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Google at the MWC 2018 event has announced the first beta of Flutter which is a new mobile UI framework that helps developers in designing high-quality native interfaces for both iOS and Android. It lets developers to create native apps in record time.
Flutter targets mobile development in performance and platform integrations of native mobile, with high-velocity development and multi-platform reach of portable UI toolkits. It comes with features like stateful Hot Reload, a new reactive framework, rich widget set, and integrated tooling which makes it easy to design fresh apps with brand new designs.
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Developers can take advantage of it to create expressive and flexible designs with composite widget sets, rich animation libraries, and a layered, extensible architecture. It also supports Google's portable GPU-accelerated renderer and high-performance, native ARM code runtime, and platform interop.
https://youtu.be/fq4N0hgOWzU
The Alpha release of Flutter last year managed to deliver features like screen reader support, accessibility features, right-to-left text, localization and internationalization, iPhone X and iOS 11 support, inline video, additional image format support, running Flutter code in the background, and much more.
It also supports Android Studio, Visual Studio Code, new refactorings to help developers have full control on the coding department. The beta release works with a pre-release of Dart 2 with improved support for declaring UI in code ...
Amazon has finally launched Amazon Prime Music service in India. It was introduced last year exclusively for Echo devices in the country. It is available for Android and iOS devices and is also available on the web at music.amazon.in. As the company had announced previously, the service is free for Prime customers since it is including in their package, and is also ad-free.
It lets you choose music in different languages such as Hindi, English, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Gujarati and Rajasthani. It also has offline music downloads and Alexa voice support that lets you search for music with your voice.
Amazon says that it has millions of of songs. It has playlists for Indian and International artists and also has curated playlists across genres, moods, activities and more.
Amazon Prime Music - Android | iOS | Web
ASUS introduced Zenfone Max Plus (M1) in Russia back in November last year, now at the MWC 2018, it has introduced the Zenfone Max M1. It has 5.7-inch HD+ full-screen 2.5D curved glass display with 18:9 aspect ratio and 82% screen-to-body ratio and has a 13-megapixel / 16-megapixel rear camera with LED flash, PDAF for 0.03 second quick focus and a secondary 8-megapixel rear camera with 120-degree wide-angle lens for group photos. There rear camera arrangement is is vertical compared to horizontal arrangement on the Max Plus M1. It also comes with 13MP or 8MP front camera with face unlock.
It is powered by Snapdragon 430 / 425 SoCs with 2GB or 3GB RAM. It has a metal finish, features a fingerprint sensor on the back, comes with dedicated dual SIM and microSD slots and packs a 4000mAh battery that promises battery life of 41 hours on standby, up to 23 hours of web browsing on Wi-Fi, or up to 16 hours of video playback. It also lets you charge other devices.
Asus Zenfone Max (M1) (ZB555KL) specifications
5.7-inch (1440 ×720 pixels) HD+ 18:9 2.5D curved glass display
Octa-Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 ( 4 x 1.2 GHz Cortex A53 + 4 x ...
After briefly going on sale in January, Google Clips is now officially available in the USA just in time for the promised March shipping time frame. Clips is Google's A.I powered camera was introduced back in October at the Pixel event.
Users who have managed to purchase the Clips camera during the sale in January will also get their deliveries starting today. Google Clips is capable of recording moving image leveraging on machine learning techniques without any human intervention. It connects via Bluetooth LE and WiFi Direct in order to sync with Android and iOS and in quickly recording spontaneous moments. It also has an option to create short movies using the recorded clips.
Google Clips comes with a 12-megapixel sensor with f/2.4 aperture, 1.55 µm pixel size and 130-degree wide-angle lens and also has Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. It has 16GB internal storage. Google claims that it can offer up to 3 hours of smart capture on a single charge. Clips use USB Type-C port to connect. As you keep using the camera, it gets familiarize with the faces so that, it will start taking more photos of the known faces, instead of strangers.
Clips app for Android and iOS lets you view, save, delete and share ...
Google at the MWC 2018 event has announced the first beta of Flutter which is a new mobile UI framework that helps developers in designing high-quality native interfaces for both iOS and Android. It lets developers to create native apps in record time.
Flutter targets mobile development in performance and platform integrations of native mobile, with high-velocity development and multi-platform reach of portable UI toolkits. It comes with features like stateful Hot Reload, a new reactive framework, rich widget set, and integrated tooling which makes it easy to design fresh apps with brand new designs.
