Friday, August 30, 2013

Sharp branching into robo-vacs, grow lights, e-whiteboards to offset slow LCD sales (video)

Sharp branching into robo-vacs, grow lights, e-whiteboards to offset slow LCD sales (video) data = {blogUrl: "www.engadget.com",v: 315};when = {jquery: lab.scriptBs("jquery"),plugins: lab.scriptBs("plugins"),eng: lab.scriptBs("eng")}; var s265prop9 = ('20621909' !== '') ? 'bsd:20621909' : ''; var postID = '20621909'; var modalMNo = '93319229', modalVideoMNo = '93320648', modalGalleryMNo = '93304207'; when.eng("eng.omni.init", {pfxID:"weg",pageName:document.title,server:"acp-ld39.websys.aol.com",channel:"us.engadget", s_account: "aolwbengadget,aolsvc", short_url: "",pageType:"",linkInternalFilters:"javascript:,",prop1:"article",prop2:"displays",prop9:s265prop9,prop12:document.location,prop17:"",prop18:"",prop19:"",prop20:"", prop22:"steve-dent", prop54:"blogsmith",mmxgo: true }); adSendTerms('1')adSetMOAT('1');adSetAdURL('/_uac/adpagem.html');lab._script("http://o.aolcdn.com/os/ads/adhesion/js/adhads-min.js").wait(function(){var floatingAd = new AdhesiveAd("348-14-15-14d",{hideOnSwipe:true});}); onBreak({980: function () { adSetType("F");htmlAdWH("93319229", "LB", "LB"); adSetType("");}}); EngadgetMenu NewsReviews Features Galleries VideosEventsPodcasts Engadget ShowTopics Buyers Guides Sagas Store HD Mobile Alt Announcements Cameras Cellphones Desktops Displays Gaming GPS Handhelds Home Entertainment Household Internet Laptops Meta Misc Networking Peripherals Podcasts Robots Portable Audio/Video Science Software Storage Tablets Transportation Wearables Wireless Acer Amazon AMD Apple ASUS AT&T Blackberry Canon Dell Facebook Google HP HTC Intel Lenovo LG Microsoft Nikon Nintendo Nokia NVIDIA Samsung Sony Sprint T-Mobile Verizon About UsSubscribeLike Engadget@engadgettip uswhen.eng("eng.nav.init")when.eng("eng.tips.init") onBreak({980: function () {htmlAdWH("93308280", "215", "35",'AJAX','ajaxsponsor');}});Sharp branching into robo-vacs, grow lights, e-whiteboards to offset slow LCD sales (video) HDBypostedJun 14th, 2013 at 9:07 AM 0

Sharp branching into robovacs, grow lights, ewhiteboards to offset slow panel sales

Remember the Cocorobo robotic vaccum that could send you pics of your newly-cleaned carpet? Sharp is going to be doing a lot more of that kind of thing soon, if a recent demo at its research center in Nara, Japan is any indication. Since the company has been losing gobs of money on its tepid LCD-panel business, it'll soon be using some of that tech in completely different industries: for instance, converting powerful LED lighting from TV backlights to grow lamps, and touchscreen TV panels to interactive whiteboards. Sharp admitted to PC World that it needed to branch into other businesses since "rivals have been able to catch up from behind" to its LCD TV and mobile phone businesses -- and judging by the drastic actions the company's taken to stave off disaster lately, it'll need to hustle those products to market, stat. Check the video after the jump to see some of the prototypes in action.

[Image credit: PC World]

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Katy Perry’s First Vogue Cover Leaked Early

Here is Katy Perry, nestled in tall grass like a newborn lamb, her powdered face turned toward Annie Leibovitz's lens like a flower to the sun for her very first-ever Vogue cover. (It bears a striking resemblance to Anne Hathaway's December cover, no?) She's wearing Rodarte, which is definitely a step up from her cupcake bras and aggressive keyhole cutouts of yore.

But wait, how are we supposed to interpret that ring on her wedding finger? The headlines do hint that we'll hear about her love life — does this mean she'll discuss John Mayer? Or Russell Brand, who is now supposedly making out with Andre Balazs's daughter, of all people? What about Robert Pattinson? Alas, these questions won't be answered until Tuesday, when the full accompanying spread and cover story will come out. (And probably when the cover was supposed to go up, had it not leaked early on the Fashion Spot.) 

Also of note: This cover reveals that the July issue will contain a story about Alexander Wang "Rebooting Balenciaga," which will surely be fluffy but hopefully interesting, as well as a feature about women who have to choose between a "good mood or good sex," which sounds unfortunate. 


