Hasta La Gadget!

Prior to the release of iTunes 9, arranging pages apps directly on your iPhone or iPod Touch was tedious and unpleasant. So when Apple touted app arranging as a new in iTunes feature this week we got very excited. We’ve spent the last three days with iTunes 9 and the new app arranging feature. While we’re satisfied with it there is one bug that made it less than perfect. Luckily, we have a workaround.

Arranging app icons in iTunes 9

(Credit: David Martin)

Arranging app icons
After connecting your device to a computer and launching iTunes 9, just go to the Applications tab as shown below. Once there, you can drag apps between thumbnails that represent the 11 home screens. Exciting, right? Well not so fast, since the process still is a bit painful if an app isn’t currently assigned to one of the 176 spaces on the home screens (four spaces are reserved for the Dock). We have the same problem when arranging (or deleting) app icons on the iPod or iTouch.

If an app icon doesn’t exist in a space, you won’t be able to manage it until you figure out a secret. The check mark on the app on the left side of the window tells you that it’s currently synced to your device. You can’t manipulate “checked” apps unless they are sitting on a home screen. If the app is not on one of the 11 home screens you have to do the following.

App checked for syncing and cannot be arranged due to iTunes 9 bug

(Credit: David Martin)

• Uncheck the app so that it won’t sync with your phone.
• Place the app on one of the 11 home screens.
• Re-check the app so it will sync again.

Unchecked app can be arranged

(Credit: David Martin)

If you forget to recheck it, you will delete the app from your device the next time you sync it with iTunes. Indeed, it’s not a very intuitive process; I only stumbled on it accidentally. You’ll also need to remember it for the tasks below.

…

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Dread going the doctor? It could be worse. Your next physician could have the bedside manner of a robot. In fact, your next physician could be a robot.

Scared yet?

Surgeons and medical engineers have been trying to create machines that can assist in surgery, increase a surgeon’s dexterity and support hospital staff. These aren’t humanoid robots but computer controlled systems that have been optimized for use in sensitive situations. An exhibition called Sci-fi Surgery: Medical Robots, opening this week at the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, shows a range of robots used in medicine.

“Industrial robots appeared in factories in the early 1960s and robots have become an important part of space exploration,” says Sarah Pearson, curator of the exhibition. “But robots have been comparatively slow to be used in medicine because surgeons haven’t felt comfortable with them.”

Robots in medicine aren’t intended to replace surgeons, says Pearson, but act as companion devices. Most robots used in medicine aren’t autonomous because surgeons haven’t been comfortable giving up control, but with advances with technology, we can expect more autonomous machines.

The exhibition offers a peek into some of the most interesting surgical robots out there, from one of the earliest medical robots to a prototype camera pill.

Above: PROBOT

In 1988, Brian Davies, a medical robotics professor at the Imperial College in London, designed a robot (with help of colleagues) that could remove soft tissue from a person. It was one of the first robots to do so. What’s more, it could perform the task with a fair degree of autonomy.

Most industrial robots usually have an arm, complete with a shoulder, elbow and wrist mechanism, and a gripper tool for the hand. That’s overkill for surgical purposes, and because of the room needed to move a robot arm around, it might even be dangerous for use in very small spaces inside human bodies. That’s why Davies and his team designed a small robot that has three axes of movement, plus a fourth axis to move a cutter for prostate surgery. (See a simplified drawing of the robot’s structure.)

The geometry of this design allows the robot to hollow out a cavity from within the prostate gland. The robot is controlled by a pair of programmable embedded motor control systems. The system are directed using a i486DX2-based PC. The robot allows surgeons to specify the correct cutting sequence to remove tissue.

But the idea of having any degree of independent behavior in a robot didn’t catch on. Although its designers tested the PROBOT in the lab and in human subjects, it was never used widely in surgery.

“Doctors just didn’t feel comfortable with the idea,” says Justin Vale, a consultant neurological surgeon at Imperial College and a fellow at the Royal College of Surgeons. “The PROBOT project shut down when funding for it ran out.”

Caption: PROBOT/ Imperial College London

Updated at 4:05 p.m. PDT: adding discussion about lack of video camera in Touch.

Broadcom chip in Apple’s iPod Touch supports 802.11n wireless–not supported in the iPhone 3GS

(Credit: iFixit)

Inside Apple’s updated iPod Touch lurks “n” Wi-Fi hardware, the potential for FM transmission, and …

Originally posted at Nanotech – The Circuits Blog

Voudriez-vous le Zune HD? Tough luck, I’m afraid.

According to Ars Technica, Microsoft has no plans to sell the Zune HD outside the United States, apparently ceding the market to Apple. That doesn’t mean that the situation will remain like that forever, but Microsoft tells Ars:

“For the time being the Zune HD device will remain US-only,” a
Microsoft spokesperson said. “Right now we are focused on deploying
an exciting service in the form of Zune Video
to 18 markets. We are looking at potential future hardware experiences
for these markets, but do not have anything to announce right now.”

Now, it’s somewhat true that one needs the skill of a lawyer to interact with technology companies these days; what’s left unsaid can be as important as what is stated, alluded to, hinted, implied, referred to… well, you get the idea. So it’s entirely possible that Microsoft won’t ship the Zune HD outside the United States because, you know, they haven’t announced it. But we’re willing to accept what Microsoft is telling Ars at face value and accept that, possibly because the Zune’s market share is a faint shadow of the iPod’s, that the Zune will only be for les Americains for now.

