Bing Translator app now available for Windows 8, uses a webcam to translate text

Microsoft's Bing Translator app has long been available for Windows Phone, but it's arriving on Windows 8 this week. Like its Windows Phone counterpart, you can translate content through text and even a webcam. The application lets you simply point a camera at printed text and automatically overlays the translated text on top.

Microsoft has added offline support to Bing Translator for Windows 8 too, meaning you can download certain languages and use them when you don't have a Wi-Fi connection. The app makes full use of Windows 8 by integrating with the Share Charm so you can highlight any text in another Windows 8 app and translate it quickly. Bing Translator for Windows 8 is available immediately in the Windows Store.

HD video functionality arrives on updated Skype for Windows 8

Microsoft has released a new version of Skype for Windows 8, which brings improved support for HD video and better video messaging.

With the latest release, you can now send 720p video and receive 1080p video, which should bolster the overall quality and performance of video calls. However, HD video support is only available in "select scenarios" depending on the sender's camera, the receiver's setup, and available network bandwidth, Microsoft specified.

As for other changes, the new version also brings improvements to Skype's video-messaging capabilities.

"Video messaging enables you to share life moments with contacts whether they're off or online," Aga Guzik, head of desktop product marketing at Skype, wrote in a blog post. "With this release we improved the stability of video messaging and made video messaging easier to find with improved notifications."

There are still several known issues impacting the video messaging feature, however. For instance, video messages should be displayed in the chat history, but they won't show up there at the moment. In addition, the video message thumbnail incorrectly redirects to record instead of playback in certain situations.

While those problems remain outstanding, Microsoft fixed a number of other issues impacting file transfers, call connections and notifications. As a result, Skype should crash less when you're sending files, reconnecting a call and clicking on notifications.

Windows 8.1 given first official outing, and yes, the Start button is back

Microsoft has given a first look at Windows 8.1, the free update to Windows 8 that it plans to deliver this autumn.

Though it will disappoint some, it should surprise few to learn that Windows 8.1 will not revert all the user interface changes made in Windows 8. Instead, 8.1 will be an incremental update that builds on the Windows 8 interface and its Metro design, but does not replace it.

As such, Windows 8.1 still has the Start screen. It is, however, a more customizable Start screen. There are new tile sizes: a double height tile, to allow apps to show more information, and a smaller tile size, to allow apps to be packed more tightly. There are more options for the Start screen background and colors, including animated backgrounds and the ability to use the same background as used on the desktop. This last change should make the Start screen feel a little less visually disconnected from the desktop world.

The Start screen is also more respectful of personalization. In Windows 8, newly-installed applications just dump their tile or icons on the Start screen. This undermined the personal nature of the screen; you'd have your own, neatly organized apps, but then you'd install a desktop program and it'd just spew a dozen icons all over the place. In Windows 8.1, new apps don't get to automatically stick a tile on the Start screen. They'll still show up in the all programs app view, and they'll be highlighted as new, but the decision to pin them rests with the user.

That all programs view is also more flexible, with a variety of sorting and filtering options. Microsoft says that it will be possible to make "alternate screens" the default when you boot the system. The company mentions explicitly the ability to boot directly to all programs view, rather than the tile view, and it's believed that it will also be possible to boot directly to the desktop.

Not content with putting Start buttons on mice (in addition to keyboards, tablets, and the charms bar), Microsoft is reinstating the taskbar Start button. Clicking it will bring up the Start screen.

Within Metro apps, the button will remain invisible; putting the mouse cursor near the bottom left of the screen will show the button, as it does in Windows 8, but the button itself has changed its appearance. In Windows 8, the button is a miniature thumbnail depiction of the Start screen. In 8.1, it will simply be the Windows logo.

Search is getting reworked to aggregate search results from multiple content sources, including files, apps, settings, and the Web, simultaneously.

Some of Windows 8's obvious limitations are being lifted. In 8.1, Metro apps can be run on multiple monitors simultaneously. On any single monitor, more than two applications can be run simultaneously. Instead of Windows 8's fixed split, where one application gets 320 pixels and the other application gets the rest, the division between apps will be variable. It'll also be possible to have multiple windows from a single app so that, for example, two browser windows can be opened side-by-side.

The built-in applications will get a bunch of updates, and some new apps will be added. Microsoft gave a little information about what we can expect to see—fewer restrictions on the Photos app so it can open files from more places and perform light editing, a "completely redesigned" Music app to make it easier to play your own music (and, we hope, have less of the hard sell that the current app has), and built-in saving directly to and loading from SkyDrive, even when offline. The company says that it'll provide more information on the new and updated apps later in the year.

Work is also being done on two of the "special" built-in apps: Settings and Internet Explorer. A major flaw with using Windows 8, especially on a tablet, is that many, many settings can only be found in the desktop Control Panel, forcing finger-based users onto a mouse-based interface. Microsoft claims that in 8.1, the Settings app will contain "all" of the settings on your device, including things like joining domains and changing the screen resolution.

Internet Explorer 11 will, of course, be faster, have better standards support, and include all the other things we expect new browsers to do. One of those features—not yet confirmed, but strongly hinted—is support for WebGL 3D graphics. The browser will also catch up to Chrome and Firefox in other regards, with tab sync across machines.

