Just in time for Christmas, Google is introducing family games for Chromecast. The diminutive streaming device is more readily associated with watching YouTube videos, but there are a growing number of apps springing up. The latest additions to the selection are a batch of games which can be enjoyed by the whole family.

What's that? The Chromecast has no controller? Far from being a problem, Google sees this as a big advantage: "there's no hassle or expense with extra controllers. Anyone with a phone or tablet can join in". Just as you use your phone or tablet to control media playback, you can do the same to control games, and the built-in sensors found in many handsets mean they work like Wiimote (or Wii Remote if you will insist on proper terminology).

An enterprising Chinese hacker has decided to ditch iOS 8 from his new iPhone 6 Plus, and instead run… Windows 98.

Yes, Microsoft’s venerable desktop OS runs quite readily on Apple’s new phablet by all accounts, even if there isn’t much point to installing an old incarnation of Windows on a modern smartphone.

Email overload -- it's something that we all suffer with; but what’s the solution? To help make it easier to focus on the emails you need to see and deal with, Microsoft is launching Clutter. It's a tool aimed at Office 365 business customers who want to be able to wade through the rubbish and get to the emails that actually matter.

In many ways, Clutter is Microsoft's answer to Google's Priority Inbox feature for Gmail. It determines which messages are those which you are likely to want to handle later rather than straight away, and moves them out of the way to free up your inbox. Less crap to sort through leads to increased productivity -- at least that's the theory.

We all use notes on our phones these days, whether a genuine note-taking, or simply setting reminders for ourselves or storing important reference numbers. But how can you transfer your notes from your iPhone to a Windows PC?

Luckily there are two main ways to import notes from an iPhone, whether without using outlook or without iTunes.

While I'm no expert in copyright or trademark law, I am sure of one thing -- the GNOME desktop environment for Linux is awesome. It is a very intuitive interface, with great programs and a helpful community. The name "Gnome" is hardly unique though; its a common word that other companies use. As an example, Travelocity, an online travel site, uses a Gnome as a mascot.

It is a bit curious then, that the Gnome Foundation is upset with deal website Groupon for using the Gnome name. Groupon is not using it as a desktop environment; no, it is using it for a point-of-sale tablet and operating system; will people really confuse such a device with a Linux desktop environment?

Amazon has been producing its Fire tablets for the past few years, and the devices have remained among the retailer's top selling items. For one reason, they are always good solid products, but for another, Amazon sells them at a good price and frequently discounts the devices. Now the company has released its latest iteration of the tablet, but what new features does it bring along?

In all honesty, there are not a lot of big changes, but many minor updates to both the operating system and the hardware have been made. The new tablet comes in both six and seven inch models, though there is also a new 8.9, which retains the HDX name used for last year's models of both 7 and 8.9 devices.

Music at a concert is different to music played at home, or in the car, because the high acoustic energy that surrounds you means you don't just hear the sounds, you feel them. There have been attempts in the past to marry sound with vibrations -- subwoofer chairs and vibrating vests, for example -- so that games or movies feel more realistic, but Woojer, which successfully raised $143,000 on Kickstarter, takes a subtler approach.

The matchbox sized subwoofer is worn on the body and connects between any audio source (your phone or a tablet, say) and headphones. The audio input -- be it a music track, a game or film -- is transformed into a tactile vibration, which you can feel throughout your body.

IObit has announced the release of IObit Advanced SystemCare 8, a major update for its comprehensive PC maintenance toolkit.

A new "Protect" module includes tools to clean and manage your browser toolbars, customize Windows security settings, block access to malicious sites and keep your Chrome, IE and Firefox home and search pages safe from unauthorized changes.

As part of the simplification of its portfolio, Microsoft is dropping the Lync name as it rebrands the business messaging and conferencing tool. The name will change to Skype for Business in the first half of 2015, and interface tweaks will see the business version of the tools closely mimicking that of the consumer Skype product.

The aim is to create a more uniform experience for people using Microsoft's communication tools at home and in the office. After a decade of Skype, and bearing in mind the success of Lync, it was almost inevitable that the two products would ultimately become one, and that day is now almost here. As Microsoft puts it: "The magic of Skype and the power of Lync are coming together".

For a whole weekend, I thought the new smartphone I had just bought was defective. Because why else could it not send any SMS messages to any of my contacts nor connect to the Internet via 4G? It was the only logical explanation at the time, as everything else -- my monthly plan, the 4G coverage in my area, the settings -- was in order. While that was happening, I could receive SMS messages, calls were working fine. Getting a defective device is not impossible, after all. I am also not the luckiest person in the world. These things happen.

The problem, however, was not with the device, or even the SIM as some may think. As it turns out, whenever this happens, you just happen to be in the wrong place. Literally. Some may be lead to believe that their setup is to blame, when it is actually the carrier's 4G network in the area that is at fault. You may find that it works great in some places, and only have problems at work, for instance.

In theory, mind mapping software should help you generate ideas, then organize and arrange them for easier sharing with others.

But then you launch your chosen package, stare at a blank screen, and are left wondering exactly how to begin. The end result is you’re wasting time dealing with the mechanics of the program, rather than thinking about the core issue you’re trying to address.

We all experience the frustration caused by IT issues from time to time, but a new survey by Forrester on behalf of operations performance specialist PagerDuty reveals that 55 percent of IT and business decision makers in the US experience IT service problems at least once a week.

What's more worrying is that 53 percent found out about the problems via users or external customers rather than through internal monitoring tools. Also 54 percent of respondents said their companies lacked adequate incident and problem management processes or didn't provide enough information to identify where the problem comes from.

German developer Boris Eyrich Software has released Artweaver Free 5.0, a major new version of its painting tool for Windows. The app, also available in a more fully featured Plus version, boasts a number of new tools and improvements.

These include a new high precision 16-bit brush engine, better file-saving mechanism, support for the OpenRaster file format and support for exporting all presets. Plus users also gain a new Mirror Painting tool.

Technology is changing our lives at an unprecedented pace. We're shopping on our phones, watching Netflix on our tablets and posting selfies to Instagram.

From a business perspective, technology is forcing a new approach. The massive, grindingly slow corporates of old, the likes of Blackberry, Blockbusters, Nokia, Navteq and Kodak, are being superseded by two guys in a garage with a start-up leveraging new, innovative technologies. Welcome WhatsApp, Oculus Rift, Twitch, Netflix, Instagram, Waze and Xiaomi.

The latest high-profile security breach has exposed the personal details of hundreds of thousand of USPS workers, as well as customers. The attack, which is suspected to originate from China, took place in the middle of September, but details are only just emerging. An investigation by the FBI started straight away and is still on-going.

USPS says that employee information such as "names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers, addresses, beginning and end dates of employment, emergency contact information" was compromised. The security breach also affects customers as call center data was obtained by the attackers, including "names, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses".