Applications > More stories
Something's going on with Google Reader but nobody knows what
Journalists and, well, mainly other journalists are mourning the loss of Google Reader, a news aggregating RSS reader which will be euthanised today.
The Chocolate Factory will close the Reader software as of midnight tonight, California time, forcing RSS fans to find a new service.
Mostly, people appear to be turning to Feedly …
Facebook restricts ads running next to dodgy posts
Facebook has begun preventing ads from running alongside controversial material - such as sexual, graphic or violent content - posted by users of the social network.
The free content ad network confirmed on Friday that it would begin protecting brands that advertise on Facebook from being displayed on pages and groups carrying …
Ballmer: 'I call it all Windows, all the time'
Quotw This was the week when NSA PRISM whistleblower Edward Snowden decided to lead the world a merry chase, like an ostentatious Phileas Fogg, or a WikiLeaks-inspired Where's Wally, with obfuscation ever his watchword. To put it another way, he took off from Hong Kong and no one's sure where he is any more.
The man who outed …
Ex-Microsofties drop cloudy-apps-for-idiots box ElasticBox
Cloud vendors looking to enhance compatibility between public and private clouds can either a) standardize on hypervisors and virtual machine formats... or b) create yet another level of abstraction higher up the stack to mask the differences between various public and private clouds.
There is very little hope for the former …
Windows Store apps for Office probably won't ship until 2014
Build 2013 Anyone who was hoping to see demos of Windows Store versions of the Office 2013 applications at this year's Build conference was in for a disappointment, because it doesn't look like they'll be ready before 2014, at the earliest.
Oh, Microsoft is working on them, all right. During the Wednesday morning keynote at San Francisco's …
Oracle partners with NetSuite for people management
Oracle and NetSuite have forged a strategic alliance that will see the companies ensure data portability between their various "human capital management" systems.
The partnership was first hinted at by Oracle chief Larry Ellison on a conference call last week, and the announcement follows on from significant partnerships with …
Oracle slips out long-heralded 12c cloudbase in SECRET
Everyone was expecting Oracle's deals this week with Microsoft, Saleforce.com, and NetSuite to revolve around the impending 12c "cloud-ready" multi-tenant database: but that product was not referred to explicitly. That is because Oracle is trying to keep the powder dry for a future shindig announcing the availability of the 12c …
Even Microsoft couldn't crack it, but eHow daddy still wants to try it
eHow owner Demand Media seems unmoved by the announcement that even mega tech palace Microsoft has bowed out of ecommerce. Demand has decided to give it a go, albeit on in a niche market and on a much smaller scale, with the acquisition of arty ecommerce site Society6 for $94m in cash and shares.
Demand, which also owns …
Latest Firefox boosts video chat, 3D graphics, JavaScript performance
The Mozilla Foundation has shipped Firefox 22 to the release channel, bringing with it improved support for web-based real-time communications and a significant performance boost for some JavaScript applications, among other features.
The new version comes with support for the nascent WebRTC API enabled by default for the first …
Microsoft: Someone gave us shot in the ARM by swallowing Surface tabs
Microsoft has produced the name of a corporate customer in a fresh attempt to convince us Windows 8 is being adopted by businesses.
Unfortunately, and in a sign of just how desperate things have really become, that customer is ARM - one of Microsoft's co-conspirators on Windows RT and Surface RT.
The threadbare "news" comes …
Hugs all round as Google relaunches Groups service
Google has ditched the old version of its Groups service after revamping the tool to allow users to share an inbox with others.
Mountain View explained:
Imagine you and a few friends are organizing an event for your school and want a single email address to coordinate with vendors, parents, and volunteers.
Members of the …
Saucy selfie app Snapchat hits $800m valuation as VCs chuck cash around
Risqué photo-sharing app Snapchat has convinced VCs its saucy-selfie-sending service can provide serious returns for their $60m investment in its latest funding round, led by venture capital company IVP.
The app firm said on its blog that it has also attracted Sony's US chief exec Michael Lynton to its board, after the deal that …
Qld opens government data for app prize
Australian app developers short of funds but long on the business of extracting useful information out of government data have the chance to top-up their finances to the tune of $AU5,000 courtesy of a Queensland government competition.
Alternatively, given your point of view: having ditched most of its IT staff in a budgetary …
Home Office boffins slip out passport-scanning Android app
Android owners with NFC handsets can now read their passports with an official Home Office app - and civil servants want to know what other features could be added to it.
UK passports have had chips in them since 2006, containing a digital version of the photograph and other details, all cryptographically signed. Phones equipped …
Shy? Socially inadequate? Fiddling with your phone could help
Help is at hand for the millions of people whose shyness is ruining their chances at improving their lot in life.
