Software Related to mobiles
Galatta cinema news app is now available for BlackBerry and Windows Phone devices as they promised last month. This app offers latest news about movies, music, movie stars and much more in the Indian movie world including Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi. It also offers news from Hollywood movie industry. Continue reading “Galatta cinema news app now available for BlackBerry and Windows Phone”
Nokia launched an amazing phone last year called the N9. It ran a Linux based operating system called MeeGo, it didn’t have any front facing buttons, it had a perfectly sized 3.9 inch screen, and the press absolutely fell in love it. So much so that Stephen Elop decided to kill the N9 shortly after it shipped because he wanted the world to pay attention to the company’s Windows Phone lineup. In fact, the Lumia 800 and Lumia 900 are basically the N9, but with Microsoft’s software on-board.
Since MeeGo was effectively killed, those who worked on the OS had a tough decision to make: Keep working for Nokia, but on projects they really couldn’t care less about, or leave the company and try to start their own thing. This is how Jolla was born. The company is based in Helsinki, has roughly 50 employees, and their goal is to announce a phone by the end of this year. Last month I sat down with the CEO, Jussi Hurmola, and had a 20 minute chat with him. You can listen to or read that interview here.
One of the questions I asked him then and the question that’s been on everyone’s mind since is how will Jolla be competitive without an app ecosystem? According to Arctic Startup, who quotes the Finnish publication 3T, Jolla’s CEO says that his OS will run HTML5 apps, Qt apps, and something that hasn’t been confirmed until today: Android applications. This will be enabled via a software project called ACL (application compatibility layer).
And the news doesn’t stop there. Jolla’s CEO has also confirmed that their first phone will have a 3.5 inch screen. Is that a dangerous thing to do in today’s market? Maybe, but Jolla is crazy enough that it might just work!
[Image Credit: Screenshot from this video]
Update 2: Jolla has unveiled their first device running Sailfish OS.
Update: Arctic Startup now says the phone will have a screen larger than 3.5 inches. Before they reported that it would be exactly 3.5 inches.
Samsung is going to host a press event in Berlin on August 29th. If you include today, then that’s just 10 days away. Now we already know what they’re going to announce there. Several weeks ago a Samsung spokesperson told Reuters that the company has plans to “unveil the next Galaxy Note”. Four days ago we even saw a leaked image of the front of said device. So what’s new today? Two things. First, there’s another leaked image, this one courtesy of Know Your Mobile. Their sources tells them nothing we already haven’t heard: 5.5 inch screen, quad core processor, ultra thin bezels, you get the idea. The second bit of “news” comes from Samsung themselves, who have uploaded a teaser video that clocks in at less than 40 seconds. It’s incredibly arty, with ultra fast cut scenes, and at the end it features German director Wim Wenders. Some of you might know him from the 2011 film “Pina”.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5P3divJBqlI
What don’t we know about that Galaxy Note II? We don’t know when it’ll hit the market, how much it’ll cost, and what version of Android it’ll run. All will be unveiled next week, but let’s just say this: Similar to how the first generation Galaxy Note polarized people, this next Note is going to do the exact same thing. For some folks, 5.5 inches seems ludicrious. For others, they’re thrilled that a company is finally listening to them. The first Note has managed to sell an average of 1 million units a month since it hit store shelves, so we know there’s a market for crazy large devices.
Are you a part of that market?
Samsung has officially announced the Galaxy S Duos that surfaced last month. It has Dual SIM support with Dual SIM always-on feature similar to the Galaxy Ace Duos that automatically forwards calls from the phone number on SIM 2, even if a user is on the phone with SIM 1’s number. It has 4.0-inch WVGA(480×800) capacitive touch screen display and 1 GHz processor. It runs on Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich).It also comes with ChatON, Samsung’s communication service. Continue reading “Samsung Galaxy S Duos with 4-inch display, 1 GHz processor, Android 4.0 announced”
Celebrate the World Photography Day on August 19th with a range of Camera Apps for Samsung bada and Android phones from the Samsung store. These apps let you add effects to your pictures, turn your phone into a scanner and edit the photos on your phone. Continue reading “Samsung bada and Android apps for World Photography Day”
While Samsung has only released the Pebble Blue and Marble White variants of the Samsung Galaxy S III so far, the Black version is expected to come out in October according to Clove.
