Coolest Features of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich

With Ice Cream Sandwich, Google is hoping to make its Android operating system more polished and approachable without sacrificing the power or versatility that gave the OS its geek cred. Yes, the new Roboto font is slick, but there are some pretty major upgrades under the hood. Multitasking has improved; there’s a new-and-improved People app; and you can even unlock your phone with your face. To give you a taste of Ice Cream Sandwich’s most important new features, we took the software for a test drive on the brand new Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

1. Front buttons go bye-bye 

Ice Cream Sandwich forgoes the need for physical Back, Home, Menu and Search buttons by integrating a new System Bar at the bottom of the screen. There’s three persistent virtual buttons here (Back, Home and Recent Apps), while ICS exposes more menu options within a separate Action Bar. Its location varies on the app and includes a search button. We appreciate that the OS provides increased real estate for content, but miss being able to press and hold the search button from any screen to launch Google Voice Actions.

2. Multitasking better than iOS 

That Recent Apps button really comes in handy, displaying thumbnails of open apps in a vertical stack that you can easily scroll through. Even better, you can just swipe an app off the screen to close it. This approach is more straightforward than the iPhone, which forces you to double tap the home button and then press and hold an app icon before closing it.

3. Face unlock  

There’s probably no easier way to unlock a phone than staring at it, and that’s exactly what Ice Cream Sandwich lets you do. Setting up Face Unlock under settings was a cinch, and it worked well most of the time. Just make sure you have enough ambient light for the front-facing camera; we had to enter a pin as a backup a few times when our Galaxy Nexus couldn’t recognize our mug. Also keep in mind that you can fool the OS by holding up a picture of yourself. Face Unlock is more of a convenience feature than a security feature.

4. Resizable widgets

Ice Cream Sandwich wants to put widgets more front and center, which is why you see a Widgets tab when you open the Apps menu. And just like on Honeycomb tablets, you can use widgets scroll through content — like your calendar or inbox. Plus, you can resize widgets just by pressing and holding on them and then dragging any one of the corners.

 5. Killer camera app 

Other Android phones offer this feature, but we’re glad to see that Ice Cream Sandwich makes a Panorama mode standard with its camera app. You just swivel your phone to left to right and the software takes care of the rest. The OS also includes robust editing capabilities, from auto-fix and cropping to a wide range of special effects.

6. Notifications clean up their act 

While we like that Android phones let you see notifications with a swipe down from the screen — Apple copied it for a reason — Ice Cream Sandwich makes it easier to manage them. You can dismiss individual notifications by just swiping them off the screen, as opposed to needing to clear them all at once. You can also dive into settings from this menu with a tap.

7. People app gives contacts a makeover 

A new People app in Ice Cream Sandwich is more inviting than your typical address book, providing a large profile along with social networking integration. We liked being able to swipe to the right while viewing a contact to see Google+ updates and Twitter updates from that person in a single stream. Too bad Google hasn’t added Facebook yet.

8. Respond to calls with a text 

Android Ice Cream Sandwich makes it easy to ignore incoming calls without being rude. If you’re too busy to answer, just swipe up and you’ll see a list of canned text messages you can tap. Choices include “Can’t talk right now. What’s up?” and “I’ll call you right back.” You can also create a custom message on the fly. Pretty convenient.

9. Just beam it

This feature will take a while to take off, but we love the idea. Provided your Ice Cream Sandwich phone has an NFC (near field communications) chip inside, you can transmit info to other phones running the latest Android OS just by touching the two together. With Android Beam you can share anything from contacts and Web pages to apps and YouTube videos. Beam will get even better once developers get their hands on Google’s code.

10. Better Web browsing

The new browser in Ice Cream Sandwich is not only faster than its predecessor, it lets you open up to 16 browser tabs at once. You can also sync bookmarks from your Google Chrome account. Tired of getting served mobile versions of your favorite sites? Just check the Request desktop site option. Offline reading lets users save specific Web pages for reading without a connection. Unfortunately, Flash support isn’t coming until later this year.

