Chinese search giant Baidu creates an open-source A.I. for detecting cancer

Baidu, the Chinese search giant, is sometimes hailed as China’s Google. And just like Google, it has a bunch of innovative side projects which go way beyond straightforward search. We recently covered Baidu’s amazing handheld universal translator. Now the company has announced its latest feat: Using artificial intelligence algorithms to help pathologists better diagnose cancer.

The company has developed an A.I. that is capable of analyzing slides containing biopsied tissue. Reviewing these slides can be difficult, even for experienced pathologists, but Baidu’s deep learning technology is able to look for tiny tumor cells faster and with greater accuracy than previous approaches. In tests, the algorithm was able to outperform both a professional pathologist and the previous winner of the so-called Camelyon16 challenge, a competition intended to evaluate algorithms for automated detection of cancer metastasis in lymph node tissue sections.

“Using A.I. to analyze pathology images is a very challenging task,” Yi Li’s, a machine learning research scientist at Baidu, told Digital Trends. “A digitized pathology slide at 40x magnification often contains billions of pixels, which is too large for a neural network to process. As a result, the mega-image is divided into tens of thousands of smaller individual images so that a neural network can analyze each of them separately. What’s unique about our neural conditional random field (NCRF) algorithm is that it can look at multiple images — including the potentially cancerous region and its surroundings, simultaneously. This new capability significantly reduces the number of false positives [in the form of] misclassified normal cells.”

To its credit, Baidu is keeping this technology to itself. Instead, it is making it available to the medical research community via open source in the hopes that it can help as many people as possible. (And, you know, help raise Baidu’s name value in the process!)

“We hope this open-sourced algorithm can serve as a high-quality baseline for future research in this area,” Li said. “The algorithm is only evaluated on a limited number of public datasets at this stage. However, the algorithm needs to be further assessed using much more clinically relevant data to prove it still maintains higher accuracy than experienced pathologists. Our team will continue improving the algorithm and collaborating with researchers with whom we can share new datasets.”

Li notes that the goal isn’t to replace doctors in performing this valuable task, but rather improving pathologists’ efficiency in their daily work. Should this algorithm work as well as hoped, doctors in the future will no longer need to spend hours looking at every slide from a biopsy, but just focus on the affected areas as identified by the algorithm.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Thanks to A.I., there is finally a way to spot ‘deepfake’ face swaps online
• A.I. detects skin cancer better than dermatologists in international study
• What is an artificial neural network? Here’s everything you need to know
• Machine learning? Neural networks? Here’s your guide to the many flavors of A.I.
• To train robotic servants, scientists built a virtual world where chores never end

A flaw in Apple’s Quick Look for MacOS exposes the contents of encrypted files

Security experts claim that Apple’s Quick Look feature in MacOS leaks sensitive data even if the content is locked behind password-protected encryption. Introduced in MacOS 10.5 Leopard, Apple designed Quick Look to give you a glimpse into a file without manually opening it with an app. But for the sake of convenience, Quick Look serves up a dish of potential privacy concerns. 

Used by the Finder app in MacOS, Quick Look stores a thumbnail containing the file’s full name, path, and a miniature image of what is stored inside the file, even if it’s password-protected and encrypted. This cached data also isn’t secured: It’s stored openly without passwords or encryption in the user’s TMPDIR directory and accessible to any person or application. The data even remains on the Mac after you reboot the device, delete the original files, and/or disconnect an external storage device. 

That said, if someone gains physical access to your Mac device, they can view the contents of any stored file. That makes Quick Look a highly useful tool for forensic investigations, surveillance implants, and for nosy significant others who simply want a quick way to snoop through your files. 

“Imagine having a historic record of the USB devices, files on the devices, and even thumbnails of the files … all stored persistently in an unencrypted database, long after the USB devices have been removed (and perhaps destroyed),” says chief research officer Patrick Wardle of Digital Security. “For users, the question is: Do you really want your Mac recording the file paths and ‘previews’ thumbnails of the files on any/all USB sticks that you’ve ever inserted into your Mac? Me thinks not.” 

The blog builds on a report issued by Wojciech Regula from SecuRing in early June who pointed out that the cached thumbnails remain on a Mac even if the originating files were deleted, previewed on an encrypted drive, or previewed using a TrueCrypt/VeraCrypt container. 

As a proof-of-concept, he created and mounted a VeraCrypt drive, stored an image of Luke Skywalker on the drive, and then pressed the spacebar so Quick Look could cache the encrypted image. After that, he could copy the thumbnail to another location on the Mac, grab the file’s full name and location, and export a miniature copy of Luke Skywalker’s image. 

“If you open a folder with files residing on an external drive, thumbnails will be created on the boot drive depending on the file type and the installed Quick Look plugins,” Wardle adds. “The previews, metadata and file paths are stored in SQLite database files deep inside the var folder. The path to this folder contains arbitrary folder names. With the proper commands the preview pics can be extracted from the database.” 

