NASA’s Opportunity rover sees its 5,000th day on Mars

This weekend, NASA’s Opportunity rover spent its 5,000th day on Mars. While that is a feat in and of itself, it’s even more impressive when you consider that it was only planned to last 90 Martian days, or sols. Both Opportunity and its companion rover Spirit were launched towards Mars in 2003, landing on two different parts of the planet in January 2004. Neither were expected to make it through Mars’ harsh winter though, which lasts about twice as long as ours and is severely lacking in light, but NASA’s team discovered that pointing the rovers towards the north and towards the sun was enough to keep them powered through the winter. Further, making sure the rovers were on north-facing slopes each winter helped to keep them going for years longer than they were ever intended to function.

Spirit got stuck in the Martian soil in 2010, preventing it from pointing its solar panels towards the sun. And NASA eventually decided to let it go, ceasing all communications with it in 2011. But Opportunity has kept trucking, even through some not insignificant damage, and has now traveled over 28 miles and sent 225,000 images back to Earth. You can check those out here. Opportunity helped scientists discover that surface and groundwater likely existed on Mars and it’s currently about one-third of the way down Mars’ Perseverance Valley. Opportunity hit its 5,000th sol, which lasts around 40 minutes longer than an Earth day, on Saturday.

“Five thousand sols after the start of our 90-sol mission, this amazing rover is still showing us surprises on Mars,” Opportunity Project Manager John Callas said in a statement.

Via: The Verge

Source: NASA

Razor’s e-skates are equal parts Heelys and hoverboard

As a cranky, childless adult in her late thirties I’ve largely missed the boat on personal transportation trends like Razor scooters, Heelys and hoverboards. This year Razor manages to combine all of those things into its new Turbo Jetts e-skates: It’s the sort of thing that your inner child will love, even as your adult self screams, “Get off my lawn!”

The hard plastic skates go over your existing footwear, and will snap over shoe sizes youth 12 to adult 12. One of the skates has a removable lithium-ion battery, which you’ll wear on your dominant foot. Neither skate is particularly heavy and, while not exactly petite, they’re still small enough to be stowed away in a bag or backpack for a day at the playground or office.

The battery lasts for about 30 minutes, though it’s really dependent on the weight of the person wearing them: Smaller children might be able to squeeze a few more minutes out of them, while adults pushing the skates’ max weight of 176 pounds will have to recharge a lot sooner. Luckily the battery only takes one hour to power up fully: It’s a pretty good ratio between play time and charge time, one that ensures that kids won’t get too frustrated waiting to use these again.

Anyone who’s ever worn a pair of Heelys will find using the Turbo Jetts second nature; it’s just a matter of pointing your toes up and letting the skates carry you forward at speeds of about 10 mph. The motor activates when the skate comes in contact with the ground, though I personally had trouble getting it going consistently.

Part of the problem is that I’ve never used Heelys or anything similar. I found myself treating the Turbo Jetts like regular roller skates a lot, as it was hard to overcome that muscle memory. It’s not going to work if you do that. After pushing off from the non-dominant foot, you really need to lean back and just let the powered skate pull you forward, keeping the non-powered skate in the rear. Though the bulk of the skates made it unlikely I’d fall backwards, I still couldn’t shake the sense I was going to fall on my butt. The need to keep one skate in front will at least keep you from falling flat on your face, but I did end up performing a few unwanted splits.

Even after struggling with the Turbo Jetts and taking a few spills at Toy Fair, I wasn’t ready to give them up. Luckily, I don’t have long to wait for my own pair — they’re available now for $130, both online and at Toys ‘R’ Us stores.

Check out the rest of our coverage from Toy Fair 2018 here.

Apple updates all of its operating systems to fix app-crashing bug

It took a few days, but Apple already has a fix out for a bug that caused crashes on each of its platforms. The company pushed new versions of iOS, macOS and watchOS to fix the issue, which was caused when someone pasted in or received a single Indian-language character in select communications apps and Apple software like Note, Safari and the app store.

Using a specific character in the Telugu language native to India was enough to crash a variety of chat apps, including iMessage, WhatsApp, Twitter, Facebook Messenger, Gmail and Outlook, though Telegram and Skype were seemingly immune. The issue was particularly troubling for iPhone users, as the affected apps would continue to crash even after reloading them, essentially shutting users out — only deleting the character using complex workarounds would liberate the app. Worse, it could even reportedly crash the entire iOS SpringBoard software that runs the home screen.

