OPPO F1s launches in India with an insane 16MP front camera
OPPO’s latest phone in the Indian market is the selfie-focused F1s. Much like the OPPO F1, the F1s’ raison d’être is the front camera, which is now a 16MP affair. However, unlike the ZenFone Selfie, there’s no front-facing flash module.
The specs include a 5.5-inch 720p display, MediaTek MT6750 SoC, 3GB of RAM, 32GB storage, microSD slot, 13MP camera at the back, LTE, and a 3075mAh battery. The hardware looks decent, but with the phone running Android 5.0 Lollipop out of the box, things aren’t so great on the software side of things.
The phone will be going up for sale starting August 11 for ₹17,999. Want to know more about the OPPO F1s? Be sure to check out our review.
OPPO F1s review
Polar M600 is a fitness-focused Android Wear smartwatch
Android Wear smartwatches offer basic step counting and heart rate monitoring, but fitness accessory maker Polar believes there’s room for a more comprehensive solution. The Finnish company has launched the Polar M600, which offers an optical heart rate sensor with six LEDs, 1.3-inch TFT screen with a resolution of 240 x 240.
The Polar M600 is a far cry from the likes of the Moto 360 when it comes to looks, but that’s not the main function of the watch. The M600 is designed to offer extensive fitness tracking and coaching features to get you moving.
The 1.3-inch display is housed in an interchangeable silicone band, and the M600 features integrated GPS, GLONASS, 4GB internal storage, and a 500mAh battery that’s good for 48 hours of use when paired with an Android phone. The M600 has a companion app called Polar Flow that lets you view your activity history and create personalized training routines.
From Polar’s Chief Strategy Officer Marco Suvilaakso:
Polar is known for bringing smarts into sports. Polar created the first heart rate monitor, the first activity tracker and now we’re the first true sports wearables company to announce a smartwatch truly made for sports. Powered by Android Wear, Polar M600 offers our customers countless opportunities to customize their smartwatch and still rely on the unique Polar sports wearable experience that is at its core.
Polar mentions that the M600 will be available in Charcoal Black and Powder White for $329.90 or €349.90 later this year. In addition to the black and white bands, a red color option will also be made available.
Best cases for NVIDIA Shield tablet
Which cases are best for the NVIDIA Shield tablet?
We know that you love your NVIDIA Shield tablet and that means you want to keep it looking like you just took it out of the box. To do that, you need a good case, and we’re here to help you find the perfect one for you. Here are our favorites.
- ProCase Premium Folio Cover Case
- NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Cover
- Poetic NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Case
- Fintie SmartShell case
- ProCase SlimSnug case
ProCase Premium Folio Cover case
You’ll love the refined feel of the ProCase Premium Folio Cover case and how well it protects the NVIDIA Shield tablet without adding a lot of bulk or weight — you’ll love the price, too: under $20 for a leather case.
Its exterior is made from leather and the inside is made of a soft material to prevent scratches. The cover folds into a stand that can be secured in numerous angles for comfortable viewing or gaming. Its elastic strap closure secures the lid when the tablet is not in use — it also turns the tablet’s screen off when closed and turns it on when opened.
If you’re looking for a case that’s made of leather, supports auto sleep and wake, and that’s priced affordably, then the ProCase Premium Folio Cover case is the one you want.
See at Amazon
NVIDIA SHIELD Tablet Cover
NVIDIA’s own Shield Tablet cover is made for its tablet, so there’s no question about whether or not it will fit.
It’s made with a polyurethane faux leather exterior and a microfiber interior for preventing scratches. Its lid has a magnetic closure and can fold over to become a stand for a viewing, gaming, or using the keyboard.
The NVIDIA Shield Tablet cover supports auto sleep and wake, which means that when you close the cover, the tablet’s screen turns off, and when you open the cover, it turns on.
If you want a case for your NVIDIA Shield tablet that you know will fit, then choose the NVIDIA Shield Tablet cover.
See at Amazon
Poetic NVIDIA Shield Tablet Case
The Poetic NVIDIA Shield Tablet case is a heavy-duty protective case built to shield your tablet from impacts and dings.
