Friday, November 21, 2014
TED app for Android finally gets Chromecast support
The TED library is massive. So massive that it has more than 1,700 TEDTalk video and audio clips. The content comes from people including business moguls to musicians to world-renowned educators. The official TED app has something informative for just about everyone. What the Android app has lacked is Chromecast support. That is until today. Version 2.3.1 of the TED app for Android brings Chromecast support. Now users can mirror TED content from their devices to televisions.
Hit the break for download links
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Google giving 1TB of free Drive storage to new Chromebook owners
We expect Chromebooks to be a very hot item for holiday shoppers this year. The devices running Chrome OS are cheap and the hardware is vastly different than what it once was. The value of a Chromebook just keeps getting and better. And it gets even better now because Google is giving new Chromebook owners free Drive storage. How much? An astounding 1TB for two years. That is nearly $240 that you do not have to spend. It is more than enough space for the average user, that’s for sure.
The offer expires on January 1, 2015. Don’t leave it sitting underneath the Christmas tree for too long!
Source: Google Drive Blog
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Nexus 6 is hiding an RGB LED, can be used for notifications if you’re willing to root
Seems the more we learn about the Nexus 6, the more it’s sounding like it was quickly hurried out the door. Another piece of evidence? The smartphone’s dormant (hidden) RGB LED light as discovered by some folks over on XDA . Yes, it’s there. Right smack dab in the center of the top speaker. Like most things, you’ll need root if you’re looking to activate it and an app like Light Flow to configure it.
If you need more help, check out the thread over on XDA . In the meantime, gawk over these pictures imagine what life would be like if you had the option to choose ambient display mode, LED notifications, or both on your Nexus 6.
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Google Makes Adobe Photoshop Available On Chrome OS For Education Customers
ChromeOS is a wonderful system. There are plenty of things that it can do that just about any person can find useful for a day to day set of operations. With that being said, there are still some things that ChromeOS is lacking, and one of those things is powerful photo editing tools like Adobe Photoshop. Having been in a project phase for the better part of two years, Google and Adobe have been working to bring the program and software to ChromeOS. Today they have made it possible to use Photoshop from a ChromeOS device with a piece of software available in the Chrome web store called Photoshop Streaming.
The issue is that for now only Educational establishments can use the software. That’s because Photoshop Streaming is apparently in a trial testing phase with Education customers of ChromeOS devices for the first six months. Reportedly, the software should open up to anyone who owns a ChromeOS laptop or desktop after that time frame, at least that’s the goal and obviously things could change in that time. Even as a personal ChromeOS user who doesn’t have access to this software on his Chromebook, it’s still amazing and awesome to know that Photoshop now runs on the operating system. It also serves as an indicator that everyone should be able to use it soon.
Essentially you can think of Photoshop Streaming as cloud based Photoshop solution. It runs as a sort of virtual machine as Adobe is basically mirroring a full version of the software from a server side setup, and then streams or displays it to the ChromeOS user, so you’re not actually running Photoshop on your own system. Because Photoshop Streaming runs this way you can only use Photoshop Streaming in conjunction with Google Drive based files, but in the future the plan is to open it up to be compatible with other cloud based storage systems, like perhaps Dropbox, Box and others, although no specific mentions were made and I’m simply throwing out ideas of some of the most popular options. If you use a ChromeOS device will you be happy to see this software be made available to all users sometime in the middle of next year?
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The RGB LED Notification Light On The Nexus 6 Stashed On The Sly Within The Top Speaker
LED Notification lights have become more or less a staple within the Nexus devices. Before they were in nearly all Android devices, you could always be certain that a Nexus device would have an RGB LED notification light somewhere on the front of the device. They have generally been in the same spot over the years with each model, and with this year’s Google Nexus 6 some had thought that there wasn’t an LED light this time around. The past few Nexus phones have had the LED notification light inserted within the bottom bezel, in fact, it was in the same spot within both generations of the Nexus 7 tablet as well. On the Nexus One it was embedded in the trackball, which was also at the bottom of the face.
With the Nexus 6 there is no LED notification light on the bottom, so some though it not to exist. A user on reddit however had recently posted some images that show the LED notification light does indeed remain on the Nexus, it was just moved to the top within the speaker. As you can see from the images below the notification LED embedded there displays different colors in each image, after the user states they had messed around with Light Flow – Color LED to get it to change different colors for certain notifications. It’s stated that the LED notification light is disabled out of the box, which makes sense due to the existence of Ambient Display on the Nexus 6. It should also be noted that you can enable the LED light for notifications yourself but you have to have a rooted device to do so.
