Microsoft

Microsoft is hoping to persuade more developers to create Windows apps by bringing its main coding environment – Visual Studio – to the Mac for the first time. Previously, developers had to use a Windows machine or run a virtual machine on a Mac to write Windows software.

The company seemingly intended to make the announcement at its Connect() developer conference on Wednesday, but The Verge spotted that Microsoft accidentally released the information early in a now-deleted blog post.

Microsoft said that Visual Studio for Mac was designed to be a direct counterpart to the Windows version, though it would not fully achieve this aim from the outset …

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In the list of moments you’re never going to live down, literally laughing at Apple’s launch of the iPhone has to be right there at the very top. Nine years on, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has told Bloomberg that Apple made it work thanks to a smarter business model.

“I wish I’d thought about the model of subsidizing phones through the operators,” he said. “You know, people like to point to this quote where I said iPhones will never sell, because the price at $600 or $700 was too high. And there was business model innovation by Apple to get it essentially built into the monthly cell phone bill.”

Microsoft was very late to move into the hardware business, despite creating a number of prototypes over the years – including something remarkably similar to Apple’s new Touch Bar, created back in 2009 …

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During Microsoft’s October Windows event today, the company did something I never expected them to do: surpass Apple’s own desktop solution and experiences. Microsoft announced the launch of their new Surface Studio desktop, an all-in-one system with a beautiful 28” touchscreen display. A powerhouse of a system with specs up to 32GB of RAM and a GPU with 4 GB video RAM, Microsoft is really pulling out all the stops here to make their desktop solution attractive to all creatives in a way normally seen as Apple’s place.

The iMac has maintained the same design for the past few years, and with the Mac Pro seemingly forgotten within the desktop lineup, Microsoft has a solid chance at stealing some of Apple’s customers away.

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Microsoft officially launched its Word Flow keyboard on iOS earlier this year, and today the app has received a significant update, bringing its version number to 2.0. The update includes a host of new features, including some that rival what Apple is bringing to the Messages app keyboard with iOS 10.

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Earlier this summer Evernote limited the free tier of its note-taking service to use on just two devices while raising prices for its paid plans. While the move was clearly intended to make Evernote’s business more sustainable, reaction from a lot of vocal users was to switch from Evernote to OneNote or Apple Notes. Now Microsoft has responded with a new import tool that lets OneNote users pull in content from Evernote.

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Microsoft has a lot of form for using Surface ads to make fun of the iPad, even if it has to mislead to do so. More recently, it seemed to be targeting Macs rather than iPads, but its latest ad – posted this week – is back to attacking the iPad …

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Microsoft is taking on Apple’s own camera app with an iOS app it claims is smarter. Microsoft Pix has no user controls, but is instead controlled by AI software, which attempts to work out what you are photographing and automatically adjust the settings to give the best results. It also automatically enhances your photos, and shows you the before-and-after to allow you to pick the version you prefer.

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Remember Letterpress for iOS, the fun word game from Loren Brichter a few years ago? The app was bought by new developers and started receiving updates again earlier this year, and today Letterpress is finally available on the Mac. The mechanics of the game remain the same, but there have been some other improvements to the competitive word game recently too.

Also happening in the Mac space, Microsoft shared its plans for supporting Skype on legacy versions of OS X today which sees some older versions of Mac OS X dropped going forward…

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A new project called Thinga.Me from Microsoft’s experimental Garage team aims to offer users a way of organizing and sharing real-world objects through a new iPhone app.

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Ten months after Microsoft wrote-off its Nokia acquisition, the company has now announced that it is effectively out of the consumer phone business. It is cutting 1,850 jobs, and setting aside almost a billion dollars to cover the costs of exiting the business.

Microsoft on Wednesday announced plans to streamline the company’s smartphone hardware business, which will impact up to 1,850 jobs. As a result, the company will record an impairment and restructuring charge of approximately $950 million […]

“We are focusing our phone efforts where we have differentiation — with enterprises that value security, manageability and our Continuum capability, and consumers who value the same,” said Satya Nadella, chief executive officer of Microsoft.

The company recently saw its market share fall below 1%. While Microsoft is – for now – insistent that it has a future in the corporate smartphone business, the reality seems doubtful …

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Microsoft is getting serious with the Mac today with its new Skype for Business preview for OS X. The new business-focused version of Skype for Mac runs on OS X El Capitan and focuses on creating an enterprise-friendly experience. IT professionals can request access to the new Skype for Business Mac Preview starting today.

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Microsoft Garage, Microsoft’s experimental projects team, has finally released their much anticipated Hub Keyboard for iOS today. This specific keyboard lacks the expected special one-handed typing mode, along with the previously reported Swype-like typing functionality. The latter feature may have been related to Microsoft’s recent purchase of SwiftKey, although it appears some of SwiftKey’s features made its way into Hub Keyboard in the form of autocompletion suggestions.

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Apple alongside Amazon, Google and Microsoft today filed a joint amicus brief in support of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and President Obama’s proposed Clean Power Plan that aims to introduce new emissions regulations. The EPA had some major pushback on the plan, so now Apple and the others are lending their support:

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