Join Dr. Bill as he examines the wild and wacky world of the web, computers, and all things geeky! Hot Tech Tips, Tech News, and Geek Culture are examined… with plenty of good humor as well!
“The team is proud to announce the release of Linux Mint 18.3 ‘Sylvia’ Cinnamon Edition.
Linux Mint 18.3 is a long term support release which will be supported until 2021. It comes with updated software and brings refinements and many new features to make your desktop even more comfortable to use.
New features:
This new version of Linux Mint contains many improvements.
For an overview of the new features please visit:
‘What’s new in Linux Mint 18.3 Cinnamon’.
https://www.linuxmint.com/rel_sylvia_cinnamon_whatsnew.php
Important info:
The release notes provide important information about known issues, as well as explanations, workarounds and solutions.
To read the release notes, please visit:
‘Release Notes for Linux Mint 18.3 Cinnamon’
System requirements:
1GB RAM (2GB recommended for a comfortable usage).
15GB of disk space (20GB recommended).
1024×768 resolution (on lower resolutions, press ALT to drag windows with the mouse if they don’t fit in the screen).
Notes:
The 64-bit ISO can boot with BIOS or UEFI.
The 32-bit ISO can only boot with BIOS.
The 64-bit ISO is recommended for all modern computers (Almost all computers sold since 2007 are equipped with 64-bit processors).”
The Verge – By: Loren Grush – “On the southeast coast of Georgia, around 20 miles north of the Florida border, a few concrete slaps and a handful of roads lie on 4,000 acres of luscious green land. They are the remnants of a now-defunct manufacturing plant. The area hasn’t seen much action in 50 years, but soon, it could be teeming with activity again — as the site of future US rocket launches.
The new proposed commercial spaceport, the first one ever for Georgia, is known as Spaceport Camden. Local government officials have big plans for the area over the next few years: they hope to build a launchpad to support rocket launches to orbit, as well as a landing area that would allow rockets to touch down after takeoff. Built through partnerships with private companies, the area could become the first exclusively commercial spaceport on the East Coast; the others in Florida and Virginia are operated by or associated with federal agencies.
‘I THINK WE HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO BUILD THE FIRST EXCLUSIVE NON-FEDERAL RANGE ON THE EAST COAST.’
The county thinks the project could be a smart way for Georgia to enter the booming commercial spaceflight economy, which was valued at $329 billion in 2016, according to the Space Foundation, a nonprofit advocating for spaceflight. Spaceport Camden is strategically located on the coast, which would allow rockets to launch east over mostly open ocean, posing little risk to populated areas on land. So far, many commercial space companies have shown interest in the place, according to county officials. Once the site is up and running, it could also serve as a hub for business and tourism, as well as an educational outpost for local schools.
There’s still a long way to go before that happens, though. Camden County, which the spaceport is named after, is currently working to get the site licensed for launches by the Federal Aviation Administration. It’s a lengthy process that involves analyzing the property to see how the site will affect surrounding areas. But if Spaceport Camden is cleared, officials hope that major structures of the spaceport can be built as soon as possible. ‘I think we have the opportunity to build the first exclusive non-federal range on the East Coast,’ Steve Howard, the Camden County administrator and head of the Spaceport Camden initiative, tells The Verge.
Spaceport Camden already has a unique connection to spaceflight. The old plant that once sat on the site was actually used in the 1960s to build rocket engines that ran on solid propellant for NASA. In 1965, the most powerful rocket engine at the time was fired up during a test at the plant. NASA even considered the area as an alternative launch site for its Apollo missions to the Moon, according to documents declassified in 2005. Florida was ultimately chosen, and NASA also wound up relying on liquid fuel rocket engines instead, rendering the engine plant somewhat obsolete. So for the last half century, the site has been mostly dormant.
Then, a little less than five years ago, a space company reached out to the state of Georgia, looking for a new location to launch its rockets. (Howard wouldn’t say which company that was, but SpaceX considered Georgia for a new launch site between 2012 and 2014 before settling near Brownsville, Texas.) That initial meeting prompted Camden County officials to meet with other private spaceflight companies to gauge interest in a Georgia spaceport where the booster plant once lived. ‘When they visited they all came to the same conclusion: that it’s a great site,’ Howard says. ‘Obviously there was a reason why the site was chosen back in the ’60s.’
