Wednesday 30 January 2013

BlackBerry 10 Launched with New Handsets Z10 and Q10

Research in Motion, unveiled three new products yesterday at the event where BlackBerry 10 was unveiled. But they first started off by renaming their company as BlackBerry from Research in Motion. So the company will no longer be known as RIM.

BlackBerry needed to showcase something fantastic that will mark a turnaround. In the past few years competition from iPhone and Android has more or less crippled BlackBerry's dominance over smartphone markets.

BlackBerry started off by showcasing BlackBerry 10 the OS, Z10 a touch screen phone device and Q10 a device that supports a physical QWERTY keypad.

BlackBerry10

BlackBerry 10 Features

  • The BB10 OS supports multi-tasking and sharing seamlessly. The design is such, that it encourages users from moving into an app and out of it with swiping.
  • The Peek feature, which allows all apps to get integration with the notifications on the phone is very useful. The OS really leverages the notifications a lot better any phone like iPhone or Android.
  • There are many small changes which make user experiance a lot better. For example the camera starts recording a video without being asked to. A tap anywhere on the screen takes a snap.
  • The app market is where BB10 is looking weak. They have about 70,000 apps and lot of the popular ones on Android or iOS are not available. For example there is no Instagram on BB10.

BlackBerry Z10 Features

  • The device features a 4.2 inch screen, 1280 X 768 display with pixel density of 356 dpi.
  • The phone ships with a removable 1800mAH battery, 8MP rear camera and 2MP front camera.
  • 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 Plus processor with 2 GB RAM.
  • The phone supports Bluetooth, NFC, LTE.

This phone is a the touch screen one and will probably end up as the showpiece phone for BlackBerry. The hardware is decent and it runs on a new shiny OS. But the apps (rather lack of apps) could hurt its prospects over the year.

BlackBerry Q10 Features

This phone is a lot different from the ones most phone makers showcase. The real reason being the a physical keyboard in QWERTY style.

The phone has 3-inch wide screen. The features of the Q10 are very similar to the Z10 device.

Road ahead for BlackBerry?

I am not too convinced that BlackBerry will survive in the long run. The BB10 OS has introduced some amazing features but those might easily get picked up Android and iOS as new updates roll out this year. BlackBerry best change of survival is at displacing the Nokia + Windows 8 phone combine. That will allow it to settle at third place.

At the end of the day, App ecosystem is what makes or breaks a mobile phone and in that regard BlackBerry's troubles still exist. If it fixes its apps market, which is easier said than done, then we might see a revival of BlackBerry.

Do drop in your comments.

-- This Post BlackBerry 10 Launched with New Handsets Z10 and Q10 is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Tuesday 29 January 2013

Google+ overtakes Twitter: What does it mean for Facebook?

According to GlobalWebIndex, Google+ has overtaken Twitter as the second most active social network. It is being used by about 25% slightly ahead of Twitter. Interestingly, Facebook has a commanding lead with garnering the attention of over 50% users.

Google+ is very closely linked to all products offered by Google. That means when you sign up with Gmail, you have created a Google+ account. The +1 button is also available on Google Play store, where apps often get +1s by Android users.

Google_overtakes_Twitter

The small detail that is a little interesting is that YouTube is also ahead of Twitter.

Should Facebook Worry?

Facebook might still be top and will remain at the top for a long time, but the fact that Google+ and YouTube are at #2 and #3 respectively should be worrying. Both are owned by Google and reasonably different in scope.

But the big stake for any social media is the data they collect. For example, with Facebook's new Search Graph, we can see how Facebook wants to show us more local data and recommendations.

Google has more rounded products to collect this data and more importantly it has its own mobile platform in Android and Google Maps as an addition.

Google+ has not really seen newer and unique features in 2012 but I am sure that will change this year.

Do drop in your comments.

-- This Post Google+ overtakes Twitter: What does it mean for Facebook? is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Friday 25 January 2013

Download – Full Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 Setup

Microsoft has rolled out .NET Framework 4.5 recently. If you programming with C#, Visual Basic and F# or writing Windows apps, then chances are you require the latest version of .NET Framework.

At the Microsoft Download center, the default link is the online installer. This means you download the installer and it needs to be connected online to install .NET Framework on your computer. That sometimes is inconvenient especially if your are on a slow connection or want to use the installer on other computers. Also sometimes you might want to install .NET Framework 4.5 on a computer that is not connected to the internet.

dotnet_45

This is why it is a better idea to download the offline installer. The offline installer is 50MB and installs the full framework.

Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 Requirements

  • The OS supported are Windows Vista SP2, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 (x64) and Windows Server 2008 SP2 (x86 and x64).
  • The minimum hardware requirements are 512 MB RAM, 850 MB available space for (X86) and 2 GB space for (X64) versions.

Download Link: Offline Installer Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 (x86 and x64)

-- This Post Download – Full Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 Setup is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Thursday 24 January 2013

Quora Launches Blogging Platform

Quora is a very interesting website. It is basically a social network that is alive with content. No silly cats or funny videos but really well researched posts and discussions by people from various backgrounds. In other words to an extent Quora has done something Facebook and Twitter have not managed.

Quora has now launched a blogging platform  It was already being used like a blogging platform by some by re-sharing their blog posts on their boards. Quora has now converted all boards into blogs.

Quora Blogging Platform

Quora's Blog Features

  • Once you sign-in to your account, you will get a message at the top to create your blog.
  • Select the relevant topics you want your blog to be associated with. And start creating posts.
  • The layout of the blogs are simple and are focused on reading more than style. The best part is I can add multiple ready-made tags or categories in the form of "Post Topic".
  • Basically if you are an expert at something, having content on your own Quora blog is a great idea.
  • Quora claims the blogging platform can be used on mobile phones but I see that at the moment it supported only on iPhones.

What could be Quora's plan?

Quora is not exactly a social network. It is a lot closer to something like Wikipedia but not social. It is also very similar to websites like About.com. But its unique and rich feature is people asking questions and experts replying on them.

Also blogposts on Quora at the moment are all public. So are other posts and answers to questions but usually only the top answer can be viewed and to see the rest you either have to sign-in to your account or register with Quora.

One thing a lot of people are watching is how Quora will finally monetize. The problem is Quora cannot make money by selling content that is crowd sourced without upsetting the users who created it.

So letting users in on some of the revenues could be a possible future strategy and what better way than a blogging platform. Ofcourse I could be way off the mark here about Quora's monetization plans.

Do your use Quora? Will you use it as a blogging platform? Do drop in your views in comments.

(via Quora Blog)

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Temple Run 2 makes it way for Android

Just last week, Temple Run 2 – sequel of one of the most popular mobile games ever has released for iPhone. Today, it has been released for Android.

temple-run-2

So what does Temple Run 2 bring to the table? Well, quite a lot. They've revamped the game scenery which looks much more organic now and it constantly keeps changing. You don't just run, instead you'll be swinging on ropes, riding mine carts and lot more.

And of course, you'll be chased by a monstrous monkey.

There are new obstacles, power ups and characters (the default is still Guy Dangerous).

The game went pretty smoothly on my phone, just like the original Temple Run.

While Apps releasing for iPhone first and then getting ported to Android isn't something new, it's good that Imangi Studios got the game to 'droid in a week.

The worst situation is of Windows Phone users, who don't have a chance to play even the original Temple Run.

It's now available on the Play store for free. Just use the link below, as it isn't yet available through search. Try it out and tell us what you think about it.

Link: Temple Run 2

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Wednesday 23 January 2013

Winners and Losers of Google’s New Image Search Design

Google will soon start rolling out a new Image search layout for desktop browsers. This will firstly make the experience of looking up images on tablets platforms and desktop browsers uniform. This actually leverages the current redesign of Google's search options showing up at the top instead of on the side.

Here is the new format that we all will start seeing in the near future for Google Images

Google_Image_Search_NewDesign

The images will be shown inline and navigation by using keyboard will make looking up results a lot simpler.

Winners and Losers

Google will show the full sized images inline instead of displaying the image against a whitened backdrop of the original page. That was actually impacting the server load as it showed up 'ghost' visits to websites. This ideally would not be very harmful for blogs and similar websites but sites known for storing public photos might find this a better deal.

But that does not mean everyone will be happy with this change. If you clicked on a small image, it took you to a page where the image is from. This is a great way for many websites get a lot of visitors to their own domains. Google is trying to appease their concerns by making the domain name clickable and also display a button to visit the original page.

That said from a user experience point of view, this change is for the better.

Have you seen this new format for Google Search for Images? Do drop in your comments.

(via Google Webmaster Blog)

-- This Post Winners and Losers of Google's New Image Search Design is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Tuesday 22 January 2013

Twitonomy: Get Free In-depth Stats and Graphs About Twitter Usage

I spend some time on social media but most of it is dedicated to Facebook. Twitter is a service which I do not really use a lot. I usually add some articles I like sharing on Buffer App and move on. I like Twitter because the noise on it is always about what is happening currently. But what it lacks is the ability to show us some handy analysis of our activity on it. This is where Twitonomy is pretty good and whats more it is free.

