Dell Announces Android and Windows Tablets

On Wednesday, Dell launched a slew of new devices, including tablets, laptops, and even a tablet/laptop hybrid. At a press event in New York City, the company showed off its Venue 7 and Venue 8 Android slates, Venue 8 Pro and Venue 11 Pro Windows 8.1 tablets, its newly refreshed XPS 15 and XPS 13 laptops, and its foldable ultrabook called the XPS 11.

The Venue 7 and Venue 8 tablets came as a bit of a surprise reveal, as Dell dipped back into the Android market it appeared to have left behind. Neither slate is particularly mighty, though: Both run Android 4.2.2 (upgradeable to KitKat) and are powered by Intel Atom processors. The 7 features a 1.6 GHz dual-core CPU while the 8 is driven by a 2.0 GHz dual-core processor. Ostensibly, Dell is aiming to satisfy the budget-conscious Android fan with this offering, judging from the way the rest of its (middling) specs read.

Both the Venue 7 and Venue 8 feature 1280 x 800 pixel IPS displays, USB 3.0, a battery life of 8 hours, and rather lackluster cameras (a 3-MP rear camera and VGA front-facing camera for the Venue 7, and a 5-MP rear camera and 2-MP front-facing camera for the Venue 8). The Venue 7 comes with 16GB of internal memory, and you can choose between 16 or 32 GB versions for the Venue 8. If that's not enough, the devices are expandable via a microSD slot. The 7 and 8 will be available on October 18, at $150 and $180 respectively.

Dell also dropped a couple of Windows 8 tablets at the event: the Venue 8 Pro and the Venue 11 Pro. With the launch of these two slates, the company officially moves away from Windows RT. The Venue 8 Pro, a pocketable 8-inch device with a 1280 x 800 IPS display and pen input, is one of the only competitors in the space of sub-10-inch Windows tablets. The slate includes Intel's new quad-core Bay Trail CPU, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage, and 10 hours of battery life. It's scheduled to go on sale on October 18 in the U.S., priced at $300.

The Venue 11 Pro, conversely, is a real rival for the Microsoft Surface Pro 2. It features a 1920 x 1080 HD IPS display, and can be powered either by Intel's quad-core Bay Trail processor or a fourth-generation Haswell CPU that goes up to Core i5. With its specs maxed out, the Venue 11 Pro can support 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, and it includes WiDi, NFC, a full-size USB port, HDMI port, and a microSD slot. Also worthy of note, the Venue 11 Pro's battery is removable—so in an emergency, users can swap it out with a fully charged one (if they're away from their charger).

In the realm of laptops, Dell refreshed its reliable XPS 13 and XPS 15 models, endowing both of them with Intel's Haswell processors. The XPS 15 got the drastic upgrade, as it now flaunts a truly impressive quad HD+ IGZO display; it's 3200 x 1800 pixels, higher even than the Retina MacBook Pro (2880 x 1800). It also boasts Nvidia graphics, 1TB of hard drive space in addition to a 32GB solid state drive (you can also opt for a single 512GB SSD), NFC, and voice features. Meanwhile, the Dell XPS 13 has gotten upgraded to sport a 1080p touchscreen, and improved graphics and battery life. The XPS 15 comes out on October 15 and goes for a $1500 starting price tag, while the XPS 13 will arrive in November, starting at $1000.

Finally, Dell revealed more details about its XPS 11 foldable Ultrabook: It'll feature a Haswell processor, solid state storage, and a Gorilla Glass touch display flaunting a dense 2560 x 1440 pixel resolution. There's a keyboard too, of course, which folds around the XPS 11's back at 180 degrees. The XPS 11 costs $1000 and will be available this November.

Source: popularmechanicsdotcom

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Google accused of illegal Gmail wiretapping

Washington: Google has been reportedly accused of illegally wiretapping Gmail content of its users to send them targeted ads.

The search giant has been accused by plaintiffs and privacy rights advocates over the years and the lawsuits have been merged into two separate cases, questioning the extent to the company's wiretapping via its emailing service and its Street View mapping project.

However, Google defending its methods has struggled to persuade overseers and its users that it protects consumer data, while arguing that the law is stuck in the past and has failed to keep up with new technologies, the New York Times reports.

The wiretapping rulings could have broad effects on Google's service, because nearly half a billion people worldwide use it and if it is a certified class action, the fines would be enormous and could have long-term consequences for all other e-mail services.

The plaintiffs have accused the search giant of scanning their email content violating state and federal anti-wiretapping laws, in order to provide targeted ads .

