Microsoft Authenticator Gets Account Backup and Recovery
I’ve been a big fan of Microsoft’s two factor authentication (2FA) client since day one and I’m also one of the tester’s. My only concern, as I wrote nearly a year ago in https://digitalmediaphile.com/index.php/2017/05/27/multi-factor-authentication-app-backup-and-usage-strategies/ is what might happen if my iPhone was damaged and I needed a quick replacement. That concern is no more! Backup and Recovery is rolling out for iOS testers.
Fix for Pen Dragging Canvas in Photoshop 2018 CC after Windows Update
There’s a whole lot of Creatives in the Microsoft Surface Answers Forum complaining that after installing Cumulative Update KB4089848 that the pen drags the canvas around instead of drawing. Uninstalling the KB fixes this (and this is the first I’ve seen that functionality changed dramatically after installing a Cumulative update, but you never never know. And now there may be a “fix” to return to “legacy” behavior.
Pricing for Out of Warranty Surface Exchanges
Microsoft has published current pricing (in US Dollars) for those needing an out of warranty exchange for Surface devices (refurbished devices with a 90 day warranty). Until the end of March, the cost to replace a Surface Pro 3 was $450.00. It’s now jumped to $599.00. This is upsetting customers afflicted by the fallout from Batterygate and other issues. That’s a lot of money for this device and you definitely can do better looking elsewhere if you want to replace your sick SP3 with another SP3.
Turning a WordPress Blog into a PWA
Progressive Web Apps (PWA) are web apps that feature a native Windows app experience, and can use features like push notifications. The addition of Service Worker support in EdgeHTML makes this all possible. Other platforms (iOS, Android) have had this support for a while. PWA’s can be defined to run as standalone, run in browser, or minimal UI. Microsoft has been using Bing crawlers to find existing “high quality” PWA enabled sites and will be automatically adding some of these to the Windows Store (and later letting site owners to claim these apps and augment them).
I decided to get a head start on this technology and have gone through the process to produce a PWA for digitalmediaphile.com which runs on WordPress. It took some “fiddling” so I am sharing the process here. Continue reading