Continue reading “64GB Black Samsung Galaxy S III Hitting UK in October”
Sony Mobile has officially announced on their blog they have started rolling out Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) update for Xperia P as they promised. This update would bring new features including new lock screen with improved functionality, Resizable widgets, Recent Apps button, WALKMAN, Album and Movies apps. Sony started rolling out ICS update for Xperia S in June. Continue reading “Sony Xperia P Android 4.0 update starts rolling out, update for Xperia U, Sola and Go soon”
In the endless search for battery life on our beloved smartphones, our friends from Mugen Batteries once again come to the rescue! This time, two of the most popular smartphones these days receive solutions for more juice throughout the day: HTC One X and Samsung Galaxy S III. As usual, every device will have two offerings, a regular sized model which will fit with the original back cover and a bigger, more powerful version with a bigger back cover. Let’s have a look:
Continue reading “Mugen Batteries announces more juice for Galaxy S III and One X”
GetGlue for iPhone has received a major update to version 3.0 that brings lots of new features such as GetGlue guide with personalized list of shows, movies, and sports, recommendations for shows that match your tastes, Sport schedules, stats, and live scores and more. The new version doesn’t let you Check-in to Music, Books, Games and Topic, which is a big drawback. Continue reading “GetGlue for iPad v3.0 update brings Personalized guide, Recommendations and more”
Instagram for iPhone and Android have been updated to version 3.0 that brings new features including, Photo Maps feature that lets you view your photos and others’ photos on a map, New design for user profiles, explore tab, hashtag and location pages, speed improvements and more new features. Continue reading “Instagram for iPhone and Android v3.0 update brings Photo Maps, New design and more”
Xiaomi MI-2, successor of first MIUI Phone has been announced in China. It packs in high-end specs such as 4.3-inch (1280 x 720 pixels) IPS display, 1.5 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor with Adreno 320 Graphics, 2GB of RAM and 2000 mAh battery with optional battery pack of 3000 mAh. It runs on MIUI ROM based on Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean). Continue reading “Xiaomi MI-2 with 1.5 GHz quad-core Snapdragon processor, Android 4.1 announced in China”
When the iPad was announced in January 2010 it forced the consumer electronics industry to scramble to create a competitive product. The first iPad “killers”, take the Samsung Galaxy Tab or the HTC Flyer for example, were basically Android smartphones with a larger screen. It wasn’t until early 2011, when Google launched Android 3.0 Honeycomb, that the search giant actually had a tablet operating system to offer their partners. Sadly, Honeycomb was garbage, and by then the thinner and lighter iPad 2 had already hit the market. Then something happened. A light bulb turned on. Companies began to realize that there’s no point in competing in the 10 inch tablet space with Apple, so why not invent a new 7 inch tablet market? And with that the Amazon Kindle Fire, the Barnes & Noble Nook, and several other tablets were born. The most recent of such tablets, the ASUS manufactured Google Nexus 7, has been widely praised as being the first actual iPad competitor worthy of your money. At $250 for the 16 GB version it’s also a steal.
So the obvious question is will Apple make a 7 inch tablet? Rumors about a smaller iPad have been circulating for about a year already, but now we’re starting to see more and more evidence that it’s actually coming. The image above, which comes from the French website NowhereElse, shows what’s allegedly the iPad mini’s flex cable. Supposedly Apple is going to announce a smaller iPad at their next event, which is unofficially due to take place on September 12th.
The key question here is price. Apple offers the third generation iPad for $499, and the second generation iPad for $399, so does that mean a smaller iPad would go for $299? That’s only $50 more than the 16 GB Nexus 7, and for that amount of cash you’ll get access to all the applications in Apple’s ecosystem, plus what we can only assume to be better build quality.
Hopefully we’ll be able to tell you more in about four weeks.
Dropbox for Android Beta (Preview version) has been updated to v2.1.8.8 that brings new features such as thumbnails for videos in Dropbox, better video playback in ICS and Jelly Bean. Option to open Dropbox files directly from other apps such as SMS, Memo etc. and more new features. Continue reading “Dropbox Beta for Android update brings Video thumbnails, Better video playback and more”
Samsung is going to hold a press conference in Berlin on August 29th, less than two weeks from today. Earlier this month a Samsung spokesperson told Retuers that the company is going to be announcing the second generation Galaxy Note there. Here’s what we “know” about the device so far from the rumors that have been floating around the internets: Similar to how the first generation Galaxy Note was basically a giant Galaxy S II, the Galaxy Note II is going to be a blown up version of Galaxy S III. The same quad core Exynos processor will be in there, likely the same 8 megapixel camera, the same cellular radios, you get the idea. The only thing that will change is, of course, the screen. What you’re looking at above is a photo of from the French website NowhereElse, who says that’s the front panel of the Note II. The first Note had a 5.3 inch display, but this new Note is expected to pack a larger 5.5 inch display.
Will the Note II be popular? It’s too early to tell since we don’t have any concrete information, but our gut tells us it’s going to be even more successful than the first Note. When Samsung announced the original Note back in September 2011, we didn’t really understand it. We asked ourselves who in their right mind would buy such a large device? But here we are, 10 months after the Note hit the market, and Samsung has managed to sell 10 million of them. That’s a million a month, which may not sound like a significant number, but it’s not small either.
And anyway, isn’t Android all about choice? If you want a tiny device, get a Sony Xperia Tipo or a Samsung Galaxy Pocket. If you want the biggest thing that you can barely squeeze inside a pocket, the Note is perfect.
Here’s a scenario I’m sure many of you have experienced: You have some friends over, there’s a party going on, someone wants to upload the photos they just took to Facebook, but they don’t want to use their cellular connection. Instead they ask you for the name of your WiFi network and the long and complicated password you can’t even remember to connect to it. What if there was a better way? Enter InstaWiFi, which I just heard about while listening to episode 72 of the “All About Android” podcast. Continue reading “InstaWiFi: The Android app that makes you wish all WiFi networks worked like this”
