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Microsoft expects IE9 to claim 25% of browser market in December

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 12:54pm MST by Tim Conneally

Microsoft's Internet Explorer team announced on Friday that IE9 has passed both Firefox and Chrome in market share, and will soon be the number one browser among Windows 7 users according to data from Net Applications.

Though data from the month of December is not yet complete, the Internet Explorer team expects IE9 to close out the year with a quarter of the browser market as users upgrade from Internet Explorer 8.

"Maybe it’s a bit early to list [IE9 as the leading Windows 7 browser] since we still have a little ways to go, but we are quickly heading in the right direction, which definitely earns a spot on the top 10 list," Said Roger Capriotti, Internet Explorer Marketing Director on Friday.

Inspired by Net Applications' last round of tallies last October, we polled BetaNews readers about their primary browser, and Chrome and Firefox led by a wide margin. Only 8.7 percent of our readers said IE9 was their primary browser at the time (That number has since grown to around 16 percent).

Upon looking at the results, BetaNews Managing Editor Joe Wilcox asked "My God, Does Anyone use Internet Explorer?"

Our results, however, were not operating system-specific, and our daily traffic reports show lots of our readers are coming to us on Linux and Mac OS machines in addition to Windows machines.

So yes, Joe, people use Internet Explorer; and the interesting trend to watch is the length of time it takes for the legacy version to be replaced. As IE9 rises, IE8 declines, and according to Microsoft's projections, IE9 should pass IE8 in market share some time before the March 15th anniversary of IE9's release.

At that point, one year in, the browser will have reached the "majority" phase of adoption.
Critical ASP.NET security patch means extra hours for IT over the holiday weekend

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 12:32pm MST by Ed Oswald

Microsoft's monthly Patch Tuesday is not until January 10, but the company is not waiting to patch a critical flaw in computers with the ASP.NET framework installed. The issue affects all currently supported versions of Windows, according to a security bulletin from the company.

According to Microsoft's description of the flaw, an issue exists in how the framework handles certain web request. If an attacker sends a request in a certain way, it could allow for elevation of privilege that may result in the execution of arbitrary code. The flaw is not easy to exploit, however, as the attacker needs to know some information about the victim.

"In order to exploit this vulnerability, an attacker must be able to register an account on the ASP.NET site, and must know an existing user name", Microsoft says. Regardless, it means IT administrators may find their holiday weekends a bit shortened as they rush to deploy the fix. Hackers know that IT monitoring is lax over the holidays, making this time of year perfect to launch attacks.

The issue also appears to pose a Denial-of-Service risk. Exploiting the vulnerability correctly may result in 100 percent of available CPU processes to be used up, which will allow for the attacker to take down an unpatched site in short order.

"The vulnerability exists because of the way that ASP.NET hashes specially crafted requests and inserts that data into a hash table causing a hash collision. When many of these collisions are chained together, the performance of the hash table is greatly degraded leading to the denial of service condition", Microsoft explains.

This out-of-cycle patch follows a rather busy Patch Tuesday in December where the company issued 13 separate patches, including three critical fixes. Those patches fixed code execution risks in the Windows kernel, ActiveX, and Windows Media.

Photo Credit: gualtiero boffi/Shutterstock
New Year's Eve giveaway: O&O DiskImage 5.6 Professional Edition

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 11:58am MST by Mike Williams

Hardware failure, malware, human error or software bugs: your files are at constant risk from a whole host of potential calamities. So it’s really a very good idea to create regular backup images of your system.

Of course with the wrong backup software that can be a constant hassle, but install O&O DiskImage 5.6 Professional and the program will create complete images of individual partitions or complete hard drives in just a click or two. And while it would normally cost you $29, Downloadcrew’s Giveaway site offers the entire package, no charge at all, for this New Year’s Eve only (or more specifically, from 23:59 Central European Time on December 30 2011, to 23:59 on December 31).

If you sometimes find backup software can take a little while to configure, then DiskImage 5 will be a very refreshing change. When we chose “One-click imaging” on its launch menu, for instance, the program figured out that we’d most likely want to create a complete backup of our system drive, understood that this contained two partitions (C:\ and J:\), and chose a default folder for our drive image. All we had to do was click “Start”, and the backup started immediately.

