Microsoft has announced the general availability of its SQL Server 2016 product, after releasing a preview build late last year. The offering comes with a couple of novelties, including the updateable in-memory column stores and advanced analytics through deep integration with R Services.

SQL Server 2016 also offers advanced analytics and machine learning models in the database, which Microsoft says will have a hundred-fold speed-up in time to insight, compared to similar deployments outside the database.

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Microsoft won’t be building its own autonomous vehicle, but it will be present in the market, it was confirmed at a conference recently.

Speaking at the Converge Asia conference, Microsoft’s head of business development, Peggy Johnson, made these claims. Instead of building its own car, the company will team up with existing car makers and see to it that the devices get powered by Microsoft’s products.

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If you’re unhappy with the way Microsoft is forcing Windows 10 onto people who really don’t want it (including plenty of people who don’t even know what it is), then you’re not alone.

A new Change.org petition is seeking supporters in order to have the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) investigate Microsoft for "malicious practices regarding Windows 10".

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I worked in sales for some years and one of the first things you are taught is the art of the alternative close. That’s where the sales person offers someone a choice of two options, neither of which leads to "no". Here’s an example: "When is a good time to start your Windows 10 upgrade? At a preset date and time, or now?"

Microsoft’s increasingly aggressive tactics to get people to upgrade to Windows 10 are now legendary. The last trick the company pulled was to reverse the meaning of clicking the X on the nag screen. Instead of meaning, "go away and stop bothering me" it now means "yes, I want the upgrade". Or rather it did. For, according to The Register, Microsoft has now removed the X, leaving Windows 7 or 8.1 users with the choice of picking a date for an upgrade, or upgrading now. There’s no close button, no cancel option. Just reschedule or upgrade immediately.

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Microsoft might have dropped support for Windows XP over two years ago, but the operating system remains hugely popular. According to the latest usage figures from NetMarketShare, it still has over 10 percent of the market.

There are numerous reasons why people might still opt to use the ancient OS, including the simplest of all -- because they like it, and it works for them -- but time has moved on considerably since XP first arrived in 2001, and the OS is missing a lot of features. Don’t worry though, you can bring XP up to date quickly and easily.

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Windows 10’s Start menu offers live tiles that update every few seconds or so to display information like the latest news headlines and weather, and also a changing slideshow of photos.

Live tiles are viewed by many as a bit odd, because unless you switch to tablet mode, you only ever see them when you open the Start menu, and the menu has to stay open so you can watch the tiles update. Fortunately, if have no need for such things, this feature is easily disabled.

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Leveraging on possible opportunities on identity systems, Microsoft is looking into building a blockchain-based identity system and it has recently sealed a partnership to further this goal.

The tech giant has made an open source collaboration with companies Blockstack Labs and ConsenSys for their current Bitcoin and Ethereum-based identity solutions, together with various developers globally.

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Gabe Aul, long the face of the Windows Insider Program, is standing down from that particular leadership role to focus instead on his work at Engineering Systems Team in WDG. 18 months, 35 desktop builds and 22 mobile builds down the road, Aul has realized he's unable to give 100 percent to both roles.

The new head of the Insider program is Dona Sarkar who has been with Microsoft since the days of Vista. Having worked on Windows 7, 8, 8.1 and 10, as well as HoloLens, the Windows Insider Program leadership role is one she says she has been "waiting for this job for 11 years" to get. With Windows 10 Anniversary Update due to launch in just a few weeks, she's being thrown in at the deep end.

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Microsoft is opening its HoloLens to a range of partners, the company announced at Computex today. This means that future VR headsets based on the HoloLens platform will come from a variety of manufacturers, and will be available in different forms, taking full advantage of Windows 10 Anniversary Update.

With a price tag of $3,000, the existing official HoloLens headset is out of the reach of many people, but in opening up the platform to partners, Microsoft says that cheaper price points should also be available. The company is also doing something interesting. One of the criticisms levelled at HoloLens is its limited field of vision. Partners will be able to build devices with wider fields of vision meaning that the official HoloLens will almost certainly not be the best.

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Security firm Trustwave has discovered a zero-day exploit for Windows for sale on an underground Russian hacking forum. A user going by the name BuggiCorp says the vulnerability affects all versions of Microsoft's operating system, from Windows XP and 2000 upwards, including both 32- and 64-bit versions.

The source code for the exploit is offered for upwards of $90,000, and the seller explains that it can be used to elevate the privileges of any software process to SYSTEM level -- the highest there is. Payment is requested in Bitcoin, but while the exploit is considered serious, experts suggest that the asking price is a little high.

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Last month, NetMarketShare’s initial desktop operating system usage share figures made it look as if Windows 10’s growth was badly stalling, gaining just 0.2 percentage points in April to put it on 14.35 percent. However, revised figures showed it had in fact gained 1.19 percentage points, and was sitting on 15.34 percent. That’s very much in keeping with the new operating system’s growth in previous months.

For May, Windows 10 really packed on the users, thanks in no small part to Microsoft going all out on forcing the operating system on to users of Windows 7 and 8.1. Let's give Microsoft a nice big slow handclap for the achievement.

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Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Microsoft are working in conjunction with the European Commission to try to tackle the problem of illegal online hate speech. This is something that the companies have taken steps to fight individually, but now there is a concerted effort to combat hate speech and terrorist propaganda in Europe.

New EU regulations require the companies to review notifications they receive about hate speech within 24 hours. The four tech giants have agreed to the new code of conduct, saying the 'majority' of reported content will be examined within a day.

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If you’re an Outlook.com user you may have noticed a lot more spam arriving in your inbox over the past day or so.

BetaNews writers have reported suddenly receiving a lot more junk messages in their Outlook.com accounts, and we’re not alone -- it’s a problem affecting users globally. But don’t panic, it’s nothing to do with the mega-breach affecting Tumblr and MySpace users, but rather something far more innocuous.

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With online ad blocking becoming ever more popular, companies have to find new ways to push their products at people. With Windows 10 -- which is being aggressively pushed onto people -- Microsoft has found the perfect vehicle.

We've already seen ads in the Start menu and ads on the Lock Screen, but it doesn't end there. Windows Insiders are also treated to ads in one of the new features available in the preview builds -- the Windows Ink Workspace.

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Microsoft has today announced a new department designed to invest into disruptive start-ups in their early phases.

The department, led by Nagraj Kashyap (corporate vice president) and executive vice president of business development Peggy Johnson, holds the name Microsoft Ventures.

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