Hello Surface 3, Goodbye Windows RT

At the beginning of April Microsoft announced the Surface 3, its new entry point device to compliment the Pro 3 range.

It has a fan-less Quad-core 1.6GHz Intel Atom x7 processor rather than a faster but more expensive Intel Core processor. This is a high performance Atom processor with a 2.4GHz turbo boost mode and advanced power management.

Most importantly with Intel inside a Surface 3 runs the full version of Windows 8.1 plus every existing and upcoming Windows application, tool or utility.

Yet, you may recall Microsoft's previous entry-level Surface devices ran something called Windows RT. This is because the Surface RT devices used the lower-cost ARM chip rather than an x86-compatible Intel processor.

However, the problem with Windows RT apps is that they have to be recompiled specifically for the ARM platform. And, in the end, not enough of these RT-flavour apps became available. So, despite a significant cost advantage, a Surface RT consumer ended up with a far less practical computing device.

With the introduction of the Surface 3 we can be assured the Windows RT experiment is over. This particular operating system is now obsolete. A direction many observers predicted when Microsoft announced a trade-in deal for older Surface RT and Surface Pro models.

Now it's Windows 8.1 for everyone, with a free upgrade to Windows 10 when it appears later this year.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

Windows 10: Free download? Minecraft included?

The fees charged for its Windows operating system licences are a significant revenue earner for Microsoft. So, it might seem an unlikely prospect.

And yet, early in 2014 Microsoft reduced its licence fee to manufacturers of low-cost PCs. While in April 2014 it announced free licences for smartphones and tablets with screen sizes smaller than 9 inches.

Of course, Apple did just this in 2013 when it made its OS X Mavericks available on the Mac App Store as a free upgrade for all Mac users running Snow Leopard or above. And offered the same deal when OS X Yosemite launched in 2014.

Minecraft Giveaway?

And what are Microsoft's plans for Minecraft after its $2.5 billion acquisition?

There's been a wall of silence so far. Although Minecraft modding integration with Microsoft's .NET development platform, toolset and coding languages seems likely.

But could this hugely popular game be included for free in a Home or Community Edition of Windows 10?

Maybe the Microsoft event scheduled for the 21st January 2015 will shed some light on Minecraft's future?

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

HP Mini Desktops and Chromeboxs

HP Pavilion Mini Desktop

The latest devices to hit the HP Store are the Pavilion Mini Desktop and the Stream Mini Desktop.

The HP Pavilion Mini Desktop is just 52 mm (2 inches) high and only weighs 725 grams (1.6 lbs). Yet processors options include an Intel Core i3, it runs Windows 8.1 plus expansion options include 8 GB of expandable memory and 1 TB of storage.

Video or casual gaming is supported by the dual display support with DisplayPort and HDMI compatible ports. So it's capable of streaming content across multiple screens, including TV with Quad HD support.

The HP Pavilion Mini Desktop also draws a maximum power of 45 watts, far lower than the 250 watts of a typical tower desktop.

A HP Pavilion Mini Desktop with Intel Pentium 3558U processor, 4 GB RAM and a 500 GB Hard Disk Drive (HDD) costs $319.99.

HP Stream Mini Desktop

Meanwhile the HP Stream Mini Desktop has the same small format as the Pavilion Mini Desktop but comes with value-added options and services.

These include a 32 GB solid-state drive (SSD) for speed and reliability, 200 GB of Microsoft OneDrive Storage for two years plus a $25 gift card for the Windows Store to purchase apps, Xbox games, music and so on.

An HP Stream Mini Desktop with Intel Celeron 2957U processor, 2 GB RAM and a 32 GB SSD costs $179.99.

HP Chromebox

These Mini Desktops supplement HP's 2014 launch of its equally diminutive Chromebox range. These desktop boxes are less than 126mm (under 5 inches) square and just 39mm (1.5 inches). And even the separate AC power brick is small; around the size of a typical laptop one.

HP Chromebox's square form is softened by rounded edges with subtle design flourishes. And there's a number of case colours to choose from; Smoke Silver, Snow White and Ocean Turquoise.

HP's low-end CB1 model has an Intel Haswell Celeron 2955U 64-bit 1.4GHz dual-core processor plus 2GB of RAM and 16GB of solid-state drive storage. In addition to the local storage owners receive 100GB of space on Google's Drive Cloud.