Currently, Mac owners can manually clear the Quick Look cache using the “qlmanage” command. In the latest version of MacOS High Sierra, simply navigate to Launcher > Other > Terminal and type “qlmanage -r cache” at the prompt without the quotes. After that, reboot the Mac and the thumbnails should be gone. 

Editors’ Recommendations

• MacOS Mojave brings Dark Mode, stacking, and a redesigned App Store to Macs
• How to combine PDF files
• How to password protect a PDF
• How to set up a VPN
• Live updates: How to watch Apple’s WWDC 2018 keynote

Moto G6 Play review

Research Center:

Moto G6 Play

For years, the Moto G-series has been our go-to pick for budget phones. They deliver solid performance and a close to stock version of Android for under $300.The budget market has become fiercely competitive, though, and phones like the Honor 7X and Nokia 6.1 have upped the ante with beautiful designs and capable cameras.

With this year’s crop of Moto G6 series phones — the Moto G6, Moto G6 Play, and the Moto G6 Plus — Motorola has focused on making its budget phones look like pricier, flagship phones. We’ve already looked at the G6 and the G6 Plus, so it’s time to look at the most affordable in the series, the G6 Play. It features a similar design as its more expensive siblings, but some components and features have been pared down to keep the price point low.

Gorgeous design, average screen

The Moto G6 Play takes design cues from its more expensive cohorts, but there are a few subtle cost-saving differences. Some of these tweaks can even save you money in the future.

For example, on the back of the G6 Play is a gorgeous, glossy body that looks strikingly similar to the other G6 series phones with one exception: It’s not glass. The back of the G6 Play is plastic, a choice we prefer as there’s a much smaller chance for cracks over the Gorilla Glass 3 on G6 and G6 Plus. Repairs for the glass backs on the latter two could end up costing as much as the phones, something you don’t need to worry about on the G6 Play.

The back of the G6 Play is plastic, a choice we prefer as there’s a much smaller chance for cracks.

There’s the same round camera module on the back of the G6 Play as the other two G6 phones, but it only packs a single-lens camera. Best of all, it’s nearly flush with the body, so it’s easier to use the phone when it’s laying flat on a desk. The fingerprint sensor is also on the rear in an easy-to-access position.

Flip the Moto G6 Play around and you’ll find a 5.7-inch display, with bezels on the top and bottom. The top is home to an 8-megapixel selfie camera and flash, while the bottom features the Motorola logo. We’re not sure why Motorola needs to add its brand name to the front of the phone, as it looks a bit tacky. The Motorola logo on the back is more than enough.

The IPS LCD screen has a resolution of 1,440 x 720 pixels with an 18:9 aspect ratio. It’s satisfactory, though text and images aren’t as sharp as you’ll find on the other G6-series phones or even the similarly priced Honor 7X. Colors, on the other hand, were vivid and the phone got bright enough to see outdoors.

Steven Winkelman/Digital Trends

The edges surrounding the screen have slimmed down (especially on the top), though they are chunky when compared to other smartphones. We don’t mind, and the phone looks quite modern considering its price.

The volume rocker and power button sit on the right edge, and up top is a 3.5mm headphone jack.  A MicroUSB charging port is on the bottom, which is a little disappointing. Motorola added the USB Type-C charging port to the Moto G6 and G6 Plus — it’s the same port you’ll find on almost all other Android phones — but the company said it will likely bring USB Type-C to all its budget options starting next year. It would have been nice to see it on the G6 Play, but it’s not a dealbreaker. The similarly-priced Honor 7X uses MicroUSB as well, so it certainly must help keep the cost down. Sadly there’s only one speaker output — the top earpiece.

Moto G6 Play Compared To

Motorola Moto G6

Essential Phone (PH-1)

Asus Zenfone AR

LG G6

Huawei Honor 8 Pro

HTC U Ultra

Meizu Pro 6 Plus

ASUS Zenfone 3 Deluxe Special…

LG V20

Samsung Galaxy Note 5

Huawei Nexus 6P

LG V10

Motorola Moto X Style Pure Edition

Samsung Galaxy Note 4

Samsung Galaxy Note 3

Our review model is the Deep Indigo version of the Moto G6 Play, and it’s the only color available in the U.S. While we love the high gloss design, it definitely picks up plenty of smudges and scratches. There’s thankfully a transparent case included in the box that offers some protection.

Like the other G6 series phones, the Moto G6 Play doesn’t have an IP rating for water resistance, but it also lacks the water resistant coating that comes standard on the G6 and G6 Plus. You definitely don’t want to get it wet.

Slightly sluggish performance

The Moto G6 Play is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 430 processor, 3GB of RAM, and it comes with 32GB of storage. There’s a MicroSD card slot in case you want to add more storage. Motorola does also offer a model with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of storage at a lower price, but we did not review this version.

In our day-to-day use of the phone, performance was acceptable, though a bit sluggish. There’s a noticeable delay when opening new applications or when multitasking with split screen view. It’s still capable of handling most tasks like browsing social media, the web, and messaging, but performance will just get worse over time, so it’s a little worrying.