‘OBVIOUSLY THERE WAS A REASON WHY THE SITE WAS CHOSEN BACK IN THE ’60S.’
Along with its prime location on the coast, Spaceport Camden is pretty far south in the US, putting it relatively close to the equator. That makes it easier for companies that want to launch rockets into orbit from the US. The equator is the widest section of the planet, as well as the fastest spinning part of the Earth’s surface. That means launching closer to the equator actually gives rockets an extra boost of speed that helps them achieve orbit more easily.
Plus, Howard touts the site’s location between two well-established NASA spaceports along the East Coast: Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, and Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. ‘I think there is synergy opportunity there,’ says Howard. The spaceports could work together or share resources, he says.
For a while, the Spaceport Camden initiative was just a promising idea, but now the state of Georgia has shown it’s serious about the project. In May, Georgia governor Nathan Deal signed a bill called HB 1, or the Georgia Spaceflight Act. The bill helps to limit the liability of spaceflight companies that launch people into space from the state. HB 1 was a signal to the industry that Georgia welcomes commercial space.
Space startup Vector’s prototype rocket launching from Spaceport Camden in August. Photo: Vector
Since then, Spaceport Camden has even seen its first launch… sort of. In August, a spaceflight startup named Vector launched one of its test rockets from the site — though the vehicle didn’t reach orbit. The rocket, which Vector wants to use to launch small satellites someday, was only a prototype, originally meant to reach an altitude lower than 10,000 feet. Because of this, the launch didn’t require the same kind of licensing that the FAA demands for missions that achieve orbit. ‘Overall it was an A-plus experience,’ Jim Cantrell, CEO and co-founder of Vector, tells The Verge. ‘We hope they get approval for orbital launches soon so we can go back.’
CURRENTLY, 10 SITES THROUGHOUT THE US HOLD FAA LICENSES TO OPERATE AS COMMERCIAL SPACEPORTS
Currently, 10 sites throughout the US hold FAA licenses to operate as commercial spaceports. These sites have undergone environmental impact reports, to see how the spaceports might affect surrounding wildlife and property. Camden County is currently funding a third-party researcher to conduct that report, and the analysis has been ongoing for a couple of years. The process involves conducting numerous public hearings and scientific studies, but Howard is hopeful that report will be complete early next year.
Once that’s finished, Spaceport Camden can start to grow. Howard says the plan is to partner with commercial companies to get the various structures of the property built. These companies would lease parts of the property, similar to how SpaceX leases launchpads and a landing site at Cape Canaveral, and even build their own launchpads (and landing zones, if necessary) for their specific vehicles. Howard says he has a number of operators already interested, and he’s confident the county will be able to make substantive construction deals.
Aerospace technology is already Georgia’s biggest export, but a spaceport could help bring even more spaceflight business and educational opportunities to the area. A report done by space consulting firm Astralytical found that Spaceport Camden could be a great home for businesses that not only launch from the site, but also design their vehicles there. ‘Launch is only one small component of the entire space industry,’ Laura Forczyk, the owner of Astralytical, tells The Verge. ‘When you’re looking at the future growth of a spaceport, you look at the whole process — from research and development, to design of spacecraft, to launching… The whole process could happen from start to finish within Spaceport Camden.’
Forcyzk’s report also shows how the site could be a great place for tourists, as well as educators and students. Of course, the report is meant to be more of an aspirational look at how the area could evolve over time. But ultimately, Howard is eager for big things to happen on what is effectively a blank slate right now. ‘We think it’s a smart project to be able to turn this stranded asset back into something amazing with a historical space connection,’ he says. ‘We just think it’s a great opportunity to do something really amazing.'”
c|net – By: Lindsey Turrentine – “Call 2017 the year no one invited tablets to the holiday party.
It’s a holiday tradition: Every year, we ask thousands of CNET readers about what you want to receive, how you’ll be shopping and for what. This year, 1,825 Americans took the CNET Holiday Shopping Survey during the second week of September, and guess what? You’re radically changing what you’re shopping for and how.