[HTML1]
Developers can take advantage of it to create expressive and flexible designs with composite widget sets, rich animation libraries, and a layered, extensible architecture. It also supports Google's portable GPU-accelerated renderer and high-performance, native ARM code runtime, and platform interop.
https://youtu.be/fq4N0hgOWzU
The Alpha release of Flutter last year managed to deliver features like screen reader support, accessibility features, right-to-left text, localization and internationalization, iPhone X and iOS 11 support, inline video, additional image format support, running Flutter code in the background, and much more.
It also supports Android Studio, Visual Studio Code, new refactorings to help developers have full control on the coding department. The beta release works with a pre-release of Dart 2 with improved support for declaring UI in code ...
Xiaomi today has launched India's first Mi Home Experience store in Chennai. It is not a regular Mi Store, but a Store where products that are not available in India at Mi Home stores can be experienced. The Mi Home Experience Store will open tomorrow.
Xiaomi has announced that it is offering phone engraving with the designs you need but the free option is only for a limited period. Xiaomi products like Ninebot Plus, Home cleaning Robots, Mi sports shoes, Blood pressure monitor, 90-point luggage carrier, Smart Rice Cooker and much more will be showcased at the Mi Experience Store. It is Xiaomi's 25th Mi Store and 1st Mi Home Experience Store in India.
As the name suggests, you can't buy any of these products. Instead, you can go and experience the products which are the only option for now. The Mi Home Experience Store will be opened tomorrow, March 1st from 11:00 AM in Phoenix Market City Chennai 1st Floor. Xiaomi has also announced that it aims to reach 100 Mi Home Stores in 2018 itself. Let's hope that Xiaomi brings some of the products to India as well.
Another MWC means it’s time for one more Samsung Galaxy flagship. The Korean giant finally unveiled the S9 at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and S9, S9 Plus combo could very well be the hottest Android phones this year. We spent some time with them at MWC and here’s what we think.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0HFRImore8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odxl9_L3C3E
Now in its 9th generation. The Galaxy S9 looks more or less identical to the Galaxy S8. It retains the same premium build, look and feel that made it look like a futuristic slab glass and metal while refining things all around.
At the front, the Galaxy S9 sports a 5.8-inch Quad HD+ Super AMOLED Infinity display with a pixel density of 570ppi. Like the S8, the screen stretches all way around the edges. The S9 doesn’t quite make the leap to an all screen design which would entail the use of a notch. There’s the usual niceties like Gorilla Glass 5 protection and while the screen is the same as from the S8, brightness levels have been boosted marginally.
The general button layout is essentially identical to the S8 and the phone continues to be exceptionally comfortable to hold despite the large display in use. The one big change ...
Samsung announced the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ smartphones with new dual aperture camera, Super slo-mo and several features at its Unpacked 2018 event at the MWC 2018 earlier this week. It also started pre-booking for the phones in India soon after the announcement. Today the company has confirmed that it will launch the flagship smartphones in India at an event on March 6th.
Samsung Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ specifications
S9 – 5.8-inch Quad HD+ (2960 × 1440 pixels) Super AMOLED Infinity display with 570ppi, Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection
S9+ – 6.2-inch Quad HD+ (2960 × 1440 pixels) Super AMOLED Infinity display with 529ppi, Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection
Octa-Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 with Adreno 630 GPU / Octa-Core Samsung Exynos 9 Series 9810 processor with Mali G72MP18 GPU
S9 – 4GB LPDDR4x RAM with 64GB/128GB/256GB storage (UFS 2.1), expandable memory with microSD
S9+ – 6GB LPDDR4x RAM with 64GB/128GB/256GB storage (UFS 2.1), expandable memory up to 400GB with microSD
Android 8.0 (Oreo)
Single / Hybrid Dual SIM (nano + nano / microSD)
S9 – 12MP Dual Pixel rear camera with LED Flash, f/2.4-f/1.5 variable aperture, 960fps super slo-mo
S9+ – 12MP primary rear camera with f/2.4-f/1.5 variable aperture, LED Flash, 960fps super slo-mo, 12MP secondary rear camera with f/2.4 ...
One phone, three years and a sprightly start up like attitude later, OnePlus has managed to break through as the largest premium smartphone brand in the country. IDC recently published its latest report with figures from Q4 2017 and the numbers tell an interesting story. With 48% market share, OnePlus is well and clear in the lead as it takes on the mantle of the most popular premium brand ahead of Industry stalwarts like Apple and Samsung.
Just as interesting are the company’s revenue figures. Crossing 1.4 billion dollars in revenues, the company grew 55 percent year on year. It doesn’t appear that the demand is going to slow down anytime either as both the OnePlus 5 and OnePlus 5T have broken all sales records for the company.
