Feeling the urge to play some music? You can try your hand at any of these 8 browser-based virtual instruments. They are perfect for those moments when you’re away from your physical instrument.

While these online instruments are not a complete substitute for high-quality hardware or software instruments, they are promising signs of what might be achievable in the realm of web-based music. Typically, these virtual platforms are more focused on synthesizers, but they still offer a ton of fun.

And who knows? We might soon see a web-based version of an electric guitar that does justice to the real thing.

1. WebSID

The Digital Nostalgia of Commodore 64

If you’re a fan of 1980s culture, WebSID is sure to evoke some nostalgia. It’s a digital version of the iconic SID sound chip found in the Commodore 64.

The interface is user-friendly and intuitive, making it easy to play using your computer keyboard. The virtual keyboard also supports touch input, making it accessible on smartphones and tablets.

Moreover, WebSID features a built-in delay effect, expanding your options for sound design.

2. MZ-101

A Simple Monophonic Synthesizer

The MZ-101 is a monophonic synthesizer, taking inspiration from the analog synths of the ’70s and ’80s like the Roland SH-101. While it may not be the most complex synthesizer, many iconic records were produced using similar equipment. The MZ-101 allows you to save and load presets, and you can even share them on Twitter.

You can interact with this synth via your computer keyboard or the virtual on-screen keys. Keep in mind that the MZ-101 relies on the Web Audio API, so it won’t work on browsers that lack this support.

3. Sympathetic Synthesizer System Mk 1

A Nod to Retro Gaming Sounds

The Sympathetic Synthesizer System Mk 1 offers a simple-to-use interface and evokes the iconic sounds of 1980s and early 1990s videogaming.

Unlike WebSID, it doesn’t emulate a specific synth or chip. However, its sound is distinctly reminiscent of retro videogames rather than the analog synths of the same era.

You can interact with the Sympathetic Synthesizer System Mk 1 using your computer keyboard or the virtual keys on-screen. The tool is built on the WebAudio API, so it only functions in browsers that support this API.

4. Patternsketch

Your Online Drum Machine and Audio Sequencer

Patternsketch serves as an audio sequencer and drum machine. You can craft patterns or play the drumkit in real-time using your computer keyboard.

The platform offers a variety of drumkits, including realistic Jazz and Live sets as well as electronic and classic Roland TR-808 and TR-909 kits. It even provides some premade drum patterns for quick use.

Patternsketch allows you to save and share your creations, enabling collaborative work. You can also export your patterns in WAV, MP3, or OGG formats for offline listening, and even upload directly to SoundCloud. It is optimized for Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox.

5. TrueGrid

A Sandbox for Modular Synth Enthusiasts

TrueGrid is designed for experimental musicians and those intrigued by modular synthesizers. Unlike traditional synths, modular synthesizers don’t have a fixed signal path and consist of individual modules that can be interconnected in numerous ways.

TrueGrid is a digital version of a modular synth, letting you patch modules together for a wide range of soundscapes. While it doesn’t offer an on-screen keyboard, you can use a MIDI keyboard if you’re running Chrome.

Keep in mind that TrueGrid is still in its beta stage, so it has some limitations. There’s a restricted selection of available modules, and you can’t pick modules within the tool just yet. To configure a synth, you’ll need to register on ModularGrid and use their planner. TrueGrid performs best in Google Chrome.

6. Waveform

Wavetable-Based Synthesizer in Your Browser

Waveform is a web-based synthesizer inspired by renowned wavetable VST synths. Craft your own unique soundscapes using thousands of wavetables, and easily share your presets through a URL. You can interact with Waveform using a physical keyboard, on-screen keys, or a MIDI keyboard. While Google Chrome is the recommended browser, other modern browsers should also suffice.

7. WebModular

A Simple, Vintage-Inspired Modular Synthesizer

WebModular is a simpler modular synthesizer that takes cues from classic synths like the ARP 2600. Similar to TrueGrid, it allows for custom signal flows but is tailored for more conventional sounds.

You can interact using the on-screen keyboard and even employ Modern Music Macro Language (MML) to write and playback melodies, riffs, or entire songs. WebModular offers a few presets to kickstart your creativity and runs on the Web Audio API. It’s also being tested with a Javascript and Flash combination for wider browser compatibility.

8. Audiotool

A Complete Music Making Suite

Audiotool goes beyond being just a virtual instrument to offer a comprehensive music-making platform. It boasts four synthesizers and three drum machines, along with a variety of effects like distortion, reverb, and delay. The platform also features sequencing capabilities, allowing for complete song compositions.

If you prefer to simply explore the instruments, pressing Caps Lock allows you to use your computer keyboard for real-time play. Built using Flash, Audiotool is designed to run smoothly across different browsers.

The post 8 Browser-Based Virtual Instruments for Musicians on the Go appeared first on Hongkiat.

As you can imagine, this is particularly crucial for e-commerce websites; after all, what’s the point of good search engine optimization if most of the people who visit your site don’t end up buying anything?

There are a considerable number of tools out there that can help you increase your e-commerce website’s conversion rates. While most of the available ones are paid, there are a few decent free and freemium options out there for those of you who are either on a tight budget or who are just starting out and testing the waters.

These range from analytics and conversion funnel tools to live chat platforms and even survey services. Without further ado, here’s a list of 10 tools to help you supercharge your e-commerce site.

HubSpot

HubSpot is an all-in-one platform that provides a range of tools for marketing, sales, customer service, and customer relationship management (CRM). Its main goal is to help businesses draw in people, turn them into customers, and keep them happy.

HubSpot offers a variety of services like email marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), content management, lead generation, social media marketing, and analytics, among others. It’s known for being easy to use and for its ability to work well with other commonly used tools and platforms.

If you run an e-commerce site, HubSpot can be really helpful. Its CRM tool can help you keep track of customer information, monitor interactions with customers, and tailor customer experiences.

The marketing tools can help you plan and carry out effective marketing campaigns, including email marketing and social media management, with the aim of bringing more people to your site and turning them into customers. The analytics tools give you important information about customer behavior, helping you understand what’s working and what’s not in your marketing strategies.

Plus, HubSpot can automate tasks like sending follow-up emails or posting on social media, saving you time and making your work more efficient. In short, HubSpot can help your e-commerce site grow by improving how you interact with customers, making your marketing efforts more efficient, and giving you useful insights based on data.

Mailchimp

Mailchimp is a leading email marketing service that provides various tools for businesses to design, send, and manage email campaigns. It offers a user-friendly interface with drag-and-drop email templates, making it easy for businesses of all sizes to create professional-looking emails.

Beyond email marketing, Mailchimp also provides services for social media ads, landing pages, customer relationship management, and automation tools. It also offers robust analytics and reporting features, allowing businesses to track the success of their campaigns and make data-driven decisions.

For an e-commerce site, Mailchimp can be an invaluable tool. It can help businesses keep their customers engaged and informed about new products, sales, and other updates. With its automation features, businesses can set up triggered emails based on customer behavior, such as welcome emails for new subscribers, reminder emails for abandoned shopping carts, and personalized product recommendations.

Additionally, Mailchimp integrates with many e-commerce platforms, including Shopify and WooCommerce, allowing businesses to sync their customer data and tailor their marketing efforts based on their customers’ purchase history and preferences. This can lead to more effective marketing campaigns and ultimately, increased sales.

SEMrush

Think of SEMrush as a Swiss Army knife for digital marketing. It’s a robust toolkit packed with features designed to help businesses fine-tune their online presence. From SEO and PPC to content and social media, SEMrush has got you covered.

It’s like having a personal assistant that tracks your keyword rankings, analyzes your backlinks, researches keywords, and scrutinizes your website traffic. Plus, it’s got a handy site audit feature that acts like a health check for your website, spotting and fixing any SEO issues.

If you’re running an e-commerce site, SEMrush is like your secret weapon. It’s got a competitive research feature that lets you peek into your competitors’ strategies, giving you the upper hand. Its keyword research tool is like a magnet, pulling in potential customers by identifying high-volume keywords they might use when searching for your products.

This boosts your visibility on search engines. And let’s not forget the site audit feature that ensures your website is in tip-top shape for search engines, paving the way for more organic traffic and sales.

SEMrush can even help you optimize your product descriptions and other on-site content with its SEO writing assistant, making sure your content is SEO-friendly and ranks well on search engines. In short, SEMrush is a key player in your e-commerce site’s SEO strategy, driving more traffic your way and ultimately boosting your sales.

Shippo

Shippo is a tool that makes shipping easier for online businesses. It’s like a one-stop-shop where you can find different shipping companies, check their prices, print shipping labels, and keep track of packages. It works with big shipping companies like USPS, FedEx, UPS, and DHL, and it can also connect with online store platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento.

Shippo is really useful for online stores. It makes shipping simpler and faster because you can do everything in one place, instead of visiting different shipping company websites. It also helps you save money by showing you the prices of different shipping companies so you can pick the cheapest one.

Plus, it lets you track packages, which means you can give your customers updates about their orders. So, Shippo helps online stores run more smoothly, cut down on shipping costs, and give better service to their customers.

Yotpo

Yotpo is a platform that helps online businesses gather and manage content created by their customers, such as reviews, photos, and Q&A. It’s a tool that helps these businesses build a stronger relationship with their customers, enhance their online presence, and ultimately, increase their sales.

Yotpo can easily be integrated with popular online store platforms like Shopify, Magento, and WooCommerce, making it simpler for businesses to collect and showcase reviews on their websites. Additionally, Yotpo offers features like loyalty programs and referral incentives to help businesses keep their customers coming back.

The reason an e-commerce site would benefit from Yotpo is quite straightforward. First, it helps build a sense of trust and authenticity. In the online shopping world, customers rely heavily on reviews and ratings from other customers. Yotpo allows businesses to display these real customer reviews, helping to build credibility.

Second, it can enhance a site’s SEO. Fresh and relevant user-generated content, like reviews, can help a site rank higher in search engine results. Lastly, Yotpo provides businesses with valuable insights into their customers’ behavior and opinions, which can be used to improve their offerings.

The added bonus of loyalty and referral programs encourages repeat business and customer referrals, further increasing sales and customer loyalty.

ClickTale

ClickTale integrates a Mouse Tracking Suite, Heatmap Suite, and Conversion Suite into one robust tool designed to optimize your e-commerce website’s potential. ClickTale supports Session Playback on both desktop and mobile platforms, allowing you to replay customers’ sessions on your website.

Additionally, ClickTale offers comprehensive heatmaps for both desktop and mobile, inclusive of link analytics. The conversion tools provided by ClickTale encompass Form Analytics and Conversion Funnels.