Global Energy is Out of Balance

 

A new study released by NASA provides further evidence that greenhouse gases are the main driving force behind global warming.

The study looked at the planet's energy imbalance, which calculates the difference between the amount of solar energy absorbed by the surface of the Earth and the amount that's sent back to space as heat. According to the calculations derived from the study, between 2005 and 2010 the Earth absorbed more heat than it gave off, in spite of lower than usual solar activity.

When the imbalance is positive — that is, when the planet absorbs more heat than it gives off — it means that global temperatures are growing warmer.

"The fact that we still see a positive imbalance despite the prolonged solar minimum isn't a surprise given what we've learned about the climate system," explained James Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. "But it's worth noting because this provides unequivocal evidence that the sun is not the dominant driver of global warming,"

The data was gathered using a network of floating temperature monitoring devices, which NASA has dubbed Argo. The data gathered from the 3,400 floats was then combined with ground-based and satellite data to form the basis of the study.

Must Know Keyboard Shortcuts - Windows

Note: Single letter keys are shown capitalized, but you do not have to hold Shift unless it's specified. You also don't have to type the plus sign; plus sign just means push the keys on either side of it at the same time.
 
Commonly Used OS-Level Shortcuts
1. Alt + Tab (toggle between programs)
2. Windows button + M (show desktop, i.e., minimize all windows)
3. Windows button + Tab (show all active windows in task bar)
4. PrtScn (save screen capture to clipboard; "paste" the image into an image-editing program to make it into a file)
5. Windows button (opens applications menu)

Browser Shortcuts
6. Ctrl + T (open a new tab)
7. Ctrl + Shift + t (reopens the tab you last closed; works multiple times)
8. F5 (reload page)
9. Backspace (go to previous page; works multiple times)
10. Ctrl + Tab (cycle between tabs)

Commonly Used Shortcuts in Most Applications
11. Ctrl+ Z (undo last operation)
12. Ctrl + Y (redo last operation)
13. Crtl + O (open file)
14. Crtl + S (save)
15. Ctrl + W (close active window or file)
16. Crtl + Q (quit application)

Copy-and-Pasters' Delight
17. Ctrl + A (select all in active window; e.g., select all text on page)
18. Ctrl + X (cut to clipboard)
19. Ctrl + C (copy)
20. Ctrl + V (paste)

Find, Select, and Navigate Text
21. Ctrl + F (find; helpful if you're searching for a particular word on a website or document)
22. Ctrl + Shift + down arrow (select until end of line)
23. Ctrl + Shift + up arrow (select until beginning of line)
24. Ctrl + Home (move cursor to top/start of document)
25. Ctrl + End (move cursor to bottom/end of document)

Open Any File Using a Single Software

SUPPORTED FILE FORMATS 

Code Files (.vb, .c, .cs, .java, .js, .php, .sql, .css, .aspx, .asp)

 
Web Pages (.htm, .html)

 
Photoshop Documents (.psd)

 
Images (.bmp, .gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .tif, .tiff)

 
XML Files (.resx, .xml)

 
PowerPoint  Presentations (.ppt, .pptx, .pps)

 
Media (.avi, .flv, .mid, .mkv, .mp3, .mp4, .mpeg, .mpg, .mov, .wav, .wmv, .3gp, .flac)

 
Microsoft  Word Documents (.doc, .docx)

 
SRT Subtitles (.srt)

 
RAW Images (.arw, .cf2, .cr2, .crw, .dng, .erf, .mef, .mrw, .nef, .orf, .pef, .raf, .raw, .sr2, .x3f)

 
Icons (.ico)

 
Open XML Paper (.xps)

 
ML Paper (.xps)

 

Torrent (.torrent)

Flash Animation (.swf)

 
Archives (.7z, .gz, .jar, .rar, .tar, .tgz, .zip)

 Rich Text Format (.rtf)