Its body is composed of food grade silicone, which is very easy to keep clean — all you need to do is rinse it off with water and wipe it with a clean cloth. It has rounded edges that make it very comfortable to hold and a raised bezel along the edges of the screen to protect it from scratches.
There’s also this other cool thing about the NVIDIA Shield Tablet case — it’s got built-in channeling chambers designed to direct sound from the speakers up toward your face so that you can hear it better. Isn’t that awesome?
If you’re looking for a heavy-duty protective case that’s easy to keep clean and that helps to direct the sounds of the speakers toward you, then the Poetic NVIDIA Shield Tablet case is a great option.
See at Amazon
Fintie SmartShell case
The Fintie SmartShell case is a combination of style and protectiveness. Amazon reviewers love how it feels and looks, and how it protects while remaining lightweight. It also comes in a variety of colors to suit every taste.
Its cover is made of polyurethane synthetic leather, with a soft microfiber interior, and a hard polycarbonate back shell. This keeps its weight down while protecting the device from scratches and dings.
The cover turns into a stand for propping up the tablet to read, watch videos, or play games. It has a magnetic closure and will turn the tablet’s screen off when it is closed and turn it back on when it is open.
If you’re looking for a case that is colorful, lightweight, and protective, then the Fintie SmartShell case might be the one for you.
See at Amazon
ProCase SlimSnug case
The ProCase SlimSnug case is slim, form-fitting, and yet protects the NVIDIA Shield tablet quite well. You’ll love how its texture makes it easier to hold with one hand and how it protects the corners.
The case itself is composed of a hard polycarbonate shell back, a synthetic leather cover, and the microfiber interior. It comes in many bright colors, and when the cover is closed, it turns the tablet’s screen off — when it’s open, it turns the tablet’s screen on.
If you’re looking for a form-fitting case that is light, protective, and comes in bright colors, then the ProCase SlimSnug case is right up your alley.
See at Amazon
NVIDIA Sheild Tablet K1
- Shield Tablet K1 hands-on
- Original Shield Tablet review
- Latest news
- Shield Tablet K1 specs
- Forums discussion
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Samsung Galaxy Note 7 now available for pre-order in the U.S.
You can now pre-order Samsung’s latest handset from the major U.S. mobile operators!
Itching to secure your Samsung Galaxy Note 7? Buyers in the United States can now pre-order the phone ahead of the Aug. 19 street date. The Note 7 is available to pre-order on AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint, with U.S. Cellular following on Aug. 4. All four carriers are offering the phone in black, blue coral and silver color options.
You’ll find full pricing details across all supported carriers on our Galaxy Note 7 U.S. availability page — as usual, there’s a mix of outright and pay-monthly prices from the major operators.
See Galaxy Note 7 at Verizon See Galaxy Note 7 at AT&T See Galaxy Note 7 at T-Mobile See Galaxy Note 7 at Sprint
Next up is Europe, with the Note 7 going up for pre-order in European countries from Aug. 16 ahead of the Sept. 2 street date.
Samsung Galaxy Note 7
- Samsung Galaxy Note 7 hands-on preview
- The latest Galaxy Note 7 news!
- Here are all four Note 7 colors
- Complete Galaxy Note 7 specs
- The Galaxy Note 7 uses USB-C
- Join the Note 7 discussion in the forums!
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Jumping on the Note 7 bandwagon today? Shout out in the comments and let us know!
What does Samsung Galaxy Note 7’s IP68 waterproofing mean?
Alongside its gorgeous, rounded 5.7-inch screen and iris scanner, the other Samsung Galaxy Note 7 feature that is capturing plenty of attention since its official launch is its waterproofing.
Indeed, Samsung had set up an enormous tank of water at the London leg of its Unpacked unveiling, just to show how effective the phone is when submerged. The S Pen too.
We have to say it’s very impressive. It’s not the first phone with IP68 water and dust proofing – the Sony Xperia Z5 and Samsung’s own Galaxy S7 and S7 edge handsets are similarly rated, for example – but it’s the first time we’ve seen a stylus working with a normal consumer device under water.