Twitonomy Features

I found that Twitonomy really shows a great deal of insights about how we use Twitter. The first thing that struck me were data on the users I most retweeted. More importantly it showed the number of tweets I had retweeted. This was pretty good data on how I basically interact on Twitter.

Twitonomy_interaction

Tweet analytics are very basic overview of the number of tweets between a particular timeframe and data related to it. For example it seems like I tweet 5.18 times a day but get a retweet only 12% of the time. That means once in every three days.

Twitonomy_Tweetanalytics

The most handy analysis I found on Twitonomy was an analysis of the retweets on my tweets. It shows a table which tweets were Retweeted and by how many users and how many followers each use had. This is I guess important to see what sort of thing that you share is the most viral.

Twitonomy_retweet_data

These were just three of my favorite stats analysis I shared above. There are several more like analysis on your followers, on lists and much more.

Additionally you can also have Twitonomy get you data on other Twitter users. But I did not find it all that useful for normal users like me. But it is something social media experts might be interested in.

Do try out Twitonomy and drop in your comments and views.

Link: Twitonomy

Related: Clean up your Twitter Feed

-- This Post Twitonomy: Get Free In-depth Stats and Graphs About Twitter Usage is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Monday 21 January 2013

How to enlarge locked Facebook profile pictures

After Google plus, we finally found a way by which you can enlarge a profile picture of locked Facebook profile pictures album. People on Facebook lock their profile pictures so that it can't be misused by their friends or any other Facebook user. Obviously anybody will not use a small 160x160px picture anywhere because faces on such a small picture are hardly visible. But what if someone can enlarge it up to 720x720px? Let's see how you can do it.

1. Open a profile with lock profile pictures album for example this profile:

https://www.facebook.com/ninakaur28?fref=ts

2. Now right click on the profile picture and click "Copy image URL". For example the URL of image for the above profile link is:

https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/c96.36.448.448/s160x160/314224_4552785855326_321076708_n.jpg small facebook profile picture 3. In the above link change 160×160 with 720×720, so your new link will be:

https://fbcdn-profile-a.akamaihd.net/hprofile-ak-ash4/c96.36.448.448/s720x720/314224_4552785855326_321076708_n.jpg enlarged facebook profile pictureThats it, you can also give this trick a try with any Facebook profile with locked profile pictures. Please note that by this post we don't want to give a new option to profile stalkers to invade user privacy and misuse their pictures. This post is just to aware people that your profile picture is not safe even if it's locked.

Happy Facebooking. :)

-- This Post How to enlarge locked Facebook profile pictures is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Sunday 20 January 2013

Kim Dotcom Launches Mega on Megaupload’s Closure Anniversary [50 GB Free]

Kim Dotcom the man behind the file sharing website Megaupload.com has launched a new file-sharing and cloud storage serivce called Mega. Megaupload.com was an extremely popular file sharing website got itself into trouble when its founder Kim Dotcom was charged in New Zealand for copyright infringement. Exactly one year after Megaupload was shutdown, Kim Dotcom launched the a new service Mega.

Mega apparently is not Megaupload relaunched but apparently 'a completely new service'. It is interesting to see the nuanced term "cloud storage" being emphasized more than the term "file sharing" on Mega.

Mega cloud service

What does Mega offer?

  • Mega cloud storage offers upto 50GB free storage space.
  • The bandwidth is limited and it seems like a file size of greater than 100MB for download is allowed only on Pro accounts. This I guess is to discourage Mega users from using it for uploading pirated movies.
  • Mega also offers cloud storing service which are paid accounts. These Pro packages are for 500GB, 2 TB and 4 TB storage space respectively. The bandwidth also is significantly higher than in the free account.

With 50 GB free storage space, it is many more times more than any other cloud service offering. Dropbox offers 2 GB, Google Drive 5 GB and SkyDrive 7GB with their free packages. But Mega has no mobile phone support while all other cloud services have apps across all major mobile platforms.

But compared to Microsoft, Google and Dropbox, Mega will be a lot less trusted brand. This is more so after Megaupload was closed down.

What are your views on Mega and its features? Do drop in your comments.

