Home Depot is piloting a program that requires tools to be activated by Bluetooth before you can use them. The program is meant to deter theft, but experts say it’s a sign of the increasingly blurry definition of ownership in the digital age. “The bigger question is what downstream software update may turn the once-owned power drill into the newly leased power drill, which throttles features, functions, benefits, digital obsolescence, and your private data,” David Forman, a vice president at cybersecurity firm Coalfire, told Lifewire in an email interview....

OLED displays are superior to the LCDs in most laptops, but short battery life and high pricing have kept them out of small, portable PCs. Dell’s latest XPS 13 could change that. It has a 3,456 x 2,160 OLED and promises a contrast ratio of 100,000:1, nearly a hundred times better than a typical LCD laptop display. This isn’t Dell’s first go at OLED. Alienware, which Dell owns, introduced a short-lived OLED variant of the Alienware 13....

Of course, that information doesn’t help those folks who might need to buy a new vehicle. A single-car family with a car that’s been in a collision or is beyond repair can’t wait 12 months (or longer) for the market to settle itself. They’ve been eyeing an EV, and now they figure if they have to buy something new, it might as well be powered by electrons instead of fossil fuels....

You’ve always been able to share app purchases, but now anything you pay for inside an app also can be shared, including subscriptions. IAP-sharing joins all the other Family Sharing services, like iCloud storage, TV and Arcade subscriptions, and Apple News+. This is a big deal, and can potentially save you a ton of money. But what about the developers? Aren’t they going to be out of pocket? James Abeler, founder and director of Firecore, which makes the excellent video-playing app, Infuse, thinks not....

Virtualization is usually considered too geeky a process for average desktop users, but all it takes is a single click to install Windows 11 on top of the new Parallels Desktop 18. With a significantly improved performance, and the ability to work with Xbox and PlayStation controllers for playing Windows-only games, initial reviews on Twitter seem to suggest Apple Silicon Macs are the best Windows PC, though the experts aren’t buying any of it....

Cybersecurity researchers at Rezilion recently discovered over 90,000 vulnerable internet-facing applications, including over 68,000 potentially vulnerable Minecraft servers whose admins haven’t yet applied the security patches, exposing them and their users to cyberattacks. And there’s little you can do about it. “Unfortunately, log4j will haunt us internet users for quite a while,” Harman Singh, Director at cybersecurity service provider Cyphere, told Lifewire over email. “As this issue is exploited from server-side, [people] can’t do much to avoid the impact of a server compromise....

Yet this is exactly what our mobile carriers have been doing. Thanks to responses published by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), we now know that not only are some of the country’s top telecom operators, including AT&T, T-Mobile, US Cellular, Verizon, and others, privy to our phone’s location information, many hold on to this, and other, rather private data, for years on end. “Our mobile phones know a lot about us,” FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in the press release about the responses....

The announcement, made on YouTube’s news blog and reported by CNET, explains how the new features will “help people more easily search and find content on YouTube.” The first change is allowing users to get a preview of the video they’re about to watch on the YouTube mobile app. A video creator can add time-stamped images that list out the different topics covered in their video and allow users to determine if it’s of interest....

Whether you use YouTube in a browser or on your phone, things are going to start looking a little different in the near future—especially if you prefer to use the dark theme. The darks are getting darker to bump up the contrast and make colors and brighter tones pop just a bit more, while video and playlist pages will be adding a little dynamic color. This “ambient mode,” as YouTube calls it, dynamically samples color from the video and adds similar shades to the background of the video or playlist page....

But unlike last year’s Marvel’s Avengers and the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy game from Square-Enix, this crime-fighting adventure is a mobile exclusive. This means fans won’t be powering up their PCs, PlayStations, or Xbox consoles, but will instead be saving the world on their smartphones. While it’s played on iOS and Android devices, Future Revolution isn’t necessarily smaller or less ambitious than the big-budget games we’re used to enjoying from behind a controller....

Whether you’re a veteran ship captain or a greenhorn, starting today all World of Warships players on any server can receive a free Premium account upgrade for a full week (normally $4.99) during the Plunder Dash event. But it’s opt-in, not automatic, so you’ll need to manually claim it before you’ll see the benefits. These Premium account benefits include increased experience gains that speed up research and ship unlocks, as well as credit bonuses so you don’t have to spend as much time saving up....

These programs — commonly called zip or unzip programs — are usually small, easy to install, ​and support lots of common compression formats. In addition to decompressing files, PeaZip can also create new archives in over 10 formats. These can be password-protected and encrypted with 256-bit AES encryption, as well as secured with a keyfile for added protection. PeaZip has some advanced features, too, like scheduled archives and support for creating self-extracting files....

All of these apps are different, but a Wi-Fi analyzer might check the network for which devices are connected to it, the strength of the channel, the IP address of the devices and network itself, open ports, and more. It’s really a must have when you’re checking out your own Wi-Fi network to see how secure it is. There are also free Wi-Fi scanners here that will help you identify networks around you, telling you if they’re open or closed as well as the strength of the connection....

Disable Startup Programs to Speed Up Windows The more applications enabled in your startup, the longer the boot up process can be. However, you can select which applications are part of the startup process to speed things up: Optimize Windows 10: Turn Off Windows Tips Windows 10 has a built-in function that runs in the background and will prompt you with tips and suggestions to make sure you use the tools available....

Scratch uses a building-block visual interface to create a scaffolded experience for kids and parents. You stack together programming components, such as actions, events, and operators. Each block has a shape that only allows it to be combined with a compatible object. Repeat loops, for example, are shaped like a sideways “U” to let you know that you need to put blocks in between the start and stop of a loop....

8 Things to Consider When Buying a Mouse What you intend to use a mouse for will significantly impact what you’ll want to consider. Something simple and inexpensive will probably do if you only need it for basic point-and-click functionality. However, if you’d prefer not to deal with cords, need something that feels very snappy and precise, or have issues with wrist comfort while working on your computer, there are several options available....

Memory Try beginner, intermediate, or advanced games of memory where you try to remember where each logo appeared in a grid as you match up pairs. It can be tricky in the advanced version where all the logos use the same colors. Slide Puzzle For the logo slide puzzle, you slide the pieces around to reassemble the scrambled logo. It’s challenging even when you recognize the logo and really tough when it’s an unfamiliar one....

It’s frustrating but there are often solutions you can try to get back to your show. What Causes Disney Plus Error Code 42? If you encounter error 42 on Disney Plus, your device is having trouble connecting with Disney’s servers. There could be a few reasons on both sides why this happens: Problems with your streaming deviceProblems with your internet connectionYour internet connection is too slow.Disney’s servers are overwhelmed....

Attributes Describe Entities If you sell products and enter them into a table with columns for ProductName, Price, and ProductID, each of those headings is an attribute. In each field under those headings, you’d enter the product names, prices, and product IDs, respectively. Each one of the field entries is also an attribute. This makes sense, given that the nontechnical definition of an attribute is that it describes a characteristic or quality of something....

Click the New Mii button to the left of your screen (it looks like a happy face with a “+” on it) to start a new Mii. You can also click on the Edit Mii button (the happy face with the eye) to change any existing Miis you have created. At the top of your screen is a row of buttons. Click the first one. This allows you to fill out basic information on your Mii such as name, birth date and favorite color (which, if you’re making a Mii based on yourself, could, of course, be your name, birth date, and favorite color)....