CnetArtist infuses zombies into classic flicks
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Geek TechWhy Microsoft's pushing Office subscriptions
Computerworld - The launch of new and revised Office 365 software-by-subscription plans for businesses shows that Microsoft realizes its current licensing revenue is threatened by cost-cutting customers, an analyst said yesterday.
"Microsoft wants to shift people to subscriptions because you cannot stop paying for a subscription," said Paul DeGroot, principal at Pica Communications, a consulting firm that specializes in deciphering Microsoft's licensing practices. "What they're facing is a lot of Office revenue potentially dropping off the books as customers stick with their perpetual licenses but stop further payments to Software Assurance."
Firms regularly pay for "Software Assurance," an annuity-like maintenance agreement that gives customers the right to future upgrades in return for annual payments spread over three-year terms. The problem with Software Assurance (SA) is that while Microsoft upgrades Office every three years, few businesses follow suit. Instead, enterprises take years to roll out an edition, skipping one or even two of the upcoming versions before again repeating the process.
By not deploying those interim editions, companies that pay for SA are spending money on something they won't use, said DeGroot.
"If you have Software Assurance, you're now entitled to Office 2013," DeGroot noted. "But say you're in the middle of an Office 2010 migration. That means you're buying not Office 2013 with SA, but Office 2016 or even Office 2019. If you renew SA, you're not going to get anything for it, or not anything that you're going to deploy in the next five, six years."
Dropping SA from an enterprise agreement can cut between 25% and 50% from an Office bill, DeGroot said, and save big businesses millions. It's no surprise, then, that enterprises are questioning the value of Software Assurance.
"A lot of companies are saying, 'I'm not going to renew SA, but I can keep using the software that I've already paid for. And I can save a lot of money,'" said DeGroot. He usually recommends that clients ditch SA for that very reason. "It's just not efficient to pay SA because you're paying twice as much for Office as you need to."
When a company dumps SA, Microsoft loses revenue. So if an enterprise takes five years between Office deployments, that's five years of lost income for the Redmond, Wash. developer.
"Software Assurance was always a bad idea, but now it's coming home to roost for Microsoft," said DeGroot. "They have to move away from SA. In five years, I don't think there will be SA licenses for Office."
Microsoft's response to the fragility of Software Assurance's future, and the potential loss of billions as customers decline to renew? Office 365, the "rent-not-own" plans that Microsoft debuted Wednesday.
With Office 365 subscriptions, Microsoft locks in customers, who must continue to pay or lose the right to run Office. There's no way to opt out, even temporarily, from the annual payments, as there is now by stopping SA, because there is no "perpetual" license, the traditional kind that is paid for once, then used as long as desired.
According to DeGroot, subscription prices for Office can be "quite competitive" with Software Assurance, assuming the customer retains the latter. "In general, subscription works about the same as Software Assurance, although subs have tended to be a little bit higher."
But by adopting the subscription model, Microsoft will be able to continually rake in revenue, year after year, from all customers, not just those who decide to pay SA's fees. That's how Microsoft can stop the revenue drain caused by desertions from Software Assurance.
Microsoft, of course, highlights what it sees as Office 365's benefits, including the right to install Office on up to five devices assigned to each worker. DeGroot agreed that in many scenarios, particularly those involving multiple devices per user, Office 365 subscriptions was the better deal than buying a perpetual license and paying SA.
What's missing from the subscriptions, of course, is a perpetual license that once paid for, can be used for years, Software Assurance be damned. Some customers may quickly wonder why they're paying and paying and paying for something they previously paid for only once.
That could be the backlash that Microsoft faces in the future.
"The risk to Microsoft is that there are alternatives to Office, especially for consumers," said DeGroot, citing LibreOffice as an example. "[Office 365] could be a boon to alternatives, and we could see more interest in the enterprise for these products. An Office 365 subscription isn't like a magazine subscription, where you're getting something new each month. Instead, it's Microsoft saying, 'To keep doing what you're doing, you have to pay us more.'"
Even so, DeGroot sees Office-by-subscription, and the demise of the perpetual license, as inevitable. "I can see a time when Microsoft says, 'The next edition of Office will be available only by subscription,'" said DeGroot.
Microsoft is already there. In an interview at a Morgan Stanley-hosted technology conference on Tuesday, Kurt DelBene, the president of the Office division, was asked if Office would at some point move to a subscription-only model.
It had crossed his mind. "I think it's the one thing that we talk about a bunch and try to figure out exactly where it's going," DelBene said. "I think we have aspirations that ultimately it might get there."
But that doesn't mean enterprises have to adopt Microsoft's model immediately.
"What I've been telling clients with Office 2010 is to just coast," said DeGroot. "You own the license. Enjoy it. In five years, when you're ready to upgrade, then buy the subscription. That's a good strategy as long as you don't keep paying Software Assurance."
Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld. Follow Gregg on Twitter at 
@gkeizer, or subscribe to Gregg's RSS feed 
. His e-mail address is gkeizer@ix.netcom.com.
Read more about Applications in Computerworld's Applications Topic Center.
Computerworld - The launch of new and revised Office 365 software-by-subscription plans for businesses shows that Microsoft realizes its current licensing revenue is threatened by cost-cutting customers, an analyst said yesterday.
"Microsoft wants to shift people to subscriptions because you cannot stop paying for a subscription," said Paul DeGroot, principal at Pica Communications, a consulting firm that specializes in deciphering Microsoft's licensing practices. "What they're facing is a lot of Office revenue potentially dropping off the books as customers stick with their perpetual licenses but stop further payments to Software Assurance."
Firms regularly pay for "Software Assurance," an annuity-like maintenance agreement that gives customers the right to future upgrades in return for annual payments spread over three-year terms. The problem with Software Assurance (SA) is that while Microsoft upgrades Office every three years, few businesses follow suit. Instead, enterprises take years to roll out an edition, skipping one or even two of the upcoming versions before again repeating the process.
