Enterprise cryptocurrency company Ripple has announced $200 million in investment funding, which brings the total value of the blockchain technology company to $10 billion, according to reports.

The seven-year-old, San Francisco-based company created the XRP cryptocurrency, the Ripple payment protocol and the RippleNet exchange network in order to disintermediate cross-border financial transactions for financial services businesses.

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Tech Events

Following its WWDC 2019 reveal, Apple shipped macOS Catalina in the early fall. Most Mac users have already taken a look at its most discussed improvements, but have you come across these?

One everyone knew

I guess most Mac users are aware of the tweaked windowing controls. Hover your cursor over the green button in the application window and you can open the app up in Full Screen, Tile Left and Tile Right views, or exit if you are already in those views.

If you are using an iPad with the same Apple ID on the same network, you can also enable Sidecar view here.

Light mode, Dark mode, Auto

You have been able to choose between Dark and Light mode in System Preferences > General > Appearance ever since Mojave. Catalina adds one more thing — an Auto button that will adjust which mode you are in depending on the time of day.

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[Disclosure: Intel is a client of the author.]

After a recent debrief on Intel’s 3D XPoint memory effort (aka Optane), I was again struck with the fact that this technology is selling well below potential. That’s sure to change as virtual providers of desktop and gaming platforms realize it’ll be critical to their efforts to remove latency, mostly in storage but also when a cloud customer or on-premise user needs to do the massive in-memory analysis of large data sets.

What got me thinking about this was when Dell EMC launched its DC D4800X product earlier this year and I saw the early reviews of Google’s new cloud gaming service Stadia, which has been getting bad reviews due to the unacceptable latency. This latency may be even more pronounced on competing services.

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Microsoft this week reworked its Windows 10 development model, severing links between features and specific releases so that it can deliver the former "when they are ready."

"While features in the active development branch may be slated for a future Windows 10 release, they are no longer matched to a specific Windows 10 release," Brandon LeBlanc, a senior program manager on the Windows Insider team, wrote in a Dec. 16 post to a company blog. "New features and OS improvements done in this branch during these development cycles will show up in future Windows 10 releases when they are ready."

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DBA pilot fish gets a message one Monday morning that the Puerto Rico database is ready to be set up. To which he responds, “Puerto Rico database?” Yes, he’s told, we need a database in Puerto Rico to handle our Spanish-speaking customers. We put together the server on Friday and flew it down, and now you need to set it up. It’s urgent, urgent, urgent!

So urgent that no one bothered to inform fish until now.

But he sets to work and quickly has everything configured. When he starts to build the materialized views, though, he’s hit with communication errors, repeatedly. He contacts the network people: What’s going on with the network? They reply: The network is fine. Fish provides documentation that the network is not fine. Networking continues to look for the problem.

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I’m on record as saying that, like it or not, the future of the desktop is in the cloud. Or, at least, that’s my take on Microsoft’s move to Windows Virtual Desktop. But what will that really look like? Let me deal out my tarot cards and tell you what I find.

The desktop-as-a-service (DaaS) model really is coming. Heck, it’s already here. Google’s Chromebooks own the education vertical. Sorry, Apple; you had your shot and you lost. I’ve also been noticing more and more Chromebooks with business-only features such as full-sized numeric keypads. Among those are the latest HP Chromebook 15 and the Acer Chromebook 715. These are meant for accountants using QuickBooks online, not kids working on their homework.

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It seems like there’s a new data breach every month, and as hackers ramp up their efforts to steal our private info, it’s only natural to feel afraid. What can you do to fight back? Oddly enough, the best way to prevent cybersecurity attacks is by fighting fire with fire. As an ethical hacker, you can make a living by exploiting cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and this $39 bundle will show you how.

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Remember the hype about the Win10 version 1909 upgrade — how this fall's Win10 1903 update would contain all of the 1909 features, lacking only the flip of a light switch to turn them on? Here’s how Microsoft puts it:

Windows 10, versions 1903 and 1909 share a common core operating system with an identical set of system files. Therefore, the new features in Windows 10, version 1909 were included in the latest monthly quality update for Windows 10, version 1903 (released October 8, 2019), but are in an inactive and dormant state. These new features will remain dormant until they are turned on through the “enablement package,” a small, quick-to-install “master switch” that activates the Windows 10, version 1909 features.

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Ah, the holidays. No matter what style of winter celebration you prefer (I'm a Festivus man myself), late December is a fine time for kicking back and regrouping for the coming year.

That means it's also a fine time for contemplating that crazy little computer in your pocket and what steps you can take to make it even more powerful — because guess what? A few minutes of tuning up now will make your life infinitely easier throughout all of 2019. Think of it as a gift to yourself — one that keeps on giving and, best of all, doesn't cost you a single dime.

