Yahoo’s New Weather App for iPhone users with Flickr Integration

Yahoo just had come out with the beautiful weather app for all the iPhone users that is easy to use and filled with useful information with NO clunky look :)

Checking the weather forecast is daily routine work for everyone. For most of us, knowing the current weather conditions of the place we have travelled or of our dream destination is the moment of anticipation or could even be a topic of discussion with strangers. aren’t you constantly checking the weather conditions on your cell phone or is it just me?

Ever wonder what could be the current weather of New York City? Is it a cloudy day or sunny day?

Well, Yahoo just released an independently operating weather app for iPhone users.  Yahoo! Weather for iPhone, that uses location and specific images to show the current weather conditions you want to know around the world at any given time from your Smartphone.

Yahoo with integration with the Flickr community have brought together the beautiful images to show the current weather conditions and all the detail forecast you want to know about your city.

Surprising things to know about the Yahoo weather app

An California based company, created a new weather app that will provide current temperature and forecasts on top of the slideshows featuring the pictures of landmarks or other local sceneries in the cities that are chosen by the user.

Yahoo weather app 

The initial screen will look simple and nice. It will show all the basic things like, the current temperature, the days highs and lows, the local time of that city and a short description of the current weather condition of the city you are searching for.

The pictures are derived from Flickr’s “Project Weather” community on the site powered by Yahoo but will operate separately from iPhone’s built in weather app. The app doesn’t promote Yahoo’s brand in the app panel.

FYI: The Flickr group is already in existence and is open for anyone to submit photos. The photos are selected by staff members so that you won’t wind up with any surprises!

If the app doesn’t find any suitable photo of exact city you are looking for, it will pull up the nearby major landmark and will update the weather forecast you are looking for.

For the places where no photos are submitted, Yahoo shows a generic weather based photo. For example, a cloudy day will be represented by a photo of clouds in the sky.

The images get changed on weather conditions and the time of the day, thus you wont be seeing the same picture late at night that you checked in the morning.

Yahoo weather app 

The weather data is presented very neatly, but the amazing thing here is the design of the app itself. it’s like a million impressive thing with the changing of background images when you dive into more details.

The app also features rich in terms of content. A five day weather forecast, a radar showing a high level overview of conditions and the wind pressure information as well as the timings of sunset and sunrise for that city/area is also shown.

The Yahoo Weather App is indeed a very useful and informative app for the geeks who want a quick overlook of the weather conditions of any city around the globe.

Yahoo Weather for iPhone is now available at Apple’s App Store.

Related:

http://mashable.com/2013/04/18/yahoo-weather/

http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/18/yahoos-surprisingly-gorgeous-new-ios-weather-app-centers-around-crowdsourced-photos/

The Future Upcoming devices may come with Flexible Displays

At first glance: The next generation devices probably may hit the grounds with unbreakable, flexible phone screens.

The Technology Industry so far has surpassed the lifestyle of common people by inventing revolutionary tech gadgets such as wearable tech coats, Google Glasses and is now a step towards a bigger revolution in screens and displays those that can be bent, folded and stretched up :)

The future devices may appear very different in looks with screens that can be rolled out and even get stretched in terms of toady’s heavy, bulky and breakable glass displays.

Well, that could be a cool surprise for all the tech lovers around the globe!

A Reveal of Flexible OLED Phone by Samsung Electronics

Samsung Flexible display screen

Samsung, The Korean Electronics Company has shown off a revolutionary ‘bending’ phone that could be virtually unbreakable.

According to the sources, the screen is expected to tie up with Samsung gadgets which ran with Microsoft phone software, though were only prototypes.

The screen doesn’t appear to be flexible enough but could be bend into a tube. These types of screen uses the OLED technology.

 More about OLED Display for newbie’s

OLED Displays

OLED is a brand new technology using which the light-emitting organic materials, beautiful and efficient displays can be produced. OLED’s are very thin and they can be put on flexible materials like plastic or metal foil etc, thus making them possible to bend. As these displays are not covered with glass, thus they are more durable and virtually splinterproof.

These displays are not used in market still, but Samsung and LG displays seems to be closest to explore this new technology in their upcoming new models.

FYI: The OLED chemicals are extremely sensitive to oxygen, thus they need to completely covered off from air.

Coming on the topic, Samsung used this technology in many of their phones already though with glass screens but for the bendable phone, Samsung placed the chemicals over thin plastic instead of glass.

They say, “ the concept of the flexible screen has been around for some time, but it finally looks as if Samsung is really going to deliver on that technology”.