But since the issue also reportedly affected software like Safari and the App Store, Apple also included tvOS in its slew of mass updates. Per its security updates page, the following were pushed out today, which users should download if they want to avoid a stray character crashing their apps.

• The latest version of iOS is 11.2.6
• The latest version of macOS is 10.13.3
• The latest version of tvOS is 11.2.5
• The latest version of watchOS is 6.2.3

Source: Apple

Apple Releases iOS 11.2.6 With Fix for Telugu Character Bug That Causes iOS Devices to Crash

Apple today released iOS 11.2.6, the eleventh official update to the iOS 11 operating system. iOS 11.2.6 comes approximately one month after the launch of iOS 11.2.5, an update that introduced support for the HomePod, Control Center updates, Siri news, and a slew of bug fixes.

The iOS 11.2.6 update can be downloaded for free on all eligible devices over-the-air in the Settings app. To access the update, go to Settings –> General –> Software Update.

Apple released iOS 11.2.6 to address a bug that causes apps like Messages to crash on the iPhone and iPad due to an inability to render a specific character in the Indian language Telugu. When sent, received, or input into Messages, Safari, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and more, the Telugu character can cause the app to freeze up and become unresponsive.

In Messages, for example, receiving the character can freeze up the entire Messages app on all of a person’s Mac and iOS devices. The Messages app then refuses to function properly until the offending character is removed by deleting the conversation with the person who sent it. Apple’s release notes are below:

iOS 11.2.6 includes bug fixes for your iPhone or iPad. This update:

Fixes an issue where using certain character sequences could cause apps to crash

Fixes an issue where some third-party apps could fail to connect to external accessories

Apple fixed the bug in iOS 11.3 and macOS 10.13.4, but those updates are still in beta testing and won’t be released until the spring. Apple last week promised a minor update to fix the bug in the meantime.

Related Roundup: iOS 11
Discuss this article in our forums

Apple Releases Minor tvOS 11.2.6 Update

Apple today released a new update for tvOS 11, the operating system designed to run on the fourth and fifth-generation Apple TVs. tvOS 11.2.6 comes one month after the release of the tvOS 11.2.5 update, which focused on bug fixes and other under-the-hood improvements.

tvOS 11.2.6 can be downloaded over the air through the Settings app on the Apple TV by going to System –> Software Update. Apple TV owners who have automatic software updates turned on will be upgraded to the tvOS 11.2.6 automatically.

As a minor 11.x.x update tvOS 11.2.6 focuses on performance improvements and bug fixes to address issues that were discovered following the release of tvOS 11.2.5. It is being released alongside bug fix updates for iOS, macOS, and watchOS to address a problem that caused devices to crash due to an inability to render a specific character in the Indian language Telugu.

tvOS 11.2.6 will be followed by tvOS 11.3, an update that is currently being beta tested and is slated for release this spring.

Related Roundup: Apple TVBuyer’s Guide: Apple TV (Buy Now)
Discuss this article in our forums

Apple Releases Minor watchOS 4.2.3 Update With Bug Fixes

Apple today released a minor software update for the Apple Watch, upgrading watchOS 4.2.2 to watchOS 4.2.3. The watchOS 4.2.3 update comes one month after the release of watchOS 4.2.2, a minor update focusing on bug fixes.

watchOS 4.2.3 can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the iPhone by going to General –> Software Update. To install the update, the Apple Watch must have 50 percent battery, it must be placed on the charger, and it must be in range of the iPhone.

Today’s update addresses minor bugs discovered since the release of watchOS 4.2.2, and it includes a fix for a bug that causes device crashes when a specific character in the Indian language Telugu is sent, received or input into an app. Similar fixes have also been released for macOS High Sierra and iOS 11.

watchOS 4.2.3 will be succeeded by watchOS 4.3, an update that’s currently in beta testing and slated for release in the spring. watchOS 4.3 introduces portrait orientation support for Night Stand mode, and it reintroduces support for controlling music played on the iPhone with the Apple Watch.

Related Roundups: Apple Watch, watchOS 4Buyer’s Guide: Apple Watch (Neutral)
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Apple Releases macOS 10.13.3 Supplemental Update With Telugu Crash Fix

Apple today released a new version of macOS High Sierra 10.13.3, which comes approximately one month after the first version of macOS High Sierra 10.13.3, an update that offered fixes for the Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities discovered in early January.

