Shropshire farm completes harvest with nothing but robots

Researchers in Shropshire, England have managed to sow and harvest a field of barley using nothing but robots. Many aspects of farming have now been automated, but rarely is the entire process — planting, tending, monitoring and harvesting — completed without someone stepping foot inside the field. The ‘Hands-Free Hectare’ project was set up last October by a team from Harper Adams University. With £200,000 in government funding, they modified a tractor and combine harvester with cameras, lasers and GPS systems. Drones and a robot “scout,” which could scoop up and carry soil samples, helped the group monitor the field from afar.

Kit Franklin, the project’s leader and an agricultural engineer, freely admits that it was “the most expensive hectare of barley ever.” So why bother? Well, commercial farms and agriculture businesses tend to use large, heavy machinery. These vehicles are efficient, but have a damaging effect on the soil and subsequent crops. “Automation is the future of farming, but we’re at a stage where farm machinery has got to unsustainable sizes,” Franklin told The Times. He believes smaller, smarter vehicles are the future, as they can work with greater precision and reduce harmful soil compaction.

Been watching the @FreeHectare harvest this afternoon. Very impressive! #worldfirst pic.twitter.com/NLIXENckDO

— Kreseda Smith (@FarmCrimePhD) September 6, 2017

The Hands-Free Hectare project, while successful, was not without its challenges. The tractor failed to keep a straight line in the field, which meant some of the crops were sown in crooked strips. After drilling and rolling the crop, the team also struggled to quickly repurpose their tractor for spraying. “Sadly, we missed that target but we have since managed to get on our T1 and T2 fungicides, including a herbicide to help tackle some grass weeds we were seeing and micro-nutrients to aid the crop growth,” Kieran Walsh, the team’s agronomist explains. Monitoring a field from a video feed, she adds, is harder than being out there and looking yourself.

It seems inevitable that automation will play a great role in farming’s future. Large-scale machinery is efficient and convenient in rural locations where labourers are hard to come by. That’s not to say there won’t be a role for human farmers — someone needs to monitor the robots and make sure they’re working properly. As Walsh hints, there’s also a certain something, a sense or ability to “read” the land that’s unique to farmers. Until a machine can replicate these observational skills, there will be a need for humans to pull on their boots and get down in the dirt every so often.

Via: Gizmodo UK

Source: The Times

T-Mobile Offered Fastest LTE Speeds in the First Half of 2017

T-Mobile was the carrier with the fastest mobile network in the United States during the first half of 2017, according to a new U.S. Market Report for Mobile Broadband shared this morning by Ookla.

The carrier scored a 23.17 using Ookla’s new “Speed Score” metric that combines low-end, median, and top-end performance for both upload and download speeds. Ookla says this is a comprehensive metric combining all factors that “matter to a good network experience” into a single score.

Coming in after T-Mobile was Verizon, with a Speed Score of 21.13, while AT&T came in third with a score of 20.05 and Sprint brought up the rear with a score of 15.39.

According to Ookla, T-Mobile’s “tightly-spaced cell site grid” and smaller subscriber base gave it an edge over Verizon and AT&T, both of whom are dealing with higher traffic loads since their unlimited plans were introduced last year.

While Verizon has managed to deliver “consistent and reliable performance” across its network despite the unlimited plans, the rollout of AT&T’s unlimited plans resulted in a “notable drop in performance.”

Sprint, unsurprisingly, had the slowest mobile network with a Speed Score of 15.39, despite improvements made over the course of the last year. From June of 2016 to June of 2017, Sprint LTE speeds improved by 23.7 percent, but the carrier still can’t match the big three.

T-Mobile comes out on top for overall speeds and acceptable speeds at a national level and provides the fastest service in 40% of the largest cities in the U.S. Verizon Wireless has the fastest service in many of the cities we looked at and comes in first on acceptable speeds in the top 100 CMAs, but we suspect their use of depriortization on unlimited could be bringing down their overall performance.

AT&T falls near the bottom in consistency of acceptable speeds and also saw a spoke in low end speeds in Q2 2017. The slowest carrier, Sprint, struggles with consistently providing acceptable speeds but saw big gains in the first half of the year.

