Australia’s second modernized Apple store opening in Robina on September 29th
After debuting its contemporary store design in Australia at Chadstone last November, Apple is preparing another significant retail expansion for this coming Saturday, September 29th. Apple Robinawill become the second store in Australia to relocate to a brand new space.
According to Apple, Robina Town Centre’s new store will be located in a different space at the same mall and open on September 29th at 9:00 A.M. Visitors can expect to see an increased focus on Today at Apple sessions. A Video Wall, Forum Seating, and Avenues will complete the space – just like at Chadstone. Robina’s current store, which opened in May 2009 as Apple’s fourth retail location in Australia, will permanently close on Friday evening.
Microsoft releases Office 2019 for Windows and Mac
Like the 2016 version, the suite is available as a one-time purchase. It includes Word 2019, Excel 2019, PowerPoint 2019 and Outlook 2019, with Publisher 2019, Access 2019, Project 2019 and Visio 2019 included in the Windows version.
Office 2019 is targeted at customers unable to move to the cloud in the near term, with Microsoft maintaining its strategy to shift customers to its cloud-based Office 365 offering.
Office 2019 also introduced new features to Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook, most of which are borrowed from Office 365.
The suite will only be available to Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016 users only, or on macOS Sierra at the least
Microsoft said consumer versions would be available “in the coming weeks”
Windows Virtual Desktop is a cloud-based service announced this week that allows users to run a version of Windows 10 through Microsoft Azure.
The service delivers “a multi-user Windows 10 experience, optimised for Office 365 ProPlus
“You no longer need to host, install, configure, and manage these components yourself—so you can deploy and scale in minutes.
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Microsoft Windows Server 2019
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Ditching passwords
“The Authenticator app replaces your password with a more secure multi-factor sign-in that combines your phone and your fingerprint, face, or PIN,” wrote Microsoft corporate vice president of security Rob Lefferts in a blog earlier this week.
“Using a multi-factor sign-in method, you can reduce compromise by 99.9 percent, and you can make the user experience simpler by eliminating passwords. No company lets enterprises eliminate more passwords than Microsoft. Today, we are declaring an end to the era of passwords.”
Available to business using usinesses using Microsoft Azure Active Directory
NBN Co doubles transit capacity in upgrade
NBN Co has announced a doubling of capacity on its 60,000km fibre network, after it delivered an update it expects will deliver broadband to more customers seeking more data.
its maximum transit capacity had increased from 9.6 terabits per second (Tbps) to 19.2Tbps per fibre link.
The first of the upgrades, which went live this week, will serve high-traffic fibre links between Eastern Creek and Asquith in Sydney. The 3600km network route between Brisbane and Darwin has also been upgraded and will go live in December. Transit capacity upgrades will then roll out in stages across the country.
NBN Co said the upgrade was made possible through new optical transmission technology from equipment maker Coriant’s CloudWave Optics. Technology that supports per-wavelength transmission rates of 200 gigabits per second. The new technology has the capability to be upgraded to 400Gbps when needed.
AWS cuts Australian data transfer costs
Amazon Web Services has reduced data transfer fees for its Australian data centres.
cut fees by up to 28 percent for data transfers from Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) , Simple Storage Service (S3) and CloudFront.
Sir Charles Kao: Fibre optics genius passes away
Sir Charles, who won the 2009 Nobel Prize for Physics, died in Hong Kong on Sunday, aged 84.
In the 1960s, he worked at Standard Telephones and Cables in Harlow and it was here that he laid the groundwork for fibre optics,
In 1966, Sir Charles realised that optical fibres made from high-purity glass could be used to transmit light signals over long distances.
He then identified silica as a “crucial material” for developing fibre optic communications.
China blocks Twitch game-streaming service
Since 20 September, Twitch’s website has been unreachable from the country and its app has been removed from the local Apple App Store.
Twitch has confirmed that it is being blocked but it has not said why the authorities have imposed the restriction.
The service was cut off shortly after enjoying a significant bump in popularity among Chinese gamers.
No official statement has been released by Chinese authorities to explain why Twitch has been blocked. China operates a comprehensive online censorship system that seeks to police talk about sensitive subjects and limit what people can do and see online.
PlayStation backs down in Fortnite cross-play row
Many games already let those using a PC, Nintendo Switch or Xbox One play together online, but Sony had refused to take part.
It had previously cited child protection as one of the reasons it blocked cross-play.
Fortnite is the first title to offer full cross-play on the PS4, and gamers will be able to use any items they have purchased in the game on other consoles.
Eurogamer news editor Tom Phillips wrote “It’s a historic moment not just for PlayStation, but for all of gaming – as all console owners will now be able to play together for the first time,”
Joes Podcast for 27/09/2018
Facebook’s newest VR headset, Oculus Quest, ships in the spring for $399 US
https://techcrunch.com/2018/09/26/oculus-quest-ships-in-the-spring-for-399/
- Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that its newest headset, called Oculus Quest, will be released in the spring of 2019 for $399.
- The standalone VR device will be the first wireless Oculus hardware to sport positional tracking, both for the headset itself and the dual hand controllers. The headset will ship with 50-plus games made specifically for the device at launch.
- The Oculus Quest headset will retail for around $399 US and while the company’s flagship Oculus Rift headset is also $399, you need to tether it to a fairly beefy gaming computer . But not the Oculus Quest it has everything you need baked into it, including the computer and battery components.
- The device is able to track your location without external sensors thanks to four wide-angle cameras on the front of the device. The controllers may have a bit of a different look than what ships with the Rift, but they both have the same button mapping meaning that it’s going to be easier for developers to convert existing PC games for the headset, assuming they reduce the complexity quite a bit for a mobile chipset.
Discuss VR headsets , have you got one or used one, what are they like.
Google to allow Chrome users to disable controversial login feature
https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/26/17904762/google-chrome-sign-in-changes-feedback
- Google is responding to criticism this week over its recent change to Chrome login behavior. Security experts criticized Google for automatically forcing Chrome users to log into the browser if they signed into Gmail on the web.
- You typically would choose to sign into Chrome itself if you want to sync your bookmarks, passwords, and browsing history between different devices.
- While Google claims its sync feature isn’t automatically enabled, the change has been interpreted by some as a method to trick users into inadvertently sharing more data. Google is now offering more control over how the changes happen.
- Updates in Chrome 70, Google is adding a new control feature to disable the automatic Chrome sign in. Chrome 70 will be available in mid-October.
- Google is also updating its sync UI to make it clearer over whether you’re syncing data like passwords, credit cards, addresses, and browsing history to a Google Account….. Chrome 70 will also clear all the Google authentication cookies when you sign out, instead of keeping these to allow you to stay signed in after cookies are cleared.
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