If you have a rooted Nexus 6 then you can find the full instructions on how to get this going by following the Light Flow thread at XDA where the original post on how to set it up was posted. That thread doesn’t contain the instructions on how to root your device though so be sure to brush up on how to do that if you haven’t rooted the device yet and are wanting to. If you get things working share your thoughts on how you feel about the LED notification light as opposed to the Ambient Display for notifications.
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Top Android Homescreen November 21st Edition: Streets Of N.Y
It’s Friday and we have a rather cool looking homescreen pick for you this week. As always and like all of our picks, we get our homescreen designs from mycolorscreen where they have a pretty wide selection of different creations, things of all tastes. To re-create this particular homescreen you can do so in one of two ways. The easiest method is to download and install Themer, which is a third party launcher application that allows users to apply pre-made themed homescreens. If you prefer a different third party launcher like Nova Prime for example, than you can set this look up without Themer too.
The Homescreen is called Streets of N.Y., and has a kind of cool city/urban vibe going on. To get things going you’ll need a few different apps, and we’ll go over all of that here so you can get it up and running on your device now. To start, you’ll want to download a third party app launcher like Nova Prime, although Apex pro should work too. You’ll also need Zooper Widget Pro, and Media Utilities for the second and third app. Once you have those apps installed from the Play Store, you also need to download the Zooper Widget files, or the Themer file if you chose to go that route. The theme’s creator, 21MarCo12, has linked to the downloads on the page for this homescreen, which you can access by hitting the source link below.
Now that you have everything downloaded and installed, Make sure to open Nova settings,(or Apex settings if you chose that launcher instead)and set your desktop grid to 8 x 6(8 rows and 6 columns)without any margins at all. Next, disable the dock, hide the notification bar up top(status bar)and disable the “show shadow” option, and finally make sure you have your homescreen number set to 4 screens. The widgets you downloaded are all 8 x 6, so all you need to do is long press on each of the four homescreens, select widgets, scroll to Zooper, and select the appropriate size and widget file. Repeat this step for each homescreen until you have all four set up. That’s about it. If you like the look of this homescreen, be sure to show some appreciation to the creator by “zooming” the picture on the mycolorscreen page for this design, and hit the love button. Have a great weekend and happy themeing!
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European Parliament Wants To Split Google Into Smaller Companies
Google is a massive company. In its ten years of existence it has really grown to be a dominant force in the land of the internet. What’s more, it seems every year its tentacles continually reach out into new avenues and new ways to create new revenues. Further still, the company does not look like it will be stopping its neverending growth anytime soon. If recently, you had started to feel like Google may be getting too big, then you are not alone. It seems the European Parliament kind of agrees with you.
For some time now, the European Parliament has worried about the dominance American companies have in the internet sphere. With Google being as big as they are, it seems they are being firstly singled-out as a prime example of American internet monopoly. As a result and as a means of trying to limit the power any one company can have online. It seems the European Parliament are considering drafting a motion which would effectively seek to split Google into multiple smaller companies. The biggest problem the European Parliament has with Google, is that its primary service (Search) is so closely involved with all its other services and products. As such, the motion (if drafted) would look to separate Google’s Search company from that of its other services and businesses. It seems the European regulators believe the separation of the Search facility will be the easiest way to reduce Google’s overall power and dominance. One interesting factor noted by the Financial Times (who broke the story) is that it seems German representatives are the ones who are spearheading the attack on Google. This is apparently due to a growing animosity between German Politicians and the internet search king.
In reality though, even if the motion was passed, it seems highly unlikely that the European Parliament would be able to enforce such an action. Especially as Google is an American company. Nevertheless, the very notion being bantered about won’t be good for Google in the public eye and would put pressure on Google to try and appease the markets. What do you think about the supposed might of Google? Do you think Google is indeed getting too big and too dominant in the internet industry? Leave a comment and tell us your opinion on the matter
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Google Adds Chromecast Screen Cast Support For Nvidia Shield Tablet And LG G Pad 8.3 GPe
The much sought after feature of casting your screen to your Chromecast device had finally made it to a status of official release earlier this year, although in somewhat limited quantities with only a handful of devices carrying the support for the function. Fast forward to today and that hasn’t really changed much, with a large number of Android devices still left without support for the ability to cast their device display onto the big screen. Google has added support for the screen cast feature on two additional devices today though, which are both tablets just in case you thought that your phone was finally getting support.