Amid the flurry of announcements Apple made Wednesday, the company quietly released the latest version of its iPhone operating system. And as is often the case with iPhone updates, Steve Jobs giveth some new features and Steve Jobs taketh away others.

A major addition to iPhone 3.1 are Genius recommendations. Similar to the iTunes function of the same name, iPhone’s Genius feature helps you search for apps you may wish to download based on those you already own. Also, iPhone 3.1 enables you to easily sort apps on your computer screen using iTunes 9. As helpful as these new features sound, iPhone 3.1 comes with major drawbacks: the loss of free, unauthorized tethering and the inability to access the unauthorized app store Cydia. One more caveat: After upgrading to iPhone 3.1, iPhone 3GS users can’t downgrade to 3.0.

That’s a tough predicament, and many likely face a dilemma. Should you download now or give hackers some time to re-exploit the system? Here, we dive into the pros and cons of the software update to help you make a decision you won’t regret.

App Genius: Smart Enough for You?

Serving up 75,000 apps and counting, the App Store was dying for a better way to sort through its endlessly growing list of third-party software. The addition of the Genius recommendation tool for iPhone apps was a logical step for Apple. Genius first appeared in iTunes 8, automatically generating playlists for you based on a song selection. Genius does this by analyzing the tunes in your library in relation to other iTunes users’ libraries to see which songs are the most compatible for a playlist.

The Genius approach to the App Store is to recommend iPhone apps for you to download based on those you currently have on your iPhone, as well as what others with the same apps have on their iPhones.

Here’s what’s weak: It does not make recommendations based on every app you’ve ever downloaded, such as those you deleted, and how you rated each of those apps. Thus, the Genius feature is only making recommendations based on stuff you decided to keep in relation to what others own. That creates a rather bland list of recommendations.

Some examples: Why would I download another Twitter app if I already own Tweetie? Do I really need another IM client in addition to BeeJive? I like a game called Cooking Dash, and Genius says others who downloaded it got Super Monkey Ball — but I downloaded Super Monkey Ball before and deleted it because I wasn’t a fan. If Genius would account for all the apps I deleted and the ratings I assigned, it would know which apps to avoid recommending and be even smarter. Like the Genius feature for iTunes songs, we find the App Store version to be pretty average.

We know these are nitpicky criticisms. Any time Apple makes the App Store easier to navigate, it’s a good move, and Genius is overall a solid idea. But we don’t think it’s a killer feature just yet, and we’re optimistic it will get a lot better in the next year.

Easy iPhone App Sorting With iTunes 9

This freaking rules. The iPhone’s touchscreen is sure pleasant, but it takes a lot of tedious finger work to put your apps where you want them. IPhone 3.1’s ability to organize apps on your computer screen in iTunes is a huge improvement of this experience.

After plugging in your iPhone and loading iTunes 9, you get a full preview of your iPhone springboard screen broken down page by page. To move an app to a specific page you click and drag with your mouse; you can also select and move entire pages (e.g., you can move a screen containing all your games from screen 4 to screen 3 by selecting and dragging the screen upward). You can even hold down shift to select multiple apps and move them simultaneously.

That’s super sweet, and we have no complaints here. This will be extremely useful for anyone with 40+ apps.

Free AT&T Tethering Is No More

Tethering — the ability for your computer to surf the web using your smartphone as a wireless modem — is not officially available for AT&T iPhone customers. It’s a promise that AT&T has yet to deliver, and nobody knows when the folks aboard the Death Star will finally make that function fully operational. But some clever nerds figured out an unofficial method (flashing the firmware) to enable Apple’s easy tethering feature, which we documented in a previous post.

Unfortunately iPhone 3.1 has nuked this workaround, meaning if you’re stranded at an airport, you’re going to have to pay up the nose just to surf the internet, or you’ll have to buy one of those pricey EVDO modems.

Underground Cydia Store Is Temporarily Closed for iPhone 3GS Users

As a solution for no more free tethering, normally we would say you could still get it by jailbreaking your iPhone and downloading an unauthorized tethering app through Cydia, the underground app store. However, this isn’t the case yet for iPhone 3GS owners.

There is currently no solution for iPhone 3GS owners to install Cydia in iPhone 3.1, according to Cydia creator Jay Freeman. This may change in the future, but if you upgrade to 3.1 today, you’ll lose your unauthorized apps as well as access to the Cydia store.

The biggest drag is, if you regret upgrading to 3.1, you can’t downgrade your software to iPhone 3.0: Apple stopped signing the older version. Long story short, iPhone 3GS jailbreakers are screwed until a workaround is released.

Our Final Thought

IPhone 3.1’s added ability to sort apps in iTunes 9 is a must-have feature, and the Genius recommendation system for iPhone apps is just OK. The loss of free AT&T tethering and access to the Cydia app store could be a loss to some, but we imagine the majority of iPhone owners won’t care. If you absolutely love your jailbroken iPhone and unauthorized apps, stay away from this upgrade for a little while: We’re sure the hacker community is working on making Cydia accessible for 3.1 soon. Otherwise, if you don’t care about jailbreaking, download away.

Updated to clarify that iPhone 3GS owners cannot downgrade to iPhone 3.0.

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com