So you've created a kickass, play-anything media center with XBMC , but it's a too hard for your less tech-savvy friends and family members to use. Here are a few ways to make your home theater PC so easy that your four year old could use it.
Chrome/Web: Learning another language can be difficult if you don't immerse yourself in it every day. Mainichi is a Chrome new tab replacement and webapp that teaches you (and reminds you of) everyday Japanese words.
We could probably debate forever which programming language is best to learn first —it could depend on your goals and other considerations . Mac developer Evan Miller, however, makes a strong case for learning C first, likening it to learning to drive stick shift.
You might not understand how truly useful and indispensable a Leatherman, or any multitool for that matter, is unless you've carried one for a while. Obviously, Leatherman President Ben Rivera is quite fond of his, but it caused a bit of a problem when he tried to pass through the gates at Disneyland while on vacation with his family. For perfectly obvious reasons, security there doesn't let people carry knives into the park. So after dropping his tool back at his hotel room, Rivera started thinking about how to carry the less offensive parts of his pocket toolkit in a more convenient way. Thus was born the Leatherman Tread bracelet.
The concept started with Rivera wearing a bike chain bracelet just to get an idea of how comfortable something slightly chunky and made of metal would be during daily wear. From there, engineers at the company were able to pretty quickly turn the concept into a product. Each link on the Tread is a fully functioning tool that can be removed, used and replaced -- hopefully with minimal fuss. The company even designed it to be fully customizable, so you can include different screwdrivers instead of the box wrenches, or skip the carbide glass breaker in favor of a cutting hook. Or you can connect them all if you happen to have particularly beefy wrists. (Arguably the most important tool -- the bottle opener -- is not optional and part of the bracelet's clasp.)
The basic bracelet is expected to hit shelves in the summer. But if you can wait 'til then, you can pick up one paired with a Swiss-made watch. The Leatherman Tread Watch may not give you turn-by-turn directions or listen to voice commands, but I guarantee you'll get more use out of its bottle opener than you will "Digital Touch."
Filed under: Wearables
Source: Leatherman
Today might be all about the next chapter in Windows, but there's something for the hardware-heads, too. Specifically the Surface Hub -- which joins Surface tablets, and Lumia smartphones on Redmond's roster of gear offerings. This beast is basically a large all-in-one PC (slash smart display) that is fully loaded with sensors, speakers, WiFi, NFC, microphones, cameras and more. The funniest thing? This huge device has been hiding in plain sight for the duration of Microsoft's keynote today.
Filed under: Handhelds, Tablets, Mobile
Apple's Touch ID is great, when it works. If you're having some trouble with your iPhone recognizing your fingerprints, it's time you train it a little more.
Address labels have become a thing that few people need to use on a daily basis outside of an office anymore. If you come across one of these rare situations (like moving, for example), you can sign up with the Humane Society to get a pack of free address labels.
Long ago, Google once said it hoped to get an official, final Project Ara device -- the so-called gray phone -- onto the market by January 2015. It doesn't take a math whiz to realize that window is rapidly closing, but that doesn't mean Google's taking the whole modular smartphone thing any less seriously. Project lead Paul Eremenko shed a little more light on Ara's future at Google's second Ara Developer Conference, and dropped a few juicy details about forthcoming Spiral 3 Ara prototype in the process. He also unveiled the latest design for the Ara, which you can peek in the gallery below.
Let's back up for a moment first: Google's been working with its so-called Spiral 2 prototype design (see below) since about last July and the search giant is getting more ambitious with its forthcoming prototype. You can simply look at the design to see that it's much more polished than previous iterations. Eremenko says we can expect the Spiral 3 to "match or exceed the functionality of a state-of-the-art smartphone today" with 20 to 30 third-party modules available for developers to tinker around with. On top of all that, the new prototype should feature day-long battery life, though Eremenko allows for a single battery swap to get users through the day. Throw in a high-end camera and support for 4G LTE connectivity (a big step from the 3G-only service the current prototypes work with) and you've got Google's vision of its new prototype in a nutshell.
As it turns out, one of the most notable changes is one you as a user might not even notice. After receiving plenty of feedback from early module developer partners, Eremenko said the electro-permanent magnets that hold modules in place have been moved onto the endoskeleton itself. Why does that matter? Well, it means the people and companies trying to squeeze gobs of functionality into teensy modules have a little more room to work with. Considering that Ara devices could hardly boot reliably last time we saw them, this new performance push speaks to how much progress the teams have made in just a few months.
It'll be a while yet before you'll be able to claim an Ara device of your very own, but you'll be able to customize it when you do... just not in the way Google originally envisioned. In the early days, the Ara team talked up the notion of customizable designs created via 3D printing, but that turned out to be too dicey to complete with the time Google's willing to invest. Instead, we're getting a completely new design customization scheme based on something called dye sublimation, which will let Google decorate polycarbonate shells in full color with high resolution imagery.
Filed under: Mobile
Every relationship has good times and bad times. When we're in the bad times, we forget or ignore the good times. Creating a couple's memory jar preserves those positive memories.
