Virtualization, Cloud Computing and Mobile: 8월 2010

2010년 8월 31일 화요일

How an App Store Could Revolutionize the TV Industry

Samsung’s next Bada device announced: the entry-level Wave 723

Are you in the market for a different smart phone operating system? Sick of the mainstream players? Perhaps you have a fondness for immature OSes that are only supported by one manufacturer?

Well, I’d initially recommend the Wave — Samsung’s original Bada-powered smartphone — but I know you’re a bit more budget minded than that. Who wants Super-AMOLED anyway?

Samsung hear ya, buddy, as today they announced their third-ish (fourth, I suppose) Bada-powered phone: the entry-level S7320E Wave 723 (henceforth known as just the Wave 723).

The most obvious feature is the built-in leather case, but other than that, the phone rocks a 3.2″ WQVGA (240×400) TFT display, 5MP camera with LED flash and QVGA (read: gross) video recording, Bluetooth 3.0, WiFi N, GPS, quad-band 2G, dual-band 3G, 3.5mm headphone jack, 90MB on-board storage, plus a MicroSD slot, and will measure just 109.5 x 53.9 x 11.8 mm.

The phone should be out in September, and, while pricing hasn’t yet been announced, expect cheap.

Check some more pics in the gallery, below.

Motorola: Droid X’s HDMI Port Is Only Active In Gallery App

The Droid X’s vaunted HDMI out seems to be of extremely limited utility at the moment, as a Motorola developer has said that it is only ever active within the Gallery application on the phone — essentially limiting it to media recorded on the phone, or media you’ve managed to slip in there. Wait, what about using a Netflix or YouTube app? And what if you want to watch a .MOV or .AVI off your SD card?

While it’s not exactly a crippling issue, it is bothersome in phone the tagline for which is “Droid does.” Not as bad as that refresh rate cap issue on the EVO, though. That would have really bugged me.

Of course, you’ll likely be able to get around it once a safe and reliable workaround or root method is distributed (contrary to early reports), but it still sucks for the end user who doesn’t want to have to worry about this kind of thing.

Samsung Epic 4G Gets Naked For FCC

With the Samsung Epic 4G launching very soon, here’s an interesting alternative view of the device. If you dig around enough on the FCC website, you’ll be able to find nude pictures of almost every phone. Sometimes they are barely legal shots, like this Samsung Epic 4G.

Wireless Goodness found these shots, and has a much more comprehensive idea of exactly what’s going on with the various circuits then I do. For example, the shot up above is of the main board and CPU: a Samsung Hummingbird processor running at 1GHz. The Hummingbird is a not so distant cousin of the Apple A4 processor, as both are made by Samsung. You can also see the NEC MC-10170 chip, which is the same video processing chip found in the Galaxy S devices.

What We’re Reading About the Cloud

In today’s cloud news we’re tackling the Large Hadron Collider and its petabytes of data as well as the importance of knowing where your apps will eventually run with so many diverse client devices out there. HP is also attempting another cloud play.

The Seven Secrets of Successful Data Scientists (From Dataspora Blog) At least in terms of building the infrastructure, this seems like solid advice. You can’t do all the fascinating analysis attributed to true data science if you have a faulty foundation.

Hybrid Apps: The Art of Being in Two Places at Once (From TechNewsWorld) This is both a good guide to buildings apps and a good lesson in strategy. Consumers use apps on a variety of devices, sometimes not online, so how/where the apps run needs to adjust accordingly.

Charge Your iPhone 4 With Sunlight

While we’ve been trying to beam the idea of a solar-embedded iPhone into Steve Job’s head (so far successfully), a design company called Frostfire is helping out. The company has created an iPhone 4 case that has a rechargeable lithium-ion battery at the base with a small solar panel embedded on it that can extend the battery life of your iPhone 4 while on the go.

Twenty minutes of direct sunlight shining on the so-called “Mooncharge” case will buy you an extra 50 minutes on standby mode, or 5 minutes of chatting, so, yeah, not a whole lot. The battery can be charged via a USB cord, as well, and fully charged, will provide the user with 315 hours on standby or 5 extra hours of talk time. The case costs $70.

Over 250,000 Apps Now in the App Store

Apple’s App Store now offers a selection of over a quarter of a million apps — a record reached in just a little over two years since the App Store first opened its digital doors.

