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Apple on Tuesday issued an update to its 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display, adding faster Intel processors, as well as the new pressure-sensitive Force Touch trackpad. The new trackpad, previously available on the 13-inch MacBook Pro and 12-inch MacBook, has built-in force sensors and a Taptic Engine that delivers haptic feedback. It allows users to click anywhere with a uniform feel, and users can even customize the amount of pressure needed to register each click. Force Touch opens up a range of new gestures, including the new force click. Developers can tap into these expanded capabilities with new APIs...

Google slow to respond. A Polish security firm has discovered more vulnerabilities in the Java coding platform used on Google's App Engine (GAE) cloud computing service, which could allow users to get access beyond their own virtual machines. The Security Explorations team, which has made a name for itself by unearthing large numbers of security holes in Oracle's Java framework over the past few years, said it had reported seven vulnerabilities to Google, along with proof of concept code. Three of the flaws allow complete bypass of the GAE Java security sandbox. Such a bypass could be used by attackers...

Update 5/15/15: I've clarified some of my findings at the bottom of this post. I've owned the 2015 MacBook for just over a month now. I've had a remarkably good time using it so far, and just yesterday I decided to upgrade my installation of Windows 8.1 to the Windows 10 Insider Preview. I had tried it out a couple months earlier through a virtual machine, and at the time I wasn't sure I wanted it as my main operating system. But after taking the plunge, I'm very happy to be using it. I wanted to record a few thoughts...

NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO, May 18 (Reuters) - Apple Inc was handed a mixed ruling by a U.S. appeals court in the latest twist in a blockbuster intellectual property battle with Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, as a prior patent infringement verdict was upheld but a trademark finding that the iPhone's appearance could be protected was thrown out. That means up to 40 percent of a $930 million verdict which had been won by Apple must be reconsidered. In the highly anticipated ruling stemming from the global smartphone wars, the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C. upheld patent infringement violations including one which...

Think you'll be getting a free upgrade to Windows 10 from your pirated copy of Windows 7 or Windows 8.1? Not so fast. For months, rumors have been swirling that suggested Microsoft was so eager to get its entire customer base onto Windows 10 that it will extend its free upgrade offer even to those who obtained their copies of Windows by, um, questionable means. Well, it seems that may not be true after all. Or not entirely true. Or something. Microsoft operating systems exec veep Terry Myerson weighed in on Friday to clarify the software giant's position on "Non-Genuine"...

University of Utah engineers have taken a step forward in creating the next generation of computers and mobile devices capable of speeds millions of times faster than current machines. The Utah engineers have developed an ultracompact beamsplitter—the smallest on record—for dividing light waves into two separate channels of information. The device brings researchers closer to producing silicon photonic chips that compute and shuttle data with light instead of electrons. Electrical and computer engineering associate professor Rajesh Menon and colleagues describe their invention today in the journal Nature Photonics. Silicon photonics could significantly increase the power and speed of machines such...

The UBS analyst who recently said Apple had "somewhat botched" the Apple Watch launch sees China playing a major role in driving sales for the new device. The insight comes from a new research note based on a UBS survey of 9,000 consumers in six countries released on Monday. "It's finding that Apple continues to be extremely strong, the stickiness is very clear, and it's China, China, China," Steve Milunovich told "Squawk on the Street." "We're finding that Apple's retention rate is very strong in China, and we're also finding that actually Apple Watch interest is highest in China relative...

Here’s something that irks Chris Urmson: Sometimes people will get in self-driving cars, the spectacularly complex piece of technology he runs at Google and to which he has devoted most of his scientific career, and leave with a shrug. Once, Urmson was riding in one of Google’s Lexus SUVs down a freeway. Several minutes in, his fellow passenger turned to him, nonplussed. “That’s it?” Urmson, recalling the story on Google’s Mountain View campus earlier this week, threw up his hands: “Do you have any idea how hard this is?!” Soon, there may be many more blasé reactions to one of...

The specs, from the Oculus website, recommend: •NVIDIA GTX 970 / AMD 290 equivalent or greater •Intel i5-4590 equivalent or greater •8GB+ RAM •Compatible HDMI 1.3 video output •2x USB 3.0 ports •Windows 7 SP1 or newer It’s worth bearing in mind that these are the recommended specs, not the minimum. "The goal is for all Rift games and applications to deliver a great experience on this configuration," Oculus said.