Without a doubt, striking that often precarious balance between price and performance has worked wonders for the company. The sheer value proposition of not having to spend flagship prices for a device that gives you all the specs for a fraction of the cost has resonated with the youth of the country.
With the OnePlus 5T, the company has managed to hit practically every flagship grade feature while maintaining the same price. More than just ...
Xiaomi launched the Redmi Note 5 Pro in India a couple of weeks ago with a promise to bring face unlock via OTA before the end of March last week, the company delivered on the promise and released the OTA for enabling face unlock last week. This is the first Xiaomi smartphone in India to get the feature, even the Mi flagships like MIX 2 are yet to get AI based facial recognition unlock. Xiaomi claims that Artificial Intelligence algorithm based facial recognition system can unlock the phone under 0.2 seconds. In case you own a Redmi Note 5 Pro and wish to use this feature, this guide will help you in setting it up.
Go to Settings > Lock Screen & Password > Add Face Data.
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Information regarding the face unlock will be displayed and on proceeding, user will be asked to enter Lock Screen Password.
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After entering the password, a warning and a Disclaimer will be shown to user, following which User will be asked to register his/her face data.
[gallery link="file" columns="2" size="large" ids="245208,245209,245210,245211"]
The smartphone went on sale today for the second time on Flipkart as well as Mi.com, the company claims to ...
Xiaomi announced Oreo based MIUI Global Beta program for Mi 6 back in December 2017 and Oreo based MIUI Global Beta ROM for the device was released in January. Now the company has released MIUI 9.2 Global Stable ROM for the smartphone which is based on Android 8.0 (Oreo), this is the first smartphone from Xiaomi receiving Oreo based MIUI Stable update.
The new update comes as MIUI 9.2.3.0.OCAMIEK and also brings the January 2018 security patch to the device. As per users on MIUI Forum, New Notification Shade is missing in this update which is strange since Quick Reply and Bundled notifications were introduced in Android Nougat.
You can download the Recovery ROM here and flash it using updater method or download the Fastboot ROM to flash it using fastboot method. We can expect Xiaomi to roll out Oreo based Stable update for Mi MIX 2 soon as company announced Oreo based MIUI Global Beta program back in January. Check out the changelog below,
Highlights
Optimization - Android 8.0 update (02-12)
Optimization - Protection from unintentional tapping for Dial pad (02-12)
System
Optimization - Android 8.0 update (02-12)
Fix - Apps changed Wi-Fi connection status without the user's permission (02-12)
Fix - Apps stopped ...
Huwei P20 smartphone surfaced online earlier this week, now the P20 Lite, the cheaper version in the series has surfaced online, thanks to @evleaks. This has a similar notch-design as the P20, but the fingerprint sensor on the front has been moved to the back. This is said to feature dual rear cameras with Leica lenses and hybrid zoom. It also matches the design that appeared on the FCC certification earlier this month.
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Huawei P20 Lite rumored specifications
5.6-inch (1080 x 2250 pixels) Full HD+ 18:9 2.5D curved glass display
Octa-Core Kirin 659 processor (4 xA53 at 2.36GHz + 4 x A53 at 1.7GHz) with MaliT830-MP2 GPU
4GB RAM with 64GB storage, expandable memory up to 256GB with microSD
Android 8.0 (Oreo) with EMUI 8.0
16MP dual rear cameras with LED flash, Leica Lens, Hybrid zoom
8MP front-facing camera
Fingerprint sensor
4G VoLTE, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS / GLONASS
3520mAh battery
The Huawei P20 Lite along with the P20, both with dual rear cameras and the P20 Pro with triple rear cameras will be introduced at an event in Paris on March 27th. Price and the availability details of the phone are missing.
Source
Google Search featured snippets are a great way to get information quickly, and today the company is introducing multifaceted featured snippets for search queries. In a way, Google is solving the nuanced queries with more actionable results.
Google says that search queries can be broad and there could be several different interpretations of the question and now with multifaceted featured snippets, Google will now better understand the query and identify when there is a need for multiple interpretations of that query. Since there could be several nuanced type queries, Google will initially start with “multi-intent” queries, which are queries that have several potential intentions or purposes associated.
In simple, a query could be interpreted in multiple ways and have different meaning and Google is taking all efforts to simply by providing multifaceted featured snippets results. It will now show snippets based on a couple of different ways the question could be interpreted. Google says that its main goal is to cover a broader set of nuanced queries beyond just “multi-intent” queries.