While the above chart information covers the United States as a whole, Ookla also compared mobile performance data in the 100 most populated Cellular Market Areas within the country. The rankings were the same, but T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless were nearly neck and neck. Across the board, users in populated cellular markets see higher speeds.

Mobile performance by carrier varies greatly from area to area, so while T-Mobile may have the best overall network speeds, AT&T or Verizon could have a significant edge depending on where a user is located. All four carriers are aggressively pursuing improved LTE speeds and network expansion through spectrum purchases, refarming legacy spectrum (like ending 3G networks), network densification, relay solutions, and other techniques.

Across all carriers in the United States, there was a 19.2 percent increase in average mobile download speeds between the first half of 2016 and the first half of 2017, with an average speed of 22.69 Mb/s.

Average mobile upload speeds didn’t see quite as much improvement, coming in at 8.51 Mb/s for a four percent improvement year over year. When it comes to average mobile download speeds, the United States is ranked 44th in the world. That rank drops down to 65th for average mobile upload speed. In rural areas, performance can be significantly worse, with speeds that are 20.9 percent slower than the nation as a whole. Verizon (51.6%) and AT&T (27.3%) have far more coverage in rural areas than T-Mobile (11.5%) and Sprint (9.6%).

In addition to looking at network performance by carrier, Ookla also shared some data on LTE speeds across carriers on two popular devices: the iPhone 7 and the Galaxy S7. On T-Mobile and Sprint, broadband speeds were on average slightly faster for the Galaxy S7, with little difference on Verizon and AT&T networks.

Both the iPhone 7 and the S7 see higher mobile network speeds than other devices because they aggregate three component carriers to improve peak and average speeds. On T-Mobile, Samsung has an edge because the Galaxy S7 enables features like higher order modulation and 4-Layer MIMO.

Ookla’s report is based on data gathered from its popular Speedtest Intelligence benchmark during the first half of 2017. More than 3 million unique devices performed more than 14 million user-initiated cellular network tests, giving the company a lot of data to work with to figure out trends during the year. For the S7 and iPhone 7 comparison tests, data from 250,278 iPhones was collected and compared to data from 134,742 Galaxy devices.

Additional test results covering minimum acceptable experience, the impact of unlimited data, fastest carriers by city, and more can be read in the full report.

Tags: Sprint, T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon, LTE
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iPhone 7 Modded to Include Fully Functional 3.5mm Headphone Jack

Former software engineer Scotty Allen has posted his second video to YouTube this week, in which he decides to modify an iPhone 7 in order to add a functional 3.5mm headphone jack into the smartphone. On the Strange Parts website, Allen explained that he spent four months on the project, working in Shenzhen, China assembling the tools, going through 7 custom circuit boards designs, and 3 disassembled iPhones to finally arrive with a working unit.

Allen said that the hardest part of creating an iPhone 7 with a headphone jack centered on the electrical design and fitting the new parts inside of the smartphone. Upon the release of the iPhone 7, Apple said that the removal of the 3.5mm headphone jack was needed to make room for the internals of the new camera system — as well as increasing water resistance — but Allen found that “there was inexplicably a lot of extra room” near the lower left hand corner of the iPhone 7, where he added the component.

The modded iPhone 7 (above) compared to an iPhone 6s (below)
While Allen’s feat is notable due to many iPhone users’ ongoing complaints about losing the headphone jack on the newer iPhones, it isn’t a practical solution for everyday users. Allen pointed out that he went through designing numerous circuit boards that were “more complex” than anything he’s ever done, as well as spending money on “lots, and lots, and lots” of spare parts and advanced disassembly tools.

I’m pretty proud of the final implementation. I took apart an Apple lightning to headphone adapter, put that inside the phone, and hooked it up by man in the middling the lightning jack with a flexible PCB. The PCB has a switching chip that switches between connecting the headphone adapter to the phone by default, and then disconnecting it and connecting the lightning jack when something is plugged into it. I have a couple other timer chips that briefly disconnect everything from the phone when something is connected/disconnected to improve the reliability of the phone detecting when something is plugged/unplugged (otherwise it sometimes gets confused).

