Group items tagged

This article talks about six apps that will help you manage your passwords. in this day and age, it is not recommended to use the same password for all your accounts. It is also advisable to use long and complex passwords. Although many of the apps cost money, I think it is worth it.

Early in the afternoon today, a clever developer managed to sneak a Game Boy Advance emulator into an innocent looking app named "Awesome Baby Names". The secret emulator is activated by a series of taps on the touchscreen inside of the app. Once it is activated you can play your classic gba games just like you did in 2005. Apple was quick to catch this security breach as it was only in the App Store for twenty something minutes, but in that time many people including myself managed to download the app. This kind of sneaky activity from developers happens very seldom, but when something is smuggled into the App Store, it is usually very important. As stated in the article, it is a very easy process to unlock the emulator from the app, but getting the games and the BIOS onto the iPhone is the hard part. You must first download a program that lets you access the phone's file directory, then you must find the app's directory and drop the relevant BIOS and game files there. I chose the portable computing tag for this article because it deals with mobile technology and exploiting it to run handheld gaming software. This idea is not knew and has been around for a long time, but the idea of hiding the identity of apps and smuggling them into the App Store is a new idea. Apple is updating their security daily, but clearly couldn't spot this "child naming app" and make it out for the emulator that it was. I chose the privacy and security tag because Apple has a high priority for the security of their ecosystem and operating system, but clever people can still find ways to bypass this and get unidentified files into the operating system. I believe that Apple must keep a close eye on how they approve future apps into the app store because one day we may see cydia disguised as a senseless app make its way into the app store. If this happens, Apple with really have some explaining to do!    

Google has recently implemented a feature known as "Inactive Account Manager" which will allow users to control what will happen to their data after inactivity for a predetermined amount of time. The option gives users the option of deleting their data, or sending the account information such as passwords to another user or email address. Besides the use of this feature for alive users that just wish to remove their information if they don't use the services after a certain amount of time, Inactive Account Manager is one of the first mainstream Google features that will allow people to control what happens to their information after they're six feet under. With the way technology has become more and more involved in our every day lives, this new implementation is not surprising to me at all. What surprises me is that it took this long for there to be a service such as this. A quick Google search shows that on Facebook alone, there is over 30 million accounts of dead users still on the Facebook servers. It won't be long until other social websites implement such features, and it wouldn't be surprising if some even allow you to write a message or status update after their untimely doom. Imagine that, "John Smith is now dea! Like or Comment"

Many of us people keep social networking as a daily part in our lives. Apparently, we can end up putting a social media footprint. This article shows us three habits to manage this footprint; to make sure that we don't put our too much of our thoughts and private lives out to the world. We know that a huge social media footprint can end up getting us judged by others. This has to do with privacy and security because we can go off on what we post on facebook and twitter and share many private things, but we need to remember that the internet has a lot of memory and can keep those posts and private things for a long time. This also relates with eLifestyle because as we have access to these different social networks we share a lot of thoughts and other things out on the internet and it can have a negative or positive effect on us.

In this fiercely competitive business environment you need proactive employees who can boost your organization's performance and productivity. And this criterion is even more critical when you are to hire a candidate for a managerial role

This article talks about new gesture that could be used in addition to finger touch in order to have more options easily and launch new apps using your knuckle, fingertip, fingernail and more. A trio of Ph.D. students at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh managed to modify a Samsung Galaxy SIII to accept input from all three different touch variations, and tell the difference between them. It accomplishes this with the help of a vibration sensor and software that listens for the acoustic differences that come with the different types of touches. A man named Harrison has already started a company called Qeexo to start selling this tech. This vibration sensor can easily be added to any smartphone's "guts" and the software added too.   This article has a lot to do with portable computing because different companies are always coming up with new innovative ways to make smart phones more "smart". This is one of those things that a new company called Qeexo is doing. They are looking to improve the options and speed of using a smartphone for example instead of opening up a note pad by going into the menu and clicking it with your finger, you can use the "shortcut" of taping your knuckle twice to open it. This can also be used in gaming, option menus etc.  The main point is that companies are always changing making technology much more natural and easy to use. I think that this is a very good idea and over time if people hear about this depending on how much this would cost to upgrade it may become big and even become a pre-installed feature. 