Should you need more control, though, switching to the advanced DiskImage interface reveals a host of useful options. So you can improve performance by choosing to back up only files and folders that have changed since the last backup, for instance. There’s support for excluding particular file types from your backup image. Compression options further reduce the archive size, optional AES encryption keeps your data safe, and the archive can even be converted to a virtual hard disk in Microsoft’s VHD format.

Basic file restoration is also very easy. You’re able to mount images as virtual drives, so they can be browsed just like any other, and recovery is as simple as dragging and dropping whatever files or folders you need to their chosen destination.

And DiskImage 5 Professional Edition can of course restore individual drives (including the system drive) or an entire computer; O&O’s Machine Independent Restoration means you can even back up your data on one system, and restore it to another, even if when it has different hardware installed.

DiskImage will need to manually build the image for your bootable start CD or flash drive, though, using the bundled BuildPE tool, and this can take a while as the program must download Microsoft’s Windows Automated Installation Kit and install it first. Of course you only need to do this once, though, and a straightforward wizard makes the process very easy (essentially you just keep clicking “Next”).

If all this isn’t quite enough then you can always upgrade to O&O DiskImage 6 Professional, which extends the program with file-based backups, support for mounting and browsing ISO images, and features a revamped interface, making it even easier to use. Normally $29, you can get a bulky 50% discount just by upgrading from the Downloadcrew store.

You should start by trying out O&O DiskImage 5 Professional, though – and that’s very simple. Just point your browser at the Downloadcrew Giveaway site, log in (or create a free account if you don’t have one already), then download a copy of the program and get your free serial code. Be quick, though – the offer is for December 31st only, and expires at 23:59 Central European Time.

Photo Credit: Zadorozhnyi Viktor/Shutterstock
Verizon blames 4G network outages on 'growing pains'

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 11:52am MST by Ed Oswald

Verizon's claim of being the nation's most reliable network sure took a hit this month. At least three separate outages occurred during December, frustrating customers. The carrier's statement, however, could not be more non-committal, as it blames the outages on the perils of building out its 4G LTE network.

"Being a pioneer comes with growing pains", the carrier says in a statement. "The recent issues that affected our customers' 4GLTE service were unforeseen despite careful, diligent planning, deployment and ongoing upgrade programs". Each of the three outages were blamed on different issues, which engineers have since remedied to prevent those issues from occurring again.

In all cases, LTE customers maintained some level of service, often being redirected to Verizon's 3G network. Despite the three incidents during December, Verizon's LTE network recorded a 99 percent uptime during 2011, it stresses.

The carrier has been agressive in its LTE rollout, and was the first major carrier to offer the technology in the United States when the 4G network launched in December 2010 (MetroPCS was first overall, launching LTE in Las Vegas in September of that year). Since then, its network has expanded to cover about 200 million people in 190 markets. Compare this to AT&T's LTE network, available in only 15 cities.

It is possible that this aggressive rollout may have contributed to Verizon's issues, but without specifics on the nature of the network issues it's hard to say. Another possibility could be sourced back to its LTE push itself. Verizon has had two major LTE device rollouts in the past two months alone: the Galaxy Nexus and the Motorola Droid RAZR. Anecdotal data indicates that both have sold well.

Verizon also has seven other LTE smartphones in its lineup -- the HTC Rezound and Thunderbolt, the Samsung Stratosphere and Droid Charge, the Pantech Breakout, Motorola's Droid Bionic, and the LG Revolution. Since the launch of its network last year, the company released just about one new device per month since the Thunderbolt, Verizon's first LTE phone that launched in March.

Add this to a host of tablets, hotspots, and USB modems also now in Verizon's portfolio, and it's not too much to deduce that a significant segment of Verizon's smart device users moved over to the LTE network during 2011. Was the network ready for it? Maybe not.

Regardless, the company is taking steps to ensure reliability which is a hallmark of its marketing.

"Among the numerous measures we have taken or will take are: geographic segmentation, which enables us to isolate, contain and rectify network performance issues, and maintain service to the majority of customers when an issue does develop; and software fixes that we have developed, tested and applied regularly -- and will continue to do so".

"We will not rest until our 4GLTE network performs at the very highest levels that our customers have come to expect from us", the company concludes.
Build beautiful panoramas with Hugin

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 11:19am MST by Mike Williams

Blending multiple images of a scene into a single panorama is one of those tasks that might seem easy -- at first, anyway. After all, if you could just align one image over another at a point where they share some common feature then that’s the job almost finished. Right?

