Here are the biggest announcements from Apple’s education event

That Apple would just a choose a massive high school in the Midwest to host a press conference was peculiar enough. Then Apple went and crafted class schedules for everyone and set up a room where people could try on Romeo and Juliet costumes, across from another room where drones were zipping around and virtual frogs were being dissected. We knew today’s press event wasn’t going to be business as usual, but we had no idea just how delightfully strange Apple wanted everything to be.

Just as Apple packed demos in to a handful of rooms at Lane Tech, it also squeezed a load of notable announcements into an hour-long press conference. In case you were busy this morning, join me for a quick — and I mean quick — recap of Apple’s biggest announcements from here in frigid Chicago.

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

Mini created an electric version of one of its classics

Mini really wants everyone to know that it’s embracing the EV future. At an event ahead of the New York Auto Show, the automaker unveiled the Classic Mini Electric that’s exactly what the name implies: an older Mini that’s been electrified.

The car is ready for a reboot of The Italian Job. Except this time all the Mini’s are silent and need to be plugged in before pulling off a heist. The company retrofitted one of its older vehicles with a battery pack, electric motor and charging port. The iconic Mini badge on the front of the vehicle has been replaced with the electric logo that’s found on the company’s electric concept vehicle.

Sadly the classic Mini Electric is a one-off vehicle so don’t expect it to show up in showrooms anytime soon. The Mini electric concept, on the other hand, should make its way to showrooms in a production vehicle in 2019.

Click here to catch up on the latest news from the 2018 New York Auto Show.

Source: Mini

Google sponsorship will cut ad time on Stephen Colbert’s ‘Late Show’

Google is determined to drum up attention for Nest’s Hello video doorbell, and it’s going about it in an unusual way: by taking over a commercial break. When The Late Show with Stephen Colbert airs on March 27th (that’s tonight if you’re reading in time), CBS will replace one of the usual ad breaks with a “More Show presented by Google’s Nest Hello video doorbell.” It’s the first takeover in the show’s history, CBS said.

This hearkens back to the early days of TV (and modern-day podcasts, for that matter), when sponsorships frequently took place in-show. And it’s not entirely surprising that CBS would go this route: it’s been a big fan of integrating ads into Colbert’s show as well as James Corden’s Late Late Show. This is breaking new ground for the network, however, and it told Variety that deals like this are “just the beginning.”

It’s certainly unusual for Google, which is still better known for its web ads than the few TV commercials it does run. The takeover makes sense for a tech company eager to capture your interest, mind you. It’s not only more likely to raise eyebrows (we’re writing about it, aren’t we?), it makes the sponsorship harder to skip — your DVR won’t pass over it, and you might see it show up in YouTube segments. Don’t be surprised if other industry giants follow suit.

Via: TechCrunch, Variety

Source: CBS Press Express

Quick Takes: There Will Be iOS 11.4, Apple Watch Trade-Up Program Expands, and More

In addition to our standalone articles covering the latest news and rumors at MacRumors, this Quick Takes column provides a bite-sized recap of other headlines about Apple and its competitors on weekdays.

Today’s edition of Quick Takes focuses on tidbits from Apple’s education-themed event at Lane Tech College Prep High School in Chicago today. For bigger news from the event, we’ve put together a roundup of links and a video that recaps everything that Apple announced on stage in under three minutes.

Tuesday, March 27

• Apple confirms there will be an iOS 11.4 software update: It will be the first point-four version since iOS 8.4 was released with Apple Music in June 2015. iOS 11.3 remains in beta testing, so we’re likely a few months away from the public release of iOS 11.4.

  From the Introducing ClassKit for Education Apps entry in the News and Updates section of Apple’s Developer Program website:

  The ClassKit framework, coming in iOS 11.4, works with a powerful new iPad app called Schoolwork that helps teachers and students keep track of assignments and progress. With ClassKit, you can help teachers easily discover specific learning activities in your app, take students directly to the right activity with a single tap, and securely and privately share progress data to help teachers personalize instruction.

• Apple Watch’s trade-up program expands: The program is now available online or at Apple Stores in Canada, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK, and select other countries. Trade-in values for the original Apple Watch, Series 1, and Series 2 models vary.
  
• Apple Pencil is now available for $89 with education pricing in the United States: The $10 discount is available to students, educators, and select faculty members. Proof of enrollment or employment at a K-12 or higher-education institution may be required.
• Apple has further discounted the price of refurbished 2017 iPad models: On the heels of introducing the sixth-generation 9.7-inch iPad, Apple has lowered the prices of refurbished fifth-generation 9.7-inch iPad models, originally released in March 2017.