We did try running a few graphics-intensive games on the G6 Play, and we were pleasantly surprised.

We did try running a few graphics-intensive games on the G6 Play, and we were pleasantly surprised. Super Mario Run took a moment to load, but we had no problems playing the game without lag. We also gave PUBG: Mobile a run on its lowest settings, and we still had no issues other than long load times.

Here are a few benchmark results:

• GeekBench 4 CPU: Single-core: 748; multi-core 3,859
• AnTuTu 3DBench: 41,158

When compared to the Nokia 6.1 and Honor 7X, there’s really no contest. The Honor 7X scored an AnTuTu score of 63,311, and the Nokia 6.1 scored 88,595. Both phones outperform the Moto G6 Play by a long shot. It’s worth remembering though that benchmarks are good for a baseline comparison but may not reflect a phone’s ability overall.

Close to stock Android

The Moto G6 Play ships with Android 8.0 Oreo, and the phone should get at least one Android version upgrade — so it should receive Android P. Motorola takes its time with updates, though, so we wouldn’t be surprised to see the update arrive more than six months after it’s released by Google.

The Moto G6 Play has a near stock version of Oreo, which means there’s almost no bloatware. The only additional software features you’ll find are Motorola services. Moto Display, for example, lets you enable a custom, always-on display. Moto Actions let you use gestures to trigger actions, like flipping the phone upside down will trigger Do Not Disturb mode, and a double twist will open the camera. There’s no Moto Voice, which lets you use your voice to launch apps or check the weather (it’s available on the G6 and G6 Plus).

Moto Key is one of the only other software additions from Motorola, but it feels like a redundant feature since Google’s Autofill software works better and is built into Android. Moto Key lets you access certain websites, apps, and devices via your fingerprint sensor. We’re already logged into most of our services though, so we never found a real reason to use it. You can also use it to log into your Windows computer, though it requires additional software to work.

Average budget camera

Motorola introduced dual cameras on the Moto G6 and G6 Plus this year, but the Play didn’t get the same love. There’s only a single 13-megapixel lens with an f/2.0 aperture.

In good lighting, the camera performs well. Colors are vivid and relatively accurate, and detail is solid.

Like most budget phones, however, things go south in less than good lighting conditions. Color in our low-light photos appear muted, and there’s a ton of detail lost in significant noise. Unsurprising and unfortunate, but it’s a problem virtually all budget phones have.

The front-facing 8-megapixel shooter is a tad underwhelming.

The front-facing 8-megapixel shooter is a tad underwhelming as well. We took several test selfies in different lighting conditions and they all turned out to generally be fuzzy, without a lot of sharpness. Turn on the optional beauty filter, and you’ll look like an anime character with big eyes.

There’s also a panorama mode, which works surprisingly well.

Battery life worth bragging about

The Moto G6 Play is packed with a gigantic 4,000mAh battery, which Motorola claims should last for 36 hours with regular use. We found that claim accurate in our tests.

On an average day filled with web surfing, messaging, watching YouTube videos, and podcast streaming, the Moto G6 Play’s battery only depleted around 35 percent by 7 p.m. That means we were left with around 65 percent for the remainder of the evening, which can easily take you well into the second day.

Steven Winkelman/Digital Trends

The MicroUSB charging port doesn’t offer the same TurboCharge feature that you’ll find on the G6 and G6 Plus, but Motorola said the G6 Play has its own fast charging feature that will add hours of use to your battery over a period of minutes. When we charged our nearly dead G6 Play with the included adapter, it gained about 12 percent battery life over 25 minutes, which isn’t very impressive.

Warranty and availability information

The Moto G6 Play costs $200 and is available from Verizon Wireless, Boost Mobile, Cricket Wireless Virgin Mobile, Republic Wireless, and Ting Wireless. AT&T will offer the phone on its postpaid plans. You can purchase an unlocked variant through third-party retailers including Amazon and Best Buy. Some carriers may only be carrying the 2GB RAM and 16GB model of the Moto G6 Play, which only costs $130.

Motorola offers a standard one-year warranty on the G6 Play that offers protection from manufacturer defects.

Our Take

The Moto G6 Play doesn’t look like a budget phone and can last two days, but everything else about it is average.

Is there a better alternative?

Yes. The Honor 7X costs $200, and it has a speedier processor with more RAM, a higher resolution screen, good dual cameras, but the battery will only last you a day.

If you can stretch your budget a little more, you can pick up the Moto G6 for $250 or the excellent Nokia 6.1 for $270. Both phones offer a gorgeous design and much improved specs over the Moto G6 Play, but the Moto G6 Play still beats them all with battery life.

How long will it last?

We believe the Moto G6 Play should last a year or two. Its processor is a little dated and it’s already a little sluggish, which is why it will likely run even slower the longer you use it. There’s no glass back, so you only need to worry about shattering the front screen. There’s also no IP-rated water resistance, so you want to keep this phone away from water.

