There are many ways to share files between the computers on your network -- simple folder sharing, or cloud-based file syncing are just two ideas that come to mind. But when Apple introduced AirDrop in OS X Lion, it added another way – an elegant, simple means of simply dragging and dropping files to quickly distribute them to other Macs on your network.

The only problem with AirDrop is that you require other Macs, running OS X Lion or later no less, for it to work. Thankfully, third parties have finally come around to developing cross-platform alternatives to AirDrop, and another promising example has just poked its head above the parapet in the form of Filedrop.

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Little over a month ago, AT&T announced that on a two-year contract the Samsung Galaxy S4 in 32GB storage trim will be available for $249.99. In the meantime the 16GB version hit the mobile operator's stores for $50 less, but even today the 32GB Galaxy S4 is still nowhere to be seen.

On its Twitter account, AT&T sheds some light on the matter and reveals that the 32GB Galaxy S4 is available starting this Friday, May 10. In just a couple of days prospective customers will be able to purchase the smartphone for $249.99 alongside a two-year contract and qualifying plans.

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The sharks are in the water smelling Microsoft blood. It's the company's "New Coke" moment. Windows 8 is too little too late (hey, that rhymes).

Over the years Microsoft has had a number of true product failures, genuine losers, but fewer than you'd think. I'd certainly count Microsoft BOB as one of these; BOB was an attempt at a cartoony, fun interface to Windows that was laughed off the market in short order. (Microsoft reps told me at the time that the focus groups loved it.)

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Instagram boasts 100 million users and it gets media attention, but the photo sharing service is far from being the only camera app available for mobile customers. In fact, while I use the service, I cannot say it is my favorite. That title belongs to Camera360, a photo app that brings all sorts of functionality to your smartphone.

Camera360 recently upgraded to version 4.0, bringing along new shooting modes, scenes, cloud integration and more. The upgrade is a hit  and today the company announces that, like Instagram, it now has 100 million customers.

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Regular readers know that I'm a sucker for good advertising. Audi's "The Challenge" is classic, pitting the new and old Spocks (Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto) against each other. Surely the geeks, especially old-timers like me, will appreciate the inside-Star Trek humor. If you're a Trek fan of long vintage, the video is a treat.

I laughed when Nimoy started singing the Bilbo Baggins song. I actually owned that album in high school. William Shatner (aka James T. Kirk) and Nimoy both released records during the 1970s, when Star Trek was in syndication and before the series' revival on TV and movie theater screens. Geeks and Trekkers, this commercial will be among the best two minutes forty-five seconds you'll spend today.

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Even if you're not the biggest Windows Phone enthusiast I'm quite sure you have heard or read about the alleged Lumia 928 that Nokia is to unveil sometime soon. I will not bore you with the rumored specs, release date or carrier on which the device is assumed to surface, but can confirm that the Lumia 928 is definitely real.

The Finnish maker, likely to keep the rumors flowing, released a picture showcasing a device referred to as "the newest Nokia Lumia" smartphone. There is no reference of the name in the photo, but the link address clearly says Lumia 928.

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In April of this year the British Library along with libraries in Scotland, Wales and Dublin gained powers to archive the whole of the UK Web for future generations of researchers. To mark the introduction of these regulations the library today announced a list of 100 sites it says will be essential reading for future generations.

Lucy Burgess, Head of Content Strategy for the British Library says that the project aims to collect about a petabyte of data over the next decade. "We want to paint a diverse picture of what life in the UK today is like, for our great grandchildren and for future generations of researchers so they can understand how we lived, how we worked and how we felt. We’re talking about our culture and our digital heritage here and that’s what we exist to preserve".

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Mother's Day is fast approaching and, naturally, Amazon would like to sell you a holiday gift. The online retailer would really like you to purchase a Kindle Fire HD tablet, and it is making sure that this purchase will hurt your wallet just a bit less than it normally would. Amazon now places the Kindle Fire HD on its site for a temporarily discounted price.