But what does the IP68 rating actually mean in real terms? And does it mean the phone will survive a dunking in the toilet? Here is our short and handy guide.
- Samsung Galaxy Note 7 vs Note 5 vs Note 4: What’s the difference?
- Samsung Galaxy Note 7 preview: Take note, this is the big-screen phone to beat
- Samsung Galaxy Note 7 iris scanner: What is it and how does it work?
- Best Galaxy Note 7 cases: Protect your new Samsung device
Pocket-lint
What is an IP68 rating?
An Ingress Protection (IP) rating is awarded to a device to give a simple, clear indication of how protected it is from foreign bodies, whether that be moisture of some kind or dust.
The first number signifies, on a scale up to seven, how protected the device is from intrusion. The second, on a scale up to nine, gives an indication of how protected it is from moisture.
The number “6” means that a device is “protected against dust that may harm equipment”, while the second number, “8”, means that it is also protected against temporary immersion in water.
The Note 7 therefore, with its IP68 rating, is rated as “dust tight” and can be immersed in water for a prolonged but not indefinite period of time.
So will the Galaxy Note 7 survive a drop down the toilet?
During the launch keynote it was joked that you can even drop the Note 7 down a toilet and it will survive. We haven’t tried it yet, but there’s no reason to think that’s not true.
Samsung claims that the Note 7 can be submerged under water down to a depth of around 1.5 metres (5 feet) for 30 minutes, which is impressive.
More impressive still is that it remains water resistant even when the S Pen is removed from the handset. The hole where it usually slots in is also protected.
The S Pen too is IP68 rated, so can also be submerged under water.
So it’s very likely the phone with survive a drop into a loo, although we wouldn’t recommend it as the case isn’t rugged and it might be physically damaged in the fall.
Pocket-lint
Is the Galaxy Note 7 good for the beach then?
Thanks to the “6” in the IP68 rating, the phone is also resistant to sand, so is far better suited to take along on a beach holiday than many handsets.
However, just because something is resistant to some of the elements doesn’t mean you should purposely expose it to them. Drop the phone on a pebble, for example, and you could have an issue.
We’d still advise you protect it further in a decent case.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 will be available for pre-order from 16 August and will ship from 2 September.
Pocket-lint Adventures: Out on the water with the Sea-Doo RXT-X 300 with the TomTom Bandit
When you think of personal watercrafts, or Jet Bikes as most of us refer to them, you picture sunny times off a beach in the Caribbean going at a slow leisurely pace and looking forward to sipping a Pina Colada once you return to the resort bar.
But that shouldn’t be the case, there are plenty of ways to enjoy them in the UK, as we found out for our latest Pocket-lint Adventure with the TomTom Bandit on a visit to Sussex Marine Water Sports near Brighton.
The TomTom Bandit is fully waterproof from the get go and comes with a dive lens cover included in the box ensuring water isn’t a problem to have to worry about. The cover and the device are IPX8 rated which means it is protected to go down to 40 meters without any bother, and that makes it perfect for all types of watersports.
Pocket-lint
Because we weren’t diving and were worried that the Bandit might go flying into the deep blue sea, we also fitted the action camera with the TomTom Bandit accessory the company dubs Floaty. It’s a £14.99 optional buoyancy aid that ensures that if you do drop the camera overboard you won’t have to go diving to retrieve it. Handy when you are out at sea.
TomTom Bandit kit secured and ready to record we headed out on the Sea-Doo RXT-X 300 with Marcel, a Frenchman who’s been doing this for over a decade.
The RXT-X 300 is the company’s latest offering and packs a 300 horsepower Rotax 1630 Ace engine to ensure maximum fun and as we found out “air”. And yes we had the performance limiter turned off.
With nowhere to really affix the action camera to the machine that has been designed so you “become one with it”, we rather precariously, at times, opted to use the TomTom Pole Mount (£54.99) to get not only greater stability in our shots, but also a better angle on the action. Watching the video footage, we certainly feel it helped.
