News

PowerApps Launch   Wednesday 16 November

Recently Microsoft discontinued LightSwitch, its almost-no-programming app creation system to replace it by PowerApps, another almost-no-programming app creation system. The PowerApps service is now generally available and we know the price. Is this not just generally available, but generally interesting?

Open AI And Microsoft Exciting Times For AI   Wednesday 16 November

A new partnership between Elon Musk's OpenAI and Microsoft, whereby OpenAI will use Azure for its research into deep learning and neural networks sounds promising in terms of "democratizing AI", something both partners are committed to.

Take VisionMobile's Gamified Developer Survey   Wednesday 16 November

The bi-annual (twice a year) State of the Developer Nation Survey is fast becoming one of those regular events that serves to remind us just how quickly the years go by. So to overcome the "Not again!" feeling, Vision Mobile has introduced a fantasy adventure theme.

Go Turns Seven With Lots Of Attention   Tuesday 15 November

Go, the free and open source language created at Google, first appeared on November 10, 2009. So it is now seven years old.

Suspense Over Visual Studio For Mac   Monday 14 November

A Microsoft blog post has appeared, announcing Visual Studio's forthcoming availability for the Mac.

//No Comment - TV Control, Geolocation & Webmention APIs   Monday 14 November

• TV Control API 

• Geolocation API 

• Webmention API 

Over 2 Billion Chrome Browsers In Use   Monday 14 November

Google held its annual Chrome Dev Summit last week and revealed that there are now  over 2 billion  Chrome browsers in active use across desktops, consoles and mobile devices. It also announced there would be no Chrome ad blocker.

TJBot - Using Raspberry Pi With Watson   Sunday 13 November

In order to get makers and tinkerers to get involved with its Watson services, IBM has come up with an open source project to create a cute cardboard or 3D printed bot, named TJ after IBM's first ever chairman, Thomas J Watson, whose name is also used for IBM's AI-based services.

Microsoft Student Contests Emphasize Azure   Saturday 12 November

Microsoft has increased the prize money for the 2017 Imagine cup and introduced an additional stipulation, Azure is required for all projects. Microsoft is also running a Hello Cloud contest for building cloud development skills.

The Weekly Top 10: Even More JavaScript Development Resources   Friday 11 November

This week's round up is about the JavaScript ecosystem and how it works in the real world. Although we regularly cover JavaScript frameworks, there are names new to me on the list of latest ones.

Ruby Competition Judged By Matz   Friday 11 November

The deadline for the 2017 edition of the Japan-based Fukuoka Ruby Award is December 27th and is open to any project that uses Ruby and was developed or completed within the last year. The Grand Prize is 1 Million Yen, currently worth less than $1,000, but the main attraction is that Matz himself in on the judging panel.

Kotlin 1.05 Released   Thursday 10 November

A new version of Kotlin, the language created by JetBrains, has just been released. Kotlin is another Java replacement and it claims, or rather aims, to be better while fully interoperable.

Google Firebase Adds Analytics, Improves Gaming   Thursday 10 November

At this week's Firebase Summit in Berlin Google announced a range of improvements for Firebase, its app development platform.

The Core

IBM, Slack, Watson and the Era of Cognitive Computing   Monday 14 November

There's a new chapter in the ongoing "Adventures of Watson" which introduces a new character and partner to Watson, going by the name of the Slack Chatbot.

Just JavaScript - In The Beginning Was The Object   Friday 11 November

JavaScript is a very subtle and sophisticated language and it deserves to be treated in its own right and not as a poor copy of other object-oriented language. In this first chapter of Just JavaScript we take a radical look at the way everything in JavaScript is an object.