It's everyone's favorite food-holiday, folks. And that can only mean one thing: it's time to dress your Android device up like a turkey!

Well, sort of. I am not suggesting you physically attach feathers or a beak to your phone, but I am absolutely suggesting you download some fun turkey-related apps on your device, like now.

(Credit: Access Lane) First, go ahead and download Thanksgiving Turkey Run Live Wallpaper. It costs 99 cents in the Android Market, but it's a small price to pay to get costumed turkeys running wildly around your home screen. You can let these cute, animated birds run freely around without a care in the world, or if you get bored observing their blissful existence, you can tap your screen to shoot them. The wallpaper even keeps a running count of your kills. Exciting, right?

(Credit: HiTechPilot) If not, you can, of course, go the fall colors and horns-of-plenty route. Fall Leaves for Thanksgiving is a great choice with its huge variety of holiday-themed wallpapers. You can choose from several different backgrounds including pumpkin patches, cornucopias, and assorted gourds, and there are virtually endless combinations of settings to always keep things fresh. ... [Read more]

Google's nifty new side-by-side viewer puts results and pages right next to one another.

Google's doubling down on its efforts to pull iOS users into frequent searchers with a new iPad-centric version of its search app.

The new version, released today as a free update to the company's universal iOS app (iTunes), gives iPad users on iOS 4 or higher a handful of new features, and put Google's app in tighter competition with Apple's built-in Safari browser.

The app now includes Google Instant, so that search results stream in as you type. Google's coupled this with its Instant Preview technology, giving users a quick look at a destination site without having to load it. These results show up in a string of previews, similar to what can be found with Google's overhauled image search carousel, the one that lets you swipe through images like you would music albums in Apple's Cover Flow view.

Here's what that looks like:

Google's new image carousel lets you flick th... [Read more]

Apple recently issued an update for Thunderbolt-equipped Mac systems that addresses the intermittent black screens some people have been seeing when using Apple's external Thunderbolt display.

The 53.23MB update is for systems running Snow Leopard, and should be available via Software Update (in the Apple menu), but can also be downloaded from the update's Web site.

The update includes new drivers for all supported graphics controllers from Intel, Nvidia, and AMD, but it also includes components of Apple's OpenCL framework that are specific to the AMD graphics chipset, which suggests this issue stems from a poor software implementation for the Radeon chips in affected systems.

Recently Apple released updates for both Lion and Snow Leopard that address a general black-screen bug in mid-2010 MacBook Pro systems. While the current update is not for these systems, the problem may be related since the issues appear to be involve the same OpenCL framework.

Be sure your computer is fully backed up before applying the update. This is not a firm... [Read more]

Even though Google's Android handily tops Apple's iOS in terms of overall smartphone market share, a new report suggests that Apple still wallops it when counting dollars spent on apps.

In a note sent to investors this morning, Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster says Google's Android Market has pulled in about 7 percent of the raw sales that Apple's had since it launched the App Store, with Apple continuing to mop up about 85-90 percent of money spent on mobile apps.

Munster offers that Google is on track to eat into that hefty lead over the "next 3-4" years, with Apple's lead on dollars spent slipping down in the the "70 percent plus" percent range. To validate this, Munster points to a mix of sources, mainly third-party app tracker AndroLib and Apple's disclosures (presumably apps downloaded, and developer payouts--two numbers Apple frequently touts).

So how much does that work out to for Google in terms of app sales? Munster offers a ballpark estimate of about $330 million since the launch of Google's Android Market. That's from 90 million paid app downloads out of Google's 6.75 billion total registered downloads, which means that 1.3 percent of its downloads were paid apps.

Crunching the numbers, Munster has Apple Apple considerably higher with 13.5 percent of its downloads being for paid applications, with Apple pulling in about $4.9 billion in cumulative sales since ... [Read more]

A new version of Firefox for Android uses the operating system's own user interface technology

It was a tough decision for Firefox on Android: improve the browser's performance or keep its compatibility with add-ons and other technology?

But after creating a prototype, Mozilla settled on the winning answer quickly: performance. And tomorrow, a month after making the decision, Mozilla plans to release an early version of the overhauled Firefox for Android.

The organization will introduce the new version on the "nightly" channel, where Mozilla tests raw new technology. With the organization's rapid-release cycle, the nightly version graduates to the Aurora, beta, and final-release channels, maturing for six weeks in each phase.

The new version is strategically important for Mozilla for multiple reasons. First, smartphones and tablets are at the center of a mobile-first transformation of the computing industry, and Firefox isn't preinstalled anywhere right now. Second, with Firefox shut out on Apple's iOS and Microsoft's Windows Phone, Android is effectively the only route for Mozilla to bring its browser to the mobile market.

Last, Mozilla's objective--to ensure an open Web--relies on Firefox. Right now, Apple and Google browsers based on the open-source WebKit project dominate mobile browsing.

Release manager ... [Read more]

Microsoft is on the hunt for beta testers for its next version of Security Essentials.

Microsoft is unveiling a beta of the next version of its Security Essentials anti-malware program and is hunting for people who can give it a test drive.

Users interested in trying out the beta can officially register at the sign-up page. A Microsoft Live account is required, and the company promises to send out e-mails when the beta is available to download.

The number of initial beta testers required will be limited, according to a recent Microsoft blog. But the company expects to release the beta to the general public by year's end.

Microsoft is touting several new features in Security Essential's next release, including a simpler interface, better performance, and savvier detection and cleanup features. The new version will also be able to automatically remove severe malware infections without bothering the user.

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Although Flash has been a staple on Android, don't expect to find it in Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) just yet.

Speaking to Slashgear over the weekend, Google said that Ice Cream Sandwich will not come with Flash preinstalled nor will the platform be available in Android Market. The issue, Google told Slashgear, is that Adobe has yet to update its application to make it function properly on the new operating system.

Currently, Adobe's Flash Player only works with Android versions 2.2 to 3.2, according to its Android Market listing.

That should change soon, though. Speaking to Pocket-Lint today, Adobe told the site that Ice Cream Sandwich support is coming by the end of 2011. Future versions of Android, however, will not get Flash, the company told Pocket-Lint.

Ice Cream Sandwich is the latest version of Google's Android platform. The operating system comes with a refreshed design and a host of improvements. In a review of the operating system earlier this month, CNET's Jessica Dolcourt said that Ice Cream Sandwich succeeds "in moving Google forward, and reaffirming its staying power as a mo... [Read more]

Microsoft's Windows Phone platform is apparently growing in popularity among app developers.

The software giant's Windows Phone Marketplace now hosts more than 40,000 apps and games from more than 10,000 different publishers, according to a study conducted by All About Windows Phone. About 33 percent of those apps were added in the past 90 days.

Of the submissions made during the past month, 85 percent were apps, while 15 percent were games. Some 68 percent of those were free downloads, 23 percent were paid, and 9 percent were paid after the initial free trial period.

Apps are being added a rate of 165 a day, and the Windows Phone watcher predicts that the marketplace, which only launched in October 2010, will surpass the 50,000-app mark by the end of January 2012.

As impressive as that growth rate sounds, the marketplace's number of offerings pales in comparison with the app stores for competing mobile platforms. Apple's App Store, which launched in 2008, surpassed the 500,000-app mark in May, adding some 150,000 apps in just four months. Meanwhile, Google's Android App Store, which also launched in 2008, offers more than 300,000 apps. ... [Read more]