Source
Xiaomi launched its first Mi TV 4 55-inch 4K HDR smart TV in India last month, which was sold out in 10 seconds in the first sale last week. Now the company has started teasing the launch of another Mi TV in the country. The teaser says "It’s time to switch to something smarter, slimmer & sleeker. Time to #SwitchToSmart TV. A new series coming soon!," hinting at another Mi TV in a new series.
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Xiaomi introduced its Mi TV 4A series of TVs that includes 43-inch and 49-inch TVs with 1080p displays and 55-inch and 65-inch TVs with 4K HDR displays last year. It introduced 50-inch Mi TV 4A in January this year.
Since it has already introduced a 4K TV, it could introduce cheaper 1080p TV at less than Rs. 20,000 price point.
Xiaomi Mi TV 4A 32-inch specifications
43-inch (1366x768 pixels) HD LCD display with 178-degree viewing angle, 6.5 ms dynamic response, 3000: 1 contrast ratio
1.5GHz quad-core Amlogic 962-SX Cortex-A53 processor with 750MHz Mali-450 MP3 GPU
1GB RAM, 4GB internal memory
MIUI TV based on Android with PatchWall
WiFi 802.11 b / g / n, 2 x HDMI, AV, USB 2.0 x 1, Ethernet
Supports H.263, H.264, H.265, MPEG1 / 2/4, WMV3, ...
Xiaomi just teased the launch of new Mi TV series in India. We expected it to be Mi TV 4, now a temporary listing on the official Xiaomi site has revealed that the 32-inch Mi TV 4 is coming to India and it also reveals the price as Rs. 12,999, which is possible since it about the same in India.
The other TV doesn't show the name, but it is listed at a price of Rs. 21,999. However the source code reveals that it will be the 43-inch Mi TV 4A. These were first spotted by the same Twitter user who leaked the specifications and price of the Redmi Note 5 phones. We have added screenshots of the pages in case Xiaomi takes the page down.
Xiaomi Mi TV 4A 32-inch specifications
32-inch (1366x768 pixels) HD LCD display with 178-degree viewing angle, 6.5 ms dynamic response, 3000: 1 contrast ratio
1.5GHz quad-core Amlogic 962-SX Cortex-A53 processor with 750MHz Mali-450 MP3 GPU
1GB RAM, 4GB internal memory
MIUI TV based on Android with PatchWall
WiFi 802.11 b / g / n, 2 x HDMI, AV, USB 2.0 x 1, Ethernet
Supports H.263, H.264, H.265, MPEG1 / 2/4, WMV3, VC-1
2 x 5W speaker
Xiaomi Mi TV 4A 43-inch ...
Samsung smartphones with model numbers SM-J337P/SM-J337A and SM-J600F have surfaced in Geekbench, which could be Galaxy J3 (2018) and Galaxy J6. According to the listing both the phones will run Android 8.0 (Oreo) and pack 2GB of RAM.
The J3 (2018) is expected to be powered by Exynos 7570 14nm SoC and the Galaxy J6 is expected to be powered by Exynos 7870 SoC that powers most of Samsung's mid-range smartphones, including the Galaxy J5 and Galaxy J7 (2017). GFXbench listing reveals few more specifications of the Galaxy J3 (2018), including camera and storage details.
Samsung Galaxy J3 (2018) rumored specifications
5-inch (1280 x 720 pixels) HD IPS display
1.4 GHz quad-core Exynos 7570 14nm processor with Mali-T720 GPU
2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage expandable memory up to 128GB with microSD
Android 8.0 (Oreo)
8MP rear camera with LED Flash
5MP front-facing camera
4G LTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS + GLONASS
The Samsung Galaxy J3 (2018) and Galaxy J6 are expected to be introduced later this year.
Source 1, 2, 3 | Via 1, 2
Apple has started rolling out updates to the apps available in the App Store that now lets you track skiing and snowboarding activities. Watch users can now record runs, see vertical descent and other stats, and contribute active calorie measurements directly to the Apple Watch Activity app.
Apple says that developers can take advantage of the built-in GPS and altimeter in Apple Watch Series 3 and custom workout APIs that were rolled out in watchOS 4.2 to enable tracking of specialized metrics. The update to apps for snow, Slopes, Squaw Alpine, Snocru and Ski Tracks now track metrics on the slopes including total vertical descent and horizontal distance, a number of runs, average and maximum speeds, total time spent, calories burned and more.
Furthermore, apps can also auto pause, resume, users will get credit towards in Activity rings, and the workout information will be synched to Health app on iPhone with user permission. Using Siri, users can start Slopes and snoww to track runs using just their voice. The updated apps are now available on the App Store and require watchOS 4.2 or later.