Rumors are in the air singing that Samsung may use this OLED display technology in its upcoming Samsung Galaxy Note 3, Wow!

There is a gradual change in the technology world and we as the users should welcome each and every change. You have something, a material, and you are looking for an application, That’s the Game!

Via,

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2260254/The-unbreakable-mobile-phone-Samsung-shows-radical-paper-flexible-screen.html

How to Convert Android Phones into a ‘Facebook Phone’?

Facebook announces a new app Facebook Home, that allows its users to experience Facebook features on their Android phones, Go social with Facebook HOME!

Facebook is taking over the Android OS( Operating System),  sounds interesting!

But what do that mean exactly?

Mark Zuckerberg, the maker of the world’s largest free online social network Facebook, had step up ahead of this modern communication media and launched an app aka  Facebook Home allowing its users a tone-setting home screen that will make android phone more personal than ever.

The Facebook CEO quoted “Instead of our phones being designed around apps … we can flip that around and design our phones around people first,”

More facts about Facebook Home App

Facebook Home

Facebook Home app turns out to be the modern way of connection over Facebook using mobiles or tablets. It is similar to Android launcher apps as it changes the home screen of the device as well as the way of accessing of the app.

Home app when installed presents the latest Facebook updates from your friends on the home screen of your mobile phone. Also it permits users to update their Facebook status directly from the home screen.

In today’s scenario, apps are rather more important. We spend almost the day messaging and communicating over phones.  Messaging is treated like an another essential app. Switching between apps causes irritation, we want to talk to people and not with the apps.

Facebook Home

Thus, not to get in more annoyance, Home app brings a Facebook Chat Heads feature when a friend messages you. Also it pops up a person’s face and tapping on their face you can start a conversation without loosing any context of what you are doing behind the app.

FYI: Chat Heads means you don’t have to leave the current work you are doing. It just allows the communication to flow and also allows to let you tap between multiple messages threads.

The new Home App is extremely visual and features wall-to-wall images with covered text like news feed, timeline and other recently designed Facebook experience.

To get Facebook Home now, just open up the Facebook Messenger on your Android phones that will prompt you to download the app.

You can also download Home app from Android Play as well as now Facebook Home available for download on Google Play for a limited selection of Android devices like HTC One X, HTC One X+, Samsung Galaxy SIII and Samsung Galaxy Note II.

Are Facebook and Google Rivals or Friends?

Now that could really a tricky question to answer…

Well, This is of course not the first time that Facebook has focused a huge amount of attention, time and its valuable efforts on Android. Rather, the social network has put it engineering long back behind the Android code and even offer the King of search engine, Google an OS saving hookup in its hour of need.

As far as I know, Facebook and Google began to compete each others more on a social ground. Actually their relationship is bit more dependent when it comes to Android.

A Facebook Engineer quoted” We are a very significant app to them and they are a very significant platform for us”.

Well, we can assume that being in good relationship with one another Facebook and Google could reach at great new heights. Wishes!

Express Your Moral Sensitivity through Facebook’s Fresh Emoticons

How Facebook Emoticons will help you in expressing your sentiments?

Facebook, world’s largest and widely used social networking website has become an essential part of everyone’s life. Likewise, you are able to convey your state of feeling with Facebook Emoticons.

FYI: Emoticons are the little graphic faces, great in expressing whatever you happen to be feeling at any given moment, whether it is sadness, happiness, joy or boredom!

Facebook Emoticons1

Emoticons are best in expressing our current mood and have become popular part of messaging. We can say it has the power of conveying our status of sentiments at that particular moment.

Facebook knows everything about your moods

Facebook recently started testing emoticons in the status updates on user profiles, permitting members to add anything from a smile face to an ice cream cone or anything related to the current mood of our mind.

Now, Facebook is finally getting around to adding emoticon-based status updates to the rest of its app.

The social site, Facebook has moved out the feature offering a variety of emoticons to choose from. It has been listed just next to the small icons for adding a picture/videos, a small, cute smiley face now occupies a space with prompt: “Share how are you feeling / what are you doing.”

Thus, we are enrolling ourselves into a more structured, more integrated era of communication where all our friends would come to know about the state, shades of our mind.

Facebook Emoticons

They say, the emoticons feature is available on a limited number of profiles, but according to Mashable it will be on all United States profiles very soon.

