The Internet of Things - like real coffee or Internet-connected mobile wallets - is on the horizon. We are waiting, a world in which all our devices are connected and communicate with each other in a sort of futuristic circle of life.
But as with any major change in technology, we are certainly not there yet. For those of us who are growing impatient, ¿I can present the Gecko, a new Indiegogo project has meant to "make your smartphone smarter."
The idea here is that the accelerometer equipped Gecko connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth low energy to help control the various things in your life and bring gesture controls and triggers to your smartphone.
With Gecko, the connection is not built into the devices themselves, but rather can be applied to objects in the house through these accelerometer- Bluetooth-based labels.
The device itself is filled with a TI CC2541 SoC removable battery type button with a year's worth of juice (depending on usage), as well as buzzer and LED light for alerts.
So, for starters, you can use a Gecko hand to control the music on your phone, or to activate
camera
to take a photo or record a video. With Gecko application accompanies even can trigger several photos taken at set intervals. The Gecko comes with four gestures available, including turning left and right and moving once or twice.
Meanwhile, Gecko can also be used as a tracking or monitoring. Tag your gateway to receive alerts when opened or closed. Tag a pillbox to get a reminder when you or a loved one has not taken his medication that day at the scheduled time. Tag your pet to get an alert when you leave a radius of 100 meters. Hell, label your child to make sure they do not go away, either.
You can even find the phone if it is paired with a Gecko as long as you have not lost the Gecko. (But in that case, you should really work on being more organized.)
The project recently went on Indiegogo and has about 40 days to reach its funding goal $ 50,000. That's plenty of time for this well-designed, clever little adventure, and hat tip Woz does not hurt either.
Everyday steps that brings us to the Internet of Things are taken. We have seen this with Samsung TecTiles-friendly and NFC tags that trigger reactions in the phone, but even with devices like the Nest learning thermostat and smart lock Lockitron.
The access code can not die yet. the
iPhone
Security System Fingerprint Touch ID 5s can be unlocked with the finger, even if you are asleep. That means a jealous lover could hold the phone to your thumb while sleeping and read all your texts, call logs, emails and more.
Apple confirms that a dead thumb will not work. Chloroforming the victim could, but international spies have no luck cutting a
first
Minister thumb to access their insurance / selfies files. Apple also does not send a copy of the fingerprints back to their servers, and instead stores it in a "safe enclave" in its A7 processor designed to be accessible by hackers or other applications.
Apple has worked hard to make the security system ID Touch easy to use. So Easy A 5s can be unlocked by a cat, your toe, or even your ... member, if you have registered your phone. The real problem, however, is that Touch ID has no way of knowing if someone passed out.
Types of fraternities, with the head up. You could wake up from a night of drinking to find his bros sent a message to all your ex boyfriends and creatively rewrote his
Facebook
Profile. However, the biggest threat is likely to misuse by significant others.
It is common to hear the story of a suspicious girlfriend or boyfriend who went through your phone unlocked guy / girl while sleeping, found them flirting with someone else, and left them. Numeric passwords prevent this.
But Touch ID is vulnerable to "sleephacking."
As anyone knows which finger [s] you have registered with tactile identifier, you can pick up the phone to the nightstand, pressed against the finger to sleep, and voila, the phone is unlocked.
If you have personal things shadow on your phone, you must have personal things ... no shadow on your phone. And if the other significant rifle will through your phone while you sleep, you have bigger problems. But if you're stuck sleeping by someone unscrupulous, you may want to go to settings, enable lock code, and delete the tracks that you have on file.
It really all comes down to the idea that there is no password that humans have yet developed is convenient and 100 percent safe. Bit strings, no facial recognition, and no fingerprints. The lack of perfect digital security has become part of our culture - a risk and an inconvenience to no one is above time. On that note, I leave you with this painting play / poem Banksy:
Yesterday Microsoft announced two new tablets surface and a set of accessories designed to help your highest slot tablet hybrid business environment of the company. The new Surface Pro 2, the top of the fountain, and the docking station are a trio of products that Microsoft expected to boost sales of its corporate hardware.
New Microsoft tablets are now for pre-order, but the top of the source and the spring will not be released until early next year.
It is worth noting the price of the get-up, though. The Pro Surface 2, sans any extras, starts at $ 899 in its most basic format. This SKU has a modest 64 gigabytes of internal storage. The area of higher-end Pro 2, with 512 gigabytes of storage, costs $ 1799, or double the price of their cheapest construction.
The docking station and pan cover will cost $ 199 each, the other when they are released. Therefore, to collect surface flagship Pro 2 SKU, along with the hardware that Microsoft is building for the extension of its use in the corporate world, spend $ three under the $ 2,200 mark. That's a high price.
Therefore, Microsoft is more than willing to charge for your company facing the Surface Pro 2 At the other end of the scale, Microsoft is selling its original tablet surface RT $ 349, and the first generation touch $ 79 coverage . It is also selling the Surface RT as part of a discounted package that includes an indoor black Touch for as little as $ 400.
Another day, another 3D printer. This time we have a model that comes from SUNY Purchase College, where he is working on a laser cut, compact printer that can do 3D Altos Extra models simply by swapping some parts.
The printer plastic pumps 100 microns, more than an acceptable resolution, and uses few moving parts. You'll notice that the printhead rides up to three lanes. This will allow longer bar or add extensions to bring the platform bigger things.
Created by students Shai Schechter, Andrey Kovalev, Yasick Nemenov and Eugene Sokolov, the project is currently in pre-beta and intends to launch a crowdfunding campaign in November. You can sign up for updates here.
