Will Cortana Impact Windows 10 Battery Life?

It is just over a month until Microsoft introduces Windows 10, and as you should know by now, Cortana is one of the key elements of the new OS.

Cortana always listens in order to hear its name and be a smart digital assistant. This is Microsoft answer to Siri and Google Now that is making its way to Windows 10.

Unfortunately, this will affect your notebook battery life. We have spoken with a few industry sources and we can definitely confirm that Windows 10 with enabled Cortana will have an impact on the battery life. We are testing this as we speak to check how big the impact is.

We don’t know how significant the battery life decrease will be, but the good thing is that you will be able to switch Cortana off in case you don’t need it. We heard that many new Toshiba notebooks will come with a dedicated Cortana button, as this is the easiest way to save battery life. Cortana on Toshiba won’t listen until you press the button.

It would be smart if Microsoft would come up with Cortana enable / disable keyboard shortcut. Win + Q will enable Cortana news while Win + S will bring you directly to the Cortana search engine.

Windows 10 seems to be a logical upgrade for anyone who has Windows 8.1 on their notebooks and misses the options from Windows 7, and some familiar UI elements. We use Windows 8.1 on some devices, while most of our computers still have Windows 7 and nothing more. Microsoft DirectX 12 will force us to Windows 10 but from what awe can tell from Preview release, the upgrade to Windows 10 from with 7 seems like quite seamless and logical step.

Just make sure to be aware that your notebook battery life might suffer because of Cortana. Have in mind that this “talk to your PC and expect a smart answer” option can be disabled.

Source

IBM Partners With BOX

IBM and BOX have signed a global agreement to combine their strengths into a cloud powerhouse.

The star-crossed ones said in a joint statement: “The integration of IBM and Box technologies, combined with our global cloud capabilities and the ability to enrich content with analytics, will help unlock actionable insights for use across the enterprise.”

Box will bring its collaboration and productivity tools to the party, while IBM brings social, analytic, infrastructure and security services.

The move is described as a strategic alliance and will see the two companies jointly market products under a co-banner.

IBM will enable the use of Box APIs in enterprise apps and web services to make a whole new playground for developers.

The deal will see Box integrate IBM’s content management, including content capture, extraction, analytics, case management and governance. Also aboard will be Watson Analytics to study in depth the content being stored in Box.

Box will also be integrated into IBM Verse and IBM Connections to allow full integration for email and social.

IBM’s security and consulting services will be part of the deal, and the companies will work together to create mobile apps for industries under the IBM MobileFirst programme.

Finally, the APIs for Box will be enabled in Bluemix meaning that anyone working on rich apps in the cloud can make Box a part of their creation.

Box seems to be the Nick Clegg to IBM’s ham-faced posh-boy robot in this relationship, but is in fact bringing more than you’d think to the party with innovations delivered by its acquisition of 3D modelling company Verold.

What’s more, the results of these collaborations should allow another major player to join Microsoft and Google in the wars over productivity platforms.

It was announced today that Red Hat and Samsung are forming their own coalition to bring enterprise mobile out of the hands of the likes of IBM and Apple which already have a cool thing going on with MobileFirst.

Source

Mozilla Delays Touch Browser

Mozilla has again delayed the release date for a touch-enabled version of Firefox that will run in Windows 8′s “Modern” user interface (UI), with the new target in mid-March.

Ship estimates for the browser have been fluid, to put it mildly. In August, the open-source developer pegged December 2013 as the target for the “Metro-ized” version of Firefox. In September, Mozilla said it was hoping to bundle Firefox Metro with the Windows edition of Firefox 27, slated for release on Feb. 4.

Metro was the name Microsoft once applied to the radical UI of Windows 8, but the company ditched the moniker in 2012 over a trademark dispute with a German retailer.

The newest information from Mozilla, however, has tapped March 18, when Firefox 28 is to ship, as the projected release of the browser.

