Techunim

Tuesday, September 27, 2022

Where is Android Auto’s promised redesign? – Google’s summer plans didn’t work out - 9to5Google

Android Auto has been waiting on a redesign for the past several months, but it seems that Google’s timeline on the update has slipped.

Recapping what we’ve seen to date, Android Auto has long been developing a new look under the code name “Coolwalk.” The design first showed up about a year ago and has evolved in the time since. Early this year, the new UI showed its first signs of expanded split-screen support, as well as some other upcoming features such as Cast support.

Then, in May 2022, Google officially announced this new Android Auto redesign.

Google touted the new design during I/O 2022 as a way to bring split-screen functionality to more users, as well as take advantage of new screen shapes and sizes.

In its older versions, Android Auto was optimized primarily for one size of display, something around a 16:9 landscape-oriented display. But as new cars have hit the market with wider displays or ones that expand down larger parts of the dashboard, it’s been easy to see where Android Auto has been behind.

As pictured below, the new Android Auto redesign adapts well to displays of varying sizes and orientations.

Where is Android Auto's promised redesign? – Google's summer plans didn't work out

So, where is it?

Google explicitly stated that this redesign to Android Auto would arrive “this summer” in a blog post from May 2022. You can read the quote in full below, emphasis our own.

And over the years, we’ve found there are three main functionalities that drivers prioritize in their cars: navigation, media and communication. This summer, Android Auto will roll out a brand new interface that will help you get directions faster, control your media more easily and have more functionality at your fingertips.

But as of September 26, 2022, the Android Auto redesign is still unavailable, at least officially, to users in stable or beta update channels.

The last time Google announced an Android Auto update at I/O with a “summer” timeline, the company lived up to that promise with a few weeks to spare. This time, though, that timeline has come and gone, and there’s no sign of anything ready to head to users.

Clearly, Google is still working on the update. Late last week, one user with a rooted Android smartphone noticed that an update to either the platform or the Spotify app had unlocked new functionality for the music widget. It’s obvious that Google hasn’t thrown away the project.

We asked Google if there is an updated timeline for releasing Android Auto’s “Coolwalk” redesign to the public, but the company had no updates to share at this time. Presumably, the update will arrive sometime later in the year.

[embedded content]

More on Android Auto:

Check out 9to5Google on YouTube for more news:

[embedded content]

Adblock test (Why?)

Where is Android Auto’s promised redesign? – Google’s summer plans didn’t work out - 9to5Google
Read More

Monday, September 26, 2022

E3 2023 books its physical venue, schedule—and confirms new fan-friendly twist - Ars Technica

Enlarge / It's baaaaaaack!

ESA / ReedPOP

The annual gaming expo once known as E3 is finally drawing closer toward rebirth as a physical event. While information about the next iteration of E3 remains scarce, this week's big news suggests a crucial change in how the decades-old event will work: a split between audience types.

The expo's new showrunners at ReedPOP, an agency responsible for regional gaming and comic expos like PAX, EGX, and Star Wars Celebration, confirmed on Monday that E3 2023 has locked down its location and date range. Both should sound familiar to E3 fans: a week-long span in mid-June (specifically, June 13–16) at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

This time, E3 will better resemble overseas game-industry showcases like Gamescom and Tokyo Games Show. The event's first two days, dubbed "E3 Business Days," will exclusively host "registered industry personnel," which ReedPOP says will include game makers, distributors, licensors, and press. E3 2023's third day will function as a hybrid industry/public day, and the fourth will be exclusively open to public ticket purchases. During this two-day span of "E3 Gamer Days," the event will host a theater full of "deep-dive looks at highly anticipated titles."

Maybe this one will be fun for average showgoers

Based on our years of E3 coverage, we imagine this structure will be a net positive for anyone who attends. In the expo's pre-COVID state, E3 primarily connected game publishers and developers with the industry's logistics side: your Targets, Amazons, and Best Buys, along with global distribution partners, digital services, and other firms that get video games into players' hands one way or another. At the E3 of old, those people were the priority, not average consumer attendees or even the press.

Yet the ESA's version of E3 sold tickets to a fanbase that had come to expect gaming expos to be fun. Typically, that wasn't the case, thanks largely to brutal waits in lines for limited numbers of gameplay kiosks—all while industry professionals waltzed past velvet ropes to skip those lines. Splitting those audiences should clear out more space for fans to actually play demos of anticipated games. ReedPOP's announcement about a theater portion also suggests that it wants to streamline public access to "exclusive" game presentations at the show—instead of making fans wait in E3 lines just to watch behind-closed-door videos.