Beyond these tracking and conversion optimization tools, ClickTale also features a suite of analytics and site efficiency tools. These include a JS Errors Report that identifies and prioritizes JavaScript errors, a Page Console that displays the most engaged and clicked pages and elements, and a Bounce Rate Report that identifies various user bounce types.

Heatmap

Heatmap is a tool that collects and displays real-time data for your websites. These heatmaps are swiftly generated and constantly updated, allowing you to make modifications to your website and observe the effects immediately.

Heatmap also employs an ‘augmented reality’ approach to the interface, featuring a sidebar that provides real-time data. This allows you to interact with and browse your pages even while the heatmap data is displayed on the screen.

Installing Heatmap is straightforward, requiring only a small JavaScript tag to be inserted into your website’s code. This tag is compact and asynchronous, ensuring that the loading time of your website is not affected. The JavaScript tag is compatible with all browsers, Ajax navigation, and fixed elements. It even supports responsive design and dynamic elements.

Pure Chat

One of the most crucial aspects of delivering an excellent shopping and user experience, and consequently, cultivating returning customers, is offering top-notch live customer support to address any inquiries they might have.

Pure Chat serves as a fantastic and free tool for this purpose. Pure Chat is one of the simplest methods to integrate live chat into an e-commerce website, allowing you to interact directly with customers while they browse your products and make purchases.

Pure Chat enables you to tailor the appearance of the chat widget to match your website, and it even provides a library of in-app images to enhance the chatting experience further.

Moreover, Pure Chat offers Hosted Chat pages, which allow you to connect with customers and buyers even if you don’t have a dedicated e-commerce website. Hosted Chat pages are compatible with eBay and Etsy pages, as well as Craigslist listings.

SurveyMonkey

SurveyMonkey is a renowned survey tool that can be extremely beneficial for optimizing your e-commerce website. SurveyMonkey surveys are not confined to being exit-only; it provides real-time results and an exceptionally user-friendly web-based survey tool.

It also offers a variety of survey templates and visual themes for optimal ease of use. Additionally, SurveyMonkey includes a feature for validating or requiring survey responses.

SurveyMonkey provides several methods to deploy or send your survey: you can distribute your survey via a web link, email, or Twitter. Alternatively, you can share it on Facebook, deploy it in a pop-up window, or embed it directly into your website. Paid accounts also allow you to download responses, filter and cross-tabulate data, and access other useful tools.

Google Analytics Experiments

Google Analytics Experiments is Google’s own free A/B testing service, and it’s part of Google Analytics. Formerly known as Google Website Optimizer, Google Analytics Experiments allows you to test different versions of a website in order to analyze important data such as bounce rate and session duration.

This is particularly useful for testing site revisions; simply set up a Google Analytics Experiment with the original site and the new version to see how both perform.

With Google Analytics Experiments, you can select the percentage of visitors included in the tests, as well as choose the objectives you’re aiming to test. The Experiments service comes with its own setup wizard to guide you through the process of creating a new experiment.

The post 10 Essential E-Commerce Tools for Your Business appeared first on Hongkiat.

The list includes many useful accessories like camera bags, straps and tripods etc, that can be really handy for a DSLR user in taking photographs easily and with much fun. So, let’s take a look.

1. Lowepro DryZone 200

Lowerpro DryZone 200 is a water-proof backpack for storing your DSLR camera. The bag has ample compartments with customizable divider system and tripod holder to carry your professional camera or video system along with 4 to 5 lenses.

As DSLR cameras are pretty expensive, therefore the bag is made with internal padding to save the equipment from damage. What makes it truly water-proof is the IPX7 rated rubberized nylon dry pod with sealed seems so you can easily take your camera in outdoor settings.

2. GorillaPod 5K

Joby GorillaPod has been in the market for quite some time and is a favorite of amateur as well as professional photographers. For DSLR owners this is specially a useful equipment that’s compact, lightweight, and a secure head for fixing your camera.

The best feature about GorillaPod is its stability and flexibility. Made with premium anodized aluminum, it has highly flexible legs that can be manuvered 360 degrees so you can use it in standing mode or wrap it around anything to capture amazing shots.

3. Rhino Rov Pro

Here is a motorized slider for your mirrorless DSLR camera. Rhino Rov Pro is a compact and handy slider that allows you to fix your camera or phone on top and control the slider with your smartphone. This way you can create beautiful shots super easily.

Portability is one of the best features of the Rov Pro slider. It is compact, lightweight, and easy to set up in a jiffy. Also, the slider has a high-quality aluminum extrusion and adjustable feet for for better stability.

4. Peak Design Travel Tripod

Photographers and videographers are often on the go and can really use a stable tripod that’s easy to travel with. So, here’s Peak Design Travel Tripod that is fast and easy to set up and offers uncanny stability.

The Travel Tripod is made in a way that it packs half the volume of traditional tripods without having any impact on its stability. You can mount a full frame DSLR camera, a telephoto lens and even your phone with an integrated phone mount and the tripod will give equal stability to every mounted device.

5. Peak Design Capture

As your camera captures nice shots, Peak Design Capture helps you carry it conveniently anywhere you want to take these shots. It is a professional and secure camera strap that keeps your DSLR camera securely fastened when you’re biking, running, hiking or even talking around indoors.

Unlike other camera straps in the market, it is very easy to access your camera instantly with Capture. It consists of a metal clip that clamps to any kind of strap like backpack or belt etc. You just need to press the quick-release button to access your camera.

6. Peak Design Slide

Another one from Peak Design, the Slide camera strap allows you to carry your camera as sling, on neck, or as a shoulder strap. The strap is padded from inside with nylon webbing that slides easily over clothes and a unique anchor link system that keeps your camera strongly fastened to the strap.

7. Peak Design Camera Cube

This amazing Camera Cube by Peak Design is a great travel case to store your precious DSLR camera along with lenses and other paraphernalia. It is designed to be mounted securely to any Peal Design camera bag and allows you to organizes your gear in multiple ways.

The case features waterproof nylon canvas shell with high-density sub-lining and a range of FlexFold dividers for customizing space with in the case. Moreover, there are high-quality dual-side zips and movable pockets for filters and lens caps etc.

8. Peak Design Lens Kit

As a professional photographer, you have to change the lens of your DSLR camera quite often. To ease your workflow in such situations, this Lens Kit by Peak Design comes in handy.

The Lans Kit allows you to change your camera lens just with one hand and gives a secure and stable place for storing the extra lens. You can attach it to your backpack, belt, or big and store up to 2 lenses in the kit.

9. Nomatic Memory Card Case

Here’s a handy little memory card case for carrying it along on a filming expedition. The case is made with durable material and can carry up to 2 c-fast cards and 6 SD cards. Additionally, it features a magnetic closure so all your cards remain safely tucked in.

10. Satechi USB 3.0 Card Reader

This versatile little device by Satechi features Type-C USB 3.0, an SD card reader, and a micro SD card reader all in one. You can simply connect it with your computer and easily do all kinds of data transfer from your SD or micro SD cards. It also has a really elegant aluminum finish and protective cover on both connectors.

11. White Balance Cards

Whenever you’re out on a shooting expedition, you need to check your camera’s white balance. This set of black, white, and grey cards can help you check your camera’s exposure anywhere as they can be attached to your keyring or camera bag etc.

These color calibration cards are waterproof and have a matte finish to minimize reflection. You’ll also get a free ebook on 18 Composition Rules For Better Photos delivered to your email.

12. MagicFiber Microfiber Cleaning Cloths

With an extensive use, your camera and lens gets dusty with lots of fingerprint marks. As the DSLR cameras are delicate and expensive, you cannot wipe it with just any fabric. These microfiber cleaning cloths are made just for that.

MagicFiber is made of high-quality microfiber material that cleans away dust, oil, smudges, and dirt etc. from your camera and other delicate devices. The clothes are 6×7 inches in size and come in protective poly bags.

13. KUVRD Universal Lens Cap

KURVD is a lens cap or lens cover for your delicate camera lenses. It is a one-size stretchable cover that fits most of the DSLR camera lenses.

Made with high-quality rubber, the cover is air-tight, waterproof, drift-proof, and shock resistant. You can simply cover your camera lens and take it to extreme weather without a care in the world.

14. XTWRUNI Universal Wireless Remote Control

It’s quite helpful in some situations to be able to remotely control your DSLR camera. XTWRUNI is a universal remote control compatible with Nikon, Pentax, Olympus, Panasonic, Sony, and Cannon cameras.

You can use the remote control to take selfies or when you want to take images without touching the camera. It has infrared connectivity and runs on Lithium Ion battery.

15. Sekonic Flashmate Light Meter

For professional photographers and videographers, getting a perfect light exposure for the camera is of utmost importance. This light meter detects exposure down to a tenth-of-a-stop for ambient as well as flash lights.

The most interesting thing about the light meter is that it offers different modes (Photo Mode, Cine Mode, and HD Cine Mode) for different purposes. Moreover it is compact and lightweight so you can easily carry it anywhere.

16. Zeiss Lens-Cleaning Kit

Here is a tactical flashlight wit multiple features. It creates superb brightness of 1380 lumens and is easily rechargeable through magnetic cable. It comes with rechargeable battery and LED light indicators that tell if the battery is full or drained. It also has a clip to slide it in your pocket or clip it with your bag.

Novoflex Multi-Tool is a Swiss knife for camera owners. It is a multi-tool with 8 different functions – Allen key 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6mm, Phillips screwdriver, slotted screwdriver, and a Trox T25 key. It caters to all mounting requirements when working with tripod and other camera accessories.

17. Tactical Flashlight

Here is a tactical flashlight wit multiple features. It creates superb brightness of 1380 lumens and is easily rechargeable through magnetic USB cable. The torch light is equipped with rechargeable battery and LED light indicators that tell if the battery is full or drained. There’s also a pocket clip to slide it in your pocket or clip it with your bag.

18. Novoflex Multi-Tool

Novoflex Multi-Tool is a Swiss knife for camera owners. It is a multi-tool with 8 different functions – Allen key 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6mm, Phillips screwdriver, slotted screwdriver, and a Trox T25 key. It caters to all mounting requirements when working with tripod and other camera accessories.

19. DJI Ronin-S

DJI Ronin is an amazing 3-axis hand-held camera gimbal for professional video making. It enables you to create the most stable shots of the most spontaneous moments with perfection.

There are different modes that you can apply to the gimbal like Smooth Track, Underslug, and Sports mode etc. It is also quite easy to set it up with Auto Tune and works with all DSLR cameras with direct camera control.

