Tech Nukem

By default, when you type in keyword(s) in Firefox address bar, it will search the keyword(s) using Google Search and lists matching websites.


To change the Firefox option is very simple, as follows:-

At Firefox address bar, enter about:config and press ENTER.
You will see a warning as below







Click "I will be Carefull, I Promise!" Don't worry the below step has been tested on firefox version 13.0.1 and would not create any issue.

At Filter: field, type keyword.url

You should see a Preference name of keyword.URL in the list. Double click it, a “Enter String Value” input box will appear.

Replace the string with:
http://www.google.com.my/search?q=

Click “OK” button and done!

Tip:
You can replace the string value with any search engine query that you know. Example for Yahoo! search:
http://search.yahoo.com/search?sm=Yahoo%21+Search&p=

Today Google announced the latest version of its mobile operating system: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. It’s an incremental upgrade — a number of valuable features have been added, but there’s no real revamp to be seen. Still, these features are incredibly competitive, and in many ways threaten Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 6.

Google’s voice transcription and search now has the look and feel of Siri’s UI, the camera app works in a more streamlined fashion with swipe to preview, and Google Now goes a step further than Siri to offer everything you need to know without you ever saying a word.


That said, here are the top five features of the new platform for your drooling pleasure. Check it out:

Google Now



Google Now is a sort of unifying service that takes everything the smartphone knows about the user, and everything the user’s previously wanted to know, and combines it to keep everything on track automatically. So, when you bring up Google Now by swiping up on the homescreen, you’ll see a list of various cards. These cards know what your day looks like, as Google Now pays attention to your usual route to work (and how long it takes to get there), the sports teams you like, your calendar, travel plans, and nearby places you might want to eat.

Knowing this, Google Now creates an array of cards that explain that it’ll take 20 minutes to get to work if the user takes their usual bus route, or that they need to leave now if you want to make their flight. Everything within Google Now communicates with the other pieces.

So picture this: you like to work out around 1pm every day, but you happen to have a 2pm flight. Google Now knows that it’ll only take you 20 minutes to get to the airport, and that your flight has been delayed to 3:30pm, letting you know that you can still get your workout in.

Basically, Google Now figures out the user based on search history, and gives everything a smartphone owner would normally get out of their device to stay productive, only Android now does it automatically.

Keyboard



Despite the fact that there’s a clear shift over to voice, the keyboard still remains one of the most important features on a smartphone. We recently saw none other than RIM debut a slick new predictive keyboard that knows what’s being typed based on context, and now Google has done pretty much the same.

The new Jelly Bean keyboard lets you get started by typing a word or two, and then based on what you’ve said, Android makes a few educated guesses on what your next word will be and offers them up as options before you’ve even started typing the next few words.

Voice text has also been significantly improved and pretty much kicks Siri right where it hurts: in the data. Google has shrunk down the voice transcription software to fit inside the device itself, rather than over the network connection. This means that users can type with their voice whether they have service or not.

Bravo, Google.

Notifications



Google has always been inherently better than Apple when it comes to Notifications, and today that only gets better. Essentially, actions can now be performed from straight within the drop-down notifications menu. So, if you’ve missed a call, you can text or call back that contact directly from the notification widget. The same holds true for liking or commenting on foursquare check-ins and other social media interactions.

All the new Gmail messages are available from straight within the notifications tab, which keeps users from having to switch back and forth between apps.

Perhaps the best part of the new Notifications menu is the ability to expand each notification. The top notification is always expanded by default, showing various available actions. But you can expand any notification by performing a two-finger swipe downward. As per usual, notifications can be deleted by swiping to the left.

Android Beam




Android Beam has been a feature in Ice Cream Sandwich for a while, but it has ended up being even more limited than Samsung’s NFC application S Beam. But Google has smartly added some new faetures to the application to keep you as future-friendly as NFC itself.

