems in the UK, US, Europe and beyond have automatically installed software from Microsoft, via Windows Update, that broke DHCP. That means some …
If you bought a dildo in Denver, the government must legally be told
Online retailers in America will soon be required by law to disclose to state governments what purchases their customers – meaning, you – have made.
That extraordinary situation is the result of a long-running legal case that the US Supreme Court this week refused to hear. This means a decision by the Tenth Circuit [PDF] …
Microsoft skates over Surface Hub sales data
Microsoft has released highly selective figures on sales of the Surface Hub, its Windows-10 powered multi-touch whiteboarding wall.
The software giant claimed to have shipped Hubs to 2,000 customers with an average deal size of 50 units. It claimed one large order of 1,500.
Microsoft did not release any financial data. …
Is your Windows 10, 8 PC falling off the 'net? Microsoft doesn't care
Updated
With more and more Windows 10 users losing internet and network connectivity – thanks to a dodgy software update that broke DHCP – you'd have thought Redmond would be on the ball with a cunning fix. Sadly not: the only official advice is to go away and reboot your PC.
“Some customers have reported difficulties connecting to …
Botched Microsoft update knocks Windows 8, 10 PCs offline – regardless of ISP
A broken software update for Windows 8 and 10 is knackering internet connectivity for users of several ISPs in the UK, Europe and quite likely beyond.
Virgin Media in Blighty is the latest provider to confirm the dodgy code is knocking a number of its customers offline. Proximus in Belgium also says a Windows 10 update is …
Busted Windows 8, 10 update blamed for breaking Brits' DHCP
Folks using Windows 10 and 8 on BT and Plusnet networks in the UK are being kicked offline by a mysterious software bug.
Computers running the Microsoft operating systems are losing network connectivity due to what appears to be a problem with DHCP. Specifically, it seems some Windows 10 and 8 boxes can no longer reliably …
The Dread Server BlackBerry Enterprise is no more
BES, the TLA that has struck trepidation into BOFHs for a decade, is no more. The brand name has been discarded in the biggest rationalisation of the company’s product lines in the company’s history.
BlackBerry's product reorganisation leaves almost no part of its enterprise portfolio untouched. Practically every product that …
Google found a way to go after 400 MEELLION new users this week
Google this week added Hindi to the languages spoken by its "Allo" digital assistance service, the company's Siri-and-Cortana competitor.
The Register fancies this is a pretty significant thing to have done, because the world has about 400 million Hindi speakers in India alone, with plenty concentrated in states like Bihar …
For God's sake, stop trying to make Microsoft Bob a thing. It's over
Vid
Microsoft has entered the virtual reality race, announcing a new headset called Evo in collaboration with Intel.
The headset will have the same advanced features of current high-end products including the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive and soon-to-be-launched Sulon Q, but will work with mid-range laptops, the company said.
Up to now, …
Revamped Cortana finally lands on UK mobe mass market
Microsoft’s ravenous, data hungry ‘personal assistant’ Cortana has arrived on iOS and Android in the UK, and the app has been revamped.
Cortana has been available here since July 2014 on Windows Phones, and last year on Windows 10. But “she” finally arrives on devices people actually use.
The UI overhaul is to address the …
Qualcomm, Microsoft plot ARM Snapdragon-powered Windows 10 PCs, tablets, phones
First, it fired shots at Intel's data center margins. Now Qualcomm is gunning for its rival's notebook processor cash cow.
Qualcomm and Microsoft are hooking up to port full-fat Windows 10 to smartphones, tablets, PCs and virtual reality goggles powered by Qualcomm's 64-bit ARMv8-compatible Snapdragon system-on-chips. These …
