Linux Live USB Creator isn't another 'me-too' utility
At first glance Linux Live USB Creator looks much like UNetbootin, theUniversal USB Installer, and every other tool that aims to help you download and create a bootable Linux environment for your PC. And as those existing tools are generally very good it’s not immediately obvious why we might need another.
Take a closer look at the Linux Live USB Creator and you’ll see it’s not just another “me too” utility, though -- the program really does have enough features and functionality to stand up against the best of the rest.
Samsung smartphone shipments soar stunning 267%, trouncing iPhone
Apple apologists' brief respite is over. Late last week, IHS iSuppli and Strategy Analytics released first quarter data putting Samsung handset shipments ahead of Nokia, ending the Finnish company's 14-year reign. But the analyst firms couldn't agree on smartphones, with Strategy Analytics positioning Samsung ahead of Apple, but IHS giving the nod to iPhone. The Apple Fanclub clung to the "We're No. 1!" data, unsurprisingly. But the last word comes today from IDC, which corroborates Strategy Analytics, crowning Samsung king in both categories.
"The halcyon days of rapid growth in the smartphone market have been good to Samsung", Kevin Restivo, IDC senior research analyst, says. "Samsung has used its established relationships with carriers in a mix of economically diverse markets to gain share organically and at the expense of former high fliers such as Nokia".
Crocodoc uses HTML 5 to solve the riddle of online document viewing
If you ever viewed a document on Dropbox, LinkedIn, or Yammer, you have already used Crocodoc. The San Francisco-based company offers an HTML5-compliant document viewer that allows for the embedding and viewing of documents as they were intended, and is making the service available for licensing starting Tuesday.
Google Docs and similar competitors have offered online document viewing for some time. Google Docs' transcoding isn't perfect and documents often lose a portion of their original formatting. While this may not be an issue for the average consumer, enterprise usage typically requires a more accurate reproduction.
Android 4 share soars
I don't know how cellular carriers or device makers could move any slower serving Ice Cream Sandwich to their customers. Still, someone is making progress, seven months after Google formally unveiled the OS and six after the first device with it shipped. Android 4.0 share jumped dramatically from mid March to mid April, granted from a small base. It's about time.
This morning I wrote a mobile browser usage story and checked official statistics on Android usage, which is based on the number of devices connecting to Google Play during the pervious 14 days. That number: 2.9 percent. Hours later, when doing a second browser story -- on desktops -- I double checked, more as formality. To my surprise, Google updated the data as of today: 4.9 percent.
Internet Explorer rises from the dead, and, whoa, that's not good for Firefox
What seemingly started as a fluke, suddenly is a trend. In April, Internet Explorer gained usage share for the fourth consecutive month, reversing a long, steady decline. That's the view presented by April browser usage data Net Applications released today. IE share rose to 54.09 percent -- that's up from 53.83 percent in March and 51.87 percent in December. The question: Are these gains sustainable? Can IE rise up, after loosing more than 40 points of share over 7 years?
I'm wondering if Internet Explorer's share rise is coincidence or convergence. Recent gains coincided with Chrome's stunning setback. In January, following a minor paid-link scandal involving a third party promoting Chrome, Google responded by treating itself like other advertisers, by reducing Chrome's search PageRank for 60 days. The effects were immediate. In January, the browser's usage share fell, ending 14 months of consecutive gains. Meanwhile, IE usage share rose.
Use Cloudfogger to better protect your online docs and files
Just how secure is the data you’ve backed up online? Most cloud-based backup providers promise to encrypt your data before it’s uploaded to their servers, but a handful perform the encryption after the data’s been uploaded, which means they possess the key required to unlock your data and potentially hand it over to anyone who comes asking (backed with the right warrant).
Cloudfogger is a brand new (and currently free) service that puts you back in control of your data, allowing you to encrypt it prior to uploading it, providing you with another layer of protection for your most sensitive documents and files.
Sony Speaker Dock RDP-X500IP [video review]
Recently I had the chance to use the Sony Speaker Dock for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod. I love the sophisticated looks; the dock would be perfect to add to the atmosphere of a get-together or party. Even though this is a Sony product, it reminds me of Apple in the sense that this speaker is very simple. It isn't overloaded with complicated buttons that you would need an instruction manual to understand.
For a dock system of its quality, the RDP-X500IP is on the less expensive end, price-wise. For example, Sony sells the dock for $250. The comparable Bose system is $150 more. If you're on a budget, however, there are many quality alternatives, from Logitech and Klipsch, among others. Overall, the RDP-X500IP is a truly fabulous audio system. It's known for great bass, which honestly is quite phenomenal for a speaker of its price and size.
Flashback Trojan generates $10,000 per day for attackers
The attackers behind the Flashback Trojan for OS X may be making as much as $10,000 per day through a click fraud scheme involving Google AdWords, Symantec says. The Trojan intercepts all queries made specifically to Google's search engine and will redirect the user to a page of the attacker's choosing. Every time this occurs, the attackers make about 0.8 cents per click.
