Google App Signing automatically compresses, secures Android apps

Why it matters to you

Google’s new App Signing service could make apps smaller and more secure than ever.

Google’s using machine intelligence to kill two birds with one stone: Optimize apps and improve security. At the search giant’s 2017 I/O developer conference in Mountain View, California, Google announced a Google Play App Signing, a new cloud-based service that fine-tunes apps for a range of Android devices.

Google Play App Signing, which launches in beta today, automatically adapts apps to fit different screen resolutions, RAM configurations, and processor models. And it compresses apps by eliminating redundant code.

Google said it’s already made a tangible difference. Deliveroo, one of the group of select developers who were given a chance to preview Google Play App Signing, saw its Android app shrink by 36 percent — from 13.6MB before to 9.1MB after. Seven saw a 48 percent reduction in size, from 53.7MB to 28MB.

Google Play App Signing’s security features revolve around private keys, the cryptographic string of characters that app developers use to verify their identities. Private keys distinguish legitimate apps from imposters, but previously, if a developer lost or misplaced their key, they’d have to publish a brand-new app. With Google Play App Signing, that’s no longer necessary.

Now, developers can upload their private keys to Google’s servers. When an app’s uploaded to Google Play, the App Signing service will automatically “sign” — or verify — the app.

The new service is the newest in Google’s ongoing effort to improve the Play Store experience. Over the past two years, Google’s expanded the Play Store to Daydream, its virtual reality platform; Android Wear, its smartwatch operating system; and Chrome OS on laptop computers. And it’s introduced features like Early Access, which lets developers test and provide feedback on beta apps; Indie Corner, which highlights the work of independent developers; and the Google Play Awards.

It’s seen success. Google said that Android users downloaded 82 billion apps from the Google Play store over the past year, and that the number of monthly installs regularly exceeds 1 million. And users are spending more — there’s been a 30 percent uptick in buyers, Google said, and a tenfold increase in the number of monthly subscriptions.

See notifications across Facebook-owned apps with this new feature

Why it matters to you

If you can’t live with all those little red notifications, Facebook’s decision to collect all its apps together with cross-app notifications may bring out the most anxious part of your psyche.

The Facebook family is finally coming together. The popular social media platform, along with its messaging arm Messenger and its photo-sharing arm Instagram, is testing a feature that will show users notification counters from either of the other two apps, and allow them to switch among the three seamlessly. So whether you’re in Facebook proper, Messenger, or Instagram, you’ll never miss a notification that someone has liked your photo or sent you an IM or replied to your comment. Really, you’ll just never leave the Facebook universe.

First spotted by social media analyst Mari Smith, the feature will ostensibly be useful in driving engagement, especially among users who simply must get rid of all those notifications as soon as they pop up (guilty as charged). So even if you don’t necessarily care about your Facebook notifications, but are browsing Instagram, you’ll still be forced to see that someone is trying to get your attention, and perhaps switch platforms, just to dismiss that red flag.

Facebook confirmed the test in a statement to TechCrunch, noting, “We are conducting a very small test to make it easier for people to discover and connect with the people and things they care about. We’re exploring ways to help people switch more easily between their Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram accounts.”

If you’re part of the test, you’ll be able to switch apps when you tap the profile icon in the top corner of any of the three Facebook-owned apps. That little icon will show you the total number of pending notifications you have, with the respective number of unread alerts next to each account. If you want to go to one of those accounts, just tap it, and you’ll be switched into another app. For the time being, the conspicuously absent app from the trio is WhatsApp, which Facebook purchased back in 2014.

So if you’re always looking for notifications, Facebook has just made it infinitely easier for you to keep your eyes in one place.

Google Assistant’s new features transform it from product to platform

Google’s next platform is all about machine learning and natural language processing.

A full year on from its launch at Google I/O 2016, Google Assistant has both expanded to new devices and added dozens of features that truly reposition it as a platform rather than a product. With everything announced at this year’s Google I/O conference, Google Assistant is a common backend of knowledge and capabilities that can be accessed through multiple interfaces on multiple devices with limitless third-party extensibility options.

It’s no longer just Google Home and an app on Android phones — Assistant is going to be everywhere you use Google.

Google Home getting smarter every day

Assistant can do more than just answer your questions and tell you jokes.

Google Home was originally the physical embodiment of the Google Assistant technology, but Assistant has since expanded to be so much more with Home leading the charge. Not only has the number of app and service integrations hit a “larger than you can recall” number, but Google is leading the charge by giving the Assistant control over an increasing number of Google’s own products and services.

