Friday, 28 November 2014
Saturday, 19 July 2014
Microsoft Kills Nokia's Android Experiment, X Series Designs to Become Lumia Products
Microsoft Kills Nokia's Android Experiment, X Series Designs to Become Lumia Products
Microsoft announced its biggest every jobs cuts on Thursday, but that's not the only big announcement the company made. CEO Satya Nadella also announced that the Nokia X series of Android phones will be making the transition to Windows Phone.
Nadella made the announcement via an internal memo sent to employees, made public on the Microsoft website:
Second, we are working to integrate the Nokia Devices and Services teams into Microsoft. We will realize the synergies to which we committed when we announced the acquisition last September. The first-party phone portfolio will align to Microsoft's strategic direction. To win in the higher price tiers, we will focus on breakthrough innovation that expresses and enlivens Microsoft's digital work and digital life experiences. In addition, we plan to shift select Nokia X product designs to become Lumia products running Windows. This builds on our success in the affordable smartphone space and aligns with our focus on Windows Universal Apps.
Stephen Elop, the erstwhile Nokia CEO and now the Executive Vice President of Microsoft's Devices & Services business unit, reiterated the same in his email:
With our focus, we plan to consolidate the former Smart Devices and Mobile Phones business units into one phone business unit that is responsible for all of our phone efforts. Under the plan, the phone business unit will be led by Jo Harlow with key members from both the Smart Devices and Mobile Phones teams in the management team. This team will be responsible for the success of our Lumia products, the transition of select future Nokia X products to Lumia and for the ongoing operation of the first phone business.
Nokia announced the X series of phones running a heavily customised version of Android at MWC this year.
Friday, 18 July 2014
iPhone 6 Clones to Hit the Market Before Apple's Smartphone
iPhone 6 Clones to Hit the Market Before Apple's Smartphone
Apple may not have confirmed the existence of its iPhone 6, expected in two screen-size variants (4.7-inch and 5.5-inch) later this year, however, this has not stopped GooPhone, the Chinese clone handset maker, to announce its own iPhone 6 version even ahead of Apple.
GooPhone is famous for releasing very similar looking clones of flagship smartphones, and its clone handset portfolio already includes GooPhone M8 (clone of the HTC One (M8)), GooPhone S5 (clone of the Samsung Galaxy S5), and GooPhone i5S (knock-off of the iPhone 5s).
Gizchina reports that the popular clone handset maker has announced its next flagship, the GooPhone i6, which will go on sale starting August 1. As of now, GooPhone has only confirmed the launch of a 4.7-inch screen variant and the official site lists some of the specifications of the handset - 4.7-inch IPS qHD display; quad-core MediaTek (MT6582) processor; 1GB of RAM; 13-megapixel rear camera; 5-megapixel front camera; 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of ROM. The GooPhone i6 is quite evidently based on what's been seen so far in numerous iPhone 6 leaks.
Thursday, 17 July 2014
why the apple-ibm deal matters
Apple’s partnership with IBM to tackle the mobile enterprise could have lasting ramifications for both companies—as well as for rivals Google, Microsoft and BlackBerry. It could also make life a lot easier for IT staff at large enterprises.
Apple and IBM announced an “exclusive” deal on Tuesday in which IBM will build a new line of enterprise-specific apps from the ground up for Apple’s iOS, aimed at companies in retail, health care, transportation and other industries.
IBM will create “unique cloud services” for iOS, including tools for security, analytics and device management. It will also resell iPhones and iPads to its corporate customers, and Apple will roll out new support services for businesses.
In other words, Apple and IBM are putting a full-court press on the mobile business market. And they’re doing so in a tightly wedded fashion: The companies used the word “exclusive” four times in a statement announcing the deal.
That suggests Apple won’t run off and do a similar deal next week with Hewlett-Packard. More significantly, IBM, at least for now, is throwing all its chips in with Apple—apparently at the expense of Google’s Android OS and Microsoft’s Windows Phone.
“We are saying these [apps and services] will be specifically for the iPhone and iPad,” said a spokeswoman for IBM, when asked what’s “exclusive” about the deal. “They are the best mobile devices in the world, from our view,” she said.
