What's New

Privacy-first search engine DuckDuckGo's year was productive in 2020. The search engine managed to increase daily search queries significantly in 2020 and 2021 is already looking to become another record year as the search engine broke the 100 million search queries mark on a single day for the first time on January 11, 2021.

Google Images Restored is an extension for Chromium-based and Firefox-based web browsers that restores the classic Google Images web interface and its functionality.

While we wait for Microsoft to deliver a modern Windows Explorer, an alternative app is already available on the official store and on GitHub. The program is called Files, and is an open source application.

Google introduced support for partitioning the cache of the company's Chrome web browser when it launched Chrome 86 earlier this year. The feature changes how web browsers cache content. Previously, web browsers like Chrome used a single cache to store content. One benefit of this approach is that all sites may make use of a cached resource, say a web font or image to speed up the loading of a page or application.

Use of a single cache opened up the door for attacks as sites could check for the existence of cached entries for use in tracking and other attacks.

Google released updates for the company's YouTube application for Android and Apple's iOS operating system recently. One of the changes of the update moved the autoplay toggle; it is now displayed in the media player.

YouTube users who use the web version, e.g. on a desktop operating system such as Windows, will get the same change. Google is rolling it out currently to all users who access YouTube on the web.

Most users should see a prompt the next time they play a video on the site stating "looking for autoplay? Choose whether videos automatically play next".

Mozilla plans to release a minor update for the organization's Firefox web browser later today. Firefox 84.0.1 is a bug fix release that addresses crashes, performance and loading issues.

The new version of Firefox is pushed via the browser's automatic updating system to all devices that have it enabled. Users may check the installed version in the browser by selecting Menu > Help > About Firefox. Doing so will run a check for updates to download available ones to the local system.

Do you work with a lot of documents, but struggle at times to find the ones you need? Documan is a freeware tool that can be used to categorize your files, and access them quickly. The program is user-friendly, and you can get started with it in just a couple of minutes.

Microsoft's newest version of Windows 10, Windows 10 20H2, appears to have a bug that may damage the file system of the Windows partition and cause blue screens during reboots.  Reports suggest that running ChkDsk on these devices may damage the file system and cause blue screens on the first reboot of the system after the check disk operation completes.

Windows 10 has two ways that you can use to change the mouse options. The modern method is available from the Settings app > Devices > Mouse, but as is the case with these modernized preferences, they usually lack functionality and are mainly useful for basic changes.

Windows 10 version 1903 will reach end of support next month on December 8, 2020 for all supported editions of the operating system. The version of Windows 10 was released on May 21, 2019 and Microsoft has released three newer versions of Windows 10 since that date.

End of support means that Microsoft won't release security updates anymore for the version of Windows 10. Systems that are not updated may be vulnerable to security issues discovered after support for the version of Windows ends.

When Microsoft unveiled the Chromium-based Edge browser some time ago, it surprised many by revealing that the browser would not be Windows 10 exclusive.

Many Windows users use the built-in web browser of the operating system to download other browsers to their system. First it was Internet Explorer, then the classic Edge, and now the new Edge that has been used for that purpose. Microsoft is still in the process of pushing its new Edge browser to Windows systems, and many systems, for instance Windows 10 systems right after installation, still come without the new version of Edge.

Are you bored with your desktop background? Let's add some life to it.

AutoWall is a simple program that allows you to use animated GIFs and videos as your wallpaper.

The developers of the BitTorrent client qBittorrent have released a new stable version of the client for all supported operating systems. QBittorrent 4.3.0 is the first release since April 2020, and as such introduces many changes and fixes to the application.

Users who use the client already should see update notifications pop up in the client when they start it up. A click on Help > Check for Updates runs a manual update check so that the update can be installed on the system.

Microsoft released Office 2019 two years ago on September 24, 2018. The new version of Office was released exclusively for Windows 10 and Mac OS X and included a number of fundamental changes to previous versions of Office and Office 365 (now Microsoft 365).

Office 2019 was released as a standalone version that required a one-time payment and no subscription. Customers could use Office 2019 on devices without Internet connection, and Microsoft aligned the support period with that of Office 2016. Both products will run out of support in 2025.