The RXT-X 300 is incredibly capable as you would expect, it’s the company’s £15,699 flagship watercraft after all, and that means you can really pick up speed, something the TomTom Bandit was able to record thanks to its ability to overlay speed and other metrics like G-Force on the videos you record. At one point we experienced over 2.5g, which is akin to what a Formula 1 driver experiences when accelerating.
Sea-Doo
Bored of us sitting on the back or driving, badly we must add, Marcel kicked us off (on to a nearby craft controlled by Sea-Doo owner Joe) to show us “extreme”.
He didn’t hold back either, jumping through the air and performing tight turns that most of us could only ever dream about performing. The weather might have been turning nasty, but Marcel was enjoying the waves the squall that was quickly forming around us was creating. This really is a muscle car on the water.
Back in the harbour and recovering from the adrenaline rush, we were able to easily check out the action from the warmth of our car. With instant sharing from your phone, and the ability to edit in an instance, the Bandit will make sure that everyone gets to see just how much fun you’ve been having, even straight away.
The TomTom Bandit has been a great companion for this Pocket-lint Adventure and we can’t wait to tackle the next.
Polar thinks there’s room for another Android Wear smartwatch
It was inevitable that smartwatches would eventually consume “dumb” activity trackers like the Fuelband (RIP) and Fitbit. These days, almost any device that you can slap on your wrist offers you basic fitness and sleep tracking as standard. Similarly, most of these gadgets offer smartphone notifications and control of your smartphone’s music playback. But as smartwatches have made in-roads to the world of fitness tech, there’s been little pushback from companies like Garmin, Polar and TomTom. At least, not until now.
The Polar M600 is the Finnish company’s first Android Wear device, which the firm’s Marco Suvilaakso describes as a “sport optimized smartwatch.” Rather than simply slapping its branding on a generic wearable, Suvilaakso says that his team has worked to make the unit a class-leading activity tracker. The result is a muscular, fully-featured smartwatch that’s as comfortable tracking laps in the swimming pool as helping you order an Uber.
There’s nothing particularly eye-catching about the M600, although that’s made up by a series of neat touches that help mark it out from the pack. For instance, rather than using one or two LEDs in the optical heart rate monitor, Polar equipped its version with six. That should both increase the reliability and accuracy of its pulse tracking and also reduce the need for the strap to be on so tight. Much like the company’s A360, the HRM will only operate during training, unlike all-day trackers like Sony’s SmartBand 2. Suvilaakso says that this is because such data isn’t “meaningful.”
The device is waterproof and has a Gorilla Glass lens covering the 1.3-inch TFT touchscreen, making it ideal for Tough Mudder types and triathletes. The silicone housing / strap, meanwhile, is removable and washable, not to mention swappable for different colors. The M600 will retail initially in black or white, with the spare band costing $30, but there’s also a red version that’s coming at some point in the not-too distant future.
Beneath the display you’ll find integrated GPS and GLONASS as well as a 500mAh battery that, Suvilaakso promises, will last two days on a charge. If, however, you want to use location-tracking, you’ll crank 8.5 hours out of that same power cell before resorting to the custom charger. The M600 uses the same custom, magnetized charging cable as the Polar Loop 2, and apparently you’ll be able to share them between these two devices.
A button on the left hand side will let you swap from Polar’s custom watch face and the Android Wear elements of the device. Additionally, a central button below the display sends you straight into the M600’s training mode, a feature that can be configured further via companion app Polar Flow. Another nice little touch is baked into the face itself: a blue line that creeps up the screen activity you do through the day.
Polar’s also hoping that its software smarts will help set it apart from other Android Wear devices, like its Smart Coaching and Activity Prompts. If you’re having a day where you’ve been grinding at the office too long, the device will let you know what you have to do to make amends. In addition, if you need to get in shape for an upcoming race, plug in the deadline and what targets you need to hit and you’ll be told what you need to do to get there.
Like several other Android Wear watches, there’s 4GB of on-board storage which can be used to sync music from Google Play. That way, they can connect a pair of Bluetooth headphones and leave their smartphone at home when they go for a run. The device works with Android and iOS devices, and will set you back $329.00 / €349.00 when it launches at some point at the end of Q3.