The deal is significant for several reasons. Apple devices are widely used by businesspeople, but the company has thus far been a “renegade” in the corporate world that slips in the back door with little regard for the needs of IT staff, said analyst Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies.
“If IBM can come in and say, ‘We’ll make sure this Apple stuff works well with the other stuff you’ve got already,’ it will make the IT guy feel a lot better,” he said.
They had already been partners to an extent, he said, but until now IBM has had the same access to Apple’s APIs (application programming interfaces) and tools as other vendors did. Tuesday’s deal might give IBM greater access to Apple features like Find My Phone and its remote wipe capabilities, allowing IBM to integrate them with its own mobile management tools, for instance, Kay said.
“It helps IBM a lot to have Apple’s blessing, so they’re not standing at the front door like everyone else saying, ‘Please accept our app,’” he said.
It’s also a shift for Apple, which until now has shown little concern for how businesses cope with the influx of its devices. “Apple hasn’t come out and said, ‘We don’t give a [damn] about enterprises,’ but that’s basically how they felt,” Kay said.
It’s now partnering with a company that bends over backwards to understand the needs of its corporate clients. That gives Apple a valuable distribution channel in the enterprise without having to change greatly how it operates.
“What it allows Apple to do is not change its philosophy and lay off to IBM the whole issue of, how do you make iPhones work for IT managers who actually want to be treated like a valued customer,” Kay said.
The deal is also notable because it’s unusual for Apple, which is usually a lone wolf, to align itself so closely and publicly with a major partner. That, in turn, could help IBM shed some of its stuffy corporate image.
“Instead of being the black-and-white guys they throw the hammer at, they become part of the winning team,” Kay said, referring to Apple’s “1984” ad depicting IBM as a corporate villain.
Wednesday, 9 July 2014
Microsoft to end support for Windows 7 in 2015
Microsoft to end support for Windows 7 in 2015
Microsoft is warning customers that the end is soon coming for Windows 7 in much the same way it came for Windows XP earlier this year.
Microsoft is warning customers that the end is soon coming for Windows 7 in much the same way it came for Windows XP earlier this year. The company will end free mainstream support for Windows 7 on January 13, 2015, but users will continue to get security updates till 2020.
The move will mostly affect consumers. Businesses that pay for extended Windows 7 support, as most of them do, will be supported for another five years, until January 14, 2020.
That's important, because many businesses are right now are in the process of upgrading their old Windows XP PCs, but they're moving to Windows 7, not Windows 8.
There's some speculation that, given the popularity of Windows 7, Microsoft might change its mind as the date nears and continue to support it a bit longer, like it did for Windows XP. All told, Microsoft supported XP for about 13 years.
That kind of extension doesn't seem likely at this point. Remember, Windows 8 basically includes a full version of Windows 7, called Desktop mode. With Windows 8.1, it's possible to run a Windows 8 machine in Desktop mode and almost avoid the new-and-confusing Windows 8 part of the OS.
And Microsoft really needs to nudge consumers into buying Windows 8 machines. More Windows 8 machines means more developers will want to write software for Windows 8, which will make more people want to buy it.
By the way, Microsoft also set an end-of-life of mainstream support for Windows 8 (including the latest version, Windows 8.1), for January 9, 2018.
This is another hint that Microsoft should have its next version of Windows ready in 2015, code-named "Threshold" (sometimes referred to as Windows 9).
If Microsoft plays its cards right, Windows 9 will be to the unloved Windows 8 what Windows 7 was to Vista, which InfoWorld ranked No. 2 on its list of the 25 biggest tech flops (also PCWorld's Biggest Tech Disappointment of 2007).
Microsoft is warning customers that the end is soon coming for Windows 7 in much the same way it came for Windows XP earlier this year.
Microsoft is warning customers that the end is soon coming for Windows 7 in much the same way it came for Windows XP earlier this year. The company will end free mainstream support for Windows 7 on January 13, 2015, but users will continue to get security updates till 2020.
The move will mostly affect consumers. Businesses that pay for extended Windows 7 support, as most of them do, will be supported for another five years, until January 14, 2020.
That's important, because many businesses are right now are in the process of upgrading their old Windows XP PCs, but they're moving to Windows 7, not Windows 8.