You no longer just talk to Google Home to have the speaker itself do something, but instead to invoke Google Assistant to do all sorts of things that can then manifest themselves on other devices — all powered by the same cross-device backend. Google Assistant processing and smarts let you ask your Home to send driving directions to your phone, shoot a YouTube video to your TV or control an increasing number of smart home devices.

More: Google Home just leapfrogged Amazon Echo at I/O 2017

Assistant on phones finally makes sense

Google Assistant is a couple of months into its expansion to just about any modern Android phone, but Google I/O 2017 marked an important change to its functionality to make it truly viable and useful to a wide number of people. The biggest change is the interaction model: you can now just type to Assistant. With this being a feature of Allo it was only a matter of time before it rolled out to the Assistant on every phone. Adding text input increases the chances of interacting with Assistant on a more regular basis, lowering the barrier to accessing its wealth of information.

Assistant on the phone is getting feature parity with Google Home.

Another massive barrier destroyed is the Assistant’s move to the iPhone. Argue all you want about Assistant’s seamless integration into Android and how much more powerful it is, but if you want a platform to succeed today it has to be on the iPhone in addition to everything else. Just as importantly, Google Assistant on the iPhone has the same backend powering it as on Android, and within reason it has the same capabilities. Millions more people will soon have access to Google Assistant, completing the loop of using the platform across all of their devices.

The future is bright as well, with the new Google Lens system promising image recognition technology to make Assistant even more powerful. You’ll soon be able to leverage Google’s image recognition and machine learning in a single place — inside Assistant — rather than having the feature spread out across disparate platforms like Google Now on Tap and Google Goggles. Even more important is Google’s expansion of proper “Assistant actions” support on phones — letting you control devices and make device-specific queries of Assistant on your phone the exact same way you can on Google Home.

A platform, not a product

It’s becoming increasingly apparent that Google Assistant is being positioned as the glue that holds together all of Google’s devices. Whether you’re using a connected speaker, phone, smartwatch, car, or TV device, the goal is to have you interacting with Google Assistant in a consistent way with seamless transition between those experiences.

Functionally there are some hurdles to overcome and features yet to hit critical mass, but it’s clear that Assistant is the future of consumer interaction with Google.

VR and AR experiences are coming soon to Chrome for Android

Developers can now enable virtual and augmented reality experiences to run inside your mobile browser.

It’s an issue I face constantly: the inability to download an app because there isn’t enough room on my 32GB Pixel XL. Thankfully, Google’s announced that developers can now run web-based virtual and augmented-reality experiences inside the Chrome browser, though it’s not clear if this includes full-size apps.

The announcement was made at Google I/O 2017 during the virtual and augmented reality session. It isn’t particularly new, as you’ve already been able to access Daydream experiences through Chrome. But now all developers who are interested can build WebVR-enabled experiences that others can view inside Daydream and Cardboard. You’ll be able to launch it simply by navigating to the page and then popping your smartphone inside the virtual reality viewer. Developers can add in Daydream Remote compatibility, too. The experience is built with Javascript.

Google’s Andrey Doronichev shows off AR experiences in the Chrome browser.

Phones that support Tango will also be able to take advantage of web-based augmented reality features, which requires multiple . The AR browser options are available in an experimental Chrome build right now. If you’re a developer, you can check it out on Github. The VR browser experience will hit Daydream later this summer.

SwiftKey for iOS adds 68 languages, gets design overhaul and new themes

SwiftKey, the keyboard app that lets you trace your finger around the letters to type words, has updated its list of supported languages in the iOS version of the app. SwiftKey has added 68 new world languages, bringing the total supported number up to 106, more than any other iOS keyboard. 

• Best iOS keyboard: The top third-party ones to try, and how to set them up

New languages can, naturally, be found in the ‘Languages’ section of the app, and are marked by a green dot to indicate they’re newly available. You can download any of them to be installed, and can use two different languages at the same time. When you start typing, SwiftKey will automatically detect which language you’re using and provide relevant predictions based on the language you’re writing in. 

SwiftKey has also introduced two new animated themes: Cogs and ZigZag. Cogs has different sized circles moving around behind the keys, while ZigZag has 3D lines moving around. The two default themes, Nickel Light and Nickel Dark, have been rejuvenated with a cleaner look to better resemble the default iOS keyboard.

The SwiftKey update is available to download now, so head to the App Store to install it and take advantage of the latest features. 

Destiny 2 Gameplay Premiere watch it again here, see the campaign mode

Activision and Bungie unveiled Destiny 2 gameplay for the first time today, with a special event in Los Angeles where it revealed a whole stack of details about the forthcoming game and showed full-on game footage.