By not deploying those interim editions, companies that pay for SA are spending money on something they won't use, said DeGroot.
"If you have Software Assurance, you're now entitled to Office 2013," DeGroot noted. "But say you're in the middle of an Office 2010 migration. That means you're buying not Office 2013 with SA, but Office 2016 or even Office 2019. If you renew SA, you're not going to get anything for it, or not anything that you're going to deploy in the next five, six years."
Dropping SA from an enterprise agreement can cut between 25% and 50% from an Office bill, DeGroot said, and save big businesses millions. It's no surprise, then, that enterprises are questioning the value of Software Assurance.
"A lot of companies are saying, 'I'm not going to renew SA, but I can keep using the software that I've already paid for. And I can save a lot of money,'" said DeGroot. He usually recommends that clients ditch SA for that very reason. "It's just not efficient to pay SA because you're paying twice as much for Office as you need to."
When a company dumps SA, Microsoft loses revenue. So if an enterprise takes five years between Office deployments, that's five years of lost income for the Redmond, Wash. developer.
"Software Assurance was always a bad idea, but now it's coming home to roost for Microsoft," said DeGroot. "They have to move away from SA. In five years, I don't think there will be SA licenses for Office."
Microsoft's response to the fragility of Software Assurance's future, and the potential loss of billions as customers decline to renew? Office 365, the "rent-not-own" plans that Microsoft debuted Wednesday.
With Office 365 subscriptions, Microsoft locks in customers, who must continue to pay or lose the right to run Office. There's no way to opt out, even temporarily, from the annual payments, as there is now by stopping SA, because there is no "perpetual" license, the traditional kind that is paid for once, then used as long as desired.
According to DeGroot, subscription prices for Office can be "quite competitive" with Software Assurance, assuming the customer retains the latter. "In general, subscription works about the same as Software Assurance, although subs have tended to be a little bit higher."
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MacworldSiri vs. Google Search
Siri, are you the most amazing feature on the iPhone? If you've seen any Apple advertising at all, you may come to the conclusion that Siri is indeed the slickest feature available on any phone ever made. You may be surprised to learn, though, that Siri isn't the only speech-recognizing search-assistant available on the iPhone, and that it may not even be the best one.
Recently, Google added voice-input capabilities to its free Google Search app for iOS devices. If you haven't tried that out yet, I highly recommend you do: I find the app's voice input so useful that I've given Google Search a spot in my Dock and have essentially retired Siri from everyday use. (Another advantage: Google's voice search also works on older iOS devices that don't support Siri, such as the iPhone 4; it runs on any device that supports iOS 4.3 or newer.)
What's so good about Google's voice search, especially on a device that comes with Siri already? The best way to answer that question is with a test. I posed the same four questions to Siri and the Google Search app.
So how'd it work out? See for yourself:
To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
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There are scads of apps on the App Store which will offer to backup your contacts. I tried four: a free app, a $1 app, a $2 app, and a $3 app (all prices listed are USD). One was great, two were pretty good, and one was downright atrocious.
(Note: all of the apps I reviewed are "universal" - that is, designed for both iPad or iPhone/iPod touch. All are optimized for the iPhone 5, with one exception which I have noted below.)
The trouble with finding a free app to backup your contacts is finding a free app which is really free, as opposed to several which are limited versions of non-free apps. Eventually I found Easy Backup which is actually free and does not seem to have any limitations.
When it first launches, it asks to connect to your Facebook account "to get better profile information." (Uh huh. You can see where this is going, right?) Sure enough, when I connected to my Facebook account, there was a "Who can see posts from this app on Facebook?" selector. Hrm, apparently in order to access my Facebook contacts, they häve to post to my Facebook account. I set the selector to "Only Me." Then Facebook told me "Easy Backup is requesting optional permissions" to post on my behalf. Under the "Why is Easy Backup asking for these permissions?" it says "Backup all contacts from Facebook." Well that's just a bald-faced lie, is what that is. I selected "Allow None."
(Aside: I have to admit that I'm confused by this 'business model' - you make a free app that you then want to let me post to my Facebook account. Why? So more people can find out about your free app? Also featured prominently throughout the app in the top-left corner is something I presume to be a "Like this app on Facebook" icon of a thumbs up. I tapped it once to see what it would do, and it appeared to try to automatically post a message to my Facebook account, but timed out, presumably because I had not granted it that permission earlier. To be fair, maybe it would have given me the option to edit the message before posting it. To be honest, I doubt it.)
Despite the name, I found using this app to be a little confusing. At first I found various 'sharing' options in the app, but they all seemed to be related to sharing the app not (for example) letting me email myself a copy of them. Eventually I realized that my going to the 'Contacts' tab and choosing 'All Contacts' and then tapping the "Check Mark" icon on the next screen then choosing the "Forward Arrow" it give me five options: Copy, Move, Share, New Group, Cancel. Selecting "Share" brought up a new email message with a vCard attached.
(Side note to new developers: if you have five options, don't label four of them with verbs and one of them with a noun. For example, in the above list of options, "Create Group" would have been a better choice than "New Group." Also, if pressing the button will result in something being emailed, label it "Email" not "Share." It will make things easier on your users.)
The vCard which was created by Easy Backup lacked the '.vcf' extension, so it was not recognized as a vCard file until I added it. Yet another little detail.
Summary: In the end, Easy Backup does work, and it's free. It even has a few extra features thrown in. But I didn't like it.
