TechBooky

The Nintendo Switch which was first announced back in October 2016 and launched in the first quarter of 2017 seems to be doing pretty well at the moment with respect to sales.  The mobile gaming console has beat its forerunner,  Wii. Nintendo sold 19.7M Switch consoles in the quarter ending June 30, with net sales of $1.513B, up 9% YoY, and profit of $394.6M, up 42% YoY. As good as the numbers look though, the company sold 1.88 million Switch consoles last quarter compared to the 2.93 million and 7.23 million sales reported in its previous two quarters. This drop is because its no longer the holidays among other factors. This is partly due to the fact that it got some exclusive gaming content including Super Mario Odyssey, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Splatoon 2 and Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle. Nintendo had set a target of 20 million consoles between April 2018 and March 2019 which means they have to do much more in order to hit the target even though some other exclusiv

It hasn’t been that long since Apple shook the world by removing the 3.5mm headphone jack from their iPhones. Recently we have also noticed this happening to Android smartphones as well. And people don’t really look at it as a negative side anymore. There’s also no reason for it. Because of that brave decision by Apple, the sales of wireless headphones have skyrocketed. This has of course improved the wireless quality but also made them much more affordable. The Xqisit oE4000 is the perfect example of that. Design The oE400’s are over the ear headphones, which means that they cover your entire ear. Do not mistake these with on ear headphones, which just sit on top of your ear. Usually these are the most comfortable type of headphones you can use for a long period of time. At least I really like them. The build quality of these headphones is kind of mediocre. But considering the price of them, it’s still pretty good. Then again the design is kind of basic and there’s really nothing that

Uber is shifting its focus from the self-driving truck unit (based in San Francisco) inside its Advanced Technologies Group, the organisation announced in an email to the media. For the present, it"s stopping advancement on the self-driving trucks startup it procured from self-driving tech organisation Otto. This shutdown though won’t affect Uber Freight which was announced last year and is meant to connect professional truck drivers with shippers looking to transport goods over a long distance. The shift in focus according to the company is meant allow them focus on self-driving cars instead (based in Pittsburgh). Read more:  An Uber Self-driving Car Just Killed A Female Pedestrian In Arizona Engineers on the self-driving truck project will now be reassigned to its autonomous car division in line with the new vision. But for those who can’t fit into the new plan maybe because of compatibly problems, there will a relocation or separation package set up for them. Eric Meyhofer, h

The WhatsApp group voice and video call feature that was announced at the last F8 developer conference is now rolling out globally according to a blog post by WhatsApp. The update which started rolling out yesterday should now be available to everyone and if you haven’t seen it yet, not to worry as updates of this nature roll out gradually to all users over a few weeks. “You can make a group call with up to four people total - anytime and anywhere. Just start a one-on-one voice or video call and tap the new "add participant" button in the top right corner to add more contacts to the call.” To begin, start a call or video call with a contact, at that point tap the include member icon in the upper right corner. Right now there is no easier way of initiating group video calls other than adding other members during a one on one call with another contact. Maybe a shortcut would be made available in future even though it would have come in handy now. WhatsApp says that the group

An interesting update is rolling out to all YouTube player on the desktop. Like mobile devices, the YouTube desktop player now supports the exact ratios of the videos you are watching. Previously, YouTube used to show black bars around videos that aren’t in the standard 16:9 aspect ratio. This included vertical videos, 4:3 videos, and videos with other respect ratios. That wasn’t really much of a problem for many, but Google is changing the way the YouTube player treats these videos in the different aspect ratios. According to a report by Android Police . The announcement wasn’t made by a blog post, as usual but was posted in the YouTube help forum over the weekend. “We launched an update to the YouTube video player on desktop – the player now automatically adapts to provide the best viewing experience based on the video’s size (aspect ratio) and your computer’s screen/browser size,” one of YouTube’s community managers, Marissa said on user forums . “Historically, for non wide-screen

YouTube confirmed back in March this year that it would release a dark mode for its mobile apps. The mode was actually released first for the iOS app even though many would have expected it to arrive for the Android version first. Last night, users on Reddit started reporting that the dark theme was being automatically applied to their mobile apps. Those who saw the change were also served with a pop-up informing them about the switch and the option to revert to the light theme. After 4 months, the company has decided to roll-out out the new feature to all Android devices. Like dark mode for iOS and the web version of YouTube, the Android version allows you to change the white backdrop into a dark colour and select their profile header. The dark UI is especially helpful during the night time as it reduces eye piercing glare, thus helping to prevent strain on your eyes while watching videos. The dark mode comes with a toggle that allows you to switch it off. As such there are no addit

Most of the web designers use PHP as their programming language as it is a powerful and effective tool for preparing interactive and interesting web pages. For the preparation of the most dynamic pages, there are a lot of php frameworks available for use and one of the most prominently used is Laravel development by the expert of laravel developer as it is a combination of all the essential features required to create one of the most dynamic websites. An overview of the Laravel Development With the help of php, laravel has been developed which is an open source framework and is coded to help in a quicker development of mvc applications. Apart from an efficient and effecting coding and web development activity, it also works as a helpful product in an improved coding process along with the creation of a better product. The relationship between Laravel and Technology Technology is ever-changing and fast growing and to keep up with it, each and every person needs to work with the best an