The full 30-minute video goes into detail of Allen’s project, and he reveals the successful final product at the 30:00 minute mark. One downside is that the modded iPhone 7 can’t listen to music and charge simultaneously, which Allen admitted would require a “pretty serious engineering effort.”

Earlier in April, Allen built his own functional iPhone 6s entirely by finding spare parts in Huaqiangbei, China. His final homemade iPhone 6s was a like-new 16GB device with full functionality, including a working Touch ID Home button.

Allen ended his new video telling Apple that he “really wants to buy an iPhone with a headphone jack from you,” hoping that Apple will return the 3.5mm headphone jack into an upcoming iPhone model sometime in the future. Apple is holding an iPhone reveal event in Cupertino next week on September 12, and all three new smartphones — the iPhone 8, iPhone 7s, and iPhone 7s Plus — are not expected to have a headphone jack, although Apple might continue to include a Lightning to headphone jack adapter in the box.

For more information about Allen’s project, check out the Strange Parts website here.

Related Roundup: iPhone 7
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iHome’s new iAVS16 alarm clock brings Alexa to your bedside

Why it matters to you

iHome has integrated Alexa into its latest alarm clock, bringing Amazon voice commands seamlessly to your bedside table.

iHome has partnered up with Amazon to release the Alexa-integrated iAVS16 alarm clock, aiming to bring all the conveniences of Amazon’s popular voice command system to your bedside table.

Though the new smart speaker looks much like a traditional clock radio — a black rectangle with a backlit LCD display and physical snooze/music control buttons on top — the added Alexa integration should alleviate all the traditional woes of those with clock/radio alarm clocks. Namely, everything from setting daily alarms to checking the weather can now be accomplished via voice control rather than by messing with pesky buttons and hard-to-remember controls.

The iAVS16 supports popular music streaming services like Amazon Music, Spotify, and iHeartRadio, and can be used to control any of iHome’s other SmartPlug products. In addition, it features USB ports for charging of cell phones and other devices without the need of extra plugs.

“This year, iHome has focused on growing its Alexa smart home offerings and integrating artificial intelligence technologies into products across all categories, including smart plugs,” said iHome’s Director of Product and Business Development Gary Schultz in a press release. “We’re especially proud of the iAVS16 because it’s unlike anything else out there and uniquely pays tribute to the product line that made iHome a household name. By combining iHome’s expertise in creating feature-rich bedside music systems with Alexa, we’ve created a truly unique product that elegantly wraps an alarm clock, a powerful music system, USB charging, and easy-to-use Alexa voice control into an attractive and compact form factor that fits perfectly on a nightstand, kitchen counter, and more.”

Those interested in testing out Alexa for the first time will likely find a very useful product in the iAVS16, as the smart speaker’s voice-controlled alarm, music playback, and weather features are all things that will come in handy when waking up and getting dressed each morning.

iHome’s new speaker will cost an affordable $150 at launch, and will soon hit Amazon’s online store, as well as store shelves at Best Buy, Bed Bath and Beyond, and other home retailers across the United States. For more information, we recommend checking out the company’s website.

Amazon’s looking to take over a(nother) town near you!

Amazon’s looking to employe 50,000 people at a new campus somewhere in America.

Amazon’s Seattle campus. (Source: Amazon)

Ask anyone who’s in or around Seattle (our own Andrew Martonik can attest to this) and they’ll quickly tell you about Amazon’s impact in that city, which sports its massive headquarters. It’s huge. How huge? Try this on for size:

Thirty-three buildings with a total 8.1 million square feet and more than $3 billion in capital infrastructure. More than 40,000 employees with more than $25.7 billion paid out in compensation, 24 restaurants and cafes, and something like $38 billion added to the city economy from 2010 to 2016.

Said Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in a press release:

“We expect HQ2 to be a full equal to our Seattle headquarters,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “Amazon HQ2 will bring billions of dollars in up-front and ongoing investments, and tens of thousands of high-paying jobs. We’re excited to find a second home.”