Getting started with Facebook Emoticons

if you want to start using the feature, simply click on the smiley button, a message will be flashed like “What are you doing?” and here you go… click on the specific categories: watching, listening,drinking, reading, feeling and eating. Clicking on the specific categories will disclose a wide range of emoticons and icons that reflects your current mood and what you have had for you lunch :)

If you are feeling tired, sad or happy, there is an emoticon for that too so that you can share your feelings with your friends in a very simple manner.

The new emoticon feature could be an interesting, concerning way of encouraging more communication on Facebook, but beware, Facebook is being watched! Facebook knows each of the activity of its users.

Just my thought, Do this digital media will ever express/understand the real human feelings? No matter Facebook emoticons adds a humorous twists to any conversation on this social networking sites, but the real human sentiments can never be replaced by these very emoticons.

Well, anything that allows people to interact effectively is surely a good thing in itself. Using emoticons and smileys in the FB chat can help in bringing a good conversation.

Heartiest Wishes to Facebook team ahead :)

Related:

http://mashable.com/2013/04/09/facebook-emoticons/

http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/09/facebook-mood/

http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/facebook-rolls-out-emoticon-mood-and-activity-status-updates/

Smart Digital Coat (Girlfriend Coat) allows you to sense An Affectionate Hug

How to feel the tender, warm (virtual) hug of your girlfriend who is leaving at a distance from you?

Yes, it could now be possible with the help of a smart tech coat called as “Girlfriend Coat” that allows you to feel the sensational hug of your girlfriend from behind.

The technology world is rapidly changing at a speed of light. New innovations are daily upgraded to enhance the lifestyle of common human beings.

More things to know about Girlfriend Coat

After the stunning invention of Wearable Video Coat, the productive students from Japan are ready to present another digital coat called as Girlfriend coat and can be used just for fun.

The simple embrace, hug of a loved one can supply some serious arousals as you can feel all the warmth from something as simple as a HUG. But there are many who never felt the joy of hug from a girlfriend or boyfriend. Don’t worry buddies, A bunch of Japanese students decided to let the technology give them the very embrace they need.

Students from the Japanese University of Tsukuba have formulated a special coat called as “Girlfriend Coat” to accompany you.

Working of digital Girlfriend Coat

video

At the first glance, the device looks like a normal coat. The coat has a neon-colored belt which is used to fasten around the wait of the wearer.

A machine is attached with the belt to simulate the feeling of being hugged from behind.

Along with the coat, wearers can also wear headphones, which beep out an imaginary voice of girlfriend in phrases such as “ I’m sorry! I’m late!” :)

The Hardware Engineer of the device say “the actual concept of this device is everyone can enjoy the feeling of having a girlfriend”.

In Japanese, the girlfriend coat is called as “Riajyuu Coat” that comes from the slang term which means “someone who is pleased with their life outside the Internet.”

The coat make use of the combination of a jacket, headphones and a belt that tightens around the users waist so that he/she will get the feeling of lovely hug at that location.

Dare to add this device in your personal closet? Would you like to use this digital girlfriend coat? let us know in comments.

via:

http://mashable.com/2013/04/10/japanese-girlfriend-coat/

Unbelievable facts of an Internet Minute

The Internet seems to be pretty busy, crammed in functioning whole lot of stuff.  An Intel’s amazing info graphic shows all the unbelievable things that happen in one single Internet minute.

The speed of the way we communicate has changed due to the internet monster. Today we can work virtually at any place all over the world. We can get our Wi-Fi fix at any place, hotels, airplanes etc… anywhere, everywhere! Its just like yesterday’s news is today’s fish wrap.

The internet has surely become flexible, elongating its reach into various places.

Can you imagine what takes place in an individual internet minute?

Intel, the worlds largest and highest valued semiconductor chip maker had disclosed the incredible figures of our single minute online activity.

internet

Great! It’s so unbelievable!!

Well, first take look at the big-daddy number. Every minute 639,800GB of global IP data is transferred, do you believe?

Let’s get into more details and no wonder the numbers could really be hard to wrap the mind around. According to the Intel info graphic, 204 million emails are sent, online habitants view 20 million photos on Flickr, 47 thousand apps are downloaded and over 100k tweets are sent and 320 new Twitter accounts are created.

Each single internet minute is filled with 30 hours of videos uploaded with 1.3 million video views (the most popular video probably involved “Gangnam Style” last year).

No doubt the social media is certainly popular. Facebook, the king of online presence gets about 6 million hits and 277,000 logins every minute. At least the Wikipedia is running behind with six fresh articles published in single minute.

So what does that means? Where are we reeling towards? I think Internet is becoming crazy popular thing for the new generations.

