For middle-aged and older people at least, using the internet helps boost brain power, research suggests. A University of California Los Angeles team found searching the web stimulated centres in the brain that controlled decision-making and complex reasoning. The researchers say this might even help to counteract the age-related physiological changes that cause the brain to slow down. As the brain ages, a number of changes occur, including shrinkage and reductions in cell activity, which can affect performance. It has long been thought that activities which keep the brain active, such as crossword puzzles, may help minimise that impact - and the latest study suggests that surfing the web can be added to the list.

Each volunteer underwent a brain scan while performing web searches and book-reading tasks. Both types of task produced evidence of significant activity in regions of the brain controlling language, reading, memory and visual abilities. However, the web search task produced significant additional activity in separate areas of the brain which control decision-making and complex reasoning - but only in those who were experienced web users. The researchers said that, compared to simple reading, the internet’s wealth of choices required people to make decisions about what to click on in order to get the relevant information. Now you have a great reason to waste even more time browsing online!

Source: BBC

Given its history of moving deadlines at a moment’s notice, it hardly seems surprising that Microsoft is keeping Windows XP alive even longer than expected, but its latest move looks particularly bad for Vista.  The apparent decision to allow OEM computer sellers to offer disks that downgrade installations of Windows Vista to XP until the end of July next year clearly bumps up against the period when Windows 7 might be released.

Partners originally had up until January 31 2009 to provide the Windows XP Professional recovery media with machines running Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate. Now they have until July 31, 2009. Microsoft had previously said it would end the scheme next January, but the continued lack of demand for Vista appears to be behind the change of heart. If the move is confirmed, it’s yet more bad news for Vista, as XP users may have the option to skip the unloved OS entirely and move straight to Windows 7.

Source: Techradar

OpenOffice may not have got the headlines it deserves in the past, but that suddenly looks to have changed… With today’s release of OpenOffice 3, developer Sun Microsystems has seen download demand for the suite reach such levels it has been forced to run a stripped down site to avoid the thing going under. Consequently all that currently remains of openoffice.org is a text only page with download links (it’s tough being popular). This popularity is looking deserved too with OfficeOffice 3 running on Windows, Linux RPM, Linux DEB, Solaris x86, Solaris SPARC and Intel based Mac OS X Mac OSX PPC OSes making it the most platform friendly office suite out there.

So what do we get this time around? In truth the benefits are more centred around improving functionality than beautification (traditionally the way with ‘OOo’) and to this end the suite takes a major step forward with a newbie-friendly smart start page (pictured) and crucially full support for Microsoft Office’s new xml based file formats including docx, xlsx and pptx. Other notable highlights include Writer’s ability to now display multiple pages at once (great for larger monitors) while the Calc spreadsheet has seen its 256 column limit expanded to over 1,000 and there are improved network collaboration tools as well. Meanwhile OpenOffice’s famed high speed, low impact performance is claimed to be better than ever.

Source: Trusted Reviews