That’s a big deal, and it’ll be a big deal for wherever Amazon decides to open up shop next. It’s looking to build a second headquarters — which it’s dubbed HQ2. Amazon stresses that this isn’t a satellite office. They’re expecting to eventually have up to 50,000 employees at this second site — which would build to to up to 8 million square feet —with annual compensation averaging over $100,000 through the next 10 or 15 years.

They’re looking for an area with more than 1 million people, within 45 miles of an international airport.

So who’s up for a little large-scale renovation, courtesy of one of the largest companies in the world? Check out more info here, and start lobbying your local and state reps!

Amazon Alexa

• Which Amazon Echo should you buy?
• Get more Alexa Skills
• How to enable and disable Alexa Skills
• How to customize Flash Briefing
• How to get sports updates
• How to sync your calendar with Alexa
• How to shop with Alexa
• Send voice messages with Alexa

See more at Amazon

The Nokia 8 flagship is available to pre-order in the UK

There’s a new Nokia flagship in town. Okay, so the “Nokia” name is a bit of a red herring, given it’s now HMD Global, a young Finnish startup, using the brand for a fresh suite of Android phones. (Oh, and a reborn Nokia 3310.) Still, the Nokia 8 is a top-end phone bearing the old iconic logo. And starting today, it’s up for pre-order in the UK. You can reserve the handset in steel or “tempered blue” for £499 from Carphone Warehouse, EE, Virgin Mobile and Nokia.com. It’ll then hit store shelves on September 13th in every retailer you would expect, including Amazon and John Lewis.

The phone, if you need a refresher, comes with a 5.3-inch, 2560 x 1440 display, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor and 4GB of RAM. Pretty standard stuff for an Android flagship this year. The design, however, is a little different. The aforementioned blue and copper variants are unusual in a marketplace awash with black and silver slabs. The bezels are noticeable, especially in comparison to Samsung and LG’s latest offerings. Still, it’s an attractive device running stock Android out of the box. The dual-camera system on the back is also decent, but far from best in class.

For more impressions, check out our initial hands-on post and my colleague Mat Smith’s camera test from IFA in Berlin, Germany.

Source: Nokia.com

The Morning After: Thursday, September 7th 2017

Hey, good morning! You look fabulous.

Good morning! T-Mobile is willing to pick up the tab for your Netflix habit, and trackball mice are back. Really.

Here’s the car that AI steering wheel is made for.All Jaguars will have electric drivetrains in 2020

Jaguar has announced that within a few years, all of its new cars will be some type of hybrid or EV. To go along with the news, it also announced two concept vehicles, including this Future-Type autonomous vehicle, shown above, that works with its Sayer AI-powered steering wheel. The other is its E-Type Zero, a classic roadster reworked to fit a 220 kW electric motor.

Out of the shadows.Epson’s ultra bright projector can hide in plain sight

Meet the new Home Cinema LS100, an “ultra short-throw” laser display. Basically, according to Epson, this $2,000 projector can be mounted within a few inches of a nearby wall and display a 120-inch 1080p image, even in a brightly lit room. Plus, the laser light source is supposed to last 10 years or more without needing a replacement.

This has never happened before.Computer Love: The surprisingly lackluster rise of VR porn

Two years after his first visit to the world of virtual reality porn, Editor in Chief Christopher Trout is revisiting the platform. Despite great expectations, it seems that very little has changed, and some key players have retreated from their 360-degree efforts. Now it’s time to figure out if this is a VR “killer app” or just another niche.

It could be the first one.India wants its own 27-mile Hyperloop

Hyperloop Transportation Technologies has signed a memorandum of understanding to investigate creating a route between Vijayawada and Amaravati. The company claims it could shrink the current 70-minute travel time to just six minutes.

Back like it never left.Logitech is bringing back the trackball mouse

The MX ERGO marks Logitech’s first new trackball in almost 10 years, pairing an adjustable hinge for better wrist posture and pronation with a subtler color scheme.

From the track to the street.Williams redesigns the chassis for lighter and stronger EVs

The F1 company is showing off a lightweight electric car chassis designed to make electric rides lighter, safer and greener.

They’re listening even when you can’t.Alexa and Siri are vulnerable to silent, nefarious commands

Chinese researchers have developed a technique they call DolphinAttack, which uses ultrasonic frequencies to command voice-controlled services without alerting their human operators.