  In the United States, for example, a Wi-Fi model with 128GB of storage is available for $309, down from $359 previously and 28 percent off the original $429 price for the equivalent brand new model. Just keep in mind that fifth-generation iPads lack Apple Pencil support.

• iBooks Author is not being retired: Apple’s app for creating iBooks on Mac will remain in development, according to iMore’s Serenity Caldwell. In a tweet, she said Pages is not a replacement for iBooks Author, despite the app receiving updates related to creating e-books earlier today.
  

  OKAY, getting some clarifications on iBooks Author and Pages. Bear with me.

  iBooks Author is NOT being sunset. It’s continuing development. This Pages update is not a replacement.

  Instead, this is just bringing Pages’s ePub 3 features and export to iPad, with new templates.

  — Serenity Caldwell @🍎👩🏻‍🏫 (@settern) March 27, 2018

• Apple shares environmental report for the new sixth-generation iPad

For more coverage of Apple’s event, visit our Front Page, Mac Blog, and iOS Blog. Also visit our forums to join in the discussion.

Related Roundups: Apple Watch, watchOS 4, iOS 11Tag: Quick TakesBuyer’s Guide: Apple Watch (Neutral)
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New Sixth-Generation iPad Priced Lower Than Previous Model in Several Countries

The price of the new sixth-generation iPad didn’t change in the United States compared to the previous fifth-generation model, but prices for the new tablet have been lowered in several other countries around the world.

Prior to the launch of the new iPad, rumors had suggested it could be priced as low as $259 in the United States, which did not happen, but the price has indeed dropped slightly in multiple countries.

In the UK, for example, the entry-level fifth-generation iPad was priced at £339, with the new sixth-generation model available for £319.

In Canada, the fifth-generation 32GB iPad cost $449, while the equivalent sixth-generation model is now available for $429.

In Germany, France, and other European countries, the new iPad is priced starting at €349 to €369, down from €399 to €419. Prices appear to be lower in most, if not all European countries.

Prices have not changed in all countries where the new iPad is available. In New Zealand and Australia, for example, prices remain unchanged, starting at A$469 and NZ$539, respectively. Prices have also not shifted in some Asian countries, including Japan, Singapore, and Korea, but prices are lower in others like China, and Thailand.

In the United States, the entry-level 32GB sixth-generation iPad is priced at $329, the price as the fifth-generation model. A 128GB version is available for $429, while Wi-Fi + Cellular models can be purchased for an additional $130 over the standard Wi-Fi only price.

Related Roundup: iPadBuyer’s Guide: iPad (Buy Now)
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Twitterrific for iOS and Mac Gains Video Attachments, New Muting and Muffling Features

Popular Twitter client Twitterrific 5 for Mac and iOS received a major update today, introducing features that bring it on par with the official Twitter apps and competing third-party Twitter apps.

Starting today, Twitterrific users can attach 140-second or shorter videos to tweets on both iOS and Mac. On iOS, a video can be inserted by tapping the camera when composing, and on Mac, you a video can be added by clicking on the camera button.

The app is also gaining official support for Twitter muting, so users and accounts that have been muted will sync between Twitter and Twitterrific with muted content removed from the timeline. Muted users do not generate push notifications, and all previously muted screen names will be auto upgraded to official Twitter mutes.

Muffling has been improved in Twitterrific with the following new features:

– Defining any muffle rule to apply only for a single user
– Muffling mentions from a specific person or mentions of a specific person
– Muffle tweets that quote someone specific
– Avoid seeing retweets from a specific person about someone else
– For full details, check out the knowledge base: https://twitterrific.com/help/muffles

Twitterrific for iOS includes several improvements such as better responsiveness when attaching media to a tweet, new rule suggestions for the Muffle submenu of the Actions menu, a easier-to-access Translate option in the Actions menu, a shortcut for muting the author of a tweet, and a media picker that sorts the most recent photos and videos at the bottom.

On Mac, the reading position marker is now updated when closing a timeline, user search results and listings indicate if a user has been muted or blocked, and there’s a new shortcut for muting the author of a tweet.