The 250,000 milestone, a figure which Apple will no doubt mention at its upcoming September 1 media-event, was recorded by 148Apps, who released the newly collected data this weekend. Its numbers detailed that over 50,000 developers are now actively working on the iOS platform, with them submitting an average of 626 applications per day. Further insight revealed that the average price of a paid application is now $2.67.

What is Popcode?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8BaE5RtYOY&feature=player_embedded

iPad Magazines: The Pros & Cons

When the iPad was launched earlier this year, one of the big talking points was that the iPad might be the savior of magazines. By now many magazines are available on the iPad, either in their own standalone app or in a virtual magazine store. In this post we look at how magazines are using the iPad, what the user experience is like, and what iPad magazines still need to do to improve.

We'll analyze a standalone iPad magazine app (Wired) and a service that offers access to many different magazines (Zinio).

Note that we're focusing purely on the user experience of iPad magazines, rather than business matters like profitability or number of downloads.

Wired

Wired magazine has been the most high profile magazine to utilize the iPad's interactivity. Each new edition costs US$4.99 and is a fairly bulky download - the most recent 'Web is dead' edition was 482MB. But it is packed with interactive goodies.

The iPad version of Wired features videos, touchscreen infographics, slideshows, music and more. For example, a story about a small American town called Picher that has been "devastated" by lead and zinc mining, is accompanied by a video featuring Picher locals talking about the impact of mining on their town. It augments the story nicely and brings the reader closer to the issue.

There are some oddities to the Wired app, however. For example, you can't do the usual pinching motion to enlarge text that is present in most other iPad apps. So if the font type is too small for you to read, you're out of luck. The blog iA has a thorough critique of this and other issues. Also see our own Sarah Perez's thoughts on the sometimes confusing features of various iPad magazines.

Turn Your Head & Swipe: Doctors Love the iPad (Infographic)

The iPad meets many of the needs doctors say that have for a lightweight mobile computer and many are very interested in the device. An infographic below, from Mobile Health News, articulates various things doctors are taking into consideration.

ComputerWorld's Matt Hamblen wrote about medical, legal and other professional use of the iPad today as well. Hamblen writes that doctors like the device's unobtrusive size and unintimidating profile in patient care, but wish that it had Bluetooth support. Easy access to electronic health records is the device's most compelling quality, something Mike Kirkwood wrote about in depth here on ReadWriteWeb before the iPad launched. (The Healthcare System: An Apple Tablet's Biggest Opportunity)

The infographic below was created in support of the latest research report from Mobile Health News, titled The iPad vs. The Tablet PCs in Healthcare. A similar recent report that may be of more general interest is PSFK's Future of Health report for UNICEF.

Re-imagining the Interface of Mobile Augmented Reality

The mobile augmented reality (AR) industry has seen a tremendous amount of growth over the last year. No longer are we simply holding our phones up looking around for nearby coffee shops - now our magical pocket computers can recognize images and augment them in real-time with 3D graphics. Mobile AR browsers like junaio and Layar have begun to venture into this realm, but a new player, Popcode, has a different spin on the mobile AR interface and how we interact with objects in the real world.

Rouli Nir at Games Alfresco brought Popcode to my attention today with his article introducing Extra Reality Ltd., the British company behind the technology. Available for Android only at the moment, the free app lets users activate AR experiences by scanning one of Popcode's unique codes.

The codes consist of a series of dots and dashes (like Morse code) placed above and below the Popcode typographic logo. By scanning this marker, the app will quickly download the necessary assets to load a 3D experience based on the markerless tracking of an actual real-world object. Some of the examples in the video below include interactive business cards, maps and t-shirts.

2010년 8월 30일 월요일

The Great Big Spreadsheet of All Known Android Devices Everywhere

How many Droids are there? How much RAM is in the Nexus One? Does the Samsung Galaxy S support Wi-Fi N? Does the Droid X have a bigger screen than the Droid 2? Can you get Android in a TV? In a car?

If these are the sort of questions you've found yourself wondering about (or even Googling about with limited success), there's a new resource out there that you should be aware of. It's this incredible spreadsheet of all known Android devices and their technical specifications. And it includes smartphones, netbooks, e-books, PMPs (personal media players), MIDs (mobile Internet devices), TVs, cars and more.

