Will 2011 be ruled by Google?

There have been a lot of talks about the year 2011 and how the advancements will be in the field of technology.I predict the year of 2011 will be a trend setter for Google as it is expected to release it's Chrome OS.The rate at which Google is spreading it's products every gadget freak will have their fingers crossed.Google will be expanding itself in more areas than we predict.


The first such area is operating systems. Those of you who watch the mobile phone market know that the Google Android operating system (OS) is now the fastest-growing OS in mobile phone history. Google has already introduced its Chrome Web browser, which is garnering high usage and praise as one of the fastest and safest browsers.

Next year, Google is poised to introduce its Chrome operating system, which is now in beta testing. Google has just sent out tablet PCs with the Chrome OS to hundreds of testers.The idea behind the Chrome operating system is to create an OS that works almost completely online.Your tablet PC or small computer will be basically used only to access your online applications and information.


There are even applications to track financial data, perform asset management, increase productivity and control sales and marketing.IT costs will come down to great extent due to lesser hardware costs.Google will do this with added security and increased productivity.

Galaxy player from Samsung

After launching Samsung Galaxy Tab,the Korean giant has decided to launch a Android based media player to Apple's I-pod.The Android based media player will be launched in Consumer Electronic Show 2011 in Las Vegas next week.

The Galaxy player will run on Android 2.2 Froyo OS and features 1 GHz CPU.Android 2.2 is also being used in Samsung Galaxy S as well as in Galaxy Tab.The player will come with 4-inch Super Clear LCD screen supporting up to WVGA resolution (800×480), T-DMB, SoundAlive audio enhancing technology, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 3.0

Galaxy player will be available in 8GB,16GB and 32 GB flash drives.There are no details regarding pricing and availability.

Android Tips and Tricks

Many are eager to get to know about Android tips and tricks from the horse mouth itself. With Android 2.2 doing the buzz,Jonathon senior vice president of Google's product management has published a list of ideas and hints on Google's official blog.

Majority of the suggestions were for Android 2.3(Gingerbread) which is currently available in Nexus S smartphone.In the coming weeks Nexus One is expected to receive over the air upgrade for Android 2.3

Let us look at the following tips

Scrolling:When you're in a scrollable list such as the Gmail inbox, an orange hue at the end of the list is a signal that you can't scroll any more.

Downloads: Items downloaded from the browser get collected in a downloads manager that's accessible in the apps drawer.

Wi-Fi: To turn your phone into a Wi-Fi hotspot, go to "Settings" and then "Wireless & Networks" followed by "Tethering & Portable Hotspot.

On the Keyboard

Capitalization shortcut: With Gingerbread, Shift+Key can be used to capitalize a letter instead of going to a separate all-caps keyboard.

Quick replace: On any previously typed word, users can tap on a suggestion to automatically replace it with the suggested word.

Applications

Favorite Apps suggested by rosenberg

Angry Birds

Astro

Flash -- "Runs even better on Gingerbread," Rosenberg notes.

Fruit Ninja

FXCamera

Instant Heart Rate

Phoneanlyzr

RemoteDroid

Shazam

SoundHound

Tango

Amazing Doodle from Google

Google's new doodle has been awesome and I never expected a doodle that focused on a holiday season all over the world.It features 17 holiday scenes from all over the world.When the user hover over the images it gets zoomed and when the images is clicked the user can get to know about it.Chilean Vineyards,Sahara Desert and Santa Claus on rooftop are some of the illustrations found in the doodle.

The doodle has been designed by Micheal Lopez and the concept was carried out by five artists over a period of 250 hours.The doodle will remain until Christmas is over.Google has been so creative when it comes to doodle this year.My favorite doodles include John Lennon's video doodle and another doodle which allowed users to play Pac Man.Let's wait and see what is in store from Google in 2011.

Text Analysis tools from Google

Google has introduced two tools that may help users discover new ways to parse the company's massive collections of public information.

One tool counts how often a chosen phrase shows up across 500 years worth of digitized books, while another divvies up search results by their levels of reading difficulty.

The first service called the Books Ngram Viewer, allows people to search for specific phrases within the company's massive collection of digitized books. In addition to links to the source material, the results will also provide a timeline showing when the phrase was most often used.

The tool runs searches against a database of 500 billion words found within 5.2 million books Google has digitized. The sampled books were all published between 1500 and 2008, in Chinese, English, German, French, Russian or Spanish.

With this service, Google hopes to introduce a new form of quantitative analysis to academic fields, one that could provide insights into historical trends or the birth of new ideas by the tracking the popularity of associated words and phrases. One group of researchers has coined the term "culturomics" to describe the approach.

Google has also added another form of analysis to its regular search as well: The company has introduced a new advanced search feature that can divide up results by reading level. The search breaks result into basic, intermediate and advanced reading levels.

Although Google does not specify what attributes define each reading level, most readability tests analyze texts by looking at attributes such as the number of words in each sentence or the number of letters and syllables in each word, under the assumption that more complicated sentences would be more difficult to read.

Google documentation explains that users might find the distinction of reading levels useful in helping to complete searches. A university professor might want only the advanced results, while a junior high school teacher might want to find more basic material for students.

Chrome Web Store opened

A portal has been started by Google for downloading extensions and web applications to it's Chrome Internet browsers.It includes nine themed categories including games, education, news,services and others.The Web Store site can be accessed only through Google's Chrome browser.