Twitterrific for the Mac can be downloaded from the Mac App Store for $7.99. [Direct Link]

Twitterrific for iOS can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]

Tag: Twitterrific
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Nwsty review: the news app for those who don’t (usually) read news

Tired of being bombarded with unimportant, ridiculous news all day, every day? We feel your pain. Even worse, today’s web-based information environment is increasingly being populated with fake news and misinformation that sometimes, can have a real-life impact.

So if you get your news from social media – and many of us do – you are exposed to a daily dose of hoaxes, rumors, conspiracy theories, as well as misleading news. And when mixed with info from reliable information from decent sources, the truth becomes a lot harder to grasp.

A new app called nwsty aims to solve this problem by offering to deliver the day’s most important news pieces from reliable sources straight on your Android device.

Setup

Simply download nwsty from the Google Play Store and launch it on your Android phone or tablet. The app is minimalistic and doesn’t have a lot of Settings to go through. So you’ll be thrown right in the middle of it. Its goal is simple, to deliver reliable news on a daily basis so you can stay truly informed and updated about important worldwide events.

Impressions

Nwsty is a pretty basic app. Launch it and you will be able to start reading news immediately. Every morning (Monday through Friday) the app will deliver a collection of what it deems to be the most important news of the day (six to ten bits).

The app takes advantage of AI technology to be able to “discern” which news is of importance. If you’re a person who doesn’t usually read the news but still likes to be up to date with the things going on in the world, then nwsty is the perfect app for you.

But I like to use my news sources as a means of discovery too. I follow science and I’m really interested in the latest advancements and published papers. So I prefer a news app which lets me choose my interests.

Nwsty simply assumes you’ll be interested in a story just because it’s trending right now or it’s flagged as breaking news. Which isn’t the wrong approach. If you want to stay informed, you’ll certainly have to go through global headlines on a daily basis. This is why nwsty is a great tool if you want to do just that.

Every day you’ll get a group of summaries outlining the latest news. These are concise, easy-to-read abstracts of larger, more in-depth articles.

Need more details? Simply tap the expansion icon in the upper right corner and you’ll be redirected to the source’s website, so you can read the full story. As far as I could see, the app uses reliable sources such as CNN, Reuters, Financial Times, NBC News, NPR, and the BBC for its pieces. So if you need a tool to combat the fake news trend, nwsty is once again the app for you.

You can also easily share the news with your friends and families by tapping on the social media button in the upper right corner. Easily share content on WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Instagram Direct.

The app delivers news from various categories including technology, business, gun control, banks, and science. But if you have a specific interest like I do, the app quickly become unsatisfactory.

As I mentioned above, the app is pretty bear. You download, install it and start getting news on your Android device. The app will send a notification each time a new selection of stories is available.

You can also revisit older news by accessing the calendar and tapping on a specific date. Other than that, there’s not much you can do in nwsty. You can’t customize your feed or pick a certain hour when you’d like to get your news delivered.

For me, the most frustrating part was that I wasn’t able to pick a specific news category or categories. But to be fair, the app’s purpose isn’t to give you an overview of news in a specific area, but to keep you informed of the important things happening in the world. Sometimes the two can overlap, but not always. I for one like to see more info about advancements in neuroscience than political stories in my news feed. But it’s my personal preference.

Conclusion

All in all, nwsty is a pretty useful app. It keeps you away from fake news by tapping into reliable sources while letting you read straightforward mini-articles that won’t take more than a few minutes to go through. It has a clean and simple interface and it’s not riddled by ads either.

Huawei P20 Pro Hands-on Review

Research Center:

Huawei P20 Pro

Bezel-less designs may be all the rage, but cameras continue to be the most talked about feature on modern smartphones. Apple touted Face ID and Animoji thanks to its TrueDepth Camera on the iPhone X; Google’s Pixel 2 is widely-accepted as the best camera phone; and Samsung made a splash about its “reimagined camera” on the Galaxy S9. Huawei has distinguished itself over the past few years with a monochrome lens, tuned by photography experts Leica, but the Chinese company is ready to ramp things up with its latest smartphone.

The Huawei P20 Pro, just announced in Paris, has four cameras: One selfie camera on the front, and three on the back. It’s something we haven’t really seen before, and Huawei is going a step further and adding a ton of AI (artificial intelligence) smarts to improve the camera experience. We’ve spent some time with the P20 Pro, and although the camera is fascinating, technically adept, and creatively exciting, the design is going to split opinion.

Huawei also announced the regular P20, which only has a dual-camera system on the rear, and some other minor specification changes. Let’s take a deeper look.