We have to credit Portable Electronics Ltd., a New Zealand-based electronics distribution company, for building this massive resource. And we must thank the many kind folks on Twitter who also brought this to our attention.

The spreadsheet, which is a publicly available Google Doc, sorts Android devices into different categories (phones, netbooks, TV, etc.) using tabs across the top.

Hardware Acceleration is Coming to Chrome - Try it Now

Google just confirmed that Chrome will soon support GPU hardware acceleration. Developers can speed up the rendering of complex pages by offloading a lot of the processing to a computer's graphics card, which - after all - was specifically designed for these tasks. As browser developers continue to try to increase the responsiveness of their applications, hardware acceleration is the natural next place to look for performance gains. Microsoft is also working on hardware acceleration for the next version of its browser. The company plans to unveil the first complete build of Internet Explorer 9 next month. Mozilla, too, offers support for GPU acceleration in the latest beta version of Firefox 4 for Windows.

Vangelis Kokkevis, one of the engineers behind the Chromium project, notes that Chrome currently only uses hardware acceleration for displaying some content. Now that the basic infrastructure is in place, however, the Chromium team expects to move "even more of the rendering from the CPU to the GPU to achieve impressive speedups." In the long run, Google will likely also use this same infrastructure to offer support for accelerated 3D graphics in the browser.

Top 10 Most Important Features for Enterprise Smartphone Management Solutions

A new report from Forrester confirms a trend we've been reporting: enterprises are turning away from "one size fits all" organization-owned smart phone phone strategies in favor of multi-device, employee owned smart phone strategies. Of the firms polled by Forrester, approximately half are already embracing a multiplatform strategy, and nearly 60% support personally owned smartphones. Many enterprises are considering solutions to augment or replace their Blackberry Enterprise Servers. Forrester has identified the ten most important features for smart phone device management solutions, and ten vendors that offer all ten features.

Challenges for the enterprise

According to Forrester, IT is struggling with a two-fold challenge: mobile device management and security. To solve this problem, enterprises are increasingly investing in device-agnostic solutions. In the firm's report on mobile application development, Forrester recommends creating Web applications, instead of native applications, whenever possible.

Popular Android Mod Now Supports Froyo, Breathes Life Into Old Phones

The new Android 2.2-compatible version of Cyanogen, a hacker-created extension for the Android mobile operating system, was released this weekend. The new version of the popular mod is already being downloaded by scores of Android users who want more from their phones.

Android owners who "root" their phones can install CyanogenMod 6.0 to boost speed and battery life and add features not supported in the factory version of the operating system, such as music app enhancements, browser enhancements and FLAC playback support.

Rooting is a process similar to jailbreaking for the iPhone that gives users more freedom to modify a phone's software (see our coverage, How to Hack Your Android Phone and Why You Should Bother).

Mods like Cyanogen claim to increase speed and performance and add features to your Android device, which may be especially useful for users with older phones. Google's Nexus One handset, for example, is a beloved early-generation Android phone that could potentially be modified to improve performance.

2010년 8월 26일 목요일

Why Google Has No Game

A few weeks ago, I wrote Pandas and Lobsters: Why Google Cannot Build Social Applications, a post that dissected why Google doesn’t get social. Since then, Google appears to have stepped up its efforts to develop a coherent social strategy. To paraphrase the Black Eyed Peas, Google is so 2000 and late, trying to get into a business that Facebook lost interest in a couple years ago.

Since Google didn’t have the social DNA, it’s taken the strategy used by awkward rich guys everywhere by trying to buy some hotness: Slide and Jambool. If that wasn’t enough, they made expensive investments in Zynga and ngmoco.

My iPhone 4 Survival Kit

Although the hot air associated with “Antennagate” has mostly blown over, it hasn’t altered the physics of iPhone 4 signal attenuation, but there’s an app for that. Apple will provide you with one of their bumpers in many colors or one of many third-party offerings for free, but a bumper isn’t for me.

Bertrand Serlet on using Apple's private API's

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd97us27eSg&feature=player_embedded

A View Into How Apple Develops APIs

Apple develops world-class APIs. But how do they do it?

Here's a bit of insight into the process Apple goes through as explained by Bertrand Serlet, Apple's senior vice president of Software Engineering. He is responsible for leading Apple's software engineering group. He reports directly to Steve Jobs.

