Microsoft has announced the hardware requirements needed to run its Azure Stack – the upcoming on-premise hybrid version of the Azure cloud.

The Azure Stack first gets installed on a server and delivers Azure services in a customer’s datacentre, enabling developers and IT professionals to build, deploy and operate cloud applications using consistent tools, processes and artifacts.

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A cumulative Windows 10 patch has had some Word 2016 users cringing in despair. The patch, titled Cumulative Update KB3124200, is causing the Word 2016 template file Normal.dotm to be renamed.

Then, once the text processing program is restarted, it sees the file missing and creates a new one, basically restoring it to factory settings, which is a bummer. The Normal.dotm file is where Word stores all the custom macros, custom spellcheck and auto-correct features.

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Google and Ford have decided to join forces to build self-driving vehicles by forming a joint venture. Google’s technology will enable the cars to drive autonomously, while Ford will design and manufacture the vehicles being used.

The partnership between Google and Ford will be announced by Ford at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in January. This joint venture will take the pressure of designing its own vehicles off of Google while helping Ford gain valuable knowledge and insight into self-driving software development.

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To some this will come as a surprise, to others not as much, but the Distributed Denial of Service, also known as DDoS -- was the most popular type of cyber-attack in the past year.

According to a report by security firm Akamai, there has been a jump of 180 percent in the number of DDoS attacks in 2015. The ending year also saw records broken in the size of the attacks, as well.

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With many U.S. lawmakers calling for an end to encryption, Tim Cook has decided to reiterate Apple’s stance on the matter. Apple’s CEO believes that when it comes to encryption there is no trade-off between privacy and national security.

During CBS’ program 60 Minutes, on Sunday Cook defended the need for encryption and how it important it is to Apple and its consumers. According to Cook, there is no reason why Americans should not be able to have privacy while simultaneously protecting America’s national security.

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Japanese tech giant Toshiba is forced to restructure itself following enormous losses, and now it is known that some 6,800 people will lose their jobs.

The company is into many businesses, from laptop building, television to nuclear energy. The people losing their jobs work in the electronic devices department. The plans to restructure the company were unveiled after Toshiba overestimated its profit expectancies for a six-year period.

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Microsoft has announced that it has acquired Metanautix, a startup company that was developing its Quest data compute engine which aims to help large enterprises filter through their vast amounts of in-house data.

Metanautix, which was co-founded in 2012 by Theo Vassilakis and Toli Lerios, was launched in September 2014 after raising $7 million of funding after Quest had been two years in development.

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Let’s face it, backups are pretty boring, which is probably the reason why they often get overlooked and people find themselves staring into the abyss of lost data. Part of the reason why so many of us hate backups is that the software used often seems to overcomplicate things with lots of options that many people never use.

Bvckup 2 aims to change all of this with a backup solution that’s clean, simple to use, elegant and fast. Produced by Swiss company Pipemetrics, Bvckup 2 is small -- the installer is less than 2MB in size - but packs in a surprising amount of sophistication.

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A virtual private network (VPN) brings additional security to anyone using a public network, such as the Internet. Using a variety of security methods, such as encryption, the VPN is able to safeguard any data transmitted across the network, which may be at risk if it simply used the underlying public network infrastructure.

VPNs are often employed when it would not be practical to use a physical private network, usually due to financial reasons. As businesses embrace mobile working and face increasing pressure to protect sensitive information, many are employing virtual private networks to improve their network security.

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Tablets are often seen as a consumer device, allowing you to update Facebook from the sofa while you watch TV, or catch up with iPlayer in bed. But they’re increasingly finding a place in the business world too, allowing mobile workers to catch up with emails or update documents on the move. They can also be a viable laptop replacement for tasks like making sales presentations.

The iPad remains popular, since it popularized the tablet format, but of late, Android devices have been catching up in terms of quality and capability. Samsung has long been one of the biggest players in the Android tablet market and its latest premium tablet, and the Galaxy Tab S2 is clear evidence of the company’s intention to park its tank on the iPad’s lawn. But how well does it succeed and what does it have to offer to tempt business users away from buying the Apple device?

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Everybody needs some way of compressing and extracting files, but sometimes the built-in zip capabilities in Windows just don’t cut it. And what happens if you receive a file compressed in some format you’ve never heard of?

The answer lies with PowerArchiver 2015. This is one of the most comprehensive archiving tools you’ll find, capable of extracting from over 50 different formats. It can also write to all key formats too, including --of course -- Zip, as well as 7-zip, TAR, GZIP and even ISO.

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Goldman Sachs thinks Microsoft is making a comeback. The investment banking firm has produced a 22-page document -- titled Righting a Wrong -- looking at Microsoft’s current business, the recent changes it has made and it’s future opportunities.

The research analyzes Microsoft’s core businesses of Azure, Windows and Office and believes that the future looks bright for the company, going as far as to change its stock rating from Sell to Neutral.

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According to a new report from Harris Poll announced this week, enterprise mobility will top IT investments in 2016. The survey reveals that more than 90 percent of IT Decision Makers (ITDMs) see enterprise mobility as the critical function for customer engagement, competitiveness and operational productivity in 2016.

Additionally, nearly three in four (73 percent) respondents indicate that they intend to mobilize their whole organization.

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Microsoft has signed an important deal with the Chinese government, one which will see the American company deploy its latest operating system directly to the government agencies.

The Verge has reported how the Redmond-based software company will deploy a customized version of Windows 10 to the Chinese government through a newly-formed company called C&M Technologies.

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A survey commissioned by X-IO Technologies reveals that almost half of IT professionals (48 percent) do not believe their current storage array would work with the next generation of storage media

Furthermore, more than a half (57 percent) of IT professionals expect that their budgets are going to shrink or at the very least stay the same in 2016. This may indicate that any further changes to their storage requirements, especially in the wake of the IOT hype and big data explosion might not find a budget.

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