Technology and Computing
The passwordless future is slowly becoming a reality. This week, Google announced that you can now log into your Google account with just a passkey. It’s a huge milestone in what promises to be the incredibly long, awkward move away from using passwords for security. In case you haven’t heard yet, passwords are terrible. People pick awful passwords to begin with, find them really hard to remember, and then don’t even use them properly. When someone gets hacked, that may…
Android users are proud of our devices’ versatility, but many of us have been low-key jealous of Apple’s AirDrop, which allows iPhones, iPads, and Mac computers to seamlessly swap files within a certain physical distance. Google, naturally, came up with its own version of the feature—Nearby Share—but until recently it was only available on the company’s operating system. Thanks to a new beta app, anyone with an Android device can now also share photos and documents with Windows 10 and…
The fewer applications you’ve got on your laptop or desktop, the better—it means more room for the apps you actually use, less strain on your computer, and fewer potential security holes to worry about. Taking some time to remove bloatware—pre-installed programs you don’t want on your device—is only the first step. After that’s done, it’s important to ensure your computer doesn’t get cluttered up with unwanted software in the future. Once these two tasks are completed, you should find your…
Disk space is always at a premium, so you should take every opportunity to free up as much of it as you can. One of the best ways to do this is to back up a bunch of files to the cloud, then remove them from your computer entirely. Stashing your data in the cloud will allow you to access your files while still having hard drive space on your computer. The process is relatively easy, but don’t let this…
Whatever familiarity you think you have with Windows keyboard shortcuts, think again. The nearly 40-year-old operating system has so many hotkeys that it can be easy to miss some surprisingly useful ones, and if you recently switched from Windows 10 to Windows 11, some shortcuts have changed. No matter how often you’re using these efficient key combinations in your day-to-day work, it’s in your in interest to learn as many as possible. A single shortcut will shave a mere moment…
Maybe you’re used to turning your computer on every day with the power button and off every evening with a few clicks—or perhaps you just leave it running around the clock. Instead, save yourself some time by making your computer turn on and shut down on a schedule. Not only will you save money on energy bills, but you’ll also have your PC or Mac booted up and waiting for you in the morning when you reach the office (or…
We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Learn more › Mac users sometimes need to use Windows software. Windows users might want to see what Linux is like. You might think, in both cases, that the only choice is to buy another computer (expensive) or set up dual-booting (complicated). There’s a third choice: virtual machines. A virtual machine is exactly what it sounds like: an entire computer running virtually on your…
It’s been a wild ride for anyone paying attention to the ongoing Microsoft Bing chatbot saga. After a highly publicized debut on February 7, both it and its immediate competitor, Google’s Bard, were almost immediately overshadowed by users’ countless displays of oddball responses, misleading statements, unethical ramifications, and incorrect information. After barely a week of closed testing, however, it appears Microsoft is already delaying its “new day for search” by quietly instituting a handful of interaction limitations that have major…
With time, monitors have grown wider and wider to give us more space and more resolution for videos and gaming. Setting up your screen horizontally may come naturally to you—that’s how it’s shown on the box anyway—but it might not be the most efficient option when you’re working. Changing to a vertical monitor setup is easy to do and can make more efficient use of every single inch of your screen. When you’re using programs like Microsoft Word or Google…
After months of hype, Google and Microsoft announced the imminent arrivals of Bard and a ChatGPT-integrated Bing search engine within 24 hours of one another. At first glance, both tech giants’ public demonstrations appeared to display potentially revolutionary products that could upend multiple industries. But it wasn’t long before even cursory reviews highlighted egregious flaws within Google’s Bard suggestions. Now, it’s Microsoft’s turn for some scrutiny, and the results are as bad as Bard’s, if not worse. Independent AI researcher…
Once upon a time, you could open the Windows Start menu, type the name of the program or file you wanted to open, and hit enter. It was the fastest way to open an app. You can bring those days back. At some point, Microsoft decided to start answering queries by showing web results from its search engine, Bing, alongside local results from your computer. This is occasionally useful but consistently slows down the Start menu search—annoying if you just…
Few people are going to have a worse Valentine’s Day than Internet Explorer. Microsoft is officially cutting ties with the iconic web relic for good tomorrow. Per a prior official company announcement, an Edge browser update will be issued on February 14 to permanently disable the browser and bring all PCs into the newer Edge fold. Interestingly, Internet Explorer’s desktop icons will remain as is for the time being. As Betanews notes, this is likely a way to ease Internet…