Barclays Android users can now pay up to £100 with contactless using just their phone
Barclays has announced that its contactless payment system, called Contactless Mobile, has launched today.
Barclays previously expressed its intent to remain out of Android Pay in favour of its own offering. That has now arrived meaning Android users will be able to tap to pay using their smartphone’s NFC.
Barclays says payments will be supported for up to £100 at anywhere that contactless cards can be used. That’s 400,000 locations in the UK, says Barclays.
Up to £30 requires a simple tap but go over that amount and the owner will need to enter his or her PIN.
But the Contactless Mobile app also means the system can be used for tap to pay travel on the London Underground in place of an Oyster card.
It all sounds great but there is a catch. Barclays says Contactless Mobile is not available for: “Basic Current Accounts, Business Accounts, Corporate Accounts or ATM only cards.” It will work with: “Initial, Freedom Rewards, Platinum cards, Cashback, IHG, Hilton Honours Platinum Visa, IHG Rewards Club Visa and IHG Rewards Club Premium Visa”.
We have a normal current account and that appears to work just fine with the app.
The Barclays Contactless Mobile works as a part of the current Barclays app for Android. Simply update, select the Contactless Mobile option and link it to the relevant card.
READ: Android Pay UK explained: How it works and where it’s supported
What is 4K HDR and how will it change your TV?
The talk of the town is 4K HDR, arriving with force in 2016, and changing just about everything about home entertainment.
It appears in a number of guises and forms, but more importantly, perhaps, than the resolution race of recent years, the HDR side if things brings with it a great deal of excitement.
But what is 4K HDR, how does it work and what content is there available to watch?
What is 4K HDR?
HDR means high dynamic range. You might have heard that expression before, because it first appeared as a popular technique in photography and is now common on smartphones.
In home entertainment, HDR is very much the same thing. The dynamic range really means the achievable difference between bright highlights and dark shadows. In the real world, your eyes are very good and balancing out highs and lows and 4K HDR does exactly that: it brings realism by being able to produce visuals to better reflect what you’d see with your own eyes.
For televisions, like the Sony XD93, HDR goes hand-in-hand with 4K, resulting in a TV that will show you incredible detail and this wider range of realistic colours. For example, you might have the brilliance of the setting sun on the horizon, and the foreground painted in rich colours, all realistically balanced.
The result of 4K HDR is brilliantly detailed images, with lots of clarity, increased contrast and better colours than have previously been available on your television. For those creating content, 4K HDR allows movies to looks closer to the director’s original vision, because television are able to display much more than ever before.
How does 4K HDR work?
In a television, you need to have a panel (screen) that’s compatible with 4K HDR to work. The resolution side of the deal (the 4K part) is fairly simple. It’s a panel with a resolution of 3840 x 2160 pixels. This is also called Ultra HD, or UHD for short, and has been appearing in TVs over the past few years and is now common on flagship TVs from a range of manufacturers.
On the HDR side, this is where things get more technical. For HDR to work, the panel has to be able to capably show both very dark and very bright parts of a scene. In simple terms, this has been achieved by allowing to the panel to display a much higher peak brightness than before.
But this isn’t uniformal brightness, it’s cleverly controlled, so that, for example, the burning flame of a candle is white hot at the centre, smoothly transitioning through reds and yellows, but set in the inky darkness of the unlit room. Sony’s Slim Backlight Drive handles this on a TV like the XD93, giving a great HDR result, but without the screen getting too thick.
What 4K HDR content is there?
This is where things get really interesting, because once you have the TV to view 4K HDR, you need something to watch. Content is already being produced in 4K HDR and with major studios now working to this new standard, there’s going to be some great content appearing.
With the first run of 4K HDR televisions in 2015 there was little to watch, but in 2016, we’re enjoying the content boom.
Streaming services
Netflix and Amazon Instant Video were among the first services to make 4K HDR content available on your TV.
As the Sony XD93 is an Android TV, it offers access to both Amazon and Netflix with a range of both 4K and 4K HDR programmes available. One of the headline shows for HDR is Netflix’s Marco Polo.
