Engadget giveaway: Win a Logitech Harmony Elite and Google Home Mini!

Universal remote controls have been around for a while, but with a product like the Logitech Harmony Elite, simplicity and future-proofing go hand-in-hand. The Elite’s Hub system lets you control IR, Bluetooth and even network-based products beyond your home entertainment system. Not only can you condense your media remotes into one easy-to-set-up package, but your power extends to connected home products like Philips Hue lights or Nest thermostats. That power goes one step further when you link a smart speaker like Google Home Mini to the Hub. Now that single remote can get a little dusty as you turn on your TV and navigate to preset channels using your voice alone.

Logitech has provided us with its Harmony Elite and a Google Home Mini for two winners this week, so they can sample they joys of smart home controls and deepen that groove in the couch cushion. All you need to do is head to the Rafflecopter widget below for up to three chances at winning this Logitech Harmony Elite universal remote and smart speaker combo. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

• Entries are handled through the Rafflecopter widget above. Comments are no longer accepted as valid methods of entry. You may enter without any obligation to social media accounts, though we may offer them as opportunities for extra entries. Your email address is required so we can get in touch with you if you win, but it will not be given to third parties.
• Contest is open to all residents of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Canada (excluding Quebec), 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so direct your anger at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
• Winners will be chosen randomly. Two (2) winners will each receive one (1) Logitech Harmony Elite universal remote control ($249.99 retail value) and one (1) Google Home mini smart speaker ($49 retail value).
• If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of being contacted. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Make sure that the account you use to enter the contest includes your real name and a contact email. We do not track any of this information for marketing or third-party purposes.
• This unit is purely for promotional giveaway. Engadget and AOL are not held liable to honor warranties, exchanges or customer service.
• The full list of rules, in all of its legalese glory, can be found here.
• Entries can be submitted until March 28th at 11:59PM ET. Good luck!

The new entry-level iPad works with the Apple Pencil

Apple’s education-focused event is underway in Chicago and, as expected, the hardware star of the show is a new iPad. VP Greg Joswiak just announced the “new” iPad, an update on the model introduced just about one year ago. The rumor mills predicted a new iPad keeping the traditional 9.7-inch form factor intact, and that’s what Apple is showing off this morning. Indeed, Apple said that last year’s 9.7-inch model has been the most popular iPad in education “by far.”

But for the first time, Apple’s entry-level iPad will support the Apple Pencil, a move that takes away one of the biggest differentiators between these cheaper tablets and the high-end iPad Pro lineup. Of course, the question remains as to how many schools can deploy both an iPad plus an expensive $99 Pencil along with it.

As for more traditional specs, the new iPad includes an A10 Fusion chip (the same found in the iPhone 7), the usual 10 hours of battery life, an 8-megapixel back camera and “FaceTime HD” front camera, the same 9.7-inch Retina display that we saw last year and optional LTE connectivity. This is all pretty similar to what Apple introduced last March, with the exception of the upgraded A10 chip.

Regardless of hardware upgrades, the software continues to be one of the biggest cases for iPads (in education and otherwise) — Joswiak says that Apple has over 1 million iPad apps in its store, with 200,000 of them focused on “education and reference.” Accordingly, Apple is releasing updates for its suite of apps including Pages, Numbers and Keynote that better support the Apple Pencil. One of those new Pencil-specific features is “smart annotation,” a feature that anchors handwritten notes to specific words — when you move things around in the project, the note goes right along with it. These new iWork apps will be available today.

This marks the first update to Apple’s entry-level iPad since last March. Previously, the basic iPad started at $500, but the addition of the iPad Pro line threw Apple’s lineup into a bit of confusion. But the addition of a $329 basic iPad as well as changes to the iPad Pro line last June had finally made the differences between the two product lineups clear. Now that the base iPad supports the Pencil, we’ll see what else Apple can do to justify the Pro’s higher price.

Unfortunately for those hoping for a price drop, this new iPad starts at the same $329/£319 price point as last year’s model. There’s a $299 price for schools, and it’ll start shipping this week. Storage remains the same at 32GB in the base model and 128GB as a $100 upgrade. Adding LTE connectivity still costs the traditional $130 extra, as well. Finally, Apple also saw fit to upgrade the piddly storage that comes with its iCloud education plans — education plans now include 200GB of storage, up from the pathetic 5GB previously offered.

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s education event right here!

Correction: This article originally stated that the LTE-capable 128GB iPad cost $459; it is priced at $559.

