May 11

Cornell’s Ranger robot walks 40.5 miles on a single charge, doesn’t even break a sweat (video)

Posted in: research, robot, robotics, Today's Chili, video

A few years ago, engineers at Cornell were rejoicing when their Ranger robot set an unofficial world record by walking for 5.6 miles without stopping. Since then, the 22-pound bot has only built up its endurance, to the point where it can now chug along for a full 40.5 miles without a single battery recharge, or an ounce of human assistance. The Ranger pulled off the feat last week, when it completed nearly 308 laps around the university’s Barton Hall running track, over the course of more than 30 hours. Engineers say that their bot’s stamina has a lot to do with its energy efficiency. The Ranger runs on about 16 watts and uses them more sparingly than most of its mechanized brethren. It also saves juice by swinging its legs more liberally than most bipedal walkers, essentially allowing its limbs to fall freely before re-stabilizing itself. The robot’s next challenge, apparently, will be to incorporate automatic steering into its gait, since walking in circles can get understandably dull, after a while. Gallop past the break for the full PR and a video of the Ranger’s latest achievement.

Continue reading Cornell’s Ranger robot walks 40.5 miles on a single charge, doesn’t even break a sweat (video)

Cornell’s Ranger robot walks 40.5 miles on a single charge, doesn’t even break a sweat (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 May 2011 18:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink PhysOrg  |  sourceCornell  | Email this | Comments

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May 11

Barcode Gallery: QR codes become wall art

Posted in: Today's Chili

Push the boundaries of art with a personalized QR code print for your wall from Barcode Gallery. You just might become a front runner for the Turner Prize.

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May 11

preGame 51: Interview with Ed Boon; Outland demo

Posted in: Today's Chili

preGame 51: Interview with Ed Boon; Outland demo

On today’s preGame we’ll interview Mr. Mortal Kombat himself, the co-creator of the entire franchise, Ed Boon. It’s been a few weeks since the latest iteration of Mortal Kombat hit store shelves, and we’ll ask Mr. Boon all about the game as well as the series’ history.

But first we’ll run down the hottest gaming news of the week including word that a new Alan Wake game will be hitting the Xbox 360, hopefully this year.

We’ll also discuss what Microsoft buying Skype means for Xbox 360 owners and then run through a new site that catalogs game time completion statistics.

Finally, Jeff will play through a demo of the Xbox Live Arcade game Outland. This gorgeous 2D platformer reminds us of the good old days of Metroid and Castlevania, but adds in some next-generation bells and whistles.

Want to be a part of our live taping? Make sure you head to http://cnet.com/live/pregame every Tuesday at 4 p.m. EDT.

Got an idea for preGame? E-mail us! pregame [at] cnet [dot] com.

Be sure to subscribe to the show: RSS (video) | iTunes (video)

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May 11

NEC’s VersaPro VK15V/TM-C looks like a tablet, runs like a netbook

Posted in: 10-inch, intel, intel atom, IntelAtom, Japan, slate, tablet, tablets, Today's Chili
If you’ve been looking in vain for the right Windows tablet, you might want to have a gander at NEC’s VersaPro VK15V/TM-C, a pad that looks like the slate it is, but packs some netbook-like specs — namely, a 1.5GHz Intel Atom Z670 processor, Win 7 Professional, 2GB of RAM, HDMI-out, and an SDHC slot. And while it’s 10.1-inch (1280 x 800) display is par for the course among Windows tablets, its 64GB SSD storage bests some other slabs on the market. No word on price — or how much battery life that Oak Trail CPU promises — but it’s expected to go on sale in Japan this summer.

NEC’s VersaPro VK15V/TM-C looks like a tablet, runs like a netbook originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 May 2011 17:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceAkihabara News  | Email this | Comments

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May 11

Google TV shows off new Honeycomb UI, plans for Market, SDK; opens up remote app source code (video)

Posted in: Android, apps, breaking news, developers, Google, GoogleTv, honeycomb, mobile, open source, opensource, remote, sdk, tablet, Today's Chili, ui, video

Google I/O is still ongoing and at the session for teaching developers how to build Android apps for Google TV the team has just shown off a quick peek of the new Honeycomb-based UI that will be released later this year. Shown above you can quickly compare it to the original UI to see how different, and hopefully improved it is. The new icon layout should make getting back to live TV a simpler process, while there’s also that large space above for widgets and support for notifications. Developers will be able to run their ADBs on devices later this summer, but prior to that it will have a “Fishtank” program for some devs to take home their internal test units to run apps on now — no hardware modification necessary.

The team also just announced that the source code to the existing Google TV remote app for Android is being open sourced, so anyone who thinks they can do better (it wouldn’t be difficult) can have a crack at building their own. Also available is code for the Anymote Protocol it runs on so developers can make tablet or phone apps that integrate with and control the Google TV — both are linked below. Other features mentioned included support for 3D, and game controllers using Android 3.1’s expanded USB compatibility. There were no product announcements before the session ended, and no word on the rumored and expected ARM base for new products, but the project manager confirmed new product announcements “later this year.” Google TV will need new product announcements if it’s going to receive a boost over other smart TV technology, but the potential of the market and availability of open source code is still providing a tantalizing vision of the promise it’s failed to capitalize on so far.