The expansions and applications have been designed with an eye toward the new HTML5 web standard. The themes area includes guidelines for setting the graphical interface of a browser to reflect one's personal choices.There are a whole lot of free extensions that can be pretty useful for the people who are new to chrome.People would have have been aware of Add Ons in Mozilla Firefox and I am sure that they will find Google's Chrome extensions useful

The store also gives software designers the chance to sell or give away their wares. The new portal replaces the gallery where users have, until now, bought apps for Chrome. According to Google, the number of users have tripled this year to to 120 million.

Body Browser from Google

Google Body Browser was launched yesterday which works in the same way like Google Earth version of human body.It's a in browser tool and one can able to view the 3D model of the human body.Like the Google Sky Map for Android, users can search for individual organs and expose different systems, such as the skeleton and internal organs.

Chrome, with WebGL is needed to run the Body Browser .WebGL, a 3D graphics API that can be run directly within the browser, was implemented in the Chrome beta that was launched earlier this week.Users will have to download the beta version of Chrome, which will put them on the beta track for updates.The female 3D model can also be zoomed and rotated.

Two users have reported on Google page have reported that the page is not loading

"Red Twitter" from China

"Red Microblog" is a Chinese site run by the local propaganda department in the city of Chongqing is attaining popularity among the Chinese people.It contains messages designed to promote revolutionary spirit among the Chinese people.There were some issues in the site that prevented new members to be a part of

it.Mr Mo, he has urged residents to sing red songs, from China's revolutionary era, read classical literature and tell stories about Chairman Mao's Long March.

The people are also been encouraged to write text messages praising the country or the city. They are called "Red Text Messages" by officials.Reports say that by October more than 120 million of these messages had been sent by local residents.

A Chinese analyst says there will be 75 million microbloggers in China by the end of 2010, an 837 per cent increase from last year. The firm estimates that the number will double next year and then to 240 million by 2012.

Samsung Galaxy Tab for $349 from T-Mobiles

T-mobile has priced Samsung Galaxy Tab at just $349 which is much lower when compared to competitors and this is the lowest price in which it is available. Sprint is charging $399 for the Tab with a two-year contract or $599 with no contract. Verizon Wireless is charging $599 with no contract, and AT&T is charging $649 with no contract. Of course, factoring in data plans for the Tab alters the total cost of ownership dramatically.

Galaxy Tab made it's debut in November and within a month the prices have been dropped.It's always common to see the prices drop during the holiday season.Apart form the price drop of Galaxy Tab,T-mobile has alos cut down the price of Samsung Galaxy S smartphone from $199 dollar to $149.

Samsung Galaxy tab lovers are going to have a great holiday season ahead with others operators are also expected to reduce the prices.

Streak to get Froyo on O2 network

Dell Streak will reach greater heights due to the presence of Android 2.2 operating system in the O2 network this week.It has been a long wait for Streak as updates will be available for Dell's 5 inch sized phone.Dell Streak was launched in June with Android 1.6 OS and got it's Android 2.1(Eclair) in September.

Having Android 2.2 will bring the Streak in line with its competion. The other Android 2.2 tablets it will compete with are Samsung's 7-inch Galaxy Tab and Viewsonic's 7-inch Viewpad. Viewsonic's 10-inch Viewpad has a dual boot setup with Android 1.6 and Windows 7.

The Streak comes with a 1GHz Snapdragon processor, a 5-inch 800x480 multi-touch screen, 512MB of RAM, 2GB of internal storage, an SD card slot with a 16GB card supplied, quad-band GSM, HSPA, 802.11b/g WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, a 5MP rear camera with flash and a VGA forward-facing camera.

Good news for Android Developers

Android market was never so good and with Google updating its Android Market to make it easier for developers to get their products seen and, presumably, bought .The developers of the Android Market were anxious as the number goes beyond 100,000.How a single application will stand out without spending money for marketing.Well, Google claims to have made it easier for both developers to promote and users to find and buy applications.

The update will be visible to all users running Android 1.6 or newer, or just about every Android device sold in the last 18 months. Eric Chu, member of the Android Developer Ecosystem team at Google, said the update was to "streamline the browse-to-purchase experience". Although laden with marketing guff, Chu's statement is an important one as the ease of application discovery is vital to the continued success of Android.

There will be a carousel of promoted applications visible on home and application category screens. From Google's point of view, the carousel represents a nice little earner as larger publishers will use it to increase the visibility of their wares. Aside from the applications category, Google has introduced additional categories for live wallpapers and widgets.

The refund time for purchases will be reduced to 15 minutes, a change that Google says will be "largely transparent" to most users as refunds are generally requested "within minutes of purchase". Google's reason for the change was to allow developers to "manage their businesses more effectively".

Google has increased the maximum package size to 50MB, which should make life a little easier for games developers as they will not have to worry so much about heavy compression.

Chu says there will be further updates to the Android Market in the coming weeks and months. If they continue to be as developer friendly as this one, then there should be no let up in the pace of new applications appearing on the Android Market. µ

Android users makes it to the top

Users of Google's Android mobiles and Samsung Galaxy users have used more data services than other smartphone users.On the other hand, wireless operators are looking forward to the profits made through the social networking boom and web browsing. These days, wireless operators are facing huge loss in their profits from the traditional voice calls. However, they are facing heavy jam-packed networks. Mostly all operators are facing network problems, however only few of them are openly admitting it, as there is a fear of losing existing and potential costumers.


In last two years it has been observed that the Android software, which was provided to the mobile vendors, has strongly grown. In global market, in the last quarter the usage of Android has ranked second, following Nokia’s Symbian. It has already pipped leading operating systems like, Apple’s iPhone as well as Research In Motion. By the end of next year, analysts expect Android to become the leading operating system across the globe.