If you’ve ever tried to do this manually, though, you’ll know the reality can be far more complex. There are barrel distortion, vignetting, and many other camera and lens issues to consider. And you’ll need to take account of variations in image exposure, alignment, and the list goes on. Although, of course, if this seems too much like hard work, then you could just get the open source Hugin application to handle everything for you.

This highly professional tool extracts information like your camera and lens type from image tags, helping it to produce more accurate work. You’re able to specify multiple “control points” -- clearly defined points that are visible on more than one image -- to further enhance the results. Hugin tweaks multiple image orientation and camera lens parameters to properly optimize your pictures, and it’ll fix exposure issues, centralize and straighten the finished results, too.

The interface for all this can appear a little intimidating, at least initially. The “Optimizer” tab alone has no less than 12 variables that can be tweaked, for instance: yaw, pitch, roll, x shift, y shift, and the list goes on. While the Exposure tab has variables for White Balance, Vignetting, Vignetting Centre, Camera Response and Exposure. Where should you start? We have absolutely no idea.

Fortunately there’s no need to worry about any of this, at first, as you can just accept the default settings and leave the program to handle most of the difficult work automatically (if also slowly: sluggish performance is probably Hugin’s only problem of note). It’s still a good idea to spend some time figuring out what the various tweaks do, as they can help to improve the final results, but the Hugin site has some online tutorials to assist here. And further guidance is available via the Hugin mailing list, should you need it.

It is worth investing the time, though, as Hugin really can produce some spectacular panoramas. And there’s no need to take our word for it: just browse Flickr for images tagged with “Hugin” and you’ll quickly get a feel for exactly what the program can do.
Tweet #betanews, win HP TouchPad

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 10:50am MST by Joe Wilcox

It's another day, and another giveaway. Actually, it's a day late. We received so many submissions to the HP TouchPad caption contest, featuring Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, that we delayed the followup contest by a day.

This new contest ends at 11:59:59 am ET on Saturday December 31, 2011. We'll announce winners some time next week. I'm being iffy on when because we'd rather announce caption contest winners first. But given the number of really good submissions, from which one winner will be randomly chosen, we don't want to rush that one too fast. To qualify for the new contest, you must follow BetaNews on Twitter.

The rules to our next New Years giveaway are simple:

1. Like this post on Facebook.

2. Tweet this post with #betanews hashtag.

3. Follow @betanews on Twitter (if not already)

4. In comments, tell us what you'd like to win next (optionally link to your tweet there).

The very next giveaway -- and you should really watch for it this weekend -- will be a Galaxy Nexus. You'll have to think hard and write brilliantly to get it -- more on what that means when I formally announce the contest.

We'd like to give away one more thing, but we're divided. There have been suggestions of iPad 2, Transformer Prime or Pica projector. Transformer Prime availability (as in not yet) is stickler.

Tell us what you would like to win and in comments "Like" the suggested prizes you would want most to win. Number of Likes will influence but not guarantee choice. For example, I'm sure many of you would Like a flight into space on Virgin Galactic; so would we. That's not happening unless Sir Richard Branson gifts one.

The winner will be randomly chosen from all qualified submissions.
Hacked! Environmental activism site Care2, users exposed

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 10:07am MST by Tim Conneally

Care2.com, a site dedicated to environmental awareness, petitioning, and charitible donation with more than 17 million members has been hacked, according to a message from the company Friday morning.

The message to users on Friday was from Care2's Founder & President Randy Paynter. It said:

We have discovered that Care2.com servers were attacked, resulting in a security breach. The hackers were able to access login information for Care2 member accounts. Our team has worked to secure Care2.com against this type of attack from recurring.

To protect Care2 members we are resetting access to all Care2 accounts. The next time you login to Care2, you will be automatically emailed a new password, which will enable you to access your Care2 account as usual.

To recover your password, you can also visit our password retrieval form and enter your username or email. Your password will be emailed to you.

To secure your privacy, we highly recommend you immediately change your password for any accounts that share the password you previously used on Care2.

We sincerely apologize for this inconvenience. We take the security of our members very seriously and are taking these extreme steps to reduce the chances of any possible negative consequences.