Notched design

Let’s get the obvious out of the way. Huawei’s P20 and P20 Pro have screens with notches, a trend popularized by Apple on the iPhone X, and now adopted by many, many device manufacturers. Apple’s excuse is the TrueDepth Camera system housed in the notch, which helps make Face ID incredibly secure, while providing highly-accurate motion tracking.

Why is the notch there on the P20? There’s no purpose. The notification center comes down just as usual, and the camera simply has a high megapixel count. While you can unlock the phone with your face, it’s not as secure as Apple’s implementation, and it can’t be used to unlock apps like you can with Face ID. The notch is a design decision, and it’s an unfortunate one.

Andy Boxall/Digital Trends
Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

Not because it’s ugly — it’s a neat implementation — but it’s a decision that will be mired in controversy for being derivative, without offering anything new. Huawei should be prepared to hear it. We’d have preferred a Galaxy S9 or LG V30 approach with a super minimal top bezel, and thankfully you can have this by adding black bars on the sides of the notch (in the phone’s settings) so that it looks like a full bezel.

The notch is a design decision, and it’s an unfortunate one.

With that out of the way, the rest of the P20 is a delight. The body is curvy, and the P20 Pro is perfectly-sized and weighted to fit into your hand. Unusually, Huawei has opted for a fingerprint sensor below the screen, rather than on the back of the P20 and P20 Pro. It’s our least favorite implementation of fingerprint sensors; while it’s slim and easy to press, it detracts from the beauty of the front panel.

Turn the phone over, however, and you’ll thank Huawei for not slapping it on the phone’s rear cover. On the Pro model, two camera lenses are set inside a camera bump, with the third underneath it with the flash and color temperature unit. That’s about it. It’s super minimalist, and instantly recognizable as a P20. It’s a shame the individuality didn’t continue around the front.

There are several different colors, but it’ll be the new twilight color scheme you’ll want. In an industry first, Huawei has applied a gradient finish to the glass, where the deep twilight blue changes to green depending on how it catches the light. It’s wonderful, and proves again how competent Huawei is when creating eye-catching smartphones.

Pro or not to Pro

The difference between the 5.8-inch RGBW LCD P20 and 6.1-inch OLED P20 Pro is more clear cut than the Mate 10 and Mate 10 Pro. The Pro version is clearly the superior model, and the one you’ll want to buy. It’s the only one with IP67 water resistance (the P20 makes do with IP53), and it’s the only one with the new triple-lens camera system. The battery is larger too — 4000mAh compared to 3400mAh — but the 2,240 x 1,080 pixel screen resolution remains the same. It has 6GB of RAM rather than 4GB, but both have 128GB of storage space and the Kirin 970 processor.

Put simply, buy the P20 Pro.

Huawei P20 Pro Compared To

Nokia 6 (2018)

Nokia 1

Sony Xperia XZ2

Nokia 8 Sirocco

Motorola MOTORIZR Z3

Jitterbug Dial

Samsung SCH-u620

LG VX9400

Sony Ericsson K790a

Nokia N93

Blackberry 8700c

Blackberry 8700g

Nokia N90

Palm Treo 650

Motorola RAZR V3c

Camera

We’ll talk about the P20 Pro and its triple-lens Leica camera here. The camera bump contains a 40-megapixel RGB color lens below an 8-megapixel telephoto lens, while outside is a 20-megapixel monochrome lens. Also inside the camera bump is the laser transmitter and receiver for the auto focus system, while the flash until contains a brand new color temperature sensor.

What does all this mean? First up, the telephoto lens has a 5x hybrid zoom capacity, and it really works. The optical zoom goes to 3x, and then it’s further enhanced digitally to 5x. The results are very impressive. Compared to the iPhone X on 5x zoom, the P20 Pro’s shots are detailed and accurate, rather than pixelated and noisy. We zoomed in on a sign and could read the text clearly, and it was impossible to tell it was shot on anything greater than a 2x zoom. We’ll need more time to test this out, but initial impressions are excellent.

Shots are also much brighter using a technology called Pixel Fusion, which lets in 4x the amount of light into a pixel, and by using all three lenses at once, sharpness is greatly improved. However, all three lenses will never work at full capacity together, so a magical 68-megapixel photo won’t be possible. The 40-megapixel lens something we haven’t seen in a phone in some time, and taking pictures in a test environment with the P20 Pro, the images it produced looked super. The color temperature skewed on the warm side, producing accurate, attractive pictures. The detail was clearly there too, but we could only view the end results on the phone’s screen at the time.

