Monday 2 October 2017

The Morning After: Getting power back to Puerto Rico

Engadget Email Newsletter

It's Monday, October 02, 2017.

Hey, good morning!

This Monday morning, we’re getting surprise deep-space photos, laying out the struggles in getting power back in Puerto Rico and juggling our favorite Switch games in a bid to play… more Switch games.

ESA discovered that the last few packets of data it sent make up an image.

Rosetta probe’s last surprise: a photo of its landing site

It’s been a year since Rosetta landed on the comet it orbited for a couple of years, so you’d think ESA had already decoded everything the vessel sent back before its demise. Apparently, the probe has one last surprise for all of us: a close-up photo of its final landing site. The team keeping an eye on the probe’s OSIRIS camera thought they’d already downloaded all the images Rosetta took during its descent. Turns out the last photo’s transmission got interrupted before it was done.

What happened and how it’s likely to play out.

How Puerto Rico’s power crisis ends

When Hurricane Maria crashed into Puerto Rico on September 20th, it found a vulnerable target. The country’s power plants are an average of 44 years old and rely on outdated oil-fired systems, while most plants in the United States are about 18 years old and use newer natural-gas generators. PREPA filed for bankruptcy in July, calling its own infrastructure “degraded and unsafe.”

Hurricane Maria made its way up the Caribbean on September 20th, bringing winds of 140 MPH and dumping 25 inches of rain on Puerto Rico. It devastated the island. Maria knocked out PREPA’s electrical systems, leaving 3.4 million people in the dark, with little hope of a quick recovery. Officials have suggested it will take four-to-six months for power to be restored.

And I still haven’t bought an SD card.

It took six months for my Nintendo Switch to run out of space

When Nintendo announced its next game console was going to come with just 32GB of internal storage, Sean Buckley’s hopes for an all-digital Nintendo Switch weren’t looking good. However, between the tedium of swapping game cards and my fear of losing them, he wound up going all digital anyway. And, within six months, his Nintendo Switch ran out of space.

However, he didn’t buy a microSD card. Instead, he’s spent the last few months using Nintendo’s built-in data-management tool -- a pop-up menu prompt that helps you clear out space for a new game by automatically culling your unplayed library.

(You could still just buy a card, Sean.)

In which we answer your burning tech questions.

Ask Engadget returns (and you should send us your questions)!

A long time ago in a far-away land called 2013, we used to run a feature called Ask Engadget, where you -- our readers, fans, followers and critics -- could ask our advice, opinions and recommendations on everything from cheap laptops and starter cameras to routers and email clients. We’re bringing it back, starting this month. If you’ve got questions, send ‘em along to ask@engadget.com.

But wait, there's more...

1. Smart tattoos turn your skin into a health tracker

2. After Math: Fly me to the Moon (and then on to Mars)

3. US pressured North Korea by overwhelming hackers with data traffic

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Saturday 30 September 2017

E-Commerce Minute

E-Commerce Minute: Saturday -- September 30, 2017

The E-Commerce Times -- E-Business Means Business
http://www.ecommercetimes.com
Part of the ECT News Network

Headline Scan
Amazon Deploys Army of Echoes Against Oncoming Threats
Cloudflare Stream Promises Easy, Cheap Video Hosting
Red Hat, SAP Team on New Integrated Enterprise Linux Platform
Digital Hub Returns
Behind-the-Scenes Cryptocurrency Mining Discovered on Showtime Sites
New Cloud Tools Aim to Streamline, Monetize Partner Relationships
Innovation Requires Market Enablement
Einstein Tries Sales Forecasting
Cloud Partner Program Aims to Replace ERP
Amazon's Alexa May Get Into Your Head
Nimble's Social CRM Finds Its Way Into Office 365
Artificial Intelligence, Smart Speakers and You
AWS to Sell Cloud Services by the Second
Finally Oracle