Backup Contacts - Easy Backup was the first app I tried. (Yes, that's the real name of the app. The whole category is flooded with keyword loaded keyword search optimization keywords. Keyword.) For only $US1, it does all that you'd expect, and perhaps even a little more. Not only will it backup your local address book, but also your iCloud or Facebook address book, or "all of the above." Once you select the address book(s) it will show you which contacts are found, and offer to let you de-select some contacts (by default, all matching contacts are selected). Tap 'Backup' and it will ask you if you want to save the backup on the device, or export it via email. If you select email, a 'Contacts.vcf' file will be created and added to a new email message, ready for you to fill in the To: and Subject: lines of the email message.
The only thing missing is the ability to backup directly to Dropbox, although that can be done by using SendToDropbox, a free service which allows you to email files and have them added to your Dropbox account. I also wish that it added the current date and time to the "Contacts.vcf" file. If I save that file from my email to my computer, I will have no reliable way of knowing when it was created. But those are both minor complaints to an otherwise excellent app.
Summary: If you are looking for a straight-forward way to backup your contacts, Backup Contacts - Easy Backup is certainly worth a look.
Contacts Backup Over Dropbox was the next app that I tried. Its $3 price tag ranks it as "expensive" in the realm of the App Store, but you'd be mistaken if you think that means that you are going to get a high quality app with a rich set of features.
The app does backup to Dropbox, but probably not as you would expect. It creates a file at "/Dropbox/sunvy/abbackup/backup.ab" instead of the more standard "/Dropbox/Apps/{Name Of App}/" path that you might expect. But it gets much worse than that. The "backup.ab" file appears to be some sort of proprietary and/or encrypted format. You can use that file to restore your contacts from Dropbox to your iPhone by using this app, but if you were expecting that this app would export a copy of your contacts in the industry standard vCard format to Dropbox, you would be sorely disappointed. At least, I was.
You might also note that there is an option to "Edit backup file" from the app, via a large and prominent button in the app. I was curious what that would do, so I tapped it, and was greeted by this:
Um. What?
Because this is a "family-friendly" website, I cannot accurately describe my disdain for this. In-App Purchases should never, ever, ever masquerade as basic features. But wait, it gets worse. The "Service Code Generator" does not actually allow you to edit your contacts, at least, not on the iPhone. Instead, that code allows you to log in to their website...which appears to be written in Japanese.
Investigating further, I came across another app by this same company: Contacts Editor. Buried at the bottom of the app description are notes which tell you that you have 5 minutes to login to their website after uploading your data, or your data will be deleted from their servers. It also says: "When editing with support site (http://www.abeditor.com), if within 2 hours without any operation, all data will be deleted." I'm not sure if that means "two hours idle" or "two hours and you're still not done" and I'm certainly not about to spend $2 to check. Oh, and after your data is deleted from their servers, that "service code" will no longer work. So if you didn't realize that the 'Edit backup file' meant that you were going to spend $2 to generate a code to let you log in to a website written in Japanese within 5 minutes and finish editing within 2 hours, well, sorry!
Summary: I would avoid Contacts Backup Over Dropbox as if it were a bowl of pus which had been sitting out in the summer sun.
I have saved the best for last: My Contacts Backup Pro. The app is feature-rich and very simple to use, with the exception of the Dropbox uploading, which works very well but is a little confusing at first.
Launch the app (which is abbreviated "MCBackup" on your iOS device) and it will present you will with a screen showing you how many contacts it found, and a prominent 'Backup' button. Tap the button, it will show you its progress, and then offer to email the resulting file. Boom, done. If it stopped right here, this would have been my favorite app because it works quickly and easily.
But there is actually a lot more hiding just underneath the surface. On the launch screen are also two smaller buttons for settings and help.
vCard (VCF) or CSV Tap the familiar 'Gear' icon to open settings and you will find an option to set the 'Type' of export: either vCard or 'CSV (Excel)' format. CSV is a nice option for those who need it, or who want to use their import their contacts into another app that does not support VCF.
Multiple VCF: create separate vCards for each contact. In the settings, under 'Configure' you can choose 'Multiple VCF' which will create a separate vCard for each of your contacts and then create a .zip file of all of them. However I recommend that you do not use that option unless you have a specific need for it. Multiple VCF files are not stored on the device, nor can they be uploaded to Dropbox through the app. When saving to Multiple VCF, your only option will be to email the resulting zip file. That said, I can think of times when it would be useful to have your contacts in separate vCards, so I'm glad to have this option.
Direct upload to Dropbox. My favorite feature is direct support for saving to Dropbox. The process is a bit confusing, probably because this feature was recently added to the app, instead of being part of the original design. The key is understanding how the app works: when you create a backup, it will prompt you to email it, but it also saves a copy of the backup within the app itself. You can find this by going to the settings and pressing the "In App vCard Restore" option. There you will find all of your previous backups. You can delete them using the 'Edit' button, or tap on them and bring up a prompt to choose from 4 options: Email, Dropbox, Restore, Cancel. (Again I'll note that "Dropbox" isn't a verb. "Upload to Dropbox" would have been a more accurate label, although it might not have fit in the available space.)
If you choose "Dropbox" it will be stored to "/Dropbox/Apps/MCBackup/" with unique filenames such as "MyContacts-2013-02-17-172220-1961.vcf" which makes it easy to tell when a backup was created: the '172220' refers to the hour/minute/second when the file was created, using the 24-hour clock.
So if you want to upload to Dropbox but not via email, simply press the Backup button when you enter the app, then tap the Settings gear icon. In settings, choose "In App vCard Restore" and select the backup you want to upload. Tap it, choose "Dropbox" and voilà. Ok, I'll admit that it's a little more convoluted than necessary, but it works. If you want a simple "save to Dropbox" feature, I suggest signing up for SendToDropbox.
Local Reminders: One feature that I really liked with MCBackup is that it can use local reminders to remind you to backup your contacts. Reminders can be set for every week or every month.
