Phones, wearables and currywurst [#acpodcast]

We’ll do it live! Andrew Martonik, Alex Dobie, and Phil Nickinson, have traveled all the way to Berlin, Germany for IFA 2017 to bring you the latest announcements in the Android universe. They do a deep dive into the LG V30, Moto X4, plus new wearables from Samsung, connected speakers, and more!

Show Notes and Links:

• LG V30 hands-on: A galaxy of good ideas
• LG V30 specs: Snapdragon 835, dual cameras, Quad DAC
• The LG V30 is the phone the G6 should’ve been from the start
• LG V30 is official, and it could be one of the sleeper hits of the year
• Moto X4 hands-on: Familiar name, entirely different phone
• Moto X4 is official: 5.2-inch display, dual cameras and glass back for €399
• Moto X4 specs: Snapdragon 630, 3000mAh battery and dual cameras
• Samsung Gear Sport hands-on: The Gear S2 refresh we all wanted
• Samsung Gear Fit 2 Pro hands-on: Simple improvements to one of the best fitness trackers
• BlackBerry KEYone Black Edition goes global
• Sony Xperia XZ1 and XZ1 Compact hands-on: Tiny upgrades
• Sony Xperia XZ1 and XZ1 Compact specs: Snapdragon 835, Motion Eye camera, and dual speakers

Podcast MP3 URL: http://traffic.libsyn.com/androidcentral/androidcentral350.mp3

Nexus 6P likely to receive Android Oreo on Sept. 11

The last Nexus might see its last OS upgrade in just a few days.

According to Canadian carrier Rogers’ OS Upgrade Schedule, Android Oreo for the Nexus 6P will be released on September 11.

When Android Oreo was initially released by Google, only phones that were currently enrolled in the Android beta program received the update. This isn’t surprising, as the people who helped test the software all along should be the ones to give a gold master version its last test. A week or so later, Oreo was pushed to everyone’s Pixel but we’ve heard no word on a wider release for the Nexus 6P or the Nexus 5X.

We have heard some whispers that Huawei and LG need to tweak a few things, mostly with the radio firmware, to get Oreo closer to perfect for the last of the Nexus line. If true, this would give more weight to a carrier announcement as the release date because they are the companies doing the final network testing.

There is also the off chance that this will be a point release and we’ll see Android 8.0.1 for the 6P next week. Whatever happens, we hope the release is good, OTAs go smoothly, and our inbox and forums aren’t filled with reports of boot loops and bricked phones.

Are you running a Nexus 5X or 6P waiting for Oreo? Let us know in the comments below!

Android Oreo

• Android Oreo review!
• Everything new in Android Oreo
• How to get Android Oreo on your Pixel or Nexus
• Oreo will make you love notifications again
• Will my phone get Android Oreo?
• Join the Discussion

Roku’s IPO filing reveals plans to raise $100 million

Roku has come a long way from its origin as the Netflix streaming player, and today the company filed for its IPO. The documents reveal that it hopes to raise as much as $100 million, and give more insight than ever into exactly how it’s doing. The company says it had 15.1 million active accounts at the end of June, more than the number of subscribers counted by the fourth largest cable company in the US. It also mentioned that former Netflix tech lead Neil Hunt joined its board of directors last month.

That’s particularly notable since its devices are heavily used to access Netflix. In its section listing business risks, Roku explained that while it doesn’t generate much revenue from the streamer, Netflix accounted for one-third of all hours streamed through its platform in 2016 and the first six months of 2017. It also explained that it doesn’t make any money from YouTube, even though that’s the most-viewed ad-supported channel on its platform.

Analyst Parks Associates announced just a couple of weeks ago that according to its estimates, Roku is increasing its lead in the streaming media player landscape, now accounting for 37 percent of streaming media players. The ability to turn all those active users into viewers of subscription or ad supported channels that Roku does make money on will be its main challenge, but so far the company’s mostly content-agnostic approach has worked for publishers and viewers alike.

Source: SEC, Roku

Google’s iOS app now shows trending searches

Earlier this year, Google added a “trending” widget in its iOS search app that shows off what people are looking for at any given moment. Now, Google’s adding that info right into the main part of the app. After installing an update that’s live in the App Store, you’ll see trending searches when you tap on the search bar in the Google app. They show up below your recent searches, which are immediately visible when you tap the bar; they’re also symbolized with a blue rising arrow icon.

As noted by TechCrunch, this feature came to Android phones a while back — and it was met with some displeasure, as vocal users said they didn’t want the search interface cluttered with more terms. Google added a setting to let you turn trending searches off, and they’ve done the same thing in the iOS app.

