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Posts Tagged ‘Google-Goggles’

Google’s Eric Schmidt Sees Smart Phones as the Future

July 1st, 2010 Liam No comments

Our society today is using more smart phones than even before and as each day passes, the more we grow dependent on the technology –and for good reason too. Smart phones are no longer the simple communication tools that the first mobile handsets were. They can do so much more now –businesses rely on enterprise devices for their employees on the field and people in general consider the smart phone as an all in one device.

And by all in one, the smart phone serves as a media player, digital camera, internet and email access device, and of course, as a mobile phone.

Google’s Eric Schmidt believes that the future of the world relies heavily on the information and convenience that the internet provides. And while the web was first made accessible through computers, it is hard to deny the fact that accessing cyberspace through portable devices is much more logical. Information, anywhere, anytime –this is probably some of the key factors that Google considers when creating new technologies for users.

The Google augmented reality feature, Google Goggles. It turns search into a visual experience and provides users with instant, real time data and information about the things they see around them.

Cheaper devices are also making the internet more accessible to people too. As technology progresses, many of the once high end devices are now made more affordable (and partially obsolete) with all the new models being released. This means that more people will get to go online and as this continues being connected to the web will become a given standard.

Of course, the fact that wireless LAN and 3G technology keeps improving is also an important factor. Having a decent mobile phone is one thing, but having a reliable network also matters a lot for smart phone users.

Google Android: NVIDIA Tegra and More Improvements

May 18th, 2010 Simon No comments

It seems that the new NVIDIA Tegra might be the hardware of choice for the next Android smart phones. It has already been revealed that NVIDIA technology is being used in the Android tablet that was shown off at the Web 2.0 Expo. This is why it would not be surprising to know that the tablet was already packed with the Tegra.

The Tegra is more than just a CPU; it is an all in one system (or as NVIDIA calls it, a system on a chip). This hardware combines an ARM architecture CPU with a GPU, Southbridge, a memory controller and Northbridge.

This places the next generation Android smart phones with a technological advantage over many other handsets. With the competition between Google and Apple reaching new heights, it is not surprising that the Android developer has been heavily focusing on not only improving its mobile platform (with the recent new improvements to search, inclusion of Flash and more), but they are now also working on improving the hardware use in Android devices.

Speaking of Android add-ons, the Google Goggles augmented reality application has been improved recently to include the ability to scan foreign languages and translate the text into English content. This is very useful especially for reading languages that are written in special characters that cannot be written manually with a standard keyboard.

It has also been confirmed that the next Android OS, version 2.2 Froyo, will have native support for Flash. As recently announced, Google and Adobe have been teaming up after Apple forced developers to stop using the Adobe Flash Professional CS5 software for developing iPhone apps.

Back to the tablet at the Web 2.0 Expo, the device pretty much shows off what makes the Android the amazing OS that it is now and also, a preview into the new features that will be included –namely the NVIDIA hardware and the implementation of Flash support.