Wi-Fi Access: Another unexpected bonus feature is the ability to download your vCard file over Wi-Fi. Because some email providers limit the size of outgoing email messages, a large contact database might not be able to be sent via email. In that case you can enable a web server from within MCBackup which will allow you to download your vCard backup (nice!), or upload a vCard backup to your iOS device (cool!), or edit contacts on your iPhone (what?). Yup, you read that right, you can actually edit your iOS contacts through your web browser on your Mac or PC. In fact, you can even create a new contact.
Summary: If this had been the first app I had tested, I would have stopped looking. It's a steal for $2 and does everything I wanted, and then some. It generates unique file names, uploads to Dropbox in the preferred location, and allows me to email the backup if I prefer.
If you write an app which works well, it is easier to overlook minor problems. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have 3 apps to delete off my iPhone.
Roundup review of iOS apps to backup your contacts originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Tue, 19 Feb 2013 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Top 10 Cisco IOS Configuration Mistakes - Petri
ISP speed test: Real speeds vs. advertised speeds, FCC February update | BGR
Review: Free Editor lets you open and edit over 70 different file types for free | PCWorld
meteoritessize | CartoDB - very cool map of all recorded meteors that have hit/landed on Earth
Exchange 2013 Hits and Misses - Petri
Windows Network Troubleshooting Tools - Petri, I had forgotten about pathping, very cool.
Finding Dropbox 'conflicted copy' files automatically | TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog
How to disable Java on your Mac | Macworld
TidBITS: Isolate Adobe Flash by Using Google Chrome
Five applications for easy password recovery | TechRepublic
http://m.techrepublic.com/blog/five-apps/five-applications-for-easy-password-recovery/1669?tag=nl.e101&s_cid=e101
Few things in life are more frustrating than needing to open a file, but not being able to remember the password that will allow it. Thankfully, there are a variety of utilities designed to help crack forgotten passwords.
This blog post is also available as a TechRepublic Photo Gallery.
As the name implies, Ultimate ZIP Cracker is a utility for retrieving lost passwords for ZIP files. This program is completely utilitarian and there is nothing fancy about it at all, but it works. In preparation for writing this bog post I created a ZIP file and assigned it a password of 1234. Ultimate ZIP Cracker cracked the password in less than a second.
Ultimate ZIP Cracker sells for $59.00, but there is a free trial version available for download.
Free Word Excel Password Recovery Wizard is a free utility for retrieving lost passwords to Microsoft Word and Excel documents. This utility can perform either a dictionary lookup or a brute force crack.
In preparation for testing this tool, I assigned a five digit password to a Microsoft Word document. The tool allows you to configure the lengths of the passwords that you want to attempt. I configured the utility to perform a brute force crack using only five digit passwords. The crack completed successfully in less than ten seconds.
Word Password Recovery Master is a utility designed to remove password protection from Microsoft Word documents. However, the software requires Internet access to do so.
Word Password Recovery Master sells for $14.98, but a free trial download is available. The trial version of this software will confirm that password removal is possible for your document, but you cannot actually remove the password without purchasing the full version.
Wondershare PDF Password Remover is a utility that is designed to remove passwords and restrictions from PDF files. The utility works by creating a brand new, unlocked version of the PDF document.
Wondershare PDF Password Remover sells for $14.95, but a free trial download is available. The trial version is limited to extracting five pages from a protected document.
Windows Password Recovery Bootdisk This utility works by creating a boot disk that you must boot your computer from in order to recover the password. The reason why a boot disk is used is because it allows the password recovery process to occur outside of the Windows operating system so that the operating system's various protective measures can be avoided.
Windows Password Recovery Bootdisk sells for $19.95, but a free trial version is available for download.
Get password reset info for users with Windows PowerShell script
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10 free tools for admins on a tight budget | TechRepublic
http://m.techrepublic.com/blog/10things/10-free-tools-for-admins-on-a-tight-budget/3407?tag=nl.e101&s_cid=e101
If you're trying to stretch a thin IT budget, you probably can't afford a lot of pricey tools. Luckily, a number of highly useful tools are available for free. Some of them even work better and are more efficient than their costlier alternatives.
Note: This list is based on an entry in our TR Dojo blog.
When the standard antivirus/malware software can't seem to find the problem, ComboFix almost always does. It also looks for and removes most rootkits and Trojans. To use this tool, you must completely disable all antivirus solutions (and you should completely remove AVG). Caution: If ComboFix is not used properly, it can wreak havoc on the machine you're trying to fix.
ProduKey will help you get product keys from installed applications so that when you need to migrate to a new machine, you can continue using those costly licenses. ProduKey will recover keys from more than 1,000 software titles, including Microsoft Office, Adobe, and Symantec. When you use this tool, you will have both the product ID and the product key; the ID is important because it will tell you which version of the software is installed.
Hiren's BootCD is a one-stop-shop Linux boot disk that can help you pull off a number of small miracles. Its tools include Antivir, ClamWin, ComboFix, Clonedisk, Image for Windows, BIOS Cracker, 7-Zip, Bulk Rename, Mini Windows XP, CCleaner, and Notepad++, among others. This single bootable disk could easily be the only tool you need.
Microsoft Security Essentials is one of the better free antivirus tools available. Its tagline, "The anti-annoying, anti-expensive, anti-virus program," is true. When the firm I work with was looking for a new free solution, we tested Microsoft Security Essentials against AVG Free and Avast Free and found Microsoft Security Essentials to be superior, less intrusive, and less resource intensive.
Note: Microsoft Security Essentials can be used for free for up to 10 PCs. Beyond that, you can purchase the business version, System Center Endpoint Protection.
WinDirStat is the program you need when you must know what is taking up the space on a hard drive. When C drives begin to fill up, performance degrades rapidly. It's essential to have a tool to help you discern what is gobbling up the precious space on a machine, and WinDirStat is the foremost app for getting this information quickly.
