| Trouble in paradise? Nokia blasts Microsoft for Windows Phone app failings Jul 27th 2013, 13:12, by Chris Smith 
Nokia has expressed frustration with Microsoft's failure to give smartphone users a convincing reason to switch to Windows Phone, in comments representing the public first signs of strain in the pair's relationship. The Finnish company's vice president Bryan Biniak said Microsoft has not held up its end of the bargain because essential, frontline apps are still missing from the Windows Phone store. In an interview with the IBTimes, Biniak said smartphone users are unwilling to compromise their mobile lives by switching to the platform, regardless of how impressive recent hardware releases have been. He said Nokia is trying to 'change the culture' at Microsoft' in order to stress that the battle to overhaul iOS and Android cannot wait any longer. Give me a reasonHe said: "To give you a reason to switch, I need to make sure the apps that you care about on your device are not only on our phones, but are better. I also need to provide you unique experiences that you can't get on your other devices." "People rely on applications for their day-to-day life and if you don't have something which I use in my day-to-day life I'm not going to switch [operating systems] because I don't want to compromise the way I live my life just to switch to a phone. "It's not just about the hardware, it's about the tools that are on the hardware. You can't sell a phone without the apps, you just can't." No time to wasteNokia's recent launches have included the impressive Lumia 925 and the soon to be released 41-megapixel Lumia 1020 cameraphone. However, the Finns are concerned these great handsets will stay under the radar for potential buyers due to Microsoft's lack of haste in attracting top developers to the platform Biniak added: "We are releasing new devices frequently and for every new device, if there is an app that somebody cares about that's not there that's a missed opportunity of a sale. "We are trying to evolve the cultural thinking [at Microsoft] to say 'time is of the essence.' Waiting until the end of your fiscal year when you need to close your targets, doesn't do us any good when I have phones to sell today." If you want a job doing well...Although the app gulf between Windows Phone and iOS and Android isn't as large as it was, Microsoft's platform is still missing apps like Instagram, a Facebook app worthy of the name, and of course, Google's impressive suite. Nokia has attempted to take matters into its own hands, campaigning for the launch of Instagram on Windows Phone, while also securing an exclusive deal to bring FIFA '13 to Lumia Phones. On that note, Biniak saved his most scathing comment until last. He said: "As a company we don't want to rely on somebody else and sit and wait for them to get it right." Will Biniak's comments jar Microsoft into caring as much about Windows Phone as it does about Windows 8 and Xbox? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.     |  | Tired of stubborn app permissions? Android 4.3 has a fix for that Jul 26th 2013, 21:04, by Michael Rougeau 
It can be hard for Android users to keep track of what exactly their apps are doing, but it looks like that's about to change with Android 4.3. Android Police caught wind of a function called "App Ops" in the latest Android update that lets you control exactly what apps can access, be that navigation, data, phone calls or something else. That way if specific apps are acting up and, for example, using your phone's GPS while you don't want to turn navigation off system-wide, you can go into App Ops and restrict the problematic app's permissions. It seems the feature isn't fully ready yet, but there are a number of ways for adventurous Android users to activate it. You have my permission to dieTechRadar asked Google to clarify whether users were meant to access these controls and whether the App Ops feature will ever be implemented more fully in the OS. We haven't heard back from the company yet, but we'll keep you posted. In the meantime, it seems the easiest way to access individual apps' permissions on Android 4.3 is to open the app and navigate through the settings menu to "App Ops." But to get the full App Ops experience you can download a third party called Permission Manager app from Google Play. The app was launched yesterday, though it looks like these functions weren't yet meant to be accessed in this way, so use at your own risk. But if you do boot it up, it should display a list of all your apps with the specific functions each use and a timestamp showing the last time they used them. It's divided into four categories based on permissions related to "messaging," "location," "personal" and "device." Selecting an app shows a full list of permissions for it with easy on/off toggles, though it seems those permissions won't show up there until the app has tried to use them at least once. That means at this point you'll never know if the list is complete, since location permissions for Facebook won't show up there until Facebook has tried to use location services at least once. It's a slight annoyance that may be part of the reason this feature isn't 100 percent there yet. In addition, if you turn off location services for, say, Facebook, then forget that you did so, the system won't remind you if you try to use geotags in Facebook and the app can't access the GPS. It simply won't work. So again, use at your own risk, and hopefully "App Ops" will get more official in a future Android update.     | | Google is evidently working on real-time mobile translation tech Jul 26th 2013, 20:21, by Michael Rougeau 
Google has its sights set on the future with projects like Google Fiber and Google Glass, and now it's adding real time voice-to-voice translation to that list as well. Google's Vice President of Android Hugo Barra said this week that Google is now in the early stages of creating real time translation software that it hopes to perfect within the next "several years," according to The UK Times. The company already has prototype phones that can translate speech in real time, so that a user speaks into the device in one language and the person on the other end hears it in a different one, like the fictional Babel fish in 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' or the TARDIS in Doctor Who. "That is where we're headed," Barra told the publication. "We've got tons of prototypes of that sort of interaction, and I've played with it every other week to see how much progress we've made." Same old hurdlesGoogle's speech-to-speech translation project is reportedly being developed as part of Google Now, Google services suite that's being designed to predict your needs before you know them. The real-time translation is reportedly better for certain language pairs, such as Portuguese and English, but accuracy remains an issue. Anyone who's tried to use Apple's Siri or Android's voice-to-text services knows that a little background noise can cause a lot of inaccuracies, and that's something Google is wrestling with still. 