This data also make us wonder a bit about the future. The new revolution in the field of science and technology had changed the life styles of the people. With the smart increase in the number of devices, will the internet infrastructure will able to sustain?

However, The Internet has come along way from the confinements of a cubicle to flourish its powers to the utmost borders of the world. It not only has offered various services but has also allowed peoples to stay connected.

It’s actually bit queer how you imagine a world without Internet, but yet there was once a time when it didn’t exist at all.

Via

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2295703/What-happens-Internet-minute-6m-Facebook-pages-viewed-1-3m-YouTube-clips-downloaded-.html

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-57575344-1/intel-reveals-what-happens-in-a-single-internet-minute/

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 Release Date in India, Features and Price

It’s a dazzling beauty, creative, innovative, imaginative, artistic…yes, Its Samsung Galaxy Note 2.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 2 is now official. The second generation of the extremely renowned Phablet (Phone/Tablet) made its debut at the Samsung Pre-IFA pres conference recently and affirmed most of the rumors from the past few weeks.

We are living in such an innovative era, where creativity never ends, where the creative masterminds all over the globe are devising stunning gadgets and gizmos that ease our life.

A creative gadget was created to unleash your creativity. Yes, the much awaited, anticipated ‘Phablet’ Samsung Galaxy Note 2 from Samsung Electronics was launched.

The upgraded version of its predecessor, the Samsung Galaxy Note, is thinner, lighter and is loaded with exciting new features as well as it is said to have a wider screen and come with a Jelly Bean.

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 is just a bigger Samsung galaxy S III with stylus or the evolutionary improvement to its successor of the Galaxy Note.

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 Features and Specifications:

  • GALAXY Note 2 comes with 5.5 inch HD Super AMOLED scratch proof touch screen that offers better clarity and a 16:9 screen ratio for perfect viewing experiences. The innovative design of the GALAXY Note 2 includes a bigger screen while maintaining a slim body to fit just right in your hand.
  • Galaxy Note 2 will run on the latest Android OS version which is Android 4.1 or Jelly Bean. We have rumors that it will have the same software as Google Nexus 7.
  • 8 MP Camera on back and 1.9 MP camera on the front with auto focus, LED flash.
  • 1.4 GHz Quad core processor
  • Bluetooth v4.0 with USB
  • 16GB ,32 GB and 64 GB storage option with expandable memory card  support
  • It is coupled with 2 GB Ram and a beefy 3100 mAh battery on board
  • The S-pen is longer and thicker making it more ergonomic with some cool new tricks
  • support for both HSPA+ and 4G LTE

Expected Price and Launch date in India

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 will rock the Indian floor from October 2012. Samsung has not yet announced the price of this device. However, the price is expected to be slightly higher than  Samsung Galaxy S III.

Expected Price in India: Around Rs. 36000 INR

The Samsung Galaxy Note 2 would certainly posses a superior quality than its predecessors. It is expected to be comparatively good both in looks as well as in features.

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 could be an appealing, charming gadget for Samsung lovers and if you don’t mind with the high price, it’s just worth considering.

Samsung Galaxy Note 2 is not about inventing something remarkable but is making everyday life special, it is addictive !!!

 

 

 

 

Turn your iPhone into a soundless alarm clock

Meet your personalized sleep coach as well as your alarm clock that wakes you up gently without disturbing your bed mate.

Yes, an innovative feature called as Lark Up has been invented by the worlds leading sleep experts will now judge your sleep data as well as endow you to improve your sleep sessions and wake you mutely with the vibrating alarm.

In this outpaced life, sound sleep is essential for every person who wants to do their best whether at school or workplace. Sleep is the cherished thing and nobody likes to wake up with the din of the alarm set by their partner. Hey, but do not worry, there is an absolute solution for this problem… your iPhone is going to prove better, a handy solution in such situation.

A revolutionary silent alarm and a personalized sleep coach

Indeed, an amazing start up called Lark, had recently demonstrated Lark Up, a breakthrough silent waking system that includes your iPhone and a wrist band which you have to wear while sleeping.

This application Lark up serves as an alarm clock on your iPhone while the band consists of an inbuilt Bluetooth sensor which vibrates when the alarm goes off.

It is often said that technology is entailed to better human lives and Lark Up is the perfect example of that statement. No beeping sound, no loud music of alarm tune, just a few tender, easy vibrations to wake you up after a peaceful good night’s sleep.

How Lark Up works?

The application is very simple and easy to use. Use the Lark Up application to set your wake up time and the alarm settings. Turn ON the alarm and your iPhone will wirelessly transfer your alarm settings and the sleep patterns to your LARK wristband.