Even if the HDR aspect isn’t available, there’s an increasing selection of 4K or Ultra HD content for you to watch. If you’re looking at a 4K HDR TV, you’ll be streaming plenty of content.
Ultra HD Blu-ray
For those serious about movies, there’s only one place to turn: Ultra HD Blu-ray. This is the next standard of optical disc, packing in 4K HDR, with staggering results.
It’s early days for Ultra HD Blu-ray, launching in early 2016, so there are only a few players available and they come at a premium price. But as time passes, there will be more to choose from and at more aggressive prices.
The selection of movies is also expanding. Big releases like The Martian and Max Max: Fury Road are wowing already and new releases, like The Revenant, are joining the list every day.
HDR Gaming
Not often mentioned, but gaming has always been part of the HDR plan, adding to the visuals to create more realism and more immersion in games. Landing later in 2016 is the Xbox One S, which not only offers 4K HDR streaming and Blu-ray, but will give you HDR games too.
Although not initially offering full 4K gaming, that’s set to come in the future too – expected by the end of 2017 in future consoles from Xbox and PlayStation.
Why do I want 4K HDR?
To get started enjoying 4K HDR, you need a TV like the Sony XD93, with a very capable 4K HDR display and all the smart skills and connectivity. Not only will it make your standard and HD content look great, but you’ll be all set to enjoy the very best of the future of entertainment too.
HDR makes a huge visual difference. It adds richness and contrast that we’ve never had on TVs before, making everything look more realistic. It’s being executed with jaw-dropping results, no matter which source you’re pulling it from.
The best thing about buying a 4K HDR TV is that you’re getting the complete package, with a great panel, so even when you’re not watching the latest blockbuster movie on Ultra HD Blu-ray, you can bask in some of the best-looking images you’ll have ever seen on your TV.
Barclays launches its answer to Android Pay
Ever since Barclays publicly shunned Android Pay in favour of its own NFC payment platform, the bank has kept pretty quiet over when you can use its Contactless Mobile service. But today, and without much fanfare, Barclays announced that Android users with a supported phone can now make NFC payments with the Barclays Mobile Banking app. It supports payments up to £100 and works everywhere a standard contactless card can be used.
Setting it up is pretty straightforward: select the Contactless Mobile option in the app, choose the relevant card and then follow the steps to make the Barclays app your default payment source. Once this has been done, the device only needs to be woken up (so the lock screen shows) and then tapped against a contactless terminal. If a payment is under £30 (the current contactless limit), the payment will be taken instantly, but if it’s between £30 – £100, you must enter a PIN before tapping again.
One drawback is that once payments are set up, Barclays’ Contactless Mobile service will display a permanent notification on the lock screen that reads: “You can make contactless mobile payments.” Barclays says this is to remind you that the payment service is enabled but the only way to remove it is to hide lock screen notifications, which means hiding every notification on your Android device.
If you can put up with that, it should mean you can go out without a wallet or travel without your Oyster card — something that iOS device owners can already do thanks to Apple Pay.
Source: Barclays Contactless Mobile
NASA debuts new internet technology aboard the ISS
The ISS has a new technology on board that can transmit data from space much faster than what NASA uses today. See, the internet as we know it here on Earth doesn’t work as well for spacecraft millions of miles away. It requires all nodes or connection points on a network — in space, these are satellites — to be active at the same time to send information back to the ground team. Since that’s not always possible due to the various elements that can block a connection, such as planets, other spacecraft, radiation, and so on and so forth, it takes a long time for data to make it back to Earth. In the worst cases, some data gets lost along the way. This new tech called Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) gets rid of those problems.
DTN uses a “store and forward” technique to send info to other spacecraft or back to NASA. It can store partial bundles of data in connection points and then forward those bundles when the next node becomes available. DTN doesn’t require all nodes to be online at the same time, and that can dramatically cut down the time for data to reach its recipient. NASA’s animation below explains it well:
NASA has been testing DTN for years, but this its first big deployment. While the ISS isn’t exactly having issues beaming data back to the agency, the technique will be especially useful in the future, when there are more probes roaming our solar system and when we’re sending spacecraft to much farther locations.