Mobile vendors like Nokia, Siemens, Sony Ericson and Alcatel-Lucent are struggling for their potential costumers and expect that the rise in the data traffic may provide them with new orders. But, the use of Android is growing and is not expected to fall down, making it as an extremely important for other operating systems to make the required changes in their services, so as to remain in the race.

So, will the Android users change their way of data usage, is something which we need to think on. My take, they should; but it won’t be so easily said & done.

Android Activation reaches 3 lakhs

This is going to be remarkable number without any doubt.Can you able to guess the number of Android phones getting activated every year?The answer to it is 3,00,000.These figures were revealed by Google's Vice President Andy Rubin in Twitter.The usage of Android based phones are increasing every month and we can see   that prices of it will also drop down further.

Android is a profitable venture for Google even though that it is based on a open source.The advertising on Android mobile makes it profitable for Google.The flexible hardware specifications and open source roots makes it easy for the users and also encourages some users in creating a customized App to suit their need. In the mobile market we can find almost all brands making smartphones based on Android.The numbers are expected to go high and the prices of mobiles are expected to fall down further.

Chrome OS will bring PC prices

The test version of Google's chrome OS has been launched and it is expected to cut down the PC's cost in India atleast by 25%.As Chrome OS is offered free people are expecting it to live up to their expectation.There is also good news for the starters as they do not have to install any new softwares in it.

PCs rely on applications delivered over the internet, making it easy for users to access files and applications from any machine. Google first announced the release of Chrome OS in July 2009 along with plans to sell netbooks running the software from the second half of 2010.In San Francisco News Conference,Google began distributing a limited number of PC models running the software does not mean that users are about to lay their hands on the Chrome OS. 

By mid 2011 Chrome OS will hit the market and until then we can hear about it from any of your friends working in Samsung or Acer as they are Google's partners.

I-pad 2 from Feb 2011

Taiwanese component maker  Foxconn has been notified that it should be ready to ship 400,000 to 600,000 units of the next version of i-pad in the next 100 days.Foxconn has reportedly declined to comment on these reports as they need to remain confidential about I-pad 2.

Digitimes reported that Apple had originally expected to begin mass production of the unofficially dubbed iPad 2 in January, but Apple postponed that schedule because the device's firmware is still undergoing testing.

The iPad 2 has been widely expected to come out in the first quarter of 2011 and feature a front-facing camera. Some analysts also expected Qualcomm will provide chips that allow the iPad to run on both CDMA and GSM networks, a so-called "world" iPad. The current 3G version is GSM only.

Google now in E-Book market

Unlike digital bookstores run by Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc. and Barnes and Noble Inc., Google's venture, unveiled Monday, is not tied to a particular reading device, Google said. Instead, its electronic books can be read on most devices and not just on those that the seller manufactures. An e-book bought from Apple, for instance, can be read only on an Apple device.

"Google is essentially going to try to break that model open" by allowing users to purchase books online and read them on as many devices as possible, said James McQuivey, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc.

Google is entering a market that has more than tripled in 2010 and is expected to grow by nearly 40% next year, to $1.35 billion, according to Forrester. By the end of 2011, more than 25 million U.S. adults will be regular e-book readers.

Google also has a big ace up its sleeve: The company has been scanning library books since 2004 and says it has digitized about 15 million books — close to 12% of the world's estimated 129 million books.

Amazon's Kindles make up about half of the market for black-and-white e-readers, not including devices like Apple's iPad or the Samsung Galaxy Tab. In addition to its Kindles, Amazon supports other platforms for reading its e-books, including Android-based devices, the iPad, the iPhone and the BlackBerry, as well PCs and Macs.

While Kindles hold half of the black-and-white e-reader market, the more serious question is how many books Amazon has sold through its e-readers.

Apple Will Continue to lead in 2011 also

Apple will "maintain both market and profit share leadership" in mobile devices during 2011, claims Canaccord Genuity analyst Michael Walkley. The statement is founded on "continued strong sell-through trends for the iPad and iPhone," including a series of bulletpoint facts. During the third quarter of the year, for instance, Apple is said to have had 47 percent of industry profits for mobile devices and tablets; the next closest competitor was RIM at 18 percent. RIM has yet to launch its own tablet, the PlayBook.

Walkley has raised his iPad sales forecast for the fourth quarter from 5 million to 6.3 million. Apple's tablet market share for the whole of 2010 is expected to be 75 percent; looking ahead to 2011 though, this share is forecast to slip to 50 percent. The company is already competing with the Samsung Galaxy Tab, and aside from RIM, Apple will also have to deal with tablets from the likes of LG and Motorola.

The iPhone has a slight dominance in US smartphone marketshare -- not profits -- at 27.9 percent, beating RIM by just half a point. The iPhone platform is more marginal globally, behind Nokia's Symbian and Google's Android. Apple's influence stems mainly from early rapid growth of the iPhone, and the high profit margins it claims on each device.

Send and receive money in Facebook using Dwolla

Dwolla has introduced a new payment system that allows users to send money to each other through Facebook and Twitter.

Paying people to be your friends online just got a whole lot easier. Dwolla, a peer to peer payment platform, has just announced that its service is now available in all 50 U.S. states and supports Facebook and Twitter, reports the AP. Dwolla is a web service with mobile apps as well. Like PayPal, it allows users to send and receive funds to one another via the net.