20. Glide Gear Snorricam

For capturing some absolutely creative shots, here is a 3rd person DSLR vest. You can mount your camera on the pole extension with the help of mounting accessories and create shots with a dynamic point of view. The pole is made of high-grade aluminum and weighs 2.5 kgs.

The post Gift Ideas For Professional DSLR Users appeared first on Hongkiat.

We’ve started seeing a lot of synths with open access to both the hardware schematics and the software or firmware (if any) at the heart of the synth.

DIY synths aren’t a new thing, but until a few years ago they used to be either super simple square wave toy synths or complex analog synths, with very little in between. These days, there’s a lot more to choose from, especially with the advent of microcontrollers running easily hackable firmware.

Here are 5 great open source and DIY friendly synths that you can play, build, modify or even use as jumping-off blocks for your own synth creations, listed in rough chronological order.

1. Mutable Instruments – Shruthi

Mutable Instruments’ Shruthi is a hybrid digital and analog monophonic synth that uses an 8-bit microcontroller to generate two oscillators plus a sub frequency oscillator.

The Shruthi-1’s oscillators are quite capable, though, and aren’t just limited to the square waves that you normally expect from DIY synth kits. Since they’re digital, the oscillators are also capable of wavetable synthesis and a smorgasboard of weird and "out-there" digital tones, such as formant synthesis and bit-crushed videogame-esque sounds.

The filter is all-analog, and by default the Shruthi comes with a four-pole low-pass filter. However, the fact that the filter is on a separate PCB means that you can easily swap filters, and there are a lot of different flavors of filter available for you to buy or build.

The Shruthi-1 also has an audio input, so you can use the filter to process external audio. The Shruthi-1 only comes in kit form and will require assembly.

[$203 kit; $39.50 – $75 enclosures]

2. Lush Projects LushOne

The LushOne is a system of small, low-priced synth modules, covering everything from base oscillator and filter combination, to sound-shaping envelopes to some effects and additional control.

All of these modules are connected to each other using small patch leads, letting you route signals and create sounds totally from scratch. The base unit contains two digital oscillators with five waveforms coupled to an analog filter, like most other synths in this list.

The Contour kit adds an ADSR envelope, a voltage-controlled amplifier (VCA) and a ring modulator. There’s also an Echo kit for adding echo effects to the LushOne.

The LushOne can be controlled via MIDI, but it also can interface with other modular equipment, since it has control voltage (CV) inputs for elements such as oscillator pitch and filter cutoff. The LushOne base unit and the additional modules all come as kits, and requires intermediate soldering skills

[$117 – $129 modules; $76.50 – $119 cases]

3. PreenFM 2

The PreenFM 2 is an open source, polyphonic, frequency modulation (FM) synth, with quite a lot of features packed into a small case. The PreenFM 2 actually consists of four separate and independent synth instruments in one little case.

Each of these instruments is quite well-equipped, with seven different modulation sources, a powerful arpeggiator sourced from Mutable Instruments’ algorithms, an effect slot for filters as well as one gate effect.

Each instrument can be set to respond to different MIDI channels so they can be played independently, or set to respond to the same channel for really rich tones.

The PreenFM 2 has between 8 and 16 voices of polyphony, great for big chords. It responds to MIDI via USB, so you can plug it directly into your computer and control, sequence and play it directly from your digital audio workstation (DAW) of choice, without needing any MIDI ports or MIDI to USB converters.

It also supports a USB stick for storing presets. It even supports presets from Yamaha’s classic DX7 synth. The PreenFM 2 comes as a kit, case included, and will need assembly.

[$252]

4. LittleBits Synth Kit

No list of open source synths would be complete without one of the highest-profile open source synth kits available today, the LittleBits Synth Kit. Designed in conjunction with Korg, the LittleBits Synth Kit is a collection of small synth modules that are completely modular – like the LushOne – and just snap together like Lego blocks, letting you create some reasonably full-featured synths from some basic building blocks.

Modules include a dual oscillator module, a filter module, a keyboard, an envelope and a micro sequencer, amongst others.

And, since the Synth Kit is built on the same platform as all of the other LittleBits kits and modules, it’s very easy to integrate a synth into other, more complex electronics creations.

The LittleBits Synth Kit is a bit lacking in connectivity at the moment, but connectivity modules – MIDI, CV and a USB input/output module – are coming over the course of the year, letting you integrate it into your existing workflow a lot easier.

The circuits are all open source, although the connectors themselves aren’t.

[$159]

5. Meeblip Anode

The Meeblip anode is the latest synth in Create Digital Music’s line of Meeblip synthesizers, one of the biggest names in the world of open source hardware synths.

The Anode is a hybrid digital and analog monophonic synth that combines square wave digital oscillators with a rich analog filter that covers a lot of sonic ground.

The Anode has a particular emphasis on generating bass sounds, and if you give a listen to the demos, you’ll find that the combination of 8-bit digital oscillators and an analog synth really help it create some rich and in-your-face bass sounds.

The Meeblip Anode might seem toy-like, but it’s a very capable synth: beyond the oscillators and resonant analog filter, you have some basic envelope controls, pulsewidth control for the oscillators as well as a low frequency oscillator (LFO) that can modulate either the filter cutoff or pitch of the oscillators.

Like most of the other synths in this list, the Meeblip Anode needs to be controlled over MIDI; you can use a MIDI keyboard to do this, but you can also use an iPhone or iPad if you get a MIDI adapter. The Meeblip Anode comes fully assembled.

[$139.95]

The post 5 Open Source Synthesizers You Can Build And Hack appeared first on Hongkiat.

Given the growing number of smartphone and tablet users, this is understandable, but there are still a lot of e-commerce retailers out there that haven’t been keeping up with the times and are still serving up unoptimized, unresponsive online stores to mobile users that can very easily drive mobile customers away.

Failing to provide a mobile-friendly shopping experience might just be putting you at a disadvantage, given the growing popularity of mobile Internet and mobile shopping, not to mention the multi-screen world we live in today.

However, if you’re yet to be convinced by the need for mobile optimization, or you’re just getting started with an e-commerce venture and want to see what the fuss is all about, read on for a quick run through of some reasons why you’ll want to get mobile-friendly as soon as possible.

What Is Mobile Commerce?

To boil it down to the very basics, mobile commerce (m-commerce) is electronic sales and commerce – in other words, e-commerce – using wireless handheld electronic devices such as smartphones and tablets.

To be clear, m-commerce is not a separate entity from e-commerce: instead, it’s a more specific sub-group of e-commerce transactions that involves the use of smartphones and tablets, instead of desktop and laptop computers.

The main goal in m-commerce is to ensure that your business’ shopping experience is well-suited to the smaller screen sizes that we see on smartphones and tablets.

Concepts such as responsive design and a mobile-friendly user experience are all important for your business’ m-commerce success, as well as mobile apps, but we’ll be covering all those in a later post.

For now, let’s take a look at why m-commerce is important for your business or e-commerce venture.

Growth In Smartphone And Mobile Internet users

The first, and most important reason you should care about mobile commerce is simply the fact that more and more people now own smartphones and tablets and connect to the Internet using these devices.

According to Mary Meeker’s 2014 Internet Trends report, smartphone usage has consistently grown over the past few years, so much so that 30% of mobile users are smartphone users.

Sure, that may not sound like a lot, but when the global mobile phone user base is 5.2 billion people, 30% still amounts to a healthy number of people. This goes hand-in-hand with a rapid rise in the percentage of users using mobile devices to access the Internet:

In addition, eMarketer indicates that more than 2.23 billion people worldwide will go online via mobile at least once a month, with the number of mobile Internet users increasing 15.6% globally in 2014 and continuing its double-digit growth trend all the way through 2016.

On a related note, Intelligent Positioning have predicted that, in the United Kingdom at least, smartphone and tablet Internet access will finally overtake desktop Internet access share by July 2014.

The Pew Research Internet Project found that, by May 2013, almost two-thirds of all mobile users used their phone to access the Internet.

These users aren’t mobile-only, but the fact that they do spend a statistically significant amount of time accessing the Internet using their mobile phones means that there’s definitely a chance that they’ll be doing some shopping on their device(s).

When you consider that mobile phone owners between the ages of 18 and 29 were the most likely to access the Internet using their mobile phones, and the fact that males and females between the ages of 18 and 34 were found to be most likely to engage in online shopping activity, then you have a very good reason to accommodate these users by making sure your websites are mobile-friendly.

Also, we musn’t forget the often forgotten, but significant, demographic of Internet users that only connect to the Internet using their mobile devices.

These mobile-only users are far more prevalent in emerging markets such as Indonesia and India, but there’s a significant mobile-mostly user base in the United States, too. The Pew Research Internet Project found that 34% of American cell Internet users accessed the Internet mostly using their phones.

Mobile Commerce Sales Are Increasing

According to Internet Retailer, retail sales via smartphones in the United States increased by 101% in the first quarter of 2014, compared to the same period in 2013.

In addition, the average order value on purchases made by smartphones increased 12% and conversion rates increased by 29%. What’s more, Forrester, a research firm, predicts that 29% of all e-commerce transactions in the United States in 2014 will be mobile commerce transactions.

As far as actual transaction amounts are concerned, the numbers are also quite impressive: PayPal processed $27 billion worth of mobile transactions in 2013, while Alipay exceeded even that, claiming that it had processed $150 billion worth of mobile transactions over the same period of time.

If these numbers aren’t enough to sway you, Forrester also expects mobile commerce transactions in the United States to total $114 billion in 2014. $76 billion will be from tablets, while the remainder will be from smartphones.

Invesp also predict an increase in mobile commerce spending, although they’re a bit less bullish on the matter: their prediction is that mobile commerce spending will reach $86.8 billion in 2016. Not as bullish as Forrester, but still a vote of confidence for the sustainability of the mobile commerce trend.

In fact, even Goldman Sachs are confident about the continual growth of mobile commerce. So much so that they estimate that 2014 will see $204 billion in mobile commerce transactions, while by the end of 2018, mobile commerce transactions will equal the amount of total e-commerce transactions conducted in 2013, a cool $626 billion. Sure, it’s a prediction, but the numbers are hard to ignore.

Couple this with research findings from 2012 that indicated that 63% of respondents expected to be doing more mobile shopping over the next few years and you have a strong indicator that it’s time to get in on mobile commerce.

On a related note, ad spend seems be tipping in favour of mobile right now, another indicator of the way things are heading. EMarketer estimates that, in 2014, desktop search ad spend will decrease by as much as $1.4 billion, down to $13.57 billion, while mobile search ad spend will increase up to $9.02 billion; yes, there’s still a nearly $5 billion gap in ad spend, but bearing in mind the growth of mobile Internet usage and mobile transactions, it’s not hard to imagine that advertisers will one day be spending more on mobile advertising than they do on desktop advertising.