Link: Mega

-- This Post Kim Dotcom Launches Mega on Megaupload's Closure Anniversary [50 GB Free] is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Friday 18 January 2013

Facebook Hacker Cup 2013: Winner Gets $10,000

Facebook is well known for its hacking competition. If you have seen the movie 'Social Network', it showed how hacking match-offs would take place and the winner would be offered a job at Facebook.

Though I would not know if those stories are real or not, but Facebook does have a lot of respect for the hacking community. They show this respect by hosting an annual programming contest called the Hacker Cup.

Facebook Hacker Cup

Facebook Hacker Cup Details

  • The competition starts on 25th January 2013. If you are interested in the competition, you can register at this link.
  • Anyone from around the world can register for the competition but read the terms while registering.
  • There will be a qualification round followed by 3 elimination rounds. All these rounds will be held online.
  • Final Onsite round will be held at Facebook offices at Menlo Park, California, US.

The Prize

  • The 1st place winner will get a cash prize of $10,000 USD.
  • The 2nd place winner gets $2000 USD and 3rd place winner gets $3000 USD.
  • The prize of $100 USD will be given to programmers who come in from 4th to 25th.

Link: Facebook Hacker Cup | Hacker Cup FAQ

-- This Post Facebook Hacker Cup 2013: Winner Gets $10,000 is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Thursday 17 January 2013

Will Facebook’s Graph Search hurt Google? Yes, Maybe and No

Facebook has recently announced a new trick. It goes by the name "Graph Search". I have signed up like many people might have, but I have not seen it showing up on my account as yet. From what some are saying it will might take up to "weeks". I was intrigued to by Search Graph and the screenshots shared in a post by Sauravjit, but I was taken aback by the deluge of posts on how Facebook's Graph Search will challenge Google's search dominance.

Facebook has apparently found a way to crash Google's party.

facebook graph search screenshots
Facebook Graph Search: Serious Competition to Google?

So will Facebook disrupt Google's search business in a big way?

Yes! Google will worry!

Okay, Google is a search giant and it has massive resources. Billions of search queries are handled by Google without breaking a sweat. Why would Google worry about Facebook's improved search feature.

  • The money is in local advertising. Google shows up pretty good localized results. I usually search for restaurants, hotels and even for movies on Google. Google rules this niche and makes potentially billions from local businesses investing in AdWords.
  • Facebook has a lot of data that is personal. It knows the movies people watch, the theaters people go to and their experience visiting restaurants. Facebook's Graph search would be very useful to find information that is personalized.
  • Google might worry about this. As a matter of fact they have been worrying about it for years now. That is why they ended up creating their own social network Google+. They want similar personalized data to work with and augment their search results.

Maybe its just Facebook fixing itself

Searching on Facebook is a terrible experience  It auto-prompts me people, pages and more but most of them are not what I am searching for. It is decent if you are searching for the profile of your friends but for searching for new stuff, it is pretty much useless.

  • So with Graph Search, Facebook might not be really be thinking of hurting Google but is actually fixing a really under-utilized feature.
  • Facebook it just rolling out something new for browser. There is still no clarity on how Graph Search will work on mobile phones.
  • Also more than hurting Google's search engine, a great search feature will hurt LinkedIn. I can already see HR departments all over the world, looking up various permutations and combinations for finding good potential employees on Facebook instead of LinkedIn.

Let's not get over excited! It is Facebook

Facebook has a great track record of coming out with something interesting and then making a mess of it. It messed up the Timeline redesign.

  • Simple things like a photo will not be displayed in completely in the profile layout. On the whole I still find the timeline design very clunky.
  • It also has some major problems managing my lists. I cannot move people in bulk from one list to another (like we can on Google+).
  • And hopefully we won't see Graph Search being case of Facebook stumbling on the "Privacy" front.

Overall it is a good development as something critical like "Search" for Facebook will be fixed. But only time will tell if Facebook will be able to really deliver a great product let alone challenge the likes of Google at the search engine game. That game is something Google really knows how to play very well.

What are your expectations from Facebook's graph search? Do drop in your comments.

-- This Post Will Facebook's Graph Search hurt Google? Yes, Maybe and No is Published on Devils Workshop .





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Wednesday 16 January 2013

AirDroid 2 Beta APK available for users to try

AirDroid is one of those apps which show the real power of Android app ecosystem. This is unlike iOS and WP, where apps are sandboxed and have access to limited system resources.