The new macOS High Sierra update can be downloaded directly from the Mac App Store or through the Software Update function in the Mac App Store on all compatible Macs that are already running macOS High Sierra.

Today’s update addresses a bug that causes apps like Messages to crash due to an inability to render a character in the Indian language Telugu. When sent or received, the character in question can cause an app like Messages or Safari to freeze up and become unresponsive.

There’s also a separate macOS High Sierra 10.13.13 Supplemental Update for iMac Pros, which is designed to fix the Telugu bug on those machines.

Prior to today’s update, the only fix in an app like Messages was to delete the entire conversation containing the buggy character. The update also impacted iOS 11.2.5, and Apple also released a new iOS 11.2.6 update to fix it.

Apple previously addressed the Telugu character bug in iOS 11.3 and macOS 10.13.4, but those updates are still in beta testing and won’t be released until the spring. Apple last week promised a minor update to fix the bugs in the meantime.

Related Roundup: macOS High Sierra
Discuss this article in our forums

Waze vs. Google Maps: Which map app should you be using?

Time may be on the side of the Rolling Stones but for the rest of us, maximizing the number of hours in a day has turned into a daily struggle. Mere minutes and seconds are treated as a valuable commodity, which is why we aim to get to our destinations as fast as possible. Sometimes finding the best route and avoiding traffic can be tough.

Thankfully, modern technology exists so our smartphones can give out turn-by-turn directions that allow us to navigate with relative ease. Yet despite the ease of use, time is still the deciding factor for many when choosing which navigation app to use, which is why Google Maps and Waze are the creme de la crème of map apps.

Google Maps and Waze are perhaps most popular because they both consistently deliver accurate directions and are straightforward to use. They’re also both owned by Google. Personal preference dictates whether you choose Google Maps or Waze but it does bring up the question — which one is actually better?

Let’s break it down.

What are Waze and Google Maps?

Waze: A turn-by-turn car navigation app, Waze acts like a crowdsourced social network while also giving drivers directions. With Waze, users can alert others to accidents, alternative routes, road closures, police officer sightings, and other such driving impediments. Google bought Waze in 2013 but it is still different from Google Maps mainly for the social network aspect and interface.

Google Maps: More of a standard navigation app, Google Maps is not just for car directions as it also provides route options for using public transit, biking, and walking. Google Maps can also be used to search for different businesses like places to eat.

What are the differences between Waze and Google Maps?

Waze

• Live traffic reporting provided by users
• Plethora of voice navigation options, including celebrity voices
• Remembers commonly used routes, frequent destinations, and commute times
• Traffic jam time countdown
• Police notifications
• Spotify integration
• Advertisement supported

Google Maps

• Offers directions for driving, biking, walking, and using public transportation
• Voice navigation choices for driving, biking, and walking
• Google Street View integration
• Turn-by-turn directions still offered during offline mode
• Built-in Google search provides information on businesses and lets you know if a business will be closing soon
• Lane designation lets drivers know which lane they should be in before turns
• Drivers can find their parked cars easily since the app saves parking locations
• Navigation backlit change based on day/nighttime
• Offline functionality

Which app will get you there faster?

The answer to this question, unfortunately, isn’t that simple.

For city driving, Waze excels at finding alternate routes around accidents or traffic jams, especially since it alerts drivers way in advance if an incident is near. Waze’s police reporting is also quite advantageous as it helps drivers to monitor their speed and avoid getting a ticket. However, to save time, Waze tends to take drivers down roundabout routes through residential neighborhoods. This could be ideal for longer drives but annoying and not really that significant of a timesaver for shorter trips.

Meanwhile, Google Maps will still get you to your destination in a timely fashion and alerts drivers about accidents and traffics jams. The alerts aren’t as informative as Waze, though, mainly because Google Maps doesn’t have a social aspect. Google Maps, however, does have a larger and more informative map view, which allows drivers to see routes more clearly.

So which app is better?

Like the last question, the answer isn’t that cut and dry. Mainly because personal preference heavily factors into a driver’s decision into what app they use.

If you like engaging in the social aspect of Waze, then that is the navigation app for you. However, if the interface is more important for you, Google Maps should likely be your preferred navigation app. Check out our guide on how to use Google Maps for some handy tips on getting the most from it.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Google Maps will now tell you when to get off the train or bus
• Learn how to use Google Maps with these handy tips and tricks
• Google’s lightweight Maps Go app is built for low-end Android devices
• Snapchat continues to seep outside the app with Snap Map on the web
• Apple HomePod vs. Amazon Echo vs. Google Home: Which is best?