CCleaner gets rid of temporary files and Windows Registry problems faster than any other tool. When a machine is having problems, this is almost always the tool I use first. CCleaner also helps ensure privacy by getting rid of traces left behind (such as cookies) by Web browsers.
Note: It is legal to use CCleaner Free for business use. However, CCleaner Business Edition comes with a few more features (including one-click cleaning) than the free version.
Defraggler blows away the defragmenting application in all Windows operating systems. It's faster, more reliable, and more flexible than the built-in tools. With Defraggler, you can defrag a single file or an entire drive. Defraggler supports NTFS and FAT32 systems.
7-Zip is the best file archiver/compression tool (outside of Linux command-line tools). It's open source and works on multiple platforms. Once you install it, you will find 7-Zip has Explorer support and a simple GUI tool that any level of user can manage.
SyncBack is a reliable, easy-to-use backup utility. No, you won't be recovering from bare metal, but you can save your precious data. SyncBack can synchronize data to the same drive, a different drive or medium (CDRW, CompactFlash, etc.), an FTP server, a network, or a zip archive.
FileZilla reminds you that the cloud has not made FTP useless. There are plenty of reasons you might need FTP, so why not use one of the best and most cost effective FTP clients? And if you need an easy-to-use FTP server to slap up on your Windows machines, FileZilla has one.
Have you used and liked the tools on this list? What other free go-to apps would you recommend?
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Recover from File : /// crash loop in OS X Messages - Mac OS X Hints
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20130204131658853
This recently published "File : / / /" bug (see
this Macworld article for an explanation) is a huge problem and can be seriously exploited to crash Mac apps, especially Messages. If someone sends you an iMessage (from an iOS device to Messages for Mac), Messages will continually crash, rendering it completely useless.
-
please DO NOT SENDa message with that content over iMessage. I
do notsuggest you test this bug. However, despite these warnings, trolling people will still send it to crash their friend's message machines.
Below are three fixes to make iMessage workable again:
FIRST (and easiest): Send 30-40 (lines of) iMessages back to the sender. The idea here is to lengthen the iMessage log so that the File : / / / message is not loaded when Messages starts up. You can either send these from an iOS device or from a Share button, such as the one in Safari. Continue trying until you can open iMessage again. Then, delete the conversation with Command+Delete.
SECOND: Remove the "chat.db" message database from ~/Library/Messages. This will remove all Messages conversations.
THIRD: Edit "chat.db" to delete the offending message. You will need to do this with an sqlite editor not subject to the crash (most that I tried do not crash). The message will be found in the "messages" table.
[kirkmc adds: This is, indeed, a serious bug, and it's quite simple to send a denial of service attack to someone using Messages. As the poster said, do not try this juts for fun. You may want to try it in other apps just to see that the crash does, indeed, occur, but at your risk and peril. It's really quite surprising that a bug of this nature got through Apple's QA…]
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Expo Notes: Hyper launches CameraMator DSLR device at Macworld/iWorld | Macworld
Make Office 2013 more powerful with 10 killer apps | PCWorld
Can a BSoD hurt my computer? | PCWorld
Android's (quiet) killer feature | Computerworld Blogs
Review: Customize and tweak your Windows 7 experience with Sunrise Seven | PCWorld
Top 10 Tech Upgrades to Make Your Small Business Run Faster - CIO.com
10 Windows 8 tips, tricks and hacks - Computerworld
Five network management tools for admins | TechRepublic
A small batch of Mac advanced tips:
Using and managing the Terminal history in OS X | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews
Manage collapsed window errors in Lion or Mountain Lion | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews
How to look up Terminal commands for OS X | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews
Oh Yeah! Review: Start Menu 8 is a free Window 8 Start Menu par excellence | PCWorld
Really awesome list for you iOS users: 33 expert tips and tricks for iOS 6 | Macworld
TechRadar: All latest feeds In Depth: Save time and money: shop smarter with your iPad or iPhone
Shopping divides us. It's either a necessary evil to be endured as infrequently as possible, or a fun leisure activity to be stretched out over the course of an entire Saturday.
If you're in the former camp, you'll want to do as much of it as possible from the comfort of your sofa. Thankfully there are hundreds of apps to help. Whether its the weekly groceries, a new TV or an entire room's worth of furniture, you can buy anything you need with a few taps on an iPad's screen.
If you view shopping as a leisure pursuit rather than a chore, there are plenty of apps to help you make it even more fun.
Find the best prices before you leave home, grab a bargain, get rewarded just for visiting a shop, and book a restaurant for lunch with a friend afterwards - it can all be done from your iPhone.
Online shopping is all very well, but you can't shop for everything from your sofa. And let's face it, shopping trips to the high street or out-of-town shopping centre can be, er, fun. Sometimes. The key to taking the stress out of a trip to the shops is planning. That means deciding where you're going to go, how you're going to get there and what you're going to buy. OK, you don't need military precision, but having a fair idea has to help. Right?
Of course, planning means lists. There are several apps specifically designed to help you make lists for grocery shopping; Groceries (£1.49, iPhone and iPod touch), for example, lets you choose specific goods from a pre-populated database and save them for later. You can can also share lists with friends and family members.
OurGroceries (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) is less structured, allowing you to choose generic categories like 'bread' and 'milk'. Again, you can share your lists with friends. ShopShop (Free, Universal) is the simplest of the lot, allowing you just to create basic lists.
However, our favourite is Clear (69p, iPhone and iPod touch). It's not aimed at shopping particularly, but is a great way to create lists of any type and works very well for groceries.
You could also use the Reminders app to maintain a shopping list and share it. Create a new list in iCloud, hover over its name and tap the wireless icon on the right, then enter the email address of the person with whom you want to share it. That way you can both update and check it whenever you go shopping.