Should you buy it?

Yes, but mostly if two-day battery life is important to you. If you can get by with a day of battery, we strongly think you should look at the Honor 7X or the Nokia 6.1.

How to sign up for YouTube Premium

YouTube’s $12/month subscription gets you a lot for your money.

YouTube Premium is finally here, and if you’ve got $12/month to spend, it’s absolutely worth the cash.

For that monthly fee, YouTube Premium grants you access to ad-free videos across all of YouTube, offline downloads, YouTube Original content, and all of the perks that come with YouTube Music.

Signing up for YouTube Premium is as easy as can be, and to get started, here’s what you need to do.

Open the YouTube app and tap the profile icon at the very top right.
Tap on Get YouTube Premium.

Tap Try It Free.

After selecting your payment method and completing the transaction, you’ll then see a splash screen welcoming you to YouTube Premium. Tap the red Let’s Go button, and you’ll see that your subscription is now live thanks to the Premium tag at the upper-left corner of the app.

Now, start exploring

If you made it to this part of the article, that means you’re now a YouTube Premium subscriber! Google’s currently giving all new members a 3-month free trial of the service, so you won’t be charged that $12/month fee until your first three months are up.

Now, stop reading this and start enjoying all of the benefits that come with your YouTube Premium subscription!

See at YouTube

Use Fooducate to make your diet goals (review)

You may be looking to better track your dietary habits. Or even just check out what exactly your diet habits actually are, you have PLENTY of choices in the Play Store to get the job done. Some are old stalwarts of the Android market, and there is a constant arrival of new apps to check out.

One option in the Play Store is Fooducate. It’s a freemium-type of nutritional tracker app. It’s designed to allow you count calories, track diet trends, and steer you to better weight management.

The free part of Fooducate is a comprehensive food library, diary, and calorie tracker. You are probably well-aware of the premise here: Fooducate first establishes your caloric needs by having you input your basic bio metrics: height, age, sex, current weight, and goal weight. Using these, it calculates a target of daily calories for you to aim for.

Welcome screen

Settings slide-out

Your home screen

Daily logging of your food

You aim for this by logging what you eat at each meal. This can be done a couple different ways. You can search the database of app-provided and user-uploaded food options, adjust the amount consumed, and add it to your diary.

Another option is a visual scanner, where you can scan UPC codes to quickly gather nutritional stats and uploading to your diary.

As you move through your day and multiple days, Fooducate tallies your calorie totals and shows your trending numbers both numerically and graphically.

If you want to know more about the nutritional quality of your dietary choices, this unfortunately is the free road ends, my friend. Fooducate does offer several premium subscription options; the main one being the “Pro” version, which will give you insight on your intake of protein, carbs, fiber, vitamins, etc.

You also get more specific training with specific/trending diets such as Paleo, non-GMO, low-sodium, and such. Pro also gives you space to log more specific metrics like body measurements, blood pressure, and others. Along with ad-free, of course.

There’s also a few other subscriptions available, including gluten and food allergy tracking, a 10-day “Diet Kickstart” (coaching), and even a pet food tracker & guide (who knew?).

Pro ain’t cheap.

Gluten & allergy option

Kick-start your diet

Pet premium?

If you choose to go with the premium options, they may be higher than you might be ready for. Example: the Pro version runs from $4.99 for a month-by-month plan, all the way to a lifetime subscription for $74.99 (!).

Of course, the value of these features is arguable and highly dependent on how much you use it over the the length of your subscription time. Your mileage may vary, as they say.

News feed.

Back on the free side of the app, Fooducate also offers an active community of users who post and comment, a-la a mini social network. There is also “Diet Tidbits” section. This provides all kinds of news and tips-and-tricks articles for you to peruse and read to your heart’s content.

You can also log into the companion website version (www.fooducate.com) to log in and find/track food intake, which can be helpful if you’re more comfortable with a bigger screen.

Conclusion

With diet tracker apps, the two main factors that drive user experience are 1.) the size of the library/database, and 2.) the interface.

The database in Fooducate is pretty good, almost great even. In my time with the app, there were a few misses in terms of food. But I could also find a pretty darn close substitute.

The FAQ was refreshingly cute.

The interface is okay –ust okay. This is admittedly hard to put into words. But as I was searching, entering, and reviewing my food choices, it just seemed like was was clicking a time or two more than I wanted to be. It wasn’t bad in any way at all; I just got a little impatient with my experience.

Overall, if you’re looking for a food tracking app, you would do well in checking out Fooducate. It’s easy to use, and is coupled with a good interface and comprehensive database. This makes for a good basic & free experience. If you’re looking for more detailed features you can find them here, but be prepared to pay for the privilege.

Who needs a nurse? This robot can extract and analyze your blood

Watch out: Bloodthirsty robots could be on their way to a place near you. On the bright side, they may be willing to trade a cookie for your precious bodily fluids. At least, that is what we’re hoping is the result of a new robotic blood-taking device that is designed for inserting intravenous needles into people’s arms with the purpose of drawing and then analyzing blood samples.