The groundwork for real time voice-to-voice translation certainly exists, though, between that speech recognition software and Google's online Google Translate service. Google said that on that service alone it translates a billion entries per day in 71 languages, and it just added new languages from places like the Philippines, South East Asia and Indonesia. Don't stop me nowGoogle discussed voice translation software back in 2010, when Google Distinguished Research Scientist and head of machine translation Franz Och offered this: "We think speech-to-speech translation should be possible and work reasonably well in a few years' time. Clearly, for it to work smoothly, you need a combination of high-accuracy machine translation and high-accuracy voice recognition, and that's what we're working on. "If you look at the progress in machine translation and corresponding advances in voice recognition, there has been huge progress recently." It would have been nice if he was right - we'd probably have real time voice translation on our Galaxy S4 right now. But at least we know they're still working on it. - TechRadar spent a week with Google's newest search tool and wrote about what it's like living with Google Now.
    | | Interview: Ubuntu may do it better, but Canonical head sees merits of Windows 8 efforts Jul 26th 2013, 18:33, by Michelle Fitzsimmons 
Canonical is heading into the weekend with about $6.6 million (about £4.29m, AU$7.14m) raised for the Ubuntu Edge, not a shabby number for the superphone's 5-day old Indiegogo campaign. We chatted with Mark Shuttleworth, the software company's founder, on the day Edge was announced, discussing this "concept car" device and the potential of crowdfunding as a mechanism for spurring innovation. We also dived into converging computing, which the Edge aims to accomplish by having serving as the "brain" of a PC. The Edge dual-boots Android and Ubuntu for smartphones, but when users plug into a monitor, Ubuntu for desktop kicks in. The Edge's proposed specs - 4GB of RAM, a multi-core processor and 128GB of storage - are built to take on the task of transforming into a PC manageable and seamless. Having a shared thread among various devices draws comparisons to Microsoft's Windows 8, but Shuttleworth said there are some important distinctions. "I think our story scales a bit more smoothly from phone to tablet to PC," he said, drawing up Ubuntu's strengths over the Softies' offering. "I think we have an advantage in that our core OS is much lighter in a way. Because it works on phones it makes it to the PC faster - we're stripping out all the fat on the phone." Still...Canonical is clearly trying to draw its own path with Ubuntu and the Edge, but Shuttleworth wasn't without a degree of deference for Microsoft's efforts. "Microsoft has clearly articulated a design vision that's designed to expand across platforms," he said. "As much criticism as the [Windows 8] has taken, I have to agree with them. It recognizes it needs to make a bold foundation. It's very difficult to make bold transitions like that without tickling somebody's nose hairs." Ubuntu is in its early mobile device days - the Edge won't even be out until May 2014 - but we could be in for an interesting OS war that's for once not Android and iOS.     | | Fighting Talk: 'Siri, why do I hate you so much?' Jul 26th 2013, 16:26, by Phil Lavelle 
You know what I hate about iPhone owners? Siri. I can't stand them for it. I have this notion that they're all sitting around in bars, screaming into their phone that they want to know what the weather is like (have you looked out the window?), or asking if they have emails from Mum. They're probably not, as I've never actually seen anyone use Siri in real life. Nobody has. We've all heard the double-plunk of it being fired up, only to be followed by an under-the-breath "balls", and then the sad sound of it being switched off. But, real or imaginary, you know why I don't like these people? Ask Siri - I'm sure she'll tell you (or he, depending on what country you're in). It's because I really want it, and I can't believe more people aren't desperate for a proper voice recognition app in their phone. Google, not NowI'm an Android user at the moment – flitting between the consumers' pet, the Galaxy S4 and the enthusiasts' grail (and TechRadar's best phone in the world), the HTC One like some kind of demented tech-addict yoyo. Both ultra-smooth. Both ultra-capable. Both Android devices. And yet, both lacking one thing: A decent digital assistant. A couple of years ago, when Ice Cream Sandwich was all the rage, and Jelly Bean was simply a sweet-tasting pie in the sky, we got whisperings that Google was working on an ultra cool digital assistant that would make Siri look rubbish. That may have been the case at one time, but right now we're still left wandering around trying to get Google Now to do all the things that it's supposed to do - I've yet to hear of anyone getting relevant flight or sports details, despite their best efforts. Google's attempt isn't meant to be a Siri challenger. It's what Google calls 'intelligent' and is meant to be different. We all know how the cards system works and that it learns from us as we browse the web or travel between locations. And yet, it seems to bring up information that isn't relevant to millions of people (like stocks and shares) whilst making it impossible to carry out the simplest of tasks – like play music. The impossible dreamOK, so I admit it, Android-fans. I have cheated in the past. I'm not wedded to Android and have enjoyed owning and using every iPhone iteration there has been. And this is where I can tell you that Apple wipes the floor with Android. 