The video is quite brief but it's revealing in a few ways.

Apple relies on technologies with longevity. These are tested, proven technologies. In the video, Serlet talks about Unix-based APIs developed 40 years ago and Cocoa APIs that were developed 20 years ago. He refers to OpenGL, developed 15 years ago.

Seed Funding for Foodspotting Brings More Praise for AngelList

Food recommendation service Foodspotting announces today that it has closed a $750,000 round of seed funding led by Felicis Ventures, with participation from 500 Startups, High Line Venture Partners, Zelkova Ventures and 2020 Ventures. Today's announcement follows the launch of an updated website, a new iPhone app, and media partnerships with Travel Channel and Zagat.

Foodspotting allows users to find and share food recommendations using photos. "Foodspotting is not just for foodies," says CEO Alexa Andrzejewski, who notes that location-based services like Foodspotting and Foursquare are demonstrating the importance of sharing tips and recommendations when choosing restaurants and bars. People seek practical information and guidance, and the mobile experience offered by the Foodspotting iPhone app offers just that - with the added benefit, of course, of taking and looking at photos of some amazing meals.

Augmented Driving on your iPhone 3GS - Now available

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAFjO6JGwKg&feature=player_embedded

HomeArchivesFeaturesTagsBest of RWWFeatured: ReadWriteCloud | VS 2010 Competition New Augmented Reality App Brings Luxury to Your Car for $2.99

You know those advertisements for fancy high-end cars that can tell you when you're getting to close to another car, or perhaps, a runaway shopping cart? Cool stuff, right? If you're like me, you probably wish you could have features like these on your run down nine-year-old Ford Escort. Well, thanks to a new iPhone app, you can come pretty close. Using augmented reality (AR) technology, imaGinyze's Augmented Driving app can enhance your heads-up driving experience with safety information and warnings.

This isn't the first time we've seen AR invading our cars. In March we showed you that General Motors is researching technology to augment our windshields, and in May we looked at AR turn-by-turn directions on Android phones from Wikitude. After installing this $2.99 app for the iPhone, users can mount their phones on the dashboard, allowing the device to see the road and detect possible dangers.

If a car suddenly slows ahead of you, the app will detect the approaching vehicle and warn you. It can also detect other cars in neighboring lanes, and can tell when you change lanes. The app can be configured to provide any combination of visual, audio and vocal alerts, and the color of the HUD is interchangeable as well.

2010년 8월 25일 수요일

Android DRM Cracked! Pirating Apps is "Easy"

The licensing system Google implemented to protect the applications found in its Android Market has been cracked, only a month after it debuted. Google's "Licensing Service for Android," designed to protect against unauthorized use of paid Android applications, was released late July for all versions of the Google Android mobile operating system, 1.5 or higher. In basic terms, the system functions as sort of a DRM protection mechanism for Android applications, ensuring that the apps on a user's phone have been properly purchased and paid for.

Now, in a detailed how-to guide posted by Justin Case on Android Police, not only has Google's licensing system been cracked, doing so was a fairly easy process.

How Was This Hacked?

It's not surprising to hear that a protection system was hacked or cracked these days. There is virtually no unbreakable code, given enough Red Bull and a dedicated hacker. What's somewhat disturbing about this particular crack, however, was how simple it was to accomplish.

In this case, the crack was made possible due to the licensing system's use of Java code. According to Case, Java code is what most Android applications are currently written in. Because of Java's cross-platform compatibility needs, there are already a number of software suites that can decompile and disassemble Java code, making it an easy target for reverse engineering.

After decompiling the code, cracking the licensing system is as simple as finding the file that references Google's licensing service and changing it to include a different set of instructions. A hacker would just need to change of couple of bytes of code that detail how an application should behave after verification of its license is complete.

Android Anti-Malware Apps vs. Tap Snake

Last week Sarah Perez reported that a game called Tap Snake, available in Android Market, was actually a mostly harmless piece of spyware. I took to the opportunity to test a few of the anti-malware apps available on the market: antivirus free from droidSecurity, Lookout, Symantec's Norton Mobile Security for Android beta, and Smobile. I was also going to try SmrtGuard, but I couldn't get the app to activate before Tap Snake was removed from Android Market. Of those four apps, only one detected Tap Snake as a potential threat.