Getting to your favourite shopping centre can be stressful on its own. Luckily, there are several apps to help. If you're travelling by train, National Rail Enquiries (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) or UK Train Times (£4.99, iPhone and iPod touch) will help you decide which one to get. NextBuses (69p, Universal) will help if you want to travel by bus and live in England, Scotland or Wales.
RingGo (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) lets you find local car parks and pay for your parking within the app. It doesn't cover every car park in the country, but does have 4,000 sites in its database, so it's worth checking to see whether there are any near where you'll be shopping. At the very least, it will save you having to search your pockets for coins to fill the machine once you've parked.
Before you head into the high street, download Quidco (Free, iPhone, iPod touch). As well as finding special offers at local shops and restaurants, it lets you earn rewards simply for 'checking in' to a store while you're out and about. If you register a credit or debit card with the app, you can also earn cashback when you use it to pay while you're shopping.
Once you've downloaded Quidco, grab Stocard (Free, iPhone and iPod touch). This handy app allows you to scan your loyalty cards and store them on your phone.
That way when you go to the till, assuming the store has an image scanner (most do), you can use the app instead of carrying the card with you. It has 200-odd preset loyalty cards, and if it doesn't have yours, you can add it manually.
For fashion shoppers in the US, Swirl (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) is essential. It allows you to browse clothes and accessories from fashion retailers, keep up to date with the latest trends, and, best of all, find out where they're on sale. Start before you go and make a list of possible purchases. Then, when you're out, you can open the app and find out which stores stock each item on the list. It's a personal shopper on your iPhone.
If you're anything like us, once you've found something you want to buy, your next question isn't 'where's the till?', it's 'if I buy this now, will I find it cheaper somewhere else later?'
You can eliminate that doubt by using RedLaser - Barcode Scanner (Free, iPhone and iPod touch). Fire up the app, scan the barcode on whatever it is that's making your credit card quiver, and it will tell you where in the local area you can buy it for less.
You can also read reviews, find deals and coupons, and order online for delivery if that works out cheaper. If you happen to be in one of RedLaser's partner stores, such as Best Buy, you can find in-store deals and promotions, plus prices for open-box items.
If RedLaser can't find the item, try ShopSavvy (Free, Universal). It claims to be the 'fastest, most accurate and most comprehensive scanner around.'
If you find that another store nearby is selling the item for less, don't leave the shop immediately. Ask to speak to the manager, show them that you can buy it cheaper elsewhere, and ask whether they're willing to match or improve upon that price.
Even if the store doesn't have an official price-matching policy, the manager might well agree to your request to stop you heading off and giving your money to a competitor.
If you're heading to the supermarket to buy your weekly groceries, Love Food Hate Waste (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) is brilliant. The idea behind it is that by buying only the food you need, you avoid unnecessary waste. Simple, right? It is with this app. The portion planner tells you exactly how much of each ingredient you need to make the included recipes, and the in-built shopping list helps you plan exactly what you need to buy. By combining the recipes, portion planner and shopping list, you make sure that you buy exactly what you need and no more, thus eliminating waste.
By now it's 11am and you must be feeling peckish; that means it's coffee time. That could mean calling on the excellent Starbucks UK (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) app. It allows you to find out where your nearest Starbucks is, discover everything you could want to know about its coffee, and check your Starbucks Card balance. You can re-load it too, if necessary. If you're in the UK or US, you can bypass the app and use your Starbucks Card from Passbook.
If Starbucks isn't your thing, AroundMe (Free, Universal) will help you find the nearest coffee shop or cafe. In fact, it will help you find the nearest anything you can imagine. Not only that, but it will direct you there from your current location, and if you're in the US, you can even use it to make a restaurant reservation - although that might be a little over the top for morning coffees.
Refuelled? Good. Fancy going to a gig tonight? The Ticketmaster UK (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) app lets you easily see what concerts are scheduled nearby, and allows you to buy last-minute tickets, if there are any available.
StubHub Tickets (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) does a similar job in both the UK and US.
And EventBrite (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), which also works in both the US and UK, allows you to store tickets in Passbook.
If there are no tickets, Seatwave Tickets (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) is one of the biggest on both sides of the Atlantic, and its app allows you to access its network of sellers. Its clever dynamic seating maps allow you to see exactly where in a venue you'll be sitting.
If you'd rather take in a movie than a concert or a play, Cinema Times, UK (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) allows you to see what films are showing in the cinemas closest to you. You can search for specific movies, read reviews, check times and buy tickets.
In the US, Showtimes (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) does a similar job, and will also give you directions to the cinema.
And if you're in Australia, My Cinema (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) has details of films showing at independent cinemas all over the country. Alternatively, both Hoyts and Event Cinemas have their own apps: Hoyts Movie App (Free, Universal) and Pocket Cinema (Free, Universal).
If you're in the UK and you know that you want to go to a Vue (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), Odeon (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), or Cineworld (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) cinema, you can download their own app. And if you're an Orange customer, you'll want the Orange Wednesdays (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) app, too.
Finally, if you've been shopping all day and then had a quick bite to eat before the cinema, you might find yourself having to answer a call of nature during the movie (yes, you should have gone in the foyer; no, not literally in the foyer; you know what we mean).
RunPee (Free, Universal) is an ingenious app that has details of the latest cinema release and tells you the best time during the movie to visit the bathroom. That way you'll never miss any action because you had to, well, run pee.
Did someone say lunch? If it's a restaurant you're after, Urbanspoon (Free, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch) will do the job. Whether you're in the UK, US, Canada or Australia, just fire up the app, shake your iPhone, and it will suggest a restaurant near you. You can then make a booking on the spot.
If you'd rather be more involved in the decision-making process, you can search local eateries and filter the results by type of cuisine, locality or price. And, of course, you can read reviews from critics or other diners.