Chrome for Android makes video smoother, less power-hungry
Google set the stage for the latest Chrome for Android update by revealing that a billion hours of video are now viewed per week on the browser, much of it on mobile. The Android team consequently focused on video for release 52, saying it’s now “smoother, loads faster and consumes less battery.” A video (below) shows load times that are five times faster, a trick that will save a bit of power and time. If you use the browser’s Data Saver mode, you’ll also get lightweight, more compressed video (much like T-Mobile’s “Binge On” mode), in case your plan is close to the limit.
Google says the changes work with HTML5, so they presumably don’t fix slow-loading Flash-based video. The improvements will be mainly beneficial for short clips, though the Data Saver video mode will obviously help if you’re watching a half-hour tutorial. You might have to wait a bit for the new version, as it appears to be on a staged rollout and our editors in Europe or the US have received it yet. Now, if it could just do something about the resource-hungry desktop browser …
Source: Google
Meeting strangers in the VR wilderness
I didn’t expect to see anyone. Not in the woods. I blink a few times and widen my stance, swiveling my head back and forth to see if there are others. No, just the one. A bearded face floating in midair, a pair of white gloves dangling underneath. “Was that…?” I whisper under my breath but before I can finish the question, the strange being has teleported a few meters toward me. Another split-second and he’s standing a stone’s throw away. “Hello,” he says with a wave and a grin.
The world I’m standing in doesn’t seem particularly dangerous. The sky is light blue, punctuated with sharp, angular mountains. Some birds are chirping in a nearby tree, and a basic campsite, complete with a tent and fire, is visible just behind me. Still, I’m tense. I was expecting a tranquil, solitary piece of escapism in VR — this stranger has caught me off guard. “Oh, hi,” I offer with a hint of trepidation. He’s not an NPC (non-player character), that’s for sure. The intonation in his voice, his body language — if you can call it body language — it’s too real. “Are you a member of the press? Or someone working on the game?” I probe, cautiously.
The bearded man, it turns out, is Dedric Reid, founder and CEO of Hello VR. His company built this virtual escape, called the “MetaWorld,” as a way for people to meet up and socialize. I’m jacking in from London, with an HTC Vive strapped to my face, while Reid is based in San Francisco. With some wand controllers and room-scale tracking, we can move our hands, pick up objects and walk around in a limited capacity.
Our impromptu meetup was, in fact, a cleverly orchestrated introduction to the game and its creator. I smile and shake my head as we exchange pleasantries, realizing how I was subtly duped. There was little explanation when I entered this virtual world, and that was intentional: The developers wanted to show me what it was like to meet a stranger in VR.
The MetaWorld feels vast but primitive. The ground is flat, a single shade of green stretching into the distance. I can see some trees, but they have simple textures and basic, circular shadows. Compared to a blockbuster video game like The Witcher 3, or even smaller titles such as Firewatch, it looks basic. But unlike those games, the MetaWorld is properly persistent. When you throw a rock or drop a stick, it stays in that exact spot until you or someone else decides to move it. The idea is that the space has its own ecology and history, changing over time as people interact with it.
“If I wasn’t conducting an interview, I think we would be bonding; remove the questions and we’re messing about, just killing time.”
The woods where we’re chatting measure a square mile. But this “place,” as the developer calls it, is only one thread in a tapestry that will eventually measure 80,000 square miles. Each will be molded by the community and allow for different types of activities. In this one, for instance, Hello VR wants to make a fishing mini-game and other camp-related tasks. Reid points to a table with a chessboard in the distance and explains how to teleport — the only way of moving beyond HTC’s room-scale body-tracking. By pressing the touchpad on the right controller, I can see a flight path and my projected position. Moving the wand changes the destination and tapping the trigger on the underside of the remote executes the jump.
The chess pieces are scattered across the board. As I pick up the rook and place it on the back row, I’m struck by the strangeness of the situation. I’m hanging out with Reid. It’s more than a conversation — that could be done on the telephone or over Skype. It’s the sense of presence and our physical interactions. If I weren’t conducting an interview, I think we would be bonding; remove the questions and we’re messing about, just killing time.