There's some speculation that, given the popularity of Windows 7, Microsoft might change its mind as the date nears and continue to support it a bit longer, like it did for Windows XP. All told, Microsoft supported XP for about 13 years.
That kind of extension doesn't seem likely at this point. Remember, Windows 8 basically includes a full version of Windows 7, called Desktop mode. With Windows 8.1, it's possible to run a Windows 8 machine in Desktop mode and almost avoid the new-and-confusing Windows 8 part of the OS.And Microsoft really needs to nudge consumers into buying Windows 8 machines. More Windows 8 machines means more developers will want to write software for Windows 8, which will make more people want to buy it.
By the way, Microsoft also set an end-of-life of mainstream support for Windows 8 (including the latest version, Windows 8.1), for January 9, 2018.
This is another hint that Microsoft should have its next version of Windows ready in 2015, code-named "Threshold" (sometimes referred to as Windows 9).
If Microsoft plays its cards right, Windows 9 will be to the unloved Windows 8 what Windows 7 was to Vista, which InfoWorld ranked No. 2 on its list of the 25 biggest tech flops (also PCWorld's Biggest Tech Disappointment of 2007).
Tuesday, 8 July 2014
Sunday, 6 July 2014
what is mimo
MIMO is a data transfer accelerant...
Multiple Input/Multiple Output (MIMO) is the same technology that makes 4G and 802.11n so speedy. It could also be called More Than One Antenna In and Out. Most simply put, it increases the number of antennas at the transmitter and receiver. They work in concert to improve the device's performance by transferring more data without requiring added bandwidth or drawing additional power.
A MIMO-enabled device does this by spreading the existing transmission power over multiple antennas, creating an array gain that can transmit more bits per cycle than a SISO (single input/single output) antenna.
...that also improves connection quality...
Essentially, a MIMO system widens the broadcast "pipeline," allowing more data to flow through at a time. Wi-fi routers have used this technology for years to streamline connections at home.
...without needing a faster processor to make it happen.
In fact, it's a good way to make a device work faster at a lower price—adding an antenna is a relatively cheap parts upgrade compared to other components.
After a 2005 integration into the burgeoning 802.11n standard, MIMO can be found today in 4G, 3GPP Long Term Evolution, WiMAX, and HSPA+ systems. As Amazon noted today, it's not in the iPad or Nexus 7. But you'll find it soon enough in the Kindle Fire HD.
How Much Does Google Really Know About You?
How Much Does Google Really Know About You?
Google is a technology giant that provides a huge variety of services, many of which are free. Gmail, Google Drive and Google Hangouts can be used without paying a dime. Instead, pay by providing information about yourself, which Google can use for advertising. Though it started in search, the lion’s share of the company’s profits come from ads.
You’ve likely noticed this already. Search for a new car and suddenly, as if by magic, ads from local car dealers begin to appear. But how much does Google really know about you, and should you be concerned? The answer may surprise you.Your Internet Trail
Google’s most obvious and transparent tracking can be found in Google Web History, which tracks your past searches on all devices where you’re registered with your Google account. Web History is supposedly beneficial to users because it allows Google to tailor future search results to your preference based on your past history, but a log of your searches is also quite useful to marketers. And, if anyone manages to snoop on your account, it could become a privacy issue.
Less transparent, but equally common, is Google’s history of the pages you visit, which occurs whether you’re logged in to a Google account or not. This is accomplished through the use of tracking cookies as well as information derived from AdSense and Analytics. Google can learn what sites you frequent, in what order you visit them, how long you spend on them, and much more.
The profile built from this information isn’t yours, in the sense that it’s based on information like your I.P. address, monitor resolution and browser plugins instead of your name and address, but it still puts together a unique profile of your activities and preferences which is then used to display relevant ads. If you have a Google Profile you can view this information by going to Google Ad Settings, a page which also lets you opt-out of specific types of ads or manually change your preferences (if you feel like helping Google profile you). You can also use EFT’s Panopticlick tool to see the information used to create your digital fingerprint.
YouTube is also an important part of the trail you leave behind. The world’s most popular video site keeps track of your viewing history, your subscriptions and your searches to augment Google’s understanding of you. All of this history is viewable in Google Dashboard – by you or anyone else with access to your account.
