2018 June 05 | AIVAnet

Jun

Lego partners with Apple to add augmented component to physical playsets

Lego already gives creative builders the chance to physically make something only limited by their own imagination, but now your playsets are going to look a whole lot cooler with the addition of Apple’s ARKit 2.0 technology. Lego has created a new augmented reality experience that supplements your physical Lego kits with virtual buildings, people, foliage, and vehicles.

During Apple’s WWDC 2018 presentation, Martin Sanders, Lego’s director of innovation, took the stage to show off how ARKit 2.0 can be used with physical Lego sets to create something even more impressive in augmented reality. With the help of Apple ARKit 2.0, Lego has created a new augmented reality experience that supplements your physical Lego kits with virtual buildings, people, foliage, and vehicles.

With the “Assembly Square” playset placed on a table in front of him, Sanders aimed at it with an iPad and, with the press of a button, created an entire town around the physical building on his screen. Other shops, sidewalks, and grass appeared, nearly indistinguishable from the physical set.

It’s made possible through the 3D object detection in the ARKit 2.0, which allows users to add additional foliage, buildings, people, or cars. Small icons visible above certain people and objects in the world even allow you to take part in missions. These can include situations that require urgent action, such as a building catching fire (with a firetruck, you can put out the inferno). During the WWDC stage demonstration, Sanders also rescued multiple trapped citizens from the roof of a building using a helicopter.

If you approach one of the buildings with your camera and attempt to peer inside, you’ll find the buildings bustling with activity. With a quick tap, you can even peel back the outside walls of multiple buildings to observe them like you would a dollhouse.

ARKit 2.0 allows up to four players to experience a Lego world at the same time, with the changes made by one player instantly visible on the others’ screens. When you’re done playing for the day, you can save all progress and tie it to your physical set, allowing you to start from the same point when you’re ready to play again.

“When we combine physical and digital together like this, it really opens up those creative play possibilities,” Sanders said.

Lego promises more AR experiences will be available in the App Store later this year. We’re crossing our fingers for something Harry Potter- or Star Wars-themed.

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Jun

Lego partners with Apple to add augmented component to physical playsets

“When we combine physical and digital together like this, it really opens up those creative play possibilities,” Sanders said.

Lego promises more AR experiences will be available in the App Store later this year. We’re crossing our fingers for something Harry Potter- or Star Wars-themed.

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Jun

Addicted to sugar? Neuroscientists could soon reprogram your brain to hate it

In the quest to get ready for summer, many of us want to get in better shape by exercising a bit more and maybe losing a few pounds. But when you’re confronted with stacks of candy bars at the supermarket checkout, sometimes it can be a bit too tempting to cheat on our diet. Sure, added willpower would be nice, but wouldn’t it be great if we could just reprogram our brain to no longer crave — or even actively reject — sugar? That’s a possibility hinted at in a new piece of research coming out of Columbia University’s Zuckerman Institute.

Researchers there have identified two regions of the brain that respond to sweet and bitter tastes, and modified these areas in mice to provoke different reactions. In their study, they were able to make mice respond to ordinary water as though it was sugar, make bitterness an attractive taste, and turn sweetness into a negative experience.

“Our current study aimed to decipher how the identity and valence of sweet and bitter taste were processed at the insula cortex and amygdala,” Dr. Li Wang, a postdoctoral research scientist in the Zuker Lab and the paper’s first author, told Digital Trends. “With viral tracing tools, we labeled these sweet and bitter cortical neurons in green and red, and mapped their projections brain-wide using one of the latest whole-brain clearing and imaging techniques. It is interesting to find that sweet and bitter neurons separately projected to two different subregions of amygdala, an important brain structure for judging and assigning the value of a sensory stimulus. By switching on or off this cortico-amygdalar circuit, it is [possible] to change the valence of taste or manually assign a new valence.”

Valence in this psychological sense refers to the inherent attractiveness or averseness of a particular taste quality. That means that it could one day be possible to use this research to alter the emotional component of eating certain foods. That might conceivably be used to help people with a range of eating disorders.

“Looking from the long-term view, it [may] help to address the obesity issue, if we could have a way to change humans’ preference of sugar,” Wang said. “In the [future], we will expand our research to other brain structures and aim to unravel how these regions drive different aspects of the taste behavioral responses.”

A paper describing the work was recently published in the journal Nature.

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Jun

Google Photos can take up less space on your phone with new mobile support

Google Photos can back up images, edit your photos, share albums — and now you may not have to download the full app to get those features. Google Photos online platform is now available as a Progressive Web App, which means the webpage has similar app features without talking up space on your smartphone for the app itself. The Progressive Web App is available on browsers that support PWAs, including Chrome on Android and Chrome OS, at photos.google.com.

Google was quiet about the change, but users spotted the update over the weekend. Inside Chrome with the PWAs enabled, Google Photo maintains more of the app’s features from the web browser. PWA webpages can also be saved as a shortcut on the home screen, which allows users to access the webpage in a process just like opening the app.

The Google Photos PWA allows users to access their images similar to the access inside the app, including creating albums, sharing photos and the assistant. Android users using Chrome may also get a popup shortcut to add the webpage to the home screen. The PWA version is missing a few things, however, including notifications and offline photos.

PWAs use less device storage than the complete apps while offering some of the same feel. Google says PWAs are also designed for a reliable and fast experience. Google Photos move to a PWA helps users access photos stored online while taking up less space on the device itself.

Google introduced PWA at the Chrome Dev Summit in late 2016. The format treats the webpages like an app rather than opening them in Chrome. And while Google Photos doesn’t appear to support notifications in PWA form yet, the format makes it possible to enable features like notifications even without the full app download. Since the launch, PAWs have been activated for Chrome Dev and Canary apps, while Safari is also adding support.

Google launched several tweaks to the Photos Platform over the last few weeks. Social reactions are arriving inside the app, while a developer program allows for third-party integrations with the cloud photo service. Last month, Google also rolled out new artificial intelligence-powered features for the app.

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Jun

How to factory reset Windows

Windows computers are rarely quicker and easier to use than the day they ship from the factory. Over time, the accumulation of files, misconfigured settings, and other factors slows down performance and impacts programs. If you find that your applications don’t run the way you expect, and opening and saving files takes longer than usual, you may want to turn back the clock.

In addition, you might want to sell or give away your Windows 10 machine (so you can buy something much more powerful). In that case, you’ll want to make sure that all of your personal information and applications are removed to protect your privacy. Fortunately, there’s a relatively easy way to start over with Windows 10: the Windows 10 reset function. Here’s how to factory reset Windows 10 and return it to its most pristine state.

First, back up your stuff!

Before you reset your system, you’ll want to back up important information that you don’t want to lose. This includes documents, photos, music, and movies, but there are other items to back up as well. Make sure that you know all of your saved passwords, export all of your browser bookmarks, and have installation files for all the software you’ll want to reinstall — or know where to get them.

Also, make sure you back up app-specific data, like custom filters saved in a photo utility, save files from your favorite games, and back up emails if using an offline client.

Windows 10

Windows 10’s reset feature is found in the primary Settings menu. This feature returns your Windows 10 installation to the default state it was when Windows 10 was first installed. Note that this might be technically different from a “factory reset” depending on your machine’s manufacturer.

Check your documentation or give technical support a call if you want to return your PC to how it was when you first pulled it out of the box. The manufacturer might have special partitions set up on the hard drive or might be able to provide a factory restore image.

Step 1: Access the settings menu by clicking the notifications icon on the taskbar or pressing the Windows button + A. Then click “All settings.”