Overall, these sound like sensible changes. The new operating system will keep the same core elements as Windows 8 but assemble them in a way that's more flexible, more personal, and fundamentally more useful. A beta of the new version will become available on June 26, coinciding with Microsoft's developer conference, BUILD.

Microsoft Gives In To The Old Guard, Adds Start Button And Boot To Desktop To Windows 8.1

Windows 8.1, which will be available for download in a preview version on June 26, will feature the good old Start button in desktop mode. Users who dislike the new Modern UI/Metro interface will also be able to boot right to the desktop. While rumors about the return of the Start button had long been making the rounds, Antoine Leblond, Microsoft’s corporate VP for Windows Program Management, made the official announcement on the Windows Blog this morning.

Given all the criticism Microsoft had to endure for removing the Start button, it’s not a huge surprise that it will return in Windows 8.1. Microsoft assumed that touchscreens would be a bit more mainstream by now, I think. Leblond notes that Microsoft has recognized that there are still many non-touch devices in use today. That’s a bit of an understatement, of course. The reality is that most Windows PCs don’t have touchscreens. Leblond especially stresses that this is true for commercial settings.

So to help mouse and keyboard users, Microsoft is making a few more changes beyond bringing back the Start button in desktop mode. It will be on by default, but if you don’t like it, you will be able to remove it.

Leblond doesn’t say this in the blog post, but a Microsoft spokesperson confirmed to us that you will have the option to boot directly into the desktop, too, without having to go through the fullscreen Start menu first. You will also be able to boot into the Modern UI, but with the Apps list view open as the default.

One question that was probably on many people’s mind, though, was what the Start button would actually do. This may come as a bit of a disappointment to many, but a click on the Start button will take you to the regular Start screen. There’s no Windows 7-like pop-up menu that appears.

If you have personalized the Start screen to the app list view, however (another new feature in Windows 8.1), you will see that instead of the usual live tile view. This view will give you one-click access to all of your apps.

Microsoft will also change the Windows 8.1 Start “tip,” which appears when you move your mouse into the lower left corner of the screen, to be the usual Windows logo and not, as it is today, a representation of the Modern UI Start screen. In addition, you will be able to change what each of the screen’s corners will do.

That’s not the only concession Microsoft is making to its users, though. It’s also improving how the operating system handles multiple Metro/Windows Store apps that run at the same time. Currently, you can only run two apps at the same time (and only on one screen). One of those apps currently has to be the main app and take over about four-fifth of the screen while the other is relegated to the other fifth.

Windows 8.1, however, will allow you to size these snap views any way you want. The limit for apps that run on the same screen is also now three instead of two. You can also snap together multiple windows of the same app (say Internet Explorer), which should make multitasking with Windows Store apps a bit easier.

For users with multiple screens, Windows currently only allows Windows Store apps to run on one screen. This will change in Windows 8.1. Windows Store apps can now run on one screen and the other screen can show the Start menu.

Another area where Microsoft is making quite a few changes is in how the Search charm will work in Windows 8.1. According to Leblond, this search feature will now pull in results from Bing and also show aggregate results from apps, files and SkyDrive. It will also show actions you can take. If the web results feature a Wikipedia link, for example, you can ask Windows to read it out aloud. You can also play music files right from this view and there will probably a few more actions you can take that Microsoft hasn’t disclosed yet.

Unsurprisingly, Windows 8.1 will also feature Internet Explorer 11. The next version of the browser, Leblond writes, will offer better touch performance, faster page load times and “other new features.” Microsoft remains pretty tight-lipped about what these “new features” are, but Leblond does say that you will be able to change the appearance of the modern IE11 to always show the address bar (it currently auto-hides). He also says that you will be able to sync open tabs across your Windows 8.1 devices.

There are obviously quite a few additional features in Windows 8.1, too (and Microsoft says it still has a few more tricks up its sleeve, too). Windows 8.1 will will, for example, allow you to save files directly to SkyDrive without the need to install a separate app.

There are also a slew of new personalization options. The Lock Screen, for example, can now show a slide show of your images (both from SkyDrive and your local storage). In addition, the Lock Screen will now allow you to take Skype calls or take pictures without having to log in.

Other personalization options include the ability to choose your desktop background as your Start screen background (which should make switching back and forth between the Start screen and desktop mode a bit less jarring). Start screen backgrounds can now also be animated, similar to the backgrounds we’ve become accustomed to on Android. Microsoft says the Start screen tiles now come in more different sizes and it’s easier to select multiple files at once to resize them, move them and uninstall them. Because Microsoft found that users often moved tiles accidentally, you now have to press and hold (or use a right-click) to move them around.

Overall, Microsoft is moving in the right direction with Windows 8.1. The operating system will get many of the much-needed features that will make it easier to use and remove some of the more baffling design decision from Windows 8.

Leblond says Microsoft has been listening to its customers. He also says, however, that Microsoft remains committed to its vision and its “touch-first” approach to Windows 8. In reality, however, the company is making quite a few concessions to its users, who weren’t quite ready for this vision yet.