In case you missed any of 'em the first go-round or maybe just didn't have the time to try everything out, here are some of my favorite productivity-boosting Android tips from 2019. Pour yourself some cocoa, polish up the ol' Festivus pole, and give yourself the gift of finely tuned technology.

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Back around the turn of the millennium, this university’s computer department upgrades several computer labs, working with the Facilities people to get things done right, according to a pilot fish on the scene.

“They put in raised floors in the all the labs and even the halls, to run cables effortlessly and make future changes,” says fish. “And several whole-room UPSes, one for each student lab, and a line conditioner. Even the air-conditioning units were sized correctly and had future capacity. It seemed a dream come true — until the first week of class."

Almost immediately, students using one of the labs discover that their floppy disks are being scrambled or wiped. No one can figure out why, and since no one wants to lose his work, the lab is a virtual ghost town a month into the semester.

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The key to productivity is structure, but many organizations use fragmented systems to reach people. Their donor list may be in one database while their volunteer list is on a separate Google Doc. This wastes too much time that could be spent engaging your audience. If your nonprofit, political campaign, or advocacy group is looking for a holistic solution that puts people at the center, look no further than Nationbuilder. 

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Apple says iOS 13 is now installed on more than half of the world’s active iPhones. I’ve been exploring the latest version of iOS since it was announced at WWDC 2019 and curated a collection of some of the tips I’ve found since then.

These should help you be more productive and efficient while on the go.

The new Undo

One of the most welcome improvements in iOS 13 is the transformed Undo/Redo function:

Undo: Swipe right with three fingers on the screen.

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Late last week, I talked about a discrepancy in Microsoft’s promised handling of Microsoft Security Essentials as Windows 7 reaches end of support. An internally inconsistent official announcement seemed to say that MSE signature file updates would stop — even for those who have paid for Extended Security Updates. 

Which is absurd. Why would Microsoft stop updating its antivirus program even for people who are paying to continue receiving Monthly Rollup patches?

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There is nothing more quintessentially mobile than text messages, the most commonly used communication method today. That's why it was very unsettling that a security research house found — and the vendor at issue essentially confirmed — that a massive number of text messages were stored in plaintext, with no security at all. In short, the texts from what the security research firm estimated were "hundreds of millions of people" were open to any thief or stalker who wanted to look.

The company involved, an Austin-based business called TrueDialog, would likely be unknown to almost all of those users. TrueDialog is a marketing firm offering SMS products and services to other companies — a lot of companies. That will make it hard for consumers to even know if their texts were victimized. Text message users were able to text back, giving the impression of having two-way conversations with businesses.

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Atlassian has created a new development platform, Forge, to simplify creation of third-party apps  that connect to its suite of productivity tools.

The Australian firm offers a variety of project management and collaboration apps, including Jira Software, Confluence, Trello and Bitbucket. It also claims to have one of the biggest developer ecosystems among software-as-a-service vendors: the Atlassian Marketplace has more than 4,000 apps and accounts for more than $1 billion in total sales since its launch in 2012; thousands more apps have been created by in-house developers for internal use at customer organizations. 

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It’s after hours at a surgery center, and pilot fish who has been working on the computers, decides to wander through the back passageways and learn the layout.

Passing through a set of double doors, fish finds himself in a hallway with bathrooms and storage. The doors at the far end lead toward the front, so he heads that way — but they're locked. And you need a code to open them. Fish heads back to the doors he came in by — locked as well. Another door leads to the outside, but it’s really cold out, and fish would have to walk all the way around a big building with no jacket.

So he calls the office manager's cell phone: Hey, man, I appear to have locked myself in a hallway ...

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Microsoft has revived a practice from the heydays of Internet Explorer (IE), releasing tools to block the new all-Chromium Edge from automatically reaching Windows 10 PCs starting next month.

When deployed and run, the Blocker Toolkit will retain the original Edge, the one built with Microsoft's homegrown rendering and JavaScript engines and bundled with Windows 10 since its mid-2015 debut. Its tools, like other such kits before it, included a very small executable to run locally, as well as an administrative template that IT admins can use to broadly block original-Edge through Group Policy settings.

Microsoft issued similar toolkits for IE7, IE8, IE9, IE10 and IE11 prior to the public release of those browsers, usually as a sop to business customers who don't want to disrupt workflows with a new application they has not yet tested. The toolkits became progressively more important because Microsoft accelerated the IE development and release tempo and changed how it distributed the browser.

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Ladies, gentlemen, aardvarks, and everything in between: Hell has frozen over. Or so it would seem this wacky winter.