This is the first year since 2013 that survey respondents put tablets behind smartphones on your wish lists. Tablets are still popular — 32 percent of you want them — but this year, 35 percent of you want a phone. Next on your lists were wireless headphones, also at 32 percent, and smart home tech at 31 percent. Millennials have a stronger preference for cord-free tech and don’t care much about tablets at all. Forty-three percent want smartphones, just ahead of wireless headphones at 41 percent and smartwatches at 33 percent.
39 percent of you would choose world peace over your most-wanted tech gift.
To conduct the survey, we asked a wide variety of questions between Sept. 5 and Sept. 11, 2017 on CNET.com. When we crunched the numbers, we looked at overall responses and then pulled out answers from US millennials, an interesting group because each year they earn more money, and as the largest American generation ages, the way they shop changes.
You’ll spoil yourselves…
This year, the majority of you (62 percent) will buy yourselves gifts, most of you citing good deals and sales. And if you’re a millennial, 68 percent of you plan to buy yourself something this year.
But you’re not selfish. Given the choice, 39 percent of our respondents would choose world peace over their most-wanted tech gift, and 28 percent would choose universal healthcare. (Still, one in five survey takers admitted you’d would rather take the tech.) And if you’re younger? You’re less likely to spend the holidays online. Twenty-seven percent of respondents are looking forward to less screen time over the holidays, but a whopping 42 percent of millennial CNET holiday shoppers want to spend less time online.
‘Tis the year to give audio and subscriptions
This year’s typical shopping list looks different from a typical wish list, and that makes sense. People plan to give tech gifts that are less expensive and typically help upgrade a loved one’s life. Headphones are most popular, possibly because so many new wireless models have entered the market this year. Twenty-two percent of you plan to give them as gifts, followed by tablets (21 percent), wearable fitness devices like Fitbits (18 percent), smart home tech (18 percent) and phones (also 18 percent).
Quite possibly the most interesting difference between millennial shoppers and the larger population is how willing millennials are to gift subscriptions. Overall, 31 percent plan to give subscriptions to a service this year (Amazon Prime subscriptions count for 49 percent of these gifts), but 37 percent of millennials intend to give them.
You’re planning on a long shopping season
This year, you’re treating the most famous shopping days as starting points but not as your last shopping stop. Nine in 10 of you (and 95 percent of millennials) plan to at least browse deals on Cyber Monday, and 74 percent plan to purchase at least one gift then, but only 28 percent plan to do most gift shopping on Cyber Monday. Many of you (77 percent) told us you planned to use the days between Black Friday and Cyber Monday to study up on prices and discounts.
Because Christmas falls on a Monday this year, many of you may be planning to string along the season once you know exactly how much deals should cost. Nearly one-third of millennials plan to take longer to buy gifts this year, but the millennial love of Black Friday surprised us. While only 69 percent of overall survey takers planned to browse then, 79 percent of millennials chose Black Friday to research deals.
When you buy, you buy online
Gone are the days of long store lines and while most of you shop online, you’re still more comfortable buying on computers than on phones. Nearly 70 percent of CNET holiday shoppers plan to purchase most of their holiday gifts online, but while 57 percent of you will research gifts on your phone (and 76 percent of millennials), 77 percent of you, regardless of age, plan to pay for those gifts using a desktop.
With the shopping season well underway, there are just a few weeks left to see which of these shopping trends bear out and whether retailers — and electronics manufacturers — benefit from the near-total shift to online shopping. If you’re not ready to shop on Cyber Monday, use the day to research the lowest prices, then keep an eye out for online deals during the month of December.”
“CloudBerry Backup 5.8 focuses on security, disk storage optimization, and a few other important features highlighted below.
Ransomware Protection
Ransomware has been a growing problem for businesses this past year. Ransomware attacks disrupt normal business continuity by encrypting important business documents and demanding ransom to recover the data. Businesses recover by paying the ransom or manually restoring their backups. To help protect customer backups, we implemented ransomware protection functionality in CloudBerry Backup 5.8.
The new feature is designed to protect a customer’s existing, good backups, from being overwritten by encrypted ones because of a ransomware attack. CloudBerry now detects encryption changes in files and prevents existing backups from being overwritten. Admins are notified and can approve the encryption changes, if legitimate and also know their backups are protected if ransomware was the cause. You can read more about this new feature in this blog post.
