Apple Want to Be Comcast's X1 Replacement Box for TV, Huawei

Dan Costa and Sascha Segan chat about the day's top tech news, including reports that Apple is in talks with Comcast about a streaming TV service, the NSA hacking into Huawei servers and spying on execs, and the Microsoft/Nokia acquisition being pushed to April. PCMAG.COM also takes a look at the Roccat Ryos MK Pro keyboard.


Dan Costa and Sascha Segan talk about backroom deals so Apple and Netflix, for example, can have priority "pipes" to deliver movies to consumers. Apple wants to develop a set top box that would replace Comcast's latest X1 box.

In the US, Huawei has been challenged due to concerns of United States security officials that Huawei-made telecommunications equipment is designed to allow unauthorized access by the Chinese government and the Chinese People's Liberation Army.

Ren Zhengfei, the founder of the Huawei, served as an engineer in the army in the early 1980s.

Twitter Delay in Resolving Host -- Embedded TImelines Delayed

Embedded timelines from Twitter are delayed on Sunday morning June 1, 2014 from about 8:00 a.m. to at least 9:30 a.m.  The message in browser status bars reports "Resolving host ..."

During the delay, no tweets are displayed. The delays are lasting about 10 to 20 seconds.

Embedded individual tweets are also experiencing a delay -- showing the "resolving host" message.

Internet Service Provider: Comcast

No mention of any trouble reported at status.twitter.com.

After Upgrade No Drop Down Menu: Facebook Can Only Share Posts and Albums to Your Own Timeline

Not ready for prime time

A Facebook bug may be related to an upgrade of the Facebook page layout that is rolling out in May 2014.  Page administrators that try to share a photo album or a post do not see the drop down menu that allows the page administrator to share the album or post to another administered page. The only option available is to share on the timeline where the album already exists.

There is a work around ...
At the top of the page that you administer, you will see the following sentence:

You are posting, commenting, and liking as [YOUR PAGE NAME] — Change to [YOUR PERSONAL NAME]

Make the change so that you are operating as your PERSONAL NAME. Go ahead and share your album, photo, or post (update). You will once again see the drop down menu.

If you go back to administering as your page name, the drop down menu might disappear again (unless Facebook fixes this issue).

Reminder ...
You might want to change back to your page name, so you don't post to your timeline with your personal name. You will just have to change back and forth every time you want to share something to one of your other pages or groups, etc.

Worthy Tech Choices from C|NET: Body Dryer and Kapersky Cybermap

This week on c/net's Crave, we check out a 3D printer modified to draw tattoos -- and it looks terrifying. We check out the tiniest sandcastle ever printed onto a grain of sand. And we blow-dry our body with the prototype Body Dryer, which circulates air and lets you ditch the towel.

Checkout the global map of online malware threats from Kapersky at cybermap.kaspersky.com.

HTC One M8 Features and TV App

HTC One M8: a quick look.

The original HTC One smartphone received widespread rave reviews. But can the Taiwanese firm attract similar critical acclaim with the M8? The Guardian takes a lightning look at the new device, touching on its sleek design and build, the modified news app BlinkFeed, its Boom Sound speakers, a cute new dot matrix case, the five-megapixel front facing 'selfie' camera and the nifty new depth sensor on the main camera.


Top 5 features.

1. 4 ultra pixel camera with a hardware solution for selective focus like a DLR.

2. Build quality: Made with aluminum that does not interfere with antenna, and screen bumped up to 5 inches with a curved back that has a nice feel.

3. Speakers with a 25 percent volume boost.

4. Sixth sense BlinkFeed ... BlinkFeed is a Flipboard-like tile interface that is set permanently on the main home page. Created in collaboration with Mobiles Republic, BlinkField pulls in content from various publications and social networks (Twitter, Plurk, LinkedIn, Flickr, Zoe Share and more), as well as your calendar and TV shows from the TV app. The feed can be customized, but the first version doesn't allow custom RSS feeds.

5. Longer battery life.


A demo showing the TV remote app on the new HTC One M8 and it works.

Embedding Google Maps with Traffic Layer Included -- HTML and JavaScript

The following code can be used to create a web page with an embedded Google map with the traffic layer activated. The example shows the latitude-longitude for Los Angeles. Simply find the desired latitude-longitude coordinate for your desired location, and replace the coordinates in the code below.

++++++

<!DOCTYPE html>

<html>

  <head>

    <meta name="viewport" content="initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=no">

    <meta charset="utf-8">

    <title>Traffic layer</title>

    <style>

      html, body, #map-canvas {

        height: 100%;

        margin: 0px;

        padding: 0px

      }

    </style>

    <script src="https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/js?v=3.exp&sensor=false"></script>

    <script>

function initialize() {

  var myLatlng = new google.maps.LatLng(34.04924594193164, -118.24104309082031);

  var mapOptions = {

    zoom: 13,

    center: myLatlng

  }

  var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById('map-canvas'), mapOptions);

  var trafficLayer = new google.maps.TrafficLayer();

  trafficLayer.setMap(map);

}

google.maps.event.addDomListener(window, 'load', initialize);

    </script>

  </head>

  <body>

    <div id="map-canvas"></div>

  </body>

</html>

+++++

Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License. 

