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Next version of Android will combine Gingerbread and Honeycomb, arrive on a six-month cycle

Eric Schmidt didn’t give a ton of details about the future of Android during his MWC 2011 keynote, but he did drop one interesting tidbit: the next version of Android will “start with an I, be named after a dessert” and combine Gingerbread for phones and Honeycomb for tablets into a cohesive whole. We’ll just go out on a limb and say that he’s talking about Ice Cream, and that we’ll see that Fragments UI construct used to bridge the phone / tablet display size gap. Unfortunately, Eric didn’t say anything about timing — just that updates have been happening on a “six month cycle.” Considering that Honeycomb has yet to officially launch on any devices, we’d say that’s not so long to wait — but of course we’re also dying to know more as soon as possible. We’ll let you know if we hear anything good.

Next version of Android will combine Gingerbread and Honeycomb, arrive on a six-month cycle originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 12:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google demos Android Movie Studio for Honeycomb

Google won’t let anyone take pictures during its MWC 2011 keynote, so you’ll just have to trust us when we say Eric Schmidt just demoed a new video editing application called Movie Studio for Honeycomb tablets. The app was built from the ground up for tablet devices, and it features everything you’d expect: a timeline-style editor, picture effects, soundtrack and audio support, and of course, HD support with uploads to YouTube. Unfortunately we don’t know much else about it, but we’ll be digging for more details, so stay tuned.

Update: We snuck a picture! You can see the timeline and the playback controls — it looks really nice, don’t you think?

Google demos Android Movie Studio for Honeycomb originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 12:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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See the new Windows Phone 7 features in motion (video)

See the new Windows Phone 7 features in motion (video)

Sure, you clung to every word we typed yesterday at Steve Ballmer’s MWC keynote, where a suite of new Windows Phone 7 features were announced. But sometimes seeing is believing, sometimes a picture is worth 1,000 words, and sometimes just watching a video is simply more fun. Microsoft has you covered, revealing a number of clips detailing the new Kinect “experience,” multitasking, and IE9. They’re all embedded below, so click on through, won’t you?

Continue reading See the new Windows Phone 7 features in motion (video)

See the new Windows Phone 7 features in motion (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 11:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Coca-Cola Secret Recipe Outed – Report

cola_recipe.jpg

Coca-Cola’s recipe is said to be one of the best kept secrets in all the world (particularly now that we all apparently know what goes into a bucket of KFC)–you know, the one that only two people in the world know, so they’re not allowed to fly on the same plane, because if it were to crash, we’d be plunged into an age of Coke-free darkness.

Oh, and also, there are armed guards who stand outside a vault holding the secret recipe all day, every day. So we hear.

Now the secret has apparently been blown by the folks at Public Radio International’s This American Life. Yep, Ira Glass and his bespectacled minions have blown the lid off of this sucker. That’s actually the recipe above. There’s also a PDF on This American Life’s site.
Coke, for its part isn't comment directly on the discover. Instead, the company is saying things like, 

The ingredients used in our beverages are listed on the product labels and many people have tried over time to crack the secret formula of Coca-Cola. That secret combination of ingredients holds a special place in the history and mythology of Coca-Cola -something we continue to celebrate as we mark our 125th anniversary this year.

Among the ingredients are: alcohol, orange oil, lemon oil, nutmeg oil, and cinnamon.

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Unstoppable: the first Blu-ray film with Android-compatible Digital Copy

It’s a little shocking that it’s taken this long to get a Digital Copy that’s compatible with Android, but clearly it’s the week of shackles being broken. Just yesterday, Qualcomm announced that all future Snapdragon devices would be cleared for Netflix streaming, and now Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment is announcing that its impending Unstoppable launch will allow Android users to watch the flick on the go. By enabling the transfer through BD Live, it marks the first time that this has been possible with Google’s mobile OS, though it should be noted that consumers will need the disc itself, a WiFi-connected BD player, Android 1.6 or higher and the free PocketBLU app to make the magic happen. Both the movie and app can be downloaded starting today, but here’s the real question: are you willing to invest in a movie just to experience Digital Copy… on Android?

Continue reading Unstoppable: the first Blu-ray film with Android-compatible Digital Copy

Unstoppable: the first Blu-ray film with Android-compatible Digital Copy originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 07:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HTC launches 1.5GHz, 7-inch Android 2.4 Flyer into the tablet wars (update: hands-on video!)

