Thurrott Daily: January 14

Good morning. Here are some tech tidbits from around the web.

1/14/2016 10:19:20 AM

Devs, mark your calendars: Build 2016 registration opens next week

If you’re serious about attending Build 2016 in late March, you need to be quick, since this event always sells out immediately. And on that note, you’ll need to be by your PC on Tuesday, January 19, 2016 at 9:00 am PT/12:00 pm ET: That’s when Build 2016 registration opens. Good luck!

Bing gets a new logo

And it’s like getting a new Bing in your Bing. Or something. Anyway,Advertising Age explains something no one would have otherwise even noticed:

Microsoft on Thursday plans to introduce a new version of the logo for Bing, the No. 2 search engine, switching to green from yello and putting the “b” in upper case. The changes come partly because the green “is easier to see over yellow,” a Microsoft spokeswoman said, and because the new look displays well “across Windows devices and services.”

Here’s the change:

Microsoft comes through on promise to open source its Edge JavaScript engine

Back in December, Microsoft said it would open-source “the key components of the Chakra JavaScript engine” in its Microsoft Edge web browser. This week, they did so.

Today, we are excited to share with you that we’ve just made the sources for ChakraCore available under the MIT License at the ChakraCore GitHub repository. Going forward, we’ll be developing the key components of Chakra in the open.

The ChakraCore repository provides a fully supported and open-source standalone JavaScript engine, with the same characteristics as the Microsoft Edge’s Chakra engine, to embed in projects, innovate on top of and contribute back to. We will be accepting community contributions and input to ChakraCore. Once the changes from any pull request have been vetted, our goal is to ensure that all changes find their way to be shipped as a part of the JavaScript engine powering Microsoft Edge and the Universal Windows Platform on Windows 10.

Microsoft quietly squeeks out a Delivery Beta app for Windows 10

No official announcement yet, but thanks to the irrepressible WalkingCat, we know now that Microsoft has released an app for Windows 10 for PCs and Mobile called Delivery Beta.

There is little information about this app: The Features list just reads, “internal beta.” But the Version notes list:

• Animations. Everyone loves animations.
• Support for mobile phones.
• Package list roaming across all your devices.
• Assorted bug fixes.

Running the app, it appears obvious enough: Just enter a tracking number (UPS, FedEx, whatever) and it will track the package. That doesn’t seem too interesting, but if it could integrate with email or other sources and be automatic, we might be onto something here.

Google Maps will predict where you’re going and provide navigation advice

Google Maps is one of the primary apps I really miss when I use a Windows phone (though Waze certainly helps on the navigation bit). There are many reasons: No other mapping/location/navigation solution works so well, is so full-featured, or is updated so often. And on that note, Google just updated Maps again, this time with a new Driving Mode feature that suggests destinations based on the time, your habits, and the traffic conditions.

Now with just one tap on Android, you can find out whether you should hit the road or put in some gym time while you wait out the gridlock. Get information like ETAs, traffic updates, nearby gas prices and quickest routes to familiar places–like home, work and recently searched destinations–all without entering a destination.

Related to this is a little discussed feature of Android that works like “deep link” tiles in Windows Phone/Windows 10 Mobile: From within Maps, you can create a Driving shortcut on your Android home screen that takes you directly to this functionality.

Amazing.