Judge Lucy H. Koh has denied Google's motion in the 43-page order and dismissed the company's argument that Gmail users consented to the interception and that non-Gmail users who communicated with Gmail users also knew that their messages could be read.

Eric Goldman, director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University School of Law said that the ruling has the potential to really reshape the entire e-mail industry.
Source : zeenewsindia

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Google unveils major upgrade to search algorithm

Google search expert Amit Singhal outlines his vision

Google has unveiled an upgrade to the way it interprets users' search requests.

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Chinese man has new nose grown on forehead

 A man from China's Fujian province has had a new nose grown on his forehead following a traffic accident last year.

The 22-year-old man suffered severe nasal trauma and his subsequent treatment caused his nasal cartilage to corrode. Surgeons came up with the idea of growing a nose on his forehead.

After nine months of growth, surgeons say that the the nose is in good shape and the transplant will be performed soon.

Source: BBC news

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Jim Armitage: Cracking the code is the way to business success

Outlook A footnote from a meeting with Wonga's chief executive earlier this week. I know, I know: to many readers, Errol Damelin is the epitomy of all that's wrong with British capitalism. But when it comes to tech, the veteran of three different start-up firms knows his stuff.

And he says British schools are badly letting down our kids when it comes to IT training. All the hours spent teaching them how to use Powerpoint, Word and Excel are "totally useless", he says.

Anyone can teach themselves how to use those kinds of programs in their own time.

What our children really need to learn is how to write computer code. It is smart coders who will create and build the next generation of businesses.

Coding really needs proper teaching, and British schools are way behind other countries.

It is, says Mr Damelin "a major deficit in skills for the UK".

What's more, he adds, if taught in the right way, kids really love doing it. Who wouldn't want to be able to say: "There's an app for that. I wrote it!"

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Scientists Use DNA to Assemble a Transistor from Graphene

Graphene is a sheet of carbon atoms arrayed in a honeycomb pattern, just a single atom thick. It could be a better semiconductor than silicon -- if we could fashion it into ribbons 20 to 50 atoms wide. Could DNA help?

DNA is the genetic meterial which is also known as blueprint for life. Could it also become the template for making a new generation of computer chips based not on silicon, but on an experimental material known as graphene?
That's the theory behind a process that Stanford chemical engineering professor Zhenan Bao reveals in Nature Communications.
Bao and her co-authors, former post-doctoral fellows Anatoliy Sokolov and Fung Ling Yap, hope to solve a problem clouding the future of electronics: consumers expect silicon chips to continue getting smaller, faster and cheaper, but engineers fear that this virtuous cycle could grind to a halt.

Why has to do with how silicon chips work.
Everything starts with the notion of the semiconductor, a type of material that can be induced to either conduct or stop the flow of electricity. Silicon has long been the most popular semiconductor material used to make chips.

The basic working unit on a chip is the transistor. Transistors are tiny gates that switch electricity on or off, creating the zeroes and ones that run software.

To build more powerful chips, designers have done two things at the same time: they've shrunk transistors in size and also swung those gates open and shut faster and faster.

The net result of these actions has been to concentrate more electricity in a diminishing space. So far that has produced small, faster, cheaper chips. But at a certain point, heat and other forms of interference could disrupt the inner workings of silicon chips.

"We need a material that will let us build smaller transistors that operate faster using less power," Bao said.

Graphene has the physical and electrical properties to become a next-generation semiconductor material -- if researchers can figure out how to mass-produce it.

Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb pattern. Visually it resembles chicken wire. Electrically this lattice of carbon atoms is an extremely efficient conductor.

Bao and other researchers believe that ribbons of graphene, laid side-by-side, could create semiconductor circuits. Given the material's tiny dimensions and favorable electrical properties, graphene nano ribbons could create very fast chips that run on very low power, she said.

"However, as one might imagine, making something that is only one atom thick and 20 to 50 atoms wide is a significant challenge," said co-author Sokolov.

To handle this challenge, the Stanford team came up with the idea of using DNA as an assembly mechanism.

Physically, DNA strands are long and thin, and exist in roughly the same dimensions as the graphene ribbons that researchers wanted to assemble.

Chemically, DNA molecules contain carbon atoms, the material that forms graphene.

The real trick is how Bao and her team put DNA's physical and chemical properties to work.

The researchers started with a tiny platter of silicon to provide a support (substrate) for their experimental transistor. They dipped the silicon platter into a solution of DNA derived from bacteria and used a known technique to comb the DNA strands into relatively straight lines.

Next, the DNA on the platter was exposed to a copper salt solution. The chemical properties of the solution allowed the copper ions to be absorbed into the DNA.