Eggheads at MIT have unveiled a virtual life coaching system called My Automated Conversation Coach (MACH) which helps bashful people practise stressful situations in the hope of allowing them to cope better in real …
Google to put Chrome Frame to pasture in 2014
After four years Google is retiring Chrome Frame, its browser plug-in that embeds the Chrome HTML rendering and JavaScript engines inside Internet Explorer.
"It's unusual to build something and hope it eventually makes itself obsolete," Chrome engineer Robert Shield wrote in a blog post on Thursday, "but in this case we see the …
Desperate Venezuelans wiped clean of bog roll
Where in the world would you need a smartphone app to be able to buy toilet paper? Why in the world would you need such high tech in order to be able to manage something so fundamental as bog roll?
You don't have to be quite such a froth-mouthed free marketeer as I am to think that perhaps this is a result of government fucking …
'Office Facebook' firm Tibbr wants you to PAY for mobe-meetings app
Tibbr, the social network designed for use at work, now integrates with online meetings for both mobile and desktop clients as it continues to argue that a social workplace is worth paying for.
The idea is to let Tibbr users throw together Google Hangouts, GoToMeeting sessions and Skype conference calls with a couple of clicks. …
Apache devs: 'We'll ship no OpenOffice before its time'
Even as the open source LibreOffice productivity suite readies its next major release, the competing Apache OpenOffice project says not to expect it to ship a new version until it's good and ready.
"On the Apache OpenOffice project we are mainly volunteers, dedicating free time to the project, and that time varies according to …
The only Waze is Google: Ad giant tipped to gobble map app 'for $1.3bn'
Crowd-sourced map app maker Waze has apparently accepted a billion-dollar buyout from Google - ending months of speculation about who was going to end up with the Israeli firm.
Apple and Facebook have both been sniffing around Waze, which draws upon the movements of its 50 million users to generate live traffic information and …
Google slides its soft finger-fondling into any willing Android doodad
Google's own on-screen keyboard software for touch-driven Android gadgets is now available as a freebie for all.
The advertising giant's "soft" keyboard comes preinstalled onto its own devices, and offers the joy of sliding one's finger between letters to spell out words rather than tapping them out like a pecking hen. Now …
BlackBerry wants to see rivals' phones with BBM preinstalled
While BlackBerry's latest handsets might not be selling as fast as some of the competition, the Canadian mobile maker is looking to expand its market presence further by having its messaging software come preinstalled on other vendors' phones, according to a report.
In May, BlackBerry announced that it will open its popular …
Never mind WinRT: Tiny Win8 slabs will ship with free Office, too
Mere days after we got word that the Japanese versions of Microsoft's Surface Pro fondleslabs would come preloaded with Office, Redmond has announced that forthcoming small Windows 8 tablets will come bundled with the productivity suite, too, and in all markets.
Speaking at the Computex conference in Taipei on Wednesday, Windows …
Microsoft waves white flag: We'll put Outlook on Windows RT slabs
An update to Microsoft's tablet OS Windows RT will finally add email client Outlook to fondleslabs.
The news was announced by Windows chief financial and marketing officer Tami Reller during the Computex keynote in Taipei - along with more details of Windows 8.1.
Windows RT is said to be a straight-up ARM-compatible processor …
Google seeks to calm facial recognition furor with app block for Glass
Google has sought to allay privacy fears by saying it won't be allowing any facial recognition applications to run on its Glass computer spectacles for the moment.
"We've been listening closely to you, and many have expressed both interest and concern around the possibilities of facial recognition in Glass," said the team in a …
Groundbreaking Camino browser digs grave, jumps in
The Camino browser, first conceived around the turn of the millennium as a free, open source project designed to be a true "Mac-like" browser for the then-nascent Mac OS X, has reached the end of the line.
"After a decade-long run, Camino is no longer being developed, and we encourage all users to upgrade to a more modern …
Minty fresh Linux: Olivia hits the virtual shelves
The Linux Mint project has released version 15 of the desktop that they’re calling the “most ambitious release since the start of the project.”
New features in Linux Mint - based on Ubuntu - include elements designed to make management and use easier and smoother.
The distro also features a driver manager for installing and …
Microsoft: Office 365 reached 1 million subs faster than Facebook
Microsoft's new Office 365 Home Premium subscription version has proven so popular with customers that it has reached one million subscribers faster than many popular online services have, the company has claimed.
According to somewhat vague sales figures announced on Wednesday, it took the Home Premium edition of Office 365 – …
Microsoft caves to Google, pulls YouTube app from WinPhone Store
Microsoft will remove its revamped YouTube app for Windows Phone 8 from its store and revert to the earlier version until such time as it can meet all of Google's requirements for the app, advertising included.