SOURCE:

developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/examples/layer-traffic

Virtual Desktop on Mac, iPad, Google tablet, or Kindle: Amazon Workspaces Available Starting at $35 per Month

Amazon WorkSpaces: Desktop Computing in the Cloud (ENT104) | AWS re:Invent 2013.

Amazon WorkSpaces is a fully managed desktop computing service in the cloud, which allows customers to easily provision cloud-based desktops that allow end-users to access the documents, applications and resources they need with the device of their choice. Amazon WorkSpaces uses Teradici’s cloud-optimized PCoIP technology, which easily scales to meet customer requirements, and provides best-in-class security and a superior user experience over a range of networks.

Desktop virtualization has long held the promise of productivity and security benefits, but has been held back by large CapEx requirements and complicated installation and management. In this session, Gene Farrell, General Manager, AWS, and Deepak Suryanarayanan, Sr. Product Manager, AWS, provide a detailed introduction to Amazon WorkSpaces, a new AWS service that combines the benefits of desktop virtualization and a cloud-based, pay-as-you-go model. You learn about the key steps for setting up and delivering a secure cloud-based workspace accessed through purpose-built client applications.

Amazon Workspaces uses PCoIP software clients -- software implementation of the PCoIP protocol for flexible client device support. Select OEM's include this in their products for x86 and ARM based thin clients, which is also the basis for the VMware and AWS Amazon Workspaces software clients for Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS and Android which use Teradici-developed core PCoIP protocol and decoding technology.

PC-over-IP (PCoIP) is a proprietary remote display protocol developed by Teradici, which is available in hardware silicon and in software. Images rendered on the server are captured as pixels, compressed and encoded and then sent to the client for decryption and decompression. Depending on the image, different codecs are used to encode the pixels sent. There are different techniques to compress video images compared to those for text.  The PCoIP protocol transmits ‘pixels only’ across any standard IP network, so that data never leaves the data center or the AWS cloud.

The service is available on multiple devices, including laptop computers (Mac OS or Windows), iPads, Kindle or Android tablets. Amazon Workspaces will also be available on secure, high-performance PCoIP zero clients, and PCoIP Optimized™ thin clients from Teradici’s broad partner ecosystem.

Some early reviews have reported that the service is laggy in its early implementation. There are currently no trial programs for the service, which costs a minimum of $35 per month for 50GB storage, 3.75 GB RAM and no additional software, except Internet Explorer, Adobe Reader and Mozilla Firefox.

TrakDot Luggage GPS Tracking Technology: Could a Luggage Tracker Help Locate Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370?

When you are the president of a highly service-oriented telecommunications sales company and you enjoy finding technical solutions for people and businesses, you're always considering new and better solutions. That's what Michael Ginsberg, President of 3GStore, was doing this morning in the shower. The missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 was on his mind, and like what often happens in Ginsberg's mind, he linked a problem and possible solutions. He thought of TrakDot, a product that his company sells.

TrakDot is a wireless device that is designed to track an airline passenger's luggage. TrakDot is powered on and placed inside a passenger's luggage. TrakDot has a built in cellular modem that connects to a local cellular network, and has the capability of sending an email and text alert to its owner(s), letting them know their luggage has safely arrived with them at the airport. When the TrakDot and its built in accelerometer sense the takeoff of a plane, it goes into a sleep mode, so it doesn't congest the airwaves, and since at high altitudes it's not going to connect with a cellular tower anyway. However, as soon as the built-in accelerometer senses the plane has slowed down under 100 knots, the TrakDot finds a local cellular carrier if available, connects to the network, and sends out the appropriate text and email alert and reports its airport location.

Is Google Quality Control Slipping? Stray Parenthesis Character in YouTube Embed Code

In error, a close parenthesis character has been visible as a stray character in the YouTube embed code at least all day Tuesday, March 11, 2014 and part of the day Wednesday, March 12, 2014.

There should be no parenthesis character after the closing "greater than" character

<iframe width="300" height="169" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/-YCeIgt7hMs" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>)


Notice the parenthesis at the lower right of the video ...

)

It is easy to fix. Just remove the parenthesis manually from the code.

Tech Radar: Best Smartphone 2014, Spring Top 10, HTC One, LG G2, and More

TechRadar's top 10 list of the best smartphones of Spring 2014.

 01 HTC One

 02 LG G2

 03 Sony Xperia Z1 Compact

 04 Google Nexus 5

 05 Samsung Galaxy S4

 06 Apple iPhone

 07 Moto G

 08 HTC One Mini

 09 Samsung Galaxy Note 3

 10 Nokia Lumina 520