Lookout screenshot - catching Tap Snake

Surprisingly, Lookout was the only app that caught Tap Snake. I say surprisingly, because Symantec definitely knew about the app by the time I conducted my tests on the morning of August 17th. droidSecurity, SmrtGuard and Symantec did not respond to inquiries as to why their respective apps failed to detect the spyware.

It's important to note that one is an incredibly small sample size, and it's hard to judge a security solution based on one case study. The apps also have other security features, such as backup, device location and remote wipe, that are worth considering.

Read more...

Android Mobile Web Use Up 400% in Q2, Outpacing Apple & BlackBerry

The Android platform has garnered much attention lately because of its rapidly expanding number of apps and phones on the market, so additional growth statistics should come at no surprise. Mobile Web usage on Android devices in the U.S. quadrupled in the second quarter of 2010, stealing market share from Apple and BlackBerry devices, says U.K. mobile analytics firm Bango. Apple's traffic grew just 13% causing it's share of the mobile browsing market to fall 16%, and BlackBerry saw its similarly slow growth outpaced by Android devices.

"Apple appears to be losing ground to the latest Android handsets from HTC, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and Samsung, showing the slowest quarterly growth in Web browsing."
- Ray Anderson, CEO Bango

Statistics like these can be misleading or confusing to some mobile consumers. To paraphrase what is happening in the mobile Web industry, all platforms - Apple, BlackBerry, Android, Nokia, etc - are all seeing growth and the market is expanding. However, Android devices saw far more growth than the others in this last quarter, snagging a larger piece of the overall pie.

As Bango CEO Ray Anderson points out, BlackBerry and Apple still dominate, together accounting for nearly two-thirds of the mobile Web market.

Countering all the FUD About Cloud Security

Right now, attacks on data as it passes between virtual machines are pretty much theoretical. We have not had a major public attack that we can point to as a clear example.

It raises questions when we talk about security in the cloud. Without any proof of any major attacks, the discussion about cloud security can seem like FUD.

Still, the perception about security is what in large part slows the cloud's adoption in the enterprise. But it can also have a counter effect by spurring security development for the network. That's where the focus needs to be as cloud computing becomes more predominant.

Tom Mornini co-founded Engine Yard. He wrote a commentary piece for ZDnet that compares cloud security to the Maginot Line:

"Reasonable security standards
A large number of data breaches occur because of issues with internal security and protocols. Security concerns are the number one roadblock to enterprise adoption of cloud computing, yet most security breaches occur on-premise. Whether it's a code glitch, unencrypted network traffic within a secure data center, a disgruntled employee, or a thief on your payroll, enterprise data may well be more secure in the cloud.

Good, But Not Too Good - Microsoft Seeks Sweet Spot With Docs.com

Microsoft announced new features today to Docs.com, a Facebook-integrated Web app in closed beta that lets users create multi-author Word docs, Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations for free.

The new features themselves are not earth-shattering, but they show how the team behind Docs.com continues to improve and innovate. The question is, how far will Microsoft go to make Docs.com better before the free service starts to undermine its flagship Office products?

Docs.com is part of Microsoft's response to Google Docs, the Web app that revolutionized collaborative editing and introduced people to the idea of letting documents live in the cloud, for free.

Microsoft Office Home and Business 2010, which includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, outlook and OneNote, costs $279.99 - which seems staggering in the age of so many free Web-based productivity tools.

Microsoft seems to be hoping that Docs.com will convert free users into paid users of Microsoft Office. The company never misses a chance to mention that Docs.com is "built on Microsoft Office 2010" and has "full compatibility with Microsoft Office:"

2010년 8월 24일 화요일

Sprint Samsung Epic 4G TV Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPktfRx2fgc&feature=player_embedded

Why iPad 2 Is Coming and What to Expect

There’s been quite a bit of buzz around the next iPad. The one we’re using now is only six months old, but some are already looking forward to the possibility of a new form factor and a new screen size. I expect Apple to release another iPad this year. Here’s why:

Competition is non-existent for iPad right now. All the other guys have tablets shipping “end of the year,” and many more of the more formidable iPad competitors will be out in 2011. Apple’s going to do what it can to get the second revision out this year only for that one liner that Steve loves, “We’re releasing the next iPad today before our competitors have even caught up with the first generation.” He’s used that line a few times, but the iPad itself will probably look very similar to the one you’re holding in your hand right now. I predict it will have the same aluminum back, the same bezel and similar weight and the battery life will be mostly unchanged. What will be new?