Boy oh boy, HTC is entering the tablet arena with quite a bang. The company has just taken the wraps off its brand new 7-inch Flyer Android tablet, which touts a 1.5GHz single-core CPU, 1GB of RAM plus 32GB of flash storage, an aluminum unibody construction, 1024 x 600 resolution, a tablet-optimized version of Sense, and… what’s this, a pressure-sensitive stylus! The HTC Scribe trademark we saw floating around in legal waters turned out not to be the branding for a tablet, it’s actually the name HTC gives to the technology enabling what it calls a “groundbreaking pen experience.” Other details include a 5 megapixel camera on the back paired with a 1.3 megapixel imager up front, a 4000mAh battery rated to last for four hours of continuous video playback, and memory expandability via a microSD card.

The Flyer will ship in Q2 2011 with Android Gingerbread 2.4 on board. HTC says it’ll be indistinguishable from 2.3 as far the end user is concerned, though we all know it won’t be quite as good as the 3.0 stuff. We’re told not to worry, however, since the new version of Sense being introduced with the Flyer will be the focal point of the company’s software offering. As far as HTC is concerned, Sense matters more than the underlying platform, and the reason Honeycomb isn’t the shipping OS here was explicitly stated as HTC not having enough time with the latest Google code to customize it to the full requirements of Sense. Guess that settles that.

There are a couple more software enhancements, both marking the introduction of the fruits of HTC’s recent deals: OnLive cloud gaming will be coming with the Flyer in the form of an app you open up to access the web-connected bored-relieving service, while that Saffron Digital acquisition has turned into an HTC Watch app for movie streaming and downloading.

We spent a bit of quality time with a Flyer unit recently, although we weren’t allowed to turn it on, and our early impressions are rather mixed. On the one hand, we do appreciate the ruggedness and durability that’s afforded by the one-piece aluminum shell, but on the other, the Flyer is quite the chunky beast in your hands. We’d imagine strapping in such an extra-speedy processor is the main culprit for its extra girth, though the Flyer is, ironically enough, not terribly light either. We found it heavier and generally a lot less polished from a design perspective than Samsung’s Galaxy Tab. Anyhow, HTC should have functional units for us immediately following its MWC presser this morning, and we’ll be delving in deeper with this super-specced device. Hang tight!

Update: Pictures of the Flyer can now be explored below and we have video awaiting your audience just past the break.

Update 2: Even more video!

Continue reading HTC launches 1.5GHz, 7-inch Android 2.4 Flyer into the tablet wars (update: hands-on video!)

HTC launches 1.5GHz, 7-inch Android 2.4 Flyer into the tablet wars (update: hands-on video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 05:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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A STD Love Story: Gonorrhea Takes a Piece of Human DNA Forever [Science]

In the first instance of gene transfer between a human host and bacteria, Gonorrhea was recently discovered to have a human DNA fragment. What the..how the..huh? Supposedly, it’s a relatively recent evolutionary event and scientists have no idea what it means. And though it’s a pseudo love story between star crossed lovers, I’m actually scaring myself as I read more into it. Scientists say: More »







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CSI: Internet

ShamusI’m aware of the whole CSI TV show craze, and the meme that sprouted up around it. I actually watched an episode of the show back when I was writing about the CSI-joke quest in World of Warcraft, just so I was familiar with the material being satirized.

However, even the WoW quest wasn’t as stupid as this:


Link (YouTube)

I realize that certain compromises are made for dramatic effect, but the very idea of examining the reflection in a person’s eye, in a photograph taken from an overhead angle, on a security camera… sigh. It would have been less immersion-breaking if they just resorted to elven magic to find the killer.


Link (YouTube)

So, a couple of detectives are surfing the internet on their mouse-less large-screen TV, when one of them realizes the website they’re looking at is being updated live. They decide they need the IP for this website. Or for someone who is updating the website. I’m not sure they know themselves. And then one of them says, “I’ll make a GUI interface using Visual Basic, see if i can track an IP Address out of this.”

Here is a cool project:

Try to list everything wrong with that conversation. It’s hard. Josh and I worked on it for a minute or two, and we were still coming up with new, ridiculous things to point out. There is so much wrongness packed in here it’s actually sort of daunting.