Source: NASA
Android Pay will tell you where it works nearby
One of the ways that Google is making Android more useful is by harnessing your location data for context-aware services. For instance, Nearby uses GPS and Bluetooth to monitor where you are, launching a relevant app should one be particularly useful. Now, XDA-Developers has uncovered code inside Android Pay that suggests that it’ll bring a similar level of location-aware smarts. If true, then it’s possible that a future update will show you retail outlets in your nearby area that take Google’s mobile payments platform. Keen-eyed investigators have even found the location-pin style icon that you’ll use to activate the feature. Of course, this is all a rumor until it isn’t anymore, but it’s perfectly in keeping with Google’s location-savvy future.
Source: XDA-Developers
Samsung is encouraging filmmakers to create VR experiences
Samsung has launched a new initiative called “Creators” to entice storytellers and filmmakers to spin VR and 360-degree tales that Gear VR users can enjoy. To start with, the Korean company has teamed up with YouTuber Casey Neistat to spotlight creators on the website who put out compelling 360-degree videos. They plan to show a curated list of works by those YouTubers at VidCon, where Samsung will also provide seminars and classes to filmmakers under the Creators program. VidCon is an annual online video conference in SoCal, which will take place from June 23rd to 25th this year.
But that’s not all the chaebol is doing to encourage more user-generated content. Samsung is also launching its 360-degree, high-res camera in the US and selling it at VidCon for $350 each. If you can’t go, you’ll unfortunately have to wait for further announcement on wider availability. Finally, the company is rebranding its Milk VR app to Samsung VR and changing the way it works. While the free app has always offered both downloadable and streamable experiences, people can now load and share their own videos through the service.
Marc Mathieu, Samsung America’s Chief Marketing Officer, said:
“We want to bring the power of VR technology directly to the people. To help creators learn and perfect the art of VR storytelling, we’ve built an entire VR ecosystem that pushes beyond the frame and empowers them to develop unforgettable, immersive stories, and inspires us all to do the same.”
Source: Samsung Creators
iOS 10: Taking a Closer Look at Apple’s ‘Swift Playgrounds’ for iPad
At WWDC last week, Apple revealed its all-new Swift Playgrounds iPad app, which aims to help younger users learn how to code in Apple’s programming language by making the experience more interactive and fun.
For those unfamiliar with Swift, the open-source language was announced by Apple at WWDC 2014, and developed over four years to be “concise and expressive” in order to make coding for iOS, Mac, Apple TV, and Apple Watch more approachable.
Using Swift Playgrounds, Apple invites users to “solve puzzles to master the basics using Swift” and “take on a series of challenges” to step up to more advanced creations. Swift Playgrounds requires no coding knowledge from new learners, but it also “provides a unique way for seasoned developers to quickly bring ideas to life,” claims the company.
Users start out by learning the underlying concepts of coding, like commands, functions, loops, parameters, conditional code, variables, operators, types, initialization, and bug fixing. The learning takes place as users create code on the left side of the screen, while they observe the results on the right side in real time.
Learning to code with Swift Playgrounds is incredibly engaging. The app comes with a complete set of Apple-designed lessons. Play your way through the basics in “Fundamentals of Swift” using real code to guide a character through a 3D world. Then move on to more advanced concepts.
The Swift Playground interface supports the iPad’s Multi-Touch capabilities, and lets students tap, drag, or type text and numbers, and then interact with their creations.
For example, tapping a number to edit it brings up a pop-up keypad, while statement boundaries can be conveniently dragged around existing code. Commonly used pieces of code can also be dragged from a Snippets Library to minimize typing.
In addition, a specially designed QuickType keyboard for coding lets users quickly access commonly used characters by holding each key, and intelligently suggests commands in the Shortcut Bar as users type.
Swift Playgrounds also comes with templates that are pre-loaded with advanced code to help users integrate iPad technologies like accelerometer, gyroscope, and Multi-Touch into their programs.
Students can add their own graphics and audio to these templates, and their completed code is readily shareable over Mail, Messages, and AirDrop, and they can also post video to Youtube of their programs in action.
