Wayne Williams

Windows 10 is a decent operating system, but Microsoft has seen fit to remove certain features found in previous iterations of the OS.

If you’ve upgraded to Windows 10 and have been disappointed to discover one or more of your favorite features have been removed, the good news is it should be possible to restore the missing functionality without too much effort.

We all know that Microsoft wants as many people as possible to upgrade to Windows 10. The new OS is free for users of Windows 7 and 8.1, and the firm has the stated goal of getting it on a billion devices within 2-3 years.

To achieve this aim, Microsoft is pushing its new OS very aggressively, forcing it on to users, even if they have no desire to upgrade and have taken steps to actually prevent it.

It’s been a while since we’ve had any new Windows 10 preview builds, thanks to the holiday season, but Microsoft has at last pushed out a new build to the Fast ring. The software giant plans to make the Fast ring live up to its name this year with an accelerated release schedule.

In the future Microsoft’s criteria for releasing builds to the Fast ring will be much closer to its criteria for releasing them to its internal rings, which means new builds are likely to be buggier and suffer other issues. Build 11099, which is available for Insiders to download now, should be relatively stable however, as Microsoft has had a while to iron out any big problems.

If you’re running Windows 10 you might want to head to Settings, Update & Security as Microsoft has just pushed out a cumulative update for its new OS.

This is an update for non-Windows Insiders, and brings the current build up to 10586.63.

Data breaches were rarely out of the news last year, with the likes of VTech, OPM, Experian/T-Mobile, Ashley Madison and even Hello Kitty all admitting to data leaks.

While you might expect attackers to be using sophisticated methods to get at user data, a new survey from software solutions firm BMC and Forbes Insights reveals that in many cases, it’s known but unpatched vulnerabilities that are being exploited.

Protection solutions specialist Arxan Technologies has just released its fifth annual State of Application Security report which takes an in-depth look into the security of some of the most popular mobile apps available.

The company found a huge discrepancy between consumers’ beliefs regarding the level of security built into the apps, and the degree to which developers of these apps actually address known application vulnerabilities. Worryingly, 90 percent of the applications tested were vulnerable to at least two of the OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) Mobile Top 10 Risks. These are the most critical risks facing apps.

If you’re still using Windows 8 it’s now time to upgrade because that operating system is about to get a whole lot less secure.

From today, January 12 2016, Microsoft will stop issuing security patches for its 3-year-old tiled OS, which will mean users will no longer be safe from newer threats.

There’s no shortage of VR products available to buy, but the daddy of them all is unquestionably Oculus Rift. Unlike some rivals, this isn’t just a device you slap a smartphone in and strap to your face, it’s a full blown VR system with a sensor for tracking head position, and an input device that’s been built specially for navigating VR worlds.

The Rift has just gone up for pre-order now, and Oculus will start shipping it from March 28. It will be available in 20 countries, including the US, UK, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and Japan. The full list of supported territories is here. It will also be available through select retailers from April.

NetMarketShare’s latest desktop usage figures suggest that Windows 10 now has nearly 10 percent of the market. And that translates to over 200 million devices, according to the latest figures released today by Microsoft.

Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s corporate vice president, Windows and Devices Group, says "there are more than 200 million monthly active devices around the world running Windows 10" and he reports some other interesting adoption figures about the new OS, which will surprise a lot of people.

At the end of last year, Michael Larabel of Phoronix wrote an article in which he pointed out that Ubuntu had failed to hit its stated aim of 200 million users by the end of 2015. This figure was a goal that Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth laid out at the Ubuntu Developer Summit (UDS) in May 2011.

"We're just days away from closing out 2015 and it doesn't look like Ubuntu has come close to reaching that goal", Larabel wrote. Clearly his article riled those at Canonical, and the company has come out swinging with a blog post that details exactly how popular, and ubiquitous, Ubuntu is.

Microsoft is largely unrepentant about pushing its new operating system so aggressively, and early in the year it will be marking Windows 10 as a "recommended update" in a bid to get larger numbers of Windows 7 and 8.x users to make the switch.

Since its launch, Windows 10 has been gaining usage share at a steady, if rather unexciting rate, but there’s a clear downward trend that shows users of older operating systems are in no hurry to upgrade.

I’m looking forward to next year when, hopefully, I’ll finally be able to get my hands on the Oculus Rift which is expected to start shipping to consumers in Q1 2016. Pre-orders were supposed to start this year, but that’s clearly not going to happen now. Still I’ve waited long enough to get my VR fix, what’s a few more weeks/months?

While I didn’t get a Rift to play with this year, plenty of new technology did make its way through my hands and into my life. Here are some of the standout pieces of tech I'd definitely recommend you check out.

It’s understandable that Microsoft would want to push Windows 10 as much as possible, particularly as the rate of upgrades has been slowing recently. It must be a source of frustration to the company that users of Windows 7 and 8.1 appear so reluctant to switch, even though the upgrade for them is free.

In an effort to guide people on to Windows 10, Microsoft has been using increasingly aggressive methods, including pre-loading the installation files on to users’ systems, regardless of whether they want the new OS or not, and removing the option to opt-out of the upgrade. In the new year Microsoft intends to ramp up its push further, and joining the Windows Weekly team for a question and answer session, Microsoft Marketing Chief Chris Capossela made no apologies for his company’s approach which, he says, is being done to get users to a "safer place".

If you were fortunate enough to unwrap a new Windows device this Christmas the chances are it will be running Windows 10.

The new operating system has much to recommend it, as well as a few features that you might not be so keen on (the spying aspect for example). Getting Windows 10 set up exactly how you want it will -- like all versions of Windows -- take a while, but follow this guide and you’ll soon be sorted.

The Surface Hub looks cool. The giant wall-mounted Surface, aimed at businesses, comes in two sizes -- 55-inch and 84-inch -- and boasts 100 points of multitouch, up to three simultaneous pen inputs, dual 1080p front-facing video cameras and a four-microphone array. And the larger model has a 4k touch-screen display that refreshes every 8.33 milliseconds, which is faster than the human eye can detect.

But here’s the problem. Seven months ago Microsoft said the Surface Hub would be available to order in 24 markets -- including Australia, North America, Japan, the Netherlands, Singapore, and the UK -- from July 1, with a shipping date of September 1. But then five months ago, based on "strong demand" it delayed things (with no word of a ship date) and then a month later said orders would start shipping on January 1 2016. But guess what? They won’t.