With its new Facebook and Twitter service, Dwolla users can message or direct message their friends a link with a Dwolla payment attached to it. The process is more secure than standard web-based transactions and only costs 25 cents per transfer, much less than traditional credit card fees. If both the sender and receiver have an account, the sender pays the fee; if only the sender has a Dwolla account, the receiver pays the fee. Pretty simple.

In addition, Dwolla has received $1 million in funding from the Veridian Credit Union, which also gives the company FDIC backing. Dwolla transactions are secured by the same technology that protects online banking systems.

Google Chrome 8 released!!!

Chrome 8 version has been released quietly.The stable release adds a new built-in PDF viewer that, like Safari, saves having to use a companion app. The tool is sandboxed to prevent a rogue PDF from compromising the browser and posing a security threat to the rest of the system.

Although not directly mentioned, developers have also revealed that Chrome 8 should have the underlying framework for the Chrome Web Store. Google's portal will let users shop for web-based apps, such as Flash games or HTML-based productivity tools, without having to visit separate sites.Access to the store isn't currently active.

Full release notes aren't available, but the update should fix a pair of major security holes with SVG images and XPath as well as other crashes and exploits that focus most on web video. Linux and Mac users get a specific fix that updates the list of dangerous files to be in sync with the Windows edition.

Unlimited game streaming for $10

Ever wondered what you can do for $9.99 per month,you can do a lot more and the latest buzz is that Onlive is introducing unlimited gaming for just $9.99 per month.In the recent days $7.99-$9.99 seems to be a magical number.Both Netflix (movies) and Hulu (TV) recently announced unlimited plans for $7.99 and now OnLive, their video game equivalent, is offering unlimited use of its service for a monthly fee of $9.99.

The service, named OnLive PlayPack, has 14 games at the moment, including Prince of Persia, Lego Batman, Fear 2, and World of Goo. These games can be played for free with a subscription. Other titles, like Batman: Arkham Asylum, Borderlands, Assassin’s Creed II, and Unreal Tournament III are available for 3-5 day rentals and full purchase. All OnLive users have free access to the PlayPack service until it leaves beta on Jan. 14, 2011.With PlayPass games priced from $3.99 to $49.99, along with the new $9.99 per month PlayPack plan, OnLive’s growing library of games will suit any budget and any type of gamer, from casual to hardcore.

OnLive is different from other consoles because it streams all games from remote servers, much like Netflix streams a movie from the Internet. Instead of having a lot of local processing power and a DVD drive, games are served via the net, making the system very affordable ($99 with a controller and free game) and compact. Unfortunately, it requires a very stable, high speed Internet connection. No one wants to lag out during a game of Unreal Tournament.

Google Chrome moves ahead

Google's Chrome browser entered the browser war with stiff competition from Microsoft's IE,Mozilla's Firefox and Apple's Safari.It has now jumped to 9.27 percent of usage in November from 8.5 percent in October, which could be a sign that Chrome OS netbooks are being used by Googlers.

The .77 percent gain appeared to come at the expense of Microsoft Internet Explorer, which dropped to 58.41 percent from 59.18 percent a month ago, and Mozilla Firefox, which nudged down a tad to 22.81 percent from 22.83 percent.

But the star of the November browser numbers was Google's Chrome 7. Share for Google's latest build of the OS grew 5.64 percent in November, second in growth only to Firefox 3.6, which saw a 6.09 percent gain between February and March.

The gain in Chrome 7.0 and in Chrome share overall is likely due to the internal use of Chrome Operating System netbooks by Google employees and computer maker partners, such as Acer and Lenovo.

The Chrome OS which was due this year has been pushed back for some reasons which Google does not want to discuss with the media.

Apple I-pads in India

There were lots of questions in people's mind when Apple I-pad will be officially available in India and the news is that Apple I-pas are available in Apple franchises all over the country but it is available only in bulk India Bulls, Hcl are few of the Indian corporates who have already booked the I-pads in bulk.

The I-pad is priced at Rs 33,000 for a 16GB model and Rs 54,000 for 32GB model with warranty and invoice.There were even reports that unlocked models are available in Hong Kong which means there won't be any warranty.India has always remained in the last position as well as Apple products are concerned.

Even though India has been home to 650 million mobile subscribers and witnessing 80-million in PC sales every year, India sees muted offtake of Apple products because there is no differentiated pricing based on purchasing power parity or a focused marketing campaign.

Froyo now in Samsung Galaxy S

Samsung India has started rolling out the Android 2.2. Froyo updates for Galaxy S smartphones.Froyo comes out with many exciting features which as been missing in it's previous versions.In this new version we can able to convert the smartphone into Wi-fi hotspot and it is still not that the feature is available in India.

Another exciting feature is that user can able to install the applications in the memory card itself and there is better performance with Flash and HTML5 based web apps in native mode.The colorful menus and icons makes this version quite popular among the youth.

1000 Core Processors From Intel

Chipmaker giant,Intel has planned a giant leap in computing world by bringing 1000 core processors to consumers which will be an unexpected jump in current scenario where 4 to 8 processors are being used.The collective ability is at an all time when such a number of processors are being used concurrently.

I don't think consumers right now don't need the power of 1000 core CPU's.In the Supercomputing Conference 2010,Intel researcher Timoth Mattson showed a demonstration of 48 core processor.the jump to 1000 cores would pose use problems to the developer than to the consumer.Windows 7 supports as many as 256 cores most modern software such as Adobe’s Creative Suite, Microsoft Office 2010, and new PC games -- typically support only four to eight cores.

