Apple unveils iPad Pro with trackpad support, signaling eventual death of Mac

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Today, Apple announced the death of the Mac. Well, sort of. Actually, the company released an all-new iPad Pro and Magic Keyboard with a trackpad. In other words, the iPad is finally an official laptop. No longer must you touch the screen when using a keyboard -- you now have an official trackpad that can manipulate the interface with an on-screen pointer.  Yes, iPad has finally reached its apex, becoming the thing consumers have been clamoring for. Let's be honest, most home consumers would be better served by an iPad Pro and this new keyboard than they would with a Mac.

Keyboard and trackpad aside, this looks to be the best iPad ever. Apple promises that the A12Z Bionic chip is so powerful, that the new iPad pro is actually faster than most Windows laptops! The  Liquid Retina display can achieve an insane 120 Hz refresh -- adjustable to conserve battery. It even gains an ultra-wide camera and five studio-grade microphones, making the iPad pro an even better tool for photographers and other creators. Most exciting, however, is the new LiDAR Scanner.

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Purism Librem Mini is a tiny Linux desktop

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Desktops have largely fallen out of favor with home consumers, as they instead opt for laptops. Really, it isn't hard to see why this is -- a desktop PC often takes up a lot of room in a home, as it usually requires its own dedicated desk. Not to mention, you then have to add a keyboard, mouse, and monitor. You are then tethered to one place, unable to realistically work outdoors or at a coffee shop.

And yet, despite all the benefits a notebook has over a desktop, many people -- including yours truly -- prefers them. If you like the idea of a desktop, but prefer one that is very small (and won't take up a lot of space), there are plenty of options such as Intel NUC and Apple Mac mini. Today, we get another diminutive desktop option, but this one is designed for Linux and privacy. Yes, Purism is finally launching a tiny desktop, and it will come pre-installed with the Debian-based PureOS. Called "Librem Mini," the cute bugger has 4 USB-A ports on the front, along with a 3.5mm audio jack, and the power button. On the rear, there are two more USB-A ports, a single USB-C port, Ethernet, HDMI, DisplayPort, and the power port.

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Privilege abuse widespread among infosecurity professionals

Admin login

Almost 65 percent of security professionals surveyed at the recent RSA conference admit to accessing documents that have nothing to do with their jobs.

The study by risk analytics specialist Gurucul also reveals that nearly one in five (19 percent) of respondents admit to having abused their privileged access to view sensitive data. That number increases to 36 percent among those who've had a poor job performance review.

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Revolut launches Revolut Junior to help kids learn financial skills

Revolut Junior

Fintech darling and banking disruptor Revolut is launching a new product designed with 7- to 17-year-olds in mind, but it is not a standalone service.

A Revolut Junior account can only be set up by a parent who already has a Revolut account, and it gives younger people the ability to use a digital app and a payment card which can be used online and in the real world. Parents are in control at all times, choosing where payments can be made.

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GitHub mobile app exits beta so Android and iOS users can manage code on the move

GitHub mobile app

It is somewhat surprising that the Microsoft-owned GitHub has been around for so long without there being a mobile app, but now this is changing. After a period of beta testing, GitHub for mobile is now available.

The app makes it possible for development teams to keep in contact on the move, as well as merging code from the comfort of a smartphone or tablet.

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Google Translate app update introduces speech transcription functionality

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The Google Translate application for Android may now be used to transcribe speech; the new functionality allows anyone to "transcribe foreign language speech as it's happening", according to Google.

Google Translate Product Manager Sami Iqram describes the motivation behind the new feature.

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Microsoft releases Windows Terminal Preview v0.10, adding mouse support and duplicate panes

Windows Terminal Preview v0.10

Last month we saw Microsoft releasing the "feature-complete" Windows Terminal Preview v0.9, and now the company has pushed out v0.10.

Although Microsoft said that the previous version was "the last version of the Terminal that will include new features before the v1 release", this update introduces two new ones. First up is mouse input support in Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) applications.

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Seagate launches fast and reliable IronWolf 510 PCIe Gen3 M.2 NVMe NAS SSD

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PCIe-based NVMe solid state drives are pretty common in consumer devices these days. Seagate, however, would like to bring them to another area -- network attached storage for business. You see, today, the company unveils the all-new IronWolf 510 -- a PCIe Gen3 M.2 NVMe NAS SSD. Performance is quite respectable, with a top read speed of up to 3,150 MB/s and a top write speed of up to 1,000 MB/s (depending on capacity, of course).