Source: Apple

The James Webb Space Telescope will be delayed for at least a year

Today, NASA held a press conference on the status of the James Webb Space Telescope, the organization’s successor to Hubble, and the news was grim. The observatory was supposed to launch between March and June of 2019. JWST will miss that window; while a specific launch time frame hasn’t been established, NASA is currently targeting May 2020.

While the telescope’s individual components meet their requirements, contractor Northrop Grumman needs more time to test them, integrate them together and do environmental testing. In order to monitor the telescope’s schedule, NASA is creating a Independent Review Board (IRB) to monitor this testing and NASA will take its recommendations into account when determining a specific launch window. That will occur sometime this summer.

Many suspected this announcement was coming after a report from the US Government Accountability Office earlier this month. The GAO found that ongoing technical issues with the telescope meant that launch delays were likely, and that the project was at risk of breaching the $8 billion cap set by Congress, which would mean it would need to be reauthorized. The telescope has already encountered delays, and it’s safe to say that more will follow. It’s an incredibly complex, detailed and delicate device, after all.

Source: NASA

Apple’s retooled iWork suite includes Pencil support

Today, Apple announced that it is releasing new versions of its iWork suite of apps — Pages, Numbers and Keynote — that supports Apple Pencil. A variety of new iPad apps (including the Microsoft Office Suite and Notability) will support the Pencil, many of which were previously only available on iPad Pro. The Pencil is intended to be used for note taking, illustration and other detail-oriented purposes. Advanced sensors within the Pencil measure pressure and tilt, which helps with accuracy.

Attendees of the Apple event today were treated to a demonstration of a new Pages feature called “Smart Annotation.” This will allow you to handwrite notes using a Pencil in the margins of a document. The annotations will be tied to a specific word, so if you move around your paragraphs while editing, your notes will move right around with them. This feature isn’t live yet, but it’s coming soon.

Apple is also introducing digital book creation on the iPad. It’s designed to be used collaboratively within Pages. There are quite a few templates to choose from that will allow you to include image galleries you can swipe through and use the built-in camera on the iPad to record.

These features definitely look interesting, but the question is will the price of the Apple Pencil come down? Our Senior Editor for Mobile, Chris Velazco, is attending the event, and he pointed out that the $99 price tag is almost a third of what these iPads cost, once you factor in an education discount.

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s education event right here!

Source: Apple

Logitech built a $49 digital crayon for the new iPad

Apple’s new starter iPad is designed to make drawing more accessible, but the $89-plus it takes to buy the official Pencil for that iPad is a lot to swallow for cash-strapped educators. That’s where Logitech might help: it’s introducing a $49 Crayon accessory for the new iPad that should put art and handwriting within the reach of more schools. It promises low lag, tilt support and sub-pixel precision with an 8-hour battery life, and won’t need pairing to get started. It’s evident that Apple is comfortable allowing Pencil alternatives if it means getting more iPads into classrooms.

At the same time, Logitech is also readying a $99 Rugged Combo 2 case for the iPad that includes a detachable keyboard (powered by the iPad itself) and a slot for your stylus. This should both make the iPad feasible as a laptop and help it survive the inevitable tumble or two. That makes the iPad/Rugged Combo pairing decidedly pricier than a Chromebook (you can easily find educational Chromebooks under $300), but Apple and Logitech are no doubt betting that the touch-native interface will be worth it in some classes.

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s education event right here!

Source: Logitech

Apple’s Swift Playgrounds will let kids code for AR

At Apple’s educational event in Chicago today, the company announced that Swift Playgrounds — Apple’s coding app for kids — is getting an AR module. Though not much has been said about it, it looks like an extension of an Augmented Reality challenge that Apple implemented last year using ARKit (which basically overlaid the Swift Playground world onto the real one). Seeing as Apple is pushing augmented reality to be part of the overall educational experience, it’s not surprising to see AR being integrated on the coding level as well. That way, you won’t get just AR apps, but also the next generation of coders creating AR apps as well. No word on when the AR module will be in the app, but we expect it to be soon.

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s education event right here!

Zuckerberg will reportedly appear before Congress on data privacy

Yesterday, Congress requested Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee to testify about data privacy — a request that was also extended to Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. Now, CNN says Facebook sources have said Zuckerberg will agree to appear before Congress. Zuckerberg was also asked to appear before the UK’s Digital Culture Media and Sport Committee, but he has declined to attend that hearing.

