In this edition of Weekend Reading, we’ve got stories about the launch of “Titanfall” on Xbox One, Office 365 Personal will be offered and Microsoft in Education’s continuing commitment to student privacy rights.
“Titanfall,” the game that really is larger than life, came to Xbox One this week, and there were no shortage of ways to celebrate this first-person shooter that’s giving the genre a big lift. Literally. In the video below, get a running start with the robots with some handy tips and tricks on how to be a master pilot. Take the “Titanfall” personality test to pick your perfect Titan. And learn the weapons that will come your way as you level up.
This spring, Office 365 Personal is a new option designed for the individual. It allows for one PC or Mac and one tablet to be connected to the service, and will be available for $69.99 per year or $6.99 per month. Microsoft will continue to offer the Office 365 Home Premium subscription for households, but the service’s name will be changed to Office 365 Home. Meanwhile, check out Oslo, a new search and discovery tool in the works for Office 365 that highlights key information of interest to you, based on what you are working on and the actions of people in your network.
More than 1,100 educators, school leaders and government officials from nearly 100 countries attended the 2014 Microsoft in Education Global Forum in Barcelona, and Anthony Salcito, Microsoft’s vice president, worldwide education, reinforced the company’s view that as classroom technology tools and cloud services increase, students’ safety and privacy rights “come first.” Meanwhile, it was announced that not only will the student winners of the Games, Innovation, and World Citizenship categories in this July’s Imagine Cup World Finals take home $50,000, they’ll also get a customized Boot Camp, put together by Microsoft Ventures, Microsoft YouthSpark and PAX. Super-bonus for one World Finals winning team: A private meeting with Bill Gates.
Bridgestone, one of the world’s leading tire manufacturers, is dramatically cutting down on paper use. Bridgestone Asia Pacific will equip its sales and technical engineers in the field with an agile, secure and intuitive Windows 8-based mobile cloud solution supported by Windows Azure. The staff will be using Toolbox Touch, a touch-based Windows 8 app developed by Microsoft IT partner NCS that fully replaces the paper-based processes the company’s sales and technical engineers had previously relied on to record inspection data.
If you want to be ready for March Madness, or that other March madness (working on taxes), Windows apps have you covered. Install NCAA March Madness Live from the Windows Store and the Windows Phone Store, and stay on top all 67 games. On the tax front, check out Mint (available in the Windows Store and the Windows Phone Store), Bing Finance (also available in the Windows Store and the Windows Phone Store) and the Money and Budget collection in the Windows Phone Store. Over in the Windows Phone Store, the App of the Week, Facebook Messenger, is great for getting in touch with your Facebook friends on your Windows Phone device. Not only does the app let you quickly see who’s online for a private or group chat, it also makes it easy for you to send private messages. If you want a food and recipe app that transports you to an alternate reality, “Gojee delivers, gorgeously,” writes Tereza Nemessanyi, a partner business evangelist in Developer and Platform Evangelism at Microsoft. For the younger set, Microsoft’s education team has curated a list of hundreds of the best education apps available. Check out the Top Windows 8 Apps for Education.
You don’t have to be a grownup to create a good app; Mohamed Tariq Jaffar Ali is proof of that. The 8-year-old, a third-grade student from Massachusetts, developed Kids Zone. The free Windows Phone app aggregates YouTube videos and clips from popular cartoons such as “Tom and Jerry,” “Curious George” and “SpongeBob SquarePants” and sorts them into channels easily accessible for kids – and their parents.
| Mohamed Tariq Jaffar Ali at the November Nokia DVLUP Day event in Cambridge, Mass. |
This week on the Microsoft Facebook page, we created macro magic with a Lumia Windows Phone.
That’s it for this edition of Weekend Reading. Thanks for visiting, and have a great pre-official-start-of-spring weekend!
Posted by Suzanne Choney
Microsoft News Center Staff