Pocket-lint has also been getting hands-on time with multiple modes across the PS4 and PC versions of the game. We will be posting our thoughts in a bit, so check those out later, but for now you can watch the main gameplay reveal all over again, as we host it right here.

What happened at the Destiny 2 Gameplay Premiere?

Bungie team members took to the stage in an aircraft hanger in LA to show the first part of the campaign mode, Homecoming, and revealed several key features of the new chapter in the franchise.

It kicked off at 10am PT on Thursday 18 May (7pm in the UK) and ran for around an hour.

One of the big new features coming to the Destiny universe for the first time is Clans. Players can set themselves up in clans, with customised team banners. But rather than exclude solo players, there is also a Guided Game mode that allows single-players to join a clan for a raid or strike, so that they too can get to experience all the wonders the game has to offer.

There are new worlds and locations, including Earth, Io, Nessus and Titan. And there are tonnes of side missions and hidden sectors to locate and plunder. In short, Destiny 2 is Destiny but ramped up to the extreme.

• E3 2017: Rumours, press conferences and what to expect from the world’s biggest games show

Where can I watch the Destiny 2 Gameplay Premiere again?

You can watch the entire hour-long keynote again (or for the first time) below:

You can also watch it on destinythegame.com or Bungie’s own Twitch channel.

Where can I find out more about Destiny 2?

You can find out a lot more about Destiny 2 in our extensive round-up feature (which we are updated constantly). It has trailers and other info we know or have heard about so far. You can find it here: Destiny 2: Release date, screens, formats and everything you need to know

Destiny 2 will be released for PS4, Xbox One and PC on 8 September 2017. 

Vevo’s Apple TV app takes cues from Spotify

Music lovers with Apple TVs, it’s time to get moderately excited — because the tvOS Vevo app is getting a hefty overhaul. From tomorrow, Vevo will let owners of fourth generation Apple TVs experience an endless wave of curated music videos like it’s 1999 all over again.

With an entirely redesigned UI and a focus entirely on music, Vevo on tvOS allows users to keep the music videos coming, featuring various playlists curated by the company. With these bespoke mixes being divided into genre, time of day and even created around big events, the company is essentially creating the Spotify of music videos. The Spotify comparisons don’t stop there, however, with Vevo claiming that its app will learn from you, personalizing the experience around your browsing habits. In a nice touch, users will also be able to browse for other videos while the main video is playing thanks to the app’s new ‘peak-inside-playlist’ UI.

Not content with just taking a page out of Spotify’s book, it looks like Vevo has seen fit to pilfer the company’s playbook. Yet, with YouTube’s stream of related videos not always hitting the right notes, this more bespoke approach to music video queueing makes enough sense for us to welcome the fairly blatant plagiarism.

Apple patented (and made) a pizza box to rid your life of soggy crust

The tech-food crossover hall of fame is filled with concepts that are more stunt than solution. Consider KFC’s phone-charging take out box or its ‘tray typer’ for texting with greasy fingers, or even the recent Guardians of the Galaxy 2 soundtrack embedded in a Doritos chip bag. Gimmicks, all. But unbeknownst to everyone, there was a bigger tech dog trying to revolutionize food packaging: Apple bent its divine design will to create a container that would, once and for all, keep your pizza from getting soggy.

The patent, filed in July 2010, describes in convoluted legalese a circular container with holes in the top that vents air and moisture to keep grease from congealing. It’s made of environmentally-friendly recycled materials, of course, and boasts enough ridges and circles to look suitably futuristic, like a certain Apple mega-building. Apparently, Apple Park cafe chief Francesco Longoni had a hand in the design. And if you think leveraging Silicon Valley’s greatest minds toward fixing a food mess problem isn’t worth time, you clearly don’t know the value of a grease-free workspace.

Via: Wired

Source: US Patent and Trade Office

Fujifilm’s SQ10 is an instant camera for the Instagram generation

Instant film cameras have been making a comeback in recent years, and Fujifilm is partially responsible for this. The manufacturer’s Instax Mini 8, for instance, is a best-seller on Amazon, which may have to do with the fact it only costs around $70. But the company seems to think people are willing to pay way more than that for one of its Instax shooters. Enter the Square SQ10, a hybrid digital instant camera that costs $280, offering the best of both worlds at a premium. It features a newly minted CMOS sensor (1/4-inch) with a 28.5mm f/2.4 fixed lens and an image processor that, Fuji says, will push out the best shots yet from an Instax product.

