How does Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) CEO Meg Whitman feel about Windows 8 vs. emerging Google Android and Chrome OS tablet and notebook alternatives? The answers emerged indirectly amid HP’s Q2 2013 earnings call. Here’s the scorecard.
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HP CEO Scorecard: Google Android 3, Windows 8 Zero
May 25, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Is Google Code In Trouble? No More Open Source Downloads For You
May 24, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Google Code got started back in 2006 as an alternative open source code hosting repository and google codecollaborative development site. At the time of its creation, I had thought that it would competitive with Sourceforge (which it was), but as it turns out Sourceforge will now get the last laugh.
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HP CEO Scorecard: Google Android 3, Windows 8 Zero
May 24, 2013 by Leave a Comment
How does Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) CEO Meg Whitman feel about Windows 8 vs. emerging Google Android and Chrome OS tablet and notebook alternatives? The answers emerged indirectly amid HP’s Q2 2013 earnings call. Here’s the scorecard.
LXer Linux News
Google I/O 2013: Voice Search on the Desktop Using Google
May 23, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Linux Advocate Dietrich Schmitz reviews the newest piece of technology to come out of Google I/O 2013, Google Voice Search. Available today in Chrome 27.
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Google Now wins grand prize for ‘best everyday utility’ at 2013 UX awards
May 23, 2013 by Leave a Comment
'Huge honor' for the Google Now team, says Matias Duarte
Google Now — Google's card-based predictive search tool — has been awarded the grand prize for "best everyday utility" at the 2013 User Experience Awards. To claim the prize, Google Now saw off competition from a wide variety of different projects, including Belkin's WeMo home automation system and healthcare startup ZocDoc.
Announcing the win on Google+, Android design lead Matias Duarte called the award a "huge honor" for the entire Google Now team. Google Now is one of the most important smartphone features of the past year, and it's a well-deserved win for Duarte and his team.
The UX award will sit alongside Popular Science's 2012 "Innovation of the Year" award in the Google Now trophy room.
Source: User Experience Awards; via: Matias Duarte
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Google+ for Android updated with new photo enhancements, improved location sharing
May 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Official Google+ app hits version 4.0 with Snapseed photo tools and more
Following on from the 41 new Google+ features announced at Google I/O last week, Google has unveiled one more to bring the count up to 42 — a new Google+ app for Android. The new Google+ version 4.0 incorporates many of the photo management and enhancement features of the latest update to G+ on the web. Specifically, Google+ will automatically show you "highlights" of each photo gallery, saving you from digging through large galleries of imperfect shots. It'll also allow you to preview or undo automatic photo enhancements. "Auto-awesome," the tool that lets you create animations or panoramas from still shots, is included as well.
But the biggest news for Google+ photo sharing might be the addition of Snapseed photo enhancements directly within the app. A selection of filters including Drama and Retrolux can be accessed from with in the app, alongside bread-and-butter tweaks like cropping, rotating and exposure changes.
Location sharing is also a bit smarter in Google+ 4.0, allowing you to see friends who are sharing their location directly on a map, in a new "locations" section. Automatic hashtags, added to Google+ on the web last week, makes its way to Android in this latest update too.
The update doesn't seem to have landed on Google Play just yet, but we imagine it'll also retire the stand-alone Google+ messenger app in favor of the integrated Hangouts app released last week.
We'll update this post when the new version starts rolling out, so stay tuned.
Source: Google+ blog
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Google H840 could replace the abandoned Nexus Q
May 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment
The Nexus Q was a short lived project, revealed at Google I/O, it was abandoned a year later due to poor sales. Questions were raised on the price of the media streamer and what the user would get for their money.
It appears Google has dropped the name and is going for a new media streamer, codenamed the H840, which just arrived at the FCC a few days ago.
Google decided to keep everything closed in the FCC filing, apart from the fact it is capable of streaming media. The filing did not contain an image, so we cannot even tell if it is going to be a huge redesign.
We did not see any hardware at Google I/O, with Google sticking to developers, software and services. We may see this new streaming device and the missing phones and tablets at another conference in a few months.
Source: Android Community
Google Play Services gives control of Android back to Google
May 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment
With API services outside of the core operating system, Google is taking back control of Android
We didn't get a new version of Android this year at Google I/O. You can read all the lamenting and gnashing of teeth over this across the web, so I'll spare you the play by play of how it was supposed to happen (a proverbial lock), but didn't.
Instead, I'll tell you a little bit about what we did get — a huge updated version of Google's service APIs, which turns out is much better.
Wait. Better? How can an app I never wanted that got magically pushed to my phone be better than a newer, higher number in my about phone screen? That's crazy talk, right?.
Turns out, that little app is a powerful beast. Read on.
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Google expanding mark up tools to select partners to influence Google Now cards
May 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Specific partnerships not yet named; hotels, flights and reservations are the focus
Speaking on one of the countless Google Developers Live talks at Google I/O, one of the creators of Google Now Baris Gultekin explained how select partners will get better access to Google Now going forward. When commenting on how Now can offer more useful information to users, Gultekin announced that certain Google partners will now be able to use mark up tools to put flags in emails that will get them directly noticed by Google Now. Similarly to the way Gmail currently looks for flight numbers, package shipment confirmations and hotel reservations, select third parties can now alert Gmail to look specifically at its email and find the relevant information to then push to Google Now.