Mobile Helps Even Traditional Retail Sales

Even if you run a traditional brick-and-mortar retail store, you can still benefit from smartphones and having some sort of mobile-friendly retail presence, whether it’s in the form of a responsive website or native app. For instance, research by Latitude from 2012 showed that a vast majority of respondents – 88% – agreed that having a mobile device that could provide real-time information actually made them more spontaneous when shopping.

A report from xAd and Telmetrics showed that purchase intent was high for both tablet and smartphone users, with 60% and 53% of users respectively making purchases related to their online activity. What’s most interesting about this, though, is that more than half – 53% – of all mobile users, and 74% of all smartphone users, were found to be making their purchases offline or in-store.

For an example of a retail store profiting from having a mobile app, you need look no further than Starbucks. With the aid of their mobile app, which lets users pay for their coffees, reload their Starbucks loyalty accounts and so on, Starbucks conducted $1 billion in mobile transactions in 2013:

Showrooming, the act of browsing retail store shelves yet using one’s smartphone to look for and purchase a better deal online, is often cited as a problem, yet a survey conducted in April 2013 showed that even amongst the 21.85% of respondents that showroomed, most (54%) ended up buying from the same retail chain anyway, albeit from the chain’s online store.

So, as you can see, it’s important to make sure that any customers who happen to be showrooming end up buying from your store anyway, and the best way to do that is to make sure your online store is mobile-friendly.

Mobile-Unfriendly Websites Drive Customers Away

At the end of the day, given the large and ever-growing number of mobile Internet users, the biggest reason to have a mobile friendly website is just the fact that a mobile-unfriendly website has every chance of driving potential customers away.

Even as early as 2012, a study from Google showed that mobile-friendliness was a key factor in purchase decisions, with 67% indicating that a mobile-friendly website made them more likely to buy a product or use a service. In addition, 61% indicated that a bad mobile experience made them more likely to leave.

And it’s not just customers that you stand to lose: the same study found that not having a mobile-friendly website actually hurt customers’ perception of the brand: 52% of users indicated that a bad mobile experience made them less likely to engage with the company, while 48% felt that a lack of mobile-friendliness made them think that the company didn’t care about their business.

Other research has provided similar information: Latitude reported that a good mobile experience improves brand perception for 61% of people.

In fact, given the emphasis Google seems to place on responsive, mobile-friendly web design – including a dedicated set of resources to making your website work across multiple devices – it’d be silly to not listen: after all, Google does rule the roost in terms of search, and it’d probably be in anyone’s best interests to do what Google likes, lest it harms your search rankings.

Conclusion

All of this isn’t to say that "traditional" e-commerce – purchases made on desktop and laptop computers – is dead and that you should move on to m-commerce.

The intention here was to highlight the way in which mobile commerce can no longer be ignored, and the reasons why your business and e-commerce venture(s) should be mobile-friendly.

It might be a few years before mobile commerce spending and revenue reaches the levels that e-commerce enjoys right now, but it’s definitely better to get in on it now and ride the wave, instead of having to play catch-up later on.

The post M-Commerce: Why Going Mobile Is Important For Businesses appeared first on Hongkiat.

With so many modules and kits available on the market, though, it can be a bit confusing if you’re not too well-versed in the subject. While it’s probably impossible to compile a definitive list of must-haves, it’s always nice to have a place to start. Here is a list of 10 fun kits and modules you should give a go.

LittleBits

LittleBits is a library of open-source electronics modules that simply snap together with magnets. LittleBits modules can be combined to create a large variety of different devices and projects.

There are a number of different LittleBits kits available to purchase, but you can also buy individual modules as well as accessories such as mounting boards and USB cables.

There are 3 beginner kits to choose from, as well as a Space Kit designed in collaboration with NASA, and a Synth Kit designed in collaboration with Korg. With all the options available, it’s easy to get a bit confused and not know where to start with the LittleBits.

Fortunately, the official LittleBits website has a large repository of projects you can make, complete with instructions, that should help you get to grips with what you can and can’t do with the LittleBits kit.

MeArm

The MeArm is an open-source robot arm design that’s designed to help children and adults learn about and develop an interest for technology and programming.

MeArm is a low-cost but high-quality robotics kit that allows you to start into the world of robotics through an easy yet fun way. You can use a number of platforms with it including Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Espruino, Beaglebone Black, and many more.

In addition to being an open source hardware platform, the fact that MeArm has Arduino at its core means that it’s going to be incredibly easy to reprogram it to do other things.

Hummingbird Duo

The Hummingbird Duo is two boards in one: the original Hummingbird controller, as seen in the Hummingbird Robotics kit, on one side, and an Arduino Leonardo on the other side.

The new dual design means that you can either use the Duo exactly like the original Hummingbird controller, or as an Arduino board with additional motor and servo shield as well as improved connectors, all of which are provided by the Hummingbird controller.

Like the previous Hummingbird, the Hummingbird Duo has been designed so that it’s easy and fun for all age groups. Hummingbird’s CREATE Lab visual programmer makes it incredibly easy to get started programming.

There are 2 kits available, the Base and Premium kits, and components in these kits include a HS-311 Servo, Pololu Gearmotor and other useful components.

Digispark Pro

The Digispark Pro is a compact and cheap USB-ready Arduino dev board. The Digispark Pro is an improvement upon the old Digispark: it still supports the more than 25 shields of the original Digispark, but with added capabilities and features.

The Digispark Pro is easier to use and program, has more pins and program space, and adds features such as WiFi, Bluetooth and BLE shields. The Digispark Pro is also ready for mobile development, and comes with examples for Android and iPhone.

The Digispark Pro has a number of interesting USB-related features. Firstly, it uses the new Micronucleus USB bootloader for easy programming over USB, direct from the Arduino IDE or command line.

In addition, the Digispark Pro can also emulate a USB Serial Port as well as various USB devices such as USB keyboards, mice and joysticks, and a Generic HID Device.

GoPiGo

The GoPiGo is a complete robotics kit for the Raspberry Pi, letting you turn your Pi into a mobile robot, complete with wheels, motors, controls and its own robust, reliable power supply. It also comes with an acrylic body so you won’t have to worry about sourcing or building your own.

However, do bear in mind that the GoPiGo itself doesn’t do much beyond turning your Pi into a mobile robot; it’s up to you to take advantage of the power of the Raspberry Pi to actually make the robot functional and useful.

The GoPiGo also comes with its own modified Raspbian OS, included in the kit. The acrylic body was also designed with the Raspberry Pi camera in mind, and offers two camera mounting options, either on the body or on a servo camera mount that will also turn 180 degrees.

The GoPiGo was designed with easy assembly in mind, and can be put together with only a screwdriver and about 10 minutes of your time.

The Spark Core’s WiFi controller uses Texas Instruments’ new CC3000, with a unique Smart Config technology that makes it very easy to get projects connected to the Internet.

As with most devices of this type, the Spark Core is completely open source, with all the hardware design files freely available, plus it’s also built on open source standards and protocols.

Touch Board

The Touch Board is an Arduino-compatible device that lets you translate touch into sound and a whole lot of other things. Basically, it’s a circuit that you can use to integrate interactivity and tactile response into a project, with the help of electric paint or any other sort of conductive material.

Just connect this conductive material to any one of the Touch Board’s 12 electrodes, and the Touch Board will then trigger an action – basically, anything you’d be able to program with an Arduino – when this conductive material is touched.

The Touch Board has both touch and distance sensing functionality, and it also works as an MP3 player or MIDI device, translating touch into sound.

There’s even a Micro SD slot so that you can completely change the sounds that the Touch Board will make just by changing the SD card. It has a 3.5mm audio output jack and is also HID capable, so you can use it as a keyboard or mouse.

TinyDuino

TinyDuino is a complete series of Arduino-compatible boards, the biggest appeal being their incredibly small size. TinyDuino boards pack the same amount of processing power as an Arduino Uno but are smaller than a United States quarter, making them incredibly suitable for projects where space is at a premium.

This small size is achieved by paring each module down to the basics and making them incredibly modular. The TinyDuino modules come as 20 x 20mm squares, but most of the modules can be cut into circular shapes.

There are a respectable number of modules available in the TinyDuino range, from the basic core Processor Board to various shields such as a MicroSD shield, a WiFi shield, a GPS shield and a USB and ICP shield.

The TinyDuino modules use small, low-cost connectors that still supports all the signals that a standard Arduino shield requires.

Spark Core

(Spark Core has been discontinued.)

The Spark Core is an Arduino-compatible development platform powered by a powerful ARM Cortex M3 running at 72MHz. In addition, the Spark Core is WiFi enabled, letting you program the Spark Core wirelessly. It also has cloud functionality with the Spark Cloud.

The Spark Cloud lets you access your projects from anywhere in the world, but it also gives you access to the Spark Core’s unique REST API, which lets you write software for mobile devices, computers and web applications that will interact with your hardware projects.

The post 10 Electronics DIY Kits and Modules to Experiment With appeared first on Hongkiat.

Cyfe is a cloud based, freemium application that lets you track and monitor a lot of different web sites and services in one place. If you constantly have to keep track of multiple metrics on a day-to-day basis, Cyfe might just be the app that will save you a lot of time and headaches.

Recommended Reading: Real Time Web Analytics Services – Best Of

Getting Started With Cyfe

There’s really nothing out of the ordinary about getting started using Cyfe. Just make your way to the website and register. Cyfe doesn’t have any integration with social network accounts, so you’re going to have to create a new Cyfe account.

Once you’ve registered and activated your account, you’ll be taken directly to your Cyfe dashboard.

Using Cyfe

Even though Cyfe is quite a powerful app, it’s not that hard to use. The two most important features are the widgets and the dashboards, so that’s what we’ll mainly be looking at. Let’s start off with the widgets.

Adding And Using Widgets

Just click on the Add Widget button in the top bar and you’ll be provided with a list of all the widgets Cyfe supports, grouped into different categories such as Advertising, Monitoring, Email and Social Media.

Once you’ve found a widget you want to use, just click on the Add button to the right of the widget name. This will add the widget to your dashboard, although it’ll be blank; you’re going to have to click on the Configure Widget button to set the widget up.

Clicking the Configure Widget button will open the Configure Widget window. What you’ll see here will depend on the widget. Here’s what the Configure Widget window looks like for the Facebook widget:

As you can see, there’s not really a lot to it. Once you’ve filled in all the required information, widgets will begin showing and tracking information. The information displayed by widgets differs according to widget, and can be seen in the Add Widget window.