There is so much to be said for driving and being able to tell your phone to play a particular song and have it just do the damn thing. Siri is brilliant, and while it's a little limited, it does what it's supposed to do better than anything out there. If you've not tried it properly on your iPhone or iPad, at least to see if you can use it more often, you're an idiot. And don't tell me you look stupid talking to your phone. That's what they were designed for - it's just you being embarrassed because you're unsure about what might happen. Google Now is supposed to do something similar, but it fails miserably at searching local content when I just want it to play a song I have stored in my memory card. Forums littered with complaints will attest to my frustration. Samsung tried to convince us that it had solved the problem when it unveiled the Galaxy S3 last year, announcing S-Voice. You'd think it could wipe out third world debt, the way Samsung sold it. Unfortunately, it can barely do the simplest of tasks. Nailed the industry, this has not. It can't even set a timer properly. Do it yourself?Theoretically, one of Android's strong points is the fact you can customise it so well. If you don't like the gallery, download a replacement version. Hate the keyboard? No problem, tap away on a third party one that you installed. But this goes to show how so many people are trying to cash in on the digital PA biz and failing miserably – with dozens of options from Skyvi and Sherpa, to Robin and Jeannie, with Iris and others in between. And all are as bad as each other, with Speaktoit Assistant having the highest success rate, albeit with its own flaws, when ordered to do something. I don't want witty conversation with a piece of code, I just want the flaming thing to play Bonnie Tyler when it's told to. Maybe this is something that Google will sort out with Key Lime Pie – but I doubt it. Android's motivation is to drive you towards the internet. Which is why Google Now is brilliant at web searching and not so brilliant at simpler tasks. Until then, keep shouting at Siri. See if I care. (I do.) I've reviewed dozens of phones and tablets for TechRadar over the years - each time putting them through their paces in the most unbiased, rigorous way possible. But as well as being a professional, I have a love/hate relationship with tech, and that's what these columns are all about: the passionate howlings of a true fanboy. Tell me why I'm right, wrong or a hopeless idiot in the comments below or by tweeting @techradar or @phillavelle.     | | Multiple Samsung Galaxy Note 3 models looking more likely than ever Jul 26th 2013, 14:20, by Kate Solomon 
After whisperings of such a thing previously, the Galaxy Note 3 could arrive in triplicate according to the latest leak which suggests the company is working on 5.5-, 5.7- and 6-inch varieties. The current Galaxy Note 2 totes a 5.5-inch screen which some might say is plenty big enough for a phone-tablet-crossover-thing. On an Indian import and export shipment tracking database, one eagle-eyed phone fan spotted the Note 3 affiliated model number SM-N900 surface with the three screen sizes alongside it. Big, bigger, biggestThey're tagged as "for R&D purpose" which at the very least means that Samsung is considering each of the sizes. However, as with the Samsung Galaxy S4 and Samsung Galaxy Mega, the company could quite easily be planning to launch various devices under the Galaxy Note 3 banner. Talk of the 6-inch dimension has surfaced before, most recently in a Twitter leak. We've also heard word of a 6.3-inch Note 3 and a 5.9-inch Note 3… The true size of the thing is likely to be revealed to us all in early September at IFA 2013. We'll be there to bring you the over-sized phone news as it breaks.     | |
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