Another benefit of the three lenses is how much more natural portrait and people shots look. The longer focal length flattens features, avoiding pictures where some facial features are unnaturally highlighted. As is the fashion at the moment, the P20 can shoot 960fps slow motion video at 720p just like the Galaxy S9, which we demoed during a fencing match. The results looked good on the phone screen, and were shot with plenty of light; but capturing slow motion video is very hard, and timing it right is a bit of a challenge.

We’ve yet to put the three lens setup to a real test, but it certainly appears to increase versatility, which in turn boosts creativity, and we’re all for that in a smartphone camera. It’s also only then that we’ll know the true benefit of three lenses, which at first glance could be viewed as literal “one-upmanship.” Huawei’s aim is to create professional level camera equipment combined with ease of use on the P20 Pro, and it certainly appears to be well on the way to achieving this.

AI and software

The Kirin 970 processor is accompanied by the Neural Processing Unit (NPU), which specifically deals with artificial intelligence tasks. It’s successful, if a little underused, on the Mate 10 Pro. The P20 uses AI in more situations, primarily in the camera, and begins to better utilize the NPU’s ability.

For example, there are now 19 different scene recognition modes in the camera, up from 13 on the Mate 10 Pro, including close-ups, waterfalls, dogs, cats, and text. What’s really clever here is that it can switch modes depending on what it sees. Point the camera at a person and it will activate portrait mode, or at a close-up object to switch to macro mode. Additionally, the AI now helps with shot composition, providing visual advice on framing group shots, or a level for keeping the horizon straight.

Andy Boxall/Digital Trends
Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

It also goes much deeper than this. Rather than using optical image stabilization (OIS) or electronic image stabilization (EIS), Huawei has introduced artificially intelligent stabilization (AIS) on the P20. AIS is so effective, the P20 can take long exposure night shots where the shutter is open for up to 8 seconds without the need for a tripod. This works on both stills and video. We tried it in a test environment and were pleased with the results using the P20’s Night Shot mode. Remarkably there was almost no blur, and very little noise. We look forward to trying this out more.

One thing we didn’t try is 4D predictive autofocus. Ever have trouble taking a photo of a flower on a windy day due to focusing problems? Huawei’s system recognizes and tracks the object, keeping it in focus regardless of how much it moves.

Elsewhere, AI powers a shopping mode which works with the camera, much like we’ve seen on the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S9. Plus, in the photo gallery app it powers a keyword search using image recognition, and organizes albums based on the best and most relevant images. This is part of Huawei’s EMUI 8.1 user interface, which also brings a few style changes, most notably to the camera app. The slide-in feature menu has been replaced by a pop-up drawer, making it easier to use with one hand. We spent only a short time using the software, which is based on Android 8.1 Oreo, but found it to be fluid.

Conclusion

The P20 Pro is unlike any Huawei phone before it. The design is all-new, the headline feature is unique, and the use of artificial intelligence is well ahead of the competition. The short time spent with the camera has seen us itching to try it out again, to see if the results really can live up to the promise. If they do, and everything slots into place as we expect, this could be the finest Huawei phone we’ve seen.

We’ll update this story when Huawei announces pricing and availability, but the company has confirmed it has no plans to launch the phone in the U.S.

Google’s Clips camera now takes high-res photos on demand

Google Clips’ manual 7-second video bursts are fine if you’re not a stickler for high resolution, but there are times when you just want to snap a quality still photo to share with friends. Why can’t you capture both? Well, now you can: Google is delivering an update to Clips’ Android app that lets you take a high-resolution photo alongside the video when you press the shutter button either on the camera itself or in the live preview on your phone. That could be more than a little helpful if you want to capture a sharp picture the moment something interesting occurs, rather than hoping you have time to take a separate shot.

You may need a firmware update to change this functionality (we’ve asked Google to verify this), so be sure to check before going on a Clips photo safari.

The update also brings pinch-to-zoom cropping while you’re in the edit mode. Previously, you had to drag corners to frame your shot — this should make it faster and more intuitive. All told, it seems that Google is determined to evolve Clips’ features rapidly and give the user more control, rather than depending solely on the camera’s AI-guided capture to reel you in.

