Apple on Wednesday included a beta version of Xcode 4.4 for developers alongside releases of OS X Mountain Lion 10.8 and Safari 5.2 The preview of Xcode 4.4 includes an updated Apple LLVM Compiler version 4.0. According to the release notes for the software, enhancements include:
Amazon Appstore for Android developers should consider obfuscating their code if they are concerned about their applications being reverse engineered, the company said yesterday.
Obfuscating the code modifies the source and machine code to be difficult for a human to understand if the app gets decompiled, according to Amazon.
A leaked Microsoft roadmap shows that the next version of Office won't ship until the first quarter of 2013, according to the Dutch developer who found the document.
Maarten Visser, the CEO of Meetroo and a decade-long Microsoft partner, stumbled upon the roadmap a week ago after clicking on a link posted on Microsoft's Dutch website. The PDF was not password protected.
Google attempted to introduce a new approach to computing when it first launched Chrome OS in 2010. The operating system consists of little more than a fullscreen Web browser perched atop a rigorously-hardened Linux environment. The platform makes some unusual trade-offs, eschewing conventional native applications in exchange for bulletproof security and low-maintenance stateless computing.
Google has released a beta of Chrome 19 bringing with it a new tab syncing feature - where tabs you have open on one device are available on all your other devices by clicking a new “Other devices” menu on the New Tab page. The tab’s back and forward navigation history is also included, so you can pick up browsing right where you left off.
According to sources, Apple has recently begun internally seeding the next major release of the iTunes application for computers, iTunes 11. Work on iTunes 11 began prior to the release of iTunes 10.6, and the development of the new software product – that we are familiar with – is currently focused on under-the-hood changes, rather than cosmetic changes. However, Apple develops different portions of products in separate groups or at separate times, so the final product will likely include some new user-interface elements and more visible features.
Apple has issued a second security update aimed at Flashback, the Mac malware that has reportedly infected 600,000 computers since last year.
Microsoft today said it would issue six security updates next week, four of them critical, to patch 11 bugs in Windows, Internet Explorer, Office, SQL Server and its virtual private networking platform. One of the updates, labeled Bulletin 4, looks like the one that should top the to-do list next Tuesday when Microsoft ships its monthly security updates, said a security expert.
Changes that are made to a web browser that you are using on a daily basis can have a devastating effect. We have seen this happen several times in the past when Mozilla made changes to the design of the Firefox web browser. Especially the move from Firefox 3 to 4 caused an uproar, with part of the userbase still rejecting to update to any version beyond Firefox 3.
Microsoft Research is working on a home automation operating system that it calls HomeOS.
In a paper accepted by the highly regarded Network Systems Design and Implementation (NSDI) conference, the firm details that it has already deployed HomeOS among trial users and programmers, with the researchers claiming the operating system will ensure that "all devices in the home appear as peripherals connected to a single logical PC".
