Here’s our list of the top 10 cool tech gifts for this holiday season. They range from stocking-stuffer size (and price), to things that are definitely a splurge.

First off, a few of you have been asking us if it's cool to go ahead and upgrade to iOS 8 at this point. The answer is yes.

It's a big week -- the iPhone 6 starts shipping (and appears in stores, not that you'll be able to buy one) on Friday the 19th, and we'll have lots to say about that soon. And today, Apple releases iOS 8, the new operating system for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

Here's our quick take on what Apple had to say on Tuesday:

Password Security

We know we harp on this every single month, so we'll just say it quickly: it is time to get serious about password security. It is just no longer safe to try to memorize the passwords of all your web sites, or to use a single password for all of them. You need a password manager, which remembers secure passwords for you.

Well, yesterday was the keynote speech at Apple's World Wide Developer's Conference -- an event I used to enjoy attending when I worked at Apple -- and while they announced no new hardware products, as some were hoping, they still said a bunch of interesting things. Here's a summary of what they are:

The news has stories regularly about password databases at big companies getting hacked, and malware such as Heartbleed is going to become more common. If you use the same password for multiple websites, or if you use a basic password (like your dog's name) as your email password, then you're at risk.

A bug, nicknamed "Heartbleed," was recently discovered in a widely used method of protecting communications between your computer and your online services. 

Heads up: A security flaw was discovered on Macs, iPhones, and iPads. It affects secure communications between your computer and web sites. While there's little cause to panic, it turns out that it's theoretically possible for someone to listen on those secure communications without you being warned about it, though not without a fair bit of trickery. It's extremely unlikely that you've been affected by this.

Now up in the iPhone app store: Our IvanExpert app that makes it easy to contact us for Mac, iPhone, or iPad support.