 
Text Files (.bat, .cfg, .ini, .log, .reg, .txt)

 
Apple Pages (.pages)

 
Microsoft Excel Documents (.xls, .xlsm, .xlsx)

 
Comma-Delimited (.csv)

 
Outlook Messages (.msg)

 
PDF Documents (.pdf)

 vCard Files (.vcf)

 
EML Files (.eml)

>>CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD<< 

Scan Your Facebook Account With Norton

Norton launched a facebook security app that scans your news feeds and identifies URLs containing security risks such as phishing sites, malicious downloads and links to unsafe external sites. With this application, you can easily see which links in your News Feed are unsafe for you or your friends to click on. From the scan results page you can go through detailed feed analysis.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE APPS  

IBM says Mind-Reading Computers Will be Available by 2016

IBM says that  in coming next 5 years span or by 2016 users will have  access to computers which can read human minds (brain) and be able to work according to brain signals. Keyboards and mouse may be the history in coming 5 years, and would be simply used in teaching of evolution of computers.

 

This isn’t telepathy, this would be the advancement of technology that to  get a real-time stream of thoughts from an individual and put into signals which computer will understand ,obey and work accordingly.  IBM researcher  are using a simple brain-machine interface (BMI) that can detect different kinds of brainwaves and tell a computer to respond a certain way.

IBM says it’s working on technology for people to use their brains to interface with their everyday devices, like phones and PCs. “Just think about calling someone, and it happens,” IBM promises in this video:

Watch the video about   “5 in 5″ forecast:

Worm Steals 45000 Facebook Logins - How to protect your account

A computer worm has stolen more than 45,000 Facebook login credentials, leaving users wonder how they can protect their accounts and personal info from future cyber attacks.

According to Israeli security management Web site Seculert, a "Ramnit" virus stole the login data for 45,000 Facebook users in the United Kingdom and France.

"Recently, our research lab identified a completely new 'financial' Ramnit variant aimed at stealing Facebook login credentials. Since the Ramnit Facebook C&C URL is visible and accessible it was fairly straightforward to detect that over 45,000 Facebook login credentials have been stolen worldwide, mostly from users in the United Kingdom and France," Seculert said on its company Web site. 

The stolen credentials were used to spread the virus to other friends and to even attack the victim's other web-based services, as many users use the same passwords for other services like their e-mail accounts and other social media sites.

According to Microsoft, the Ramnit virus is "a multi-component malware family which infects Windows executable as well as HTML files" in addition to stealing stored FTP credentials and cookies from Web browsing.
Ramnit, according to PC World, is a two-year-old worm that has become more of a threat since it recently began to use borrowed code from malware Zeus, infecting about 800,000 machines worldwide in the past few months.

Seculert said it gave all pertinent data regarding the Ramnit virus to Facebook, including all stolen credentials found on the servers.

"Our security experts have reviewed the data, and while the majority of the information was out of date, we have initiated remedial steps for all affected users to ensure the security of their accounts," a Facebook representative told ZD Net.

"Thus far, we have not seen the virus propagating on Facebook itself, but have begun working with our external partners to add protections to our antivirus systems to help users secure their devices."

While social networks have the power to virally transfer information and communicate with others on a large scale, viruses can spread just as fast as sending a simple Hello to a friend. So how do you protect yourself and secure yourself from harmful viruses like the Ramnit, which anti-virus software Symantec reported accounted for 17.3 of all malicious software infections?

Facebook said while the social networking Web site is currently adding additional antivirus software protection, users should never click on any strange links or tagged posts from untrusted sources. Facebook also recommended reporting suspicious activity directly to Facebook security and to join the Facebook Security page for the most up-to-date security updates about potential threats and viruses.

Also, Web users should be reminded to vary passwords, rather than having the same password for all Web services, and changing them frequently.

For More Details: Click Here

12 Great Tips to Scan Your Family Pictures

In the age of digital photos, photo scanners are still around largely because most of us—or our parents and grandparents—have collections of old film-based photos. Most people would like to get those photos scanned, if they could only figure out how. If that's the boat you're in, here are some tips that can help. 