Once users have mastered the basics with the app’s built-in library of lessons, they can advance to new challenges that appear in a regularly updated App Store-like area of Swift Playgrounds. Finally, any code created in the app can also be exported to Xcode and vice versa when students are ready to take the next step.
Swift Playgrounds will be available in the iOS 10 public beta this July. The final version of the app is expected to launch for free on the App Store sometime in the fall. You can watch Apple’s WWDC demo of Swift Playgrounds in action here.
Related Roundup: iOS 10
Tags: Swift, Swift Playgrounds
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Bang & Olufsen embraces Google Cast, you can now Cast music to your B&O systems
Over the years, high-end audio brand Bang & Olufsen has been making strides to standardise its systems, with many of them now able to stream music through Apple Airplay, DLNA, Bluetooth and its own Beolink Multiroom technology.
Now you can add Google Cast to the list. The Danish company has partnered with Google to add support for its wireless streaming technology to the BeoSound 35 soundbar and BeoSound Essence one-touch music controller.
Google Cast offers the ability to stream tracks through allied music services, such as Spotify, Deezer and TuneIn, by just tapping the dedicated icon from within their mobile apps. It works on Android, naturally, but also iPhone and iPad.
READ: Bang & Olufsen BeoSound 35 preview: Pentagonal powerhouse
Google Cast is different from many other streaming features because it streams the audio (or video, for supported devices and TVs) directly, rather than through your phone or tablet. That way you can continue to use your mobile device independently while music still plays.
While the BeoSound 35 has built-in wireless connectivity, the BeoSound Essence turns all audio devices into Wi-Fi music players. It comprises a wall-mounted controller and separate hub that you can use to feed non-wireless audio kit.
READ: Bang & Olufsen BeoSound Essence: Hands-on with the one-touch, wall-mounted control music system
It means that you can stream music tracks through Google Cast and the other streaming technologies available to any speaker system, no matter how old.
Google Cast will arrive as part of a software upgrade for your systems later this month.
Samsung Galaxy Note 7 to come as curved edge version only
The next Samsung smartphone reveal is expected to be for the Galaxy Note 7 and word is coming in that it’ll be available as a curved edge variant, only.
According to the Korea Herald we can expect to say goodbye to the standard screened Note at Samsung’s next Unpacked event where the Note 7 edge should be revealed. A previous report from Korea’s Electronic Times made the same edge-only claim a few weeks back.
Following on from the popularity of the Galaxy S6 and S7 edge smartphones it appears Samsung is going for a Note 7 edge model as the only option.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 edge is expected to feature dual curved edges on either side, like the current Galaxy S7 edge.
A leaked teaser invite showed the edge of a screen, made to look like a seven, being drawn on with a stylus. This would suggest that the S Pen can actually be used on the screen edges – for what use, we can’t fathom.
Samsung is expected to unveil the handset at a dedicated event on 2 August. Specs are rumoured to include a 5.8-inch QHD Super AMOLED display, Exynos and Snapdragon processor variants with up to 6GB of RAM, a 12-megapixel camera, 4000mAh battery and an S Pen stylus.
Samsung is reportedly skipping the Note 6 name to jump right to Note 7 so it can put the device in line with its flagship Galaxy S7 as well as up against the iPhone 7.
READ: Samsung Galaxy Note 6 / Note 7: What’s the story so far
BBM Video for Android and iPhone is now out in Asia-Pacific
Most BBM users finally have access to the app’s video calling capability. BlackBerry has released the feature for Android and iOS in Asia-Pacific, which is apparently home to its biggest userbase. The company said it made cross-platform video calls available in the US and Canada first, because it wanted to be able to fix bugs before it reaches more people. Since video calling is now stable, the phonemaker can roll it out to the rest of world.
While BBM isn’t as popular as its newer, shinier rivals like Messenger or WhatsApp anymore, BlackBerry is still developing new features for it. In fact, this release is but a small part of a bigger rollout. Later this summer, the company will launch the capability to register for an account using a phone number, among other things. Android users will be able to share larger videos, as well, while those on iOS will be able to mute group notifications.
Source: BlackBerry
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