Until now, Evernote's service options have been something of an all-or-nothing proposition: either you stick to the free, very limited tier for your notetaking or shell out $50 a year for the full Premium package. You won't have to pay quite so much after today, though. The company has introduced an in-between plan, Evernote Plus, that unlocks a few key features at a more reasonable $25 per year, or $3 per month. You can only upload 1GB per month, but you get access to offline notes on mobile devices, automatic email-to-note conversion and a passcode lock. It's enough to help you with some serious life organization or your schoolwork, and not much more. If you do need more, though, you'll be glad to hear that Premium now has unlimited uploads and larger note sizes. All told, you're more likely to pay only for the features you'll actually use.
Despite Apple's notorious love for secrecy, it famously lost a prototype device in the past (maybe even two), when one of its employees left it in a bar. Now, the company might have lost another: a 20-year-old man reported that a couple robbed his Cupertino home and took an iPad "test model" with them, along with $7,500, prescription drugs and more electronics. It's unclear at this point what exactly "test model" means, and if it's a prototype for an upcoming version or one for an earlier iteration. Either way, it hasn't been returned yet, even though the couple is already in custody.
According to Mercury News, the victim was kidnapped by the duo after answering the woman's advertisement (its nature wasn't revealed) and meeting them two blocks away. They all drove to the victim's house, where his guests pepper-sprayed him at knifepoint. While authorities refused to divulge more details about the tablet, we'll likely hear more about it in case it's an upcoming version. After all, Apple has already proven that it'll go to great lengths to retrieve and protect its unreleased devices.
Microsoft just demoed its 2-in-1 Continuum feature on a Windows 10 phone giving the mobile device the ability to become a really tiny desktop computer. Continuum adjusts the UI of Windows 10 on a device from desktop to tablet mode based on what's plugged into it. If you plug a keyboard and mouse into a tablet or phone, it goes into desktop mode. When those are unplugged, a pop-up asks if you want to enter tablet mode with touch input. Desktop mode includes the Start Menu and Taskbar you usually associate with a full size computer. For anyone that travels that would like to pare down the devices they pack, this is great. Corporate Vice President of the Operating Systems Group, Joe Belfiore did note that phones would need a hardware upgrade to fully implement the feature.
When Microsoft debuted its Windows Holographic Platform and HoloLens headset a few months back, Windows 10 apps were mentioned as a possibility. Well, at BUILD 2015 today, the folks in Redmond offered a look at Windows 10 universal apps in holographic action. During the on-stage demo, apps could be placed on walls or floated in space, and resized based on the user's needs -- something we'd only seen in videos up to this point. Of course, this means that users in different locations can collaborate on 3D models without having to be in the same room. Any Windows 10 app can be used as a hologram with the headset, so getting work done at a place other than your desk will soon be a possibility.
After months of waiting, Microsoft finally has a proper name for Windows 10's brand new web browser: forget Project Spartan, and meet Microsoft Edge. It still has the same flat, minimalist look you saw at the start of the year, as well as clever features like Cortana voice commands and annotation for websites. You'll also get a new tab page that shows both other websites as well as handy info like weather, and Microsoft is now making it easier for developers to port extensions from other browsers (such as Chrome). Yes, the folks in Redmond are largely using the Edge name to distance their latest browser from Internet Explorer's less than stellar reputation, but you have to admit that the new branding is decidedly catchier.
At today's Microsoft Build conference, vice president of operating systems, Terry Myerson announced that websites can now be placed inside a Windows 10 universal framework. In other words, developers can make a Windows 10 app out of their site. The site-based apps can be listed inside the Windows Store and support Cortana notifications and in-app purchases. Building these apps is pretty simple according to Myerson. Couple this with news that the company helping iOS and Android developers port their apps to Windows 10, and it's pretty clear Microsoft really wants you to start using the Windows Store.
One of the reasons some people didn't like Windows 8 was that it seemed to include two versions of Windows: Live Tiles and the desktop, with touch-friendly apps kept far away from traditional x86 programs. With WIndows 10, Microsoft seems to be trying hard to make the user experience feel less jarring, and now, it's taking things a step further with the Windows Store. Once home exclusively to touch-friendly, "Metro-style" apps, it will now house a mix of Win32 and .NET apps as well, along with server-hosted web applications. The result is that users will now have a one-stop show for all manner of Windows downloads. From a developer standpoint, meanwhile, all of these apps will be able to take advantage of the same Windows Store platform -- that means updates are delivered the same way, and developers can also enable in-app purchases, as they would in any other Windows Store download.