Next the platter was heated and bathed in methane gas, which contains carbon atoms. Once again chemical forces came into play to aid in the assembly process. The heat sparked a chemical reaction that freed some of the carbon atoms in the DNA and methane. These free carbon atoms quickly joined together to form stable honeycombs of graphene.

"The loose carbon atoms stayed close to where they broke free from the DNA strands, and so they formed ribbons that followed the structure of the DNA," Yap said.

So part one of the invention involved using DNA to assemble ribbons of carbon. But the researchers also wanted to show that these carbon ribbons could perform electronic tasks. So they made transistors on the ribbons.

"We demonstrated for the first time that you can use DNA to grow narrow ribbons and then make working transistors," Sokolov said.

The paper drew praise from UC Berkeley associate professor Ali Javey, an expert in the use of advanced materials and next-generation electronics.

"This technique is very unique and takes advantage of the use of DNA as an effective template for controlled growth of electronic materials," Javey said. "In this regard the project addresses an important research need for the field."

Bao said the assembly process needs a lot of refinement. For instance, not all of the carbon atoms formed honeycombed ribbons a single atom thick. In some places they bunched up in irregular patterns, leading the researchers to label the material graphitic instead of graphene.

Even so, the process, about two years in the making, points toward a strategy for turning this carbon-based material from a curiosity into a serious contender to succeed silicon.

"Our DNA-based fabrication method is highly scalable, offers high resolution and low manufacturing cost," said co-author Yap. "All these advantages make the method very attractive for industrial adoption."

The experiment was supported in part by the National Science Foundation and the Stanford Global Climate and Energy Program.

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Tribhuvan University published the results of B.Sc Third year-2069

Tribhuvan University office of the controller of examination Balkhu today (september-6-2012 )

 published the results of Bachelor of Science (B.Sc) Third year-2069. The examination of B.Sc third year was held six months ago in Magha-Falgun 2069.

Result statistics for B.Sc third year-2069

• Total number of students appeared for B.Sc third year exam: 4,966
• Total number of students who passed B.Sc third year result: 2,867
• Pass percentage in B.Sc third year exam result: 57.73%
• Total number of students expelled during B.Sc third year exam: Nine (9)

Students can view the results of B.Sc third year result here

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Subisu CAN SofTech 2013

Around 59,000 people have visited the different stalls at Subisu CAN SofTech 2013 on the first two days of the event. According to Computer Association of Nepal (CAN), the number of spectators was recorded at 34,211 on Wednesday -- the first day of the event, while 24,722 people visited the event on Thursday.

The sixth edition of four-day long event being held at Bhrikuti Mandap Exhibition Hall with 120 stalls of different software solution companies and internet service providers is underway in the capital with an expectation of around 100,000 visitors according to the organizers.

CAN said the number of visitors can even extend the level of expectation as the event this year has more than double the stalls than previous times with more number of company´s participating. Previously until the fifth edition of the event, the stalls were limited to 40 at the DECC Hall in Tripureswor.
According to officials at CAN, the event solely aims to promote the ICT industry of the country and plays a crucial role to decrease the gap of digital divide between those who have access to information technology and those who don´t have.

“ICT industry can play a significant role in the competitiveness invited by open-market concept,” said Binod Dhakal, president of CAN. However, Dhakal emphasized the need to systematize the growing use of technology in the country bringing in use suitable policy for ICT industry by government.
Meanwhile, Uma Kant Jha, the minister of Science, Technology and Environment, talking at the inaugural ceremony on Wednesday, assured of suitable policy for the ICT industry in Nepal in near future.

Software solutions, internet service providers and telecom operators, among others, are showcasing various software related to education, cyber security, banking, information management, account management, anti-virus, security solutions, wireless solutions, printing solutions and power solutions amid the event.
The four-day long event concludes on Saturday.

Source : myrepublica

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Yahoo's new logo

After a month-long typography fashion show Yahoo crowned a new corporate logo Wednesday night.

While still purple and in all caps, the company's new logo dumps the serif-like font for a sans-serif presentation with distinctive interior elevations. It also adds a twist to its familiar exclamation point, allowing it to dance around half the logo during page refreshes before settling at the end of the company's name. An alternate version includes a reverse white-on-purple presentation.

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer described the process of designing a new logo in a Tumblr post this evening that said the new logo reflects the personality of the company she took over last summer: "whimsical, yet sophisticated."

There are no straight lines in the new logo because "straight lines don't exist in the human form and are extremely rare in nature, so the human touch in the logo is that all the lines and forms all have at least a slight curve," she wrote.

The design team wanted a mathematical consistency to the new logo and leaned toward letters with thicker and thinner strokes. Lowercase and sentence case presentations were also considered, Mayer wrote.