Android Beam now lets you tap your phone to any other NFC-enabled Android Beam phone to share photos and videos. You can also automatically pair any NFC-capable Bluetooth device, including speakers, headsets, etc., with your phone by simply tapping the phone against the device. “It’s that easy.”

Camera



The Jelly Bean camera app now lets users swipe for a quick preview of the last photo taken, but picture review gets even better. Users can continue swiping to see all photos taken, and pinch to shrink the gallery into a film strip UI, allowing users to navigate to the right image quickly.

You can swipe a particular picture from the film strip away to delete it, but in case it was a finger spasm or some other sort of misstep, you can always hit undo to get the image out of the trash can.

A Few Thoughts

There’s no doubt that this is the best version of Android that we’ve ever seen, as it should be. But in many ways, it feels like Google is playing catch up. I know. I know. Phandroids will scream that iOS is just a rip-off of Android, and fanbois will say the opposite. But after five years, all these companies are clearly learning from each other and building off of features that are already out in the world to try and come out on top.

With Jelly Bean, there are quite a few new features that feel very similar to things we’re seeing on iOS 6. For example, these new search cards that come up after performing a Google search are strikingly similar to the cards Siri pops out when you ask her a question. Sure, they’ve been dressed up in Google garb, but the feature itself is essentially meant to keep Android’s voice functionality on par with Apple’s.

Even Google Now encroaches on a number of iOS features like the Reminders app and Apple’s new Maps application. In fact, Google Now beats Apple down like a redheaded step child. It all comes back to automation. I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple found a way to learn about you based on Siri inquiries and other actions to create a centralized productivity hub soon.

The camera update to Android is a good one, but we’ve seen swipe to preview for a while now. iOS 5 has it, WP Mango had it since inception, and even a few OEM skins offer it, like Sense. In fact, Sense already has that film-strip style navigation within the photo gallery, though you don’t have to pinch to activate it. You simply swipe a few times and Sense knows you’re looking for an image way on down the line, and simply makes the transition to film-strip for you.

I also find the Android Beam updates a bit underwhelming. The Samsung Galaxy S III leverages NFC in a much more fully functional way with S Beam, and other manufacturers are joining in on the NFC fun too. Sony has its own NFC sticker automation tool, and Windows Phone 8 is getting amped up for NFC, too. It’s soon to be a crowded space, and whoever gets out in front early will be glad they did. Unfortunately, it seems as though Google’s already lost its lead with regards to the software side of things.

I don’t know too many people who would look at the Galaxy Note and its 5.3 inch display and say “y’know, it would be great if this thing was just a little bigger,” and I now I know why. As it turns out, those people live in Korea, work for Samsung, and may have decided just that.

According to their usual unnamed sources, Korea’s MK Business News reports that Samsung’s Galaxy Note 2 will sport an even larger 5.5-inch display when its unveiled at Germany’s IFA 2012 trade show in August.




Naturally, the display isn’t all they’re said to be upgrading here. The next-gen Galaxy Note is also rumored to pack an unspecified quad-core processor (most likely an Exynos 4 Quad), and a 12 or 13 megapixel camera around the back instead of the 8 megapixel shooter as seen in the original. To top it all off, it’s said to run on Google’s newly-revealed Jelly Bean version of Android, though it’s unclear at this point how the company will be tweaking their UI to account for Jelly Bean’s new features.

So how much of a handful is thing going to be? Well, while the display has been stretched out a bit, the device itself isn’t expected to be significantly larger than the current Galaxy Note. Frankly, this seems like both a blessing and a curse — users who can comfortably wrap their mitts around the original model should do just fine, but that slightly larger display may make one-handed operation even less feasible than before.

Now I’m all for pushing limits and whatnot, but this just begs an obvious question: how big is too big? Most tablet manufacturers are loath to dip below the 7-inch barrier, and if this report holds true then Samsung is eagerly chipping away at the other side of that limit. Samsung’s success with the Galaxy Note has also prompted companies like LG to take up the super-sized phone challenge, so it’s very possible that phone screen sizes haven’t topped out just yet.