There’s not much about your online activity that remains outside of Google’s hands. Even supposedly private browsing modes, like Google’s Chrome, don’t entirely protect you. Only more advanced measures, like VPNs and the Tor network, have the potential to shield your privacy.
Google+ Your Info
While Google’s tracking efforts are incredible, the advent of Facebook revealed there was an even easier way to grab user data; just as them. Facebook has encouraged hundreds of millions of people across the globe to give up information Google collects through complex algorithms and databases.
And so we have Google+. Your user profile is exactly that – a profile of you, which can be used to better target advertisements. Entering your date of birth, occupation, interests and location provides more data points for Google to feed into its calculations. The same is true of the contacts you make, the messages you post, and the photos you upload.
No Such Thing As Private Gmail
Of course, users of Google+ likely know what they’re getting into. Users continue to sign up for Facebook, which has displayed ads for years, with no apparent qualms. There’s no reason to expect Google+ to be different, and the information it collects isn’t particularly insidious. In short, users don’t expect social networks to be private affairs.
You may, however, be surprised to hear that your Gmail account is not cordoned off from Google’s data collection. On the contrary, its introduction has provided the company with a wealth of information that’d otherwise be unobtainable. Google mines your inbox for data that might indicate your preferences. The company also can compare information found in your email with other publically available information to gain a better understanding of you.
For example, keen observers noticed that Google was using data collected via Gmail to spot users who were signed up with competing social networks. Once spotted, those users received a message suggesting they connect the competing social network’s account with your Google account, which in turns gives Google access to data stored by the other social network.
This presumably includes Chat, as well, since it’s covered by the same terms of service. Speaking of which, all of that chats that you’ve conducted through GTalk are saved in Gmail, a fact users often forget because Chat history is not displayed by Gmail’s menu bar until the “more” tree is opened.
You Own Your Google Drive Files, But Google Can Still Read Them
Whether Google similarly mines documents in Google Drive is not clear. Presumably the same terms of service could be applied, given the company’s unified privacy policy, and the techniques used to conduct such a search is unlikely to be much different from that used to mine Gmail. However, at this time Google has not confirmed or denied mining Drive data.
googledrivetos How Much Does Google Really Know About You?
There was some drama over Drive’s security because the company’s terms of service provide Google the right to “use, host, store, reproduce, modify or create derivative works.” However, the company’s ToS also says that users “retain ownership of any intellectual property rights.” In short, Google can’t steal your content outright – but this legalese does provide the company wiggle room to read your data at will if it chooses to do so.
Android Is Watching You, Too
Much of your Internet trail can be tracked no matter what device you use. PC, tablet, smartphone – it doesn’t matter much, particularly if you have a Google account which, if you’re using an Android device, you almost certainly do. Your browsing activities can be tracked much as they are when you use a computer.Android owners also open themselves up to location tracking, which occurs if you turn on location data when setting up your device or installing a new app. This obviously provides some very useful data that can indicate not only where you live but also your habits and the locals you frequently visit. You can view the information Google has on you with the Location History tool and you can even delete your history, if any, though it’s not clear if doing so scrubs it from Google’s internal database.
Another area of concern is Android’s backup service. Thoug
Your Google Digital Shadow Is Complete
Taken as a whole, the information Google collects about users is shockingly complete. The company can mine your emails and Drive documents, track your browsing history, track the videos you watch on YouTube, obtain your WiFi passwords and much more.
None of this is meant to be insidious, of course. Google’s interest is serving ads, and in this sense an accurate profile might be perceived as a boon; if you’re going to see ads, they might as well be ones that interest you. The reveal of the NSA’s PRISM program, however, has proven that data collection is always a privacy issue because there are organizations that can compel data from those who hold it, either through legal finagling or by force.
Google debuts health & fitness tracking platform Google Fit
Following Apple’s launch of HealthKit earlier this month, Google has also re-entered the health and fitness segment by unveiling a new health & fitness tracking platform called Google Fit at its ongoing annual developer conference Google I/O 2014. (Our entire coverage of Google I/O 2014 here)
This platform will be a part of the Google’s next Android release and will provide a single set of APIs for app developers to manage fitness data from apps and sensors on cross-platform devices and on wearables. It will apparently provide an unified view of the user’s fitness activity enabling developers to build smarter and more comprehensive health apps.