Despite the small dimensions a Chromebox isn't short of ports. There's four USB 3.0 ports (two front, two back), both HDMI and DisplayPort out for video (including dual monitor support), analogue audio out, an SD card slot, Ethernet port and a security lock slot. Wireless communication options include 802.11b/g/n wi-fi and Bluetooth 4.0.

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Windows 10 (Threshold) Features

At Microsoft's press event on 30 September the audience is expected to see a sneak preview of the next version of Windows, codenamed Threshold.

In the following months developers can expect to have an early preview of Windows 10 to play with, and a public release could happen by the middle of 2015.

So, what changes can we expect?

Reincarnated Start Menu

Rumours are surrounding about a new Start Menu. The existence of a Start Menu has been partly fuelled by a particular Microsoft screenshot, briefly shown at its Worldwide Partner Conference in July.

Indications suggest this wont be a rehash of the old-style start menu, but something quite new, taking design hints from the existing Start Screen.

A new Start Menu is likely to exhibit both compact and full-screen configurations. The latter might look rather similar to the current Start Screen.

Interactive Live Tiles

The latest incarnation of the Modern UI is said to feature both interactive Live Tiles and a new Notification Centre. The existence of interactive Live Tiles was reported back in April 2014.

An interactive Live Tile allows users to perform a range of app-specific tasks without actually opening the application. Although, in reality, this functionality would only applicable to a limited subset of Live Tiles.

Form Factor Modes

Windows 10 might offer different startup modes depending on the host device form factor. This would ensure the most appropriate interface is presented by default.

So, desk-bound and laptop devices would obviously go straight to desktop mode. But as yet it's unclear if this would be a single, hardwired mode or whether users would have the option to select the startup mode they prefer.

This would be a significant change from Windows 8.1, and one that's sure to please the business community.

Virtual Desktops

Virtual desktop functionality has been an integral part of Mac OS X and Linux for many years now. The ability to switch between multiple desktops - each with their own collection of windows - is an important productivity feature for power users.

So far Microsoft hasn't gone the down this route. However, with its increased desktop focus Threshold could sport virtual desktop capability. So look out for a new taskbar button and keyboard shortcuts in Windows 10.

Charms Rethink

The Charms Bar has also been the focus of much discussion. Strong indications point to the removal of the current screen corner mouse activation.

Yet many applications rely on the Search, Share, Devices and Settings charms. So, it's unlikely they will disappear altogether. But exactly how they'll be accommodated in the UI is unclear.

Cortana Integration

Cortana is Microsoft's answer to Siri. Owners of smartphones running Windows Phone can ask (or type) questions for Cortana's artificial intelligence software to answer.

Up to now Cortana hasn't appeared on Windows desktops and tablets. But Windows 10 might be the point when we see a dedicated Cortana Live Tile. Though it remains to be seen if Microsoft retains the famous 'typical dark' interface.

Cortana in Windows 10 could offer enhanced voice input features to improve accessibility. And may incorporate an improved interpretation and analysis feedback mechanism.

New Update Strategy

Microsoft might change its current Windows update cycle to a month-by-month one. In this way consumers would receive new and updated features much more promptly. And the whole update process could receive a streamlined makeover.

However, enterprise customers generally evaluation new updates before deployment. So monthly updates would put their IT departments under a lot of pressure. And recent events suggest even Microsoft has its own problems with testing.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

Microsoft Surface M

Will we see a Microsoft Surface M device, running on Intel's new Broadwell 14nm Core M processor chip, before the end of 2014?

The Core M operates at lower power levels and generates less heat. Yet it still runs Windows 8 applications at performance levels similar to existing Intel Core chips.

All models in the Core M chip range have two physical cores plus a 4MB L3 cache. Speeds can by dynamically scaled for both the CPU (800MHz to 2GHz or 1.1GHz to 2.6GHz) and GPU (100MHz to 800MHz).

This means a Core M powered device would have:

• a Sleek, Thin and Light design (no cooling fan required)
• improved Battery Life (compared to Surface Pro models)
• full Compatibility with Windows software (unlike the Surface RT)
• Intel Core-like Performance (superior to an Atom processor)

One form factor for the Surface M would be an ultra-lightweight 10.5 inch device. Or it could be stretched out to 12 inches (like the Surface Pro 3) without incurring much weight penalty.