FYI: To use this application, all you need is your iPhone with the Lark Up app download in that and a wrist band.

Just strap on the lightweight, hassle free wristband and go to bed. The micro movement sensor will pick up your sleep behaviors and your Lark wristband will vibrate gently when its your time to wake up.

Meet your personal sleep coach

Designed by leading sleep experts, Lark Personal Sleep coach brings a forefront sleep tracking and training for you.

A 7-day judgement program of your sleep is taken and accordingly, your personal sleep coach unveils your sleep type and provides an action plan to improve your sleep.

You can get time-to-time feedback on how healthy your sleep is and also you can come up with how to sleep in peace, better way. Your personal coach tracks your improvements and guides you to improve with the words of support, sometimes a little tough and a lot of individualized attention.

Salient features of Lark Up app

  • A silent and peaceful wake up that is designed by sleep experts.
  • With the use of this, there is no more disturbance to your bed partner or your room mate’s sleep with the loud, noisy voice of traditional alarm clocks.
  • Even if your iPhone battery discharges, still you will hear the alarm.
  • It has a large snooze button and a numerical display.
  • You can adjust the snooze time.
  • It has an automatic dimming clock interface.

Don’t sleep for sleep’s interest, sleep to improve what concerns you the most like your happiness and health. Lark Up is at your finger tip to serve you at its best.

Wake your potential and not your partner with LARK. So, get ready to awake with Lark… Happy Sleeping!!!!

 

 

 

Cocos2d : Scene management in iOS game development

Scene is the basic and main element of any cocos2d game. So in time of game development we have to do our scene management efficiently. In iOS the memory is low as compared to the desktop computer memory. A game is highly memory consumable as well as use very high graphics. Where scene is the parental container of all the visible resource, so in that perspective scene management is important for Cocos2d game development.

Every game there is multiple scenes. There at least two scene in our game. One is play scene and another one may be menu scene, instruction scene whatever is needed for the game. In coco2d scene is represented by the CCScene class which is nothing more than a special type of node, as every cocos2d class is inherited from the CCNode class. The scene is act as a parent container for all other visible node in the scene.

Generally one scene which is visible is running at a time. Normally for scene change we have to replace the scene with new one. The new scene is visible and old scene is dead. Also we can also follow the iOS pattern of present model view transition by push the new scene on top of old one, in that case the old one is pause and new scene is active. Later the new screen pop out and old scene is resuming. Normally we follow the first approach as iOS memory is less and we cannot stored any extra thing in memory.

These scene transition in cocos2d is entirely handled by the CCDirector, it is act as a Singleton class or game manager which manage and co-ordinate overall operation logic of the game development.

CCDirector start running with a given scene

[[CCDirector sharedDirector] runWithScene :[SomeScene1 scene]];

For replace the scene we used

[[CCDirector sharedDirector] replaceWithScene :[SomeScene2 scene]];

If we want to just push a new scene over the old scene we use

[[CCDirector sharedDirector] pushWithScene :[SomeScene2 scene]];

Cocos2d support many type of scene transitions which provide scene animation in the game. Here are some main scene transition type:

CCTransitionFade
CCTransitionFlipAngular
CCTransitionShrinkGrow
CCTransitionMoveInB
CCTransitionMoveInT
CCTransitionMoveInL
CCTransitionMoveInR
CCTransitionFadeTR
CCTransitionFadeUp
CCTransitionFlipX
CCTransitionFlipY
CCTransitionPageTurn
CCTransitionCrossFade

we can add the scene transition by following way

[[CCDirector sharedDirector] replaceScene: [CCTransitionFade transitionWithDuration:0.5f scene:[SomeScene2 scene]]];

 

 

The thumb rule of cocos2d scene management

1. Did not store any scene in memory which is not active.
2. Always replace the new scene with old scene in CCDirector.
3. Release whatever resource used by the old scene as a developer we want to use our memory efficiently.

We have very small iPhone game development lab in AM Infosystems Pvt. Ltd. but it consist of developers who have years of experience and passionate on game development for iPhone. Our game developers can design any type games; from children’s education fun loving games to high end graphics supported Racing and adventures games. So if you want to transfer your complex and innovative idea into real life game, AM Infosystems Pvt Ltd is your ultimate destination. You can hire iPhone developer from us in very low cost with industry based expertise. Our iOS developers will be taking care of all ideas to bring that ideas in reality and push it to the App store, which is your ultimate goal.