As of press time, we still have questions about how the show will operate. Will the attendance split between industry members and public consumers be reflected by a show floor change once E3 Business Days give way to E3 Gamer Days? Meaning, will the show's third and fourth days add more public gameplay kiosks for unreleased games? Also, ReedPOP's other expos are largely marked by third-party merch booths (i.e., clothing, "mystery boxes," and retro game resellers). Will that ReedPOP status quo spill over into their version of E3, despite those booths arguably missing the point of E3's industry-exclusive days? (Representatives for ReedPOP did not immediately answer Ars Technica's questions on these matters.)

But who will actually be at E3 2023?

Most of all, E3 is defined by the video game developers and publishers who present there, but even before COVID forced the show's physical incarnation to halt, major publishers had begun bowing out of the show to emphasize their own physical and digital events. Without formal confirmation of participating publishers at this point, we're left reading various industry-event tea leaves.

On the console side, this summer's Gamescom saw the return of Xbox at physical events, but that console family's handlers at Microsoft didn't participate at ReedPOP's PAX West 2022, just minutes down the road from its Seattle-area headquarters. Nintendo, to its credit, had formal presences at both recent expos. Sony has been the most expo-reluctant company since it pulled out of E3 2019, as its PlayStation arm has been happy to alternate between YouTube presentations and limited hands-on events for the press. The most recent PAX West was telling as far as ReedPOP's relationships with potential participating game makers; in addition to Nintendo, the September event's show floor had a scattershot selection of recognizable game publishers, including Bandai Namco, Devolver, and various Embracer-owned subsidiaries. But Gamescom 2022, which is not affiliated with ReedPOP, shot a little higher with its inclusion of Xbox, Sega, and Ubisoft at its events.

What's more, Game Awards and Summer Game Fest organizer Geoff Keighley, who was affiliated with some of this year's Gamescom events, is moving forward with a physical version of Summer Game Fest 2023. As a longtime behind-the-scenes organizer of E3-adjacent events, Keighley may flex his savviness with major game publishers to fill out his own show floor in June 2023—and leave the new version of E3 starved for content. SGF 2023's dates, venue, and participating game makers are still unknown as of press time, but already, we are anticipating a showdown in one way or another for fans' June 2023 game-preview bandwidth, both online and in person.

Adblock test (Why?)

E3 2023 books its physical venue, schedule—and confirms new fan-friendly twist - Ars Technica
Read More

Sunday, September 25, 2022

YouTuber Tests Apple Watch Ultra Durability With a Hammer: Table Breaks Before the Watch - MacRumors

Sunday September 25, 2022 2:27 pm PDT by Sami Fathi

A YouTuber has put Apple's claims for the durability of the Apple Watch Ultra to the test by putting it up against a drop test, a jar of nails, and repeated hits with a hammer to test the sapphire crystal protecting the display.

[embedded content]

TechRax, a channel popular for testing the durability of products, first tested the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌ by dropping it from around four feet high. The ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌ was left mostly unscuffed, aside from some minor dents along the titanium casing. Next, the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌ was mixed around in a jar of nails and was once again left with no visible marks.

TechRax also tested the durability of the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌'s sapphire crystal display cover by repeatedly hitting it with a hammer. In the test, the watch withstood repeated hits with the hammer until it finally cracked, and only after the table took some damage first.

apple watch ultra hammer test
While the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌'s display did not initially take damage, the watch did fail to turn on after repeated hits. The failure to power on could indicate that while the sapphire may not have broken at first, some internal components may have suffered damage. Of course, the test is unrealistic in portraying a typical use case of the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌, but it may provide some customers reassurance about the strength of the sapphire crystal display cover.

Apple claims the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌ is its most rugged, durable, and extreme Apple Watch yet, appearing to be aimed to compete directly with Garmin. In response to the ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌, Garmin said it measures battery life in "months" and not "hours." The ‌Apple Watch Ultra‌ is priced at $799 and began arriving to customers on Friday.

Saturday, September 24, 2022

Don’t open your Apple Watch Ultra - 9to5Mac

The Apple Watch Ultra has just started arriving in customers’ hands, and unlike previous Apple Watches, it has four exposed screw heads on the bottom of the device. I like taking a look inside my tech, whether to add a thermal pad to an M2 MacBook Air to improve performance or just to see what’s inside making the tech work. The moment I saw the screws on the bottom of the Apple Watch Ultra, I knew I wanted to take a peek inside. But I probably shouldn’t have …

The bottom of the Apple Watch has four P5 pentalobe screws. These are the same sort of screws that hold on the bottom of MacBook, and while they aren’t as common as a Philips or flathead screwdriver, pentalobe screwdrivers aren’t uncommon either. After I took out those four screws, the first complication arose – there is a very tiny o-ring around each screw. These are, no doubt, part of the extreme waterproof ratings of Apple’s high-end smart watch. As I went to screw back in those initial four screws, it proved nearly impossible to tighten them without the o-ring partially slipping out of its place.