A couple of things to note: firstly, you’re free to move and resize widgets as you see fit. Secondly, deleting widgets will also delete all historical data associated with the widget. Now, let’s head on to Cyfe’s dashboard features.

Cyfe Dashboards

You also have the option to create multiple Dashboards, which might come in handy if you want to monitor pages and sites related to different businesses or projects. Just click on the New Dashboard button, and you’ll be asked to name the new dashboard.

Cyfe will automatically change your view to the new Dashboard. You can switch between Dashboards using the drop-down menu, as well as rename your Dashboard by clicking on the Edit Dashboard button.

You also have a number of other Dashboard options accessible from the top bar. You can change the Dashboard’s background – Cyfe provides a few background options, but you can also upload your own background – as well as Export, Duplicate and Delete your Dashboard. You can also generate Public URLs that allow you to share your Dashboards, although this is a Premium-only feature.

Users And Settings

Let’s move on to the left-sided sidebar. From here, you can access the Users and Settings screens, as well as access Cyfe’s help form, go back to your Dashboards or logout.

The Users view lists all the users associated with the account. It shows information such as name, email address and last login, and you also have a quick shortcut to account settings. This is where you can Add Users, although, again, this is a Premium feature.

There are a fair bit of options you can access from Cyfe’s Settings screen. This includes personal and account settings, Dashboard settings such as currency and AdWords Margin, your Cyfe membership plan as well as custom branding of your Cyfe account.

Conclusion

All in all, Cyfe is a very useful dashboard application that lets you monitor and track sites and services in one place, helping you get a grip on all the important information that’s essential to your business or project. Cyfe even looks good on mobile, although you’re limited to viewing widgets on mobile, and can’t add widgets, dashboards or access any of the other features. Cyfe is a freemium service: you’re limited to five widgets with a free account, and Premium membership costs $19 a month or $168 per year.

The post Group and Monitor All Your Analytics In One Place With Cyfe appeared first on Hongkiat.

Getting to grips with the terminal and terminal commands isn’t the easiest thing, but Betty might just make things a lot easier. Betty is a Linux tool that can translate plain English commands into Linux terminal commands. In a sense, it’s a bit like Siri or Google Now for the Linux terminal.

The whole motivation behind the development, according to the GitHub page, was to allow users to use the terminal using natural language input, letting you do a lot of things without ever leaving the terminal or having to look up obscure terminal commands on the Internet.

Recommended Reading: Elementary OS Luna: The Linux Distro That Works Like Mac OS

Installing Betty

You’re going to have to delve into the Linux terminal to install Betty, but it’s a straightfoward process; just make sure you type these commands in exactly, and make sure your Linux install is up-to-date.

First off, you need to install Ruby, Curl and Git. Enter these commands into the terminal (if you already have these installed then you can skip these steps):

$ sudo apt-get install ruby curl

$ sudo apt-get install git

Once you have Ruby, Curl and Git installed, it’s time to install Ruby and set up an alias for easier usage. This assumes you have installed Betty into your Home folder.

$ cd ~ && git clone https://github.com/pickhardt/betty

$ echo "alias betty=\"~/betty/main.rb\"" >> ~/.bashrc

$ source ~/.bashrc

Also, if you’re running older versions of Ubuntu (such as 12.04), you might have to update Ruby to 1.9.1 to avoid getting a lot of errors when you run Betty commands. Just run these two commands:

$ sudo apt-get install ruby1.9.1

$ sudo update-alternatives –config ruby

When you run the second command, you’ll be prompted to choose your version of Ruby. Just select Ruby 1.9.1 by typing its selection number, press Enter and you’re good to go.

Using Betty

Once you’ve completed the installation process, you can start using Betty. There’s quite a bit you can do with Betty, and there’s a list of commands on the official GitHub page, with more and more commands being added as development progresses.

But let’s just look at some examples of what Betty can do. Let’s start with some basics. Betty can provide basic information such as time and date. Just type in Betty what time is it to get the time, and Betty what is the date to get the date.

Betty can also fetch and return other basic information such as your username, IP address, other logged in users, and so on.

You can also use Betty to compress and uncompress files and folders.

In addition to actions related to your machine, Betty also has a web mode that will let you execute Internet queries. These queries include checking the weather, translating words and even looking up people, things and places.

A couple of things to note: firstly, these are only a handful of examples of what Betty can do. Some experimentation, and a quick look at the list of commands available on the GitHub, should reveal everything else Betty can do (including controlling iTunes and Spotify).

Secondly, since Betty aims to understand natural language input, there are a lot of different ways to word the same request – you just need to experiment to find out what they are.

Conclusion

Betty is quite a useful tool for anyone interested in using the Linux terminal, as well as for anyone with a passing interest in the development of natural language input systems for computers.

The fact that Betty shows the commands it executes also makes it great for anyone trying to learn Linux terminal commands, since it helps you associate often abstract commands with natural English-like sentences.

It may still be a bit limited in what it can do, but the fact that it’s under active development means that it’s definitely a tool to keep an eye on even if it’s yet to be your cup of tea in its current state.

The post Betty: Turn Generic English Into Linux Terminal Commands appeared first on Hongkiat.

Furthermore, this will signify the debut of Amazon’s Fire OS on smartphones, which is likely to pique the curiosity of certain observers.

Kindle Fire users are probably already familiar with Fire OS. However, if you haven’t been keeping up with the Kindle Fire models and are only now considering purchasing an Amazon device, you might be interested in learning more about Fire OS and how it differs from standard Android.

Is Fire OS Android?

To answer the question of whether Fire OS is Android, the simple answer is no.

Although Fire OS is built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) variant of Android, Amazon has separated Fire OS from the entire Google ecosystem and created their own unique ecosystem on top of the Android base.

How is this achieved? Without delving too deeply into technicalities, the Android that most of us are familiar with can be split into two parts: the open-source base, known as the “Android Open Source Project (AOSP)”, and the closed-source Google-branded apps and services.

Therefore, what most of us encounter when we use an Android device is a blend of an open-source OS with a closed-source Google ecosystem. In the case of Fire OS, while it is based on the Android OS, it substitutes the closed-source Google ecosystem with its own closed-source, walled-garden Amazon ecosystem.

Detaching from the Mothership

As one might expect, Google is not particularly enthusiastic about allowing Android forks to access Google services and its ecosystem. This is where Fire OS diverges from standard Android – since Amazon doesn’t have access to any of the closed-source Google APIs, Fire OS has been disconnected from Google services, including the crucial Google Play Store and Google Maps.

In essence, Fire OS can be viewed as Android without all the (often Google-branded) features of Android that people enjoy. Despite developing their own replacement or equivalent APIs, Amazon’s Fire OS simply doesn’t offer the same experience as Android.

Additionally, this situation also determines where Amazon devices are produced. All manufacturers who produce Android Google devices are part of the Open Handset Alliance, where members are contractually prohibited from manufacturing devices that do not receive Google’s approval.

In other words, members of the Alliance are not allowed to build devices running Android forks. Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablets (and possibly the upcoming smartphone) are manufactured by Quanta Computer.

Understanding the Fire OS Ecosystem

For many manufacturers, losing access to Google APIs and services would be a significant setback. However, Amazon is not your typical manufacturer. The constraints of Fire OS actually make it an ideal component of a larger system that includes Amazon-related apps and services like the Amazon Appstore, Amazon Instant Video, and the Kindle Store.

Fire OS is designed to encourage and guide users towards purchasing and using Amazon products and content.

The interface prominently displays media content, and the easily navigable menu options allow you to purchase and access apps, games, ebooks, videos, and more, all from Amazon. The interface is user-friendly, and updates are automatically pushed to all Kindle devices without any complications.

Fragmentation is not a problem with Fire OS.

Amazon has developed its own APIs to replace or mimic some of Google’s proprietary APIs. For example, Fire OS has its own API for push notifications, called Amazon Device Messaging, and GameCircle, which is their version of Google’s Play Games API. Despite Amazon having equivalents for most of Google’s APIs, developers still encounter challenges when porting apps and games to Fire OS.

This certainly contributes to the fact that Fire OS’s selection of apps and games cannot compete with what is available on the Google Play Store. According to App Annie, the Amazon app store only has about 190,000 apps, a small fraction of the 1.5 million apps available on the Google Play Store.

So, is Fire OS inferior to Android? That entirely depends on the type of user you are:

If you’re a fully subscribed Amazon Prime member, or if you get most of your digital content from Amazon, then Fire OS is a pretty impressive operating system. The fact that the Amazon smartphone comes with Prime Data – where any data used when consuming Amazon media content doesn’t count towards your monthly data cap – certainly sweetens the deal.

However, if you’re not a fan of Amazon, the Amazon-branded services won’t compensate for the lack of Google APIs and access to the offerings in the Google Play Store. In that case, you might consider rooting your device.

Unlocking Fire OS

Fire OS is fundamentally an Android-based operating system, hence, it’s entirely feasible to unlock Fire OS by installing Google Play Services, albeit this might involve venturing into some grey areas. You have two alternatives: you can either root your Fire OS device and install Google Play Services in that manner, or you can sideload Google services and apps onto your Fire OS device.

Rooting is the superior choice if you desire full compatibility with the Google ecosystem, but it does come with a drawback: it technically nullifies your warranty. Therefore, you should carefully weigh whether gaining full access to the Google ecosystem is worth the invalidated warranty.

Rooting

This article doesn’t have the space to delve into the intricacies of what rooting is and how to execute it on your Kindle, but there are numerous guides available online about rooting a Kindle Fire. Rooting also allows you to install alternative kernels that can enhance performance or battery life, and it’s a part of the process of installing a completely new ROM.

Sideloading

Sideloading is a method where you install apps or services by transferring them to your device’s internal storage and then executing the installer, rather than downloading it from an app store.

Most apps will operate fine, but you’ll likely encounter error messages quite frequently; they won’t prevent you from using the apps, but they can become somewhat irritating. Nevertheless, it’s a minor inconvenience to endure if you really need an app that isn’t available on the Amazon app store.

Why Launch a Fire OS Smartphone?

Let’s pause for a moment and consider this pressing question: Why introduce a smartphone running on Fire OS into an already saturated market? The answer lies in the fact that a Fire OS smartphone creates a constant, direct link between Amazon and its consumers. A smartphone, being more portable than a tablet, is the perfect tool for those who prefer shopping on the move.

If Amazon plays its cards right, this new smartphone could further integrate the Amazon ecosystem into its customers’ daily routines through m-commerce and impulse purchases.

Remember the 3D display technology that is set to be a key feature of the Amazon smartphone? Coupled with head tracking capabilities, it could provide consumers with a more immersive shopping experience. This technology would allow consumers to view physical products from various angles, in addition to offering multi-perspective media content – a truly exciting prospect.

