February 2018

I was greeted by a Recovery error message the other day when I powered up a PC running Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system. The recovery screen stated that "Your PC/Device needs to be repaired. The Boot Configuration Data for your PC is missing or contains errors".

The PC shut down properly the day before and the whole thing was mysterious. The Recovery screen suggested to use recovery tools or contact a PC administrator or the PC/Device manufacturer for assistance.

Read on to find out how I repaired the PC and how you can do it as well.

Trend Micro security researchers identified 89 different malicious extensions for Google Chrome that use Session Replay functionality to log user activity while using the browser.

Session Replay scripts are analytics scripts that record user activity on websites. Companies use it to understand what users do on their sites by recording mouse movement, keyboard input and other interactions with the page in question.

Research suggests that nearly 1% of the top 50,000 Alexa websites use Session Replay scripts including WordPress, Microsoft, Adobe, Godaddy or Softonic.

The author of the popular Firefox add-on Tab Mix Plus released the first version of the upcoming WebExtensions-based version of Tab Mix Plus yesterday.

The extension is available under a new URL on the Mozilla Add-ons Store to separate the classic add-on from the new.

When Microsoft revealed Windows 10 S in mid-2017, some believed that it was a return of the dead-before-it-shipped operating system Windows RT.

It was a low-cost version of Windows 10 designed for low-end hardware and "light-use" environments, and it only supported Windows Store apps.

Blocksum is a puzzle game for Windows PCs that mixes elements from Tetris, 2020 (if that game existed back in 2007), and Dr. Mario.

Whereas you try to fill lines completely in Tetris to remove them and move blocks of the same number next to each other in 2020, you use basic math in Blocksum to create adjacent blocks of the same sum to have them all removed at once.

On Jan. 30., Redhat announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire CoreOS, Inc, for $250 million. CoreOS, is a major player in the containers and virtualization area of the corporate server / development world.

Adobe released the security advisory APSA18-01 for Flash Player that confirms a critical security vulnerability in Flash Player 28.0.0.137 and earlier.

Flash Player 28.0.0.137 is the most recent version of the program which means that all installed versions of Flash are affected by it.

Affected products:

Google announced plans some time ago to integrate a native ad-blocking mechanism into the company's Chrome web browser.

The announcement may have come as a surprise to many as Google makes the bulk of its revenue through advertising.

Snaps are a type of container created by Canonical Inc., to serve as a universal installation package across distributions, so that developers and users alike, know that the software can run on any system, anytime.

The idea, is that all dependencies are packaged, snaps auto-update and can easily be rolled back in the case of issues, so long as you use a distro that supports snaps, you’re good to go (in theory.)

Currently, the supported Distributions are:

Microsoft's General Manager for Windows, Bernardo Caldas, and General Manager for Office, Jared Spataro announced changes to Office and Windows servicing and support today.

Microsoft revealed that Office 2019, the next version of Microsoft Office, will ship in the second half of 2018 and that previews will be available in the second quarter of 2018.