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Google’s Web Vitals helps websites put visitors first
Google's new developer tool will help achieve optimal performance for websites.
Airturn is a Bluetooth-enabled music page turner for iPad
We heard about the Airturn when it first released a few years ago, and the company is here at Macworld/iWorld 2013 this week in San Francisco, showing off both the older two-pedal unit, and the brand new four-pedal unit you can see above. That piece in the middle of each unit is a Bluetooth device, and it hooks up to about 40 different music apps and score readers on iOS, so that musicians can turn pages and scroll down virtual music sheets without using their hands. There's even optional bite- and tongue-switch accessories The standard Airturn unit, called the BT-105, is US$120, and you can set up the pedals in quite a few apps to not only turn the page, but also toggle audio or navigate lists as you go. The four-pedal version arrived last year, and it's $159 (though both models have a discount on at the expo this weekend). Airturn shared a booth with a company called The Gig Easy, that makes music stands for the iPad. They seemed very sturdy indeed, and I'm not sure what else you'd want from a way to hold your iPad up while you play. Seems like there are plenty of excellent options for musicians looking to use iOS to read and play their tunes.
Google+ Pages gain interaction with those beyond their circles, will get analytics soon
Many running Google+ Pages for their companies have likely been frustrated by the lack of interaction with some of their fans -- if visitors haven't already put the brand in a circle, they've been off-limits regardless of their interest. A quiet change may have just opened the floodgates. Pages can now share, comment on and +1 posts from those who weren't already followers. Google hasn't made the change official, but it is promising a feature that's ultimately complementary: Pages should get their own analytics for demographics and social activity in the "coming weeks," giving owners an idea as to who they're attracting. While we hope that the loosened restrictions don't lead to unwanted conversations in our feeds, they're undoubtedly valuable to companies that just want to share good news or offer a helping hand.
This is just like word wrap, except that it works with photos (video)
If you regularly snap pages of hardcopy text on your smartphone for perusing later, then an Android app being developed by Fujifilm may just tick your literary boxes. Called GT-Layout, it automatically carves up a photo containing text so that each character becomes a separate image. These sub-images can then be reformatted with line breaks to fit your screen area and preferred level of zoom -- so you don't have to pinch and pan so much and there's no need for OCR. Want to try it? Then you'll have to wait. GT-Layout is reportedly coming in an update to Fujifilm's Dropbox client, GT-Document Lite, but there's no sign of it appearing there just yet.
Samsung Galaxy S III US sign-up page goes live
So enthused with the Galaxy S III that you want to know exactly when in the summer Americans can buy one? You can follow us, of course, but Samsung has you covered with a sign-up page that will take your vitals with promises that you'll "get the latest on the Next Galaxy." We wouldn't read too much into seeing AT&T, Sprint, Verizon and others in the list of carriers to choose from, though. Samsung has run identical sign-up campaigns in the US before, and it focused the initial Galaxy S II launch on three major carriers rather than carpet bombing every network at once. [Thanks, Michael]
Google+ web app adds two new features, iOS and Android soon to follow
Twitter recently revamped its web interface, and now Google has decided to do the same for the Google+ web app, bringing two new features that should be a boon for the Big G's thriving social network. You can now see who's been rolling out +1's to your latest Hello Kitty pics with a simple click of the +1 count near the button. There's also a "What's Hot" stream, a section focused on the most interesting shared content that's accessed by flicking your thumb right on the main Circles timeline. The only casualty from this update was the Incoming feed page, which was replaced due to lack of use according to its creator. The iOS and Android applications are expected to make the jump soon, but in the meantime, the web app should satisfy the need to indulge.
Researchers enable tactile feedback for e-readers using real paper, just like the olden days (video)
Brainiacs from Osaka University have created what they've called the Paranga -- a device that fulfills the lack of tactile feedback of page turns when using an e-reader. It's got a built in sensor that detects when the book is being bent and will rotate a roll of paper strips against your thumb. The force exerted against the device will control the speed of the paper roll. Although it's not accurate enough to turn one page at a time, the researches believe that if foil is used instead of paper, the voltage will be discharged as soon as a page is turned, ensuring single-page accuracy. If you want to see a video of the Paranga imitate page-turning, press play on the embed below the break.