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Male Gaze: A$AP Rocky’s Temple Braids

During the last New York Fashion Week, the rapper from Harlem with a love for grillz, girls, chin-length braids, and baseball caps owned the scene. He flashed his trademark middle fingers (which temporarily made Terry Richardson's thumbs obsolete) at seven different shows, walked down the runway for Hood by Air, and even appeared in a spoof video for Alexander Wang. This Sunday, the fashion darling and hip-hop star will perform at Bonnaroo. Will his newfound dalliance with the fashion world be enough to make him wear a man skirt like Kanye? Or maybe even a long tunic or floral top. At the very least, we can expect to see a lot of middle fingers waving around. And bring some shades, or that winsome grin plated in silver and gold will blind you.


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Frequently Asked Questions About the Miley Cyrus Half-Jeans, Half-Sweatpants

Miley Cyrus recently wore pants that were half jeans, half sweatpants at a red carpet event for MySpace. The reaction has mostly been disbelief. To help you through this time of ?!?!, the Cut is providing answers to all of your questions about her half-jeans, half-sweatpants.

Are those pants really half jeans, half sweatpants?
Yes.

How does that even work?
The left half is jeans. The right half is sweatpants. They are sewn together. Both the zip-and-button closure of the jeans and the elastic waist of the sweats have been preserved.

Are they designer, or something?
Yes. Miley's pants are from Ashish's spring 2013 collection. Designer Ashish Gupta also showed pants that were half jeans, half sequined slacks and half pleated jeans, half normal jeans. On the Internet, you can buy Ashish pants that are half sequined skinny leg, half sequined wide leg. Those pants cost $2,127, so Miley's pants are probably in the four-figure range, too.

Is there precedent for this?
Yes. Margiela has used the technique. When H&M offered a Margiela diffusion line last year, split-down-the-middle half-and-half jackets were among the re-created Margiela classics. The twin forces of colorblocking and asymmetry have led many a celebrity to half-and-half dresses. 

Half-jeans, half-sweatpants, though? Miley might be the first. Ashish's sweat jeans have appeared on some personal style blogs, but never before on a red carpet, as far as I can tell. (Feel free to disprove me in the comments.)

What should we call these frankenpants?
For your consideration: sweat jeans; jweats; swenim; sweans; bipolar pants disorder; split pants personality; "She likes to split her legs, heh heh heh"; everything you can steal from your boyfriend's closet all at once. I'm rooting for jweats.

What are the drawbacks to wearing jweats?
Being ridiculed; having your sanity questioned; having one side of your butt get saggy before the other one does owing to differing tensile strengths of fabrics.

What are the benefits of wearing jweats?
Compromise; attention; half-comfort, half-more-comfort.

What is the best face to make while wearing jweats?


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White House mandates that federal agencies make better use of spectrum

White House mandates that federal agencies make better use of spectrum data = {blogUrl: "www.engadget.com",v: 315};when = {jquery: lab.scriptBs("jquery"),plugins: lab.scriptBs("plugins"),eng: lab.scriptBs("eng")}; var s265prop9 = ('20622427' !== '') ? 'bsd:20622427' : ''; var postID = '20622427'; var modalMNo = '93319229', modalVideoMNo = '93320648', modalGalleryMNo = '93304207'; when.eng("eng.omni.init", {pfxID:"weg",pageName:document.title,server:"acp-ld39.websys.aol.com",channel:"us.engadget", s_account: "aolwbengadget,aolsvc", short_url: "",pageType:"",linkInternalFilters:"javascript:,",prop1:"article",prop2:"wireless",prop9:s265prop9,prop12:document.location,prop17:"",prop18:"",prop19:"",prop20:"", prop22:"jon-fingas", prop54:"blogsmith",mmxgo: true }); adSendTerms('1')adSetMOAT('1');adSetAdURL('/_uac/adpagem.html');lab._script("http://o.aolcdn.com/os/ads/adhesion/js/adhads-min.js").wait(function(){var floatingAd = new AdhesiveAd("348-14-15-14d",{hideOnSwipe:true});}); onBreak({980: function () { adSetType("F");htmlAdWH("93319229", "LB", "LB"); adSetType("");}}); EngadgetMenu NewsReviews Features Galleries VideosEventsPodcasts Engadget ShowTopics Buyers Guides Sagas Store HD Mobile Alt Announcements Cameras Cellphones Desktops Displays Gaming GPS Handhelds Home Entertainment Household Internet Laptops Meta Misc Networking Peripherals Podcasts Robots Portable Audio/Video Science Software Storage Tablets Transportation Wearables Wireless Acer Amazon AMD Apple ASUS AT&T Blackberry Canon Dell Facebook Google HP HTC Intel Lenovo LG Microsoft Nikon Nintendo Nokia NVIDIA Samsung Sony Sprint T-Mobile Verizon About UsSubscribeLike Engadget@engadgettip uswhen.eng("eng.nav.init")when.eng("eng.tips.init") onBreak({980: function () {htmlAdWH("93308280", "215", "35",'AJAX','ajaxsponsor');}});White House mandates that federal agencies make better use of spectrum MobileBypostedJun 14th, 2013 at 1:51 PM 0