This article is about how Google maps now allow you to go into street view over the peaks of mountains.Google's Dan Fredinburg, program manager and mountaineer, lead Google Mountain Enthusiast teams up Aconcagua in Argentina, Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Mount Elbrus in Russia, and up to the Everest South Base Camp in Nepal. Unfortunately, the team showed up just a little bit too early in the season to make it all the way to the top of Everest, and had to settle for base camp citing their guides' literal warning of certain death on the way to the peak, Fredinburg told Wired. But summit of Everest or not, the sights are still amazing, and have never been quite this easy to see for yourself. So go on google maps to see how amazing these peaks really are.  In my opinion, I believe that this is incredible for everyone because not everyone is a mountaineer and some mountaineers themselves haven't been able to reach the peak of a mountain. So I believe that with this new feature, it will grab people's attention and give them a better idea of what the top of a mountain looks like.

        It is being reported that the newest Xbox console will have online DRM (Digital Restrictions Management). DRM is technology that puts restrictions on media such as software, games, music, etc. that limits how the buyer is able to use and share the media that he or she bought. This means that the Xbox will always need to have an active internet connection to be able to use the games that you buy, even if the game itself does not require internet connection. The point of this is to prevent to prevent the resale of used games. However, this will mean that people can not share games with eachother, play if the internet goes out or they they do not have the internet at all. This will increase the sale of new games giving the companies more profits. However, this may backfire on Microsoft, as many gamers may not purchase the new console as a form of boycott, reducing Microsoft's profit until the DRM is removed. 

This is a very great report, keep up the great work Spider Man

Uncle Ben would be proud

One on the most popular social networking sites, Facebook, obtains Instagram. Instagram is a trending photo/camera app that many iPhone users are currently using. This will affect facebook users who like uploading and sharing their photos in a great way, because it will give them more options. I think Facebook will manage Instagram very well because they are very experienced in working with apps and software. The creators of Instagram also believe that Facebook will change and work with them in an efficient way.

This is article is all about running a second operating system in a virtual machine or dual boot. Choosing between this two methods is up to you, because  you need to think which better for your particular needs.Both have pros and cons, but are better suited to specific situations. Dual booting is great for games and other Long stints in an operating system while virtualization is great for running that one program, or testing out a new OS.

This article discusses the options of running an OS within an OS for example a VMware image of Apple Mac OS X 10.7 Lion running on a Windows based machine within the VMware software package. It discusses the issues of performance when you use another OS within a host OS and how the processor has to utilise and manage its resources within the both OS's for it to run, so therefore the virtual OS will be very laggy and unresponsive if it has to utilise a lot of resources and if it has a lot of programs and processes open simultaneously. While Dual booting is great if you own a Apple Mac due to the fact that not many games can run on the Mac environment because of the need of most games require the Microsoft DirectX 10 codec or higher for example CRYSIS 2  which is only available to windows machines for it to function properly. This therefore is relevant to my course due to the fact that it discusses many software package limitations and also hardware limitations which can get in the way of what you want to achieve for example VMware .ISO file of Apple Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion running on an Acer Aspire 5247.  

This article is all about ChromeOS. ChromeOS has always been just a Chrome browser and very little else. With the latest development build, however, Chromebook owners can try out a window manager, a taskbar, and even desktop space. At the moment, only owners of Acer or Samsung Chromebooks can try out the latest Dev Channel build with "Aura," the new desktop scheme.

In order to prove that the Windows Phone 7 flagships phone are faster than any other phone, Microsoft has a new marketing campaign where they invite you to bring your own phone in and pit it's speed against one of Microsoft's phones. Someone has actually managed to win this challenge but was not awarded her prizes because the employees at the store gave her a sudden excuse about needing to have widgets open that tells the weather in two different cities in two different states. She was later issued an apology and challenged to a rematch.

This article tells the readers about 7 apps that were released this week. The seven apps are Pair, Bump Pay, Fuze HD, Babbel forAndroid, MTA or Merifian, Paper, and Wonders of the Universe.   Pair is an app for many of those who are in a long distance relationship. They allow couples to create a private timeline, swap photos, share videos, and their location. The app also has "thumb kiss" feature that vibrates the phone when they both touch the same part of the phone. This app is available for iPhones. Bump Pay is an app that allows you to pay others by simply "bumping" your phones together. You would pay them using PayPal. Fuze HD is an video conference app that allows others to have a video chat with up to ten people on at once. You could  also send text, images, and other media during the presentation. Babble for Android is a language app. It has over 3000 vocabulary words, sounds, images, speech recognition and a personalized review manager for multiple languages. MTA on Meridian is a app that you can use to browse art of particular line or plan your own transit system art tour. Paper is a new app that allows people to draw diagrams and sketches and shared them with others on the web. Wonders of the universe is an app that lets you explore space with graphics and visuals.  I think that this article is interesting because it tells me many of the apps that I didn't know about.