Kindle for iOS updated, adds page numbers and progress meters
The Kindle app for iOS (my personal reading app of choice) got a nice update yesterday that brings "real" page numbers into the app. Now, as you read along in some e-books, you'll get to see where you'd be in the printed version, so if you're reading Kindle books along with a class or book club, you can find the same pages you're all reading together. The update also adds information on the homescreen that shows your progress through the books on your iPhone, and you can now look up words using Google or Wikipedia directly within the app itself. Pretty groovy -- like I said, this is my reading app of choice on the iPhone, and the update only makes it better. Some of these features were already seen in the Kindle for Mac app available on the App Store. But we'll probably see another Kindle update coming soon anyway, as of course, the app has to comply with the new restrictions on subscriptions, including offering the same in-app deals that are offered outside of the app, per Apple's new subscription rules. That shouldn't be too hard to do -- if indeed Amazon wants to do it. We'll have to wait and see on that one.
Google's Larry Page says there's 'something wrong' if your Android phone's battery doesn't last all day
Cellphones and batteries. It's an eternal struggle, but one that Google's Larry Page says should at least be manageable. That topic arose at the recent Google Zeitgeist forum, where Page responded to a question about battery life on Android phones by saying that he actually found it to be "pretty good," and that "if you are not getting a day, there is something wrong." That prompted Google CEO Eric Schmidt to chime in and explain that the main culprit for excessive battery use on the phones is the transmit / receive circuit, which he says some apps are "not particularly smart about" using.
Apple's official iPad video, specs page
Apple has updated their website with all kinds of fun iPad information, including an official specs page and the video that was shown at the end of today's event. The thing looks just plain beautiful, but then again this is basically their first ad for the "magical and revolutionary" device, so you'd expect that. You can find screenshots of all the different apps, and see folks like Johnny Ive and Scott Forstall chatting about how awesome it was to work on something so "unbelievable." Interesting things to note on the official stats page: no camera at all, no Flash support, and while they did talk about a month-long standby battery life this morning, it's not actually listed on the stats page (probably because they can't be certain of which month you're talking about). Also interesting that there are a total of four buttons and controls on the entire device, and the only connector looks to be the dock. We've got to give it to Apple -- even though we haven't been able to touch it in person yet, this is a pretty amazing computer.
Link to the launcher text
Just a quick tip for those of who may be stranded at work and thinking about World of Warcraft (which, during the day, is probably all of you?) I've never seen a link to this page (though we've snuck it in some maintenance posts before), but fortunately the good folks at the WoW LJ community have spotlighted it: Blizzard's welcome screen notice is just a text page online, and it's publicly available. So even if you can't load up the WoW client, you can still keep track of realm downtime on maintenance days, or just keep an eye on what Blizzard is posting about lately.It's a little thing (and truthfully, there's probably not much there that you really need to know anyway -- if you're away from a WoW client, obviously you can't log in even if your realm is back up). But you never know, someday when you're thinking about World of Warcraft, far afield of your installation, and really need to know what Blizzard has to tell you, it could come in handy. Definitely earned a place in my bookmarks, just in case.And having it in quick and easy online text form means we can script it to go elsewhere, right? Anyone want to try hooking a Twitter account up to this thing?
HTC's official Fuze page shows up... kinda
If you had any lingering doubt that HTC's US, GSM version of the Touch Pro (AKA the Fuze) was headed to AT&T in the near future, you can probably take a deep breath. Thanks to an eagle-eyed tipster, we're now able to view HTC's official page for the device, although it looks like they may not be done with all the coding, as an image of the Tilt is still being used as a placeholder. There's no mention of release date, though we do learn that the device will sport AT&T's Cellular Video and Mobile Music services, and a "unique AT&T defined 5 row slide out / slide away QWERTY keyboard," which definitely means nothing at all. Hit the read link if you don't believe us, but for goodness' sake -- you should see someone about that paranoia.[Thanks, Wie]
In Russia, World of Warcraft page visits you!
Blizzard has released the Russian World of Warcraft webpage over at their European site. I can't read a darn thing on it, so I'm forced to rely on other's translations of it, and some good old Google Translator action on the press release. A couple interesting things. First, they'll be releasing the fully localized version of Russian WoW in a few months. The second interesting thing is that they're actually looking for some people fluent in Russian to work for them, and this is a good thing since the Russian version of the site isn't nearly as complete as other language's versions of the site. Finally, ignore the translator error given by Google: "Our list of frequently asked questions concerning the withdrawal of Russian version of World of Warcraft." There is no withdrawal, there will be a Russian WoW.The Russian version of WoW was announced back on December 10th, 2007. It's good to see that Blizzard is continuing the localization of the game. Many international users are forced to either play on the plethora of European servers or come play on the United States servers. This can be a difficult thing, in that the distance between the realm server and the player's computer is so great that very large and unruly ping times often result. This is not a good thing if you're trying to have any sort of skillful game playing.All and all a nice little present for our Russian friends.