Rightly most softwares don't work with many cores and a lot can't take advantage of more than 6 cores.A few years ago, leading processor makers Intel and AMD realized that boosting the sheer speed of individual CPUs beyond 4 gigahertz or so was becoming physically impossible, explained a PC magazine's laptop analyst.To run at those tremendous speeds, the chips spat out simply too much heat, and cooling them was a serious problem

If you follow Moore's Law, where CPU power per dollar doubles every 18 months, and you use quad-core CPUs as your starting point, you're looking at about 12 years before a 1,000-core CPU would be as affordable as a quad-core CPU today.

Blackberry Bold 9780 in India

The latest smartphone from Blackberry,Blackberry Bold9780 is sold at Rs 26,900 in India which is an upgraded version of  Blackberry Bold 9700..The difference in 980 is that it comes with a 5 mega pixel camera with with auto-focus, flash and image stabilization.With 512MB RAM,the applications will be running much faster and it is also loaded with Blackberry OS 6.0.With improved interface and a faster Webkit based browser we can expect this one to be a hit

Apple leads yet again

This holiday season is going to be much happier for Apple as the recent survey of consumer satisfaction put's Apple's I-phone on top for overall device enjoyment.The survey was conducted by Changewave and Apple's I-phones topped the chart with 77 percent of "very satisfied" consumers.The second and third places go to Motorola with 71 percent and followed by RIM with 44 percent.

Changewave found that Apple's 4G I-phone customers are more satisfied than Apple's 3G customers.The 32-gigabyte and 16-gigabyte iPhone 4 models were well-received by 84 and 78 percent of those purchasing the device respectively. Only 81 percent and 77 percent of customers indicated that they were "very satisfied" with their 32-gigabyte and 16-gigabyte iPhone 3Gs phones.

Another important thing regarding the survey is that 34 percent of all surveyed indicated that they would have purchased an iPhone if, in some magical world, it had been available on their carrier of choice.

Atlast Google Docs Editing for Android

The long due feature of mobile editing google docs has finally been made possible by Google in Android and iOS platforms.The thing is that we can edit and make a list of things in Google docs.This feature was expected to come from Google last month itself.

The news was updated in official Google blot and the feature will be rolled out over the next few days.To get to know more about this visit google docs from your mobile web browser of Android or iOS device then select the document you wish to edit or create a new document and start editing it.The Edit button activates the mobile editor and then it will let you edit your documents in such a way that you have a near real-time experience.Google Spreadsheet can also be updated and shared among the users.

iOS to be delayed until Nov 24th

Apple's iOS 4.2 which was supposed to be launched a couple of days back has been postponed till Nov 24th.There were no confirmed reports regarding the delay but reports from certain developers sad it's mainly due to bug in the code resulting in wifi connection problems.Apple's i-OS was supposed to have a fabulous launch on November 12th.

Apple's iOS 4.2 includes Airplay which will allow users to wirelessly stream content from an i-OS device to compatible receiver such as Apple TV

E-mail service from Facebook

Facebook,the largest social networking site will announce it's E-mail service on Monday and it's going pose a great challenge to other E-mail services such as Gmail, Yahoo Mail and Hotmail.It will be a full featured E-Mail client and the service will allow the 500 million users of the Facebook to use @facebook.com.

This development from Facebook has come amidst the ongoing rivalry with Google which has recently stopped Facebook's access from importing contacts in Gmail's address book.Facebook's E-mail service could be the next big thing and service would be a full featured E-mail client.It will also be integrated with Microsoft's Office online services.

Apple acquires Wi-Gear

Apple has acquired Wi-gear that specialises in Bluetooth audio accessories.This make us think about the future of I-phones and I-pod touch which may include the wireless headphones in their coming versions.The official reports of acquisition is yet to come.

I-Muffs range of Bluetooth headsets are very popular among the I-pod and I-pod touch users who wants to listen to music without headphone cables.So far Apple had limited success with it's own Bluetooth solutions and if the acquisition is true,Apple will be competing with Motorola and Plantronics which are currently leading in Bluetooth audio equipments.

Playbook to cost less than 500 dollars

RIM's Playbook will be launched in the first quarter of 2011 in North America and the good news is that it will be priced below $500.This news even had a impact in the Wall Street as RIM's share went up by 7.53 percent at 59.14 in the trading session

The pricing of Playbook will heaten up the competition in tablet market and it will be among Apple's I-pad and Samsung's Galaxy Tab.Playbook will have a global launch during the second quarter of 2011 and definitely the pricing will attract a lot of people and international retailers.

Even though the screen size of Playbook(7' inch) is smaller than I-pad(9.7' inch),it will plays Adobe Flash video software which is banned in Apple's device.

Internet Week Celebrations kicks off

The Internet Week celebrations in UK has began and Skype will be providing free wifi access acrss UK till November 12th.There will be more than 100 events taking place in and around London during this week.In order to use the wifi access provided by Skype,people need to ensure that they are in wifi hotspots with the latest Skype with Mac or Windows.

The concept of Internet week was already started in US two years back and now Europe also has started to celebrate.Google and Yahoo are hosting several events and even BBC is getting involved.London's East end which was seen as Silicon Valley's rival is gaining a lot popularity.The aim of the five day festival is to raise the profile of Europe's digital industry.I wish everyone to enjoy this Internet week and get to know about many things

Google Tablets,the wait extends

Attractively priced I-pad started the storm of Tablet PC's which was followed by Samsung,Blackberry and Dell.I still don't which is people's favorite.Apple's I-pad has got praises from almost all media executives in the public events.All the tablet manufacturers are determined to give a new experience to the users with rise in digital subscriptions


Android tablets are slowly gaining popularity and magazine publishers want to work with Google for many reasons.It would make sense for Google to go out of its way to give content makers what they want–in this case, the ability to sell magazine subscriptions and keep all of the customer data–because more content makes its tablets more attractive

Only 20% honesty in Facebook and Twitter

It has been found from a survey that only 20 percent of the people are honest in social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook. It clearly shows that people are more convenient in telling the truth during face to-face conversation. In the survey involving 2000 people conducted by Optimum Research, on behalf of Direct Line insurance firm, majority of the people prefer not to be honest in social networking sites.