White House

The White House has long been calling for smarter use of spectrum among federal institutions, and it's translating some of those words into deeds through a new Presidential Memorandum. The new set of guidelines requires that agencies wanting spectrum prove that they've both explored alternatives and will make efficient use of the airwaves they'll get. The NTIA also receives an expanded role under the mandate: it should offer wider access to government-owned frequencies and work more closely with the private sector. Not much changes for the FCC, though. The White House wants it to largely stay the course and prevent carriers from hogging spectrum. Accordingly, we're not expecting a sudden surge in wireless capacity as a result of the memorandum; it might, however, cut back on some waste.

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Microsoft Office Mobile for iPhone hands-on

Microsoft releases Office for iPhone, available now for Office 365 subscribers only handson

It wasn't a question of whether Microsoft would release Office for iOS, but when. The company just released a free Office Mobile app for the iPhone, and it's available today in the US, with other regions to follow over the coming days. Before you all go rushing off to the download link, though, there's something you need to know: an Office 365 subscription is required in order to use the app. That's a bummer for people who bought a traditional copy of the suite, or who normally use other word processors, but it makes perfect business sense for Microsoft. After all, the company doesn't want to give folks too many reasons to use iOS, and it also needs to protect the precious revenue stream that is Office sales.

In any event, if you do have a 365 subscription, you'll be delighted to know that the iOS app does not count toward your limit of five PC / Mac installations. Rather, you get to install the application on up to five iPhones, the same way you can put the full suite on up to five computers. Also, in addition to merely viewing whatever Word, PowerPoint and Excel files you already had stored in SkyDrive, you can also make light edits. Additionally, you can create new documents from your phone, though this only applies to Word and Excel, not PowerPoint (understandably so, we think). Again, the app is available today in the US, and for the iPhone, specifically; for the iPad, Microsoft is steering people toward its Office web apps. As for other platforms, the company won't comment on whether an Android version is in the works. At any rate, all you iPhone owners with 365 subscriptions can get your download on now. And then you can read on past the break, where we've got some screenshots and hands-on impressions at the ready.

when.eng("eng.galleries.init")Microsoft releases Office for iPhone, available now for Office 365 subscribers only handson

To run Office, you'll need an iPhone 4, 4S or 5 (or a fifth-gen iPod touch) running iOS 6.1 or higher. Since you already have an Office 365 subscription, you won't need to create any new usernames or passwords; just enter the email address associated with your Office / Microsoft account, followed by the password. Boom. Voilà. You're in. What you'll see next is a home screen with four little tabs at the bottom for opening files, creating new ones and jumping to recently used documents. You can also adjust the settings using the tab farthest to the right. Each of these tabs is pretty self-explanatory, we'd imagine, and as you'll find throughout the entire app, none of these menus goes very deep. Depending on how much of a power user you are, the paucity of options could be frustrating, but if nothing else, the simple layout means you'll never get lost inside the app.

By default, the app synced with my SkyDrive account, though you can also add a SharePoint library. Obviously, that's a no-brainer; Microsoft would integrate Office Mobile with its own SkyDrive service. But it's worth noting that other iPhone office suites like QuickOffice and Documents To Go don't support SkyDrive, so if that happens to be your storage service of choice, Office Mobile already has a leg up. As a nice perk, you can view your SkyDrive photos inside the app, even though it was really built around Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Syncing your files also works just like you'd expect: open your SkyDrive folder and then swipe down on the screen to refresh. As for creating a brand-new file, you can open a blank Word document or Excel spreadsheet, with three templates in each category (think: budget, agenda, etc.).

Though Word, PowerPoint and Excel each offer different features, they generally work the same way. Across the board, you'll find a trio of shortcuts along the top of the screen, including a save button, followed by another for editing. Hitting that formatting button will pull up a drawer full of options along the bottom of the screen, right where the onscreen keyboard usually appears. This is the place where you do things like bold text, or change the background color (and not much else, as you'll see). Finally, the third shortcut lets you choose a different viewing option, whether it's data sorting in Excel, Outline View in Word or a slide overview in PowerPoint.

