Articles about Microsoft

Tomorrow is New Year's Eve in America (and other countries that use the Gregorian calendar), meaning many people will be out partying with friends and family. Me? I like to stay in and watch Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve on TV while eating some tasty snacks and drinking Perrier. True, the television broadcast is not as good since Mr. Clark died, and Ryan Seacrest is insufferable, but I am a creature of habit, I suppose.

In China and other parts of the world, the Lunar New Year is followed instead, with the holiday often happening in January or February. The Chinese assign an animal to represent the year, and on February 5 2019, it will officially start "The Year of the Pig." Microsoft has created a new Windows 10 theme to commemorate the upcoming occasion. In other words, the company is using a pig theme to try and put lipstick on the "oinker" that is its terrible operating system.

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A few days ago, Microsoft issued an emergency patch for Internet Explorer to fix a zero-day vulnerability in the web browser.

The problem affects versions of Internet Explorer from 9 to 11 across multiple versions of Windows, but it seems that the patch has been causing problems for many people. Specifically, people with some Lenovo laptops have found that after installing the KB4467691 patch they are unable to start Windows.

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Microsoft recently confirmed that it plans to transition its Edge browser away from the EdgeHTML engine to Chromium, embracing open source, bringing Chrome extensions and more. Making such a big change obviously requires a lot of testing, and Microsoft is giving you the chance to get involved via the Microsoft Edge Insider program.

The company already has the Windows Insider program for people who want to get their hands on new builds of Windows 10 earlier than they would normally, but this is a commitment that not everyone is willing to sign up for. Now Microsoft has launched a beta program for Microsoft Edge so you can try out early builds and help to shape the future of the browser.

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Microsoft has a new open source project -- Project Mu. This is the company's open-source release of the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) core which is currently used by Surface devices and Hyper-V.

With the project, Microsoft hopes to make it easier to build scalable and serviceable firmware, and it embraces the idea of Firmware as a Service (FaaS). This allows for fast and efficient updating of firmware after release, with both security patches and performance-enhancing updates.

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Microsoft has issued an emergency, out-of-band patch for an Internet Explorer zero-day that was being actively exploited in targeted attacks.

The company says that it learned about the vulnerability through a report from Google. CVE-2018-8653 affects a range of versions of Internet Explorer from 9 to 11, across Windows 7 to 10 and Windows Server.

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It’s nearly Christmas, and Microsoft has rolled out a brand new build of Windows 10 19H1, the last of 2018, with plenty of exciting treats for users to try out.

Build 18305 for Fast ring insiders, introduces a number of improvements and new features, including a simplified Start layout and Windows Sandbox.

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Although there are plenty of office suites available, including lots of free choices, Microsoft Office remains the one that most people use. Today, Microsoft rolls out a new app for Windows 10 called, simply, Office, which is designed to replace the existing My Office app.

The app itself is free and can be used with any Office 365 subscription, Office 2019, Office 2016, and Office Online -- the free web-based version of Office for consumers.

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Microsoft has announced an upcoming security feature which it hopes will take the fear and risk out of running unknown software. Windows Sandbox is an isolated desktop environment which functions much like a virtual machine; any software installed to it is completely sandboxed from the host operating system.

Aimed at businesses, enterprises and security-conscious home users, Windows Sandbox will be part of Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Enterprise. It is not clear exactly when the feature will debut, but it could make an appearance in Windows 10 19H1 next year.

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We're coming up to the time of year when a little extra money is welcome. Well... that's true of pretty much any day of the year, but with Christmas presents to buy, it is particularly true now. So how about some free money from Microsoft?

It seems that you may already have a free gift certificate worth $10 sitting in your inbox. Microsoft included the gift cards in emails it sent out to people, but rather than making an announcement, the company decided to stealthily hide the money.

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The many problems relating to the Windows 10 October 2018 Update are well known. Shortly after it was originally released, back in October, reports started to filter through that the OS update was deleting user files. Microsoft pulled the update, and then re-released a fixed version six weeks later, but additional problems surfaced.

Microsoft suggested at the time -- as it always does -- that users wait until offered the update before installing it, but now says that it is fully available to advanced users. But what is an 'advanced user' in this context?

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Earlier this week we reported on how Windows 10 could be sharing your activity data even if you had told it not to.

In response Microsoft has released a statement from Marisa Rogers, privacy officer at its Windows and Devices Group.

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Windows 10 is a very good operating system, but the October 2018 Update has left a bad taste in many users' mouths. It caused a multitude of problems, got pulled, and even after it was made available again, new issues surfaced. The April 2018 Update rolled out to users at lightning speed, but the October 2018 Update has only been installed on about 3 percent of systems to date. Ouch.

Microsoft has said previously that Windows 10 will be the "last version of Windows", but is it time to rethink that idea and give users an operating system that goes up to 11? Take a look and make up your own mind.

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We all know that Windows 10 logs data about what you do on your PC. What you may not be aware of is that it still sends that information to Microsoft even if you have told it not to. Sneaky, huh?

People on Reddit have been discussing the issue and finding that even if the option to send data to the cloud is turned off it still shows in the online Privacy Dashboard.

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Although the Windows 10 October 2018 Update is still only trickling out to users (AdDupex says as of the end of November under 3 percent of users have it installed), Microsoft is hard at work on the follow up due out next spring.

The latest Windows 10 19H1 Insider preview Build for Insiders in the Fast ring offers a number of new changes including File Explorer and Start menu improvements, and Notepad updates.

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The news that Microsoft is going to create a Chromium-based version of its Edge browser has been met with a mixed reaction, but there is some good news for users. The company has confirmed that the adoption of Chromium means that Edge will support Chrome extensions.

Microsoft Edge has been much maligned for its lack of features when compared to Firefox, Chrome and Opera, and the number of extensions currently supported by the browser is laughably small. For this reason, the confirmation that Chrome extensions will be supported will be warmly welcomed by users.

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