Developed by researchers from Rutgers University, the robotic device is comprised of three subsystems. First up is a robotic venipuncture device, which uses near-infrared and ultrasound imaging to localize blood vessels, image analysis to reconstruct the vessels in 3D, and then miniaturized robotics to place a needle in the center of the indicated vein. Once a blood sample has been taken, it is then moved — using a sample handling module — to an analysis unit. This part of the system provides blood measurements using a miniaturized centrifuge and microscope. At present, it can perform a three-part white blood cell differential and hemoglobin measurement.

Max Balter

“Diagnostic blood testing is the most common medical routine performed in the world, and forms the cornerstone of modern medicine,” Dr. Max Balter, who led the research, told Digital Trends. “In the U.S., for example, blood tests are performed 2 billion times each year and influence 80 percent of medical decisions made in hospital and primary care settings. However, blood draw success rates depend heavily on practitioner skill and patient physiology, and diagnostic results are generated almost exclusively in centralized labs from large-volume blood samples using labor-intensive analytical techniques. Our team at Rutgers University has developed a device that enables end-to-end testing by performing blood draws and providing diagnostic results in a fully automated fashion. By reducing turnaround times, the device has the capacity to expedite hospital workflow, allowing practitioners to devote more time to treating patients.”

So far, the robot has only been tested on artificial arms to demonstrate that it works effectively. The next step is to evaluate the safety of the venipuncture device in a small human feasibility study. This will allow the team to evaluate the design, form factor, and usability of the device. Ultimately, the hope is that technology such as this could be used to combine blood drawing and laboratory testing in a one-stop-shop of point-of-care testing.

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

Editors’ Recommendations

• Is this the future of medicine? Synthetic blood could buy patients 48 extra hours
• Tummy ache? Swallow this sensor-studded pill to get a diagnosis on your phone
• ‘Surgery in a pill’ may offer diabetics an alternative to bypass surgery
• With artificial bone marrow, scientists aim to decode blood disease
• When diagnosis time means life or death, NVIDIA’s advanced AI can save lives

Stand up or sit down? Many don’t take advantage of VR’s room-scale experience

Oculus’ Vice President of Content Jason Rubin claims that a “significant percentage” of Oculus Rift headset owners would rather sit down to enjoy virtual reality rather than take advantage of room-scale motion detection. He made this revelation to Insomniac founder and CEO Ted Price during an on-stage talk at E3 2018 last week. 

When we first experienced the Oculus Rift behind closed doors at CES 2013, the pre-Facebook studio provided a demo using a version of Epic Citadel with populated non-player characters. You were seated during the demo, moving through 3D space using an Xbox gamepad while the headset itself allowed you to look in all directions. At the time, the experience was an eye-opener and seemed to be the future of VR. 

Since the launch of the Rift and HTC’s competing Vive headset, we have room-scale motion tracking allowing us to move about in physical space and flap around like wild chickens, whacking furniture, walls, and people as we’re immersed in a physically charged virtual space. But there are experiences that don’t require out-of-your-seat action, like Star Trek: Bridge Crew. 

Yet despite the pre-launch sit-down demos, only one bundled sensor to track head movement at launch, and no support for room-scale motion tracking until a year after the Oculus Rift hit the market, Rubin said during the conversation that the Oculus team assumed everyone would be standing in their VR experiences. The comment seems contradictory given the state of the product prior to the Touch controllers. 

But what rings true is that humans don’t necessarily want to flap like wild chickens when exploring VR. “It turns out a lot of people — fully perfectly healthy people — would like at the end of a hard day of work, or whatever they’re doing, to just sit down,” he told Price. “But they appreciate the immersion of VR and everything else. So we didn’t expect that.” 

The comments arrived just over 14 minutes into the conversation with Price, which was mostly conducted to promote the upcoming Oculus Rift game Stormland. He said the Facebook-owned company is fully aware that gamers love VR, but they also love playing seated. That should be obvious: We’ve done nothing but sit on our bottoms to play games since the first Pong knock-offs entered households in the 1970s. VR is a new, evolving platform that’s still trying to find its footing while pulling gamers off their couches. 

“[Sitting in VR] seems contradictory,” Rubin added. “Not the case at all. They love it. That’s a good example of something where nobody at Oculus, when we launched Rift, thought that would be the case. It is the case and it’s a significant percentage of players who play seated a lot of the time.” 

Rubin said he began seeing more and more Reddit requests for seated gameplay modes. Given the evolution of the Oculus Rift, owners may see less of these modes due to the platform’s newfound room-scale motion detection capability. He said due to the feedback, developers are implementing seated modes, such as From Other Suns. 

Google Maps on Android no longer lets you book Uber rides

In early 2017, Google announced that it would be adding a feature to Google Maps allowing customers to book an Uber without having to leave the Google Maps app. Now, however, it looks like that feature is on the way out — Google announced it is removing Uber functionality from Google Maps altogether.