When you're ready to exit the document, tap the back arrow in the upper-left corner. If you haven't saved your most recent changes, you'll be prompted to (though you of course don't have to). That's all well and good, but there is one thing about the app that feels unintuitive. When you've got the formatting options pulled up at the bottom of the screen, you need to press a down arrow to make the formatting menu go away. It's not like when you're using the iPhone keyboard, and you can just tap the background to make it disappear. If you've been using iOS for a while, this one little quirk could take a lot of getting used to.

Microsoft releases Office for iPhone, available now for Office 365 subscribers only handson

Let's start with what you can do. While the full version of Word has evolved over the years to make it easier to add YouTube videos, the mobile app is all about the text. Using Office for iPhone, you can write stuff, making use of features like bolding, underlining, italics and a strikethrough feature. You can change the color of the text and background, but your only choices in either case are red, yellow or green. You can also adjust the size of the font, but all you have to work with are onscreen plus and minus buttons. And... that's it. No visual cues as to where you are on the spectrum of font sizes. So, you could be at 48- or 72-point font. You won't really know until you dismiss the formatting menu and resume writing. As you'd expect, at least, you can use the iPhone's highlighting tool to retroactively change the text color or font size. This partially makes up for the fact that you can't select font sizes from a list: at least you can see how each change will look like while the text is still highlighted.

Additionally, there are some other, less important features missing; things for which we can probably wait for an update. These include: font options, text alignment, bulleted lists and, again, more color choices, all of which you can find in, say, the Google Drive app.

Microsoft releases Office for iPhone, available now for Office 365 subscribers only handson

It's a similar story with Excel: the app has some good features in its 1.0 state, but we'd like to see Microsoft take things even further. Similar to some other apps, like Google Drive, you can't insert new rows or columns anywhere you want, though you can use the blank cells at the very bottom or on the far right. As on Google Drive, you can't delete random rows or columns either. In this case, though, you can't even add a new spreadsheet tab -- plenty of other apps let you do that.

All this means unless you build a spreadsheet from scratch, any "editing" you do will really just include touch-ups to existing files. As in Word, you can bold, italicize or underline text, as well as change the text and background color. (Same three color options here.) You can also tap a numerical figure to change it to a dollar value, percentage or calendar date. And, once you've highlighted data in the spreadsheet, it's possible to create charts out of it. (There are six options in total.)

Perhaps the most robust feature, though, is the ability to calculate formulas on the go. As on the desktop version, there's a formula button up top, near the text-entry bar. You can select from categories to find the formula you want or you can just start typing and the app will automatically whittle down the options for you. "A" will get you to absolutes and arccosines. "Av" will pull up "Average," which, let's face it, is probably what you were looking for all along. (Psst: there's also an Auto Sum option in the formatting menu.)

Clearly, then, Microsoft's got the ingredients for a solid Excel app -- charts, simple formatting for individual cells. The visuals and formulas, in particular -- Google's app doesn't do any of that. But these features only mean so much if you can't insert rows of fresh data. The way it stands now, you can either start from scratch, making sure you put everything in the right order the first time out, or you can rearrange the deck furniture on existing spreadsheets, adding columns or rows at the very edge of the document only. It's a fine start, but it's not a completely workable solution either.

Microsoft releases Office for iPhone, available now for Office 365 subscribers only handson

Of all the apps here, PowerPoint feels the least crippled, if only because editing a presentation on a phone seems like a less likely scenario to begin with. Using the app, you can change slide text, move slides, hide them and add notes. And frankly, that's about as much as we'd imagine doing on the iPhone's 4-inch screen. Create new slides? Add transitions? Those are the sorts of things we'd do at our desk, well before it's time to leave for a meeting, or take off on a business trip. Ideally, by the time we're in transit, we'd only need to make small corrections here and there. And if you did leave your presentation for the last minute? Well, you do travel with a laptop, dont'cha?

We can't tell if Microsoft deliberately handicapped Office Mobile for iPhone, or if it's simply saving some features for a later update. (A company rep declined to comment on what we can expect from future versions.) We're willing to believe Microsoft still has some unfinished items on its to-do list, but even so, it's a shame that iPhone users waited this long for an Office app, only to get something with such a minimal feature set. All told, Office Mobile represents a good enough start for Microsoft, and in some ways it's better than Google Drive, particularly where spreadsheets are concerned. Still, it's miles behind other office apps for iOS, including Apple iWork.

If you're an Office 365 subscriber, you might want to try out Office Mobile anyway, if only because many competing office suites for the iPhone don't support SkyDrive. And besides, it's free, so you've got absolutely nothing to lose. Even then, though, you might want a more full-featured app, depending on your needs, at least until Microsoft updates Office Mobile with some additional features. As for the rest of you without a 365 subscription, you're not missing much -- at least not yet.


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