 I was surprised by the survey results as we spend a lot of time in social networking sites and still people feel it is not a medium to share everything. A lot of people update their status and tweet using their smart phones and I hate people who even update about the breakfast they had.

App developers Selling user id's suspended

The largest social network Facebook has announced the crack down on Application developers who had sold their id's to data brokers

 The crackdown was prompted by revelations last month that some applications on the site were passing user IDs (UIDs) in violation of Facebook policy.Facebook engineer Mike Vernal wrote the site was "instituting a 6-month full moratorium on (the developers) to Facebook communication channels, and we will require these developers to submit their data practices to an audit in the future to confirm that they are in compliance with our policies.”

 While Facebook did not name the guilty parties, Vernal wrote that fewer than a dozen developers were impacted and none of them was responsible for any of the top 10 apps on the site.

 Facebook also reached an agreement with Rapleaf, which has agreed to delete all UIDs in its possession and to not "conduct any activities on the Facebook Platform (either directly or indirectly) going forward," Vernal noted. Rapleaf has said that it immediately implemented "a solution to cease the transmissions" once it was discovered Facebook UIDs were being passed to ad networks by applications the company works with.

We will release this functionality (available via the Graph API and FQL) early next week. We encourage developers to move to this mechanism quickly and will require it on January 1, 2011."

 In addition, ad networks on Facebook must delete any Facebook UIDs regardless of how they were obtained as a "precondition to continuing to serve ads on Facebook Platform," Vernal wrote

Online communities Map

Generally everyday night I used to read articles on various topics from health,sports etc and yesterday I came through a cartoon which was so different and made me how the social media have really transformed in the last few years.Just check this below picture below

The earlier version of this kind of map came in the year 2007 which was dominated by Myspace and at that time Twitter was not present.The 2010 version,majority area is occupied by Facebook and followed by Twitter which occupies a larger territory in lower half of the map.Currently there are some issues of privacy in Facebook but I feel many of the users are not bothered about it.The number of users using Facebook has been increasing everyday.

UK's Fastest Broadband from Virgin

From December in UK the speed at which you receive and transmit packets of data through Internet will be faster than 5.2 times of average broadband speed.The telecom giant Virgin will roll out it's 100Mb broadband service from December and at this speed you can able download a High Definition movie in 7 minutes and a entire music album in just 30 seconds.The registration for super fast broadband has started and the speed they are offering has really taken everyone by surprise.
CEO  of Virgin Media,Neil Berkett said: “The world of possibilities that broadband will enable is set to explode and we’re excited about the innovations we can bring to consumers in the next decade.”

The cost of the service will be 45 pounds when bought as solo product and it will be 35 pounds when bought as a bundle.With more people watching HD programmes and clips online,these packages will be very useful for them.Virgin users in UK will be more excited about this and for me it's another step for the future

Tianhe-1 Rules!!

China is all set to take over US for the fastest super computer ever made.In our school days we have read of supercomputer like IBM' Bluegene and Roadrunner but this time China's Tianche-1 will have it's place in textbooks worldwide.Tianhe-1 which means Milkyway has sustained a speed of 2507 trillion calculations per second.In the year 2002 US lost the supercomputer crown to Japan which made machine powerful than America's top 20 supercomputers.Tianhe is 1.4 times faster than the current supercomputer in National Laboratory is Tennnesse.The official supercomputer rankings will be released next week and until then we need to wait

Guide to buy a good headphone

A lot of things has to be taken into concern while buying a good headphone.Before getting a headphone for your mobile or music player decide on the model and consult with your friends about it.If you don't get sufficient knowledge from them there is always reviews available in the Internet.This post does not focus on any particular brand either and however the reviews are not available for all models,the fast moving ones will occupy their places in all sites related to technology.

The prices are very vital while going for a good headphone as a highly priced one may be of poor quality.Many of my friends who owns a I-pod are not satisfied with their headphones and they think there are lot of headphones in the market which are better than it.As far as I am concerned choose the headphone as per usage.If you use it daily at house alone there is no need invest too much on it and whereas in case if you use it for jogging then go for neckband type headphones as there is minimal chance of headphone wire getting damaged.

War of Playbook and I-pad

In my earlier post I had already spoken on RIM's new tablet PC before the DEVCON 2010,but the table PC was named as Playbook.The Playbook will be available in the early next year and it is loaded with features which is missing in I-pad.The features include HDMI out and cameras.Playbook has a 7 inch touch screen and a thickness of just 10mm.It also comes with a front and back facing camera for video conferencing,Wi fi and high definition playback.The Playbook will display both Adobe flash based video and HTML5 on the web.The availability,pricing and feature like battery life is yet to be known from RIM.

As Apple App store has many games,Playbook will be a hit even among the non blackberry users if games are available for it.Games do sell well and RIM can make this bold move to capture market.

Blackpad from RIM very shortly

Canadian based smartphone maker RIM will launch it's tablet computer Blackpad during DEVCON 2010 next week.This news has come out after Samsung released it's Galaxy,tablet computer last week.Motorola and DELL have also prepared launch their tablet computer at the end of this year.All these maker's tablet computer will work on Google's Android operating system.