Source : techcrunch

Google+ is obviously a major focus for Google these days, but until now, the company hasn’t really focused on extending the Google platform beyond its own services and its +1 buttons. Now, however, the company is extending the Google+ platform to mobile with the upcoming release of its Google+ SDKs for iOS and Android. This new platform will allow developers to use Google+ sign-in buttons, sharing widgets, and the Google+ history API it quietly launched yesterday. Developers will also be able to pull in public Google+ content through the existing (but limited) Google+ API. In addition to these SDKs, these features are also now available as mobile web optimized social plugins.




It’s worth noting that the program is launching slowly. The Android version will be available in the coming weeks and on iOS, Google is initially launching the platform in Developer Preview, meaning developers can test and run their apps, but not release them to the public.



As Google announced during its I/O keynote yesterday, “there are now more people that use Google+ from a mobile device than from a desktop computer.” Because Google has always “believed in the importance of mobile for [its] users,” but the company is obviously also interested in establishing a foothold on mobile, where Facebook and Twitter have already established their own presence over the last few years.

Source : "Techcrunch"

Over 80 percent of people seek health-related information online, on everything from insurance to help diagnosing aches and pains. As the world goes mobile, so too does health. Instead of using Google for your health queries or perusing WebMD, HealthTap launched last year to give people a way to connect with doctors in realtime via their mobile devices.

Today, the startup is announcing a significant update to their interactive mobile health network, including a suite of new apps for the iPhone, iPad, Android and the Web, and a revamped, cleaner UI.




Since launching last year, HealthTap has built a network of 12,000 licensed physicians — no easy task — to allow its users to get answers to medical questions for free without relying on algorithms — and has raised $14 million from Mayfield Fund, Mohr Davidow Ventures, Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors, Esther Dyson, and more. With its new mobile apps, HealthTap is essentially trying to bring the house call back to life, giving users the option to text doctors from their mobile devices for free.

Founded by Ron Gutman, who previously founded health information portal Wellsphere, HealthTap offers a directory of over one million doctors, which includes transparent doctor-to-doctor ratings by way of its so-called “DocScore.” The ranking system is basically the medical equivalent of a FICO score, incorporating both publicly available data and peer reviews from other doctors. It also gives doctors the opportunity to rank each other based on their expertise in specific fields or procedures.

The other nifty feature is the ability to not only ask questions but make in-person appointments from your phone via direct messaging or or calls. HealthTap shows users which doctors are available (via a green dot), whereupon they can send HIPAA-compliant texts with the option to include images, health records, test results, etc.




Sending that initial text message costs about $10, with follow-up messaging at $5 a pop. It’s admittedly far more expensive than your average SMS conversation, but compared to the cost of the average office visit (and the typical lengthy wait time to make those appointments), the convenience of realtime, mobile messaging and virtual appointments is more-than-a-little appealing. Plus, HealthTap archives those conversations and virtual in-person meetings along with giving you the ability to store your health records.

There are a number of startups trying to give people better access to health information on the web and telehealth, too, is growing fast. HealthTap is really trying to focus on educating the average user through informational Q&As, rather than giving doctors a virtual practice, which gives it the ability to avoid the kind of regulations and constraints it would have were doctors using HealthTap to write prescriptions, for example.

It’s a pretty comprehensive mobile platform for health education and it offers doctors an easy way to build their online presence and reputation, while giving developers the chance to tap into a whole mess of health content and data.

Source : techcrunch

It wasn’t long after the iOS 6 developer beta first started hitting devices that people started noticing something peculiar about its iTunes app — the iTunes U, Audiobooks, and Podcast sections had disappeared.



That prompted quite a bit of speculation that each of those content types would get their own standalone app when the update launched, and now Apple has seemingly confirmed those inklings by releasing a new Podcasts app for iDevices running iOS 5.1 or later.





