News tagged ‘Opera’

Last year at least 11 fifteen-year-old children were working in 3 factories that supply Apple. They are situated in China, but Apple also has factories situated in Taiwan, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Czech Republic, Thailand and of course United States.

Cupertino's company claims children are no longer used for work or at least they are no longer underage:

"In each of the three facilities, we required a review of all employment records for the year as well as a complete analysis of the hiring process to clarify how underage people had been able to gain employment".

This is a citation from Cupertino's Supplier Responsibility 2010 Progress Report. After studying of it we summed up a whole bunch of interesting facts...

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Patently Apple reports that Apple filed for the 'magic trackpad' trademark. US Patent & Trademark Office published application on February 26, 2010. 'Magic Trackpad' likely refers to an external peripheral device for desktop computers or laptops plugged into external displays. There has been speculation about some sort of multi-touch "trackpad gadget" from Apple. Maybe Apple will provide desktop users a way to take advantage of some external multi-touch system.

The application requests registration in International Class 009 under a number of categories relating to computer hardware and software, as well as several types of peripheral devices:

International Class 009: Computers; computer software; computer operating system software; computer utility software; computer hardware; computer peripherals; scanners; touchscreens; keyboards; computer mice; trackballs; trackpads; touchpads; light pens; joysticks; game controllers; graphics tablets; digitizers; cables and connectors; flash memory drives; USB drives; solid state storage devices; barcode readers.

A new group of hackers claim they found a new exploit for the iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch with the new BootRom. This means that jailbreak for iPhone 3GS (late models) and iPod Touch 2G (MC) and iPod Touch 3G will be available.

We just found an amazing Exploit in the Boot-System of the 3GS with the new Bootrom! This Exploit works on ALL iPhone and iPod Touches!

The tool will be called Gull1hack. The operation is very simple and the code is sent when the device is in recovery mode, just like Blackra1n and Redsn0w do. This jailbreak tool has been neither confirmed by Geohot nor from the DevTeam. Many users think this is fake. We'll see.

Here's a video with Gull1hack in action:

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ScreenDimmer is a new app that provides longer battery lifetime for your iPhone by either dimming the device’s screen or switching off the backlight.

Auto-lock setting can be an alternative method of saving the battery, but it is not convenient to lock and unlock the device while you are waiting for something. It also provides power save by backlight reduction if not to use the phone for a time predefined by the user.

In whole ScreenDimmer is a convenient and easy in operation application for your iPhone. You can download it in Cydia Store via BigBoss repo, and its cost is only $.99.

Here is a video of Opera Mini for iPhone (Alpha version). Now the product is in complete beta, so this video is a bit outdated. However it still it gives some impression of what Opera Mini on iPhone looks like:

Opera had finally demonstrated new Opera Mini for the iPhone at the Mobile World Congress.

In comparison to the default iPhone browser it looks pretty quick - Opera Mini loads the New York Times like 5x faster than its rival. Its main disadvantage is that it lacks the all-important feature pinch-to-zoom, and the only alternative is a method of double-tapping the webpages. Generally, the iPhone owners will find that the usual silky smooth scrolling through favorite webpages and responsive interface are maintained at the very best.

Unlike other platforms, the iPhone variant actually remembers the website you happened to browse last - the feature that will obviously be favored by a legion of iPhone admirers.

Company says as soon as beta tag is removed the browser will be submitted for approval. And it is not obvious whether Apple approve it or not, because it maintains the option of rejecting any app that "duplicates functionality" of the apps Apple builds into the iPhone. Opera co-founder Jon von Tetzchner has his own point of view on this:

"Opera Mini is the world's most popualr mobile browser and users on the iPhone deserve a choice."

There is a handful of people who have been trying to tell the story of Steve Jobs, chief executive of Apple and one of the front-rank hi-tech innovators of modern era. A number of attempts to tell about this remarkable personality have either enjoyed very modest success or were vehemently repulsed.

It looks as if only Walter Isaacson, the author of two other best-selling biographies and former editor of  Time magazine, could persuade Jobs to take part in the project. He says that the book will cover the most important stages of the Steve’s life, from his life in the notorious Silicon Valley through the years at Apple.

Though the Apple spokesmen do not comment on these rumors.

AT&T, Telefonica, Orange and 9 other world's leading mobile phone operators created an alliance to build an open technology platform that is designed to deliver applications to mobile phone users. The decision will be announced tomorrow at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. There are rumors the presentation is supported by Samsung, Sony Ericsson and LG.

According to the Times, Vodafone hasn't yet committed to the new alliance. It is collaborating with Verizon Wireless, Softbank of Japan and China Mobile to create a new common technology standard.

Opera Software company just announced that it plans to show Opera Mini browser for iPhone during the Mobile World Congress 2010 (MWC).