Good news for Nigerians. Google Station, the web giant’s public Wi-Fi service, has gone live in Nigeria. As it has done in four other countries—India, Indonesia, Mexico and Thailand—where the service has been launched, Google will partner with local service providers for infrastructure and locations while it offers a cloud-based platform and devices to provide and manage hot-spots. The Wi-Fi service is not the Google’s first internet access-focused initiative in Africa. In Ghana and Uganda, it has launched Project Link through which it builds fiber-optic networks to help local internet service providers and mobile operators provide faster broadband. The company is also in talks with telecom operators in Kenya to launch Project Loon, an ambitious plan to beam internet to users using solar-powered high-altitude balloons. Facebook also has a history of internet access projects in Africa, including Express wifi and Free Basics. Google Nigeria Country Director Juliet Ehimuan Chiazor said, “

It’s official. Facebook Inc. just had the biggest stock-market drop in American history. Until now, Facebook has appeared to be immune to the litany of scandals its business has generated over the past couple of years, with ever-increasing growth in revenue and users and an unsinkable stock price. On Wednesday, its ability to coast on its years of success finally seemed to give out. On an earnings call with investors, Facebook reported that its revenue grew by 42 percent over the same time last year, reaching $13.2 billion for the quarter—a number that was lower than the $13.3 billion analysts expected. The slight miss may have been what sent Facebook’s stock plunging more than 23 percent after the call in after-hours trading, but more likely it’s what’s going on with some of the social network’s metrics. Facebook"s margin fell to 44 percent in the second quarter from 47 percent a year ago as it spent heavily on security and initiatives to convince users the company was protecti

With summer in full swing, Google is making it easier for Android users to schedule their events in the calendar, as well as find them in Search. After adding new ways for users to look for events close to them last year —Google is now bringing new features meant to offer personal recommendations and info about interesting events. Today Google has announced that it is adding a few more features to Search thats making finding events even easier . The search feature which will trigger the new event interface will show information like time, location, and ticketing providers in a convenient and easily parsed format. Links to further purchase tickets for events, save them to your own personal list, or share them with your friends are also included. For example, searching for “events near me” or “free concert” around you will bring up a list of events from various sites, along with details about the event. Both will be displayed in the Search window, but if you tap on the event, you will ge

It beats Apple Music yet again. Spotify is still the largest streaming music service around but it"s no longer the only major player on the field. Apple Music is gaining significant ground, although there"s still a sizeable distance between the two companies" user base. Three months earlier, the Swedish company had reported 75 million paying subscribers during its first earning report . Fast forward to now the company unveiled the figure , on the high end of its forecasts, as it released its earnings for the quarter to June. It added 8 million paid subscribers during its second quarter to get to 83 million premium users. With 180 million ad-supported active monthly users. The growth in paid subscriber comes mostly from European subscribers, whose account were 37 percent of the company active monthly user base, against 31 percent in North America, slowed during the second quarter due to the introduction of new GDPR privacy rules in Europe. Latin America remained a growth

Have you ever stepped away from your PC only to return and find it in the middle of an update? Such is the bane of forced updates on Windows 10. They"re not disappearing, but Microsoft is employing machine learning to train Windows 10 not to update itself at an inappropriate times. Windows 10"s overly aggressive update system, which sometimes restarts while using the device, has been a point of frustration for many users for a long time. Software has been developed to prevent forced update of Windows 10 by volunteers, but of course Microsoft also receives feedback from users and recognises that there is a problem with Windows 10 update. Microsoft currently has a snooze feature to postpone installing updates, but it still seems that complaints of "restarting while using the device" are still being sent.  To combat this issue, Microsoft has been testing a new system that uses a predictive model to learn when devices aren’t in use. So instead of applying an update whil

Less than a year after taking over Snaplab, Mark Randall is leaving Snap Inc, —to start his own company. Randall, who joined Snap in 2016 to head up its Spectacles project, announced his departure in an internal memo obtained by Cheddar . It"s the latest shake-up for the Specs division, which saw layoffs last year, and for the company at large, which has struggled to impress Wall Street since going public last year. [caption id="attachment_12183" align="alignnone" width="1200"]                                       Mark Randall is leaving Snap two years later [/caption] Randall was elevated to vice president of hardware and took over Snaplab from Steve Horowitz in September 2017. A dozen people were also laid off from the division around that time, most of whom worked in marketing. The hardware team, whose efforts up to now have mostly consisted of Spectacles, has been realigned under Snap’s Senior Vice President of Engineering, Jerry Hunter, with Sah