The update also added “instant answers to the search box. When you start typing in a question (like “how tall is the Eiffel Tower?” or “what is the Red Sox score?”) it’ll pull up the answer for you before you’re even done. It looks like the app is basically pulling in information from Google’s expansive knowledge graph and showing it to you early rather than waiting for you to hit search.

If you just have to know what nonsense everyone is searching for at any given moment, the update is live now in the iOS App Store.

Via: TechCrunch

TouchArcade iOS Gaming Roundup: PAX West, Suzy Cube, Game of Thrones and More

We are at PAX West this weekend, scoping out the coolest mobile games in Seattle for coverage on TouchArcade. If you’re also here and want to show us your game, be sure to hit up either @hodapp or @jaredta and we’ll make sure that we make it happen. For everyone else, like any other week in the calendar year, this one has been packed with all sorts of interesting things happening in the world of iOS gaming.

First off, one cool thing that we do around TouchArcade is called the RPG Reload play along. The basic gist of the whole thing is we select an RPG, which typically is an older or other retro game, and we all play it together over the course of a month and share out experiences in this forum thread. It’s a really awesome way to revisit older games that you have (or haven’t) played before. This month we’re focusing on the action RPG Bastion. It’s a fully narrated game experience, which is… unbelievably cool if you’ve never tried it before. Check out the trailer, or the forum thread, and hop in. These play alongs are a ton of fun.

While it’s the first time we’ve mentioned it in these MacRumors roundups, Suzy Cube is a game we’ve been following over on TouchArcade for years now. It’s basically a modern, touch-based, reinterpretation of the 3DS game Super Mario 3D Land. The amount of time the developer, Louis-Nicolas Dozois, has put into refining every aspect of the game is really just sort of incredible. His latest developer blog posted over on Gamasutra details all the challenges that went into designing the controls of a 3D platformer. In fact, the entirety of his development blog is a really fascinating read if you’re at all into following the passion project of a developer who is making a game that isn’t typically done so well on mobile with touch screen controls.

On the sales front, Street Fighter IV Champion Edition has slammed down to two bucks. It’s a full-featured mobile iteration of Street Fighter which we really loved in our review. It has a couple caveats: The framerate isn’t as good as its console counterparts, and if you’re not a fan of touch controls you’re probably not going to be that into the controls of this particular game.

Additionally, all the Simogo games are also on sale for a buck. Simogo is responsible for some of the most innovative (and strangest) games on the App Store. Device 6 is a fascinating spin on interactive fiction, SPL-T is a brain-twisting puzzle game, Year Walk is an incredible atmospheric avdenture, and the list just goes on. Simogo consistently releases amazing titles, so if you’re missing anything from their catalog, now is a great time to stock up.

If your mind is still blown from the Game of Thrones season finale, you’ve got a brief reprieve before the launch of Game of Thrones Conquest. You can pre-register for the game here, which awards $50 worth of in-game goodies once the game goes live. So far it sounds like it’s one of those free to play MMO battle games, which could be pretty cool with a Game of Thrones skin on top. Interestingly enough, it’s developed by Turbine who were the original developers of Asheron’s Call, making Game of Thrones Conquest potentially far more interesting than your typical free to play game.

In the world of App Store approval drama, Apple kicked CheapCharts off the App Store. If CheapCharts is new to you, it’s basically an app with functionality sort of similar to the original AppShopper app. Apparently, when they added Mac apps to their price tracker, that was the final straw for Apple who “suddenly claimed that our business model would not be in compliance with Apple’s guidelines and that the look and feel of CheapCharts would be identical to that of the App Store.” For folks in our situations, this is unbelievably frustrating as all CheapCharts, AppShopper, and the TouchArcade app really do is encourage people to buy more things from the App Store.

Last, but by no stretch of the imagination least, the original Infinity Blade has been updated to 64-bit. Aside from evading the 32-bit purge of iOS 11, this also provides a fantastic opportunity for anyone who didn’t play Infinity Blade when it was new and exciting to download the game knowing it’s going to work on their phone for the foreseeable future. It’s ancient by today’s standards, but out original review of Infinity Blade still stands as one of the best games ever released on the App Store. Since then, two other games have been released, which are both just as good.

For all this and more, be sure to check out TouchArcade, we post this sort of news around the clock and it’s really the best place you can go to follow the beat of the mobile gaming world!

Tag: TouchArcade gaming roundup
Discuss this article in our forums

Leaked Apple Document Outlines Apple’s iPhone Repair Rules

A leaked Apple “Visual/Mechanical Inspection Guide” shared this afternoon by Business Insider provides some insight into how Apple’s repair policies work, highlighting how Apple determines when to offer an in-warranty repair, an out-of-warranty repair, or a denial of service.