This article explains how a program created by scientists from the University at Buffalo, can allow a computer to determine whether or not a person is telling the truth in a conversation, strictly by accessing the speaker's eye movements. I found this invention extremely interesting and as I kept reading, it turns out a computer with this program was able to correctly spot various lies with 82.5% accuracy, but a trained human interrogator only manages a success rate of about 65%. Somebody who dedicated their entire life to studying human psychology and has done years of hard work and training in this subject was outsmarted by a computer who can do the same effort and work but in a better performance. These scientists really put the time and effort into creating this software to work as efficiently and be most successful as possible so just by the computer looking at your eyes, more specifically the movement pattern and the rate of your blinking, it can identify if you are telling the truth or not. This is a prime example of how technology is evolving all around us and how we are using our knowledge to further programs and devices to help and assist us perform tasks, be successful, and happy living our everyday lives. 

Tired from listening to complaints from costumers, Apple finally decided to do something about the battery length on the iPhone 4S. Apple released 5 iPhone battery cases that will extend the length of your battery. Although the cases aren't exactly pretty I guess we'll just have to manage with those for now.

This is the same device that actually managed to sell LESS than the 3DS when it launched. When you launch hardware you have to have good software or else it will bomb.

I agree they did not have good software for japan but I think they just need a monster hunter game and it will sell in japan just like the regular psp but the hardware for the vita is actually great i like the touch pad on the back and it is a great value it is the most powerful portable console out there. When it launches in North America i think it will do good because of all the great games like uncharted, wipeout and the like.

But the system also has many flaws, like an irreplaceable (and short-lasting) battery, expensive proprietary storage, it's too big, and it's also too expensive, which Nintendo learned the hard way after the 3DS price drop thing. Sony is going to have to at least drop the price to be able to compete. Although I do agree that it will eventually have good software, it doesn't yet, and that can really hurt the system.

This article is about how you can protect your personal information that is on your computer/phone. There are a few ways that you can increase your security and privacy settings so that no one else can see your information. For instance you can manage which apps can access your data on that service. Or you could turn off your location tracking on your phone so that no one knows where you are. This is a very useful article because many of us forget how important it is to keep our information to ourselves. Whenever you put something online, you never know who can see it. 

HP managers in Russia have allegedly bribed executives in the Russian Prosecutors General Office for about $9.7 million to land a deal to supply the office with HP computers, printers, etc for $45.3 million. German lawyers say that HP its self should be prosecuted and there should be a US investigation. HP is cooperating with the US and the court but say that they didn't that this was happening. The people who bribed those officials are not very smart because if you bribe someone you know that you will get caught sooner or later. Because of their actions this might cause a fall in HP sales of their software, computers and printers. Legally this ruins costumer trust for HP and could also cause fall of sales.       

Admit it, if you have a smartphone, you're probably glued to it. It goes everywhere with you, and you use it all the time, even in school, where it's a big distraction. In South Korea, the most wired country in the world, some schools are remotely disabling students smartphones in school via an app called iSmartKeeper. With the app, teachers can lock all the phones in the school, only allow emergency calls, only allow texts and calls, disable specific apps, and unlock the phone during breaks. The app also uses geofencing that puts the restrictions on the phones when the students enter the school premises. Parents are also provided with a management app that allows these restrictions to be put in place when their teens are doing their homework. In Seoul, the app has been trialed in 11 schools, and the results were mixed. Many students rooted their phones to avoid the restrictions, and the geofencing sometimes didn't leaving the phones to be locked after the students left school. This app is for Android only due to the popularity of local brands like Samsung, however, iOS users should beware, as an iOS version is coming next month.. I think some advantages are it minimizes distractions and encourages students to be more focused on their studies. However, it may anger many students initially. No word yet if the app will be available outside South Korea.

although many people weren't pleased with the new release from apple because it was only an upgrade to the previous iPhone 4, apple still managed to break records. An estimated one million pre-orders were made in the span of 24 hours. the iPhone 4S which is a major upgrade to the iPhone 4 has better processor improvements, a new 8 mega pixel camera, and new speech to text and text to speech.