"Flashback uses a specially crafted user agent in these requests, which is actually the clients universally unique identifier (UUID) encoded in base64", explains Symantec. "This is already sent in the 'ua' query string parameter, so it is likely that this is an effort to thwart 'unknown' parties from investigating the URL with unrecognized user-agents". In other words, the attackers are going to great lengths to cover their tracks.
The long road to a new BlackBerry begins today with alpha launch of new OS
As Ontario, Canada smartphone pioneer Research In Motion struggles to keep its BlackBerry smartphone platform relevant, one of the company's major strategic points is a major operating refresh with BlackBerry OS 10.
At its annual BlackBerry World conference on Tuesday, RIM has released a deluge of information about the "new BlackBerry" with BlackBerry 10, including a developer Alpha build of the platform with a special Dev alpha device, a BlackBerry 10 developer toolkit which includes the BlackBerry 10 Native SDK with Cascades (a native application development toolset that allows developers to build app interfaces in either C++ or QML) and the WebWorks SDK, which lets developers use HTML5 and CSS to build "native-like" apps.
Bitdefender USB Immunizer protects your PC from flash drive malware
There are a number of ways in which a virus or malware infection can find its way onto a computer, and if USB drives are used to transport files from one machine to another, this represents a security risk that could be exploited by malicious software. Part of the problem arises from the fact that USB drives can be configure to autorun just like optical media, but this is something you can tackle with Bitdefender USB Immunizer.
This free tool is not new, but it has undergone an overhaul that makes it easier to work with multiple USB drives and enables you to prevent USB drives from being automatically launched. This is achieved by creating a read-only autorun.inf file in the root of the drive, which is left blank so that it serves no real function. Because the file is read-only, it cannot be edited by malware looking to launch itself when your USB drive is plugged in.
iPad leaps ahead of iPhone browser usage, Opera Mini collapses
New iPad tipped the mobile web browsing balance, according to April data Net Applications released today. Apple's tablet now exceeds iPhone for browser usage share among mobile devices. That's 33.7 percent to 27.4 percent, after being neck and neck for the previous three months. iPad had nudged in front during February and March, but in April leapt ahead of iPhone.
Considering how much larger is iPhone's install base, or Android's for that matter, iPad's ascension is quite remarkable. Cumulative iOS device shipments reached 365 million during first calendar quarter -- nearly 67 million of them iPads. In all, iOS devices give mobile Safari tremendous usage share in the category: 63.84 percent, that's up from 52.36 percent in June 2011.
Have frequent Skype crashes ruined your relationships? Try the iOS update
iOS users now have an updated VoIP app to work with following the release of Skype 4.0 for iPad and Skype 4.0 for iPhone. The latest version focuses mainly on stability and accessibility improvements, but there are also a few other enhancements and new features to enjoy. There’s a new sign in screen in addition to a number of minor UI tweaks.
Anyone who finds the app prone to crashing should be happier with this new version. Skype promises generally-improved stability, and auto-restart in the event of a crash. This is hardly a ringing endorsement for a chat tool, but it’s a step in the right direction. Surely, it's better than untimely disconnects during an important video chat.
How big is Apple? [infographic]
A week ago, Apple reported record fiscal 2012 second quarter earnings. Profits soared by 94 percent to $5.99 billion, or $6.40 per share, from $39.2 billion revenue. In long missives that followed, I took to both sides of the company's performance: "Apple is better off without Steve Jobs" and "There is no Apple without Steve Jobs". Yeah, I argued with myself.
But what do the numbers mean? The accompanying infographic distills them in tidy fashion, and I won't repeat them here but simply add that during the first half of fiscal 2012, Apple generated more revenue ($85.83 billion) than all fiscal 2010 ($65.23 billion). The company's net income for first fiscal half exceeds that of fiscal 2009 and 2010 combined and is surprisingly close to all of fiscal 2011. By measure of financial performance Apple isn't the same company it was three years ago.
Security software market shows steady growth as threats explode
Faced with an ever-increasing number of threats, IT administrators continue to increase spending on security software, a new survey suggests. A recent report from Gartner shows revenue in the sector increased 7.5 percent in 2011 over the year previous. The gains come even as IT spending overall has stagnated due to uncertain economic conditions worldwide.
Altogether, revenues totaled some $17.7 billion last year, with market leading Symantec making up a fifth of that total. Gartner says the company's success in the sector is due to a continuing expansion outside of the antivirus software market and into other sectors, including storage and encryption. Coming in a distant second and third were competitors McAfee and Trend Micro, both making up about seven percent of the market.
What the frak is CISPA?
There's something really troubling about CISPA. While the Internet rallied against SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and Protect IP, including boycotts, there is near silence about the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act. This lack of interest hits BetaNews, too. For more than three weeks, I've asked writers here to do a CISPA story. No one wants it. Am I the only one scared witless about this thing?
I got to thinking about CISPA, again, this afternoon after the info graphic accompanying this story dropped in my mail box. It's a tidy explanation of what is CISPA that sheds some light on why the Internet isn't in uproar about it. Where's Anonymous? Who muted the Reddit outrage?
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