Via: 9to5Google, The Verge

Source: Google Play

TouchPal’s Talia A.I. assistant improves your smartphone keyboard experience

Julian Chokkattu/Digital Trends
Julian Chokkattu/Digital Trends

Injecting artificial intelligence into existing products and services is every company’s mantra in 2018. Jialiang Wang, CEO of the company behind the popular TouchPal keyboard, thinks Google and Apple will embed their respective voice assistants — Google Assistant and Siri — into the default keyboards on Android and iOS. But TouchPal wants to stay ahead of the game, which is why it’s launching the “first A.I. keyboard,” featuring a smart assistant called Talia.

TouchPal is a third-party keyboard you can install from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store. It has been around for quite some time, with many of the same features and customization options available on competitor keyboards. It’s preinstalled on numerous Android devices thanks to manufacturer partnerships (such as HTC) and the company said it has more than 712 million users around the world.

Talia was announced at Mobile World Congress 2018, but we’ve been testing a beta version of this keyboard to see how much of a difference an A.I. assistant can make.

Requiring permissions

The first thing you’ll want to know is that Talia requires quite a number of permissions so you can use it to its highest potential. Aside from access to your contacts and phone numbers, it also will need permission to store password and credit card details. You’ll have to go into your phone’s accessibility settings to enable enhanced features like intelligent prediction, smart reply — which can suggest emoji and text — and more. You can deny it access to some of these permissions, but then you won’t get the full Talia experience.

The company said it never collects personal information, and these permissions you allow helps to “improve the input experience.”

Smarter keyboard

The TouchPal AI Keyboard already has features you’d expect like themes, sticker packs, GIF search, gesture typing, support for multiple languages, voice input, a clipboard, and more. The biggest improvements artificial intelligence introduces are the A.I. Engine and Talia.

TouchPal claims the A.I. Engine offers a “higher prediction accuracy of 99.4 percent,” which in turn should improve typing speed. This can be seen in the bar above the letters. So if you type, “You’re my favorite,” the keyboard suggests words like “person,” or “girl” (we intended to type the former). This prediction system does a fairly good job of finishing off your sentences accurately if you want to use it. We wouldn’t say it improved our typing speed much, though.

Talia is helpful

The most impactful improvements came from Talia. It’s the intelligent assistant that sits at the top right edge of the keyboard, with an icon that looks like a circle with two other circles inside it. Talia reminds us a lot of Google’s Gboard keyboard — where you can access the power of Google search (and machine learning) right within the keyboard. But Talia is a more personalized assistant that is prone to offering more suggestions.

It’s easy to see the benefits Talia provides.

There are two ways you can use Talia. You can use it to search for things within a conversation, so you don’t have to leave the app you’re currently in. For example, if someone mentions a trip tomorrow and you want to check the weather, tap the Talia icon and type “what’s the weather,” and you’ll be presented with a weather card. You can inject these weather details into your conversation if you want to share it with the person you’re messaging. Ask Talia a bunch of things and the assistant generally offers helpful results, and if it doesn’t have what your’e looking for, the results default to web searches.

You can ask Talia to convert currency, convert text to GIFs, paste a phone number in to access a dialer, find nearby places and restaurants, use it as a calculator, and more. These are all genuinely helpful tasks, and Talia makes sure you don’t need to leave the conversation.

What’s even more helpful is when Talia automatically offers a suggestion. If you mention you’re hungry, or you specify a particular type of food you’re craving, a little pop out bubble will emerge from the Talia icon, asking you to “find restaurants nearby.” Tap on this and you can swipe through a list of recommendations. If someone mentioned Italian food specifically, then Talia will tailor the results to find Italian restaurants.

These suggestions also extend to copy and paste. If Talia detects you just copied text in another app, it suggests pasting it in your message conversation in case that’s what you were meaning to do. Sometimes we didn’t, but we never found these suggestions to be obtrusive.  Kind of like Google’s Smart Replies, Talia can also offer up suggested phrases you can use when someone asks you something. We haven’t seen these working in action, but it’s a beta and it will be a feature in the final product.

It’s easy to see the benefits Talia provides, and we can see the assistant becoming even more useful when TouchPal adds more features over time. It’s not life-changing, but it’s undeniably time-saving. It’s also a glimpse of what we can expect to see if Google or Apple ever decides to add their respective assistants into their keyboards.

TouchPal said it’s launching Talia and the AI Engine for its keyboard likely by the end of March. It will be available as an update to the TouchPal keyboard on both the Google and Apple app stores.

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