Support for Changed Block Tracking (CBT) in VMware ESXi
VMware’s Changed Block Tracking (CBT) automatically tracks virtual disk modifications. CloudBerry Backup support for CBT allows us to use this information to more quickly perform an incremental backup of your virtual machines. Click here to learn how to enable the feature in CloudBerry Backup 5.8.
Disk Capacity Tool
The Disk Capacity Tool allows you to visualize your local disks by displaying a breakdown of folders and folder sizes. This allows customers to easily understand the sizes of folders and how they affect total backup storage. Read our blog post that dives deeper into this new dashboard.
Increased Amazon EC2 & Microsoft Azure disk restore limits
Amazon and Microsoft recently increased maximum disk volume sizes for their virtual machines. CloudBerry Backup 5.8 includes support for these larger disks on both EC2 and Azure.
The new disk volume limits for EC2 and Azure virtual machines have both changed as follows:
2 Terabytes for MBR-partitioned disks
4 Terabytes for GPT-partitioned disks
Read more about these recent Amazon EC2 and Microsoft Azure changes in the blog post.”
ZDNet – By: Charlie Osborne – “Cyber Monday 2017 has become the largest online sales day in history with a projected $6.59 billion spent by consumers, according to Adobe.
According to Adobe’s 2017 online shopping data, Cyber Monday this year managed to smash through last year’s projected sales as consumers parted with an estimated $6.59 billion, a 16.8 percent year-over-year increase.
The company’s forecast suggests that shoppers spent over one billion more than in 2016 during the sales event.
In comparison, Black Friday and Thanksgiving Day brought in $5.03 billion and $2.87 billion in revenue respectively, according to Adobe, which predicts this will be the first shopping season in history to break the $100 billion barrier.
Adobe has based its predictions on web traffic to retail sites, specifically, an analysis of one trillion visits to over 4,500 retail sites and 55 million stock keeping units (SKUs).
These increased by 11.9 percent on Monday, far beyond the season average of 5.7 percent. Mobile traffic also surged, representing 47.4 percent of overall visits — 39.9 percent on smartphones, and 7.6 percent conducted through tablets — and accounted for roughly 33.1 percent of retailer revenue this Cyber Monday.
Smartphone-based revenue is estimated to have reached $1.59 billion, a growth of 39.2 percent year-on-year.
Apple iOS users placed average order values of $123, while Android users spent a little less on average, coming in at $110 for each purchase.
Adobe estimates that the largest price drops on Cyber Monday were for toys with an average discount of 18.8 percent, followed by television sets at 21.1 percent and computers at 14.7 percent. Among the most popular purchases this year in technology was the Google Chromecast, iPads, Samsung tablets, the Nintendo Switch, and Microsoft Xbox One X.
‘Shopping and buying on smartphones is becoming the new norm and can be attributed to continued optimizations in the retail experience on mobile devices and platforms,’ said Mickey Mericle, vice president, Marketing, and Customer Insights at Adobe. ‘Consumers are also becoming more savvy and efficient online shoppers.’
‘People increasingly know where to find the best deals and what they want to purchase, which results in less price matching behavior typically done on desktops,’ the executive added. ‘Millennials were likely another reason for the dramatic growth in mobile, with 75 percent expecting to shop via their smartphone.’
Adobe added that the season for sales isn’t over, with the next 13 days projected to rake in an additional two billion in online sales.”
ZDNet – By: By Danny Palmer – “Hackers are using a recently disclosed Microsoft Office vulnerability to distribute backdoor malware capable of controlling an infected system, providing attackers with the ability to extract files, execute commands and more.
Cobalt malware has such potent capabilities because it uses a well known and legitimate penetration testing tool, Cobalt Strike — a form of software for Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations, which can be used to access covert channels in a system.
What helps the campaign to be even more potent is the use of a Microsoft Word exploit that has been active for 17 years, but was only disclosed and patched earlier this month.
The CVE-2017-11882 exploit is a remote code execution vulnerability, which exists in Microsoft Office software as a result of the way the software handles certain objects in the memory.
Attackers can exploit this flaw to run arbitrary code, which if the user has admin rights, allows the hacker to issue commands or deliver malicious software that can take control of the system.