1. Face Reality. Scanning photos is a time-intensive operation. Almost anything that speeds it up (other than buying a faster scanner) lowers scan quality. So pick the level of quality you want, and then accept the amount of work that comes with it.

2. Know Your Classes of Scanners. If you're still looking for a scanner, the balance of scan quality and ease of use should be your key concern. Unfortunately, the scanners that are easiest to use tend to have the lowest quality. That said, if you'll be satisfied with scans that are suitable for viewing onscreen or reprinting at the same size—although with noticeable color shifts and loss of resolution—consider using an inexpensive sheet fed scanner like the Kodak P461 Personal Photo Scanner ($139.99 direct, 4 stars). These scanners make all the settings decisions for you so all you have to do is feed the photos through a slot.

For quality suitable for just about anyone but a pro or prosumer, consider an inexpensive flatbed scanner, like the Editors' Choice Epson Perfection V300 Photo ($99.99 direct, 4 stars). For still better quality, consider a more expensive flatbed, like the Epson Perfection V700 Photo ($550 street, 4 stars). Also keep in mind that for the best quality, you should skip the printed photo, and scan the original negative instead, if it's available, preferably with a scanner like the V700, which can scan 12 slides at once.

3. Scanners on MFPs Aren't Great. Most MFPs are aimed at scanning documents and are best avoided for photo scanning. You can recognize the few exceptions by options in their scan utilities that are clearly meant for photos, like a color restore feature. Even for those, however, don't expect great quality. The best MFPs we've seen at PC Labs are in the same class as an inexpensive flatbed.

4. Choose a WIA or TWAIN Scan Drivers. Many scanners give you the choice of scanning with a separate scan utility or by calling up a driver from a program -- using PhotoShop's File | Import command, for example. In most cases the interface and setting options are the same either way, so it doesn't matter which approach you take. However, you may also have the choice between using a WIA driver or a Twain driver. If so, the Twain driver will almost always give you far more control over the scan settings and better results even with the default settings.


5. Auto Mode Can Be Your Friend. Most scan utilities include an automatic or nearly automatic mode, the scanner equivalent of using a point and shoot camera. If you're in hurry or know nothing about scanning, the auto mode will usually provide reasonably good quality and may be all you need.

6. Finetune with Advanced Modes. If you want the best possible quality from your scanner, explore the advanced modes in your scan utility. The best way to get a feel for any given option is to scan the same image with different settings and compare results. For many settings, you won't even have to scan repeatedly. Simply do a preview scan, change the settings, and you'll see the effect on the preview image.

7. Use Restore for Scanning Faded Photos. Most scan utilities offer a color restore option for restoring color to faded photos. Most often, there's more than one setting, so you can pick the one that matches the level of fading. If your scan utility doesn't offer color restore, you'll have to fix the color in a photo editing program instead, which is usually much harder to do.

8. Clean Up Dust and Scratches. Many scanners offer digital dust and scratch removal features. Software based versions typically do some good for removing dust specks, but don't do much for scratches. Hardware-based features, like Digital ICE, do a much better job, but add to the price of the scanner. If your scanner doesn't offer a good quality dust removal feature, blowing the dust off your photos before scanning with canned air takes a lot less time than manually removing dust specks in a photo editing program later.

9. Fix the Lighting with Backlight Correction. Some scan utilities offer backlight correction. This can automatically improve photos that were shot with a bright light behind the subject, like someone standing in front of a window or with the sun over his or her shoulder. If your scan utility has the feature, it's well worth using for badly lit photos. Keep in mind, though, that some photos may be intentionally shot with backlighting for effect—to get a silhouette for example. So don't use the feature unless there's a reason to. 


10. Scan Multiple Photos with Batch mode. Also look for a batch mode, which lets you place multiple photos on the flatbed at once and have the scan utility automatically put each one in its own file. In most cases, you can run a preview scan and adjust scan settings separately for each photo before giving the scan command.