For beginners, AirDroid lets you control your Android phone via your desktop. You can send/recieve SMS, access files (download/upload them), install apps, manage contacts, listen to music and lot more – all from the comfort of your desktop via a web browser. The only requirement is that both your phone and desktop should be on same Wi-Fi network.

airdroid-2

Now if you're a regular user of this app, here's the news – A beta version of AirDroid 2 is now available as an APK, free to try for everyone. It'll be released in the Play Store later.

What's new in AirDroid 2?

Firstly, one of the biggest limitations of AirDroid is removed in the 2.0 version i.e. your phone and desktop don't need to be on same Wi-Fi connection. In fact, your phone can be on mobile data (2G/3G) and AirDroid will work fine.

AirDroid's Android app doesn't even need to be open on your mobile to connect it to desktop, you can just go to v2.airdroid.com, sign in with your AirDroid account (which you can create for free) and your devices are connected.

You can now even take photos remotely and have them saved to your desktop directly. I tried the feature and it turned out to be like this. :D (it doesn't use the native camera app, that's why the blurred photo)

airdroidception
This is what you call as AirDroidception.

There's also a 'Find phone' feature which locates your phone and shows it on Google Maps (it kind of mimics Apple's 'Find my iPhone').

The web app's UI is slightly revamped and looks better now.

So, that wraps it. If you haven't started using AirDroid, you should. If you already use it, then you'll love this update. Hit the link below to grab the APK, or just wait for it to hit Play Store.

Link: AirDroid 2

-- This Post AirDroid 2 Beta APK available for users to try is Published on Devils Workshop .





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The Mac Freebie bundle lets you download 8 paid Mac apps for free

Mac software is generally pricey, especially for Windows converts like me. Thankfully, there are app bundles which let you buy software at bulk and get discount. Sometimes you can get lucky and could get an app bundle totally for free – which is exactly what StackSocial is offering.

stack-social-mac-app-bundle

StackSocial is popular for giving discounts on software and they have just released 'The Mac Freebie Bundle' which essentially gives you 8 paid Mac apps for free.

The apps list include IconBox, Ondesoft Screen Capture, VidConvert, Image Smith, Wallpaper Wizard, ClipBuddy, TypeFu and Sweetie. As you may have guessed, it's mostly productivity software and can be really useful.

Of all the apps listed, I already use Wallpaper Wizard (got it from another Mac bundle) and really love it. It lets you change your desktop's wallpaper automatically from a curated list of wallpapers.

Even if you aren't much of a productivity guy, nothing hurts from grabbing a bunch of paid apps for free. The offer will last for 15 days, the site looks slow from here, probably because of heavy traffic. You just have to register for the site, share on your social network and you'll gain access to the apps.

Link: The Mac Freebie Bundle

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Tuesday 15 January 2013

All about Facebook’s new Graph Search

Facebook is all set to introduce a new feature and completely change the way we search for people and stuff on it. It is the Facebook's new "Graph Search". Since Facebook is huge and there are more than a billion people and more than 240 billion photos on it, so "Graph Search" will allow users to find people with similar interests like music, places, food, sports e.t.c. According to Facebook "The first version of Graph Search focuses on four main areas — people, photos, places, and interests." Let's see how to search for something on it and how to get your beta version.

How to use Facebook's Graph Search?

This Graph Search seems like (not exactly same) a text version of Apple's Siri. You can search for people, photos, places, interests and make new connections. Once you start typing it automatically suggests relevant content in a drop down list. You can filter your results using tools on the right sidebar of search results page. Check out some example of searches below:

  • People who like tennis and live nearby.
  • Photos before 1990.
  • Photos of my friends in New York.
  • Sushi restaurants in Palo Alto my friends have liked.
  • Tourist attractions in Italy visited by my friends.

How Graph Search works?

Graph Search looks for search results based on your friend's posts shared with you or post from other people on Facebook who shared it publicly with everyone. That means search results will be different for different users. Facebook made it very clear that no private posts will be shown in the search results.

Also there will be no change in your current privacy settings. If you don't want to share your posts like location, tags or posts you can change it on your Activity Log.

When you can start using it?

Currently beta version of "Graph Search" is out but it is available to a small number of people who are using Facebook in English (US). If you wish to use the beta version you can join the waiting list. Open this page and click "Join Waiting List" at the bottom of page.

Screenshots:

facebook graph search screenshots facebook graph search screenshots facebook graph search screenshots

Quick Links:

  • To join the waiting list, click here.
  • To try it now and see how Privacy works with Graphs, click here.

Don't forget to share your views with us on Facebook Graph Search. :)

-- This Post All about Facebook's new Graph Search is Published on Devils Workshop .





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