Dated March 3, 2017, the document is known internally as the “VMI” and covers the iPhone 6, 6s, and 7, along with Plus models. An Apple technician told Business Insider that there’s a similar document for all of its products, and that it’s generally used for training.

The guide is divided into three sections. The green section denotes problems where Apple will provide a warranty service, the yellow covers issues where Apple will offer out-of-warranty repairs, and the red section contains examples of issues Apple will refuse to fix.

Click to enlarge
Debris under the display glass, a pixel anomaly, FaceTime camera foam misalignment, and a single hairline crack to the front glass are all problems that Apple will fix under warranty, even if there’s additional accidental or liquid damage to the device. These are the only issues that can be fixed automatically even with additional damage to a device.

Apple will provide out-of-warranty replacements for liquid damage confirmed by the user, evidence of corrosion, LCD fractures, camera damage from lasers, cracks at a point of impact, damaged Lightning/audio/microphone components, extreme abrasion or puncture holes, and a bent or split enclosure.

Devices that have user-replaced parts, intentional tampering or damage, non-Apple batteries, or catastrophic damage are not eligible for service at all. Enclosure damage, like scratches and scuffs, is not covered and cosmetic problems do not warrant a replacement or repair if there are no other issues.

Apple also has a special set of rules for water damage. Employees are instructed to look for signs of water damage both internally and externally when diagnosing issues, and if there is evidence of contact with water, employees are told to deny some in-warranty repairs and instead offer an out-of-warranty repair.

Click to enlarge
According to Apple employees, the VMI isn’t often used unless there’s an “oddball issue,” and it’s also more of a guide than a hard and fast rule when it comes to replacement, as there are many issues that arise that aren’t covered here. “There are always those one-off issues that the phone is technically not covered under warranty but we swap the phone anyways under warranty,” an Apple technician told Business Insider.

These rules don’t apply to devices covered by AppleCare+, as that warranty entitles users to two device replacements or repairs, even for accidental damage, so long as the fee is covered. For out-of-warranty repairs, Apple charges $130 to $150 for screen repairs and $300 to $350 for other damage. With AppleCare+, a screen repair costs $29 and other damage costs $99 to fix.

Tag: Apple retail
Discuss this article in our forums

Alphabet finalizes restructuring with a new company called XXVI

Back in 2015, Google announced that it was restructuring its company into multiple parts, with a new giant company called Alphabet to oversee all of Google’s various businesses. The reasoning behind the move was to essentially separate out some of Google’s “Other Bets” projects into their own entities, so that they would be valued separately from the core Google business. Today, Alphabet is finally wrapping up the reorg with the invention of a new company, called XXVI Holdings Inc.

XXVI Holdings will be the umbrella encompassing those aforementioned “Other Bets” projects, which include Waymo, which comes up with self-driving tech, and Verily, which specializes in digital health and medical devices. Google, on the other hand, is changing from a corporation to an LLC, because it’s now part of a holding company instead of a listed public company. As a reminder, Google is still home to the business’s bread-and-butter units like Gmail, search and YouTube.

Despite the changes though, it’s really just a formality. “We’re updating our corporate structure to implement the changes we announced with the creation of Alphabet in 2015,” said Gina Weakley Johnson, an Alphabet spokesperson. It won’t affect shareholder control, operations, or management.

As for why it’s called XXVI? Well, it’s 26 — the number of letters in the alphabet — in Roman numerals.

Source: Bloomberg

Instagram Stories will soon be available outside the app

Why it matters to you

Instagram is bringing more features to users who don’t have a quick enough connection to use the app.

Instagram Stories are going beyond the app — on Thursday, August 31, Instagram announced that the popular Stories feature will soon be on the mobile website.

Stories allows users to post several short video clips of their day, providing friends with a brief visual breakdown of the day’s happenings. The feature, which launched a year ago, was only available inside Instagram’s app. Now, the social platform is bringing the feature to the mobile web.

Instagram Stories still aren’t accessible on a desktop computer, but users can login to their account on a mobile browser and will soon see those familiar Stories circles at the top of the screen. Instagram says the feature is rolling out globally in the next few weeks. That update will be followed by the ability to actually add to a Story without the app, an update the company says is coming in the next few months.

Instagram Stories now has over 250 million people using the feature every day. While the concept was originally a Snapchat option, Instagram’s version quickly gained more users than the original.

Instagram has been steadily improving its mobile site this year, adding the ability to post a photo and use the Explore tab in May. The platform has long stuck to a mobile-first, instant sharing philosophy, so while the features are available from a web browser, features like the photo upload, and now, Stories, are only available from browsers on a mobile device.

“Stories has quickly become an important part of the Instagram experience — over 250 million people use it every day to see what their friends are doing in the moment,” the official blog post reads. “Now we’re excited to bring stories to people who use Instagram on the web.”