Binge on.T-Mobile family plans now include free Netflix streaming

It’s still 480p, though.

But wait, there’s more…

• ‘Dragonfly’ hackers are actively targeting US and European power grids
• Microsoft to unveil new Surface gear on October 31st
• Martin Shkreli is selling his $2 million Wu-Tang album on eBay
• Facebook: Russian group spent $100,000 promoting ‘divisive’ stories during 2016 election
• ‘Flip-flop’ design makes quantum computers more affordable

The Morning After is a new daily newsletter from Engadget designed to help you fight off FOMO. Who knows what you’ll miss if you don’t subscribe.

Oyster card app simplifies top-ups in London

With the growing popularity of contactless payments, the humble Oyster card has a diminished role on the London Underground. Still, it’s a useful option for tourists, children, or anyone who wants to keep a close eye on their travel spending. Today, Transport for London (TfL) has launched a mobile app for iOS and Android that makes it easier to top-up and review your balance. Once your account is set up, you can top-up from anywhere — no more queuing at a ticket machine. After 30 minutes, you simply need to touch a reader and the amount will be added on automatically.

In a perfect world, of course, you wouldn’t need to touch the reader at all. That’s the case with contactless debit and credit cards, as well as mobile payment platforms such as Apple Pay. Still, it’s a step forward for the trusty Oyster. The app also lists your journey history from the last eight weeks (how did I spent that much last month?) and will send a notification when your balance is running low. The latter feature sounds pretty useful, because no-one wants to be that person holding everyone up at the barrier, or rushing to top up while the train glides away from the station. In the future, TfL says you’ll be able to apply for refunds through the app too.

Source: TfL Oyster (iOS), (Android)

Native Instruments Maschine gets color screens, larger pads

Whether you’re an in-room musician or take your craft onstage, the Native Instruments Maschine is an incredibly handy tool for working with and triggering samples and controlling MIDI instruments. Well it just got a nice upgrade with the Maschine MK3.

The latest version of the music production from Native Instruments sports two full color displays (replacing the pretty old looking black and white screens on the MK2) for easier editing of sounds and samples. It also ships with larger more responsive (even though they still only support 16 levels of pressure) light-up pads so you can tap out your favorite beats with a bit more nuance.. Plus it has more function buttons because you can never have too many of those.

On the audio side, the Maschine has upgraded the audio interface from 16-bit resolution with 44.1kHz sample rate to 24-bit resolution with a 96kHz sample rate. An important jump for anyone trying to get the best possible sound out of their gear or recording for release.

The hardware still comes with the free Maschine software along with an eight-gig audio library of samples, drum kits, songs and more. It also still works with your favorite DAWs like Abelton Live, Logic Pro and FL Studio.

Unless they’re looking for higher quality audio, the new Maschine probably won’t lure too many MK2 owners to take a big chunk out of their bank accounts. With a price tag the same as the previous generation though ($599), for anyone thinking about adding the production hardware to their arsenal, this might push them closer to the buy button.

Source: Native Instruments

Amazon wants US cities to bid for its second major HQ

Amazon is looking for a second company headquarters and wants cities around the US to convince the retail giant why it should take up residency with them. Amazon says it plans to invest more than $5 billion in the new site, called HQ2, while creating up to 50,000 new jobs, and claims the development will bring “tens of billions of dollars in additional investment” to whichever area wins the bid. The company points to its Seattle location as evidence of this, claiming that investments in the site from 2010 to 2016 brought in an “additional $38 billion to the city’s economy — every dollar invested by Amazon in Seattle generated an additional 1.4 dollars for the city’s economy overall.”

The company has produced an eight-page request for proposal document, with submissions open until October 19 2017. Amazon said it would prioritize bids from metropolitan areas with more than one million people that provide a “stable and business-friendly environment”, and boast communities that “think big and creatively”. The final site selection will be announced in 2018. “We expect HQ2 to be a full equal to our Seattle headquarters,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “Amazon HQ2 will bring billions of dollars in up-front and ongoing investments, and tens of thousands of high-paying jobs. We’re excited to find a second home.”

Source: Amazon