Sources told CNN that Zuckerberg and Facebook are currently working on a strategy for his testimony, which will take place on April 10th. Last week, the Facebook CEO was also asked to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Zuckerberg and Facebook have been in some serious hot water over the Cambridge Analytica scandal, wherein profile information on some 50 million Facebook users was handed over to the political data firm. Zuckerberg broke his silence on the situation last week and Facebook took out ads in newspapers apologizing for the role it played in the scandal.

CNN’s sources say that because Zuckerberg has now agreed to appear before Congress, Pichai and Dorsey may feel pressured to follow suit. But there’s no word yet on if that will be the case.

Via: CNN

Apple sneaks art lessons into curriculum with ‘Everyone Can Create’

At its “field trip” event in Chicago today, Apple launched a new 9.7-inch iPad with Pencil support, as well as a slew of new software for classrooms. That includes a training program for teachers and retooled iWork apps to help stay on top of homework. There’s plenty of focus on using Apple’s stylus in these programs, which makes the company’s new “Everyone can create” curriculum less surprising than you might think.

It folds into the existing “Everyone can code” initiative, and is a program designed to help educators “integrate drawing, music, filmmaking or photography into their existing lesson plans for any subject.” It’ll help teachers embed art and design lessons, like drawing or composition in photography, into courses about other subjects like history or science.

As noted by our executive editor Dana Wollman, “In an age when arts funding is seeing so many cuts, this is an interesting, almost subversive, way to keep the arts in there.” A preview of the Everyone Can Create plan is already available, and will launch for classrooms in the fall. Later this spring, Apple Stores will begin teaching Everyone Can Create as part of their regular Today at Apple sessions for educators.

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s education event right here!

Source: Apple

NVIDIA’s Quadro GV100 GPU will power its ray tracing tech

Last week, NVIDIA unveiled its RTX real-time ray tracing technology at GDC. It has the potential to change the way artists and developers work in 3D, by letting them quickly render realistic scenes. The only downside? It was meant for video cards the company still hasn’t launched yet. At its GPU Technology Conference (GTC), NVIDIA announced the first GPU that can power RTX, the Quadro GV100. Like the recent $3,000 Titan V, it’s a powerhouse card built on the company’s next-generation Volta architecture.

Under the hood, the GV100 features 7.4 teraflops of power for double-precision rendering (which helps to avoid errors), 14.8 teraflops for single-precision and 118.5 teraflops for deep learning. In comparison, the last high-end Quadro, the GP100, sported 10.3 teraflops for single-precision rendering. The GV100 comes with 32GB of memory, but you can also use NVIDIA’s NVLINK technology to pair it with another card for 64GB.

While the GV100 isn’t meant for consumers, it’s a big step towards bringing NVIDIA’s Volta architecture towards more mainstream cards. And it’ll be fascinating to see how artists adopt the company’s RTX technology. It’ll let them create scenes that would previously take hours of rendering work (that’s why we distinguish pre-rendered CG from in-engine graphics). The company says major studios like Disney and Industrial Light and Magic are already onboard with RTX. It’s the sort of thing that could help avoid rendering flubs, like what we saw in Black Panther.

We have no idea how much the Quadro GV100 will cost yet, but as a measuring guide, the GP100 GPU sold for $7,000. You won’t be buying this just to play PUBG. NVIDIA says the GV100 will be available in April.

Source: NVIDIA

Oracle vs. Google is still a thing, thanks to US federal court

The fight between Oracle and Google has been going on for years, and now there’s been a development, according to Bloomberg. The US Court of Appeals found that Google violated Oracle’s copyrights through its use of Java code in the Android operating system. The case is now going back to a California federal court to determine how much Alphabet owes Oracle. The Supreme Court has already sent this case back down once, but you can bet that Google will appeal this decision.

“We are disappointed the court reversed the jury finding that Java is open and free for everyone,” a Google spokesperson told Engadget. “This type of ruling will make apps and online services more expensive for users. We are considering our options.”

The root of the complaint stems back to the fact that Google wanted to make it easy for Java developers to create software for Android, but didn’t actually want to pay Oracle to license the programming language. It used Java APIs (application programming interfaces), which Oracle took issue with. The question is, does Oracle’s copyright cover the way its code is arranged? Google claimed it didn’t, but apparently the US Court of Appeals disagrees.

Google has already removed Java APIs from Android, but that isn’t enough. This case is huge in terms of precedents when it comes to technology and what copyright actually covers. If Google loses once and for all, it could mean a fine in the billions, depending on whether Oracle demands royalties for every Android device, as has been rumored.

Source: Bloomberg