If you’re the proud owner of either the LG G Pad 8.3 GPe or the Nvidia Shield Tablet, you can now cast your screen to the Chromecast and mirror whatever is happening on your device. This can come in handy for many things, but the first thing that always comes to mind for me with this functionality is playing games on the big screen that are compatible with a Bluetooth gamepad. The only issue with this is that their is a slight bit of lag in the response time from what actually happens on the device display and what you’re seeing on the TV screen or monitor that your Chromecast is hooked up to. Ultimately though this only becomes a real issue if you’re playing something hugely competitive, like say, online multiplayer games. While it can still be an annoyance for playing any other types of games, it’s a little less rage inducing since you don’t have to worry about it affecting any online scores. When it comes to casting your display for using other apps, you really don’t notice any lag.
Now that Google has flipped the switch for this feature on those two tablets and turned on support, you’ll find the screen cast to Chromecast feature located in the Quick Settings menu. At least, that’s where it should be hanging out if your device has the capability. I personally have neither the LG G Pad 8.3 GPe or the Nvidia Shield tablet, so if any readers out there are able to test this out and see how it works, share your thoughts on it in the comments on G+.
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Google Play Services Update Brings A Material Design Update Page
At the start of the week we heard the news that the update to Google Play Services was rolling out. This update brought Play Services to version 6.5 and added improvements to Google Maps. Google Wallet, Google Drive and Google Fit. The majority of the update was aimed towards Maps, bringing additional features which allowed third party apps to take advantage of a more seamless integration with Maps. The update to Wallet, Drive and Fit were a little less substantial. With Wallet adding a ‘Donate with Google’ button, Drive adding improvements to its syncing and Fit offering (like Maps) improvements to its third party compatibility.
Well, it seems there might be a few aesthetic improvements coming with the update too. Android Police are working on their typical APK teardown and have already noted one of the improvements to the general look of android. In particular, the update feature. With the Android 5.0 (Lollipop) update around the corner, we all know what the standard ‘check for updates’ page looks like. It consists of a rather mundane grey page with ‘Your system is up to date’ along the top. Beneath is a small page break line followed by information on the last time the system was checked. Well, as you can see in the image below that has all changed. The new look consists of a much more ‘Card’ and Material Design feel. The grey has been (half) replaced with the top half taking on a much lighter blue sky image. Gone is the page break line with the separation of the card acting as a break in itself. The actual font type seems to be much more refined too, with more pronounced and bold lettering. Lastly, you can see at the bottom of the image the standard ‘Check now’ click box has gone too. This has been replaced with a new blue all capitalized ‘check for update’. So overall, it seems the update page does look far more attractive.
Its not clear as to whether making the update page more attractive and prettier will of course help with the stress of constantly pressing the check for update button only to be told you do not have Lollipop yet. That said, it is nice to see the improvements constantly rolling out and even areas which one might not think is going to be improved like the update page. What do you think of the new look and feel to the update page? You prefer the more relaxing and upbeat Card and sky look? Let us know your thoughts.
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Friday App And Game Sales: Worms 3, Plex, SOULCALIBER, And More
If you have just gotten a Nexus 6 or are waiting for it to appear on your door step, you might want some new apps and games to take it for a spin. Well, you're in luck. There are some great sales on right now, so read on to stock up.
Apps
FlightTrack 5 – $0.99 from $4.99
DFX Music Player Enhancer Pro – $2.99 from $4.99
WikiExplorer – Pro – $1.48 from $2.99
PocketBand Pro – $4.99 from $9.99
Sworkit Pro Personal Trainer – $1.99 fro, $3.99
DSLR Camera Pro – $1.99 from $2.99
Plex for Android – $1.99 from $4.99
Remotix VNC RDP Remote Desktop – $4.95 from $14.99
Games
Waking Mars – $1.99 from $2.99
King's League: Odyssey – $0.99 from $2.99
Worms 3 – $1.00 from $4.99
Worms 2: Armageddon – $1.00 from $4.99
Alien Breed – $1.00 from $4.99
Puddle – $0.99 from $2.99
Escape Story – Free from $0.99 (Amazon)
Table Top Racing – $0.99 from $3.49
Garfield's Escape Premium – $0.99 from $1.99
SOULCALIBUR – $3.92 from $13.99
Friday App And Game Sales: Worms 3, Plex, SOULCALIBER, And More was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
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AWS-3 Auction Passes $31 Billion, 33% More Than Anticipated
The FCC’s AWS-3 (Advanced Wireless Services) has now passed twenty four rounds of bidding and the amount has topped $31 billion, already $12 billion more than the 2008 700 MHz spectrum auction and materially more than analysts had predicted would be raised by the auction. Reports indicate that bidding activity has slowed down, which indicates that the auction is starting to wind down. According to the FCC, the highest provisional winning bid is close to $1.9 billion for a 10 by 10 MHz license of paired AWS-3 spectrum covering New York City. A license covering the Los Angeles city area attracted a shade over $1.5 billion in round twenty. These figures illustrate how the bigger two carriers – AT&T and Verizon Wireless – value the spectrum. And we’re seen reports that Dish Network has been deliberately bidding up prices, partially because it will polish the valuation of their own spectrum. The paired spectrum in the AWS-3 auction operates in the 1,760 MHz for the uplink part and the 2,165 MHz part for the download link. The unpaired uplink frequency is at the 1,700 MHz point.