Of course, if she was really doing what she said she was doing, it would look like this:


Link (YouTube)

Hello? CSI? Yes, I’d like to report a crime. You see, apparently someone is stealing money from CBS. I don’t know what they look like, but I know they’re posing as a writer on a procedural crime drama. They’re writing hilarious gibberish and then making off with a paycheck at the end of the week. Catch them? No! I don’t want you to catch them. I want you to put me in contact with them. I’ve been writing stuff that’s coherent for a few years now, and I have to say it’s a lot more work and way less profitable. If you could hook me up with a job writing asspull fiction, I would really appreciate it.

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Pin your love on the map

[Cross-posted on the Official Google Blog]

This Valentine’s Day, tell your friends, family or significant other that you love them with a fun message from Google Maps.
Location can be a powerful trigger of memories—from the Italian place in San Francisco where you went on your first date to the cabin you rented at Lake Tahoe with your roommates. For that reason, we thought it would be great to create a Valentine’s Day card that’s tied to a specific location. As long as there’s a place that means something special to you and the ones you love, mapping your valentine is a great way to make Valentine’s Day a little more special.


One of my favorite memories is from a family trip we took to Eilat in Israel (check out my awesome fashion sense, I’m on the far left…), so I sent my parents this card:

I hope you’ll take a moment to remind the people you love of the places you’ve shared with them. Visit www.mapyourvalentine.com to get started.

Happy Valentine’s Day from Google!

Posted with love by Aaron Weissman, Google Maps & Earth Team

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Intel shows off more of its MeeGo Tablet UI, still needs lots of work

You may remember back at Computex we caught a very quick look at Intel’s MeeGo for tablets. Well, Intel’s landed at MWC with that very same tablet user interface, except it has done a bit of work to the underlying software and it’s finally ready to start letting the press play around with it. If you were to closely compare the design of the UI or what Intel is calling its “tablet user experience” to the one we saw back in June, you probably wouldn’t notice much of a difference in terms of aesthetics, and that’s because most of the work Intel’s been doing has been to the code and framework — it shifted it away from C++ and moved it over to QML, which is part of the Qt language. The brunt of the experience and the individual apps (we’ll get to those, or the lack there of soon) are all built on QML, which Intel’s Mike Richmond promises will enable lots of neat UI elements. So yes, Intel’s done some important retooling on the technical and software end of things, but unfortunately, that doesn’t mean the interface is anywhere close to done yet. We got a look at the software running on an Atom-powered ExoPC, so hit the break to find out just what we are talking about.

Continue reading Intel shows off more of its MeeGo Tablet UI, still needs lots of work

Intel shows off more of its MeeGo Tablet UI, still needs lots of work originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 06:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video)

We’ve just gotten back from playing around with LG’s 8.9-inch, 3D-friendly Optimus Pad (known as the G-Slate in the US). This Android Honeycomb tablets sports a dual-core CPU inside and a dual-camera array outside, giving you both the optical and processing capabilities to produce 3D video. Its screen cannot actually play back glasses-free 3D, but if you really have to have that third dimension on the move, you’ll be able to buy a set of glasses to recreate the effect. The Optimus Pad is slim, though we couldn’t get a great feel for its ergonomics with all the wiring attached to it, has nicely curved corners, a matte black back cover that’s pleasant to the touch and seemingly durable, and an extremely glossy screen up front.

We likened the Pad to the Optimus 2X in an earlier post and it carries over a lot of industrial design elements from its smartphone sibling, including the metallic strip down the middle of its rear branded with a “with Google” logo. That’s actually meaningful this time — the Optimus 2X wasn’t a stock Android installation, it was subjected to LG’s (not entirely successful tweaks), however the Pad looks to be a straight Google Experience Device, in much the same vein as the Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, its nearest and most direct competitors. That being said, the code on the device we handled still wasn’t up to scratch on the software front, as evidenced by us managing to crash both the browser and Google Maps within a few minutes of putting down our first fingerprints on the tablet. The 3D camcorder also seems like a memory hog, we weren’t able to get it started up initially because of the number of apps that were already open (which at the time was no more than four). Let’s remain optimistic, though, this wasn’t exactly a slate we snatched off a retail shelf and LG has time to optimize and spruce things up before shipping this thing out. We’ve got pictures for you below and a press release after the break. Video is incoming at the very fastest speed our wireless connection can carry it.

Update: Video is now in, get to the ogling!

Continue reading LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video)

LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 05:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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