Verizon to Put Live TV on the iPad

Verizon unveiled a series of new video applications today, including an upcoming iPad app that will allow FiOS subscribers to watch the same linear programming that is available on their TV screens on their tablet devices. The new app is expected to be rolled out early next year and Verizon expects to have all of its content partners on board by the time the app launches.

There will be certain limitations at the launch of the app. At first, subscribers with an iPad will only be able to watch linear programming within their own home, which allows Verizon to authenticate and make certain that the users have access to whatever content they’ve paid for. Verizon CIO Shaygan Kheradpir said in a press briefing that the iPad app takes advantage of Verizon’s architecture, which he characterized as “cloud TV.” The experience is similar to what’s available today on FiOS set-top boxes, and takes advantage of the same software that Verizon uses for its set-tops. As such, Verizon says it should already have rights to stream the content, as it’s just another screen in the home.

Apple Now Allows Magazine Subscriptions on the iPad

Time Inc. is the publisher that finally convinced Apple to bypass the pay-per-issue model and allow existing subscribers to reap the benefits of their iPads. As of Thursday, People magazine allows existing subscribers to download and view current content on their iPads for free. Subscribers forced into paying twice for the same content had previously contributed to extremely negative reviews for apps like Sports Illustrated and others.

The New Yardstick: If You’re Not Apple, You Lose

For 2009 and 2010, the clear winner in consumer electronics is Apple. Its mindshare among analysts and consumers is far beyond any other company. I’d even go so far as to declare Apple the most successful tech company of this decade. That’s why I feel sorry for every other company in this space.

No matter what your company did in the past two years, Apple did it better. It reminds me of Sony in the 80s and Microsoft in the 90s. Companies were afraid of Microsoft in the 90s. All Microsoft had to do is decide to enter your space and you’d be out of business, if you weren’t lucky enough to be bought by the company. That’s not the case anymore. In this sense, Apple is the Microsoft of this decade.

iOS 4 on iPhone 3G: Fake Email Offers Real Hope

It appears that we have a new “Fake Steve Jobs” in our midst. And this time ‘Steve’ is claiming via email that the apparent performance issues witnessed on iPhone 3G devices running the latest iOS 4 software will be addressed in an upcoming update to iOS 4. Regardless of whether the email did in fact come from the Real Steve Jobs or not, there are plenty of reasons to believe that Apple is serious about getting iOS 4 working properly on iPhone 3G devices.

Next Gen Customers on Previous Gen Devices

The most likely recipients of older iPhone 3G devices will be the siblings of the owners of the devices which have replaced them with the new iPhone 4. This is a very important class of user that Apple cares a lot about. The new owners of these older iPhone 3G devices will be potential Apple customers throughout their academic life. And it appears that students are serious about Apple. Providing a less than awesome experience now could jeopardize their loyalties later.

Apple Still Boasts Lion’s Share of Smartphone Advertising

Google bought AdMob, and Android has been catching on with consumers like a brush fire on a dry midsummer day, but Apple is still holding the reins as far as serving ads to smartphone users goes. That’s according to new data released by Millenial Media, which is now the largest independent mobile ad network.

Millenial used to be number three, but that changed when Google acquired the largest, AdMob, and Apple acquired the second largest, Quattro, which i t recently shuttered in favor of its own iAd platform. That means the closest to unbiased numbers regarding mobile ads that we’re likely to get are probably from Millenial.

iPad Roundup: Religious Studies

Some of the religious apps are audio-based, while others provide brief moments (“thought of the day” style) of inspiration. There are the standard works for reading, as well as full-on study aids to really dig in deep. There are even some religious-themed comic books, if that’s more to your taste. Of course, these various options are used at the whim of individual developers, so not all features and delivery methods are available in every religion.