Google is putting its AI to work to make you a better writer. The company is finally adding a grammar check feature to Google Docs — one that will be able to address even complicated grammatical errors. The new feature was announced at the Google Cloud Next conference , alongside updates to its automated email-writing features. Google Docs, the company’s online word processing service, enables any Google account owner to create documents for free. The platform is fairly robust, offering many of the basic features needed for document creation and collaboration. How it works The most used extension spell-checking tool is Grammarly . Well, Grammarly is getting some competition in the form of a new machine learning-based grammar checker from Google that’s soon going live in Google Docs.  The new update which uses artificial intelligence to identify grammar issues and mistakes, such as using “a” instead of “an,” as well as more complex issues, such as the improper use of subordinate clauses

As Google has committed itself to becoming an enterprise technology vendor, it has followed a path it knows very well in pitching big open-source projects as the solution to the challenges of distributed computing. The company has announced the second of two partnerships that will allow it to offer the financial services industry and others a cloud-based platform on which they can develop and run blockchain-based applications. In a blog post ahead of its Google Cloud Next "18 conference this week, the search giant said it is partnering with Digital Asset and BlockApps to enable customers to "explore ways they might use distributed ledger technology (DLT) frameworks on Google"s Cloud Platform (GCP).  The tie-up means that Google Cloud Platform (GCP) customers will now be able to build distributed ledger technology (DLT) frameworks (essentially the backbone of blockchain) in their own apps and services. Digital Asset is a provider of DLT software for the financial servi

In an effort to help mobile users find new content to watch: YouTube is about to launch the test of a new “Explore” tab for its iOS app, which YouTube says will show videos, topics and channels users probably wouldn’t ordinarily see. Google-owned popular video streaming platform YouTube on Monday announced that it will start testing a new Explore tab on iPhone that will allow users on the platform to discover related content from channels that they have not yet subscribed to. Explore is different from the Recommendations tab in a way that it is expected to broaden topics instead of showing just videos similar to the ones in browsing history and in the subscription list. According to a Twitter post by the company. The feature is currently being tested on just about 1 percent of the iPhone users with the YouTube app installed, the company announced in a video on its Creators Insider channel. In making the “Explore” tab announcement, YouTube notes it’s always experimenting with ways to

Google Duo is a simple video calling app that brings you closer to your friends and family with just a click away, —and it allows you leave a video message if the person you"re calling can"t pick up. In an update introduced by Google, Assistant will now be able to make video calls, including international ones on Google"s video chat mobile app "Duo". The feature would enable users to make video calls from their phones, contacts and messages apps using the mobile video chat app. As reported by Android Police .  "If you use the Google Assistant: You can start a "Duo" video call by saying or typing, "Video call (name)," Google wrote in a post. The update was released on the latest version of "Duo" for both, Android and iOS-based smartphones and tablets. Users using Android 8.0 and up would have to sync their "Duo" settings using the "Account Sync" option on their Google Assistant. The settings have started sh

Even if you buy the most high-tech smartphone that’s easily available in the today’s market, there is another product in the market that may be introduced the next month. Since the grass always remains green on the unachievable side, our want for the new hottest smartphone always remains ravenous. If your love for the mobile phones is higher than that the love for new clothes or diamonds, then you surely requires a cost-effective solution for the hi-tech philandering. Since you can or cannot move to the cheap counterparts for your clothes, you can switch towards refurbished smartphones to quench your thirst for the latest technology. This is the favored option for all the high-end tech geeks. Why Are Refurbished Phones Trending Now? The customers have shifted towards buying refurbished phones more than ever because of the peripheral changes in design and slowing innovation in the new models. So, why buy a new flagship product when a cheaper option with good functionality is available.

With the rapid progression of scientific learning and research methodologies, the spread of technology has been everywhere in the modern education system. Technology in education has not just revolutionized the way students learn but also the way in which the professors teach. Thanks to the rapid progression of technology, the methods used in the classrooms have evolved. It has also lead to the harnessing of the effects of digital revolution in a highly constructive and positive manner. In the present times, the aim of the top educational institutes is to create a curriculum that is appreciative of the potentials of technology. This will help to make the classrooms more engaging for the students and also enable them to be better equipped when taking up IAS Coaching   The Forays Made by Technology in Education Technology has made rapid inroads into the educational system leading to a change in the way education is perceived and imparted. The following are some of the prominent ways in w

With the expanding business and competition, if you"re a programmer you need to be at the top of your game constantly. Here are a few tips to do better. 1) Alternative Framework Although Rails is the dominant framework for Rubyist, it"s not the only one out there. You might be working on Rails every day, but you need to know how to work on alternative frameworks out there. In some cases, it is better to go with Sinatra, Grape or the plain old Rack application. By learning all that is available and how to use them, you will have the ability to make smarter technology choices and incorporate non-Rail approaches in your Rail Application. You will also be able to mismatch your projects by diving them into smaller chunks and later on combining them to create one big application. 2) Knowing how the web works It often happens, that Ruby web developers don"t have much idea about how the web works. That is because they often come from a non-technical or a non-IT background which