Appple's i-pad and i-phone are not popular among the business users because of the tight control Apple exerts over all aspects of the devices functions.Blackberry's Blackpad is mainly targeted among the business people and will also have a separate operating system.The new operating system of Blackpad comes from QNX software system which was bought by RIM in April this year.Blackpad is expected to be available from the end of this year

Shortcuts in Android mobiles

Shortcut keys plays an important role in navigation purposes from one application to another application.After being used to lots of shortcuts in Windows in PC we expect shortcuts in mobiles also.While Symbian mobiles does not provide the user with many shortcuts,Android based smartphones provides a lot of shortcuts.In this blog post I have given some essential shortcuts that can be used

Shortcuts for Android Apps:

Search-E: Open E-mail
Search-G: Open Gmail
Search-B: Open Web browser
Search-C: Open Contacts
Search-Y: pen Youtube

You can add or change these shortcuts through Settings-Applications-Quick launch

Web browser shortcuts
The browser shortcuts are really cool and there is a shortcut for almost every operation we want to do in a browser.

Menu-J: Go back a page
Menu-K: Go forward a page
Menu-R: Refresh current page
Menu-F: Find on page
Menu-B: Open bookmarks
Menu-A: Add bookmarks
Menu-S: Open social network sharing menu
Menu-H: View browsing history
Menu-S: Open browser settings
Menu-D: Downloads
Menu-G: Page info
Menu-E: Select text

Typing Shortcuts

Shift-Del: Delete the character to the right of the cursor
Alt-Del: Delete an entire line
Shift-Shift (press it twice): Activate caps-lock; press shift once more to exit
Alt-Trackball-Left: Move cursor to beginning of line
Alt-Trackball-Right: Move cursor to end of line
Alt-Trackball-Up: Move cursor to top of page
Alt-Trackball-Down: Move cursor to bottom of page
Shift-Trackball-Left/Right: Highlight text for cutting or copying

Only few persons know about these shortcuts that were available,this post will be really useful for people who are new to Android mobiles.

3G rates of BSNL slashed

The 3G battle is yet to start in India and BSNL has slashed the rates by 40 percent.This is going to be useful sign for the people who are expecting other operators 3G services which will be launched by the early next year.The prices have been slashed from Rs 2499 to Rs 1359 for postpaid customers and Rs 1499 from Rs 2756 for prepaid customers.Apart from this short term vouchers were also launched starting from Rs 10 which allows 20 MB of download for one day.

The new tariff rates would be valid from September 22nd is sure to heat up the battle of 3G segment in India when other operators launch their services.

AMD's Processor Line up

The chipmaker giants AMD and Intel have planned to release a new line up processors in the coming months till second half of 2011.This time both Athlon II and Phenom II are also included.Bobcat,Bulldozer and Sandybridge are the names of the processor architectures that will be introduced.These processor architecture will face competition from Intel's Gulftown,Lynnfield and Clarkdale based processors.

There is a huge expectation for AMD and we have to wait till late 2010 how these fit into the market.The mobile based demo's of AMD's technology have been very satisfying and Phenom II ,the new quad core will be released in a year.They have already done it twice in a year and hope the six processors released yesterday will be a big hit among the people.

DEVCON 2010 to start on September 27th

It is going to be a big day on September 27th as DECVON 2010 starts at San Francisco.The four day event will focus on improvement of RIM products and the company's development.There will also be announcement on RIM's upcoming products.the last day of the event is dedicated to developers of RIM's applications.A new social apps platform will be unveiled that will enable device to device communication of Blackberry messenger to other apps.DEVCON 2010 will have strategic breakouts and access to hands on labs.

The new OS of Blackberry named as Blackberry 6 OS will be launched.It will be very challenging for the developers to create apps for it.RIM had it's share of problems in India and Middle East regarding access to it's mail service.The smartphone giant is also expected to release new handsets in DEVCON.It will be a fun filled event for the people attending the conference.

Smartphones from LG

LG has introduced two smartphones named Optimus one and Optimus chic recently.These two models  are based on Google's Android and provides support for Google's Mobile Services.Both the mobile models comes with a 3.2 inch touch screen and 600Mhz processor.The mobile services supported by both them include Google Voice Search,Google Voice Actions,Google Maps,Google Shopper and apart from it also offers access to Android market.LG has earlier reported a loss in the previous quarter due to huge drop in the handset sales as it failed to introduce any smartphones to match it with the competitors.Let's wait and watch how Optimus will capture the market as Samsung, Nokia and RIM are topping the lists.

Samsung's Galaxy Tablet PC released

Korean Electronics giant Samsung has launched Galaxy Tablet PC in Newyork yesterday .The tablet PC is based on Google's Android and it comes with a wide variety of features.It allows the customers to purchase films and TV shows on the device.The availability and pricing of the tablet PC is yet to be announced.AT&T and Verizon will be selling the tablet within a month and prices will be announced a week before the launch date.The pricing is expected to be competitive and the primary focus of the tablet PC is to view media content.Some of the application can be viewed in split screen in the tablet PC.

Two more smartphones from HTC

Taiwan based HTC has unveiled two new smartphones Desire HD and Desire Z using Google's Android software.The mainfocus of HTC has been hardware development rather than mobile online services.These two smartphones has been packed with many features and both mobiles will be on sale during the holidays in the fourth quarter.These two models are built upon HTC's hit Desire model and is en route for another competition with Apple and Samsung.I am sure that these two new models will create a buzz among the people as HTC have worked on many new features.