This latest chapter in the ongoing mano a mano between Google and Microsoft over Redmond's YouTube mobile app comes …
Internet advertising giant (Google) 'mulls' map app Waze gobble
Ad giant Google is also considering snapping up mapping software firm Waze, which could spark a bidding war with Facebook over the business.
Sources whispered to Bloomberg that Google was interested in the navigation firm - which is, of course, seeking a price tag of more than $1bn. What kind of tech company are you these days …
Peak Facebook: British users lose their Liking for Zuck's ad empire
Facebook's popularity is slumping in the UK as users become fed up with being bombarded with advertising, a YouGov survey has revealed.
In a report examining social media use among web-savvy Brits, the market research firm found a 9 per cent drop in Facebook usage since April 2012.
Among the people who had quit Facebook, 23 per …
Microsoft and pals: Save the global economy by NOT ripping us off
Ditching dodgy software can rescue not just the UK from its financial worries, but the entire world, or so says the latest study from the Business Software Alliance.
The BSA, comprising vendors including Microsoft, CA, Adobe, Apple and others, commissioned biz school INSEAD (once known as the Institut Européen d'Administration …
Microsoft melds SkyDrive Pro and SharePoint
Microsoft has released a new SkyDrive Pro client that offers users of Office 365 and SharePoint the chance to store files locally. The application is the heir to the My Site feature from previous incarnations of Office 365.
SkyDrive Pro has most of the the same functions as the consumer version of the service, which is one of …
Microsoft tweaks WinPhone YouTube app to fix Google gripes
Microsoft has issued an update to its YouTube app for Windows Phone 8 that addresses some of Google's concerns over the earlier version, but not all of them.
Google's streaming-video division sent Microsoft a takedown request for the earlier version of the app last week, claiming that it violated YouTube's terms of use by …
Speaking in Tech: Portland hipsters gagging for yesterday's web tool
Podcast speaking_in_tech Greg Knieriemen podcast enterprise
For El Reg's latest Speaking in Tech podcast, Ed Saipetch is hosting the chat live from DrupalCon 2013, which is in hipster central Portland this year, while co-hosts Greg Knieriemen and Sarah Vela put out fires elsewhere.
Eddie is joined by special guests Joaquin Lippincott …
Eric Schmidt: 'Google IS a capitalist country... er, company'
Big Tent Google is just conforming to the way the global tax system works, the company's executive chairman Eric Schmidt said today as he rejected the criticism levelled at the ad giant by Labour leader Ed Miliband.
"We're trying to do the right thing, not the wrong thing," Schmidt said. He was speaking at Google's annual Big Tent event …
Word 2 to Office 365 and beyond: The good, the bad and the Ribbon
Live Chat Since the pioneering work of Word and Excel daddy Charles Simonyi, Microsoft has set the gold standard on productivity applications on the PC.
With the Office software suite, Microsoft built a moneymaker worth billions of dollars that has been further sustained by a network of devs who’ve reinforced the cash machine with add-ons …
Google builds crowdsourcing into new Maps code stack
Google I/O Google has been giving more details about how it has redesigned its Maps software by adding in crowd-sourced photographic and driving directions to its coding scheme.
The new Maps package is a ground-up rewrite of the code and the algorithms it uses, with the aim of generating personalized maps for each user that are suitable …
That $1,000 the lad in Lagos needed? Just email it with Google Wallet
Google has integrated its payment Wallet with Gmail, enabling PayPal-style transactions from within the Gmail interface, and to any over-18 American with an email address and a Google Wallet account.
Google Wallet has also spread to another couple of handsets, including the Samsung flagships (S4 & Note II) and the HTC One, all …
BlackBerry Messenger unleashed: Look out Twitter and Facebook
Analysis BlackBerry announced this week that its flagship messenger service, BBM, will no longer be tied to its proprietary handsets, potentially opening up a lucrative licensing stream which could rescue the beleaguered mobe-maker.
Fan forums have been in meltdown after the announcement. From some, the pain appears to be personal. Odd …
Google tells Microsoft to yank its new WinPhone YouTube app
No sooner has Microsoft managed to get a full-featured YouTube app running on Windows Phone 8 – something it long maintained was impossible – than an irate Google has asked it to immediately remove the app from the Windows Phone Store.
The Verge, which editor-in-chief Joshua Topolsky has described as "a news site which covers …
Apple seeks techies, designers to revive iWork office suite
Apple looks set to refresh its answer to Microsoft's office: the neglected iWork software suite, which hasn't received a significant update since 2009.
Listings on its jobs page, some of which date back a few months, the fruity firm says it is looking for nine people to help develop the office software collection. Could this be …