“We’re aiming for a very intimate experience,” Reid explains. “Something like this, we’ll limit to maybe 20 or 30 people. Anything beyond that will break the level of social immersion that we’re trying to achieve. But beyond this space, we’re looking at thousands of players that could coexist.”
Work to be done
The MetaWorld has been in development for six months though Reid says he’s been working on the idea for well over a year. Before Hello VR, he contributed to the Xbox One as part of Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business (IEB) and then, under Comcast, the Xfinity X1 cable box. In 2014, Reid became head of design for a company called AltspaceVR, which is developing a virtual playground similar to the MetaWorld, where people can hang out, play games and watch movies together. The big difference is that the world isn’t persistent or as large as the one that Reid wants to build with Hello VR.
Future versions of the MetaWorld will have full character models and a backpack for managing your inventory. As you wander through the woods, you’ll be able to pick up items and store them in a 3D-modeled rucksack. You’ll swing it over your shoulder and use your hands to dig inside, compare and share your belongings. It’s a novel approach to inventory management and one that promotes exploration, social interaction and ownership over what can otherwise feel like virtual tat in video games.
Hello VR has a lot of work to do. Reid is keen for the community to shape the design and personality of each world. That means designing content-creation tools — a notoriously difficult problem in video games, especially if it involves freeform sculpting. Before that, however, Hello VR needs to build more objects and richness into the environment. Reid also wants “a sort of locomotion mechanic” that can supplement the game’s teleportation. “This is one square mile out of about 80,000, so how do we get to the other 79,999?” I give a half-hearted shrug in response, before realizing my character doesn’t have any shoulders. I raise my hands instead, palm-side up — the universal body language for “I don’t know” — which garners a quick chuckle from Reid.
Hello VR started with the HTC Vive, but it’s looking at other VR platforms too. Reid says the MetaWorld could theoretically support a variety of headsets, including the Oculus Rift and PlayStation VR. The mechanics will need to be modified — Sony’s headset, for instance, doesn’t have room-scale body tracking — but he’s confident the controls can be adapted. In the end, he promises you won’t be able to tell which hardware people are using.
Meeting the founder of Hello VR online was exhilarating. But these sorts of public interactions won’t be for everyone. In fact, I can see the MetaWorld appealing to smaller groups of people that already know each other. I love the idea of kicking back with some friends after work, sitting around a campfire and exchanging stories. Or taking a virtual road trip and spending a day, if not more, pitching tents and playing hide-and-seek. Sure, it wouldn’t be the same as a real camping trip — the great outdoors is exactly that, outdoors — but it could serve as a decent substitute. Especially if you want to connect with friends who are scattered all over the world.
“That’s exactly what we’re thinking,” Reid says. “Honing in on the more intimate experiences, but also opening them up in a vast sort of way. It’s intimate, but it’s still vast; we’re not cooped up in a room together.”
We spent our last few minutes together trying to hit a rock with a stick. I was the pitcher; Reid was the batter. The results were terrible and also hilarious; it’s clear the game’s basic controls were never designed for such sportsmanship. Still, it was a fitting way to cap off our little meeting. We were doing nothing in particular — just goofing around like children. But doing that in VR, with the knowledge that thousands of miles separate us, felt special. Eventually, we shook hands and said goodbye.
Improbable, not impossible
The MetaWorld is a grand undertaking. To build such a space would, years ago, have required an enormous budget and technical knowhow. Hello VR, however, claims to be sidestepping the problems by using Spatial OS, a service developed by a little-known company called Improbable.
The team, which numbers around 100, has developed a way to better harness servers and their computational power. You may have noticed that in most MMORPGs, like World of Warcraft, the player base is split into different servers. The world might be large, but it’s effectively mirrored for these groups. The monsters are tightly regulated, both in number and where they can roam. Environmental damage disappears. These restrictions help the developer to control the game experience, and, more importantly, manage the load on its servers. Allowing every monster and player to fight in the same dungeon would cause the game to crash.