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Today's Story Highlights

Amazon Deploys Army of Echoes Against Oncoming Threats

Amazon has unveiled five new Echo products that raise the bar in the
automated home market. Among other things, Amazon has improved the sound
quality in its second-generation Echo speaker to compete with several
new competitors in the high-end audio segment. The new Echo, which is
more compact and comes in a variety of shell colors and finishes, offers
more immersive sound.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84841.html

Cloudflare Stream Promises Easy, Cheap Video Hosting

Cloudflare on Wednesday released the beta version of Cloudflare Stream,
a new, inexpensive streaming video service. Designed for app developers
who want to build businesses hosting and streaming videos, Cloudflare
Stream bundles encoding, global delivery and video player software into
one package. These functionalities can be separated upon request.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84843.html

Red Hat, SAP Team on New Integrated Enterprise Linux Platform

Red Hat on Tuesday announced the launch of Red Hat Enterprise Linux for
SAP Solutions, a new platform that combines two existing systems for
analytics and data management into a single offering. The new platform
combines the existing Red Hat Enterprise Linux for SAP Applications and
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for SAP HANA into a single, consolidated
platform.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84845.html

Digital Hub Returns

Digital Hub is not a new idea. It's been percolating for a few years,
and its roots can be traced to Dublin, Ireland, where in a cluster of
eight buildings, there exists what might be the original hub. In Dublin,
it's made up of 97 companies employing 725 people, and it was given a
jumpstart by the government in 2003. Elsewhere, we might be more attuned
to the idea of a tech incubator.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84844.html

Behind-the-Scenes Cryptocurrency Mining Discovered on Showtime Sites

Showtime Networks apparently has mined the websites of online viewers
using the same Coinhive technology that The Pirate Bay recently used in
a test run on its site. A subsidiary of CBS, Showtime is a premium
television network that offers professional boxing, feature films,
original scripted television shows like Ray Donovan and other
programming.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84838.html

New Cloud Tools Aim to Streamline, Monetize Partner Relationships

AppDirect on Tuesday announced new products and functionality for its
Cloud Commerce Platform. The new tools, AppReseller and Cloud Management
Suite, enable software vendors to launch reseller partner programs
quickly. Software as a Service providers can use the new capabilities to
help their small and mid-sized business users manage and leverage their
software more effectively.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84839.html

Innovation Requires Market Enablement

In this age of tech industry consolidation, one has to wonder what will
happen with the pace of innovation as a few large companies begin to
dominate. In personal computers, the WinTel marriage continues to
control the technology, while Dell, HP and Lenovo control the devices.
Similarly, in smartphones, Apple and Samsung, which both design their
own chips and devices, dominate the market, especially in North America.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84836.html

Einstein Tries Sales Forecasting

When Salesforce unveiled sales forecasting with its artificial
intelligence tool, Einstein, my immediate reaction was that it should
have tried something easier -- like solving global warming. Really, a
sales forecast that bears some resemblance to reality has been a grail
quest for all of us for many years, and Salesforce is not the first
software company to throw its hat in the ring.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84835.html

Cloud Partner Program Aims to Replace ERP

Brightpearl, which offers a cloud-based retail management system for
mid-sized retailers and wholesalers, on Wednesday launched a new
Enterprise Partner Program. The company aims to build out its partner
ecosystem to deploy an end-to-end management service for omnichannel
retailers as an alternative to traditional enterprise resource planning
systems.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84833.html

Amazon's Alexa May Get Into Your Head

Developers at Amazon's secret Lab 126 reportedly have been working on
audio-only smart glass technology that would allow users to communicate
with its virtual assistant Alexa. The smart glasses would connect
wirelessly to users' smartphones and transfer communications through a
bone-conduction audio system that would negate the need for headphones.
Amazon plans to release the device this year.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84830.html