Usage of Smartphones

The usage of Smartphone by people has been increasing everyday mainly because of the different Apps.Many Android apps have grabbed attention in the recent times as it help the users to spend their free time wisely.Lots of companies are developing apps these days and some of my favourite android apps include Trivial Droid(Quiz based) and Traffic Jam Free which is puzzle based game.The recent survey shows that many of the smart phone users download a new App every month.A large section of the people are mainly downloading games with their smartphones.After games the second most used category is weather related apps.The biggest challenge is to develop Apps based on mapping and navigation based as it is more prone to bugs.The prices of Android based mobiles are dropping due to heavy competition in the market.A lot of effort has been put by the App developers and it's in the hands of the smartphones users to decide.

Nokia X2 at a very affordable rate

Mobile handset giant Nokia has launched it's new model X2 in the market at a very affordable price of  Rs 6579.Nokia which leads the mobile segment in India has been introducing many models in the range of 7000-10000.The new Nokia mobile will be a big hit among the youth due to it's affordable price and features.Nokia X2 features dedicated music buttons,5MP camera and a loud stereo speakers for sharing music.There will be many mobile models that will be released in the upcoming months and prices may even drop due to competition from the competitors.It's high time for people to change their mobiles for better features at price that don't leave a hole in our pocket.

How Apple's iWatch will fare?

Apple's iWatch looks so trendy and cool but how will it fare in the market is the question right now in gadget freak's minds.Some people call it as the best smallest music player that can be worn as a watch.The functionality of iWatch is same as ipod and iphone and it weighs just 21grams.iWatch joins the family of  Apple's latest devices with an amazing battery life of 24 hours of music.I am eagerly waiting for iWatch to arrive at the Indian markets.

Music comes to the rescue

We have heard of music theraphies getting popular as it has benefitted many people suffering from depression or pain.A good music really works out well and it has been scientifically proved that it also helps to relieve pain to a great extent.Tempo,lyrics and the technical structure of the music piece all plays an equally important role to ease the pain.Apart from these there are other factors like the association of music with sad or happy events,when and where the song is heard.Soon a computer program may be developed to identify the best music for the patients.

The concept of Digital Wallet

The concept of Digital Wallet is no not new to countries like Japan.Brazil where people pay their bills through their mobiles.The same concept in India has been desgined by Sam Pitroda with some changes to it.This mobile transaction platform could be the next big thing if it attains popularity among all the sections.As far as India is concerned pople still prefer to shop rahter than purchasing things online due to securit fears.With a secure transaction gateway,this digital wallet works like a mobile money by which people can pay their bills by selecting a menu in their mobile phones.This can be huge hit in India since a large number of people have started using smartphones.Sam Pitroda's digital diary is a big hit and hopes this concept also works out on a larger scale.

Smartphones Security

With the rise in usage of smart phones,mobile security also needs to be improved in a variety of ways to handle the personal data of the users.With instant access to the sites there is always a lot of risk involved when the mobile is stolen or lost.Companies are too striving too protect user data and some have devloped softwares to wipe out user data completely in case if the mobile is stolen.Lookout,a smartphone security company's software backs up contacts,personal data,videos and photos in the mobile.Safe mobile computing remains the primary issue of the people buying smartphones.I have even heard of softwares like Wavesource which performs the same functionalties as Lookout but don't know wheter people are still using it.There are going to be more smart phones sold this year and I hope users never compromise over the security softwares.

IFA 2010

IFA 2010,one of the best trade show for consumer electronics and home appliances which started on September 3^rd in Berlin is concluding today. The trade show attracted visitors from all over the world and they were lucky enough to witness the new range of appliances and devices which will be launched in the coming years. The exhausting list of exhibitors include Sony, JVC, LG, Philips, Siemens, Samsung and much more. IFA International keynotes were delivered by Bryan Burns, Bernhard Burgener, Micheal Rhodin on a wide variety of topics ranging from 3D Sports,3D Cinema and Eco friendly appliances. The closing day(today) keynote address will be given by Dr Eric Schimidt, CEO of Google.I hope in India too such expos happen so that people will tend to know about the next generation devices. Some of my favorite devices are Sony’s Alpha Nex-5,JVC’s Full HD Camcorder GZ-HM335 with associated remote control and and Samsung TV C9090(extremely thin).

I-pods becomes cheaper

During my college days I was desperate to buy an Apple I-pod and flaunt it among my peers but didn't have enough money to buy it on my own.I-pod shuffle 2GB was pretty affordable at that time but I didn't prefer it as it did not have screen.When I went through the reviews of  I-pod Nano 8GB I couldn't resist myself from buying it.Atlast it was during Feb 2010 I owned my new I-pod Nano 8GB.There was a lot of difference between I-pod and other MP3 music players on terms of sound quality and design.
A week back came to know that I-pod prices have been reduced and new model of  I-pod Nano was launched with  Multi touch option.The design is so cool and it comes with a built in clip.The new I-pod Nano is 46 percent smaller than the previous model.My idea was that they could have introduced the multi touch feature with the same specifications of the previous model.The screen size of 1.5 inch screen looks amazing as it's the first of kind music player to have touch facility with that small screen.

Price:$149 for 8GB and $179 for 16GB

My First Post

It's been a long break and I feel great to be back to blogging arena.In my blog I will be updating the blog with the latest technology news from all over the world.Had spent a lot of time last week to read the latest from smart phones and different android applications which has been creating the buzz over the recent past.Hope you enjoy my reading my posts.