While the vulnerability was only disclosed weeks ago, researchers at Fortinet have found that attackers have been quick to take advantage of it, in the hope of distributing malware before users have installed the relevant security update.
The particular campaign targets Russian speakers with a spam email claiming to be a notification from Visa about rule changes for the payWave service.
The message contains a password-protected RTF document, which the user is provided with the credentials to unlock. This RTF file contains the malicious code, but the password protection helps to hide it from detection.
Once opened, the user is presented with an almost blank document, save for the words ‘Enable Editing’. However, as with many malware campaigns, the strange nature of this document serves as cover for its real intention, which in this case is running a PowerShell script to download Cobalt Strike and take control of the victim’s system.
Once installed, the attackers can control the victim’s system and move across the network with Cobalt Strike commands.
‘Threat actors are always on the lookout for vulnerabilities to exploit and use them for malware campaigns like this. This goes both for new and old vulnerabilities, whether they have been published or not. We frequently see malware campaigns that exploit vulnerabilities that have been patched for months or even years,’ wrote Fortinet researchers Jasper Manual and Joie Salvio
‘This may have come from an assumption that there are still a significant number of users out there that don’t take software updates seriously, which sadly, is far too often the case,’ they added.
Microsoft Office users can download the critical update which protects them from the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability here — while those who’ve installed the update are already immune to this particular attack.
The malware effectively gives attackers control of an entire infected system.”
ZDNet – By: Chris Duckett – “Firefox 57 is set to bring the biggest shake-up that Mozilla’s browser ecosystem has seen in quite some time, and the simple reason is that a huge number of extensions and add-ons are set to stop working.
Appearing on November 14, Firefox Quantum brings together a number of long-running programs to speed up the browser — including using its C++ alternative language Rust and multi-process functionality — but it comes at the cost of Firefox’s best feature, its extensibility.
This is far from a surprise, with the switch from XUL to WebExtensions first signalled in mid-2015, but it is a hard break with the past.
Many popular extensions have already been ported to the new framework, but due to extra restrictions imposed by WebExtensions, some existing add-ons are simply unable to do what they once did.
For those still using Firefox 56 and earlier who would like to know what they are going to lose when they upgrade to 57, you are able to see what will disappear thanks to the Add-on Compatibility Reporter.
Sometimes your favourite add-ons are not long for this world.
After installing the add-on, head over to the about:addons page in your browser, and any extensions with a bright yellow Legacy label are sitting on death row.
Ironically, the Add-on Compatibility Reporter is among the extensions that will stop working when Firefox is updated to Quantum.
How to deal with add-ons that will not work is something each user will need to investigate, but Mozilla has said most users should not be impacted by the shift to Quantum.
For users who absolutely have to keep using a XUL-based extension, it is possible that using a fork of Firefox dubbed Pale Moon could work, or switching to Firefox’s extended support release will get another 11 months on Firefox 52, or sitting on Firefox 56 for as long as is needed.
The Verge – By: Dani Deahl – “Update November 14th, 11:06AM ET: This article was updated to include a statement from Amazon denying the claims.
Amazon is reportedly working on a free, ad-supported version of its Prime video streaming service, according to sources that spoke with AdAge. Currently, Prime members pay $99 to access a variety of video streaming content, which is usually ad-free.
This alternate version described by AdAge would be available to non-Prime members and would be supported by the advertisers. AdAge says Amazon may also share audience information and ad revenue in order to bolster its initial efforts with the project. One unnamed executive told AdAge that ‘Amazon is talking about giving content creators their own channels, and sharing ad revenue in exchange for a set number of hours of content each week.’
People have been migrating away from traditional TV and toward subscription-based services like Netflix, in part because these platforms offer ad-free experiences. This version of ad-supported streaming will certainly be attractive to advertisers and content creators, but the question is whether consumers will bite on watching shows interrupted with commercial breaks, even if they’re free.
A ‘freemium model’ could be beneficial to Amazon as movies and TV shows are one of the main reasons people sign up for Prime accounts. So sure, a free version is a good deal, but freemium could drive people to upgrade to a Prime account to access ad-free streaming, along with all the other benefits Prime offers, like free two-day shipping on eligible purchases.
