At the moment, the service is available as a technical preview. Microsoft says customers can replicate IaaS-based applications in Azure. This can be achieved across regions without the need for additional software or devices. Microsoft Principal Program Manager Rochak Mittal says the disaster recovery works with Azure Backup for IaaS VMs to create business continuity: “As you move production applications to the cloud, Azure natively provides you the high availability and reliability that your mission critical workloads need....

One soon-to-launch feature is one that has been oft-requested by users. Microsoft will bring a new Wish List feature to the Microsoft Store in the near future. As the name suggests, the feature will let you select apps you like and/or want for purchase at a later date. Of course, the major benefit of the Wish List is it allows you to come back to apps you may have seen before....

Microsoft’s award says what it does on the tin. The Surface Book was the best laptop PC over the last year, a solid achievement. Especially when we consider some of the competition. Nominees for the award included Dell XPS 12, Lenovo Yoga 900S, HP Spectre x360, Acer Aspire Switch 12 S, and the Apple MacBook. The T3 Awards are among the biggest tech shows. Indeed, the event is known as “the Oscars of Tech” and has been running for ten years....

Microsoft first signaled its intentions to provide custom background in Microsoft Teams in April. It’s been a long time coming as the company promised the ability for a long time. Early in 2019, Microsoft announced it would bring custom background to the service. As the name suggests, this Microsoft Teams tool allows users to change the background effects in meetings. This extends background features that have been part of Teams for two years....

It’s true, Microsoft and Sony have only really locked horns in the gaming market, managing to stay relatively distant in other areas. However, the rivalry between Xbox and PlayStation as been fierce. In fact, when it comes to matters such as Cross Play for Minecraft the relationship between the companies has been frosty at best. So, we can chalk the new Microsoft/Sony partnership down to another example of Microsoft doing its best to freeze hell over....

Part of that could be the rumored chat-based interface known as Conversational UI. Like Google Assistant, Cortana will apparently interact with users through text. The idea is to persuade users who don’t want to speak into thin air. In terms of notifications, Bowden reports that user will be able to filter between Cortana’s cards and notifications, while quick settings will move to a dedicated control panel. We’ve already begun to see evidence of this in the latest Insider build, which brings some of Cortana’s cards to the Action Center....

Business Insider reports Microsoft’s decision is in view of the ongoing importance of cloud-based services during the COVID-19 outbreak. The company has seen a surge in users across Azure cloud services bother in enterprise and consumer. Office 365, Microsoft Teams, and Skype are just three Microsoft apps currently thriving. So, why is Microsoft not continuing hiring across the board? After-all, CEO Satya Nadella has said the company is well positioned to emerge from COVID-19 lockdowns “pretty strong”....

According to Microsoft, it will stop access to Microsoft 365 back-end services next year (2023). This is two years before Office 2016 and Office 2019 reach end of support. Customers became concerned Microsoft was going to block those customers access Microsoft 365 back-end services after next year. Microsoft has now confirmed that is not the case. Users running Office 2016/2019 will still be able to access Microsoft 365 back-end services....

Azure Storage Explorer is a way of analyzing large streaming data sets in real time. While it may seem similar to Azure Analysis Servicer, Data Explorer allows combined data from multiple sources into a single analysis model. ADX reached general availability in February. With the latest update, ADX has gained support for virtual machine (VM) disk management. Thanks to this integration, Azure customers can get a higher upload and download speeds when accessing managed disks....

1 Changelog2 Other Windows 10 Versions It is worth noting the update is optional so it will not be coming to your machine automatically. Microsoft says the update is specifically for users running older versions of Windows 10, including the October 2018 Update. The build in question is 17763.720 for the October 2018 Update and comes with numerous fixes. Among them is solving a problem where Windows Hello Face Authentication would stop working during a system restart....

Users who wish to keep their notes safe from prying eyes can now add passwords to each separate section. In addition, the new update brings reordering of Notebooks to the OneNote Windows 10 app, which allows users to sort their Notebooks however they like by clicking and dragging. New Shapes gallery Microsoft’s latest update to the OneNote for Windows 10 app also adds a new menu. Available in the Draw tab, users can find the Shape gallery which lets them insert lines, basic shapes, diagrams, and flow charts....

In a new post on its processor support page, Microsoft is updating the processor SKUs that work on Windows 11. If you cannot upgrade to the OS because of your processor, don’t get too excited. Microsoft is not adding previously unsupported chips to the list. Instead, the company is adding new processors such as Intel’s 13th Gen Raptor Lake-S CPUs and AMD’s Ryzen 7000 series desktop CPUs. There are also other CPUs from both companies added to the list, which you can see below:...

As we have seen on the Windows preview, the update is bringing several big changes to Visual Studio. Among them is a new user interface that promises to make the platform easier to use. Microsoft also says there are significant performance improvements to bring more stability to customers. In terms of specific perks for macOS users, Microsoft says the update brings complete support for native accessibility features on Apple’s platform....

However, despite the metric, it was still hit by the pandemic. Despite its efforts to help out with the virus, scared investors have resulted in a drop from a peak share of $188.70 in February to $144.45 today. On Sunday, Forbes reported that its stock had dropped by a “staggering” 27%, versus a 32% fall in the S&P 500 as a whole. Comparatively, Apple was at $327.70 in February and now sits at $241, a 26....

Microsoft announced its plans to “kill” off Skype on Windows Phone back in July 2016 and now is getting ready to go through with it. The news arrives just one day after the announcement that Skype for Linux 4.3 will retire in July as well. In the email, Microsoft says that after July 1, 2017, users will no longer be able to sign-in to these versions of Skype. Furthermore, the company directs Skype users to a Skype support page....

In a blog post today, Mozilla confirmed the new Firefox Android experience will be launched in full this fall. At the moment, the experience is available in preview. “We realized that users demanded a full-fledged mobile browsing experience, but more private and secure than any existing app,” Mozilla says. “So we decided to make Firefox more like Focus, but with all the ease and amenities of a full-stack mobile browser....

Speaking on a blog post, CEO Chris Beard accused Microsoft of “giving up on an independent shared platform for the internet”. The Redmond giant’s move cedes significant ground to Google, which is already dominant in the browser space. There are significant worries that the search giant will soon hold a monopoly over browsing. While Beard concedes that Microsoft’s decision makes sense from a business point of view, he believes it’s damaging for the internet at large....

Windows Hello is a security service that allows users to sign into Windows devices through authentication biometrics like fingerprint or facial recognition. Equally, users can set a PIN or enter through a FiDO2 device. With the upcoming launch of Firefox 66, users on the browser will be able to use Windows Hello to sign into Microsoft services like Office 365, Outlook.com, and OneDrive. As part of the service, Microsoft provides APIs for developers to integrate Windows Hello into their apps and services....

According to Reuters, the US, UK, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and Denmark are drawing up new cyber warfare principles. If implemented, they would redefine the justification needed to launch cyber attack weapons. The result could be a more aggressive stance on hackers from China, Russia, and North Korea who try to disrupt or steal technology. “There’s a change in the mindset to accept that computers, just like aircraft and ships, have an offensive capability,” explained U....

The research team describes it as “a fundamental computer vision problem of extraordinary difficulty,” and collaborated with members of Kingston University. The functionality is thanks to a neural network which was trained with 2D images and corresponding 3D models. The web app utilizes ‘a simple CNN architecture’ and detects facial expressions, masks, and various angles. You can try it for yourself via the online demo. It’s easy to see the applications once the researchers add more polish....