Inkling Says the iPad is the Textbook of the Future

University students may all carry smartphones and netbooks now, but for the most part, their textbooks continue to be stubbornly old-fashioned: huge, expensive, hard-cover books printed on dead trees. Inkling, a startup founded by former Apple staffer Matt MacInnis that launched last week, wants to change all that. The company believes the iPad — for now, at least — is the future of the textbook. Inkling’s software turns textbooks into interactive content, with video, hyperlinks between text and images, notes that can be shared between students and teachers, and even 3-D molecules that can be viewed from any angle.

Virtualizing the University Computer Lab

We are beginning to hear announcements fairly frequently about the states, school districts, and universities that are moving to the cloud for their email and productivity tools. As schools and universities adopt cloud technologies, what will become of the school computer lab?

Computer labs have been important locations on campus for students to work, study, and access computing resources. But almost all students now come to college owning their own personal computers. A recent CNN story said that 95% of college students interviewed this spring owned at least one computer (83% owned a laptop, 24% a desktop, 15% both). That's up from 23% of students who owned laptops in 2003.

Budget Pressures

So as universities battle budget issues (as well as space issues), the rooms full of rows of PCs may seem a good target for elimination. An article in the Chronicle of Higher Education last fall said that 11% of universities were phasing out or planning to phase out the computer lab.

The cost savings of eliminating the computer lab can be substantial. When North Carolina State University announced its move to a virtualized computer lab, Eric Sills, the assistant vice provost touted the $500,000 saved by closing down half its labs and by not purchasing a round of new computers. Sills did admit however that the university was likely to buy more servers which would negate some of that savings with its move to virtualized computer labs.

The world's first mobile Augmented Reality Special Magazine Edition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRceOYbrVzc&feature=player_embedded#!

Can Augmented Reality Help Save the Print Publishing Industry?

There's a memorable scene in the movie Minority Report where a man reads a futuristic newspaper with rich embedded multimedia updating live with breaking news. While we are a long way seeing anything like this in the hands of the general public, a German newspaper has taken a small step in that direction with the release of a special augmented reality (AR) edition of its Friday magazine.

Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ), Germany's largest national newswspaper, has partnered with Munich-based AR vendor metaio to provide subscribers with an immersive reading experience that hints at the future of publishing. The experience is similar to Esquire's augmented reality edition from November of 2009, but with advancements that have been made to smartphone AR technology, a desktop webcam is not needed to view the content.

The magazine, hitting newsstands this Friday, features several AR experiences littered throughout its pages that can be activated using metaio's junaio iPhone and Android apps. The cover of the magazine features a popular German TV personality who comes to life in an interactive video unlocked by holding a smartphone up to the magazine. Other augmented features in the magazine include an illustration that becomes 3D, an interview with additional exclusive quotes and a crossword puzzle whose answers appear when viewed through the smartphone.

Mobile Serendipity: StumbleUpon Heads to iPhone & Android

Less than a month ago, we told you about how social bookmarking and discovery service StumbleUpon has quietly grown into a Web behemoth, driving nearly twice as much traffic as its closest competitor, Digg. One of the things that makes the service stand out from the others is its ability to learn your habits and tastes to feed you relevant links upon which to stumble. Today, the service is brining the serendipity of its recommendation engine to a smartphone near you with boredom-killing apps for the iPhone and Android.

"Think about all those times when you're riding the bus, sitting at the airport gate, or waiting for friends, playing with the same mobile apps again and again," writes the company today on its blog. "Now you can have the perfect boredom-buster: with StumbleUpon for the iPhone and Android, the best of the web is, literally, at your fingertips."

For those unfamiliar with the service, the concept is fairly simple. Simply select a few topics that

Pay With Your Phone: BofA, Visa Begin Testing Mobile Payments

Bank of America has started working with Visa to begin testing the use of smartphones to make in-store payments without the need for cash or credit cards. The system will make use of Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, which is a short-range communication technology for mobile phones, to make payments as simple as waving your phone at another NFC-enabled device.

According to Reuters, the two companies will begin testing next month the system of paying that "some say could become a primary means of everyday purchases."

Near Field Communication is a new standard based on RFID that we've been paying close attention to and earlier this year ReadWriteWeb founder Richard MacManus took an in-depth look at using mobile phones as a payment device.

