Hasta La Gadget!

NEW YORK– Valerie Chamberlain met her sister at the 99 cents store they own near the corner of Woodhaven Boulevard and Jamaica Avenue Monday.

The store sits near the center of what is usually one of the busiest commercial strips in Jamaica, Queens, a working-class section of New York City near JFK airport. Their plan: work most of the day or until the wind gets too loud to ignore.

Hurricanes don’t really scare Chamberlain, 37, who hails from the island of Jamaica. But Hurricane Sandy, a massive tropical weather system wrapped in a nor’easter, sounds exotic and pretty frightening, she said. Chamberlain and her sister opened the store Monday because they will probably have to close it much of the rest of the week.

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Design by committee might not be the death knell for technology after all. Over four months after the Alliance for Wireless Power was founded in earnest, the coalition has already greenlit a specification for its partners to work from. The guideline lets device makers start building devices that charge through a magnetic resonance technology more forgiving of distance and material than Qi while simplifying the process through short-range wireless formats like Bluetooth 4.0. While the A4WP group hasn’t made all the details public, it’s holding meetings this week to speed up the commercialization process — it’s here that we’ll learn whether the corporate bureaucracy is just as quick at getting wireless charging hardware into our hands as it is handshaking on standards.

Continue reading Alliance for Wireless Power approves its specification, edges closer to truly cable-free charging

Filed under: Cellphones, Peripherals, Tablets

Alliance for Wireless Power approves its specification, edges closer to truly cable-free charging originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 30 Oct 2012 01:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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SAN FRANCISCO — The district attorney and the mayor said Monday they are seeking legislation to prohibit the reinstated San Francisco sheriff from overseeing any domestic violence programs in his department while he’s on probation in such a case.

District Attorney George Gascon and Mayor Ed Lee said they were not satisfied with Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi’s response to Gascon’s request to recuse himself from duties in his office related to domestic violence offenders.

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The first question we always ask is “why?” Why, when the rest of us are hunkered down in our kitchens gathering canned food, water and batteries, are some seemingly-hypnotized people glued to their laptops or preparing their minivans for a hurricane chase?

Self-described “weather weenie” Angela Fritz emailed the Huffington Post with her story of when she first became fascinated by the weather:

My mom tells this story about when I became a weather geek. I was 2 years old and there was a massive thunderstorm rolling through Cleveland, Ohio, where I grew up. She says I would walk right up to the huge picture window in our living room and press my face to the glass and just stare at the storm through lightning, thunder, wind and rain. I can honestly say I don’t remember wanting to be anything else.

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Last year, Google launched its Chrome Remote Desktop in beta. This app allows users to remote access their own computers while away, and to access other computers running Chrome with the remote desktop extension. Google announced Monday that the application is now out of beta, and that it includes some new features.

As the announcement touts, “from adjusting printer settings on your mom’s computer to finding a lost file on your dad’s laptop,” Chrome Remote Desktop simplifies the task of hopping on someone’s machine (or your own) and getting stuff done. The new features include real time audio for Windows users, and the ability to copy and paste between local and remote machines. Says Google, more features are in the pipeline, and will be announced as they become available.

Getting started with Chrome Remote Desktop is simple enough that, should you be unfortunate enough to have to play tech support for someone, walking them through the steps on setting up the app should be relatively frustration-free. After downloading the extension, you’ll be prompted to choose your Google account from a list if you have more than one. Once you’ve selected the account, you’ll be presented with a list of requested permissions, which includes permission to view your email address, your Chrome Remote Desktop computers, and to view and send chat messages, as well as permission to perform all three actions when you’re not actually using the app.

After clicking the “Allow Access” button, you’ll be presented with two options: connect with a different computer, or set up a connection with your own. Under “Remote Assistance,” you can either share your computer with someone else by clicking “Share,” or you can access another computer by clicking “Access.” In order to access your own computer, you’ll be prompted to click “Enable Remote Connection,” and then set up a 6-digital PIN.

Over all, using Chrome Remote Desktop proved to be fast and simple. Google touts it as a useful tool for those using Chromebooks, allowing users to remote desktop from the Chromebook into a laptop or desktop computer to access files while on the go. You can check out our review of the Samsung Series 3 Chromebook here.

[via Google Chrome Blog]

Chrome Remote Desktop out of beta, has new features is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
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