How to install Microsoft Visual Studio Code on Raspberry Pi
If you’re not familiar, Visual Studio Code (VS Code) is an open source C development environment from Microsoft. It is available for Windows, macOS and x64 Linux, and now you can run it on Raspberry Pi too.
The tool supports text editing, full web development (with JavaScript, TypeScript and Node.js) and git source code control. It supports extensions too (although not all of them), so you can further expand its capabilities.
Microsoft Teams use boosted by pandemic work shift
Among the main beneficiaries of the pandemic-related shift to remote working have been suppliers of workplace collaboration and conferencing software.
New research from digital experience management platform Aternity shows that Microsoft has been a big winner with Teams usage increased nearly 3,900 percent since the beginning of pandemic.
Never send the wrong email attachment again
Many of us will at some point have attached the wrong file to an email or sent an attachment to the wrong person.
This is more than an inconvenience as it could end up exposing sensitive data. But thanks to a new feature from Tessian you may never make an attachment error again.
Number of 2020 vulnerability disclosures set to overtake 2019
Despite a sharp decrease of 19.2 percent observed earlier in the year, vulnerability disclosures in 2020 are expected to exceed 2019's level according to Risk Based Security.
The company's VulnDB team aggregated 23,269 vulnerabilities disclosed during 2020. Despite the initial disruption from COVID-19, the trend of total number of vulnerabilities suggests that business operations and routines have normalized as the gap has closed to 0.98 percent.
Demand for business intelligence solutions increases by 41 percent
A survey of over 120 developers and IT leaders from Reveal shows a 41 percent increase in demand for business intelligence solutions last year and 38 percent seeing increased revenue as the tech market shifted.
But while many took advantage of opportunities, 50 percent reported having to make do with less in 2020. Of those, 23 percent saw projects canceled or postponed, with some respondents indicating lost funding (14 percent) and staff reductions (14 percent).
Twitter confirms that Donald Trump will never tweet again
Twitter has confirmed that, even if he is re-elected as US president in 2024, Donald Trump will not be allowed to use the platform ever again.
The former president was unceremoniously kicked off Twitter towards the end of his leadership after concerns that his tweets were an incitement to violence. The company hit Trump with permanent suspension back in January, and has now made it clear that permanent really does mean permanent.
Creative Sound Blaster PLAY! 4 is a very affordable USB-C DAC
Back in the day, computer builders would often buy sound cards for their rigs. This was because on-board audio used to be terrible. Going even further back, some motherboards did not even offer integrated sound, making a sound card a must.
Nowadays, however, most computers have on-board audio that isn't just passable, but quite good. Sure, there are still dedicated sound cards on the market, but they are usually reserved for audiophiles and/or gamers. These days, most computer users would be better served by a USB DAC -- a digital to analog converter. These offer superior audio for both laptops and desktops, and can reduce electrical interference and noise too.
Forget pricey Microsoft Windows 10 -- the Ubuntu Linux-based Linspire 10 is cheaper
Windows 10 is actually a really great operating system. The problem? It is actually quite expensive at its normal retail price. Amazon sells Windows 10 Home for a whopping $130! Not to mention, Microsoft's desktop OS is quite resource intensive, making it a bad choice for those with aging hardware. For those with older computers, Linux-based operating systems are often a better option.
While many people associate Linux distributions with "free," the truth is, some can actually cost money. There is nothing wrong with paying for a Linux distro either -- it is a fine way to support the development. One such operating system, Linspire (formerly known as "Lindows") recently hit a major milestone -- version 10. Starting at just $29.99, the Ubuntu-based operating system is far cheaper than the expensive Windows 10.
Apple fixes serious sudo vulnerability in macOS
A serious vulnerability was recently discovered in the sudo tool which could be used to gain root access on Linux-based systems. It soon transpired that the very same issue also affects macOS.
The security vulnerability -- known as Baron Samedit and tracked as CVE-2021-3156 -- is a years-old heap-based buffer overflow bug, and Apple has now issued a patch that fixes the problem for users of Big Sur, Catalina and Mojave flavors of macOS.
2020 sees ransomware increase by over 400 percent
A new study from cybersecurity company Deep Instinct, finds that last year malware increased by 358 percent overall and ransomware increased by 435 percent as compared with 2019.
The report which analyzes millions of attacks taking place across the year finds distribution of the Emotet malware skyrocketed by 4,000 percent, while malware threats attacking Android phones increased by 263 percent.
MacBook Pro battery not charging properly? Apple may give you a free replacement
It's an unfortunate fact of life that over time all laptop batteries become less efficient. The machine that once got your through the day will eventually only last a couple of hours -- perhaps even less.
Age is one thing, but sometimes there can be a hardware or software problem that exacerbates the issue. And this is case for some MacBook Pro owners. But there's good news. Apple may replace your battery free of charge.
Poor SIEM configuration puts enterprises at risk
Enterprises invest billions annually on SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) software and expect this investment to result in comprehensive threat coverage.
But a new report from AI-powered threat coverage platform CardinalOps shows that on average SIEM deployment rules miss 84 percent of the techniques listed in MITRE ATT&CK.
2021 Prediction #5: Apple (and maybe Google) saves the world
Back on January 23, the New York Times published an Op-Ed piece by Kate Murphy titled America Has a GPS Problem, citing fear at the highest levels of government and industry that international bad actors might bring down the Global Positioning System satellite network, running your Tesla into a guardrail in the process. It’s just the sort of story you’d expect to read here, rather than in the Times, but what the heck. And the story is absolutely correct: we are all in danger. But Ms. Murphy, beyond wringing her hands, doesn’t say how the crisis will be averted or who will do the averting. I predict that Apple will fix the problem and save the day and they’ll probably do it this year.
The military and intelligence communities have long been worried that China or Russia could shoot down some or all of the 24 GPS satellites, blinding our strategic weapons in the process. It’s literal shooting-down, too, since the anti-satellite weapons demonstrated so far have been kinetic -- dumb rocks smashed into our satellites at incredible speed, knocking them from the sky and requiring incredible precision. So far only China and Russia have this offensive capability. But Ms. Murphy and the Times expand the population of bad guys beyond China and Russia to include enemies jamming, spoofing, or otherwise hacking GPS, which could be anyone -- Iran, North Korea, even groups of private individuals.
What's wrong with software debugging? [Q&A]
We've seen a tidal wave of developer-enabling technologies over the last ten years. From DevOps, to CI/CD, to containers and microservices -- all of these best practices and technology patterns aim to speed up the process of shipping code fast from the developer into production.
But while software has become increasingly easy to package and deploy, the process of diagnosing and fixing bugs in production has become much more difficult. When services crash in the middle of the night, developers still find themselves in the world of logs, hotfixes and desperation -- but now with much greater surface area to investigate as applications span distributed systems.
Microsoft encourages Windows users to install essential fixes for serious TCP/IP vulnerabilities
Whenever Microsoft releases updates for Windows, the company is always keen for as many people as possible to get the patch installed. But with this month's Patch Tuesday bug fixes, the company is encouraging Windows users even more than usual.
Referring to two Critical security issues and one Important one, all affecting TCP/IP, Microsoft says that "it is essential that customers apply Windows updates to address these vulnerabilities as soon as possible". The CVE-2021-24074, CVE-2021-24086 and CVE-2021-24094 vulnerabilities affect Windows 7 upwards.