Google Play product manager Ellie Powers mentions that if users grant explicit permission, apps can have access to a user’s entire fitness data to provide better recommendations to users. For instance, she showed a weight loss coach app Noom, which communicated to Withings scale for weight data and provide recommendation to users.
Partners: Google has roped in prominent fitness brands like Adidas which will be opening up data from its smart sensors to developers on Google Fit platform. Nike will apparently allow other apps and fitness devices to integrate with Nike Fuel through this API. It will also be publishing Nike Fuel data to the Fit platform, allowing third party apps to make use of this data to provide better insights to users.
Google Fit Partners
Other partners include Intel’s Basis, Runtastic, Runkeeper, Withings, Asus, HTC, LG, Motorola and Polar among others. Worth noting is the absence of the popular fitness trackers like Fitbit and Jawbone, although its possible that these companies can come on board by the time of the next Android release.
Google Fit’s platform preview SDK is expected to be available in few weeks and developers can sign up for the SDK here. While Google didn’t mention it in the keynote, its possible that that Google is also building a dedicated heath app like Apple’s Health app.
Why this is important? Google Fit and Apple’s HealthKit platforms are significant since this allows companies to access more data and thereby provide more accurate fitness and health recommendations to users.
Right now, health-related apps and fitness trackers track and store data separately and don’t typically talk to each other. Hence this data remains siloed within the respective apps, which usually led to inaccurate recommendations and users gradually stop using these apps.
Why is Microsoft Entering the Wearable Market with Smartband?
The smartbands have been around for quite some time and their fad is unlikely to be washed by smartwatches, on the basic functionality they might appear same though. Both the wearable devices are aspired gadgets for health and fitness fanatics as it can track the user’s vital data, but the smartwatches have gone a step ahead as it can be used for making or receiving calls and browsing web on the tiny screen.
In this rapidly changing world, with fast-emerging technologies, consumers do not hold on to their devices for long. Since the devices are discarded once a new technology comes into scene, investing a huge amount of money on such devices does not seem a wise move. In a recently conducted survey, users shied away from the iWatch which is yet to be launched, but the same users are willing to go for iWatch if it is price tagged with $200 or low. Smartband offers basic functionalities though, it’s cheaper than a smartwatch. Moreover, after the launch of Android Wear and 2 smartwatches at the GoogleI/O Conference, more vendors are likely to venture into the smartwatch market, resulting in more competition and may trigger a price-war. With the upcoming smartband Microsoft is aiming to leverage the two factors; price and cross-compatible, thereby answering to many questions.
The smartbands have been around for quite some time and their fad is unlikely to be washed by smartwatches, on the basic functionality they might appear same though. Both the wearable devices are aspired gadgets for health and fitness fanatics as it can track the user’s vital data, but the smartwatches have gone a step ahead as it can be used for making or receiving calls and browsing web on the tiny screen.
In this rapidly changing world, with fast-emerging technologies, consumers do not hold on to their devices for long. Since the devices are discarded once a new technology comes into scene, investing a huge amount of money on such devices does not seem a wise move. In a recently conducted survey, users shied away from the iWatch which is yet to be launched, but the same users are willing to go for iWatch if it is price tagged with $200 or low. Smartband offers basic functionalities though, it’s cheaper than a smartwatch. Moreover, after the launch of Android Wear and 2 smartwatches at the GoogleI/O Conference, more vendors are likely to venture into the smartwatch market, resulting in more competition and may trigger a price-war. With the upcoming smartband Microsoft is aiming to leverage the two factors; price and cross-compatible, thereby answering to many questions.
Monday, 2 June 2014
Monday, 28 April 2014
productive use of smartphone
PRODUCTIVE USE OF SMARTPHONE
The smartphone industry is already crowded with high end devices and everyone is for the flagships doesn't matter how well we use it. The PC era is on the decline owing to smartphones and tablets.
No one else reads a book on his
laptop but he can take it along him through his smartphone or through a kindle(there are even apps which read the text for you) as they are more mobile. So smartphones if used productively can bring good results.You can use apps that gives maximum out of your smartphone.
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