The news was first picked up by Android Police from a Google support page, which gets straight to the point in saying that “you can no longer book Uber rides directly in Google Maps.”

It’s not currently known why Google removed the feature from Maps. It’s possible that Google and Uber have simply decided to end the program. It’s also possible that the relationship between Uber and Google is getting rockier, especially as they begin competing in the self-driving car business. On top of that, Alphabet, Google’s parent company, made a large investment in Lyft late last year, so it’s possible that had something to do with the decision.

Another possibility is that Uber prefers people to use the Uber app instead. Uber has been known for collecting data through its app since it first started, with the practice sometimes landing the company in hot water. While Uber can still collect data through integrating with Google Maps, it’s likely it can’t collect quite as much.

It’s important to note that integration between the two services isn’t completely gone. You can still open Google Maps up and select an Uber to get to your location, but once you do you’ll be taken to the Uber app instead of being able to complete the ride straight from the Google Maps app. That’s how you’ve always had to book rides through other ridesharing services — you’ve never been able to book a Lyft straight from Google Maps, for example.

Of course, it’s not unexpected to see the feature removed. It’s actually now only being removed from Android — the iOS version of Google Maps lost the feature almost a year ago. Regardless of why the feature was removed from Google Maps, you now need the Uber app to complete Uber rides — which you can download for Android here.

Updated on June 16: You can no longer book Uber rides from Google Maps.

Editors’ Recommendations

• After being down for a few hours, Apple’s Maps app is working again
• Google Maps for iPhone now shows you restaurant wait times
• Which way is which? Here’s how to quickly calibrate the Google Maps compass
• Bye to Apple Maps, hello to Waze: CarPlay to support third-party navigation apps
• Where’s Waldo? He’s hiding out in Google Maps for the next few days

Unihertz Atom review

Research Center:

Unihertz Atom

Large screens, small bezels, fashionable glass bodies — these are all the traits smartphones have been moving towards for the past few years. The Unihertz Atom is a smartphone that has none of these things, which is why you may want to buy one.

The Atom by Unihertz is a follow-up to last year’s Jelly Phone, and its existence is solely thanks to a highly-successful Kickstarter campaign. Unihertz promises the Atom to be a speedy, long-lasting, durable and water-resistant Android phone that can serve as a primary device for outdoor activities, and in the week we’ve spent with the phone, it delivers.

A tiny titan

Size is the first thing you’ll notice about the Atom; true to its name, it’s tiny and easy to grip. Even the smallest of hands should have no problem holding this phone.

If size isn’t what’s first on your mind, it’ll be the Atom’s rugged body, which frankly looks a little ugly. It’s wrapped in a TPU-style material that’s reminiscent of rugged cases from the likes of Otterbox. The reinforced corners are stylized with red accents, which make the phone look flashy. Still, this phone feels like it could fall down a mountain without significant injury.

There are chunky bezels around the 2.4-inch display, and the front-facing fingerprint scanner is flanked by two capacitive buttons. The volume rocker is on the phone’s left side, along with the SIM card tray; the right side houses the power key, as well as a programmable push-to-talk (PTT) button, which we’ll get to later. Oddly enough, the USB Type-C charging port is also on the right edge of the phone.

A headphone jack is present too at the top center of the Atom. Thanks to the small size, you shouldn’t have any issues accessing any part of the phone, though you might have problems holding the phone in your right hand while charging, due to the awkwardly-positioned charging port.

The Atom feels like it could fall down a mountain without significant injury

Flip the phone over and it will look even more rugged. The TPU back panel has a diamond-pattern texture for extra grip, and a lanyard attachment at the bottom underneath the large Unihertz logo will ensure extra drop protection (no lanyard included). The rear-facing 16-megapixel camera and flash sit at the top of the rear, and the only speaker on the phone is at the bottom. The speaker is suitable for calls, but we wouldn’t recommend using it for music. You’re better off pairing the Atom with a pair of wireless earbuds or a Bluetooth speaker.

We’re happy to see a fingerprint sensor available on the Atom, but its placement is awkward because the phone is so small. Even worse, the sensor proved unreliable most of the time, as it really requires the perfect-placement of your fingertip. When it does work, however, it’s quick.

Unihertz Atom Compared To

Nokia 6 (2018)

Nokia 1

Sony Xperia XZ2

Nokia 8 Sirocco

Cat S41

Motorola MOTORIZR Z3

Jitterbug Dial

Samsung SCH-u620

LG VX9400

Nokia N93

Blackberry 8700c

Blackberry 8700g

Nokia N90

Palm Treo 650

Motorola RAZR V3c

There is a Face Unlock option available, which actually tended to work more reliably than the fingerprint sensor. A change of hairstyle, sunglasses, or lighting can easily set it back, though.