11. Picking a Resolution Is Important. The basic rule for resolution is simple. For printers whose resolution is a multiple of 300 dots per inch (dpi) nothing over 300 pixels per inch for the photo will make any difference when you print, and even 200 ppi looks almost as good. So for anything you may print at the same size, set the scan resolution for at least 200 ppi and no higher than 300 ppi. For printers whose resolution is a multiple of 360 dpi, the equivalent scan resolutions are 360 ppi and 240 ppi.

If you think you might crop the image or print it at larger size, scan it at a resolution that will give you at least 200 (or 240) ppi after it's enlarged. For a 4 by 6 that you might print at 8 by 10, for example, 8 divided by 4 is 2. So if you want 200 ppi when you print at 8 inches, you need to scan at 400 ppi.

If you never expect to enlarge the image or even print it, 72 ppi is fine for viewing on screen.

12. Scanning Photos in an Album Can Be Done. If the photos you want to scan are already mounted in an album, it's best to take them out before scanning. It's hard to get book pages to lie flat on a flatbed, and it's hard to get a good scan if the photos aren't flat. If you can take individual pages out of the binder, use your scan utility's batch mode if it has one, so you can scan the whole page at once. Otherwise, it's best to take each photo out of the album, scan it, and then remount it.

If the photos are permanently mounted, and the pages won't come out, try scanning with the scanner close to the edge of the desk or table it's on. Put one page of the album as flat as possible on the flatbed, and let the facing page and cover hang straight down along the side of the desk or table.

Make your own favorite iphone in 7 ways

Everyone represents themselves in their own way. Then why the iphone that we are using should be in the same single form??? Here are the seven ways to change your iphone according to your taste.

FOR: THE DJ

Bone Collection Horn Stand
Price: $9.99
Pump up the volume! This little portable amplifier may not look like much, but it's got some decent power. No batteries needed. 

FOR: THE PHOTOGRAPHER

iPhone Telephoto Lens and Tripod
Price: $31.99
Sometimes you actually do want to be in the picture. This setup will appeal to your inner photographer. The kit comes with a hard case for your phone, an 8X telephoto lens, mini tripod, and an attachment to fit the phone to the tripod. 

FOR: THE COUCH POTATO

I-Got-Control Apple iPad/iPhone/iPod Universal Remote Controller
Price: $39.99
How many times have you or someone you loved shouted that in disgust: "Too many remotes!"? Why not use the thing that's by your side at all times? The IRB1 accessory and the associated i-Got-Control app let you control your infrared-based devices—home theater components, lights, fans, etc. Thousands of remotes are pre-installed and if the device doesn't have the code initially, it can "learn" it. The device is small enough that you can even take it on the road with you. 

FOR: THE THROWBACK

'80s Retro iPhone Case
Price: $20
Can't get enough of the '80s? If you love retro then check out this iPhone case. Measuring 2.75 by 2.5 by 7.5 inches, this plastic case is big, bulky, and so not high tech. All you need now is your parachute pants and Members Only jacket. 

FOR: THE SCIENCE GEEK

Mini Microscope for iPhone
Price: $39.97
Are you a closet Marie Curie? Perhaps you're just naturally curious. This Mini Microscope should satisfy your inner science geek…at least a bit. The lightweight microscope provides 60X magnification and LEDs for viewing different objects. 

FOR: THE GAMBLER

Jackpot Slots
Price: $34.95
• Fits Apple iPhone 2G, 3G, 3GS, or 4 and all iPod touch models
• Requires iOS 3.0 (or higher)
Looking for a cheap alternative to Vegas? Get your own one-armed bandit courtesy of Jackpot Slots. The hardware accessory works in combination with the free Jackpot Slots app to bring you a realistic slot machine experience, including the spinning action. Just don't expect quarters to shoot out of your iPhone. 