"We are thrilled to offer journalists and partners an exclusive preview of Opera Mini for iPhone during the year’s biggest mobile event,” said Jon von Tetzchner, Co-founder, Opera Software. “This is a unique opportunity to introduce the fast, feature-rich Opera Mini experience for the iPhone, and to showcase our latest beta releases of Opera Mobile and Opera Mini on other platforms and devices. Opera’s mission is to bring the Web to the world, and by making Opera Mini available on yet another platform, we are one step closer."

But remember that Apple would never allow alternative browsers that are not based on WebKit. So what's the point of all this? A Cydia Store release? The real intent might be to draw attention to Opera's Mobile and Mini browsers running on other platforms where the software is actually released like Symbian, Windows Mobile, and Android.

It is known, that iPad has a restrictive DRM shackles, which makes Apple the only available supplier of software for this device. So if you buy an iPad, you will have to download software only from the Apple’s AppStore. Yes, there is a big possibility of jailbreaking the gadget within the first 48 hours after its shipping since it’s based on the already jailbroken OS iPhone, but still this is not the best way of downloading applications for most of the people.

There are people, who disagree with a DRM-based strategy of software distribution. Some of them created an Anti-DRM group named Defective by Design. They told us they created an online petition that has been signed for 8,800 times since its inception 4 days ago. DbD has already sent off their first 5,000 signatures in the form of a giant postcard, which is in the photo above.

DbD’s operations manager John Sullivan says their main target is to get Apple to remove DRM and DRM enforcement from all its media and software. This is especially valuable for the iPad designed to be widely used by non-technical people who might not be aware of DRM.

- What Apple is doing with software is quite different. This is a scary step … as Apple move towards this model in the future,

said Sullivan.

Debra Shinder from TechRepublic posted an article about 10 reasons why she won’t buy an iPad. As time passes by her thoughts provoke more and more passionate discussions on this topic. So here are these 10 reasons:

1. There is no physical keyboard (or you need to buy an Apple Bluetooth Keyboard).
2. One size doesn’t fit all (it doesn’t fill the gap between mobiles and netbooks as 9.7” inches is an exact screen size of netbook, and you cannot put it into your pocket).
3. It runs iPhone OS (so there is no multi-tasking).
4. There’s not enough storage (and you cannot expand it via USB-flashdrives).
5. There’s no HDMI output or camera (if you can watch video, why you can’t make videoconferences with your friends?).
6. There are no USB ports (and you would not be able to connect your own web-cam, for example).
7. There is no flash memory slot.
8. The price is not right (it just seems to be illogical to pay 200$ for additional 48 GB )
9. It is locked in. All apps are in AppStore, and good ones cost money.
10. It is all about network (why should people change their internet provider to AT&T just because of purchasing some new device?).

While Debra compares fully-equipped 829$ iPad with a powerful and though compact laptop, it seems like she’s looking for an ability to make use of all its capacities. On the other hand, TUAW critics and Apple fans say that iPad is designed to be an enhanced ebook-reader that makes it easy to handle everyday operations like checking e-mails or surfing the web.

What do you think?

Google today announced the launch of its Nexus One smartphone. It is based on the Android 2.1 operating system and offers 800x480 screen, 5 megapixel camera with flash,  Qualcomm's 1 GHz Snapdragon processor. The Nexus One offers 512 MB of Flash and 512 MB of RAM, and ships with a 4 GB Micro SD card with support for cards up to 32 GB.

Nexus One is initially available from the Google web store in the US without service for $529 or starting at $179 with a two-year contract from T-Mobile USA. In the near future, Verizon Wireless in the US and Vodafone in Europe plan to offer similar service plans.

Here is the full list of hardware and software features:

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Wind Os is a simple application that brings the feeling of using Windows on the iPhone. There is a bottom bar and user can open the Start menu and access minesweeper game and the notepad. The applications are fully functional, but there is always a possibility of some errors in the system:

This application has no real value and is therefore directed more to jokes. Just make friends think that you have installed a lightweight version of Windows on the iPhone. Wow!

Wind Os is avaliable in AppStore for $0.99 (link).

This is the first video hands-on of Nexus One, best known as the first Google Phone to be released in early 2010. In the movie we can see the Android Market, the speed of the processor, quite functional browser, the ability to open documents, and even Google Maps Widget.

Here are some characteristics of the device:

• OLED display with capacitive touchscreen
• Home Screen renovated with the possibility of using an animated background
• Two microphones to reduce background noise during a conversation
• The new version 2.1 operating system,
• Snapdragon processor
• Supports GSM networks
• WiFi
• Great camera
• Virtual keyboard on the screen, but there is ability to use voice to dictate the words

Here is a side-by-side photo of Nexus One and iPhone:

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We published several news about new firmware 4.0 and even new iPhone 4 hardware. Recently one more iPhone developer has noted a single instance of iPhone OS 4.0 being used in their Pinch Media analytics. While such data can still be faked, it seems less likely to be. Testing of iPhone OS 4.0 may correspond with reports of new iPhone hardware also being tested. Any new iPhone would require a new version of the iPhone operating system to support the new hardware.

We can not yet imagine the features of this new OS or the new device. Apple is widely expected to release a new iPhone in the summer around WWDC 2010.