Update: The entire presentation is now available on YouTube, check it out after the break as well as an earlier Bootcamp presentation on the same subject.

Gallery: Google TV – How to build Android Apps session

Continue reading Google TV shows off new Honeycomb UI, plans for Market, SDK; opens up remote app source code (video)

Google TV shows off new Honeycomb UI, plans for Market, SDK; opens up remote app source code (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 May 2011 16:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceRemote source code, Anymote, YouTube  | Email this | Comments

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May 11

Acer Chromebook: A solid-state Netbook for $349

Posted in: Today's Chili

Acer’s just-announced Chrome OS laptop: Is it really any different from a Netbook?

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May 11

Industrial robots do Star Wars better than Lucas

Posted in: robot, robotics, Robots, Star Wars, Today's Chili, video
Yasakawa robots perform lightsaber duel

At the International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Shanghai, industrial robot company Yasakawa equipped a couple of its manufacturing machines with lightsabers and choreographed a violent ballet for them to perform. The resulting battle is more exhilarating than the duel at the end of Phantom Menace and the performances are less lifeless than those in Attack of the Clones. Best of all — Lucas can’t add 30 minutes of new CGI scenes and re-release the video below in 3D.

Continue reading Industrial robots do Star Wars better than Lucas

Industrial robots do Star Wars better than Lucas originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 May 2011 16:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Akihabara News  |  sourceIEEE Spectrum  | Email this | Comments

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May 11

Video games are ‘art’ eligible for your tax dollars

Posted in: Today's Chili

National Endowment for the Arts announces it will fund content for mobile and gaming platforms. What do you think? Are video games art?

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May 11

Nokia N9 hits the FCC, packs more bands than a rubber tree

Posted in: meego, nokia, qwerty, QwertySlider, smartphone, Today's Chili, wifi

Last we heard, the Nokia N9 rode Stephen Elop’s burning platform into the sunset, never to be seen again. Today, there’s a FCC filing that begs to differ. Wireless Goodness spotted that RM-680 in the always-helpful government database, where it claims support for six cellular frequencies as well as Bluetooth and 2.4GHz 802.11 b/g/n WiFi — enough to appear on most any GSM carrier, to say nothing of AT&T and T-Mobile. Will the MeeGo-packing QWERTY-sliding hardware that Eldar Murtazin called “near perfect” appear in the US or Canada one day? We don’t think it’s terribly likely, but if it comes with a dash of Windows Phone 7 on board, we can’t promise not to jump for joy. See the full list of bands after the break.

Continue reading Nokia N9 hits the FCC, packs more bands than a rubber tree

Nokia N9 hits the FCC, packs more bands than a rubber tree originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 May 2011 16:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceFCC  | Email this | Comments

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May 11

Firefox 3.1 to Get More JavaScript Speed Optimizations

Posted in: Firefox 3, Freeware, performance, Pre-Release, Software, Today's Chili

This article was written on August 25, 2008 by CyberNet.

fast firefox

Mozilla is looking to drastically improve the JavaScript performance in Firefox 3.1 when it is released later this year. When Firefox 3 was released back in June it included a significant boost in the JavaScript performance arena, but will they be able to do it again?

If you decide to download a nightly build of Firefox 3.1 to test out the improved JavaScript performance it’s important to know that the new JavaScript engine, dubbed TraceMonkey, isn’t enabled by default. To enable it you’ll need to open the about:config and find the javascript.options.jit.content setting. Set the value to true by double-clicking on it, and the changes will be applied without needing to restart the browser. Refer to this article if you need help using about:config.

I know you’re wondering how much better it performs, and so I’ll turn your attention to the Sunspider test, which we’ve used in the past to compare the various browsers. I ran all of the following tests on the same MacBook Pro computer with the Mac OS X operating system (lower amount of time is better):

  1. Safari 3.1.2: 3062.0ms
  2. Firefox 3.0: 2997.2ms
  3. Firefox 3.1 nightly without TraceMonkey: 2510.2ms
  4. Firefox 3.1 nightly with TraceMonkey: 1610.4ms

That’s a rather significant difference. Compared to Firefox 3.0 the new Firefox 3.1 nightly build is nearly twice as fast, and my results are consistent with those that Mozilla got. Bravo!

Behind the scenes the optimizations occur when repetitive tasks are done in JavaScript. For example, the folks over at Mozilla whipped up a quick image editor that lets you adjust the brightness and contrast of a photo. It’s nothing fancy, but there is a noticeable difference using Firefox 3.0 compared to Firefox 3.1 with TraceMonkey enabled. That’s because the JavaScript runs significantly faster due to the image editor consistently repeating the same task. Generally that’s how it works, but the nitty gritty details can be found here.

There’s still some work that needs to be done on TraceMonkey, and some bugs need to be ironed out before it will be ready for prime-time. I’m already getting pumped about Firefox 3.1 though.

Thanks natmaster!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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