In fact, Intel partners have already demonstrated Core M powered 12.5 inch reference tablets at Computex. One was just over 7mm thin, weighed less than 700g and yet still had a 32 watt-hour battery (the Surface Pro 3 is 9.1mm and weights 800g).

So, the Surface M would be an excellent replacement for the Surface RT. And now that Satya Nadella has announced Microsoft is to focus on a unified cross-platform OS, it slots beautifully into this new strategy.

With Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 sales already exceeding early predictions, a Surface M could be the perfect addition to the family.

But Microsoft need to hurry. I'm sure Apple have plenty of ideas for Intel's Core M chip too. For example a new range of Macbooks or even a hybrid iPad/Macbook.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

Samsung vs Xiaomi

Samsung's meteoric growth, quality approach and R&D investment has already killed off threats from the previously dominant Japanese. Even a giant like Sony now relies on insurance to bolster its slim profit margins. While Panasonic is in dire straights and continues to make hefty annual losses.

These days it's countries like China that provide the biggest threat. In fact one of Samsung's strongest competitors is China-based Xiaomi (pronounced she-yow-mee).

One of the fastest growing technology companies in the world, Xiaomi has a recent venture capitalist valuation of $10 billion. It's already the sixth largest handset maker, behind Samsung and Lenovo, in 2013 Xiaomi shipped 18.7 million smartphones. And the smartphone targets for 2014 and 2015 are 40 million and 60 million respectively.

These smartphones aren't simply clones of Samsung or Apple products but offer unique features.

For instance, the latest flagship Xiaomi Mi 4 device is light and thin with a brilliant 5 inch display (17% more pixels than the iPhone 5S) and a high-performance Qualcomm processor.

In addition it has a wristband that acts as an ID authenticator for phone unlocking.

And Xiaomi's regular software updates often incorporate popular requests from device owners.

Yet Xiaomi is expanding well beyond smartphones. Today it manufactures millions of tablets, large HDTVs, set-top boxes, routers and much more.

With lower labour costs and easy access to raw materials Xiaomi products are increasing seen alongside Samsung alternatives on high streets around the world.

Read more Samsung analysis posts.

Samsung Tizen: Android Rival

In June 2014 Samsung announced its intention to reduce its reliance on Google's Android by introducing a rival operating system.

Named Tizen it's a Linux-based operating system offering high levels of system and app performance, tight software integration plus increased security levels.

Tizen has a complex genealogy. It takes influences from many other mobile-focussed predecessors, such as MeeGo, LiMi and Bada. With such a background it's no surprise to learn that Tizen Association participants include Intel, Huawei, Fujitsu, NEC, Panasonic, KT Corporation, Sprint Corporation, SK Telecom, Orange, Vodaphone and NTT DoCoMo.

But there's another, more commercial reason for the Tizen move. Although Samsung operates its own app store, currently most app purchases are made via Google Play. However, Tizen devices push consumers towards the Samsung app store.

Tizen App Potential

Launching a new operating system that competes directly with Apple iOS and Google Android is a bold move. Success isn't guaranteed. But Samsung already has 30% of the global smartphone marketplace (compared to Apple's 15%), plus an equally strong position in the tablet and wearable marketplaces.

For the app developer Tizen appears to be yet another lucrative marketplace. For instance, back in July 2013 Samsung announced a Tizen App challenge with $4 million in prizes.

Yet it's not just about money. Tizen's developer community can code apps using familiar web-development languages, tools and libraries. An attractive alternative to battling with Apple's proprietary languages and unfamiliar tools.

Available Now

In February 2014 Samsung unveiled its Gear 2 Tizen-powered wearables. This range includes the Gear Fit smart-bands for fitness fanatics and Gear Neo smartwatches, with customisable colours and themes.

In June Samsung launched its Z range of smartphones with the SM-Z910F model. And there's plans to put Tizen in cars and smart TVs.

Samsung Plays Smart

Tizen may well play a big part in Samsung's future. But it isn't about to place all its eggs into a single basket.

Although most of the Gear 2 wearable range is Tizen-based, the Gear 2 Live smart watches use the new Android Wear platform, as announced the Google I/O 2014 developer conference.

So, for the foreseeable future, Samsung will continue to work closely with Google to develop Android, Android Wear and Android Auto products. Meanwhile its keen to demonstrate commitment to open standards by participating in open source hardware and software working groups.