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Number of followers on all other forms of social media is about 8.5 millionHis Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai's twitter account has reached over four million followers, making him one of the most followed leaders globally on the social networking site, while the total number of his followers on all other forms of social media is about 8.5 million. Sheikh Mohammed's account has come second globally in a study issued by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development for 2014 in his ability to reach the largest...

Menuet's kernel includes pre-emptive multitasking support and the super-compact operating system includes an impressive GUI MenuetOS, a GUI-toting, x86-based operating system written entirely in assembly language, has hit version 1.0. The milestone comes after almost a decade and a half of development for the operating system, which despite having an impressive graphical user interface is still compact enough to fit on a floppy disk (assuming you can find one). The 32-bit version of the system is released as open source until the GPL, while the 64-bit version is free for personal and educational use (commercial use requires negotiating with the...

VirtualBox for OS XHow many ways can you run Windows or Linux on your Mac? Some Mac users might reply with a terse, ‘Too many ways.’ I understand the sentiment. Windows isn’t free. Linux isn’t easy. However, the Mac is the ultimate platform in that it runs almost any popular operating system for personal computers (what was once all the rage prior to the post-PC era of mobile computing), and in some cases can run them all at the same time. How can you do that? Easy. And free. Virtually, My Dear Watson Apple builds in a straightforward way to...

Access and copy files from a Mac-formatted hard disk on a Windows PC How to read Mac OS HFS drives in Windows for free In general, Macs and PCs play fairly nicely together. Most file types work on both platforms, and both will talk to each other across a network. However, if you have an external USB hard drive for your Mac, it can be tricky to share it with a Windows laptop or PC as Microsoft doesn't support Apple's HFS file system in Windows. (Apple introduced NTFS support in OS X Leopard so you can share a Windows drive...

Luxury car-maker Bentley last year shot an ad for the Mulsanne (a mere $298,000 to you, Sir) on the iPhone 5s and iPad Air, and has this year upgraded to the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Its new ad is for a driving jacket rather than a car, and it has again produced a behind-the-scenes video (below) showing the kit and software used … The latest video features four Saville Row tailors, each of which has created a bespoke jacket commissioned by Bentley for a Saville Row Bespoke exhibition in Washington. The video was shot with a mix of iPhone...

And who hasn't brought this up? To think that what Bob McDonnell did is miniscule compared to what Liberals have been doing for years. Hopefully congress will take this matter up soon and take a vote to pardon Bob McDonnell. And they can use this matter to twist Obama's arm when it comes to giving him what he wants passed. It's like that classic scene from the Godfather. Obama! either you sign this deal or we will close every KFC within 50 miles of DC!

A man claiming to be a spiritual healer has announced that he converted a jinn to Islam on Twitter according to a report in a local newspaper recently. The man who uses ruqya the reciting of Qur'anic verses to heal people published the supposed conversation he had with the jinn on his Twitter account which has 16000 followers. Jinns are creatures with free will created from smokeless fire by God alongside humans and angels according to Islamic belief. According to the post the jinn said: 'I am the jinn Habibi. I announce my conversion to Islam at the hands of...

Data privacy may seem like a distant and abstract concept but what is more personal than the information you are sharing with Google? Imagine you get a letter in the post offering you free water. Instead of paying Irish Water for your supply, another company promises you a generous quantity of free water. The catch? Instead of water meters, the company wants to install meters measuring the comings and goings to your home. They will also record who you know, who you communicate with and how often.They will store information on what you watch on television, what websites you visit...

Quick! The bad guy/super villain has left the room! Plug in a mysterious device that’ll hack up their computer while an on-screen progress bar ticks forward to convey to the audience that things are working! It’s a classic scene from basically every spy movie in history. In this case, however, that mystery device is real. Samy Kamkar — developer of projects like that massive worm that conquered MySpace back in 2006, or SkyJack, the drone that hijacks other drones — has released a video demonstrating the abilities of a particularly ridiculous “necklace” he sometimes wears around. Called USBdriveby, it’s a...

Bidding for the RadioShack brand and customer data has ended, but not before Apple weighed in on the proceedings, saying that information collected during the sale of its own products should be left out of the deal. A shuttered RadioShack store, via Ted Eytan. The hedge fund Standard General was the top bidder with $26.2 million for RadioShack's brand name and customer data. The same firm bought out Radio Shack's 1,700 store leases in March, as noted by Bloomberg. But as the bidding process was underway in a Delaware bankruptcy court, Apple joined the proceedings with a filing of its...