Gultekin didn't mention any specific names in relation to this initiative, but he did note that it was focused on things like flights, hotels and dinner reservations. Getting all of the major airlines and hotel chains on-board with this program could help ensure that Google Now never misses an important event surrounding travel, which is very important if people are going to trust Google Now to give them relevant information.
The entire 22 minute talk (seen above) is quite interesting if you're at all interested in Google Now, but if you want to jump ahead to the specific part where Gultekin mentions the partnerships you can find it at about the 16 minute mark. This surely won't be the only little gem that gets noticed as people wade through the hours of footage coming out of GDL at Google I/O this year.
Via: TechCrunch
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Mystery Google media player drops by the FCC
May 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Could a Nexus Q successor be on the way?
Google's kept pretty quiet about the Nexus Q since removing it from sale last summer. Last we heard, the company was still working on refining its streaming sphere, and that was back in January. In recent days, the lack of Nexus Q support in the new Google Play Music app had led some to believe that Google had abandoned the project. However, freshly-filed FCC documents indicate that Google could be preparing another media player device for release.
The "H840 Device" is revealed in FCC documents to function "as a media player," and was given with the model number H2G2-42, an apparent Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy reference. As is customary for unreleased products, Google has requested that diagrams and photos of the device remain confidential.
Testing documents reveal that it was tested hooked up to a 24-inch Dell monitor, and that it possesses Wifi a/b/g/n support and a USB port. What's more, it gets its power from a separate power supply unit, so we can safely assume this isn't a smartphone, tablet or wearable device.
Google unveiled the ill-fated Nexus Q at least year's Google I/O conference, where attendees were given complementary spheres. The device went up for pre-order shortly afterwards, but before going on sale Google withdrew the device and shipped Qs out to pre-order customers free of charge. Despite being a no-show at this year's I/O, Google's official stance remains that it's "hard at work" improving the multimedia orb. So could this "H840" device be the result of the past year's efforts? We'll have to wait and see.
Source: FCC; via: Liliputing
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From the Editor’s Desk: After Google I/O
May 19, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Three days just isn't enough to absorb all the info from Google I/O. In fact, it's physically impossible to get to every session, be it due to overlaps, overcrowding (only so many seats) or overexhaustion. It's a good problem to have, though, and Google handles it quite well.
In case you've been living under a rock, in addition to streaming a number of the key sessions live, Google also records them, so you can watch at your leisure. And that's what I've been doing since returning home from San Francisco, the better to get a grasp on all the new features and services announced. And if you've never seen one of these developer sessions before, you might be surprised just how entertaining and engaging they can be. This was my fourth Google I/O, and it still catches me a little off guard.
You can watch the developer sessions on YouTube.
Another surprise this year was the keynote address. Consolidated into a single address this year (as opposed keynotes the first two days at previous events), it went a whopping 3.5 hours. (Longer if you could the time spent waiting in line.) And it was time well-spent. There was so much information crammed into our brains in far less time than it took many of us to even get to San Francisco. But between all the new Google Play services, and the new Google Maps, and the improved Google+, and the Google Play game services — and that's just the major Android stuff — I could have gone another hour, easy.
There's not a lot I can say about Larry Page's appearance — his first such speech at Google I/O in the years I've attended — that you can't get from watching the recording. (And I recommend you do.) But I will say this: I've always believed a good CEO should overreach a little. The more Apple-friendly pundits love to poke fun at some of the things Eric Schmidt has said over the years, and perhaps rightfully so. There's certainly a fine line between cheerleading, inspiring and downright crazy talk. And occasionally crossing that line opens you up to jokes and criticism, but I love the sort of head-first-into-the-wall mentality. It's what makes Google Google, it's what gets things done, and it's what moves us forward.
A few more thoughts on the week that was:
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Congress Demands Answers From Google Over Google Glass Privacy Concerns
May 18, 2013 by Leave a Comment
The ability of Google Glasses to inconspicuously take photos or videos of subjects without their knowledge has a group of lawmakers concerned about the privacy of individuals. Members of the Bipartisan Congressional Privacy Caucus of Congress headed by Rep. Joe Barton, Texas and seven others sent out a letter to Google’s Larry Page requesting answers on several issues of privacy concerns regarding the device.
The letter states that “As members of the Congressional Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus, we are curious whether this new technology could infringe on the privacy of average Americans. Because Google Glass has not yet been released and we are uncertain of Google’s plans to incorporate privacy protections into the device, there are still a number of answered questions that we share.”
Some of the questions being raised are
- Will Glass collect users’ data without their consent?
- What steps are being taken to protect non-users’ privacy?
- Will Glass offer facial recognition to identify non-users and display information about them?
- What restrictions is Google placing on Glass and Glass apps?
- Will Google Glass cause Google to change its privacy policy?
- Will Glass store data on the device, and will it offer user authentication?
The concern of the committee is the possible use of facial recognition technology that will “unveil personal information about whomever … the user is viewing.” When Google Glasses will become available commercially it will only be a matter of time before someone will develop a program where you will only have to look at a person’s face to get their personal information such as their address, work history, marital status and measurements.
Google’s initial response stated that “We are thinking very carefully about how we design Glass because new technology always raises new issues. Our Glass Explorer program, which reaches people from all walks of life, will ensure that our users become active participants in shaping the future of this technology.”
The search giant has until June 14 to reply to the letter sent by the lawmakers.
via zdnet