Read more Samsung analysis posts.

Apple vs Samsung Design Battle

In the battle between Apple and Samsung to design the next round of mobile devices, wearable tech, multi-platform operating systems and user-experience interfaces who will come out on top?

If it was a numbers game Samsung would win hands down.

Samsung has six Korean R&D centres plus more than a dozen others in America, India, Russia and other strategic locations around the world, including a strong European base in countries such as the UK, Poland and Finland.

These Samsung centres employ over 1,000 designers who work with advanced materials, user interfaces, graphics, digital media, printing, communications, cloud-computing and, of course, hardware and software engineering.

In stark contrast Apple employs less that 20 designers. They are housed in a single, super-secure R&D centre built into the heart of its head quarters building. So secure in fact that only Tim Cooke and few other top executives are allowed entry.

Samsung is said to lead the world in digital photography research. And its chip designs are so good even Apple sources the processors for its iOS devices from Samsung.

Samsung R&D labs developed the Galaxy Note range of smartphones and tablets. Devices which offer fast and smooth multi-tasking, multi-windowed interfaces, along with the much admired S-Pen technology. Innovations that are unmatched by others, including anything in Apple's product line.

And Samsung isn't afraid to invest when in-house innovations don't meet its own high quality standards. For example it is reportedly in talks to acquire Nuance, the accepted world leader in voice recognition technology.

Interestingly, Nuance technology also underpins Apple's Siri - for the time being at least.

Read more Apple and Samsung analysis posts.

Apple To Launch Liquidmetal Products?

Apple seems to be close to announcing new products based on brand new materials.

This June Jonathan Ive himself dropped hints about new product materials when he said ...

"I would love to talk about future stuff - there are materials we haven't worked in before. I've been working on this stuff for a few years now. Tim is fundamentally involved in pushing into these new areas and into these new materials."

Back in June 2012 I wrote an magazine article about liquidmetal material science, Atakan Peker, the Liquidmetal Technologies company and Apple's interest in this technology.

Two years later, almost to the day, it seems this might finally be the year Apple brings Liquidmetal into its product line.

Whatever Jonathan Ive is cooking up in his super-secret Apple design studio, chances are we'll find out soon.

Read more analysis posts about Apple.

Apple's Swift Language - The Wrong Direction

So, Apple has a brand new coding language to supplant it's ageing Objective-C.

Swift certainly is a much needed replacement and it solves numerous flexibility and performance roadblocks faced by Objective-C developers.

Yet it's a move in the wrong direction. Times have changed.

These days developers wish to make their own decisions about languages and tools. They favour standard-based technology that's platform-independent. And they like to get involved by suggesting new features or even writing their own enhancements.

Swift is another proprietary language attempting to lock developers into a platform. One that is unlikely to attract the open source coding community. And one that's more likely to alienate some current members of the Objective-C tribe.

A much better solution would be take a popular language and add it the Xcode toolbox. Maybe something similar to Microsoft's TypeScript language for instance.

Nevertheless, there was a encouraging note in the WWDC keynote announcements. The new Interactive Playground in Xcode 6 shows plenty of promise. Great tools do turn developer's heads - often much more easily than a new language.

Interactive Playground's features still might not make a huge difference in attracting new iOS and OS X developers. But I'd expect similar features to appear in Microsoft, Google and many open source community offerings soon.

For example, there may be refinements to the similar, and already well received, IPython Notebook initiative.

Read more analysis posts about Apple.

Perfect Forward Security

Material surrounding the NSA's PRISM and MUSCULAR programmes, exposed in the Edward Snowdon documents, have generated much consternation in the IT industry. And the public aren't at all happy with the alleged capture, storage and analysis of their communications either.

Major technology organisations felt compelled to conduct a top to bottom review of existing security systems. Many have decided to significantly enhance and extend data security.

High on the list is the introduction of an encryption strategy called 'Perfect Forward Security'.

Enhanced Encryption

So, what exactly is Perfect Forward Security (PFS)? And how does it help secure our data?

At its core PFS is based on the highly regarded and well proven public-key encryption system. A system that relies on a pair of mathematically related keys. If you'd like to understand the nitty gritty technical details of key exchange they are expertly explained in this Wiki entry.

Despite widespread adoption the key-exchange scenario does have a flaw. If a private key is compromised all data - past, present or future - encrypted with this key can be viewed in plain text. For example Microsoft's outlook.com email service has historically relied on a single master key.