World of Warcraft, the most popular MMORPG. Credit: Blizzard
There are ways to get around this. CCP Games, which runs the spaceflight MMO EVE Online, has a feature called “time dilation,” which slows down particularly large battles so that its servers can keep up. Improbable thinks it can solve this problem by chaining servers together into a swarm-like platform. The technology means that data and problem-solving can be shared between them, enabling larger worlds and more complex ecosystems. “It’s like a giant game of musical chairs,” Herman Narula, CEO of Improbable says, “where servers and computational agents are moving between different machines in order to make the simulation possible.”
It’s a deep engineering problem, and one that few companies have been able to solve before now. “It’s not like a footnote or a little library or background detail,” Narula explains. “It’s a whole new science. A new approach to making large-scale distributed systems possible.”
Herman Narula, CEO of Improbable. Credit: Edge Magazine via Getty Images
The company is offering its capabilities through Spatial OS. Narula calls it a “distributed operating system,” referring to its ability to run a single application on a thousand different machines. Developers can log onto the Improbable website and download a console application that allows them to program a game or experience compatible with Spatial OS’ APIs. The final product can then be “pushed” to servers that Improbable is renting from the usual technology behemoths, such as Amazon and Google.
The system means that Spatial OS customers pay Improbable, not the server-farm owners, for the computational power that they need. Improbable acts as the middle man for both parties, charging developers a subscription based on their requirements.
Spatial OS can support many types of experiences: video games, such as the MetaWorld and the equally persistent Worlds Adrift, city simulations and medical research. The only requirement is that each project involves entities, with properties, in some kind of space. (Hence the name.) You wouldn’t use the platform to analyze language in a million books, for instance. That’s a problem that could be split up and handled by many servers working in isolation. Instead, Spatial OS is designed to deal with objects that interact and influence one another — animals in an MMORPG, or cars trying to weave their way through a traffic jam.
Keeping quiet
Improbable is working with a small group of developers right now. The company has been “deeply involved” with some of these early testers, but the plan is to build an interface that people can use entirely on their own. “The end game is that you rock up to the Spatial OS website, download the SDK and then you’re away,” Nurman says.
The company has been quiet for the last few years, beavering away at the algorithms that power Spatial OS. But slowly, it’s been expanding the pool of developers that have access to the platform. Worlds Adrift, a game developed by Bossa Studios, is one of the first projects to receive mainstream attention. And with good reason: It offers a large, persistent play space like the MetaWorld, which players can change and interact with in permanent, meaningful ways. “When a ship blows up, all of those little pieces fall to the ground, and they’re permanently there for thousands of other players to find,” Nurman says. “The ecology will then clean them up over time. All of this creates a whole new kind of experience.”
The promise of Spatial OS seems, at times, to be too good to be true. Maybe it is.
The promise of Spatial OS seems, at times, to be too good to be true. Maybe it is. But that’s why Improbable invited me in to see the MetaWorld and speak with Reid through VR. It’s a hint at the scale and social intimacy that can be achieved with a thousand servers working in harmony. “This is something tangible,” Nurman promises. “You put on a headset and you saw something today. That’s the beginning, the acorn of something interesting.”
Twitter for iOS Gets Shortcut Keys for Smart and Bluetooth Keyboards
Twitter has quietly introduced new keyboard shortcuts for iPad owners using Bluetooth and Smart Keyboards, in the latest update to its iOS app.
The new shortcuts were revealed in a series of tweets by Twitter app developer Amro Mousa yesterday. Mousa let it be known that holding down the Command key brings up a shortcut sheet on connected devices running iOS 9 or later.
Holding down the key shows shortcuts for a new tweet (Command+N), move left one tab (Shift+Command+[), and move right one tab (Shift+Command+]), but there are others available, as Mousa later highlighted.
@amdev CMD+R to reply in tweet details or a DM conversation. And CMD+Enter to send. 😋
— Amro Mousa (@amdev) August 2, 2016
The additional shortcuts are for closing a tweet dialog (Command+W), replying in tweet details or a DM conversation (Command+R), sending a tweet (Command+Enter), and another way of cycling through Home, Notifications, Moments, Messages, and Me screens in the app (Command+1 through 5).
Twitter can be downloaded from the iOS App Store for free. [Direct Link]
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