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You are almost certainly familiar with Pandora, the popular music app that allows you to build stations based upon your favorite artists or songs. It's available in both free and paid versions, and you can choose which one to go for based on your tolerance for commercials.

You may, however, be less familiar with Sonos. For those who don't know, it is a whole house music system that allows you to connect multiple speakers, each of which can be individually controlled -- you can have them all synced to play the same thing, or different songs in different rooms.

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Back in September, we told you some interesting Linux Mint news -- version 18.3 would be named "Sylvia." That is hardly the most exciting recent Mint news, however. Actually, the bombshell that the operating system would be abandoning KDE was far more intriguing. While some people will mourn Linux Mint KDE, I certainly won't. Quite frankly, it should never have existed in the first place as it fragments the user experience, but I digress.

If you are a fan of Mint KDE, don't panic -- there is still one more release featuring the desktop environment. Yeah, the upcoming 18.3 "Sylvia" will have a KDE version. Today Linux Mint 18.3 BETA sees release, but it is only a Cinnamon and Mate affair -- for now. Unfortunately, the Mint team picked a bad day to release the beta as it will surely be overshadowed by the superior Fedora 27 which was released earlier today too.

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Over the years, many people have bought Windows machines only to wipe the storage drive and install their favorite Linux-based operating system. For the most part, this practice works well, but you still may experience hardware incompatibilities, albeit far fewer nowadays than in prior years. The Wi-Fi card, for instance, may not have Linux drivers, leading to huge headaches.

The better option is to buy a computer with Linux pre-installed. Why? Well, this lets you know that all the hardware is compatible, as the seller has tested it beforehand. Not to mention, you are supporting the Linux community this way. Buying a Windows PC even when you erase Windows still helps Microsoft -- why the heck would you want to do that?

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If you want a pure, no-nonsense, Linux-based operating system, look no further than Fedora. It is stable as all hell, while also being fairly bleeding edge with up-to-date packages. Best of all, the distribution focuses heavily on open source ideology, using only truly free software. It is a great way to experience Linux as it should be. Hell, the father of the kernel, Linus Torvalds, uses Fedora -- that’s saying something.

Today, version 27 of the operating system finally becomes available. Desktop users should love the GNOME 3.26 desktop environment, which offers many improvements, including color emoji support. Yes, emojis do matter -- Linux users can have fun too. Also included is LibreOffice 5.4 -- a worthy alternative to Microsoft’s office suite. From a more technical aspect, some users will appreciate the addition of TRIM support for newly encrypted solid state drives.

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The F800 is an impressive dash cam, but it is not the ultimate high-end model that Thinkware has to offer. The F800 Pro is actually the one that sits at the top of the range, and, if you haven't heard of it before, that's likely because it hasn't been offered in the US or Canada so far.

That changes starting today, as Thinkware announces that the F800 Pro is now available on Amazon and through major automotive retailers. Its latest flagship has the price tag to match its aspirations, being available from $329.99.

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Let’s be fair, for reading a PDF your average end user will rarely need anything more than a simple reader, so Preview on the Mac or Edge on your Windows 10 PC will suffice.

For business users, portable document format files offer a method for sharing commercial-grade documents which can be marked up before they are sent to a printer. Indeed, if you share your PDF through the cloud, anyone can download, view, add a comment and save it back for others to read the comments and make changes.

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Did you read the classic JRR Tolkien books? Perhaps you saw the award-winning series of movies that did a phenomenal job of portraying The Lord of the Rings story. There are, of course, some things left out for brevity's sake -- it's hard to put that many words on the big screen.

For everyone who reminisces about the books and/or the films there will soon be a way to get transported back to that magical land of elves, dwarves, wizards, orcs and other creatures that reside in a certain part of our psyche.

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Most enterprises and government organizations fell vulnerable to insider threats and around half have experienced an insider attack in the last year, according to a new report.

Commissioned by Cybersecurity Insiders, the study is based on a comprehensive online survey of 472 cyber security professionals.

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Development teams have turned to continuous delivery to help them adapt software features whilst rolling them out to customers. At the same time project management teams have used feedback mechanisms to get information on how well the software is working.

The problem is that in many businesses these two operations are separate, which leads to delays and duplication of efforts.

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Healthcare providers are spending a lot of money on connected devices. But this comes at a time when cyber attacks on healthcare targets are increasing with medical devices a prime target.

Israeli start up Medigate has secured backing for a technology platform, that lets security teams defend networked medical devices from cyber attacks. It combines knowledge and understanding of medical workflow and device identity and protocols with the reality of today's cyber security threats.

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Rooting Android phones is fairly common these days, and it opens up the possibility of doing things that would not otherwise be an option. But if you are rooting your phone, you want it to be you who is in charge of the process. If you have a OnePlus phone, you may be interested -- and a little disturbed -- to learn that the company is preinstalling an app that acts as a backdoor to root access.

The app is called EngineerMode and it is preinstalled on the OnePlus 3, 3T and 5. It is possible to exploit the app to gain root access to a device -- all it takes is a simple command and a password that can be determined fairly easily. On one hand this is a worrying discovery; on the other, it opens up a way to root OnePlus phones without unlocking the bootloader.

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According to a new report, one in four UK healthcare IT professionals aren't confident in their organization's ability to respond to cyber attacks.

Research from network intelligence company Infoblox finds that disruption caused to the NHS by WannaCry in May 2017 means many healthcare organizations are preparing themselves for further ransomware attacks.

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Buying an Xbox One game as a gift for Christmas, birthday, or other occasion no longer means having to hit the stores, or buy a gift card. Microsoft has now opened up digital game gifting to everyone.

While this is not a completely new option, it was previously only possible to send games to people via Xbox Live. Now you can buy a digital game for a friend or family member, and send it to them via email.

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Microsoft has announced the upcoming release of a Skype Professional Account desktop client. Due to launch in the US as a preview very soon, this is a business-focused build of Skype that offers a host of extra features.

This includes the ability to book meeting, make notes and take payments, all from the comfort of a chat client. The aim is to reduce the number of tools and services anyone conducting a business online needs to use.

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Mesh networking is all the rage nowadays. If you aren't familiar with the concept, a mesh network links several access points into a single wireless network, providing improved range and speed. The problem with a mesh network, however, is that it requires you to purchase all new hardware. If you already own a great router, but need to eliminate a dead zone in your home, it might not make sense to invest in mesh right now.

If you love your existing router but want to expand your Wi-Fi coverage, a range extender is a smart buy. It is a device that connects wirelessly to your existing router and then provides access to your dead or spotty zones. Today, Linksys unveils one of the most beautiful such devices. The "RE9000 Max-Stream Tri-Band AC3000 Wi-Fi Range Extender," as it is called, has four antennas and promises to improve your home's Wi-Fi coverage. It can also serve as an access point to convert up to four hardwired gigabit device connections into wireless. Linksys even provides a useful app to help you find optimal placement of the extender -- nice.

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