But it doesn't have be like this. PFS is specifically designed to address this problem. Originally introduced way back in 1992 by Whitfield Diffie (the key-exchange co-inventor), Paul von Ooschot and Michael Weiner, PFS describes a session-based station-to-station protocol.

This protocol mandates that both ends of the network channel work together to generate a new key set for each separate communication session. This means that owning a compromised key only allows an attacker to access information for one specific communication session. The next session will be encrypted using a different key set. So, adopting PFS greatly enhances data security.

Unfortunately there is small additional processing cost to generating new keys. While this isn't welcome the PFS configuration can be adjusted based on circumstances. For example the sensitivity of the information being transmitted or the security policies of various organisations involved.

Work In Progress

Google was one of the first major players to adopt forward security technology. As far back as 2011 Google switched on PFS for secure socket layer (SSL) encryption on its secure Search, Google+, Gmail, Calendar, Docs and other web services. Now it's using PFS for all its data centre internal network traffic to counteract further surreptitious data collection.

Microsoft has started a multi-phase plan to securely encrypt all stored user content and associated data transfers at every global data centre by the end of 2014. Key targets for enhanced encryption are the Outlook.com email facility, Office365, SkyDrive cloud-based storage and the Windows Azure suite of online services.

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer responded to the NSA surveillance allegations with a blog post to assure customers that, "Yahoo has never given access to our data centres to the NSA or to any other government agency. Ever." Mayer went on to confirm that Yahoo will enhance it's SSL security with 2048-bit level keys by January 2014 and all worldwide Yahoo data flows by the end of Q1 2014.

Twitter's announcement appeared in late November confirming it had implemented PFS on its main website, mobile site and API feeds. The configuration ensures new encryption keys are generated every time the user log in.

More To Do

As you might expect from a defender of digital rights and freedoms the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is keen to push for even wider PFS adoption. In a post on the EFF website it suggests all technology companies should seriously consider going down the same forward security route.

Yet there's still a long way to go. At the time of this post some big technology names are only just starting to think about how they address this area. Yet by mid-2014 any major services not supporting PFS are likely to attract plenty of negative media coverage.

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Microsoft Positivity

Microsoft's latest results look incredibly positive. This is especially true in the area of cloud computing, and in particular Office 365 and Windows Azure.

Office 365 subscribers have passed the 2 million mark. Many home users need access to the real thing (rather than office-like alternatives) and a subscription offers great value. The same subscription model suits businesses too as it keeps costs under control.

As for Window Azure it continues to make big strides. While there's a long way to go before it reaches Amazon's hold on this segment of the marketplace it's already well ahead of the rest, including Google's App Engine and the various offerings from IBM, HP, Oracle and such.

Why is this? As I showed in my recent articles (part 1 and part 2) Azure not only has enviable technology scope but is also a leader in promoting openness. Openness in service access, in coding languages, in frameworks, in industry standards and in development tools. How things change...

Obviously Microsoft needs to change to survive. And it is. More importantly lots of organisations and influential developers are noticing. Momentum is growing and it would seem the only way is up.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

Microsoft: One Big Opportunity

So Steve Ballmer is on his way. His publicised plans for a company-wide reorganisation failed to excite shareholders or markets. They will go down in history as his swan song.

Yet his resignation caused a seven percent rise in Microsoft's stock price. A strong indication now is the perfect opportunity for a fresh start.

While there's any number of internal candidates, it's time to look outside Microsoft's corporate walls. There's a desperate need for fresh blood to invigorate and reenergise the company.

The challenge is to find someone like Facebook's Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg or Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer. Appointing the right person would herald a gripping new chapter in the Microsoft story.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

What's the scope of Microsoft's Bing Platform

Microsoft recently launched the Bing Platform for developers.

So, what's the full scope of the Bing platform? The answer is much larger than most people realise. Here's a brief summary in alphabetical order.

• Bing Ads, formally known as the adCenter, enables publishers to monetize their websites through pay-per-click advertising scenarios.

• Bing Dictionary is based on Microsoft's Encarta World English Dictionary. An associated audio player facility enables users to hear word pronunciations.

• Bing Entertainment has searchable, detailed information and reviews on music, movies, TV shows and video games. In addition users have direct access to Bing Online Games through a close partnership with Microsoft Games.