Much of the Android-watchin' community's in a tizzy this week over word that Samsung — better known 'round these parts as the company that's never truly cared about timely Android upgrades — has actually managed to get the latest Android release onto some of its U.S. flagships within the same year of the software's launch.

It be true, all right: Multiple reports indicate Android 10 is indeed in the midst of rolling out to Galaxy S10 owners on Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint as we speak. And compared to Samsung's typical slow-as-molasses software delivery habit, well, that's quite the feat.

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Enterprise technology continues to evolve at an incredibly rapid rate, with emerging technologies creating a business environment of constant change. What challenges should Apple-using enterprises think about in 2020?

Prepare for 5G

Apple is expected to introduce 5G devices in 2020. Meanwhile 5G networks are being put in place so that when the iPhone 5G does appear, it will have a network to run on.

We’re in the early days of this deployment, but it’s likely your enterprise is already looking at how the latest network standard can support work. Smart cities, smart factories, IoT deployments, smart homes and an array of high-bandwidth consumer and enterprise service developments loom.

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In four weeks, Microsoft will push Windows 7 down a flight of stairs, proving that it thinks the decade-old OS has outlived its purpose and must give way to a sleeker, shinier, newer Windows 10, which, by the way, will live forever.

How humiliating for Windows 7, the OS that once powered 1 billion-plus PCs.

Microsoft has made exceptions, as it often does, for its most valued customers. Enterprises can fork over fees for what Microsoft has tapped as "Extended Security Updates," or ESU; in exchange they'll receive patches that repair critical and important vulnerabilities. The ESU program will run for three years, starting in January, in one-year increments. A company that paid for the first year would receive updates through January 2021, at which time it would decide whether to continue another year - for double the price of the previous period - or drop out.

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This small software company does almost all its customer support through email, reports a pilot fish there.

“For the first two years I was there, all support email was handled via Outlook,” fish says. “However, we started to grow, and using Outlook became impractical; people started double-answering the same message.”

So company invests in a new support ticketing system that will allow better tracking of tickets and who is assigned to what.

The company’s lead support tech tests the new system for several weeks, and everything appears to be working fine. The rest of the techs are trained. The system is announced to customers as a big step forward in support. As a last step before launch, the support people create signatures to attach to all their outgoing messages to customers.

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Microsoft never sleeps. Even before the Windows 10 November 2019 Update (version 1909) started to roll out, the company began working on upcoming feature updates to Windows 10. As it did with version 1909, Microsoft has been releasing a series of public preview builds to members of Microsoft's Windows Insider Program.

After years of using “Redstone” in its code names for upcoming releases, Microsoft switched to a new format with version 1903, released in May 2019. The code names now use a YYH1/YYH2 format, with the YY standing for the last two numbers of the year and H1 or H2 referring to the first or second half of the year. So Windows 10 version 1909, which was released in November 2019, was code-named “19H2” (for second half of 2019). The next feature update, due in the spring of 2020, is code-named 20H1.

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These are the stories that defined Apple in 2019.

Apple delivered a product blitz

Apple CEO Tim Cook kept his commitment to “major launches” across the year, including hardware, software and services. 2019 saw the company introduce (or upgrade):

The iPhone 11, Apple Watch Series 5 (and ECG app), Apple Card, AirPods, AirPods Pro, the seventh-generation iPad, iPad Air, iPad mini, Mac Pro, Pro Display XDR, 16-inch MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac, Research app, Apple TV+, Apple News+, Apple Arcade, macOS Catalina, iOS 13, iPad OS, tvOS 13, watchOS 6, Final Cut Pro X, Logic Pro X, iPod touch, Siri Shortcuts.

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Working at a research facility affiliated with a U.S. government hospital, this pilot fish becomes acquainted with ICD-9 codes for the statistical classification of diseases.

But it bothers him that the codes allow for reporting an issue but not for reporting resolution: There’s a code for having high blood pressure, but none for returning to normal, and there’s a code for a broken right wrist, but none to indicate that it has healed.

So in a review meeting with the researchers, fish asks about their assumptions: “Since there is no ICD-9 for ‘no longer has high blood pressure,’ how do we differentiate the two conditions, just-not-taking-medicine and no-longer-needs-medicine?”

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Chrome dominated the browser market throughout 2019, starting the year by generating more than two-thirds of global browser activity and ending November at almost exactly the same place.

Rivals like Mozilla's Firefox fight over a diminishing dish of scraps while Microsoft simply surrendered to the search giant by adopting Google's Chromium technology to power Edge.

What's true for consumers also holds for the corporate world: Chrome rules. So when Chrome makes changes, everyone pays attention, whether the latest are in the most recent browser upgrade - which Computerworld tracks in the What's in the latest Chrome update? series - or are slated to show up in the next version, or the one after that.

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