Of course, this is all speculative at this stage. However, it seems that the primary goal of introducing Fire OS on the smartphone is not so much about selling the device itself, but rather about extending the reach of Amazon’s content and media ecosystem directly into the pockets of users.

Final Thoughts

While it may be disappointing that Google exercises such tight control over their services, APIs, and Android in general, this control could arguably be beneficial for Amazon. Amazon has transformed the challenges they’ve faced into a replacement OS that provides users with a unique and user-friendly online shopping experience, exclusively for Amazon products.

Admittedly, the limited number of apps could potentially be a drawback for the Amazon smartphone, as users might expect more from a device they carry with them all the time. However, its emphasis on simplicity, easy content consumption, and a low-pricing strategy, which makes it a suitable platform for tweaking and modding, offers a distinct experience compared to the standard Android. Whether this is better or worse will entirely depend on the type of user you are and what you expect from your device.

The post How Amazon’s Fire OS Will Change the Way We Shop appeared first on Hongkiat.

There’s actually been a fair bit of excitement about the smartphone, although it’s mostly centered around the aforementioned 3D capabilities. That said, Amazon shares rose 5.4% after the announcement, which says quite a bit about the climate surrounding the smartphone.

But hold up, before we get carried away, it’s probably a good idea to bring in some perspective by taking a look at some issues Amazon might have in trying to push their flagship smartphone to compete in an already-saturated smartphone market.

Lackluster Phone Specs

Despite the looming deadline, days away, the most we’ve heard about Amazon’s debut smartphone is that there may be two, instead of one. A Boy Genius Report post from April indicated that at least one of the two smartphones looking to be launched this week will be targeted at entry-level users. The other, a higher-spec phone will apparently be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor with 2GB of RAM and a 720p, 4.7-inch screen. Little else is shared.

(Image Source: Boy Genius Report)

The leaked specifications aren’t exactly stellar, and even the higher-end variant seems to be targeted at the mid-lower-end of the market. The choice in resolution, if the leaked details are true is also more of a setback considering media content would benefit more from a higher pixel density a 1080p display would provide. For a phone that’s ostensibly about encouraging consumers to buy media from Amazon, the combination of resolution and screen size might be a bit of an issue.

It does come with some nifty features such as Prime Data and head tracking (more on these two later) but first let’s take a look at why this upcoming smartphone may not carry a high price tag.

A Low-Pricing Strategy…

If you are familiar with Amazon’s mobile devices, you would notice that they are available at relatively low prices: for instance, the 7-inch variant of the Kindle Fire HDX retails for less than half the price of the equivalent iPad Mini with Retina yet boasts an almost identical PPI – 323 for the Kindle, compared with 326 for the iPad Mini.

There’s no reason to expect the Amazon smartphone to buck this trend of offering great bang for buck because that’s not how Amazon makes its earnings. Amazon’s devices ensure that buyers get locked into Amazon’s ecosystem, without having any access to the Google Play Store or any of the other Google-branded features that you might admire about Android. This is how Amazon can afford to sell their devices so cheap: they make most of their money from product purchases.

According to Business Insider, Kindle-owning Amazon users spend, on average, $443 more than Amazon users who don’t own Kindles: $1,233 per year as compared to $790 a year. The lack of profit on devices is made up for by the increased profit made off of Amazon purchases. Overall, estimates peg Kindle profit at $565 million, which is a pretty big amount. Imagine the sort of surge in buying if Amazon users have a pocket-sized Amazon device on them all the time.

(Image Source: Business Insider)

… That Goes Against The Grain

Then again, while this pricing strategy may have worked out for the Kindle Fire, Amazon may face a bit of a resistance from the smartphone. The thing is, at least in the US, nobody pays full price for a smartphone; most consumers buy their phones on contract.

On top of that, getting users to buy an Amazon smartphone will be tough, seeing as how there are plenty of competition coming from lower-priced phones such as the Moto G, Moto E and Nokia X. They’ve also had a pretty good headstart. Safe to say that this means that the Amazon smartphone can’t compete on price alone. It’s going to have to be a combination of price, specs and features, speaking of which…

Do You (Really) Need These Features?

The thing that is making headlines when it comes this Amazon smartphone is the head-tracking functionality, achieved with four infra-red cameras positioned at the front of the smartphone. Potential uses for this head-tracking technology include 3D effects and gesture-based navigation. This head-tracking will probably be complemented with a novel tilt-to-control interface, letting you navigate by tilting the phone in certain directions.

Until the phone is launched though, most of what is out there are at best rumors of of how this head-tracking feature can really relate to smartphone user habits.

What does show better promise however, is a special wireless data plan offered alongside the smartphone. Known as Prime Data, this service is going to be a Sponsored Data-type service. Basically, if you use Prime Data to consume Amazon content, the mobile data used will not eat into your monthly data cap. The downside is that this may mean that the smartphone will be exclusive to AT&T.

Nonetheless, what this means it that you won’t have to worry about streaming full albums or a movie purchased from Amazon, since that won’t count towards your mobile data cap. If you’re a media fiend and a big fan of Amazon’s offerings, this is definitely something that’s going to be up your alley.

(Image Source: Boy Genius Report)

It’s more likely that Prime Data is going to have a bigger effect than the head-tracking feature to make consumers opt for Amazon’s smartphone over competing devices. And don’t forget, this will benefit only users who buy Amazon products.

Breaking Into Saturated Emerging Markets

In order to be considered a success, the Amazon smartphone is going to have to make a splash outside the US, which opens up a different set of obstacles, altogether. It’s impossible to deny that Android is the leader in emerging markets, which is going to make it tough for the Amazon smartphone to compete.

For instance, trying to add value to the smartphone with Prime Data, so far the strongest feature that would make you even consider the smartphone, may not be as successful outside of the United States.

Telecommunications work differently across borders. Amazon might face difficulties in negotiating Prime Data deals with service providers, which in turn will put a dent in Amazon’s strategy of making money off the locked-in ecosystem it is trying to build up. Apart from the lack of a sponsored-data mechanism, slower, and less reliable mobile Internet connections found in emerging markets may stop users from consuming Amazon’s media content.

(Image Source: STBY)

There are perks of the fact that Fire OS is fundamentally Android – it’s going to be easy to root, which allows users to break free of the locked-in ecosystem. Then again, it is hard for the Amazon smartphone to escape from the looming spectre of other low-cost Android smartphones, which are already in these markets and does not require root access to use Google Play Store.

Also of unrelenting significance, peer pressure particularly in smartphone ownership is hard to ignore. Consumers will want to have access to all the stuff their friends and family are using, and if they all happen to be using Android phones – the smartphone market is incredibly crowded – then the cheaper, more accessible Android phone may trump Amazon’s latest offering, without even trying.

Final Thoughts

A lot of non-Amazon users are attracted to the Kindle Fire tablets because on top of the low prices, and respectable hardware, it’s generally quite easy to unlock the bootloader and flash a “pure” Android OS installation onto the Kindle. It will be possible to do this with the Amazon smartphone too, of course, but that’ll probably totally break the head-tracking functionality and any other features that come with.

Of course, it’s been a couple of months since the specifications leaked, so it is possible that there may be a couple of surprises the launch will unveil. And depending on how Amazon prices it its debut phone it could be the difference between a calculated success that puts Amazon on the smartphone market, or a device that only Amazon fanatics will even consider.

The post Selling Amazon’s Upcoming Smartphone: A Challenging Task appeared first on Hongkiat.

Badly designed uniforms can take out a whole team, like what happened to team USA in the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics recently. In badminton, line-call technology is now used to assist line judges for when players challenge their ball is "in or out" calls.

The FIFA World Cup is also no stranger to technological innovation. The 1970 World Cup, for instance, was the first one to be broadcast in colour.

For the first time, footballs fans get to watch matches live on TV from their living rooms and see their favorite teams’ uniforms in all its glorious colors. This upcoming 2014 will be no different when it comes to debuting new technologies in the world of football and international sports.

Let’s check out some of the highlights to look forward to.

1. Goal Line Technology

Goal line technology may well prove to be the most important, and notable, new technology to make its debut at the World Cup.

It’s been used in European club football over the past year, most notably in the English Premier League, as well as in some smaller international competitions, but the World Cup is going to be the biggest footballing event to ever implement goal line technology.

After an extended period of trials and testing, FIFA appointed GoalControl GmbH as the official provider of goal line technology for the 2014 World Cup.

Goal line technology aims to assist referees in making calls on whether the ball has crossed the goal line and whether a goal should be awarded.

It does this by using 14 high-speed cameras positioned around the stadium which track the position of the ball in 3D. When the ball crosses either goal line, the referee will be alerted via a wristwatch that’s synced to the GoalControl system.

You only need to look back at Geoff Hurst’s 1966 World Cup Final goal for England against West Germany and Frank Lampard’s controversially disallowed goal in the 2010 World Cup to see how goal line technology will help the sport and referee decisions.

2. 4K Coverage And Broadcast

4K has to be one of the more interesting developments in display technology recently. We’re all used to our HD 1080p displays, but 4K takes things way beyond that, with a display resolution of 3840 x 2160 pixels.

And what better way to take advantage of this new high-resolution technology than to watch the World Cup in all its 4K glory?

Well, Sony and FIFA have joined forces to do just that: broadcast certain World Cup 2014 matches in glorious 4K resolution. However, they’re not going to be broadcasting the whole World Cup in 4K. Instead, Sony’s aim with this partnership is to more towards bringing this technology to the mainstream.

To this end, 3 World Cup 2014 matches will be shot and broadcasted in 4K: one Round of 16 match, one semi-final and of course, the final match itself. Match footage will also be included in the Official FIFA 2014 World Cup film, which will also be in 4K.

The film will be released after the conclusion of the World Cup. FIFA has also confirmed that World Cup fanzones in Brazil will also be showing some 4K content.

3. Vanishing Spray

If you’re an ardent football watcher, you’re probably familiar with this situation: when the attacking team is awarded a direct free kick near the opposition penalty area, the defensive wall is nearly always just a bit too close.

This gives the defending team a slightly unfair advantage, triggering complaints from the attacking team and a delay as the referee tries to get the defensive wall to move back to the regulatory 10 yards’ distance.

Well, this might be a thing of the past at the 2014 World Cup, since referees will now be using vanishing spray to mark out the 10 yard distance.

When a free kick is awarded, the referee will walk 10 yards from the site of the offense and then spray a line on the pitch to indicate where the defensive wall should should stand. This line will disappear within a minute or two, so there’s no risk of the line overstaying its welcome or having any untoward effects on the match itself.