For this coming Mother's Day, Amazon knocks $20 off the usual $199 price tag for the Kindle Fire HD 16 GB model. This is the 7-inch screen tablet with 1280 x 800 resolution (720p), Dolby audio, WiFi and 1.2 Ghz dual-core processor. The retailer also throws in some free cloud storage for mom to keep those family pictures.

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Judging by all the heavy criticism hitting the interwebs each day one would rightfully assume that Microsoft is on the wrong path with Windows 8. The operating system is often blamed for declining PC shipments, an user interface designed only for touchscreen devices or a scarce Modern UI app ecosystem filled with knockoffs. So, therefore, Windows 8 must be a clear sales miss, right?

Today, Tami Reller, Windows & Windows Live CFO, boasts about 100 million Windows 8 licenses, a figure which does not fall in line with what every naysayer leads you to believe. "This number includes Windows licenses that ship on a new tablet or PC, as well as upgrades to Windows 8. This is up from the 60 million license number we provided in January. We've also seen the number of certified devices for Windows 8 and Window RT grow to 2,400 devices, and we're seeing more and more touch devices in the mix".

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The European Union's Competition Commission has ruled that Motorola Mobility (owned by Google) abused its position in the German mobile market by filing a patent injunction against Apple.

Motorola won an injunction related to Apple products using data transmission technology in February 2012. The fruit-logo company offered to pay a licence fee for the patents but the companies failed to agree on a price. A number of Apple products, including iPad and severall iPhone models, were taken off sale in Germany during the dispute.

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VirusTotal.com is a great resource, a powerful tool which can quickly check just about any file for malware with around 50 of the world’s leading antivirus engines. But if you need to submit more than one or two files then its limited browser-based interface will quickly become a problem, and so you may want to try the new PhrozenSoft VirusTotal Uploader, instead.

Once installed, the program makes it much easier to check the files you need. At its simplest, you can just select one or more files in Explorer, drag and drop then onto VirusTotal Uploader, and they’ll be uploaded for you. A straightforward interface keeps you informed on the upload process, and results are displayed as they arrive.

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Four weeks ago, Microsoft flicked the switch and officially merged Windows Live Messenger with Skype. Users of the popular IM tool were greeted with a message stating "A newer version is available. You must install the newer version in order to continue.  Would you like to do this now?"

Although Skype is a great tool, many fans of Messenger were up in arms about the forced change, and I know people who still pine for the old chat application. Fortunately, there’s a very simple way to get it back.

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It’s not difficult to create PDFs these days. If your application doesn’t already have a “Save as PDF option”, then a virtual printer like Bullzip will generally get the job done.

These converted documents won’t always be formatted properly, though, and large or oddly-sized margins can be a real problem -- but that’s where the open-source Briss comes in. If you need to crop PDFs, perhaps to remove page numbers, maybe just to make the document easier to read on a small screen, then this small free program could an excellent solution.

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Yesterday (yeah, yeah, I'm late), Google released a stunning new version of Gmail for iPad and iPhone. I tried to write this story several times on May 6, but the newsroom was short-staffed, keeping me extra busy. Vacations, bank holiday in United Kingdom and Orthodox Easter Monday just about emptied BetaNews. So, please, pardon this belated story about the great Google escape.

What a wild one, too. Control-freak Apple uses Safari to keep developers like Google in check. Especially such a rival that invades iOS with a remarkably rich set of apps tightly tied to myriad web services. So Gmail's sudden liberation is quite surprising. Links now go to installed Google apps -- gasp, Chrome, Maps and YouTube -- rather than opening Safari. Chrome linkage really is a shocker, and all the more so with Google kissing WebKit to the wind in favor of its own browsing engine. Expect it in the Chrome stable channel soon.

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Anti-rootkit tools used to be bulky, complex, packed with so much low-level jargon that even most Windows experts might struggle to figure out what was going on. And they were risky to use, too, with the authors often employing unauthorised low-level coding tricks which could easily blue-screen your PC just by running a regular scan.

If you know what you’re doing then there’s still scope for a little low-level Windows exploration, of course, but most people just want something which will check their PC for threats, finding and removing them with the maximum speed, and minimum hassle. And that’s just what you get withTrend Micro Rootkit Buster.

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