According to AdAge, the free, ad-supported version will feature a lot of back catalog from Amazon, including children’s programming as well as lifestyle shows that revolve around topics like cooking and travel.
Despite all the details, however, an Amazon spokesperson told The Verge: ‘We have no plans to create a free, ad-supported version of Prime Video.'”
VentureBeat – By: Emil Protalinski – “Mozilla today launched Firefox 57, branded Firefox Quantum, for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and iOS. The new version, which Mozilla calls ‘by far the biggest update since Firefox 1.0 in 2004,’ brings massive performance improvements and a visual redesign.
The Quantum name signals that Firefox 57 is a huge release that incorporates the company’s next-generation browser engine (Project Quantum). The goal is to make Firefox the fastest and smoothest browser for PCs and mobile devices — the company has previously promised that users can expect ‘some big jumps in capability and performance’ through the end of the year. Indeed, three of the four past releases (Firefox 53, Firefox 54, and Firefox 55) included Quantum improvements. But those were just the tip of the iceberg.
Firefox 57 for the desktop is available for download now on Firefox.com, and all existing users should be able to upgrade to it automatically. The Android version is trickling out slowly on Google Play, and the iOS version (which is usually updated separately from the other platforms) should eventually arrive on Apple’s App Store.
Mozilla doesn’t break out the exact numbers for Firefox, though the company does say that ‘half a billion people around the world’ use the browser. In other words, it’s a major platform that web developers target — even in a world increasingly dominated by mobile apps.
Speed
Mozilla says that Firefox Quantum will feel speedier when you browse your favorite websites, thanks to faster page loading, smoother scrolling, and a more responsive user interface. The company noted three ways Firefox now bests the competition:
Firefox Quantum is 2X as fast as Firefox was 6 months ago, according to the (still-in-development) Speedometer 2.0 benchmark
Firefox Quantum is oftentimes perceivably faster than Chrome in a side-by-side comparison
Firefox Quantum often uses less memory than Chrome (~30 percent less using a Windows 10 PC)
While Firefox has historically run mostly on just one CPU core, Firefox Quantum finally takes advantage of multiple CPU cores on desktop and mobile. Firefox Quantum features a faster CSS engine written in Rust that runs quickly, in parallel across multiple CPU cores, instead of running in one slower sequence on a single core. ‘No other browser can do this,’ Mozilla claims.
Firefox Quantum prioritizes the tab you’re actively using — that tab downloads and runs before other tabs you have open in the background — and includes a new CSS engine called Stylo, which takes better advantage of multiple CPU cores that are optimized for low power consumption. Mozilla has also fixed hundreds of issues related to Firefox speed in the past several months, which adds to the feeling of a faster browser.
You can check out Mozilla’s tests here and the technical background here.
New features
Performance aside, Firefox Quantum includes a visual refresh, called Photon, that ‘feels fast, fluid, and at home with modern operating systems.’ Photon takes advantage of today’s High DPI displays and other hardware across Windows 10, macOS High Sierra, Android Oreo, and iOS 11.
‘We call this initiative Photon, and its goal is to modernize and unify anything that we call Firefox, while taking advantage of the speedy new engine,’ the team explained. ‘You guessed it: The Photon UI itself is incredibly fast and smooth. To create Photon, our user research team studied how people browsed the web. We looked at real-world hardware to make Firefox look great on any display, and we made sure that Firefox looks and works like Firefox, regardless of the device you’re using. Our designers created a system that scales to more than just current hardware but lets us expand in the future.’
Photon on a Windows PC with a touch display, for example, adjusts the menu size based on whether you click with a mouse or touch with a finger. You can expect square tabs, a dark color scheme, smooth animations, and a restructuring of menus. There’s also a Library feature that provides quick access to bookmarks, Pocket, history, downloads, synced tabs, and screenshots.
Speaking of Pocket, Firefox Quantum integrates the read-it-later app, which Mozilla acquired in February, even further. When you open a new tab, you’ll see currently trending web pages recommended by Pocket users, in addition to your top sites. Firefox Quantum lets you save to Pocket right from the address bar. If you have the Pocket app for Android or iOS, you’ll also get offline access to your saved stories.