The Atom is hardly fashionable, but it’s not really trying to be a replacement for your $1,000 iPhone X or Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus. It’s a phone you take out on weekend outings when you’re worried about damaging your expensive smartphone. It’s tough and rugged, the build quality is superb, and it’s also lightweight at just 108 grams. The IP68-rated water- and dust-resistance means the Atom can handle some water (up to 1.5 meters depth for about 30 minutes) — just make sure the ports are dry before recharging.

A disappointing display, but solid performance

Considering the Atom has a 2.4-inch LCD display, you’d be right not to expect a super high resolution screen — it has a measly 432 x 240 pixel resolution with a 16:9 aspect ratio, delivering 207 pixels per inch. It’s not a big deal because the phone isn’t going to be replacing your media center, but it certainly isn’t sharp. Pixels are easily visible.

We are a little disappointed, however, that the colors are a little washed out, and blacks lack punch. Worse yet, the screen doesn’t get bright enough to view outdoors in broad daylight, which feels like a huge misstep. It’s manageable, but Unihertz should have really made sure a brighter screen was a key feature on the Atom.

Mark Jansen/Digital Trends

The screen is protected by an unspecified version of Gorilla Glass, which can still shatter. The phone does come with a pre-installed film screen protector, to protect against scratches, but it doesn’t fit the whole screen, only covering half of the selfie camera. It looks like the same screen protector Unihertz sold for the Jelly Pro.

Despite the disappointing screen, the Atom comes roaring back with solid performance. It’s powered by an octa-core ARM Cortex-A53 processor with 4GB of RAM. There’s 64GB of internal storage, which is plenty for most people. Despite dual-SIM support, there’s no MicroSD card slot, which may come as a disappointment to some.

Here are a few benchmark results:

• AnTuTu: 84,856
• Geekbench 4: Single-core 811; multi-core 3,272
• 3DMark Sling Shot Extreme: 441

The Unihertz Atom beats out the midrange Moto G6 with its AnTuTu score by a considerable margin. Its scores rival the Nokia 6.1 in some areas, and comes close to the Moto G6 Plus — two similarly-priced phones. Benchmark scores don’t necessarily reflect a phone’s performance, though, so how did the phone react in day-to-day use?

The Atom handles most tasks easily, zipping through navigation menus and opening apps in a blink. While the tiny screen isn’t going to be your first choice for mobile gaming, the Atom surprised us with solid performance during games like Hearthstone.

Stock Android

Unihertz has opted for the stock version of Android 8.1 Oreo, which is likely why performance is relatively smooth. The software is simple to use. There are only a few apps installed by default (other than the standard array of Google apps), such as the walkie-talkie emulating app, Zello. The physical, red push-to-talk button will trigger Zello’s broadcasting function by default, and you can chat with other Zello users just like with a walkie-talkie. Thankfully, you can swap it to launch something else.

Some other pre-installed apps have proved useful, like Toolbox. It’s packed with a surprisingly accurate compass, a level, flashlight, and other tools that might be useful in a variety of circumstances.

You can expect the Atom to stay up-to-date with the next version of Android at the very least.

Our biggest frustration is with the keyboard. The Atom comes preloaded with Google’s Gboard app, which works wonderfully on big-screen phones. Typing with it on a 2.4-inch screen, however, is painful. Using Gboard’s swipe-to-type function alleviates the problem a little, but we found ourselves avoiding typing whenever possible, and you likely will too.

Unihertz told Digital Trends that an Android P update is in the works, so you can expect the Atom to stay up-to-date with the next version of Android at the very least.

Average camera

There’s only a single, 16-megapixel camera on the back of the Atom, but there’s also a 5-megapixel selfie camera on the front.

The right lighting conditions will get decent performance out of the main lens on the rear. We took some nice photos with blue skies and well-balanced color palettes. In scenarios with high contrast or low lighting, the camera starts to struggle — a problem that plagues almost all budget phones. Also, photos you take may look better on the small screen than they really are when enlarged on a computer.

The camera’s focusing is also quite unreliable. It struggled to focus properly multiple times when we tried to focus on particular subjects, like a rock.

The app is barebones, but that’s not necessarily a problem. Holding the shutter button takes burst shots, there are options for some filter overlays, and there’s an HDR mode — though you can’t use filters in HDR mode. A panorama mode is also available, but the results are not good at all.

The Atom can take some surprisingly good photos, but we would have really liked to see a better camera here, especially since people likely want to take and share photos of their outdoor experiences. If that’s you, then you still may want to bring your primary smartphone or DSLR, which will undoubtedly take better photos (though doing that defeats the purpose of using the Atom). If you don’t care about taking a lot of photos, then the Atom’s camera will be sufficient.

An excellent battery, and extra features

The tiny Atom packs a 2,000mAh battery, which may sound small, but don’t forget this phone’s size. The battery also doesn’t need to power a large screen or a powerful processor, which means the Atom is capable of offering two-day battery life.

The battery finally expired two days after it had been taken off the charger.