The team hopes that the product is completely open source and because it uses very few expensive parts that are capable of very aggressive price. While I love projects like these, I'm anxious to see how they build their software - one of the most important parts of a package of 3D printing. While it is solid would be totally down with this cold equipment.
Despite its recent acquisition, BlackBerry announced it will launch a desktop application in BBM BlackBerry Jam Asia 2013 this week. Unfortunately, the long-awaited implementation leaves much to be desired. BBM come to desktops, from Windows-based PCs. Since most major BlackBerry customers were customers of the company, these customers spend much time behind their desks. This version should have come way before. But even more surprising, the desktop application messaging service is horrible.
After installing the application, users will have to connect their phones to their computers, probably via Wi-Fi. If you're in a coffee shop and want to send a quick message from your laptop, you first have to find a way to connect the phone to the computer. Is the PlayBook nonsense again.
Messaging someone should be everywhere and effortlessly. You should not have to wonder if your phone is active to send a message from your computer. Some applications allow you to send text messages from your computer. But the point is that BBM is not SMS - is supposed to be better. Moreover, BBM messages pass BlackBerry servers, like
Facebook
messages, I-Messages, WhatsApp messages etc, and these other services not redirect all your messages through your phone.
That's why BBM limited to one device at a time is a serious defect that should have been corrected. Many people have a phone, a tablet and a computer and want to use the same services on all three devices. In its current implementation, it is not possible without a dirty trick to BBM. Due to the limitations of multitasking, even iOS users sometimes need to restart the application to deliver messages desktop - that is, if the BlackBerry can fix their servers and actually launch BBM for iOS and Android.
No release date yet, and the company showed only the Windows version at the conference. WhatsApp does not have a desktop client, so you could say that the release of BBM is better than nothing. But BBM 2.0 desktop will have to be more than a simple interface that redirects messages to your phone. For now, it's just an empty shell.
Update: It turns out that a show on stage was made is a way to extend BlackBerry 10 on the desktop. Here is a statement from Chris Smith, Vice President, Handheld Application Platform & Tools BlackBerry:
"This was a demonstration that showed how applications can be projected from one BlackBerry 10 device to a Windows or Mac OS. In the demo, the power of BlackBerry 10 is used to detect the connection via WiFi or USB then adapt the user interface and mirror the content on the desktop monitor.
The concept of proof is used to show only one of the possibilities of mobile computing - "and to display integrated into the BlackBerry 10 platform that our developer community could exploit capabilities into their own applications.
If you're like me, you spend too much of their day sitting at his desk, hunched over his computer. During busy days - especially once the "zone" standing - it is easy for a couple of hours to fly without leaving a sedentary position. For this reason, I'm probably not the only one who could use a gentle reminder, just a little, "Hey Rip, who has been sitting for two hours, what's up, and lazy?"
Well, my friends, the Fitbit can remind you that you are behind in your footsteps, but what if you could remind her desk stand, or take a break? With Revolver, a person born in Los Angeles startup founded by former Apple employees, Disney and IDEO, now you can buy a smart desktop that will do just that.
Stir Kinetic Desk, the first product launch, which launches today, combines software health monitoring wearables as popular Fitbit and connected up with hardware and machine learning to create a work experience that really promotes movement - and, in so doing, his health.
Founder and CEO of JP Stir Labrosse was one of the first 35 employees to join Apple's iPod division, where he led development teams in two initial engineering projects to iPod. No surprise, then, that the Bureau of Kinetic borrows some designs and interfaces Apple family, including a touch screen function, which has a size of iPod very kind, shape and look to it. It is this touch interface that acts as the main table "control panel" that allows users to change the configuration and height of your desk, or to move from sitting to standing (and vice versa) just by double tapping.
Not only that, but the screen displays graphics and visual representations of a user's movement, so you can quickly see how long they have been sitting and what their work habits and use looks like. The desktop contains a thermal sensor presence and computer equipped with the software health monitoring, allowing you to track your movement and display the data through its touch screen.
While it may sound almost uncanny, not to worry, the table is not yet equipped with Siri's voice or any kind of personal assistant. While Labrosse was willing to admit that the tourist Stir Kinetic could incorporate some features 9000 HAL-like Watson or on the road, for now, the board intends to work with the Internet of things, not to try to command and master his office.
In fact, the board of control and adapts to your personal routine so that has meant to optimize the health and productivity. The desktop displays how many calories you've burned, time spent standing in front sit - and his answer to "who is the fairest of them all table?" Course.
Labrasse, echoing recent study by Harvard Business Review called sitting "smoking of our generation", which is probably a little over dramatic, but it is true that in our modern working environment overworked, connected to través-, we spent more time in the chairs on our feet. While his desk Kinetic not remind you to eat, shower, end coding and go outside or be a best friend, who will help you stay upright and conscious healthier routine that is right around the corner .
The desktop also contains a setting called "active mode", which can be activated by pressing a button on the front of the table, which will mode "Whisperbreath" - meaning that the table asks you to move after you've been sitting too long in one smooth motion, one inch up and down. Then you can tap twice to change position.
New Smart desktop Stir also comes with integrated ports AC and USB (eight four, respectively), connected to a single power cord plugs into the wall, and comes with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, which hopes CEO eventually allow the desktop devices to integrate with third-party health and fitness. Think: Your desk may come your fitness and wellness own graphic. Imagine that. The team also eventually release a control panel web based that lets you see your data and health work on the fly.
Stir Kinetic Desk has a wooden surface, comes in white, espresso and four colors bottom surface, and will be sold at an expected $ 3,890. Not cheap, but hey, you can not put a price on good health, people, especially when it comes to your office furniture that keeps you healthy.
