May 2015

The video portal YouTube keeps track of watched videos automatically and indicates those with a watched flag so that they are easier to differentiate.

The core issue that many users have with it is that the watched flag is not shown at all times and not indefinitely on certain pages.

Most file sharing methods are not efficient, secure or private in nature. For instance, most Internet services are eliminated right away when it comes to privacy. If you don't want your files to be stored on servers you don't have full control over, then you cannot use the likes of Dropbox, OneDrive or Google Drive for that.

While encryption may be a suitable option, it adds another step to the process which increases its complexity.

ShadowCrypt is a Chrome extension that brings encrypted messaging to Internet sites such as Reddit, Facebook or Twitter. The core idea behind ShadowCrypt is to provide Internet users with the means to post encrypted messages on the Internet so that only select recipients can read it.

ShadowCrypt runs as a browser extension in Chrome that replaces page input elements with secure  inputs and encrypted text.

McAfee Stinger is a second-opinion scanner that you can run alongside your resident security solution to check the system for malicious programs.

The main purpose of the program is to detect and remove infections on computer systems running a supported version of Windows.

McAfee did add a real-time behavior component Raptor to the application in recent time to improve the program's capabilities.

When I launched the most recent version of Windows 10 today I noticed high cpu load almost immediately.

I opened the Windows Task Manager with the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Shift-Esc, clicked on the more details link and found the Windows process wsappx to be the cause (Note: the process may display as wsappx (2) or wsappx (3) as well).

Cpu use would go as high as 30% and while it went down at times, it did go up almost immediately again in the same moment.

Whenever I find a new program to review here on this site, I run it through a series of security tests first to make sure that it is not malicious or problematic in other ways.

Services like Virustotal are indispensable for that as they scan these files using dozens of different antivirus engines. While that increases the likelihood of false positives as well, the results are useful most of the time especially if no hits are returned by the service.

Microsoft announced not long ago that Windows 10 would be available as a free upgrade for eligible systems for the first year.

This announcement caused confusion on several levels. First, the wording was vague and some journalists and end users suggested that Microsoft would charge users who upgraded after that one-year period.

Some even suggested that Microsoft would introduce a subscription-based system instead similar to the company's successful Office 365 subscription-based system.

While it is theoretically still possible to install past -- and now unsupported -- Windows operating systems on modern machines, it may be difficult to do so especially when it comes to pre-Windows 95 systems.

If you just want to relive memories of the past or check out how things have changed in recent years, emulation may be an better option.

Programmers have created browser-based emulators for various Microsoft operating systems that you can load at any time without having to install and set up those operating systems first before you can do so.

When you open the homepage of the advertising company Superfish right now you see a simple statement on it instead of information about the company or its products.

It reads: "Superfish is currently transitioning our focus - but we are still offering our patented visual search technology to our partners. If interested in working with us contact [email protected]".

If you do a lot of document scanning on a regular basis, you may find the tool that ships with your printer not suitable for that task as it is usually bare bones and not really user friendly.

While there are enough alternatives available, many image viewers and editing programs come with scanning capabilities for instance, specialized programs may offer better functionality than those.

Not Another PDF Scanner 2 is a free open source program for Windows that is such an application. It is available as a portable version and installer which both work identical.