Tag Archives: microsoft

Pokemon Go changed the way people think of mobile games, with its slick use of augmented reality overlaying computer-generated monsters on the real world. Now Minecraft wants to change the way we think of AR. Microsoft on Friday announced a new take on Minecraft as the game marks 10 years since its initial release. The …

This story is part of Father’s Day Gift Guide, featuring our top picks for dads who love tech. Like mom, dad’s given up a lot of life-respawning time to spawn little humans, as well as playing Fortnite with them when he’s more of a Forza Horizon 4 guy. Thank him for the sacrifices by helping him get back into his …

When Apple’s iPhone was released in 2007, Erin Lauridsen was frustrated. As someone who’s blind, she was worried mobile phone tech would leave people with disabilities behind.  Thankfully, with the iPhone 3GS two years later, it offered VoiceOver, a screen reading technology that’s part of Apple’s iOS mobile operating system. Ten years later, Lauridsen uses her iPhone XR, along with free or low-cost …

Ask anyone who was around before smartphones, and they’ll tell you life was different. But for Nutsiri “Earth” Kidkul, who went blind eight years ago, life-changing doesn’t begin to describe the impact of mobile apps. Before specialized apps came along, Kidkul would have to plan and prepare much more for basic tasks like grocery shopping, traveling or reading documents. What’s …

Google released Android Q’s third beta earlier this week at Google I/O, its annual developer conference, but we’re no closer to knowing Google’s plans for its full name. Since 2009, Google has historically named its operating systems after desserts (Android 1.5 Cupcake), but there aren’t many sweet treats starting with Q. Even Wikipedia is at a loss. “We’re superexcited about the desserts,” Sameer Samat, said …

Google runs a lot of key services through voice and sound: Assistant, in particular. But immersive audio, the type that the Bose Frames audio glasses have promised, hasn’t become integrated into Google’s AR plans yet. But the company’s thinking about it, as a conversation with CNET at Google’s I/O developer conference confirmed. “When we talk about immersion, we’re sometimes too focused …

If you’re feeling like Google’s data centers are holding back your AI abilities, the company now lets you gang together lots of its tensor processing unit (TPU) chips for better performance. The Google Cloud service now offers TPUs linked together into “pods,” the company announced at its Google I/O conference Tuesday. The resulting speedup is chiefly of interest to the …

Imagine you’re thinking about chairs, and you Google up some to try out in your living room. Or, you’re looking at a subway map in Tokyo, and you see suggestions on what routes to take that suddenly appear, translated into your own language. Google AR and Google Lens are getting there faster than you think. I’m in Google’s Immersive Lab …

You no longer need to use your hands to chat to Alexa on Windows 10 PCs. The most recent Windows Store update for the Amazon-powered voice assistant reveals that you longer have no interact with the app to get it to listen. “Alexa on your PC is now hands-free,” read Microsoft’s patch notes. “Just ask and Alexa will respond, even …

Unless you’ve experienced the joy of hunting down a functional computer that hadn’t been updated in a decade in order to file your expenses, you probably won’t appreciate the new Internet Explorer mode for the Edge browser introduced on Monday at Microsoft Build 2019. Kidding aside, this seemingly minor feature is exceptionally important, for example, if your employer has mission-critical …