‘Florence’ is a superb meditation on love from the designer of ‘Monument Valley’

App Attack is a weekly series where we search the App Store and Google Play Store for the best apps of the week. Check out App Attack every Sunday for the latest.

Video games rarely capture the act of falling in love with any degree of authenticity. Most of the time, two characters are simply deemed destined for one another. Their love exists because it has to (see: Mario/Princess Peach, Link/Princess Zelda, etc.). We don’t see the beautiful mess that is falling in love unfold organically very much at all in games. Since games are an interactive medium, that blind spot is particularly upsetting. This week’s app, Florence, fills that void and then some, offering one of the most thoughtful and heartfelt experiences I’ve experienced on a mobile device.

The debut title from Mountains, designed by the man behind Monument Valley, can be finished in less than an hour. Within that brief span, though, Florence delivers a razor sharp tale that, on the surface, is about falling in and out of love. But beneath the surface, Florence illuminates an even more universal and critical theme: loving yourself. Clever little puzzles connect you with the story in small, but meaningful ways to elevate the experience.

At the start, the titular character is 25. A typical day for Florence: she hits the snooze button on her alarm multiple times, rides the bus to work with her face glued to her phone, spends her day balancing company numbers in a cubicle, eats dinner in front of her TV, watches more TV, and then goes to bed. The game quickly conveys that Florence, like many people, feels alone. Her most intimate interactions come in the form of phone calls with her mother that never end well.

Soon Florence comes across Krish, a cellist playing a gorgeous tune in the park. And almost immediately, the makings of a relationship begin to bloom. We see their first date, the first time Florence has him over to her apartment, we see them push each other to reach towards their respective dreams. We witness their first minor squabble, we see a map of all the places they’ve been and people they’ve met together. Six months later, he moves in. And everything is perfect, until it’s not.

I know, none of this sounds inventive. A couple falls in and out of love in their mid-twenties. So what? That happens to almost everyone. Why yes, it does, and that’s one of the reasons Florence’s story strikes a chord. It doesn’t offer an artificial Hollywood-esque story of love to foolishly aspire for; it presents a character study of a young person who might as well be you or me.

If you have gone through heartbreak, specifically the kind that sneaks up on you when you thought this person, this relationship, could really be the one, you’ll find much to relate to here.

But don’t be mistaken — Florence also imparts a moving message of hope. There’s happiness to be found after heartbreak. And as corny as it sounds, true happiness really does come from within. Florence stresses this common theme without devolving into cliché.

What makes Florence especially poignant, however, is not the story as told by the developers, but the way the interactive elements manage to bring you closer to the game’s defining themes. Best described as an interactive comic book, Florence uses a restrained yet beautiful color palette that stitches together its moving pieces brilliantly with the help of a wonderful soundtrack.

Some panels have you merely tap an object on the screen, such as the blaring alarm clock, to make progress. Other times, you turn clock hands round and round to advance time. Occasionally, you rub the screen to reveal a picture, or drag a frequency bar until the scene comes into focus.

At first, the extremely minimalistic approach to gameplay disappointed me. And that minimal requirement of me, the player, mostly remained through the credits. Yet, I grew to appreciate what the game asked of me.

Florence’s puzzles won’t stump you. They aren’t meant to. Instead, they work hand-in-hand with the story to convey underlying emotions that sometimes become obscured by words. When Florence and Krish speak, you fill in the dialogue bubble by piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. The number of pieces and their shape directly correlates to the situation. When they first meet, its hard for Florence to converse, so there are more pieces. As the date goes on, the puzzles have less pieces. This ingenious mode of portraying human interaction works so well that actual dialogue — of which Florence doesn’t have — is rendered unnecessary.

When they move in together, you unpack a box onto various shelves by dragging and dropping household items, but not all of them can fit.  You have to decide which belongings to keep in storage. And when the relationship dissolves, you have to pick which possessions stay behind.

After subtly inviting you into its focused story, Florence deftly gets you to interact with its moving parts just enough to encourage you to trace through your own experiences with love. 

 Florence is available on the App Store now for $3. 