• Bing Events is linked to the Zvents database (zvents.com) which hosts a constantly updated collection of upcoming events. Searches reveal event descriptions, dates, times and venues. And there's also a ticket purchase facility.

• Bing Finance features include stock searches, company profiles, market statistics, stock ratings, historical data, financial statements and analyst recommendations. Filters screen stocks appropriate for value contrarian, high-yield and bargain investment strategies.

• Bing Health aims to help users navigate complex medical topics. Health-related information is gathered from a variety of trusted sources, including the Mayo Clinic, National Institutes of Health and Medicine and the Microsoft acquired Medstory.

• Bing Images refines search results by image size, layout, colour (or black and while only) and type. It also incorporates facial recognition technology. Search result pages have an attractive, generated tile layout and an infinite scroll feature.

• Bing Local taps into business listings and reviews for your local area. There's a close integration with Bing Maps and Events.

• Bing Maps offers high quality road and satellite maps, landmarks, route identification, traffic flow and bird's-eye views. Bing Maps for Enterprise introduces high-resolution 3D panoramas, which allow users to fly over cityscapes and around buildings.

• Bing News is a convenient aggregator for a wide range of online news and information.

• Bing Recipes serves up foody ideas from data stored by Delish.com, MyRecipes.com and Epicurious.com. Search criteria includes ingredients, methods, courses, cuisine convenience or occasion.

• Bing Reference generates semantic indexes to Wikipedia pages. This capability is highly reliant on the natural language search engine technology Microsoft acquired from its Powerset company purchase.

• Bing Social finds real-time information from Twitter and Facebook, prioritised on relevance and context. It's currently limited to public feeds from the last seven days.

• Bing Shopping is the place to discover online products and goods. Microsoft has developed a number of strategic partnerships, such as with eBay's Commerce Network.

• Bing Translator allows users to translate web pages or specific text into over 40 languages (including two Star Trek Klingon dialects). The service offers a side-by-side text comparison and a mouse-hover translation feature.

• Bing Travel uses predictive algorithms to determine the best time to purchase airfares and hotel reservations. This technology was the drive behind Microsoft's acquisition of Farecast.com.

• Bing Videos has a fast, powerful search engine with multiple categorisations and an in-results-page Smart Preview feature. MSN Video users can access editorial content.

• Bing Visual Search appeared in 2012. Powered by Microsoft's Silverlight technology it enables users to refine their search queries through an image-based interface.

• Bing Weather is a highly regarded, richly graphical Windows 8 app, complete with animation. It uses data from multiple sources, such as Foreca (foreca.com), to deliver weather reports from around the globe, plus extended 10 day forecasts.

• Bing Wolfram Alpha came out of a partnership with the Wolfram Research (wolfram.com). Behind the natural language interface search results are generated using computational algorithms and a knowledge base of curated data, instead of the more usual semantic search engine.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

TypeScript & CoffeeScript: A Better JavaScript

JavaScript is a hugely popular language. Its scope extends well beyond the classic web development scenario. Today developers are able to create cross-platform mobile apps and full-sized applications in pure JavaScript.

Google, Appcelerator, PhoneGap and many others have active, well resourced JavaScript-based projects and compilers are springing up all over the place.

Nevertheless JavaScript coding can be a challenge, even for the professional developer. As code listings grow in size and complexity the language's many shortfalls induce to a steep increase in bug count and raise developer frustration.

Using a quality IDE will certainly help. But, how about a new language with a cleaner, modern-looking syntax? One that requires less lines of code for the same functionality, yet is still 100% JavaScript compatible.

Here I'll take a brief look at two, TypeScript and CoffeeScript.

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TypeScript version 0.9 was unwrapped in front of Microsoft's developer community during Microsoft's Build 2013 event by Anders Hejlsberg.

In common with many recent Microsoft initiatives there's a strong lean towards openness, exemplified by the Apache 2 licence and CodePlex-hosted source code. In fact, TypeScript is a preview of what to expect in the upcoming ECMAScript 6 standard.

The open source, open specification, cross-platform compiler is itself written in TypeScript. Type declarations are removed by the compiler and the ECMA standard JavaScript output runs in any browser and on any host.

TypeScript is a superset of JavaScript. So developers can start with a JavaScript listing then use whichever TypeScript features seem most appropriate. The addition of types and generics, plus improved class definitions and 'intellisense' support allow developers to create well structured code and introduce fewer bugs.