Rather eat somewhere a little less formal? McDonald's (Free, iPhone and iPod touch)? PizzaExpress (Free, iPhone and iPod touch)? Nando's (Free, Universal)? There are apps for all of those, each of which will tell you the location of your nearest restaurant and, in the case of PizzaExpress, give you the option of booking a table and accessing special offers.
If you can't decide what to go for, Fast Food UK (69p, Universal) will point you to your nearest McDonald's, Burger King, KFC, Subway, Pizza Hut or Domino's.
When it's time to go home and you wish you'd brought the car rather than taken the bus, you might decide to treat yourself to a cab. If you're in London, Black Cabs (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) will allow you to hail a cab and pay for it using PayPal.
And if you're in London, Dublin or Toronto, Hailo (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) will have a cab with you in two taps of your iPhone's screen. Hailo is hoping to launch soon in New York, Chicago and Boston, too.
If you're in Washington DC or Sydney, Australia, myTaxi (Free, Universal) will help get you home.
If you've already over-spent on your day out, then you might have to walk home. Sadly, there's no app for that.
It's hard to imagine that a little more than a decade ago, shopping from home meant picking up a heavy catalogue, wading through hundreds of glossy pages, then picking up the phone and speaking to an operator. If you ever tried doing weekly supermarket shop that way, you'll know what a frustrating experience it was.
Now, of course, shopping from home means sitting on your sofa with an iPad, iPhone or laptop, and surfing hundreds of stores. And thanks to iOS, there's no need to even open a web browser. Most large stores, and plenty of smaller ones have their own app.
Amazon was the first to really take the internet by the horns and exploit it as a means to shop from home. So it's no surprise that its app, Amazon Windowshop (Free, iPad), is among the best available. It allows you to easily switch between Amazon country-specific stores, view products by category, or search for them.
When you've found what you were looking for, you can read details and reviews, and see related items. And when you're ready to buy, you can use 1-Click or add the item to your basket. If you've recently added something to your basket while logged into Amazon on another device or computer, that will show up in your basket in the app. And as well as ordering products by sales, you can rank them by the most wished for, most gifted, and by the most recently released.
The other great bastion of online commerce is eBay, and its eBay for iPad (Free, iPad) app is every bit as impressive as you would expect. It makes full use of the iPad's spacious screen, and provides easy access to your buying, selling and watching lists. It even displays thumbnails of popular items based on what you've watched, bought and sold in recent months.
Perhaps the best thing about the eBay app, however, is that it takes the pain out of listing your own items for sale. Scan the barcode of the item you want to sell, and eBay will populate its details automatically. If it doesn't have one, adding them manually is easy, too. You can also add images from your Library or directly from the camera. eBay for iPhone (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) isn't quite as impressive for browsing due to the smaller screen, but is equally good for listing items for auction.
Grocery shopping online tends to split opinion. You either love the convenience and the fact that it keeps you out of the supermarket, or don't trust the store's own pickers to choose your meat, fruit and veg for you. If you're in the former camp, there are plenty of apps to help.
Which you choose will be dictated by your preferred supermarket, but of the apps themselves, Tesco (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) has a slight edge in the UK over Asda (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), Sainsbury's (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) and Ocado (Free, Universal).
All four apps allow you to browse, search, and order items for delivery. You can book and amend time slots too, and Asda, Tesco, and Sainsbury's allow you to search for your nearest stores. Asda also allows you to search for items by scanning a barcode and to use its price match guarantee service.
Tesco, however, adds the ability to order from Tesco Direct as well, and, crucially, to store your Tesco Clubcard details so you use your iPhone in-store rather than having to remember to take your the card itself. If you want to use a Nectar card in Sainsbury's with your iPhone, you'll have to download the Nectar app. Ocado does have the benefit of being a Universal app, and therefore takes advantage of the iPad's bigger screen.
Clothes shopping online is a world away from the experience of the high street. You can't feel the fabric or try garments on to see how they look, but stores such as Asos (Free, Universal), Debenhams (Free, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch), Oasis Fashion (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), and La Redoute (Free, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch) have done their best to compensate by providing the ability to view clothes at very high resolutions so you can see the weave of the fabric and details such as neck and hem lines.
Others, such as Next (Free, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch), Very Catalogue (Free, Universal), and Zara (Free, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch) could be improved.
Asos, in particular, has done a good job of making the most of the iPad and iPhone screens in its app, changing the available views depending on whether you're in landscape or portrait mode. You can sync your account with a web browser, so any items you've added to your shopping bag or saved for later show up in the app. And you can save searches, too. You can also view your nearest drop-off and collection points on a map.
Debenhams' app includes fashion tips, style advice and a gift guide, as well as videos featuring its product range. And, of course, you can browse its catalogue, search for items, and order online for delivery or collection at your nearest store.
If it's home furnishings you're after, and you tend to shop at Ikea, you'll want the Ikea app (Free, Universal). It allows you to download the current Ikea catalogue for whatever country you're in, as well as specific catalogues for bedroom, office and so on. You can browse the catalogue, search for items, view details and order online. And if you have a paper copy of the catalogue, scanning specially-labelled pages with your iPhone or iPad will allow you to access additional photographs and videos.
The M&S Home (Free, iPad) app is a beautifully-photographed catalogue of M&S's range of furniture and furnishings. You can bookmark pages, create lists of ideas, and buy online from within the app.
Before you buy furniture, however, download SnapShop Showroom (Free, Universal). This clever app allows you to choose furniture from its library and then super-impose it on the image from your iPhone or iPad camera, so you can get an idea of how that three-seater sofa will look in your living room.
You can't buy a house online, but you can search your local property market, see photos, details, and floorplans, and book appointments to take a look round in person.
In the UK, the Rightmove (Free, Universal) app does a great job, allowing you to specify the area you want to search, your price range, the type of property you want, and how recently it was listed. Photos can be viewed full-screen as a slideshow, and an integrated map shows you exactly where the property is.