Now that the auctions are slowing down, analysts are starting to piece together the potential amount that each carrier will spend. Estimates are currently that both AT&T and Verizon will spend $14.5 billion in total and T-Mobile USA will spend just $1.4 billion. Sprint decided to sit out these auctions on the grounds that any spectrum it wins, it may be required to hand back. It’s possible that because these auctions are raising more than originally expected, the value of Sprint’s spectrum will increase: all boats rise in a rising tide. New Street analysts believe that mid-band spectrum is worth more than originally believed and that the 2.5 GHz frequency “should probably still trade at a discount to mid-band, but perhaps not as much” – in other words, it’s worth more.
Another conclusion drawn from the higher value of the auctions is that the spectrum is both needed and, given the amount paid, may well be deployed sooner than later. And this is good news for customers, because it’s us customers who will eventually be paying for the licensesso let’s get the benefit sooner rather than later.
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How To Get Rid Of That Annoying ‘Ok Google’ On Your Android Wear Watchface
Some of you Android Wear users out there may have taken notice of something that has become quite a few people’s pet peeve. We are talking about the ‘Ok Google’ that pops-up on top of the watchface of your Android Wear device. This pops-up to let users know that they are able to say “Ok Google” into their Android Wear device to trigger Google Now, the problem with this is that figuring that out is a one time thing.
People do not need to be constantly reminded that they are able to say “Ok Google” by a pop-up on their Android Wear device. And what makes the pop-up worse is that it pops-up right over your watchface which can be annoying. So, naturally, people want to know a way to get rid of the ‘Ok Google’ that keeps overlaying their Android Wear watchface, that is where this article comes into play. There is indeed a way to get rid of the ‘Ok Google’ pop-up on your Android Wear device and better yet, it is extremely easy to do and does not require scrolling through five menus to find a hidden checkbox.
In order to get rid of the ‘Ok Google’ pop-up on your Android Wear device all you need to do is simply say “Ok Google” a few times and it should disappear. Yep, you read that right, it’s really that quick and simple. You don’t even have to say anything when you trigger ‘Ok Google’, all you have to do is then close it, or you can actually say something if you want but it makes no difference, either way will get rid of it. So, once you trigger ‘Ok Google’ a few times the command should go away for good, although it has been known to appear again after updating Android Wear so be aware of that. But, just like now, all you will have to do is trigger ‘Ok Google’ a few times and it should go away again.
See, wasn’t that super easy? It works essentially the same way it does on phones, when you get a new phone that has ‘Ok Google’ hotword detection, the words ‘Ok Google’ will constantly appear in the search box until the user says that phrase a few times at which point it will disappear. At least features in Android on different platforms are working similarly.
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Take A Look At This Latest Preview Of Lollipop Running On The Samsung Galaxy S5
Everyone wants to know what Android 5.0 Lollipop looks like on their devices and we don’t blame them. The Material Design, the smooth animations, all of it. It’s just gorgeous looking and really elevates the Android OS to a level of style that it has never had before. If you own a Samsung Galaxy S5, your device is on the list of future supported devices for the software update, so keep your eyes peeled for the details on when Samsung is looking to push it out to carriers who will then push it out to users. In the mean time, while you wait for Lollipop to officially drop, you can check out this latest video of Android Lollipop running on a Samsung Galaxy S5 from Sammobile so you can see just how Lollipop and Samsung’s TouchWiz UI play together.
