Future Technologies

Apple   has filed a patent application that describes a handheld device with a case made entirely out of glass. Such a case could be formed from a "hollow glass tube" or two pieces of glass bonded together. The material would be radio transparent, and the device could be hermetically sealed and thus water resistant. The  iPhone  4 and 4S aren't really that far from this idea, their case consisting of two pieces of glass and a steel frame. Some problems immediately come to mind. While the glass material used in modern smartphones is quite tough, a smartphone made entirely out of glass could easily be damaged in a fall. Furthermore, the iPhone is chock-full of sensors, some of which might have problems functioning in a (transparent) glass enclosure - though Apple's application addresses this problem by suggesting some parts of the glass case can be made opaque. And the upsides? Well, Apple names a few in its patent application: "Some of the reasons ...

They’re in front of every office worker 9 hours a day, and miniaturized versions are always in our pockets: Computers and the microelectronics inside them are an inescapable part of modern life. Check out the latest developments on Technology Update this month, starting with some of the world’s speediest supercomputers and novel cooling systems that double energy efficiency. Then, get the inside scoop on a new kind of memory device that could hold the key to unlocking truly intelligent artificial life. And get a glimpse of two new processors that challenge the dominant architectures, and offer nearly unmatched performance. source: http://rt.com/shows/technology-update/next-gen-computer-tech-443/

Facebook Inc, the world's No. 1 social network, is adopting the "hashtag," one of the most recognizable features of its younger rival Twitter, in a move to position its Web service as an important complement to television, sporting events and breaking news. Facebook said on Wednesday that it will begin to roll out the feature on its social network, making it easier for users and advertisers to find hot spots of user activity around specific events or topics. And Support for the all-but-ubiquitous topic organization system was rumored in March and will roll out to a small percentage of users Wednesday. Facebook will roll out hashtags to more users in the coming weeks. The social network wants to make it easier for users to find content already on Facebook, and functional hashtags are the first step. According to Facebook, many users already post hashtags anyway, so why not make them work. Hashtags will be both clickable and searchable, so, for example, topics l...

The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem.  There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity—jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month’s income.  Solving these problems isn’t simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we’re unveiling our latest  moonshot  from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access We believe that it might actually be possible to build a ring of balloons, flying around the globe on the stratospheric winds, that provides Internet access to the earth below. It’s very early days, but we’ve built a system that uses balloons, carr...

STORY HIGHLIGHTS Raspberry Pi works when plugged into an HDTV or digital monitor Pi can display videos, browse the Internet and more Pi does not have internal storage The hottest computer on the market isn't a $1,000-plus decked-out gaming machine. It's actually a bare bones circuit board the size of a credit card. And it costs just $25. Meet the Raspberry Pi. What's it good for? For starters, you hook the Pi to an HDTV or digital monitor using HDMI. It can display high-definition videos, browse the Internet, play games or work on spreadsheets. Sound great! Is it for you, though? Well, it depends. First, let's look at a bit of history. The low-cost Raspberry Pi is the brainchild of Eben Upton. In 2006, he was teaching computer science at the University of Cambridge. He found that computers were too expensive and too hard for ordinary users to program. So, he set out to make a low-cost programming computer. His charitable foundation is working...

STORY HIGHLIGHTS You will need Office 365 subscription to use Office Mobile on iOS New tools help you run Office on small screen No Android version for now Microsoft Office is finally coming to the iPhone but you'll need an Office 365 subscription to take advantage of Office Mobile on Apple's handset. The app, which is meant to complement Office on a personal computer, lets users access, view and edit Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents on the iPhone, or create Word and Excel docs (but not PowerPoint docs) from scratch on those handsets. The app includes Word templates for an Agenda, Outline or Report, and Excel templates for a Budget, Event Schedule and Mileage Tracker. Microsoft says that as you apply edits on the phone, or add comments, all the formatting and layout changes you make remain intact when you return to the document on a PC or Mac. You can review comments made by others on the phone. And you can review Office documents you receive a...

STORY HIGHLIGHTS Feature can show users current weather, traffic alerts and the like Tab appears in Notifications Apple did  a lot of borrowing  for the  latest release  of its mobile operating system, and  MacRumors found something in iOS 7  that will seem awfully familiar to Google Now users. It's a series of notifications that appear under a tab called Today — the feature can show users the current weather for places they may be going, alert them to traffic before their regular commute, and, like a personal assistant, tell them what their schedule looks like for the morning. Alerts appear under a Today tab in the Notifications Center, which you can turn on in the Settings app. The data, according to some info that MacRumors found, comes from different sources within iOS. Traffic information about frequently visited locations is gathered if the user turns on the Frequent Locations feature under Location Services. Today, at least in its cu...