And the confusing name changing continues. If you are a Ghacks regular you know that Mozilla made the decision earlier on to rename their email-based login system BrowserID to Mozilla Persona. The issue here was that the name conflicted with Personas, which provided Firefox, Thunderbird and SeaMonkey users with the means to change their program’s [...]

You may remember that Google some time ago announced that they would start to charge for Google Map api calls above a certain level (see Google Introduces Google Maps Api Limits). Usage limit was capped to either 25,000 or 2,500 per day depending on the data used, and companies that went beyond that were asked [...]

Microsoft has removed the start menu for good in the Windows 8 Consumer Preview version that was released yesterday. If you have tested the Developer Preview version of the operating system, you might have noticed that it was possible to restore the start menu in that release. With the start menu removed completely in the [...]

With Google consolidating many of the company’s privacy policies into one came the fear that the companies primary motivation for the move was to generate even more revenue through their advertising programs than before. Google users have only a few options at their disposal to escape the tracking. Experts suggest to log out of the [...]

Program launchers could see a boost in popularity when Windows 8 gets released later this year. the reason is simple: Microsoft has done away with the start menu, which was used by many Windows users to launch programs and perform searches for files and applications on the system. With the start menu gone, attention has [...]

With the start menu gone for good in Microsoft’s upcoming operating system Windows 8, some users have run into problems shutting down the PC properly. The shutdown button, originally attached to the start menu, has been moved by Microsoft to the new start screen. It is not directly visible on the screen though, and it [...]

By now you have probably read about Google’s privacy policy changes that take effect today. Some of you may have deleted their web history and other Google history, or even migrated Google services to other service providers with stricter privacy policies. Google today announced the privacy policy change and a small FAQ that explains Google’s [...]

Even if you are a tech savvy user, it will take some time before you understand the workflow and functionality of Microsoft’s new Windows 8 operating system. The change from a desktop-orientated system to a Metro and desktop hybrid may throw you off at first as basic features have been changed in the operating system. [...]

Security Analyzer is a free program for the Windows operating system to assess the system’s security status. The application works in some regards identical to Microsoft’s Action Center control panel applet. Unlike Microsoft’s built-in tool, it provides additional information and options to see if the system is protected properly. The program runs a quick scan [...]

Included in today’s Windows 8 Consumer Preview release was an updated version of Microsoft’s upcoming web browser Internet Explorer 10. IE10 Platform Preview 5 is available both in the operating system’s Metro interface, and on the desktop version of Windows 8. Both versions share the same core engine that is optimized for HTML5 contents. The [...]

Microsoft has released several beta versions of upcoming products. You are probably already downloading the Windows 8 Consumer Preview that was released about an hour ago. The release marks the beginning of the beta phase of the operating system. Windows Server 8 Beta, Visual Studio 11 Beta and Microsoft .Net Framework 4.5 Beta have been [...]

Deploying a customized version of the Firefox web browser can be quite the daunting task. It does not really matter if you are a home user who wants to copy Firefox to another PC, or a system administrator who has to deploy Firefox on hundreds of PCs. Home users can use Firefox backup programs like [...]

The release of Avast 7 has caused anger and confusion in part of the security software’s user base. Especially the fact that Google Chrome was installed in a sneaky way during updates or new installations fueled criticism of the new version. Some users on the other hand reported that the application did not install or [...]

A press release by eBay Germany indicates that the company plans to switch the site’s current payment processing system to a new one this summer. Ebay customers who purchase goods on the site will then make their payments directly to eBay, and not the seller of the product anymore. The system works similar to Amazon’s [...]

You probably know about Gmail’s Indicator setting which adds group and single message indicators to all mail folders. You can enable the feature with a click on the Settings button, the selection of Settings from the context menu and scrolling down on the page until you see the Personal level indicators preference. The very same [...]

Two weeks ago a team of mathematicians and cryptographers have released a paper in which they describe a weakness in the encryption used by routers, firewalls, web services or virtual private network. The flaw, affecting only a small number of cases where the random prime number generation fails to work correctly. A new HTTPS Everywhere [...]

If you ever have been to a country where Internet is heavily censored, you might have noticed that you cannot load some of the websites that you use to go to. Your only option in this case is to use a proxy or virtual private network to connect to the site. Ultrasurf for Windows has [...]

Have you ever noticed that the mouse cursor tends to get in the way when you are editing text in your operating system or on the web? It happens that the cursor is directly on top of a character or characters on the screen so that these chars cannot be identified properly until you move [...]

Privacy has moved into the public focus in recent years. Initiatives like Mozilla’s Do Not Track Header try to improve user privacy on the Internet. Google Privacy is a Firefox add-on that tries to enforce do not track on popular websites. The name may suggest that the add-on has been created by Google but that [...]

When I first heard about Mozilla’s new project, Boot To Gecko (B2G), an open source operating system for smartphones, I initially thought that Mozilla should better spend the resources on the Firefox web browser. Now that I have read more about it and viewed a demonstration on YouTube, I have to admit that my stance [...]

I recently switched from using the Fox Clocks extension in Thunderbird to the lightweight Simple Clocks alternative (with a size of 100 Kilobyte compared to Fox Clock’s 700 Kilobyte). Both programs can be configured to display the time of select locations in the world. That’s extremely useful if you are communicating with people from all [...]

When you write down all the computer security tips that come to your mind, you probably end up with a long list. If you analyze that list then, you may realize that most of these tips can be broken down into categories. This guide concentrates on what most users can agree on when it comes [...]

The question came up here whether it is possible to disable Opera’s built-in Speed Dial feature. Speed Dial displays a number of websites or Speed Dial extensions on the browser’s new tab page. Speed Dial was initially designed as the means to quickly access popular sites right away from the new tab page without having [...]

Making sure your system and the software running on it is up to date is one of the things that you need to do to protect it from malicious attacks and malware. And while updating works more or less automatic when it comes to the Windows operating system, the same cannot be said for software [...]

Norwegian based Opera Software has just released Opera Mobile 12 and Opera Mini Next. Unlike on the desktop, where the Opera browser does not get much traction, it is Opera who is the leading browser on mobile devices. Opera maintains two different mobile browser versions. Opera Mobile, which has just been released in version 12, [...]

Imagine the following scenario. You film how you are collecting ingredients for a wild salad, and upload the video to YouTube. You then get a copyright claim later on stating that the video contains copyrighted music from another company, even though there is no music in the video other than the song of birds. You [...]

Avast 7 has been released a few days ago and it has not only received praises but also criticism by part of the security software’s user base. Users have been complaining about a variety of things, including slow system starts on Windows 7 among other things (Caused by the installation of Microsoft Security Essentials on [...]

When you start writing an ebook, you can use all sorts of editors for that task. From good old – and plain – Notepad to Microsoft Word or Open Office Writer. Sigil’s main advantage over those editors is its focus on ebooks. The program is a free, open source editor for EPUB format ebooks. It [...]

One of the main selling points of the popular file cleaning software CCleaner is its extensibility. Instead of just having to live with the cleaning options that the software developers have integrated into their program, users can add custom locations to CCleaner that they want cleaned whenever the program is run. The basic idea behind [...]

QR Codes, the QR stands for Quick Response, are images that contain messages that can be decrypted with specialized software. These codes are fairly common in the mobile phone world, where companies use them to direct users to their web offerings more easily. Instead of having to enter a web address manually, you could simply [...]