TypeScript header files add type information to existing libraries. A github-hosted project called DefinitelyTyped already contains an impressive collection of '.ts' definition files covering many popular libraries and frameworks, including jQuery, MongoDB, Node.js and D3.js.

There are IDE plugins for Visual Studio and WebMatrix, plus support for editors such as Sublime Text, Emacs and Vim editors. However, at present only Microsoft's Visual Studio 2012/2013 tool delivers comprehensive support for all TypeScript's features.

To discover more watch Anders Hejlsberg's hour long Build 2013 talk or navigate to the TypeScript preview website and select the 'Play' mode.

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CoffeeScript appeared in 2009 when Jeremy Ashkenas placed an early version on GitHub. The stable 1.0 version appeared in December 2010.

CoffeeScript aims to increase developer productivity via syntax influences from Python, Ruby and Haskall. It's a succinct language, with noticeably less syntactic fluff. Consequently, a CoffeeScript listing is not only easier to read, understand and debug, but typically requires less than half the code when compared with JavaScript.

CoffeeScript code is trans-compiled into pure JavaScript. This means any Javascript framework or library can be referenced, including the ever popular jQuery and Prototype products. There's support in Node.js and Ruby On Rails version 3.1, plus an online tool to convert existing JavaScript code into CoffeeScript.

To find out more checkout the free open source introduction to CoffeeScript.

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Microsoft Under Pressure

Microsoft is under pressure as never before.

Reaction to Windows 8 is at best mixed.
Millions of RT Surface devices lie unsold in warehouses.
Nokia isn't selling nearly enough Windows Mobile smartphones.
First quarter 2013 revenue was down eight percent.
Profits are dwindling fast.
And now there's been dramatic share sell-off.

It puts even more pressure on Ballmer's company-wide reorganisation, which amounts to one of the biggest upheavals since Microsoft's inception in 1972.

Ballmer's can only hope his call to arms memo will have far greater impact than the 1995 Bill Gates memo.

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

How much should an RT Surface tablet cost?

With millions of RT Surface tablets gathering dust on warehouse shelves, Microsoft has slashed the price.

But is it enough? What is the right price?

After all, it's certainly a powerful device with a rich, powerful operating system capable of both desktop and tablet functionality. Yet, it doesn't have allure of an Apple device - and probably never will.

However, presenting consumers with a straight, equal-cost choice between a 7.9" iPad Mini or a 10.6" RT Surface, complete with free touch keyboard cover, might prove interesting.

Would that be enough to swing the pendulum in Microsoft's favour?

Read more Microsoft analysis posts.

Inside Steve's Brain by Leander Kahney

The appeal of this multi-faceted book extends to marketing folks, product designers, budding entrepreneurs and anyone curious about how Apple came to be the most valued company in the world.

It works as a narrative on Apple's history, with an extended timeline compared with rival books, and includes a detailed look at the formation of Pixar and it's day-to-day activities. Historical information is blended with analysis of the single-minded focus, marketing methods, design practices and perfectionist approach that made Apple the company it is today.

Threaded throughout are tales of the man himself and how he shaped the company right from the very beginning. While it certainly isn't intended to be chronological biographical study of Jobs, it is nevertheless full of interesting facts and anecdotes.

His religious devotion to perfection is evident in every chapter. Examples include boxing of the original Macintosh in 1984, meticulous attention to screw heads, precise lighting arrangements for Apple's onstage announcements and the internal layout of the high-street stores.

Of course, Jobs needed a world-class team of people around him to achieve such great things. Each individual was invariably handpicked, lured by Jobs's vision and cajoled by his undoubted charm. Yet they needed to share his passion, adjust to his individualistic work practices, weather his fierce outbursts, cope with his often overbearing attention to detail, and handle the relentless pressure to deliver nothing less than perfection.

The book's smooth narrative style and flow makes for an enjoyable read. Nevertheless, I'd like to have seen more insights from Jobs himself. The majority of the views expressed come from employees and associates, which aren't the same as listening in on his own thoughts. In addition, the reverence given to Jobs and his methods means we miss out on a more balanced view of what it was really like to work for one of the most influential characters of the computing age.

Read more Apple analysis posts.

Enterprise Games by Michael Hugos

In fitting with the subject matter this book has a lively, engaging and conversational delivery. In structure it's loosely divided into three parts.

