The Geek The Ory

Office 2016  may still be getting the finish touches in Redmond, but Microsoft is opening up its productivity suite for public preview. If you'll recall, some apps were included in previous releases  of the  Windows 10 Technical Preview  and made available for both IT folks and devs. As of today, though, regular folks can get an early look and offer feedback on all the new stuff -- including those redesigned  universal apps . This means that you'll gain access to OneDrive attachments in Outlook, real-time co-authoring and retooled applications that learn how you work to lend a hand. Specifically in Excel, there are updated charts and graphs alongside one-click forecasting and more data analyzing tools. Looking to take it for a spin before the official release this fall? Even if you're not an Office 365 subscriber, you can nab a trial version  right here .

As districts and schools try to find the best way to implement Common Core State Standards in the classroom, early research shows that they are better off when teachers hold the reigns. Researchers at Center for American Progress have begun the process of assessing schools that give "teachers formal leadership roles in the transition to the new college and career standards. As detailed in a new report, these school districts recognized from the start that teachers would be integral to the success of the common core standards, and treated teachers as true partners in implementation," according to US News. They found that when school districts enabled teachers to control Common Core instruction from early on, it created trust between teachers and administrators, made it more likely for teachers to "buy-in" and support the instruction, and overall gave teachers confidence to implement the standards thanks to the engagement. "Based on interviews with teac...

MyScript Calculator - Handwriting calculator What does it promise? T he MyScript Calculator app promises a very intelligent interface that recognizes equations written by the user and gives them the answer instantly. It allows you to easily edit and scratch out scripts that you need to replace. It promises an innovative way to solve math problems without having to punch equations into calculators. Does it deliver?  This app delivers with flying colors. It can be used by children ages four and up because of how easy it is to write using the simple interface. For younger children, they will be able to appreciate the fact that they can use their hands to write the equation and see the answer magically appear in front of their eyes. It's an app that will save students a lot of time but where it fails is in teaching students how to actually solve equations. It does all the work for you and that’s fine but when it comes to an app that teaches, this one falls a little short. F...

Measured Progress, a not-for-profit organization responsible for creating standard based assessments, open up about their latest challenges with the online assessment delivery platform provided by Smarter Balanced and developed by a Smarter Balanced vendor. Measured Progress  is known for connecting the K-12 educational community with innovative and flexible assessment solutions. Their major goal according to the most recent release is to accurately test the students learning period making it easier for teachers to pinpoint the areas that need extra attention. Martin Borg, president and CEO of Measured Progress, gave a statement on the Smarter Balanced platforms that have run in to a few challenges, however, Borg says that Measured Progress is working on fixing the bugs and accessing woes upon the platforms launch. “Measured Progress has a long history of successfully deploying online assessment,” said Borg in a statement for Measured Prog...

Information protection is now scrutinized in all commercial and government industries. Theft of information has crippled many organizations and businesses. One of the main reasons information is lost, corrupt, or stolen is because many industries have not fully adopted it as a risk, and have yet to implement strong quality assurance policies and programs. Some of the most common risks are because of unattended computers, weak passwords, and poor information management practices. Hackers look for the weakest target and tunnel into a business from easy sources, like tablets or cell phones. Using smart encryption software can remediate this threat and vulnerability, making it difficult for competitors or rookie hackers to penetrate your device. However, software alone is not enough to prevent Macs from being hacked. It is the Mac user who has the authority and resources to save it from potential penetration.  The top 10 ways to prevent your Mac from being hacked  is ...

Thanks to a recent software update,  Amazon’s inexpensive Fire TV Stick —an HDMI dongle that works as a sort of mini digital media set-top box—has improved its support for Miracast wireless display. This means that in addition to its normal functionality, you should be able to use Fire TV Stick to mirror the display on your Windows Phone, Windows PC or tablet, or Android device. But there’s just one problem. And that problem is: it doesn’t work reliably. On the Windows Phone handset I tried—my Lumia 930—I was able to mirror the display, but audio didn’t work. This means that you can’t play music or audiobooks, of course. But you also can’t hear the audio in videos, like the TV shows or movies in Xbox Video. I also tried to test this with two Windows PCs, my Surface Pro 3 and another Windows 8.1-based laptop. In both cases, it successfully connected Fire TV Stick as a wireless display. But the video never worked, nor did the audio. According to one emailer, he was ab...

While Miracast was once an unreliable solution for replicating a PC or device screen to an external display, Microsoft’s newer Miracast dongles—in particular the inexpensive Microsoft Wireless Display Adapter—change all that. And I now bring such a device with me on family trips so that we can all enjoy TV shows or movies together on the big screen. We’re in Puerto Rico this week for the kids’ vacation—how we managed to get out of Boston and its historic snowfalls and low temperatures is still unclear—and I brought along the Microsoft Wireless Display Adapter for this very reason. It’s a simple and,  at $60 at the Microsoft Store , inexpensive solution: Just plug in the HDMI end of the dongle to an available HDMI port on the TV and plug the USB end into a USB port for power. (If there’s no USB port on the TV, you can use a standard cell phone-like power adapter instead.) In addition to its rock-solid reliability, there are a number of nice things about the Microsoft Wireles...

HP’s stunning new Spectre x360 gives Windows fans reason to cheer: It’s a premium transforming, multi-touch Ultrabook that doesn’t ape the MacBook Air’s styling but does deliver stellar performance and battery life. Best of all, perhaps, the Spectre x360 won’t set you back the $2000+ that other premium Windows Ultrabooks currently demand: it starts at less than half that heady sum. I’ve been using an HP Spectre x360 since last week, and it appears that HP has successfully done for the high-end of the market what Stream did for the low-end: Revitalize HP’s PC reputation by delivering an awesome combination of power, style, and value. Readers know I’m always looking for the best values in technology. And this Spectre delivers. Let’s start with the industrial. The Spectre x360 is precision milled and machine polished from aluminum and immediately presents the kind of understated elegance one might associate with Mercedes. It’s not a head-turner: indeed, on a recent trip I’...

Despite hitting a record 10 million sales in the second quarter of 2015, Microsoft's phone division is in trouble. Competitors, including Apple and Google, are pushing the envelope even further, leaving Microsoft in the dust. Redmond has seemingly chosen to produce only low-end phones with a flagship phone conspicuously absent from the current lineup. A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission  highlights just how bad things have become. Microsoft acquired Nokia back in 2013 for around $7.2 billion (a figure which has since risen to over $9 billion, according to the filing) and the division, named "Phone Hardware", brought in $1.4 billion in Q3 2015 with the cost of revenue exceeding that figure by $4 million. This means that Microsoft lost around 12 cents per phone according to analysts, even before R&D costs, among other expenses, are applied, despite exceptional unit sales. The filing talks of a potent write-off of the Nok...