Nonetheless, I carried on, well aware at this point that some of the waterproofing of the watch could be compromised. With those screws out, the only way to continue was using a spudger and thin shims to separate the ceramic back of the watch from the titanium casing. It was well sealed, and the moment it pulled away that thin waterproofing was destroyed. In addition, there are two thin ribbon cables connecting the back of the watch, and all of its health sensors, to the battery, screen, processor, and body of the watch. I had to be careful while separating the two to avoid damaging the cables.

Taking off the back panel didn’t reveal too much of the internals. There was a large black component with an Apple logo, but the two buttons used to release the Apple Watch bands came out, and three of the four springs disappeared into the abyss of my carpet.

With the back panel of the watch removed, there wasn’t any sort of immediate error from the watch, but it, understandably, couldn’t connect to my phone. There were three more screws – this time tri-wing – and small metal plates holding down that black component, but once I removed those and began to lift it, it became clear that it was a bit too big of a task. There seemed to be multiple ribbon cables connected to the other side of it, and from the back side of the watch, there didn’t seem to be a good way to disconnect them. Getting to those probably involves removing the display by softening the adhesive and then using an opening pick to separate it. That’s how you could access the internals on previous Apple Watches, but the seam of the display on the Ultra didn’t seem to have a great way to open it that I was confident I could do without cracking the display. The display of the Apple Watch Ultra is sapphire, which, while more scratch resistant, is potentially more prone to cracking. That’s probably part of the reason Apple extended the metal body of the watch up around the flat sides of the display.

At that point, I put everything back together as well as I could. It proved rather difficult to reattach the two ribbon cables connected to the bottom of the device. The buttons to remove the watch band, now lacking some minuscule springs, rattle with the watch’s haptics. And, the little rubber o-rings around the screw stick out a bit. With the o-rings out of place and the adhesive seal broken, the waterproofing of the watch is certainly nowhere near its factory standards. I certainly wouldn’t take it scuba diving at this point.

No doubt, in the coming days we’ll see a more complete teardown of the watch from the people of iFixit. They’ll certainly venture farther into the Apple Watch Ultra than I did. I’m sure someone more skilled than I could do a better job disassembling and reassembling the watch without as much damage to the waterproofing, but alas. I would certainly recommend waiting for their guide to feed your curiosity, rather than taking apart your own watch, as otherwise you could be left with a non-waterproof (or, even worse, a broken) version of Apple’s most durable smart watch yet.

Check out 9to5Mac on YouTube for more Apple news:

[embedded content]

Adblock test (Why?)

Don’t open your Apple Watch Ultra - 9to5Mac
Read More

iPhone 14 Pro Max vs Galaxy S22 Ultra vs Pixel 6 Pro: Battery Life Test - PhoneArena

Adblock test (Why?)

iPhone 14 Pro Max vs Galaxy S22 Ultra vs Pixel 6 Pro: Battery Life Test - PhoneArena
Read More

Report: 17-Year-Old Arrested On Suspicion Of Being Hacker Behind GTA VI Leak - Kotaku

As reported by The Desk and reporter Matthew Keys, the arrest of the suspected 17-year-old GTA hacker by police in the United Kingdom was part of an investigation being conducted by the FBI and the UK’s Cyber Crime Unit. It had previously been reported that the FBI was likely looking into the recent hacks at Uber and Rockstar Games.A source told The Desk that the teenager is being held on numerous charges, including conspiracy to attack at least two different computer systems.It’s believed that the teenage hacker arrested Thursday evening in Oxfordshire is connected to the hacker group “Laspus$.” This group of hackers is allegedly also involved with high-profile digital intrusions at other large companies including Uber, Microsoft, Cisco, Samsung, Nvidia, and Okta. The group first showed up in 2021, hacking Brazil’s Ministry of Health. It was thought the group had gone inactive, but earlier this month it allegedly ramped up its activities again and targeted Uber and Rockstar Games.

G/O Media may get a commission

$10 or more

Humble Bundle - Starlight Bundle

Benefit the Starlight Children's Foundation
For $10 or more, you can help hospitalized kids get access to video games—and get some sweet games for yourself too, including Lego Star Wars - The Complete Saga.

The Grand Theft Auto VI leak that occurred over the weekend was one of the largest video game leaks in history. 90 video files showcasing early development footage of the next GTA game, which is assumed to be GTA VI, were posted on the GTA Forums and quickly spread across the internet. The footage seemed to confirm previous reports and rumors that GTA VI would be set in Vice City and would star two different characters, a Bonnie-and-Clyde-like criminal couple.On Monday, September 19, following the leak, Rockstar Games confirmed that someone had “illegally” gained access to its files and shared them online. It also stated that this leak would not slow down production on the game and that it planned to reveal it in a more official way soon.