In Canada, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the U.S., Firefox will use Google as its default search provider. Back in November 2014, Mozilla swapped the default from Google to Yahoo for these countries. Firefox default search providers in other regions are Yandex in Russia, Turkey, Belarus, and Kazakhstan; Baidu in China; and Google in the rest of the world. Firefox still lets you swap between search providers — Mozilla says Firefox offers more than 60 search providers pre-installed across more than 90 languages, which is more than any other browser.
Here’s the full Firefox 57 for desktop changelog:
A completely new browsing engine, designed to take full advantage of the processing power in modern devices
A redesigned interface with a clean, modern appearance, consistent visual elements, and optimizations for touch screens
A unified address and search bar. New installs will see this unified bar. Learn how to add the stand-alone search bar to the toolbar
A revamped new tab page that includes top visited sites, recently visited pages, and recommendations from Pocket (in the US, Canada, and Germany)
An updated product tour to orient new and returning Firefox users
AMD VP9 hardware video decoder support for improved video playback with lower power consumption
An expanded section in preferences to manage all website permissions
Various security fixes
Firefox now exclusively supports extensions built using the WebExtension API, and unsupported legacy extensions will no longer work. Learn more about our efforts to improve the performance and security of extensions
The browser’s autoscroll feature, as well as scrolling by keyboard input and touch-dragging of scrollbars, now use asynchronous scrolling. These scrolling methods are now similar to other input methods like mousewheel, and provide a smoother scrolling experience
The content process now has a stricter security sandbox that blocks filesystem reading and writing on Linux, similar to the protections for Windows and macOS that shipped in Firefox 56
Middle mouse paste in the content area no longer navigates to URLs by default on Unix systems
Removed the toolbar Share button. If you relied on this feature, you can install the Share Backported extension instead.
Some older versions of the ATOK IME, including ATOK 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010, can cause crashes and are therefore disabled on the Windows 64-bit version of Firefox Quantum. To fix those incompatibility issues, please use a newer version of ATOK or one of other IMEs.
The default font for Japanese text is now Meiryo
Complete visual refresh of both the Light and Dark DevTools themes, matching the new visual style of Firefox Quantum
The Inspector shows the values of CSS variables on hover
Completely new and re-designed Console panel. Joining the Debugger and the Network Monitor, the Console has been rewritten using modern web technologies such as React and Redux. It now also allows to inspect objects in context.
If you’re a web developer, more details are available for you here: Firefox Quantum 57 for developers.
Here’s the full Firefox 57 for Android changelog:
Performance improvements for faster page loading and stability
Updated interface, including a revamped new tab page that includes top visited sites, recently visited pages, and recommendations from Pocket (in the US, Canada and Germany)
Video decoding is shut down when the tab playing the media is sent to the background. Video resumes when the tab is brought to the foreground. Audio will not be affected.
Added an option to enable tracking protection outside of private browsing
Automatically enable private mode on compatible keyboards during private browsing
Long URLs in the URL bar are now scrollable
Added Wolof (wo) locale
Various security fixes
Firefox for Android now exclusively supports extensions built using the WebExtension API, and unsupported legacy extensions will no longer work. Learn how we made extensions faster and more secure
Allow Android Apps to launch a customized web browser
Mozilla releases new Firefox versions every six to eight weeks, and Firefox 58 is currently slated for late January.”
The new proposed commercial spaceport, the first one ever for Georgia, is known as Spaceport Camden. Local government officials have big plans for the area over the next few years: they hope to build a launchpad to support rocket launches to orbit, as well as a landing area that would allow rockets to touch down after takeoff. Built through partnerships with private companies, the area could become the first exclusively commercial spaceport on the East Coast; the others in Florida and Virginia are operated by or associated with federal agencies.
The new feature is designed to protect a customer’s existing, good backups, from being overwritten by encrypted ones because of a ransomware attack. CloudBerry now detects encryption changes in files and prevents existing backups from being overwritten. Admins are notified and can approve the encryption changes, if legitimate and also know their backups are protected if ransomware was the cause. You can read more about this new feature in this blog post.
Cobalt malware has such potent capabilities because it uses a well known and legitimate penetration testing tool, Cobalt Strike — a form of software for Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations, which can be used to access covert channels in a system.