This vanishing spray technology has been used for a while in South American leagues, but this is the first time it’s being used in a major international tournament.

4. Brazuca

As always, the ball itself is also quite a technological marvel. In the previous World Cup, footballers complained furiously about the Jabulani ball being hard to control, behaving erratically whilst in the air.

This, as you’d expect, is not something FIFA want to happen again at the 2014 World Cup.

Adidas claims that the Brazuca, the official match ball for the 2014 World Cup, will be different; in a press statement, they claim that the ball will meet and exceed all FIFA metrics.

According to Adidas, the Brazuca has been tested for more than 2.5 years and has gotten the approval of world-class footballers such as Lionel Messi, Iker Casillas, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Dani Alves and the one and only Zinedine Zidane.

This level of performance apparently has a lot to do with the Brazuca’s construction. The Brazuca is unique in that it’s made out of six interlocking urethane panels with thousands of little dimples – somewhat reminiscent of a basketball ball – that apparently improve the ball’s grip, stability and aerodynamics.

5. Mind-Controlled robotic Suit

Now, for something a little bit different. This isn’t going to be featured in any of the matches, and it won’t have anything to do with the broadcasts, but the 2014 FIFA World Cup will be the public’s first glimpse of an exciting new robotic exoskeleton that might just be the future replacement for the wheelchair.

On the opening day of the World Cup, a young Brazilian paraplegic will use this robotic suit to walk to the centre of the pitch and kick a ball, marking the opening of the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

The mind-controlled robotic exoskeleton, built from lightweight alloys and powered by hydraulics, is the culmination of many years of work by the Walk Again project, an international group of scientists.

The exoskeleton also comes with a cap which will pick up the user’s EEG signals, which will then be translated by a computer in the exoskeleton’s backpack into movement commands for the exoskeleton legs.

While it will probably take a while before a robotic exoskeleton actually replaces the wheelchair, it’s definitely an exciting development that will be great to see at the opening ceremony of the World Cup.

The post 5 New Technologies Used in FIFA World Cup appeared first on Hongkiat.

Wearable computers seemed like a fanciful idea only recently, but now they’re pretty much the next big thing to go mainstream. The emergence of the Oculus Rift could probaby catapult virtual and augmented reality into literal reality.

With this in mind, here’s a list of 10 interesting futuristic technologies that we’ll most probably be seeing in the near future. Although these are mostly still in the very early stages, they’re at something of a middle ground.

While you won’t see these readily available everywhere yet, but at least we now know that in due time, they will become actual products we can see, touch and utilize. Without further ado, here’s the list.

1. Jet Pack International H202

Jet Pack International are making great strides in jetpack technology H202 and H202-Z jetpacks. As the name suggests, both the H202 and H202-Z are hydrogen peroxide-fueled jetpacks that will allow uers to fly at up to 77 miles per hour at a maximum height of 250 feet.

So far thought, the higher-capacity H202-Z is only capable of a maximum flight length of 33 seconds and a maximum travel distance of 3,300 feet.

But you have to admit, it’s a start. The Jet Pack International units have great potential, and the lacking travel time and distance is outweighed by how mobile and controllable the flight is and how compact the units actually are.

The Jet Pack International H202 and H202-Z are actually currently available, albeit not commercially: you can assemble the jetpack yourself, if you have $100,000 lying around.

2. Aerofex Aero-X

If you’re a Star Wars fan, the Aerofex Aero-X, a real-life equivalent of the Star Wars speeder bike, is definitely something you’ll want to keep your eyes on. The Aero-X is the result of more than 15 years of research and development.

Powered by a water-cooled 240 horsepower engine and two large rotors, the Aero-Xcan hover at an altitude of 12 feet and at speeds of up to 45 miles per hour power. It can also carry up to 310 pounds. Think of the potential.

Also, as a result of this extended research and development period, Aerofex claims to have overcome the dangerous coupling effect that can arise due to using two rotors, ensuring that the Aero-X will be safe and easy to control.

The Aero-X is currently available for preorder for a refundable $5000 deposit. The final unit is scheduled to be available in 2017 at the price of $85,000.

3. Prosthetics With A Sense Of Touch

In March 2013, Denis Aabo Sorensen had the privilege of testing a new type of prosthetic hand, created by a group of European engineers and scientists.

Unlike conventional prosthetics, the new prosthetic hand connects directly to the remaining nerves in Denis’ upper arm. This means that the "hand" has a sense of touch and is actually controllable.

Blindfolded tests showed that Denis was indeed able to differentiate between different items such as a bottle, a baseball and a mandarin orange. It also could exert different levels of pressure, allowing Denis to touch, hold or grab something.

While this prosthetic hand is indeed a great leap forward, it’s still far from ready for widespread use: the arm required electrodes to be implanted directly into Sorensen, and tests still need to be carried out to determine the durability of these electrodes.

In addition, the hand required a lot of processing power, and was hooked up to a laptop; researchers are working on making the processing computer small enough to be integrated within the implant itself.

4. TALOS "Iron Man suit"

TALOS stands for Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit, a combat suit that the US Army hopes will become a reality within the next four years. The TALOS provides ballistic, shock and fire protection for Special Operations soldiers.

The aim is to provide these soldiers with better, more mobile and more versatile protection than what currently exists. The development of the TALOS suit will be a collaborative effort between universities, government agencies and corporations.

While there is yet to be a working prototype, development is proceeding at a rapid pace. The head of the US Special Operations Command, Admiral William McRaven is confident that unpowered prototypes will be ready in June. There is also the goal of testing a complete working prototype in August 2018.

Don’t expect to be able to buy this, of course, although there’s every chance that some of the tech here could eventually trickle down to civilian uses.

5. Titan Arm

The Titan Arm is the work of a team from the University of Pennsylvania and is a strength-enhancing upper-body exoskeleton that’ll help you lift an extra 40 pounds. Granted, it’s a far cry from the Powerloader we see (and love) in the Alien films but the Titan Arm was designed with a more humble goal in mind.

The Titan Arm is built to help rehabilitate people who’ve suffered serious arm injuries or strokes as well as provide some extra strength and protection for anyone who lifts heavy objects for a living.

To keep costs low, the Titan Arm uses 3D printing techniques allowing the prototype development costing to be reduced to £1200. This, and the fact that the developers gained extra funding by winning the 2013 James Dyson Award, means that the Titan Arm may just become a commonplace sight in the near future.

6. Super Maglev Train

Chinese researchers have been looking into the next phase of train transportation. China and Japan already have very fast Maglev trains that are capable of reaching over 260 miles per hour, but the new next-gen Maglev technology, dubbed super Maglev, will apparently be even faster.

Super Maglev is built on the same Maglev technology, but it encapsulates the train in a vacuum tube, further reducing air resistance, allowing for higher, mind-boggling speeds. Researchers claim that such enclosed-tube Maglev systems could see trains reaching speeds of up to 1800 miles per hour.

Of course, there are doubts about the feasability of constructing long vacuum tubes and keeping them pressurised, but if scientists and engineers can figure that out, we may one day be able to cross large distances quicker and more safer than we’ve ever imagined possible.

7. Cave2

Cave2 is a hybrid reality environment that lets artists, scientists and engineers become fully immersed in their research. The Cave2 is a 360° wraparound structure consisting of 72 LCD panels, a 20-speaker surround sound system and a 10-camera optical motion tracking system.

With 3D glasses, scientists and engineers will actually be able to virtually experience and move through anything of their choosing, whether it’s the human body or planets in the solar system.

The Cave2 holds an immense amount of potential, especially for situations involving large amounts of data requiring visualization.

In fact, a recent project fed crime data from the city of Chicago into Cave2, allowing policymakers and investigators to virtually fly through Chicago, accompanied by real-time crime data and information.

8. 3D Printed Food

3D printing has taken the world by storm, and slowly but surely people are being won over by the idea that it’s for more than just gadgets. Food is also something that can be feasily 3D printed.

German company, Biozoon, is harnessing the power of 3D printing to create seneoPro, a range of 3D-printable powder mixtures that solidifies when printed but also very quickly melts when eaten.

The main target for this new 3D-printable food are elderly patients who suffer from dysphagia, or the inability to swallow.

Such a technology would definitely reduce the risk of choking, and the 3D-printed nature of seneoPro means that caregivers and family members can very easily mix and match the powders to create all types of dishes.

And you can also add coloring agents and texturizers to make the food even more appealing.

9. High Power Wireless Charging

Wireless charging, up until now, usually means charging via a pad, rather than via wires and cables. But if you ask the team from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology wireless charging can also be done a distance away.

The team recently demonstrated a prototype of a new Dipole Coil Resonant System (DCRS) that can wirelessly power devices up to 15 feet away.

The DCRS system achieves this using a magnetic field, and is apparently powerful enough to charge up to 40 mobile phones, and can even power larger devices, like a TV.

There’s no word yet on how soon we’ll be seeing this technology in the real world, but in the mean time you can check out Cota, a somewhat similar wireless charging technology that’s coming soon.

10. StoreDot Fast Charging Battery

StoreDot, a ground-breaking nanotechnology company, recently unveiled a prototype for a next-generation battery that harnesses all their knowledge of nanotechnology and energy storage technologies.

StoreDot uses bio-organic "nanodots" that have increased electrode capacitance and electrolyte performance.

The science is a bit complex, but the outcome is simple: as a result of these nanodots, the battery can be fully charged in only 30 seconds.

The best thing is that, since StoreDot’s nanodots are bio-organic, they’re a lot more environmentally friendly, not to mention power-efficient, than a lot of other competing nanodot technologies which often use dangerous metals and chemicals.

They’re also apparently cheap to manufacture, so who knows, we may be seeing super-fast batteries in our smartphones before too long.

Bonus: “Back To The Future” Hoverboard

Yeah, we know, it was a hoax, but for a brief, glorious moment, it seemed like all ourBack to the Future-fueled dreams were coming true: an actual working hoverboard that wasn’t just a scientific experiment constrained to a laboratory.

The promo video, from a company named HUVr and featuring famous faces like Tony Hawk and Dr. Emmet Brown himself doing everything from just riding around to catching footballs and even controlling the hoverboard with an iPhone.

As it turned out only a day later, the video and the entire hoverboard was a hoax by Funny or Die, but the fact that it captured the imagination of so many people shows that, yes, people really do want hoverboards.

It’s safe to say that if reserachers ever do figure it out, it’ll be an achievement that nobody will ever forget.