Editors’ Recommendations

• ‘The Shape of Water’ review
• ‘Detroit: Become Human’ hands-on preview
• ‘Black Panther’ review
• Here’s everything we know about Hideo Kojima’s mysterious ‘Death Stranding’
• ‘SOS’ hands-on preview

‘Alto’s Odyssey’ aims to amplify adventure, without sacrificing serenity

App Attack is a weekly series where we search the App Store and Google Play Store for the best apps of the week. Check out App Attack every Sunday for the latest.

It’s been three years since Alto’s Adventure was released, and the sequel to the highly-praised infinite runner will soon see the light of day. On Thursday, video game developer Built By Snowman will launch Alto’s Odyssey, which takes Alto from the snowy climes to the majestic desert.

For those unfamiliar with the mobile game, Alto’s Adventure mirrors the atmosphere of snowboarding. The player taps on the screen to navigate Alto through various elements while also completing goals and collecting rewards. It also includes stunning visuals that act as a calming force within a fast-paced game.

With Alto’s Odyssey, lead artist and developer Harry Nesbitt and the team at Snowman — who refer to the collaboration as “Team Alto” — wanted to appeal to its existing fans as well as those who have yet to play the game. It was decided that mechanically, the game wouldn’t involve having to adjust to new control schemes. The ability to play comfortably one-handed was an important aspect of the game to adopt from its predecessor — making it more approachable and less complex for all types of players.

Team Alto ultimately wanted to build on what became the central part of the DNA Alto — which gave an extreme sport like snowboarding, a more relaxing flow through its design and controls. With its parabolic curves and propulsive downhill motion, the game allows you to build up speed, gain points, and crush obstacles in a way that doesn’t feel like you’re doing too much at once.

“We are constantly surprised and humbled by the fact that players will depict fan art of our characters or send in letters that Alto maybe helped them cope with some stress or some illness, and that’s something we never really could ever have foreseen when making that first game,” Eli Cymet, producer at Built By Snowman, told Digital Trends. “I think we really were thinking about what to put on the cutting room floor and what to advance to the next stage in terms of mechanics … we always had that player appreciation in the back of our minds around like, ‘Is this going to make the game more stressful?’”

Incorporating a calming nature into the gameplay, meant there was room to push boundaries elsewhere — specifically with Alto. In Alto’s Adventure, there was a cozy feel to it as users explored his home mountain — careening down hills amidst the forests with its lantern lit homes and villages, all blanketed with snow. This time around, it was important to create a new space filled with variety, which meant branching into territory that was uncharted — and creating multiple versions of a particular setting.

“We want every time you pick up the game to feel fresh and to feel like you’re experiencing a slightly different part of the world that you maybe played last time,” Harry Nesbitt, lead artist and developer of Alto’s Adventure and Alto’s Odyssey, told Digital Trends.

Since the mountain is the one natural space that you spend time in while playing the game, the team has added about a triple of the number of visual content and sites to see as it did in Alto’s Adventure. Ranging from snapping vines, rushing water inside the temple zone, wind tornadoes that propel you into the air, and more, the sequel sets out to amplify the experience of being in the desert through its unique mechanics.

Incorporating more hidden gems and details into Alto’s Odyssey also allows players to make the experience their own. “Hopefully the player projects certain narratives on their progression to the space based on the play session that they have. When they got a high score while they were boarding through a palm grove or something like that, that’s going to help it feel like it belongs to them,” Nesbitt explained.

As Alto’s Odyssey approaches its launch date, Team Alto isn’t looking to out-do themselves in comparison to the success of Alto’s Adventure. While they hope it will resonate in a new way with existing fans, both versions are meant to act as stand-alone experiences so that those who have never played Alto’s Adventure can jump right in without feeling confused. Both versions are meant to co-exist peacefully.

“I hope that players come away thinking of them both as these little places they can go for a few minutes of time each day. Depending on what mood they’re in and what kinds of emotions they wanna stir in themselves, maybe they’ll choose one over the other,” Cymet said.

Alto’s Odyssey is currently available for pre-order on the App Store and will cost you $5. It will officially launch for iOS on February 22.

Editors’ Recommendations

• TCL’s Alto audio line arrives at CES 2018, headlined by the Roku Soundbar
• ‘Florence’ is a superb meditation on love from the designer of ‘Monument Valley’
• ‘SOS’ hands-on preview
• ‘Shadow of the Colossus’ Remake review
• ‘Sea of Thieves’ hands-on preview