"But, in the end, we felt the logo was most readable when it was all uppercase, especially on small screens," she wrote.

Yahoo announced in early August that it would parade a series of new logos each day for one month, after which the logo that best exemplified the company's "renewed sense of purpose and progress" would be unveiled. However, while the updated logo is intended to reflect a new corporate personality, Yahoo made clear it would retain the familiar exclamation point, purple complexion, and trademark yodel that have represented the company for the past 18 years.

While changing a logo is unusual, due largely to the cost and effort that go into building logo recognition, it's not unheard of. To maintain consumer recognition, new logos tend to retain at least some element of their predecessor.

Google unveiled a new logo in May for its recently acquired Motorola Mobility, replacing the decades-old red button "M" for a rainbow of colors and a "Google company" tagline. A little more than a year ago, Microsoft introduced a redesigned logo that retained the long-standing four-color Windows image but did away with the wavy look for a squared-off image.

Not all logo redesigns resonate well with consumers. A new AOL logo in 2009, designed to reflect its divorce from Time Warner, was met with derision. The design, which dumped the familiar all-caps logo, was called "lame" by GigaOm's Om Malik. "It is ambiguous at best, and as sexy as the obese, shapeless humans living on Axiom, the flagship of the BnL fleet in Pixar movie 'WALL-E.'"

News soucers : http://news.cnet.com

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Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch

• 1.63-inch LED touchscreen
• 1.9-megapixels Camera
• Spiker
• Microphone
• 4 G.B internal memory
• Inbult battery
• 315mAh ie 3 day of battery life 
• 10 times more option
• 70 + apps at lunch
• MRP $299
  
  

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd unveiled a smartwatch on Wednesday that works as an accessory to its market-leading Galaxy smartphones, with a small screen offering basic functions like photos, hands-free calls and instant messaging. The world's top handset maker hopes the Galaxy Gear will boost the appeal of its range of Android-powered smartphones, as it battles to maintain its supremacy in the rapidly saturating high-end mobile market against arch rival Apple Inc.

The smartwatch features a 1.63-inch (4.14-cm) screen as well as a basic camera, and will connect to Samsung's latest Galaxy Note 3 smartphone via wireless Bluetooth technology. It will make calls, display messages, record videos and snap photos, all while the user's phone stays in their pocket or handbag. The success of Samsung's latest smartwatch - clunky earlier versions in 1999 and 2009 didn't go down well with consumers - will be measured as much in how it affects sales of high-end Galaxy smartphones as in sales of the device itself.

But it is also a shot across the bows of Apple and Google Inc, which are widely believed to be working on their own wrist-worn devices in what analysts expect to be the next phase of the mobile communications boom.
"We had smartwatch-type products before, but they were mainly for making phone calls. What's different with the Gear is it's got far more useful functions. It's usability has increased significantly and design is not bulky," said J.K. Shin, Samsung's co-chief executive and head of mobile business.

Hardware design
There's no question that the Galaxy Gear is a good-looking gadget. The 1.63-inch colour touchscreen is framed by a matte silver bezel, and the band is available in six attractive hues ranging from the subtle "jet black" and "rose gold" options to the more eye-catching "wild orange" and "lime green" varieties.

The band, which consists of a textured rubber material, feels sturdy enough to suffer the rigours of everyday activity, but the soft touch finish adds a premium feel that matches the rest of the Galaxy Gear's upmarket aesthetic.
Importantly, the relatively large display isn't as in-your-face as you might expect, and the watch itself doesn't feel too awkward or heavy when worn. There are two microphones on either side of the watch face that work in tandem for noise cancellation during phone calls, and the speaker is built into the band's buckle.
The 1.9-megapixel camera is located on the top end of the watch band, but its positioning isn't ideal. To take photos or videos of what's directly in front of you, you'll need to tilt the Galaxy Gear so that the screen is completely horizontal – unfortunate, as the screen's limited viewing angles make it difficult to see in this orientation.
The relatively small 315mAh battery means you'll need to charge the Galaxy Gear as often as you charge your smartphone, with a run-time of roughly 25 hours. The bundled charger consists of a leather-look dock that wraps around the watch face and plugs into a wall socket.
The Galaxy Gear 3 will be released alongside the Galaxy Note 3 in more than 140 countries around the world from September 25. Its Australian release is expected to be close to, if not contemporaneous with, the worldwide launch. Pricing is yet to be announced.
Telstra is the only Australian carrier that has confirmed it will be selling the Galaxy Gear smart watch along with the Galaxy Note 3. Vodafone, Optus and Virgin Mobile have all confirmed they will be selling the Galaxy Note 3.

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