Although a preview of Firefox Metro was bundled with the Aurora build of Firefox more than three months ago — and is currently in Aurora for Firefox 28 — it has not yet been promoted to the next channel, Beta, which is the precursor to Release. Mozilla has set a Jan. 31 deadline for deciding whether the touch browser is ready to add to Firefox 28 Beta.

Mozilla started work on a Metro edition of Firefox in March 2012. It shipped a rough preview in October 2012, several weeks before Microsoft launched Windows 8. At that time, Mozilla’s schedule said the Firefox app might appear as early as January 2013. In May 2013, however, the company said its developers would complete Firefox for Modern between Oct. 2, 2013, and March 20, 2014, with mid-November the likeliest date.

If Mozilla makes the targeted March 18 release, it will have spent two years crafting the browser, which will have shipped 17 months after the retail debut of Windows 8.

Although Mozilla has said it’s important that it have a Metro-ready browser to remain competitive — and Windows 8′s and Windows 8.1′s user share has climbed above the 10% mark– it’s unclear what percentage of those PC and tablet owners spend serious time in the UI, as opposed to the traditional Windows desktop.

Mozilla is also discussing a name for the browser, which was code named “Firefox Metro” during development and later was saddled with the label “Windows 8-style Firefox.”

One suggestion, forwarded by a Mozilla user experience designer, has been “Firefox Touch,” which got nods of approval from others in a Mozilla planning message forum.

“‘Windows 8-style Firefox’ is too long and already doesn’t make perfect sense with Windows 8.1 released, but will make less sense when Windows 9 comes out,” noted Brian Bondy, a Firefox platform engineer who has led the work on the Metro version. “I like Firefox Touch and I think we should go with that. It’s a product designed above all else for touch.”

Some, however, objected to labeling the browser as “Firefox Touch,” pointing out that that would downplay the Android browser Mozilla maintains, which is also touch-enabled.

“I agree with Jim that it should be simply Firefox, and that differentiation happens at the point of download,” countered Peter Scanlon, Mozilla’s acting chief marketing officer, in another message to the same discussion forum.

Source

Galaxy Nexus 4G LTE Finally On Sale

Verizon Wireless finally announced that the Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone running Android 4.0 on its 4G LTE network will be available on Thursday in stores and online for $299.99 with a two-year agreement.

The announcement, which came late Wednesday, arrived after days of speculation that the phone was being delayed over a dispute between the carrier and Google over the Google Wallet application, which doesn’t work on Verizon’s version.

During the period many expected Verizon to release the Galaxy Nexus, problems with the carrier’s LTE network arose for nearly two days, pushing LTE users to Verizon’s slower 3G service.

But Verizon never admitted there was any delay in releasing the device and pointed out that it had never given an official release date until Wednesday.

Verizon will carry a 4G LTE version that supports download speeds of up to 12Mbps. Online sales were set to start at 1 a.m. ET Thursday.

The new device has many features putting it at the top of the market for competing smartphones, including one of the highest prices: $299.99. Many rivals are priced at $200 or $250 on other U.S. carriers.

.

Source…

RIM’s PlayBook Gets Harsh Reviews

RIM’s PlayBook tablet didn’t fare so well with influential technology reviewers who called the iPad competitor a rushed job that won’t even provide RIM’s wildly popular email service unless it’s hooked up to a BlackBerry.

The overwhelmingly bad initial response to a device the company hopes will get it attached to the tablet computing explosion overshadowed a splashy coming-out party in New York Thursday evening, where co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis played up the gadget’s attractiveness with corporate users.

There was little mention of the blistering reviews only hours before.

“RIM has just shipped a BlackBerry product that cannot do email. It must be skating season in hell,” New York Times’ David Pogue wrote in a review published on Thursday.

Research In Motion built its reputation on a BlackBerry email service that it says is so secure that it can’t bow to government requests to tap messages, winning high-profile customers in business, defense and politics before branching out to a wider consumer market.

But the PlayBook, which hits North American store shelves on Tuesday, offers that secure service only in tandem with a BlackBerry. RIM says secure email and other key services will come later, not at launch.

Read More…