Microsoft will release a new office suite for the Mac before the end of this year, according to the companys manager for Office products in Germany. The version available today, Office:mac 2011, lags far behind the latest Windows version in terms of user interface and functionality, although it has been updated since its release so it can be used as part of an Office 365 subscription. Microsoft folded its Mac business unit, which developed the package, into its business software unit in 2010. It...

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The data London cites is New York Citys 311 non emergency data stream, which takes as its input New York residents emails, phone calls, and text messages sent to communicate issues to city authorities. Each day, HereHere pulls 311 data for each neighborhood and identifies the most compelling, important 311 request types, and the system generates cartoons and text that represent a neighborhoods characterized reactions.Think of it as a meta status update for the day—a simplification of issues in...

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Abobe planned to release an emergency update for Flash Player on Thursday, after security vendor FireEye pointed to a zero day exploit used by attackers to target visitors to websites of three nonprofits, two of which focus on national security and public policy. The Flash exploit allowed attackers to target users of the websites of the Peterson Institute for International Economics at PIIE.com, the American Research Center in Egypt at ARCE.org and the Smith Richardson Foundation at SFR.org. The...

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Microsoft is planning to release a OneNote for Mac app later this month. Sources familiar with Microsoft’s plans tell that the Mac application is part of a broader effort to expand the features and functionality of OneNote. While Microsoft originally released OneNote more than 10 years ago, the company has largely limited its note taking app to Windows. Versions for iOS, Android, and the web have debuted in recent years, but the full desktop version has always been a paid app available for...

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On Tuesday, Google Drive added a way for its Docs and Sheets office apps to tap into third party plug ins, giving both services additional features that Google hasnt supplied itself. The plug ins for Docs and Sheets directly compete with the Apps for Office program that Microsoft launched last year. And the three apps that Google highlighted as part of its program address some of the weaknesses Google Docs now part of Google Drive cloud storage service has compared to Office itself. To help take...

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This security update resolves sixteen privately reported and two publicly disclosed vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer. The most severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page using Internet Explorer. An attacker who successfully exploited the most severe of these vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the current user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users...

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The ability to pin Modern apps to the desktop taskbar is an interesting piece of cross environment integration in .1 Update 1. But in experimenting with the RTM version of this update, I've noticed a few additional featured I'd not seen before. Here an interesting example. If you're familiar with how taskbar pins work in Windows 7 and 8.x, you know that these application buttons can provide jump lists and live previews that show what the underlying app looks like if running, so you...

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The faces at the top of Microsoft may have changed lately, but it still full steam ahead for the Xbox division. Both new CEO Satya Nadella and ex Nokia boss, now devices and studios head Stephen Elop are said to be extremely committed to the Xbox hardware and software divisions. That might seem obvious really, but previous reports suggested that Elop would consider selling the Xbox arm should he have taken over as chief executive officer instead of Nadella. He didnt, but the Xbox division and...

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