With the technology now entering testing by the largest U.S. consumer bank and the world's largest payment processor, it seems that the idea of using mobile phones for making payments is gaining some serious traction, at least in the U.S. According to Reuters, the U.S. has been slower to adopt NFC payments as compared to countries like Japan, where mobile payment systems have been in place for years now. Just this week, PayPal indicated that mobile payment systems are a "top priority" after launching its own trial of NFC payments last month.

How to Improve IT Worker Morale

9.05 pm by the trial IT job satisfaction is at an all time low, and has been since January according to a CEB survey cited by ComputerWorld. We recently reported that about 1/3 of IT workers are ready to leave for another company. What can your organization do to boost morale and retain staff?

Cut Back the Hours

By far the biggest drag on tech workers is the number of hours worked - ComputerWorld puts the average workweek at 71 hours for IT staff. IT staff are often expected to work late into the night to fix problems, and still show up at 8:00 AM the next morning. Also, tech workers are frequently contacted at home and on vacation. At my first IT job after college, my boss told me "Forty hours a week is part-time."

ComputerWorld article asked why women leave careers in IT. The real question should be why anyone actually stays in the profession under these conditions.

Cutting hours for IT staff may sound like an impossible task, but it may actually lead to more productivity in addition to better morale. As the 37 Signals Book Rework points out: "Working more doesn't mean you care more or get
more done." According to a recent survey by Microsoft, the average worker is only productive for about 30 hours of their 46 hour work week.

Gmail for iPhone Gets the Blackberry Treatment

You've got a new email! Holy smokes am I going to get pinged a lot if I turn on the newly announced Gmail and Google Calendar push notifications on the Google Mobile iPhone app. Google just announced the new feature and it's a logical one, but it also seems like a throw-back to a simpler time when push notification for any and every email made sense.

There's no ability to set rules, to limit notifications to just emails from contacts, or anything. Just push notifications. For calendar that might make sense, but I'm already getting SMS messages ten minutes before my calendar events. A push notification is a beautiful thing, but I don't think it makes a lot of sense anymore in this context.

Push notifications are good for breaking news, they're good for regular reminders and sometimes they can be useful for social media comments and feedback. But mark my words, if the future is going to be all about tackling information overload - very few people are going to want bulk email push notifications.

See also Boxcar, probably a better choice.

News Discovery iPhone App is (Almost) the "Pandora for News"

Fans of "old media" who treasure the sensation of flipping through inky newsprint have argued against the customized curation of Internet news. As they see it, this eliminates the chance of discovering a story or topic you didn't know you were looking for. However, the Internet has been known to leverage technology in order to resolve these conflicts. Just as Pandora helps music lovers discover music according to their tastes, a new app for the iPhone - The Accidental News Explorer (ANE) - invites users to "look for something, find something else."

The app is powered by Daylife, a content curation and discovery platform, and will cost iPhone owners $1.99 to use. Simply enter a search term and the app will return (mostly) fresh news about that subject sorted by search relevance. You can quickly scan the headlines or select one to see an excerpt, the source of the story or a list of related topics.

Links to read the full story launch a fully capable built-in browser, or you can chose to open the story in Safari. The app supports iOS 4 app switching, so you won't lose your place. You can also chose to email or copy the link or save it for later to your Instapaper account.

2010년 8월 18일 수요일

Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone 7.WMV

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLh2-uc_XMs&feature=player_embedded

HTC Widlfire “soft” rooted

So, it’s not the big, badass hard root that enables custom ROMs and NAND unlocks, but the HTC Wildfire now has a method of rooting that allows the installation (and more importantly, the execution) of all those wonderful “root only” apps on the Android Market.

Despite this limitation, you Wildfire owners can’t really grumble, as now you can wirelessly tether your internet connection, backup your apps n settings, or take screenshots, among other tasks.

Full details on how to get it on your phone are over at XDA, but note that you will have to re-enable root every time you reboot your phone. Baby steps, baby steps…

Apple Support Discussions to Become a “Community”

According to an announcement at Apple Discussions, “very soon” we can expect more easily accessible and friendly “Apple Support Communities” for all our free troubleshooting needs. Expect to get what you pay for.

While I’ve been able to troubleshoot problems with products using Discussions, it’s seldom been easy. Besides the antiquated search engine, the quality of answers for a given question can vary widely. The Introductory FAQ for the new Apple Support Communities doesn’t give the impression that will change much.

피드 구독하기: 글 (Atom)