It can be useful finding out when friends are broadcasting live on Facebook, but unfortunately -- depending on your friends, of course -- there is a good chance they won’t be broadcasting something so interesting you’ll want to drop whatever you’re doing to watch there and then.

Facebook will alert you when someone is live, but like any notification, you can disable this so you won’t be alerted when Dave takes a motorbike ride in the rain, or Ellie’s children perform an out-of-tune rendition of "Let it go" from Frozen.

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With the launch of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Apple not only removed the headphone jack, the company also replaced the mechanical home button with a static one. What was not revealed, however, is that iOS 10 also has a secret software Home button.

The feature is a safeguard built in should anything go wrong with your physical home button. Should this happen, the button problem will be detected and iOS 10 will offer up a temporary on-screen Home button to tide you over until you can get to the Genius Bar.

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ScreenWings is a free Windows tool which prevents malicious software capturing your screen.

The program is convenient to use. There’s no drivers or services involved and it doesn’t require installation, so you can run it from a USB key whenever necessary. The interface is equally basic: a small gray window with a close button and an icon of a monitor (if you’ve two or more monitors you’ll get an extra icon for each one). That’s it. At this point, you don’t even get a minimize button.

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Still reeling from the Galaxy Note7 recall and flight ban, Samsung has announced it has started mass producing system-on-chip (SoC) products with 10-nanometer FinFET technology.

It follows on from the mass production in 2015 of FinFET mobile application processors, and Samsung says this is another industry first. The company says that devices featuring 10nm SoCs will launch in early 2017 and become more widespread throughout the year.

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HP Inc will cut around 3,000 to 4,000 jobs over the next three years as demand for its PCs and printers has slowed in recent months. The company originally announced the job cuts in February as part of its restructuring program which will see some 3,000 jobs cut by the end of this year.

Dion Weisler, the president and CEO of HP Inc, spoke out regarding how these cuts will affect every department of the company during a conference in New York. He argued that the restructuring plan would work out in the company's favor in the long run.

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San Diego, Calif. The cop convention is in town this weekend, and I have never seen so many men in blue-grey suits or uniformed officers strutting sidearms. Quite possibly the safest-feeling place in San Diego through October 18th is the Convention Center and the areas around it—that is unless you're a lawbreaker or someone as afraid of men and women in uniform as clowns. What the hell is this clown craze anyway? Yeah, that's off-topic.

The International Association of Chiefs of Police holds its 123rd annual conference, which I blasted through (poor choice of words, I know) yesterday for a specific, and interesting product launch: Patriot One's NForce CMR1000; self-described as a "covert primary screening device for the detection of on-body concealed weapons at access points including hallways and doorways of weapons-restricted buildings and facilities". I met with CEO Martin Cronin and Chief Science Advisor Natalia Nikolova.

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Windows 10 is a very rewarding operating system. While Windows 8.x was very polarizing, the newest version of Microsoft's OS is much more appealing. Not to mention, through updates, it is getting better all the time. The user interface is easy to use and learn, while also being wonderful for productivity.

If you are still using an older laptop running Windows XP or Vista (or something else), and have a need for a new computer, I have good news. We here at BetaNews are giving away a beautiful 11.6 inch convertible PC running Windows 10. It has been upgraded with an SSD, and can be both a notebook and a tablet. Entering to win is very easy, and you can learn more below.

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At the moment it does not matter whether you perform a Google search from your phone or from your computer; you'll see the same results. But in a few months this is set to change. The company is set to launch a new mobile search index that will be more up to date than the desktop index.

The news came at Pubcon, a social media and optimization conference, via Google's trends analyst Gary Illyes. It was an idea that was floated last year, and after a little experimentation, Google is almost ready to launch the new search index.

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The latest high-profile victim of online abuse is actress Faye Marsay, famous for her portrayal of the Waif in Game of Thrones. After finding herself on the receiving end of hate and harassment, she has announced that she is to quit Facebook.

Marsay's decision comes after guidelines were unveiled to help determine whether criminal proceedings should be brought against individuals engaging in online hate crimes.

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An emergency order has been pushed through by the US Transportation Department that means the Galaxy Note7 phones cannot be taken on board any US flight.

The grounding of the handset comes after Samsung stopped manufacturing it because of numerous reports of phones catching fire or exploding. It is yet another incentive for anyone who has hung onto the Note7 following a recall which saw Samsung offering customers $100 to switch to another phone from the company.

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The future of computing is open source. While there is still room for closed source software, more and more companies are going the open route. Major players such as Microsoft, Apple, and Facebook are all contributing to the open source community. Google in particular is a huge proponent of open source. Heck, two of the company's operating systems -- Chrome OS and Android -- are Linux distributions.

Today, the search giant announces the 'Open Source Report Card'. This is essentially a report that explains the details of its open source projects. Google is undoubtedly a major open source contributor, but the question is, what grade should the company get?

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Nearly a month after releasing the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, Apple is giving consumers the option of purchasing the unlocked versions of its latest flagships in US. The "SIM-free" models are available in all the color and storage configurations as their carrier counterparts, with prices starting at the same $649 for the iPhone 7 and $769 for the iPhone 7 Plus.

The unlocked iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models carry the designation A1778 and A1784, and support the same LTE bands as the AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon versions. But what are the differences?

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Fintech is certainly mentioned a lot in business circles, but without a clear understanding of what the term actually means it risks becoming just another technology buzzword. Not only that, when you consider that investment in fintech had grown from $4.05 billion in 2013 to $12.2 billion by the start of 2015, it’s clearly something that is worth having an understanding of.

As a portmanteau of financial technology, it is hardly surprising that fintech refers to any kind of technology that relates to the financial sector. More specifically, however, the term has gained much greater traction in recent times due to the rapid adoption of the Internet, smartphones and mobile applications. So many aspects of our lives have been disrupted, enhanced and revolutionized by digital technologies, and the financial services sector is no different.

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Manufacturers seem obsessed with making laptops, tablets, and smartphones both thinner and lighter. You know what? That is a good thing. As long as the design isn't entirely form over function, who can argue with a more sleek device? As someone who is constantly carrying a laptop in a backpack, having a lightweight machine is wonderful for my back and shoulders.

Speaking of svelte laptops, the Acer Swift 7 is the world's thinnest. Yes, the 13.3 inch Windows 10 notebook is apparently a record-breaker at an insane 0.39 inches height. You might think the 2.48 pound PC would have an Intel Core M processor, but actually, it has a Kaby Lake Core i5.

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Flow charts and mind maps are useful tools which can help anyone to organize their ideas, but creating them can be a challenge. Choose the wrong package and it’s all too easy to be buried in enterprise-level detail about SysML or entity relationship diagrams.

SimpleDiagrams (Windows, Mac, $29) takes a friendlier approach. It can create flow charts, sketches, mind maps, UI flow diagrams and more, yet has a straightforward interface which anyone can pick up right away.

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