Windows 8 users running Skype will now have the option to exert greater control over who can contact them, thanks to a new software update. Version 1.6 of Skype, tipped by the company in a blog post on Friday, brings the ability to block contacts. The update also includes a number of performance enhancements for the audio and video chatting software.

Users can now swipe at the top or bottom of their screens to bring up a command bar relating to a particular contact's name. They can then select "block" in order to cease receiving contacts from that user. Users also have the option to label a contact request as spam or to remove a contact entirely.

In addition to contact blocking, version 1.6 fixes an issue that saw outgoing video sometimes not displayed after switching the camera. Another issue, in which Skype would display the wrong call error message when a call failed, has also been fixed.

In May 2012, LinkedIn acquired document presentation startup SlideShare. Since that time, the company has been integrating itself into LinkedIn’s carefully managed (and profitable) corporate culture.

Today, SlideShare announced a very LinkedIn-style feature for its service. The new feature, called “Send Tracker,” is an analytics tool that will allow users to gather metrics on how people use Slide Share presentations. For example, the software could report back on who viewed a presentation and how much time they spent on each slide. It can also send alerts when people click through emails or view SlideShare content.

The feature is geared toward marketers and salespeople, so that they can observe potential customers and focus their time on prospects who engaged well with a presentation. It’s a free feature for subscribers to SlideShare’s premium “SlideShare Pro” service.

As expected, SlideShare has prepared a slideshow that covers the highlights of the new feature. The SlideShare presentation is embedded below, and it probably uses Send Tracker analytics to send data back to SlideShare.

Marin Software has released a new report looking at mobile search advertising around the world. The report cites data from Cowen and Company about Google’s estimated mobile revenues, which indicates that Google will make as much as $20 billion in mobile revenue in 2016.
“According to a research report from Cowen, Google earned $2.5 Billion in mobile rev- enue in 2011,” says the report. “And by 2016, it’s estimated that mobile could drive $20 Billion in revenue for the search giant. The exponential growth in mobile advertising largely tracks consumer adoption trends. Smartphones now have a greater than 50% penetration in the US mobile phone market. And mobile advertising isn’t just limited to phones. In fact, sales of mobile devices (phones and tablets) running Google Android are expected to have eclipsed ‘PC’ sales in 2012. And consumers worldwide have already bought more than a billion iOS and Android devices.”

“The emerging world of the mobile-enabled consumer is quite different from the pre- smartphone world,” it continues. “In this new reality, the walls between online and offline commerce are crumbling. Case in point: today’s consumers routinely check product reviews and compare prices online while they’re in a brick and mortar store.”

This is why Google launched the controversial Enhanced Campaigns model for AdWords last week.

You can find Marin’s full report here.

The Linux Foundation Secure Boot System solves a fundamental problem for many Linux distributions, by providing a way for a Linux-based OS to run on new hardware controlled by UEFI firmware, also known as “secure boot” technology.

Linux Foundation technical advisory board member James Bottomley led the development of the bootloader.

As a potential replacement to the long-used BIOS firmware, UEFI is an industry initiative to secure computers against malware by designing the computer’s firmware to require a trusted key before booting the operating system, or any hardware inside the computer, such as a graphics card. UEFI would provide a foundation for a chain of trust that would connect all the way up to the software layer, which could thwart attempts to install illicit, and harmful, software on computers.

Microsoft is requiring UEFI on all machines running Windows 8. While OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) have the option of providing a way to turn off UEFI so other operating systems can run on the machine, many in the Linux community fear that OEMs will not provide a UEFI off-switch, thereby not allowing other OSes without a key to run on these machines. A generic Linux distribution will not run on a Windows 8 computer without keys.

The latest releases of many major Linux distributions now include a bootloader or a shim of some sort to work with UEFI, including Ubuntu 12.10 and Fedora 18. This UEFI requirement, however, has been seen as a roadblock for those who like to create their own distributions of Linux. The Linux Foundation bootloader provides a hash code, certified by Microsoft, and support infrastructure to boot a generic Linux kernel.

This is not the first approach someone in the Linux camp has devised for working with UEFI. Security developer Matthew Garrett released his own shim last year. A shim is different from a bootloader in that in that it does not require a signed key from a third party, though this approach is more unwieldy to manage. Garrett and Bottomley are discussing merging Garrett’s shim with the Linux Foundation’s bootloader.

UEFI has proved to be a challenge to implement even for Microsoft Windows. Garrett also reported that certain Samsung laptops running Windows 8 could permanently stop working due to a bug in how the Samsung firmware stores system crash data in the UEFI storage space.

On February 1, Oracle pulled the trigger early on the February release, which had originally been scheduled for February 19, due to a serious vulnerability that affected Java at the browser level.

As a result of the sped-up release, Oracle didn’t manage to include a “small number” of fixes that had been planned for inclusion, according to the blog.
Critical patch releases for Java SE are cumulative in nature, meaning that any user who didn’t apply the group released on February 1 will get everything at once in the February 19 batch, according to the post.

The patch set released on February 1 contained 50 fixes, including 44 for vulnerabilities at the browser level. It wasn’t clear on Friday how many more will be added to the set later this month.
Oracle has come under fire lately over Java, not only regarding vulnerabilities but also the fact that Java updates include third-party software, or as some critics call it, “crapware,” such as the Ask.com toolbar.

An online petition asking Oracle to stop the practice had garnered more than 10,000 signatures as of Friday.

Users can opt out of installing the software, however.

Oracle’s head of Java security also recently made a public pledge that Oracle will “fix” Java as well as be more open and regular with its communications around the language.

If you were just cruising around the web today and got hit smack in the face with a Google Chrome malware error, you weren't the only one. A whole number of sites from such as imgur, DeviantArt, The San Francisco Chronicle, and YouTube were blocked for many users citing malware from us.bernerverein.ch.



Reports started bubbling up on Twitter this afternoon,and list a whole slew of websites that appear to be affected. The cause of the alerts is unknown, as is where the malware came from and what it's trying to do, provided it is more than some sort of false positive. If there is something truly sketch afoot, chances are it wormed its way in through ad networks. It'll probably be cleaned up soon, but in the meantime it's probably wise to steer clear if "infected" sites if you can. [The Verge]

Google Drive launched last year, and it's had no trouble making headway against competitors like SkyDrive, Dropbox and iCloud.

And though third-party apps that interact with Google Drive have long been buried, Google announced Friday that changes have been made to remedy that.

Google's Nicolas Garnier, developer advocate focusing on Google Drive and Web APIs, wrote in a Google Developers blog post that over 100 different third-party apps feature deep Google Drive integration, and now those same apps will be easier to discover and access.

Google added space to the "create" menu for third-party apps to sit alongside Google apps like Docs and Sheets, plus a "Connect to Drive" app browser to search for Drive-enabled web apps without having to leave Drive at all.
Creative improvements

Clicking on the create button now reveals whatever third-party web apps you've connected with your personal Google Drive alongside the standard first-party Google apps.

"This makes your Drive-connected apps easier to reach and more visible to Google Drive users," Garnier wrote, addressing developers of apps that use Google Drive.

Within the create menu, clicking "connect more apps" allows you to browse Google Drive-connected apps from directly within Drive, negating the need to visit the Chrome Web Store.

Google app developers whose apps are already compatible with Drive and listed in the Chrome Web Store's Drive section don't have to do anything extra for their apps to be integrated thus - Google is doing it automatically.

Garnier recommended Google app developers who aren't yet integrating with Drive check out thesesteps to learn how to do so.