On the back of the SQ10, there’s a 3-inch, 460,000-dot LCD (no touchscreen) and a physical dial for browsing the camera’s menu. Around that dial are six buttons, which let you do things like set exposure, control vignette effect, click to print and select between 10 image filters. Yes, it’s like Instagram but in real life. While the SQ10 doesn’t support WiFi, Bluetooth or NFC, you do have the option to transfer your shots via microSD — the aspect ration is 1:1, hence the Square moniker. As for battery life, Fujifilm says you’ll get close to 160 prints from a single charge, and you can recharge it via USB.

Compared to the Instax Mini 8, the SQ10 is a little chunky, but that’s to be expected given that this model has a built-in screen and a large metal ring around the lens that acts as the power button. The good thing about its bulkiness is that it makes it feel like an actual camera, rather than a toy. Fujifilm also put two shutter buttons on the SQ10, making it easy to take pictures as you’re gripping it with either your left or right hand.

The Instax Square SQ10 comes with 10 prints included, and each set after is going to cost you roughly $18. That’s important because the camera alone is already $280, so you could end up spending a few hundred bucks in a short period of time. If money isn’t a problem though, you can pre-order it now from stores such as B&H, with shipments expected to arrived by the end of this week.

The FCC Chairman still thinks it’s 1996

FCC chairman Ajit Pai sounds like a broken record.

“Light touch framework.”

“Light touch approach.”

“Light touch regulation.”

As an ideological concept it seems reasonable. Especially to a conservative such as Pai who believes that the government shouldn’t “pick winners and losers” to use a favorite phrase of republicans. Except when you actually look closely at the chairman’s argument about how to regulate internet service providers, it collapses under its own misguided logic.

Perhaps Pai’s favorite touchstone when arguing in favor of returning ISPs to being classified as a Title I information service (instead of a Title II common carrier) is the Clinton administration. In April he asked this misleading set of questions:

Do we want the government to control the Internet? Or do we want to embrace the light-touch approach established by President Clinton and a Republican Congress in 1996 and repeatedly reaffirmed by Democratic and Republican FCCs alike?

Let’s ignore the bit about the government controlling the internet, which is not what net neutrality is or what the rules under Title II will allow. Instead let’s focus on the last bit about the “light touch” used by President Clinton. The TL;DR version of Pai’s argument is that Title II as established under the 1934 Communications Act is outdated and is not equipped to effectively regulate the internet. Instead we should return to rules established in 1996.

The problem is, when it comes to the internet, 1996 might as well be 1934. In 1996 there was no Google, Facebook or Netflix. Broadband penetration in the US sat at around 0 percent. The internet was a new industry that was still finding its way. The internet thrived under this light touch approach because it was in an experimental phase. Only 16 percent of Americans had access to the internet in 1996 and those who did relied on dial up.

The other flaw in this argument is that the changes made to the law by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 have made the internet more vulnerable to the very abuses Title II seeks to prevent.

Pai has said that “We decided to abandon successful policies solely because of hypothetical harms and hysterical prophecies of doom.” Except they aren’t hypothetical. Thank’s to the Telecommunications Act’s Title III, which allows for media cross-ownership, we have immense consolidation in the US of service providers, studios and news outlets.

Comcast is the largest internet provider in the country. It’s also the largest broadcaster and cable TV provider in the nation. And now it’s dipping its toes into mobile. But Comcast also owns NBCUniversal, NBC, Telemundo, Universal Pictures, Focus Features, DreamWorks, USA, Bravo, SyFy, E!, a bunch of regional sports stations and more.

And Comcast has already been caught, repeatedly, violating the spirit of net neutrality, if not the law. In both 2012 and 2015 the company came under fire for excluding its own streaming services from data caps, while counting Netflix and Hulu, putting them at a distinct disadvantage. This even led to an investigation by the Department of Justice in 2012.

Then in 2014 Netflix started noticing a steep decline in speeds on Comcast networks. While there’s no evidence the company artificially throttled speeds, there is evidence that the ISP let aging equipment at key points languish degrading the quality. Ultimately Netflix was forced cut out its own ISP and pay Comcast to ensure its videos streamed at an acceptable rate.

And Engadget’s parent company Verizon is hardly innocent either. This of course drew the attention of the FCC, and is part of what led the agency to reconsider its approach to net neutrality.

Ultimately moving moving broadband back being a Title I service will let the ISPs choose the winners or losers, no the public. And the government will be powerless to stop them.

The truth is the wolves are at the door of net neutrality and Ajit Pai is (wittingly or not) laying out a welcome mat.

Title II of the Telecommunications act is not perfect, but it was designed in part to keep monopolies in check. And the media conglomerates of todays internet are emergent monopolies — not scrappy .com startups looking to make a name for themselves on this new fangled world wide web.