More Related:

• 5 Exciting Emerging Trends In Gaming
• 5 Key Features To Expect In Future Smartphones
• 8 Technologies That Will Shape Future Classrooms
• 9 Smart Car Technologies We Want To See (A Geek’s Wishlist)
• How Smartphones Are Revolutionizing Diagnostic Medicine
• 8 Next-Generation User Interface That Are (Almost) Here

The post 10 Futuristic Technology That May Come True (Very Soon) appeared first on Hongkiat.

Announced in Apple’s 2014 WWDC, Yosemite brings with it a raft of changes that are going to really change the way users use Mac OS. From a fresh new look, to the tweaked and improved Notification Center and Spotlight, not to mention great new features such as SMS and call support, and a more powerful Safari, Mac OS X Yosemite looks like it’s going to be a great new OS.

Here’s a quick look at what you’re going to be able to expect from Mac OS 10.10 Yosemite.

1. Adopting Flat yet Classy Design

Well, Apple has gone and done it. They have meshed iOS and Mac OS X into one with the latest design changes. Mac OS 10.10 also known as Yosemite features new flat, clean and minimalistic icon designs, translucent title bars as well as sidebars with see-through windows that changes color to reflect the wallpaper in the background. This translucency is carried over to the Dock as well.

The typography for this round of update achieves more consistency, especially in the menu and title bars and some apps are getting a new space-saving integrated menu and title bar. Plus, the latest Mac OS update is getting a Dark mode that we’re sure many are eager to try out.

2. Interactive Notification Center

Understandably the Notification Center is also getting a brand new look in Yosemite. As you might expect, it follows the new design standards looking clean, and flat, and with a new Today view. This view shows you all your calendar appointments, reminders and weather for the day.

This view is also expandable, and you can even extend the Today view’s capabilities with third-party apps and widgets. The new Notification Center is also interactive and clickable.

3. Spotlight Goes Everywhere

Spotlight gets a facelift, a new position, and more attention right in the center of the screen. You can’t miss it, which is a good thing since Spotlight has also become a lot more powerful than it already is. It’s no longer limited to returning only results and information from your Mac, but now can also show additional info from the Internet as well as third-party applications such as content from Wikipedia.

You can also get screening times (for films), Maps data, content to stream straight from iTunes — all directly in Spotlight. On top of that, the new Spotlight also lets you look up people, their contact information, find them in Mail as well as events and reminders they are involved in.

The cherry on top however has to be that you can now convert units of different measurements directly in Spotlight.

4. iCloud Drive Taking The Wheel

It’s hard to ignore the hunger for cloud-based sharing and Apple’s solution to that comes in the form of ICloud Drive. While the concept isn’t new and they could have come up with a more creative name, iCloud Drive is the solution to cross-platform access to files.

You’ll be able to drop in, access and sync your files whether you’re on iOS, Mac OS or even Windows. These folders are accessible via Finder and tagging is supported.

5. Mail Drop & Markup

Mail on iOS 8 has a lot more features than its desktop counterpart but you can still expect to fall back on more reliable syncing, faster switching between mailboxes, and a Mail Drop feature that lets you send encrypted attachments separate from the email via iCloud (of up to 5 GB in size). Mac users will see the attachments as normal, while non-users (or those not using the Mail client) will get a link to the file.

Yosemite also introduces a new Markup feature, which lets you annotate and scribble on images or PDF files without third-party image editing software. Markup will even clean up and fix things such as arrows and speech bubbles, so you can focus more about your annotations and less about trying to make your arrows look nice.

6. Super Safari

You wouldn’t think it is possible but Safari is getting yet another facelift with a new unified menu and title bar. This unified bar removes a lot of what we usually see in the Safari menu bar and replaces it with a new smart search field that not only shows your favorites, but also gives you Spotlight suggestions.

Safari’s also getting a new sidebar with all your bookmarks and a more powerful sharing feature, letting you subscribe to an RSS feed directly from the browser, forward sites to social networks, as well as share and email webpages and images to people you communicate with. And, yes, Markup is also supported here.

Upgraded Tabbing

The tab functionality on Safari has also been enhanced. For one thing you can now smoothly scroll through all your tabs (from left to right), and for another, you get a bird’s eye tab view that not only shows all the tabs you have opened, but neatly categorizes them into the sites they are from. You can also now create a new private window easily from the menu, and this window will not affect any of the other windows you have open.

On the technical front, Safari now supports WebGL, SPDY and HTML5 Premium Video; the latter makes streaming video more efficient and will apparently ensure that your MacBook battery lasts 2 hours longer than usual when streaming 1080p video content via Neftlix.

7. AirDrop, Handoff And Instant Hotspot

Since we are going for higher integration between iOS 8 and the latest Mac OS X, AirDrop has also seen some improvements. It now lets you sync files and communications between the mobile and desktop OS, but what really pushes the envelope is the Handoff feature.

Handoff greatly improves and redefines inter-device continuity, allowing you to switch seamlessly from one device to the next. While you work on one device, icons will appear — in the dock on Mac OS X, or on the lock screen of your iPad — that will let you immediately swipe a file or email among your Mac, iPhone and iPad.

Basically, you can finish writing the email started on your Mac, on your iPhone if you really need to go. You don’t even have to worry about setting this up. Yosemite has it all figured out for you, as your Mac will be able to detect a nearby iPhone and let you set up a mobile hotspot directly from the Mac — no complex, time-wasting setup or configuration required.

8. SMS And Call From Your Mac

The new AirDrop and Handoff features tie in to the interesting new SMS and calling features. iMessages now can act as a relay for SMSes, letting you read and reply SMSes on your Mac, even from non-iOS users. Yosemite will also transfer phone calls directly to your Mac, showing you caller ID, as well as letting you accept and reject calls directly from your desktop.

You can even use your Mac as a speakerphone, so you never even have to pick your iPhone up if you’re working at your Mac. This calling functionality means that you can also dial numbers directly from webpages and the Contacts app.

Availability

Mac OS 10.10 Yosemite is available today for developers, as part of its developer preview program. Non-developers will have to wait until Fall to install Yosemite, but the wait is going to be made a lot sweeter by the fact that Yosemite, like Mavericks before it, is going to be free.

The post 8 Cool New Features of Mac OS X Yosemite appeared first on Hongkiat.

Well, one of the ways you can do that is with animated infographics.

Animated and interactive infographics, especially those designed using HTML5, are quite possibly the future of infographics. Animated infographics engage with viewers better and can help add interest to topics that might otherwise come across as mundane.

Here’s a list of 10+ animated and interactive infographics that you can enjoy and find some inspiration from. Do click on the links to get to the full version of the infographics, complete with the animation.

Hungry Tech Giants

This interactive infographic is a sortable timeline of acquisitions from five of the world’s biggest tech companies over the past 15 years.

HTML5 & CSS3 Readiness

This interactive infographic is a breakdown of HTML5 and CSS3 support in all the major web browsers up to 2013.

The Evolution Of The Web

This infographic uses SVG elements, the timeline of browsers and technologies, as well as the growth of the Internet itself.

Inception

This infographic uses animations to great effect to help explain what happened in the movie ‘Inception’. The minimalist design definitely helps it achieve this goal.

Flights Interactive

This infographic is an aviation buff’s dream. Not only is it an interactive world map that tracks all the planes and flight routes in real-time, it’s also a presentation on the history of commercial flight.

Bond: Licence To Drive

This wonderfully animated, designed and drawn infographic charts the evolution of Bond cars, from the Sunbeam Alpine in ‘Dr. No’ up to the Land Rover Defender in ‘Skyfall’.

World’s Biggest Data Breaches

This interactive infographic is a visualization of all the biggest data breaches since 2004.

Thirteen Reasons Why Your Brain Craves Infographics

This charmingly animated infographic takes a quick look at why we love infographics so much.

How Search Works

This interactive infographic details how Google search works, from the initial crawling and indexing stages to how they fight spam to ensure the quality of your search results.

Dribbble: What’s It Used For?

This interactive HTML5 infographic explains Dribbble, from what it’s used for to some common terms used on the service.

How A Flat Panel Display Works

This animated infographic, made in HTML5, dissects a flat screen display to show exactly how one works.

How A Car Engine Works

This HTML5 animated infographic shows you how a car engine works in brilliant detail.

The post 10+ Animated & Interactive Infographics That Brings Content to Life appeared first on Hongkiat.

Here are five websites that will be streaming World Cup matches legally, for free. There is a catch though. These live streams are all limited to residents of certain countries, so you’ll either have to be residents of these countries or take advantage of VPNs and other methods to get your fix.

Still, if you’re a football fan, it’s probably worth the hassle. Let’s check out the list.

1. FIFA.com TV

What better way to watch the World Cup online than via FIFA’s own live, and completely free, streaming service? FIFA.com TV started in 2007 when FIFA decided to move the whole broadcasting procedure and operations in-house, which means that you’ll be getting the stream directly from FIFA.

The only catch is that it’s mostly only available in European countries. FIFA also has a lot of short videos you can watch to get you in the mood for the World Cup.

2. BBC And ITV

In the UK, the BBC and ITV will be sharing World Cup broadcast duties between them, on BBC’s iPlayer service and the ITV Player. Since the matches will be split between the two, you can check here for a comprehensive breakdown of what matches will be on which network.

The BBC will be using the same tried-and-tested technology they used for their London Olympics 2012 live streaming, so you should expect a steady stream with very few hiccups.

3. ARD Das Erste and ZDF

Like in the UK, Germans will be splitting their World Cup matches between two broadcasters, ZDF and ARD’s Das Erste channel. The two stations will split the 64 matches between them, and while there doesn’t seem to be a concrete schedule yet, we do know that ZDF will be showing the opening ceremony on June 12 while the July 13 final will be shown on Das Erste.

One thing to really look forward to is the fact that both websites will be offering additional multimedia content and additional camera angles beyond what you’ll get on TV.

4. NOS

NOS is the official Dutch broadcaster for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. One of the best things about NOS is that they won’t just be showing the 64 matches of the World Cup. The NOS World Cup 2014 portal has all the news, schedules and multimedia content you’ll need to keep yourself updated with everything that’s happening, all in one place.

There might be a slight tendency to focus on Dutch national team news, but that’s understandable, and won’t matter one bit to fans of the Oranje.

5. SRF Player

The SRF Player is the official live stream of the Swiss SRG SSR public broadcasting organisation. SRG SSR is a non-profit public broadcaster that survives mostly on licensing fees, and thus both of their stations are free to watch online if you have a Swiss IP.

Like NOS, SRF will also be a one-stop location for all the latest news and happenings in Brazil, so you can keep track of the news and watch all your football matches in one place.

The post Top Websites to Watch The FIFA World Cup For Free appeared first on Hongkiat.