Nimble's Social CRM Finds Its Way Into Office 365

Social sales and marketing software provider Nimble and cloud services
consultant NeoCloud have partnered to deliver a simple, affordable
contact management and CRM package for Microsoft Office 365. NeoCloud
has agreed to bundle Nimble CRM into all of its Office 365 deployments,
beginning this month. Nimble CRM adds employees' individual connections
to a shared team relationship manager.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84828.html

Artificial Intelligence, Smart Speakers and You

The artificial intelligence speaker war is now being waged, and it is
escalating. Today you can choose between Amazon Echo and Google Home.
Harman Kardon's Invoke is coming this fall. By the end of the year,
Apple's HomePod will be competing in the market, and Samsung has
indicated it will join the fray as well. With all these choices, how can
you determine which smart speaker is right for you?
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84827.html

AWS to Sell Cloud Services by the Second

Amazon Web Services on Monday unveiled a new per-second pricing plan for
EC2 instances and EBS volumes, which will take effect Oct. 2. The new
pricing for Elastic Compute Cloud and Elastic Block Storage used with
EC2 instances will allow greater flexibility and efficiency for
customers wanting to expand their use of cloud computing data, AWS said.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84822.html

Finally Oracle

Oracle showed some very good numbers in its latest earnings report. As
it begins its second year of aggressive cloud promotion, the company
overall is showing significant year-over-year improvements, thanks to
its turn to cloud infrastructure, applications and platforms. Yet when
read right, the numbers announce the end of the beginning of the end as
much as they announce the end of the beginning.
http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/84825.html

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The Morning After: Weekend Edition

Engadget Email Newsletter

It's Saturday, September 30, 2017.

Hey, good morning! You look fabulous.

Welcome to the weekend. After Apple and Amazon, it’s Google’s turn to reveal some new hardware next week. We have all the information you’ll need to prepare, plus some of the big stories from this past week like our SNES Classic Edition review and Twitter’s controversial change.

Yes, he can do that.

Travis Kalanick kicks off a power struggle at Uber

Uber’s ongoing corporate drama took another strange turn late Friday night when its ex-CEO announced the addition of two new board members. Travis Kalanick is still on the company’s board despite stepping down as its leader, and as a result of an investment deal last year, has control of three seats -- Uber investor Benchmark Capital is suing to change that.

Everything new.

What to expect at Google's Pixel 2 event

On Wednesday Google will take its turn to unveil new hardware, and we’ve collected all the rumors fit to share in one place to help you prepare. Pixel 2, Home Mini, PixelBook and more -- it’s all right here.

BFR

Elon Musk's Mars dream hinges on a giant new rocket

Big F’ing Rocket. It’s the key to SpaceX’s plan for travel throughout our solar system and even the world, but how does it all come together? Steve Dent takes you through Elon Musk’s latest proposal, all the way from Moon Base Alpha to Mars City.

Where’s the TurboGrafx-16 Mini?

A mini version of the Commodore 64 is coming in 2018

Missed out on your first attempt to purchase the SNES Classic Edition? Maybe you’ll have better luck with the C64 Mini. The $70 box from Retro Games is scheduled for release early next year with 64 preinstalled games aboard including California Games, Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe and Paradroid.

All Amazon everything.

The Engadget Podcast Ep 44

This week, we turn our attention to a small underdog of a company with a narrow, well-thought-out product line. Just kidding, we're talking about Amazon, which has enough money to roll out a wide range of products and see what sticks. We ranked the company's confusing new lineup from "sensible" to "weird," and also carved out a few minutes to rant about Twitter's new 280-character experiment.

Secure the bag.

Bloomberg: Google’s ‘Advanced Protection Program’ will replace two-factor authentication

In case typical two-factor authentication isn’t enough or is too complicated to set up, Bloomberg reports Google will roll out a replacement soon. Called the Advanced Protection Program, it’s intended for people with “heightened security concerns” like politicians and CEOs (John Podesta could’ve used this). According to the rumor, it will rely on two physical keys, including one that plugs in via USB, before anyone can access the user’s email or cloud storage.

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