Commenting on the same, Jonny Moseley, Olympic Moguls Gold Medalist and Squaw Alpine Mountain Ambassador said:
Having the ability to track the details of runs ...
Sony recently launched the RX0, the company's latest compact camera in India. It was introduced at the IFA 2017 in Berlin last year, has a 1.0″-type stacked 15.3 MP Exmor RS CMOS image sensor, BIONZ X processor and a wide-angle ZEISS Tessar T 24mm F4 fixed lens to capture both RAW and JPEG stills and 4K video, full HD at 240 fps and super slow motion capture at up to 960 frames per second.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRxtIg3WRoQ
It has Anti-Distortion Shutter that can shoot as fast as 1/32000 second and is waterproof at depths of up to 10 meters (33 ft) on its own, and can be used at up to 100m (330 ft) depth when paired with the new MPK-HSR1 Housing. It is also shockproof, when dropped from up to 2 meters (6.5 ft) and crushproof (1 to 200kg / 440lb / 2000N).
It can be used as a standalone camera or as part of a multi-camera rig in any kind of shooting conditions. Multiple RX0s can be linked together to produce unique content like bullet-time, time-slice and many other unique styles and Sony’s PlayMemories Mobile app allows up to five RX0 models to be connected and controlled wirelessly from any paired device.
The Sony RX0 is ...
After DisplayMate rating the Galaxy S9 as the best smartphone display, DxOMark now rated the S9+ camera as the best on a smartphone and rated it a whopping 99 points. DxOMark is a standard for cameras of smartphones and Pixel 2 was the previous best with 98 points until the S9 came out.
DxOMark says that the Galaxy S9+ packs a camera setup that hasn’t got any obvious weaknesses and performs very well across all photo and video test categories. The Galaxy S9+ got a staggering score of 104 points making it the best. On the other hand, with 91 points, the video score is a little lower but still among the best. It now becomes the obvious choice for photography enthusiasts.
The rear camera can produce excellent output in good light, and sunny conditions where the colors are bright and vivid and exposure is also good, with a very wide dynamic range. The DxOMark is taking the Bokeh, and Zoom features into account and these two are the critical areas as they are now crucial features for any flagship launching these days. From the attached samples, it is very obvious why the Galaxy S9 gets such an impressive score.
The Galaxy S9+ achieves better detail ...
Xiaomi launched the Redmi Note 5 Pro smartphone in India last month along with the Redmi Note 5. We recently brought you the first impressions of the smartphone, here we have the camera samples from the phone. The Redmi Note 5 Pro has a 12-megapixel rear camera with Sony IMX486 sensor, PDAF, f/2.2 aperture and large 1.25μm pixel size. It has a secondary 5-megapixel camera with Samsung sensor, 1.12μm pixel size and f/2.0 aperture camera to capture the depth information. It also comes with LED flash. It has a 20-megapixel front-facing camera with Sony IMX376 sensor, f/2.2 aperture, LED flash and 1080p video recording.
The camera UI is familiar with other Xiaomi smartphones with flash and HDR toggles on the top, front camera toggle on the bottom along with option to select modes (Panorama, Timer (3 to 10 seconds), Audio trigger, manual mode to adjust white balance and ISO (100 to 3200), Straighten, Beautify, HHT (Hand held twilight), Scene and Tilt-shift to blur a part of an image. It has image preview window, camera and video buttons on the right side. For the front camera, it has beautify mode, pro mode and smart mode that guesses your age using facing recognition algorithm.
Coming to the image quality, daylight shots came ...
Keeping up with tradition, Sony unveiled its next generation flagships at MWC. The Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact are both top of the line phones with flagship grade specifications. The biggest change however is the all new design language.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdKMZwQ2Luk
Long awaited and much anticipated, Sony has completely revamped the design language. Gone are the large bezels and boxy build and instead we have a curvier and more ergonomic build. The XZ2 is equipped with a 5.7 inch 18:9 display and trimmed down bezels all around. This is a Full HD+ HDR that looks downright stunning. There’s Gorilla Glass 5 for protection.
The fingerprint scanner has now been moved over to the back of the phone. Conveniently located towards the centre, you’ll easily be able to reach out to it. Up above you’ll find the camera, laser AF module, IR sensor for gauging white balance and an LED flash of course. The 3D glass body of the XZ2 is downright stunning but unfortunately, you’ll be left cleaning out fingerprints everytime you pick it up. There’s gorilla glass 5 here as well.
Internally, the phone is powered by a Snapdragon 845 chipset paired with 4GB of RAM. There’s 64GB of storage that can be expanded further ...