The site is a privately-held nonprofit, and it supports environmental organizations such as The Nature Conservancy, Environmental Defense, Wildlife Conservation Society, National Wildlife Federation, Defenders of Wildlife, and World Wildlife Fund.
Duplicate protected Windows files with Fast Raw File Copier Pro

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 7:15am MST by Mike Williams

It’s barely two weeks since Italian security vendor NoVirusThanks released a bunch of small tools as freeware, but it seems the company is still feeling seasonally generous -- another two of their utilities are now also entirely free to use.

Fast Raw File Copier Pro, for instance, is an apparently simple file copying tool: point it at one or more files, select a destination, and it’ll transfer the specified data at a click. Which sounds ordinary enough, but this program has a twist. It figures out where your files are located on the disk, then accesses the clusters directly, without going through Windows, and that means it can copy anything -- even files that would normally be protected.

If you want to make a direct backup of your Registry files, for instance, you could try copying the contents of the \Windows\System32\Config folder from Explorer, but you’ll just see multiple error messages complaining that the files are in use. And as the Registry is always open, this won’t ever change. Point Fast Raw File Copier Pro at the folder, though, and it’ll transfer the files to your chosen destination with no problem at all.

Some of the copying logic behind the program confused us a little, at first. We chose the “Copy Folders” option, set C:\Test as a source, and J:\ as a destination, expecting a J:\Test folder to be created. But instead everything in the C:\Test folder was copied to J:\ , leaving us with a little cleaning up to do. So it’s probably best to think of the “Copy Folders” option as more like “Copy Lots of Files”, and make sure you specify the precise destination you need.

Another oddity is that the progress bar is turned off by default (click Settings, check “Show Progress” to turn it back on). And despite the “Fast” tag, Fast Raw File Copier Pro worked at about the same speed as Windows in our tests. Still, if you’ve ever needed to copy files and found Windows won’t allow it then this is a straightforward (and now free) alternative.

The second NoVirusThanks freebie is Smart PC Locker Pro, a simple tool that claims to lock your PC or laptop at a click, ensuring no-one else can access the system while you’re away. It promises to disable Task Manager and CD-ROM drives, and even pop up when Windows loads so there’s no way an intruder can snoop on your files.

While all this sounds great, it just didn’t work for us. Sometimes we’d click “Lock” and nothing would happen. And when we could lock the system, rebooting was enough to give anyone access, even if we enabled the “Start with Windows and Lock Screen” setting. Still, if you need something like this and would like to see if you have more luck, the program is now available for free on the NoVirusThanks site.

Photo Credit: Raimundas/Shutterstock
Freemake Music Box: Streaming, no subscription required

Posted: December 30th, 2011, 6:59am MST by Mark Wilson

When it comes to listening to music on your computer you have a number of options. You can just play a CD, or you may have taken the trouble of ripping your existing music collection so that all of your favorite tracks are available on your computer. You could stream music using the likes of Last.fm, or you could listen to streaming radio stations from all over the world. But all of these options have their limitations -- if you don’t have a CD with you you can’t listen to it, working on different computers means that you might not have access to your music collection and radio stations may not necessarily play what you want to hear. Enter Freemake Music Box.

This is a free app that enables you to stream free music to your computer without the need to create an account or set up a subscription. The tiny app -- it’s only 1MB in size -- can be downloaded and installed in a matter of moments and after performing your first search you can be listening to music in seconds. You can search for your favorite band or jump straight in to find a particular track.

If you are looking to create a perfect soundtrack to accompany your work, numerous tracks can be built up into a playlist that you can listen to however you want -- and if you step away from your computer you will be able to pick from where you left off. The app itself is very simple and streamlined; it is not bursting with features, but it doesn’t need to be. It does what it set out to do – providing access to a wealth of free online music -- and it does it very well.

There are already a number of enhancements planned for future versions of the app -- as it stands, Freemake Music Box has not even reached version 1.0 yet. In the, hopefully not too distant future, we can look looking forward to using a web based version of the app as well as synchronizing playlists between computers. It is early day for this music app, but things are already shaping up well. The fact that only legal music is available will be attractive to anyone keen on avoiding getting into trouble, and everyone can benefit from the fast searches and extensive music database there is available.

You can find out more and download a free copy of the app by paying a visit to the Freemake Music Box review page.

Photo Credit: Dmitry Naumov/Shutterstock