After taking the Atom off the charger at 8 a.m., we took it on a five hour hike. During this time, we used GPS navigation, took pictures, and kept up to date with various messaging systems, and ended up with 54 percent battery still remaining at 5 p.m.. After that, we ran benchmarks, took further test images, and tested gaming performance, and the battery finally expired two days after it had been taken off the charger.

Sitting on the bedside table overnight, the phone only lost 2 percent battery, which is great standby time. Charging it back to full took about two hours, which isn’t too fast.

The Atom will ship with U.S. and E.U. adapters for its USB Type-C charging cable. Unfortunately, a U.K. adapter will not be included with phones making their way across the pond. When we asked Unihertz about this, the company said U.K. adapters would be available from its store. It’s odd they can’t package it in.

Mark Jansen/Digital Trends

The Atom does have NFC, which means you can make contactless payments via Google Pay, and the USB Type-C port is On-The-Go (OTG) compatible, so the Atom can also transfer its battery life to another phone, or pull files from a USB stick when used with the correct adapter. Unihertz also sells accessories to go with the phone, including a bike mount, a belt clip, and armband.

Price and availability

The Unihertz Atom is currently available on Kickstarter. Backers can buy it for the discounted price of $220 until the campaign ends on July 11. After the campaign, the Atom will retail for $300 on Unihertz’s website. The Atom is sold unlocked, and it works with 4G networks on Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T (Sprint support still has to be confirmed).

Unihertz offers a 12-month warranty that only covers manufacturing defects to the phone.

Our Take

The Unihertz Atom delivers zippy performance, simple Android software, and excellent battery life. Its screen and camera are mediocre, but if you can look past them, this is a perfect little companion to take on outdoor trips over the weekend.

Is there a better alternative?

Yes, if you’re looking for a small smartphones. The iPhone SE and the Sony Xperia XZ2 Compact offer great performance, great screens, and have good cameras. They’re small, but they’re considerably larger than the Atom, and so are their price tags. Check out our best small smartphones guide for more.

If you just need a phone that lasts for a long time in the $300 price range, you can’t go wrong with the new Moto E5 Plus, which has a larger display and a two-day battery life. You can find more options in our list of phones with the best battery life.

If durability is your primary concern, your best bet is the LG X Venture. It has two-day battery life, it’s water resistant, has a solid screen, but it’s sadly only available on AT&T and U.S. Cellular. Check out our best rugged smartphones for more devices.

How long will it last?

The Unihertz Atom is well built, with water resistance and built-in shock resistance. It won’t get damaged easily. In terms of software, Unihertz has already promised the Android P update, and we expect the device will work relatively well for around two years or more. You won’t be using this phone every day (unless you make it your primary phone) so performance and the battery shouldn’t decline as quickly as other budget phones.

Should you buy it?

Yes. If you’re in the market for a secondary backup phone — especially one to take on outdoor activities like hikes — the Atom is a great companion that will take up very little space.

Here’s what art looks like in 2018: Spheres that react to your presence

In the 1960s sci-fi spy thriller series The Prisoner, the residents of a small coastal resort are kept from escaping their location by a weird floating white balloon called Rover, which recaptures or eliminates anyone who tries to leave. Here in 2018, a group Random International has created a fleet of similar-looking autonomous flying spheres, which flock together like a slow-motion group of birds, while keeping an eye on nearby humans.

The helium-filled foil spheres are part of a project called Zoological. They are piloted by an onboard drone-style flight system while using Lidar technology — the same pulsed laser technology which helps power autonomous cars — to make sense of what is happening around them. By using Lidar, the spheres are able to work out depth data concerning their environment and determine their formation and groupings. They can also act out different moods by way of programmed “emotions.” These mean that, one day, they might choose to stay away from groups of people by remaining high up in the air. On other days, they might alternatively — and probably a bit more disconcertingly — get bolder and float closer to the ground, while singling out one particular person to follow.

For anyone worrying about these autonomous flying spheres, though, don’t be too alarmed: They are not part of some next-generation surveillance technology (even though police drones really are on the way.) Instead, they are an art installation that make up one part of an exhibition called +/- Human, taking place in the U.K. They are the work of award-winning choreographer and director Wayne McGregor, and are intended to examine the relationship between mechanical autonomy and human beings.

This isn’t the first weird algorithmic art project we’ve covered at Digital Trends. Recently, we wrote about a crazy robot table which uses a grid of ferrofluid liquid rocket fuel “pixels” to respond to passers-by. Then there is also this giant art installation which displays 3D selfies on an enormous 850,000-LED “head.” It seems that, just like the rest of us, the art world is to wrap their minds around exactly what today’s technology will mean for the future!

Editors’ Recommendations

• Awesome Tech You Can’t Buy Yet: Smart Rubik’s Cubes, diving drones, robot artists
• 9 bizarre drones, from web slingers to lake hoppers
• Halo Drone Pro review
• Why self-driving trucks will take over before self-driving cars
• Amazon delivery drone may use lights and music when it shows up at your home