FOR: THE OLD-SCHOOL GAMER

Pinball Magic
Price: $34.99
• Fits Apple iPhone 2G, 3G, 3GS, or 4 and all iPod touch models
• Requires iOS 3.0 (or higher)
Are you a pinball wizard? If so, check out this portable (and we mean super small) pinball accessory table. Simply install the free Pinball Magic Game app, slip the phone into the casing, and it's time to learn the angles. All the class game controls are here: ball-launching plunger, flipper buttons, and a backbox that lights up.

Nook Tablet Specifications and Features

 

Super-Light and Portable

1/3 lighter than the leading tablet with an easy-to-hold soft touch design 

 

Height: 8.1 inches
Width: 5.0 inches
Depth: 0.48 inches
Weight: 14.1 ounces¹

 

World's Most Advanced VividView™ Touchscreen

Remarkable clarity and minimal glare 

 

•  7-inch VividView™ Color Touchscreen

• 16 million+ colors, IPS² display
• High resolution display—1024 X 600, 169 pixels per inch (PPI)
• Fully laminated with no air gaps for remarkable clarity and reduced reflection & glare-read indoors or outside

Adjustable Fonts

Customize your reading experience 

 

• 8 text sizes, 6 font styles, change background colors, line and margin spacing
• Look-up words in the built-in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition

Web and Email

Surf your favorite sites and check & send email 

 

• Enhanced Web browsing with video via Adobe® Flash® Player³
• Check & send email all from one inbox (i.e., POP and IMAP webmail, including Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL and others)
• Parental controls to easily disable the Web browser

Built-in Wi-Fi®

Connect wirelessly in seconds 

 

• Wireless connectivity via Wi-Fi® (802.11b/g/n)
• FREE Wi-Fi® in all Barnes & Noble stores

Microphone

 

Record narration for kids' Read and Record™ books

Supported File Types⁴

Borrow library books, listen to music, watch videos & more 

 

• Load EPUB (including Adobe DRM or DRM free) or PDF file types from your computer or microSD card
• Other documents: XLS, DOC, PPT, TXT, DOCM, XLSM, PPTM, PPSX, PPSM, DOCX, XLX, PPTX
• Watch videos in MP4, or Adobe Flash Player format, 3GP, 3G2 MKV, WEBM (Video Codecs: H.264, MPEG-4, H.263, VP8)
• Supports Netflix video up to 720p and sideloaded video up to 1080p; renders at 1024 x 600
• Load photos and create personal wallpaper: JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP
• Play audio on built-in mono speaker: MP3, MP4, AAC, AMR, WAV, OGG (Audio Codecs MP3, AAC, AMR, LPCM, OGG Vorbis)  

Built for Speed

 

1GHz TI OMAP4 (dual-core) processor with 1GB RAM

Extra-Long Battery Life

 

• Up to 11.5 hours of reading or 9 hours of video without recharging⁵
• Installed rechargeable battery
• Charge from a wall outlet using the in-box Power Adapter and USB Cable (charging time: approximately 3 hours from wall outlet)

Memory

 

Hold thousands of books, songs, videos, photos, & more 

• 16 GB⁶ (up to 10,000 books) built-in memory (13 GB for content; 12 GB reserved for B&N content)
• Add up to 32GB with microSD™⁷ memory card 

Pre-Loaded NOOK Apps™

 

Netflix, Hulu Plus, Pandora® internet radio, Chess, Crossword, Sudoku, Media Gallery, NOOK Friends™, Email

In the Box

 

• NOOK Tablet
• USB Cable
• Quick Start Guide
• Power Adapter
• Rechargeable Battery (installed) 

Connectors

 

• Universal 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack
• Charging port
• Expandable microSD⁸ slot 

Nook Tablet Covers

Most Powerful Tablet

Videos stream smoothly. Web browsing is lightning-fast. Get books instantly- usually in under 10 seconds. Built for speed- switch between books, movies and games effortlessly. All it takes is a touch. (And a dual core processor & 1 GB of RAM).