Hasta La Gadget!

While Vic Gundotra wasn’t willing to talk Glass in our run-in here at Google I/O, a few others were. In speaking with folks from Google, we learned a few new details about the project, while confirming some whispers that we’d heard floated in the past. Here’s a quick rundown:

• Engineers are currently ‘experimenting’ with connectivity options. Existing prototypes — including those worn in the skydiving stunt this morning — do not have any sort of built-in WWAN connectivity.
• While it’s possible that a 3G / 4G module could end up in production devices, the general idea is that latching onto nearby WiFi hotspots or relying on a wireless tether with your smartphone will be the primary way that Glass gets its data to the web.
• Controlling Glass will eventually rely on a mixture of inputs: it’ll recognize voice commands, while also taking cues from the right sidebar. There’s a touch-sensitive pad on there that’ll understand gestures.
• It’s entirely probable that Glass will also be able to be controlled via one’s smartphone, but physical inputs will be the preferred ones.
• Glass has an accelerometer and a gyroscope, enabling wearers to tell Glass what to do by nodding, shaking one’s head, etc. (For what it’s worth, we’ve seen similar demoed by NTT DoCoMo.)
• The internal battery sits just behind the ear on the right side; the capacity and longevity weren’t confirmed, though.
• Glass will be able to record locally, but the idea is to have ‘most everything’ streamed live to the web; it’s the “live, right now!” nature of Glass that Google intends to push as one of its differentiating factors.
• In an area where wireless data isn’t available (like a remote National Park or a hospital room that forbids phone usage), storing video locally would be possible for uploading later.

We also confirmed that the team is playing around with various colors, with orange, white, black and blue editions being sported here at I/O. Whether or not all of those hues make it to market remains to be seen, of course, but we’re adequately jazzed about the possibilities.

More Google Glass details: experimenting with connectivity options, control possible via voice originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jun 2012 16:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Make no mistake, Project Glass dominated the Google IO 2012 keynote, with a blockbuster entrance worthy of a James Bond film, and the shock news that the wearable is actually up for preorder. Google’s Sergey Brin interrupted the presentation with news that Glass-wearing skydivers were floating in a blimp above the Moscone Center, and would be jumping down while live-streaming through a Google+ Hangout. Check out the must-see video after the cut!

The skydivers were met by stunt bike riders, who passed a Project Glass unit to abseilers, who handed it to more bikers that delivered it to Brin on-stage. He then called up some friends from the Glass development team to flesh out Google’s vision for the headset, in what was increasingly sounding like a sales pitch.

That suspicion proved well-founded in fact, when Brin revealed that Google would be taking preorders for the Project Glass Explorer Edition at IO this week. Available for $1,500 and expected to ship in early 2013, the headset doesn’t come cheap but already developers are flocking to sign up.

Of course, no Google keynote would be complete without a little anti-Apple snark, and it was left to Project Glass to highlight quite how much better looking at data in a natural way out of the corner of your eye is, compared to stabbing frantically at a tiny phone screen.

Google IO 2012: Project Glass wrap-up is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Google’s IO Keynote wasn’t all about Jelly Bean: the company also had some slick new hardware to demonstrate in the shape of the Nexus 7 tablet and Nexus Q media computer. The ASUS-made Nexus 7 came as little surprise, a 7-inch 1280 x 800 tablet running Jelly Bean on a Tegra 3 processor. As for the Nexus Q, that takes a little more explaining.

The orb-like gadget is part headless-phone – running Android, of course – and part Apple TV alternative, hooking up with HDMI to your TV and throwing in speaker connections too. It can be used as a media streamer, pulling in content from YouTube and other cloud stores such as Google’s new movie purchase system, as well as a communal jukebox of sorts, with a shared playlist accessible from Android devices. It’s priced at a hefty $299 and will ship in 2-3 weeks time in the US.

One such Android device that could control the Nexus Q is the Google Nexus 7. The tablet ticks all the spec-sheet boxes – it has a 1.2-megapixel front camera, WiFi b/g/n, Bluetooth, 8GB/16GB of internal storage and 1GB of RAM, all in a 198.5 x 120 x 10.45mm form factor weighing 340g – but comes in at $199 for the entry-level model.

The 4325 mAh battery is good for up to 8hrs of use, Google claims, and there’s a microphone, NFC, accelerometer, magnetometer, GPS and a gyroscope. Interestingly, it runs Chrome for Android as the default browser, and comes with a specially updated version of Currents.

Standby for hands-on content with both new Nexus devices!

Google IO 2012: Nexus 7 and Nexus Q hardware wrap-up is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Yeah, two hours can be a lot of press conference to sit through, but if you took a bathroom break, got a drink or just blinked, you might have missed some of the action-packed spectacle that was today’s I/O keynote. We got Jelly Bean, the Nexus 7, the Nexus Q and some extreme Project Glass action. Check out the full video after the break.

Update: And just like that, it’s gone again. Google has apparently made the video private. We’ll add it back in when it goes live again.

Google’s I/O 2012 keynote is up in video form, in case you missed the skydivers the first time originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jun 2012 15:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Here’s a bit of a surprise that slipped under the radar during the Google I/O keynote: Google Earth for Android has been updated to 7.0 to take advantage of the new 3D map technology it unveiled at another special event just a few weeks ago. As a refresher, the visuals are automatically created from 45-degree aerial imagery and can pick up 3D elements as subtle as trees. Before you go racing to your hometown to see how it looks in 3D, be aware that just a handful of cities and regions exploit that dimension. Besides San Francisco Bay, the full coverage extends to Boulder, Boston, Charlotte, Lawrence, Los Angeles, Long Beach, Portland, San Antonio, San Diego, Santa Cruz and Tampa in the US, with Rome being the lone international hotspot. If that’s too few places to visit, there’s always the addition of guided tours. Android users can head over Google Play to get the update today; iOS users shouldn’t fret, as they’ll get the new maps soon.

Update: Google now has video, if you’d rather not (or can’t) install the app to try it yourself.

Continue reading Google Earth 7.0 for Android brings new, super-detailed 3D maps for some cities (update: video)

Google Earth 7.0 for Android brings new, super-detailed 3D maps for some cities (update: video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jun 2012 15:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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