Adblock test (Why?)

Report: 17-Year-Old Arrested On Suspicion Of Being Hacker Behind GTA VI Leak - Kotaku
Read More

Friday, September 23, 2022

NVIDIA's new AI model quickly generates objects and characters for virtual worlds - Engadget

NVIDIA is looking to take the sting out of creating virtual 3D worlds with a new artificial intelligence model. GET3D can generate characters, buildings, vehicles and other types of 3D objects, NVIDIA says. The model should be able to whip up shapes quickly too. The company notes that GET3D can generate around 20 objects per second using a single GPU.

Researchers trained the model using synthetic 2D images of 3D shapes taken from multiple angles. NVIDIA says it took just two days to feed around 1 million images into GET3D using A100 Tensor Core GPUs.

The model can create objects with "high-fidelity textures and complex geometric details," NVIDIA's Isha Salian wrote in a blog post. The shapes GET3D makes "are in the form of a triangle mesh, like a papier-mâché model, covered with a textured material," Salian added.

Users should be able to swiftly import the objects into game engines, 3D modelers and film renderers for editing, as GET3D will create them in compatible formats. That means it could be much easier for developers to create dense virtual worlds for games and the metaverse. NVIDIA cited robotics and architecture as other use cases.

The company said that, based on a training dataset of car images, GET3D was able to generate sedans, trucks, race cars and vans. It can also churn out foxes, rhinos, horses and bears after being trained on animal images. As you might expect, NVIDIA notes that the larger and more diverse the training set that's fed into GET3D, "the more varied and detailed the output."

With the help of another NVIDIA AI tool, StyleGAN-NADA, it's possible to apply various styles to an object with text-based prompts. You might apply a burned-out look to a car, convert a model of a home into a haunted house or, as a video showing off the tech suggests, apply tiger stripes to any animal.

The NVIDIA Research team that created GET3D believes future versions could be trained on real-world images instead of synthetic data. It may also be possible to train the model on various types of 3D shapes at once, rather than having to focus on one object category at a given time.

All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. All prices are correct at the time of publishing.

Adblock test (Why?)

NVIDIA's new AI model quickly generates objects and characters for virtual worlds - Engadget
Read More

Techunim

Rechercher dans ce blog

Tuesday, September 27, 2022

Where is Android Auto’s promised redesign? – Google’s summer plans didn’t work out - 9to5Google

More on Android Auto:

Monday, September 26, 2022

E3 2023 books its physical venue, schedule—and confirms new fan-friendly twist - Ars Technica

Maybe this one will be fun for average showgoers

But who will actually be at E3 2023?

Sunday, September 25, 2022

YouTuber Tests Apple Watch Ultra Durability With a Hammer: Table Breaks Before the Watch - MacRumors

Related Stories

Apple Watch Ultra Priced at $799, Available to Order Today Ahead of September 23 Launch

Apple Watch Ultra Unboxing and Hands-On

Apple Watch Ultra: 10 New and Noteworthy Features

Apple Watch Ultra 'Depth' and 'Siren' Apps Appear on App Store Ahead of Device's Launch This Friday

Apple Watch Ultra Repairs Cost $499 Without AppleCare+

Apple Releases watchOS 9.0.1 for Apple Watch Ultra

Apple Watch Ultra Can Check the Water Temperature As You Dive and Swim

Popular Stories

Ten Things AirPods Pro 2 Tell Us About AirPods Max 2

New 14-Inch and 16-Inch MacBook Pros Reportedly Launching Later This Year

Gurman: New iPads and Macs May Be Announced Through Press Releases, No October Event

Android App Copying iPhone 14 Pro's Dynamic Island Released on Play Store

AirPods Pro 2 Engravings Appear in iOS During Pairing and Connecting

Six New Apple Watch Features Coming Later This Year

Saturday, September 24, 2022

Don’t open your Apple Watch Ultra - 9to5Mac

iPhone 14 Pro Max vs Galaxy S22 Ultra vs Pixel 6 Pro: Battery Life Test - PhoneArena

Report: 17-Year-Old Arrested On Suspicion Of Being Hacker Behind GTA VI Leak - Kotaku

Friday, September 23, 2022

NVIDIA's new AI model quickly generates objects and characters for virtual worlds - Engadget

Google's encryption-breaking Magic Compose AI proves iPhone shouldn't support RCS messaging - BGR

Archives du blog

Libellés