Cool Guys and Girls needed to play Warlocks
Axel on LJ points us to an easter egg on the Official WoW page that I can't help think must be fairly old, but I've never seen it before, so here you go: highlighting text under the Warlock and Warrior listings on the class page reveals some funny flavor text.The US page seems to have been changed from the original above (as of this writing, under Warlocks it says "hey you found some hidden text, there must be some giant conspiracy here"), but the European page shows the original "cool guy/girl" as a recommended player for Warlocks. At least one commenter on the LJ page says this has been around since day one on the main page, and I wouldn't be surprised -- Blizzard is familiar with leaving secrets on the official page for players.
insideapple.apple.com?
The promotional email for the .Mac webmail refresh that went out over the weekend might have been a bit more revealing than we originally thought. Reader Harry noticed the address Apple used to send it was a bit different than the standard 'noreply@apple.com' (and honestly, I'm signed up for so much promo stuff these days I don't pay attention to who it's from with stuff like this anymore). The email was sent from an inside.apple.com domain, and following it redirects you to an apple.com/chatterbox 'we'll be back soon!' maintenance page - not the typical 'Looking for something at Apple?' page.Some googling revealed that others have seen this /chatterbox/ link used before, especially with images that are linked in newsletters, so this might be nothing more than some internal system for site and/or email and newsletter management. The 'we'll be back soon' bit simply makes it a little more interesting, as that sounds like it could actually be something public. In all likelihood it's nothing, and you can simply move along.
CPSC and Apple get recall battery lists synced
We've noticed around the web, and also received a number of reports from you observant readers, that the list of recalled batteries didn't quite match up between the CPSC (U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) and Apple. Understandably, quite a bit of confusion was building over this, but fortunately, InsanelyMac News is reporting that the CPSC has updated their list to match Apple's, so everyone should be on the same page now.Also, we and others have been linking to various battery recall pages, missing the correct page for this most recent recall and causing even more trouble. This is the proper link for the most recently announced 1.8 million battery recall page, so we hope this helps clear things up.
Sandvox 1.0.2 with new features, demo screencast, intro pricing ends soon
Karelia Software has updated Sandvox, their feature-packed WYSIWYG web design app, to version 1.0.2, bringing a few new features to the table such as a much-requested Format menu. Of course, other bug fixes and the like are included, so check out the release notes for the full details.In addition to a one-hundredth of a point update, Karelia Software has also created a demo screencast for Sandvox which takes (potential) users through the site creation process and demos the many features Sandvox has to offer, such as adding weblogs and photo albums, as well as the Pro feature lineup. Along with the screencast, Karelia Software has also updated their online documentation with "How do I?", troubleshooting and reference sections. Last on the Sandvox update is the impending doom of their introductory pricing offer. Presently, a single regular Sandvox license goes for $39 USD, while the Pro version is $69 USD - but only until Friday, June 16th. I couldn't track down what these prices will bump up to, but I'm sure they'll make these look like a good deal. Get it while it's hot.
New Packrat version adds true list and note creation
A new Packrat version (version 0.84 build 220) has enabled 100% edit-ability of lists and notes on pages, including the create of new lists and notes on pages that previously had none. To facilitate this, a new 'Action' button has been added to Packrat's toolbar, containing 'create new note/list' commands for your productivity pleasure.To find out more about the update, check the blog of Rod Schmidt, Packrat's developer.
Packrat update brings more Backpack editing, bug fixes
Packrat, the offline editing and syncing client for Backpack, has been updated to version 0.83 build #206 (I know, it isn't as pretty as 'Packrat 2.0', but you'll live). More editing abilities have been added, as you can now delete emails you have sent to Backpack pages, edit the page title and body and rename pages simply by double-clicking them in the page list on the left. For more details of what's new and fixed, check out Rod Schmidt's blog (the developer).A demo that allows you to view and edit four of your Backpack pages is available, while a full license will cost you $24.95 from infiniteNIL Software.