Instagram’s expanded mobile website allows users with slower networks to access the platform’s biggest features, particularly in high-population but low-tech countries such as India and parts of Africa. While viewing posts and Stories and sharing a photo are accessible with the mobile website, features like messaging and adding videos still require the app.

Instagram’s parent company, Facebook, however, doesn’t have the same mobile-first idea — Facebook began testing Stories on desktop browsers last month. While Facebook hasn’t shared recent numbers, the feature is thought to lack Instagram Stories’ popularity.

Bioengineering could make more donor lungs suitable for transplant

Why it matters to you

New bioengineering research from Columbia University could enable the repair of donor lungs that would otherwise be rejected for transplant.

The major shortage of donor organs is a problem that scientists are frantically trying to solve. Whether it’s finding innovative ways to use animal organs without them being rejected or developing “nano-warming” technology that allows organs to be transported more easily, eliminating transplant waiting lists is among the medical world’s greatest challenges.

With this mission in mind, researchers at Columbia University have developed a new method for bioengineering healthy lungs, which could have a major impact on the quantity of donor lungs that are suitable for transplants. Since currently only 20 percent of potential donor lungs are considered suitable for transplants, the results may be highly significant for sufferers of lung disease — which kills around 400,000 people per year in the United States alone.

“We [have] developed a radically new approach to bioengineering of the lung,” Professor Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, leader of the project, told Digital Trends. “Over the last decade, several groups have fully decellularized lungs to obtain a scaffold with the proper architecture and stiffness that can be repopulated by fresh cells. To rebuild a functional lung starting from this cell-free scaffold, both the epithelial surfaces in the airway and the vasculature need to be regenerated. Intact vascular network — lacking in these scaffolds — is critical not only for maintaining the blood-gas barrier and allowing for proper graft function but also for supporting the regenerative cells. We reasoned that an ‘ideal’ lung scaffold would need to have perfusable and healthy vasculature, and developed an approach allowing removal of the pulmonary epithelium, while maintaining the viability and function of the vascular network and the lung matrix.”

The team has demonstrated its new technique in an ex vivo rodent lung, meaning a rodent lung outside the animal. The researchers are also experimenting with larger lungs from humans and pigs, and have established methods for local targeted interventions in diseased sections of the lung. While plenty of work still remains to be done, this is extremely promising research.

“This approach could benefit patients with lung disease where the epithelium is primarily involved, which is the majority of lung disease and injury,” Vunjak-Novakovic continued. “By preserving the vasculature and blood supply, we enable removal of damaged epithelium and its replacement with fresh regenerative cells. This way, the lungs that would be rejected for transplant can be repaired and used.”

A paper describing the work was recently published in the journal Science Advances.

Machine learning can predict simulated earthquakes by listening to fault lines

Why it matters to you

We’re not there yet, but new research suggests that it may one day be possible to use AI to help predict earthquakes.

In lab tests involving simulated tabletop earthquakes, researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico demonstrated that machine-learning technology can play a role in predicting major tremors by analyzing acoustic signals to find failing fault lines.

For the experiment, earthquakes were modeled by the researchers using two large blocks of steel, which were put under stress. This resulted in them rubbing against one another like tectonic plates on the Earth’s surface. The movement released energy in the form of seismic waves — which was then analyzed by the team’s artificial intelligence.

“We discovered that an artificial intelligence can learn to discern a very specific pattern in the sound emitted by the fault before it ruptures,” Bertrand Rouet-LeDuc, one of the researchers on the project, told Digital Trends. “This pattern tells us how much stress the fault is undergoing. Once this AI has been trained on an experiment, it can be used to make very accurate predictions of the time remaining before the next laboratory earthquake, for the same experiment but later on, or even for a different experiment. Concretely, even right after a laboratory earthquake, the AI can listen to the experiment for a very short duration, and make an accurate prediction of the time remaining before the next quake.”

There is plenty of discussion in the geoscience community regarding whether the prediction of earthquakes is actually possible, or whether quakes are random and therefore cannot be predicted. Rouet-LeDuc observes that the fact that the work of the team in lab conditions provides hope that real world earthquake prediction may, in fact, be possible. It won’t be easy, though.

“We started working on real Earth data, and there are many additional challenges,” Rouet-LeDuc said. “In particular, the ambient noise picked by the seismometers that comes from human activity, oceans, or the weather is an issue. Another challenge is that we’re also picking up signals from many faults close to the fault that we study, and these signals are mixed with the ones we are interested in.”

Despite this, the researchers describe the preliminary results as promising. “In any case, we are certain we will learn far more about the friction within real faults, and that will only help us understand and characterize [them],” Paul Johnson, another researcher on the project, told us.

A paper describing the research was recently published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.