Upon launching the app, users are greeted with all of the podcasts they subscribe to laid out in a handsome grid. Not a fan of the blocky default layout? A quick tap brings up a list view of all of your downloaded podcasts for easier access to stored audio and video content.

New to Apple’s Podcast experience is the Top Stations feature, which allows users to browse podcasts based on genre and subsets within those genres. Take the Games & Hobbies genre for instance — swiping left and right within that set of podcasts will expose users to shows about Aviation, Video Games, Hobbies, and the like.



In usual Apple fashion, they’ve loaded up with the app with skeuomorphic design elements. Scrolling through those Top Stations bears a mild resemblance to the radio dials of yore, and most notably the podcast player itself is designed to look like an old reel-to-reel tape player. The level of detail at play here is what you’d expect from Apple, and there are quite a few neat touches — the rotation rates of those reels vary in accordance with the playback speed controls.



Interested? The free app is available in the App Store now. Now we just have to wait and see if iTunes U and Audiobooks apps soon make their way out of the woodwork as well.

Source : techcrunch

My Technorati Claim Token : HA4RX4PV99UJ

Back when Box launched its OneCloud platform for enterprise mobile apps back in March, VP of Platform Engineering Chris Yeh says that virtually all of the user comments boiled down to a single question: What about Android? So today, Box is answering the cry of forlorn Android owners by releasing OneCloud for Android.

OneCloud is basically a collection of mobile apps that integrate with Box. Viewers can browse, purchase, and download apps from a gallery. Then, when you’re browsing your documents in Box, you can interact with them using the apps that you’ve installed. Yeh says that 25 percent of Box iOS users are visiting the gallery every day, and that OneCloud is already on-track to drive hundreds of thousands of dollars of app sales for developers in its first year. The most popular apps involve document editing and PDF annotation, he adds.


As for Android, Yeh says it was always on the roadmap, especially since the company’s mobile user base has more Android owners than iOS. (So why start with iOS? Because of the potential of the iPad.)

“In a perfect world we would have launched [Android and iOS] simultaneously, but it was a lot to bite off,” Yeh says.



He adds that in some ways the experience is better on Android, specifically in allowing for a smooth transition from opening a file in Box, opening an app to edit the file, then saving that app back to the same location in Box, which he says is not as clean in iOS.

There has been one big surprise, Yeh says: The relatively small overlap between OneCloud apps on iOS and Android. Initially, he expected to bring most of Box’s iOS partners into the Android platform, but he realized that many small developers only have an app on one or the other — they don’t have resources for both. So even though Box has signed up 50 launch partners to OneCloud for Android, only 11 of them are also available on iOS. This, Yeh says, is an indication of how “fragmented” the smartphone landscape has become.

The Android apps include printing app Breezy, note-taker FetchNotes, and e-signature app Docusign. And with today’s release of the Box OneCloud Android SDK, their ranks should grow. (Yeh says the Box team likes to work directly with each partner, although that may become less feasible as the platform scales.)

It’s all but confirmed.

We’ve seen plenty of evidence over the past few months, including an image of one, but today we’ve spotted some interesting new press shots of what appears to be T-Mobile’s Samsung Galaxy Note (blue). If the phablet isn’t coming to T-Mobile, we should all consider ourselves Punk’d.

The latest come by way of Cell Phone Signal, which claims that the T-Mobile Galaxy Note will be available July 11. The phone will reportedly come with HSPA+ on T-Mobile’s 850/1900 bands.

Samsung’s mobile head JK Shin today predicted that Samsung would hit a cumulative 10 million Galaxy Note sales by July. That would be on par with the 5 million units sold in five months on the market.

In any case, hopping on to a new carrier can’t do anything to hurt sales, even though the Galaxy S III — which will be riding in on many a carrier — is sure to start chomping into the Galaxy Note’s numbers.

Source : Techcrunch