While I am not personally a fan of the TouchWiz UI, I will admit that Samsung has done well to move the Kit Kat based version of TouchWiz on the Galaxy S5 and the Galaxy Note 4 into a smoother experience for users. It does look a lot nicer than previous versions of the interface and it feels a bit snappier too. So how does it look running on top of Android 5.0 Lollipop? It appears to run smoother than TouchWiz on top of Kit kat, and it certainly has the Material Design shine through. You can still tell that it’s TouchWiz of course, but what else would you expect? It does seem that with this final preview of Lollipop on the Galaxy S5, things are much snappier than they were before and things appear to be more fluid and animations look like they’re more noticeable Transitions between screens and apps look smoother too.
In addition to some visual changes coming along with the Lollipop update, the video shows off a brand new toolbox setup with newly added tools that you can place on the homescreen. For those that are unaware of the toolbox, once turned on it sits essentially on top of other applications and is basically a floating app, and once you tap on it it opens up the drop down which includes quick access to certain apps or tools. In Lollipop the toolbox adds 5 new icons, including screenshots, zooming, the flashlight, quick connect, and S search, although you can add your own selection of apps or tools into the toolbox and aren’t just limited to those five. Are you excited for Android 5.0 Lollipop on the Galaxy S5?
Click here to view the embedded video.
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Android Epic App Battles: Evolve SMS vs Textra SMS
The default messaging apps have arguably gotten quite a bit better over the years, but they still don’t have the level of customization of third party SMS apps. Text messaging is something that many of us do on a daily basis, so we decided to go with a battle of two of the most popular SMS apps to see who comes out on top. We’ll highlight some of the features of both apps here, than make sure to cast your vote in the polls on G+ and let us know which SMS app you prefer.
Evolve SMS
Evolve SMS from klinker apps is on highly customizable SMS app. While like every other app for text messaging you can choose things like ringtones and notification settings to tune just hot you get notified about messages, Evolve SMS has a huge list of available themes that one can download to give their messages a more personalized look. There are a number of preset themes inside the app too, with a wide range of colors, or you can you can look for something a little more custom in the Play Store. Evolve also makes messaging simple and swift, allowing users to swipe with their finger through all open conversations, instead of having to go back to your inbox and find the one you want.
Evolve also supports a full list of multimedia, so you can send pictures, video, contacts, audio and GIFs inside of messages without a problem. There’s also full support for Light Flow so you can get just the right color for LED notifications with Evolve messages, and it supports group messaging too so you can lump a few people into one message when needed. Archive old messages if you like to hold on to things, or batch delete stuff if your inbox needs some spring cleaning.You can also use messaging from the desktop with Evolve SMS through Yappy or Pushbullet, and there’s Android Wear support so you can send messages and reply to them from your wrist. Did we mention the Material Design UI?
Textra SMS
Textra SMS is another great SMS app that gives you some customization options. It also carries a Material Design UI to give you a little taste of Lollipop even if you aren’t running it. Like Evolve, Textra supports quick reply messages through Android Wear and Pushbullet, so you can send text messages from your desktop or your wrist. It doesn’t support the capability for user submitted custom themes from the Play Store, but it does have a load of custom color themes that are pre-installed so you can personalize your messaging a little. It also supports full multimedia which means pictures, videos, and GIFs too of course.
There’s a quick reply popup to make messages smooth and fast, and you can get rid of conversations fast by swiping to delete them from your list. You can use group messaging with Textra too, so if you have to message a few people at one time Textra makes it easy and possible. Sometimes you just don’t want to talk to certain people though, and that’s where Textra’s SMS blocker and blacklisting features are useful, allowing you to block specific people from sending any messages. If you like every single person to have their own customized look, you can change bubble colors, style, icon color, vibrate pattern, LED color, Sound and more for each contact, or you can just stick with default and choose a look and style that applies to everyone.
So there you have it. Two popular third party messaging apps, both with heaps of awesome features and some customization to make things more personal. Both have support for Android Wear, and Pushbullet, and both offer a Material Design style UI. Which ones do you use the most, or which one do you simply prefer? Who deserves the crown and title for best SMS app between these two awesome options?
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LG G Pad 8.3 GPE And NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Get Chromecast Screen Casting Support In What Continues To Be The Slowest Rollout In History
Google added screen casting support to a select few devices earlier this year, but the wide rollout has been very, very slow. Today there are two new devices listed on Google's screen cast support page—The NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet and the LG G Pad 8.3 GPE.
You don't need to do anything to get your tablet ready for screen casting. This is a server-side change of some sort. Both these devices should have a tile in the quick settings for screen casting, but you can also use the Chromecast app to accomplish the same thing.
LG G Pad 8.3 GPE And NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Get Chromecast Screen Casting Support In What Continues To Be The Slowest Rollout In History was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
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