In the US, the Realtor (Free, Universal) app allows you to see homes for sale in your local area, as well as those recently sold. You can draw your search area on a map on-screen and use the Area Scout tool to see average values in a neighbourhood. Property listings are updated at least once a day, and most every 15 minutes.
Finally, whatever you buy online and wherever you choose to buy it, waiting for delivery is frustrating. Make sure you download package-tracking app Delivery Status Touch (£2.99, Universal).
It allows you to track the progress of deliveries from dozens of different couriers, including FedEx, UPS, and TNT.
Type in the tracking number provided by, say, Amazon or Apple, and Delivery Status Touch will display your package's current location on a Google Map.
It will also give you an expected delivery date, and a link to the shipping company's website in case you have any questions or concerns.
Tracking down bargains is half the fun of shopping, and if you have your iPhone with you when you hit the high street, it will be much easier. There are numerous apps designed to help you find the best prices and take advantage of deals offered by retailers.
We've already seen how RedLaser helps you track down the best online price for a product you've found on the shelves, but it can do a great deal more than that.
The app also lets you find coupons and voucher codes for the product whose barcode you've scanned, track down the best price at a local shop, see daily deals, and find products that are popular with other RedLaser users.
It will even suggest items based on those you've searched for before. As long as you don't mind holding your iPhone up to the barcode of, say, a DVD or book, it's a great way to save money.
Vouchercloud (Free, Universal) only works in the UK, Ireland, and Malta, but it allows you to find local shops, restaurants and venues that are running promotions, and to download vouchers directly to the app or use them immediately.
You can view offers by geographical proximity or by type (eating, retail, leisure, days out and so on). The app will then learn your preferences from vouchers you use and, suggest more special offers that might interest you.
MyVoucherCodes Vouchers (free, iPhone and iPod touch) does more or less the same thing.
It's slightly more polished and shows local deals on a map rather than as a list, but you can't access saved deals from a web browser on another device as you can with Vouchercloud.
In the US, Coupon Clipper (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) and Coupon Sherpa (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) help you to find similar deals, and download and redeem coupons.
ValPack Local Savings (Free, Universal) allows you to find deals at local retailers.
If you live in Australia, The Specials Board (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), Wealie (Free, iPhone and iPod touch), and Screencoupon (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) are essential for finding voucher codes and coupon deals.
Groupon (Free, iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch) allows you to access the crowd-buying service from your iPhone or iPad, and will send new deals to you each morning.
It covers both regular Groupon offers and the Getaways travel bargains. You can buy deals and redeem them within the apps, and keep track of those you've purchased but not yet used.
If daily deals are your thing, you should also try LivingSocial (Free, Universal). It's more geared towards restaurants, bars, and days out than tangible goods, but if that's your thing, it'll send you a local deal every day.
For loyalty card lovers in the UK, the Nectar (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) app is essential. It will show you which retailers in your area give Nectar points, display daily deals, award you bonus points, and let you check your balance.
ShopSavvy (Free, Universal) is similar to RedLaser. It works in North America and Europe, and allows you to scan barcodes to find the best price locally or online. Cleverly, it also lets you add details to its database if it doesn't have a record of the code you scan - and if you find a better deal than those in the app, you can add that, too. It helps you find voucher codes as well, and lets you see price-matching policies, enter contests and check stock.
Finally, mySupermarket Mobile (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) allows UK shoppers to see which supermarkets are running deals on your weekly regulars. Scan a barcode or check your saved shopping list to find out where you'll save the most.
The idea that we should be able to pay for goods and services in shops without having to carry money has been around for decades, but we're still stuck with cash and plastic. The Passbook app in iOS is a pointer to where Apple might be headed, though. It lets you store tickets, boarding passes, loyalty cards and vouchers to display when you need them, so you no longer have to carry physical copies.
So far support is limited, especially outside the US, but Apple hopes developers and merchants will take full advantage of it in the future.
Passbook is currently not really a payment system, though. Will we ever use our iPhone or iPod touch to hand over our cash? Apple seems to think so. It has already introduced a system in its own stores, called EasyPay, which allows you to scan the barcode of some products in-store, then log in with your Apple ID, pay with the stored credit card and collect your purchase before leaving the store. So far, however, it's restricted to Apple's own retail stores.
Square, co-founded by Twitter's Jack Dorsey, has a card reader that plugs into the audio jack of a mobile device to accept payments, and Square Wallet allows customers to make payments using a smartphone.
SagePay is trialling a similar solution in the UK that would let shops accept chip and pin payments on mobile devices like smartphones, and Barclays PingIt (Free, iPhone and iPod touch) allows you to send money to anyone using a mobile phone number. These systems, however, still require you to queue at a checkout in order to make a payment in a shop. If mobile payments are to work efficiently, they need to eliminate that step.
Much has been made in recent years of a technology called near field communication (NFC) - a short-range wireless system that lets customers use smartphones to make payments at NFC-enabled tills.
Google Wallet, for example, lets users store credit card details and then use those through a specially-created pre-paid MasterCard to pay for goods. There's no global standard for NFC, however, which makes rolling out universal payment systems tricky. Also, in order for it to work, shops have to install NFC-enabled payment points.
That's expensive and there is little incentive for them to do so. There appears to be no great demand from consumers, perhaps because the extra convenience of swiping a phone at a reader rather than a credit card is minimal. And the single most popular smartphone on the planet, the iPhone, doesn't support NFC.
If not NFC, then what? Cloud-based payments could use Bluetooth 4 to link to a store's payment system. You would scan the item you want with your phone, tap 'Buy' and be connected. You'd still need some way to transfer money, of course.
That could be where Apple comes in. It already holds millions of credit card details in iTunes, and allowing third parties to deduct payments from your iTunes account shouldn't be too difficult. Indeed, Apple has applied for a patent - called iWallet - for just such a system.
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