Part one addresses the business-centric application and potential of what Hugos refers to as Game Mechanics. It stresses the need for game-like goals and rules, real-time feedback, player engagement and generating a desire to participate. Here you'll find a succession of insightful thoughts and challenges to the status quo of business operations.

The second and third sections are filled with examples to illustrate Game Dynamics in action. Examples as divergent as multi-player online games, social media, mobile apps, 3D animation and visual data analytics. These sections are quite similar in form, with the latter focusing more on the social implications.

Is the book an informative and thought provoking guide to Game Mechanics? Yes it is. Does the book contain examples of how specific companies employ Game Mechanics today to attract, engage and motivate your customers or employees? Absolutely.

However, this book doesn't answer the puzzle of how to implement Game Mechanics inside your own organisation. It's left to the reader to find their own path within the gaming framework. Such a description isn't really possible. After all, there are so many routes to take, so many options to explore, there isn't one simple formula that will work for every organisation. A positive book in nature, the optimistic highroad focus means it doesn't really explore the potential drawbacks and consequences of a game-centric approach.

The world of Game Mechanics is at an embryonic stage. Enterprise Games is a comprehensive and accomplished entry point to exploring this new world. In the coming years it will be interesting to see who's had the foresight, bravery and determination to make it work.

Hybrid PCs, Microsoft Surface and Windows 8

Hybrid PCs aim to provide all the advantages of a handheld tablet with a fully functional laptop.

Discover their potential, including an appraisal of the new Microsoft Surface devices, in my Micro Mart issue 1232 six page feature article - out today.

Here are a few extracts:

Laptops are essentially a portable desktop machine, complete with powerful processor, large storage capacity, enhanced connectivity, well-specified operating systems and fully-featured application software. Their owners need a device that supports a wide variety of construction-focussed activities. A device that can create and edit office documents, write blogs and articles, fabricate and process images, produce and manipulate videos, design and build websites, or develop and test software apps.

However, a tablet is quite a different proposition. It's a consumption-centric device, aimed primarily at leisure and entertainment activities. Tablet owners want to swipe through photos, kick back with a video, catch up on missed TV programmes, listen to music, play games, surf the web and read ebooks. The smaller 7 inch screen versions are ideal when reclining on the couch, visiting a coffee shop, travelling by train and packing the holiday suitcase. Tablets with high definition 9 to 11 inch screens are more suited to business professionals and researchers, who wish to read documents, magazines and websites without recourse to frequent zooming in and out.

A successful hybrid device must cater for both construction and consumption activities. It's quite a challenge. Any device attempting to run office suites, software development tools or high-end image and video manipulation applications must have a reasonable screen size, adequate CPU and graphics horsepower, plus a good quality keyboard. Yet, lightness, portability, touch-centric operation and long battery life are the prerequisites for tablets you can pop into your bag as you head out of the door.

Take the Surface device case for example. It's thin and light, constructed from a unique VapourMg material. VapourMg combines the strength and lightness of magnesium with an industry-first process that forms a tough, scratch-resistant, subtly tactile finish. It has a superbly designed, integrated flip-out stand with a high-quality, dependable hinge mechanism - all in the same VapourMg material. Despite the sleek form it's still endowed with a good selection of connectivity, including full-sized USB ports.

Then there's the snap-on covers, complete with integral keyboard and trackpad. They're attached magnetically in an easy snap-on operation, yet hold securely. They protect the screen and give a reassuring 'book-like' feel when carrying the device around.

The crux of the Windows 8 architecture is its dual personality. The classic desktop mode still exists to deliver that familiar productive experience and ability to run the powerful software required for office, web, multimedia and software development activities.

However, the desktop is now supplemented by a new Metro-style user interface. This UI offers a radically different, colourful, touch-friendly user experience. Gone are the fiddly menu options, scroll bars and general multiple window clutter. They're replaced by a collection of horizontally sliding tiles supporting swish-able panels, pinch-able zooms and gesture invoked operations.

The Metro-style UI is attractive, clean and fast. The 'live tiles' deliver real-time, dynamically-updated content, such as weather reports, RSS feeds, new email messages and tweets. It successfully creates the sort of laid-back, consumption-mode experience that's best enjoyed while reclining in a comfy chair, lolling around on the sofa, or sipping your cappuccino.

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