But what exactly makes the drive a "NAS SSD" anyway? Is that just marketing? Actually, no. The IronWolf 510 provides higher endurance and reliability than a normal such SSD -- ideal for network attached storage. You even get a limited five-year warranty. While the drive is designed for both businesses and professionals in a network attached storage application, but they can obviously work for other things too.

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Fedora 32 Beta Linux-based operating system now available with GNOME 3.36

ladyfedora

Fedora is one of the best Linux distributions on the planet, but it doesn't always get its due. It isn't flashy or new, instead hanging its hat (pun intended) on being stable and reliable. That is why many Linux users try other distributions, only to find themselves back at home with Fedora. Fans of the GNOME in particular flock to Fedora, as the operating system is one of the best ways to experience that desktop environment.

Today, Fedora 32 Beta becomes available for testing, and it is very exciting. It comes with GNOME 3.36 -- the lastest and greatest version of the desktop environment, You can read more about GNOME 3.36 here. If you aren't a fan of GNOME, that is OK -- you can instead opt for KDE Plasma, Cinnamon, MATE, and more. There is even a special ARM variant of Fedora 32 that will work with Raspberry Pi devices.

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New threat scoring module helps security teams cope with alert volumes

judges scoring panel

Businesses increasingly struggle with the sheer volume of cyber threats that they face. One way of tackling that is a risk-based system that allows analysts to focus on the most pressing issues.

SIRP a Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR) platform is launching a new security scoring module to provide vital context for security teams and allow them to prioritize risks.

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One man's journey to earning over $100,000 from cybercrime

hacker

Researchers at security vendor Check Point have revealed the identity and activities of a hacker whose seven-year career in cybercrime has earned him at least $100,000, and probably much more.

He's single, 25-years-old and living in Benin City, Southern Nigeria. His cybercrime activities have earned him, on average, at least 14 times the national minimum wage in Nigeria and three times the average professional salary in Nigeria every year since 2013.

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Microsoft releases .NET 5 Preview 1

Microsoft logo on the corner of a building

It won't be until November that we see the general release of .NET 5, but ahead of this Microsoft has released .NET 5 Preview 1 for developers to try out.

With .NET 5, Microsoft is continuing to unify .NET into a single platform; it will include ASP.NET Core, Entity Framework Core, WinForms, WPF, Xamarin and ML.NET. Key changes here are significant improvements to the Regex engine, which Microsoft says brings throughput improvements of  between 3x and 6x.

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Microsoft-owned GitHub is acquiring JavaScript developer platform npm

GitHub npm

Microsoft has announced plans to acquire npm Inc, the company behind popular JavaScript package manager npm.

No details of the amount of money involved have been revealed, nor the timing of the acquisition, but Microsoft says that it plans to integrate npm into GitHub. Both companies feels that acquisition will help the open source community in general, but the JavaScript community in particular.

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Microsoft pesters people to use even more of its services with Windows 10 nag screen

Windows 10 post-update nag screen

Microsoft is no stranger to using nag screens to annoy Windows 10 users, and now the company is back to its old tricks again. After installing the latest batch of update for the operating system, users are being confronted with a full-screen "Get even more out of Windows" message.

The nag screen encourages users to investigate other Microsoft products such as Your Phone, Windows Hello, Office 365 and OneDrive. It's part of what Microsoft describes as "post-upgrade setup".

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Seagate announces Storage Expansion Card for Xbox Series X

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Earlier today, Microsoft revealed a ton of new information about its upcoming new game console -- the terribly named Xbox Series X. This is just three months after the game system was first unveiled to the world. Despite its terrible name, the Xbox Series X is looking to be an incredibly powerful console. The AMD-powered system features 12 Teraflops of power, 4K gaming, and an insane 16GB of GDDR6 memory.

The Xbox Series X will come with a super-fast 1TB SSD too, which sounds like a lot of capacity, but it really isn't. Look, with more and more people downloading games and forgoing optical disks, a terabyte of storage will fill up very quickly. Thankfully, Xbox Series X has a special storage expansion port on the rear that will allow owners to easily increase capacity without opening up the device. Best of all, this port will apparently allow the same speed as the internal drive. Unfortunately, however, Microsoft has opted for a proprietary port -- one that will only work with this console.

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