Hasta La Gadget!

If you feel the current design of the PlayStation Store leaves a lot to be desired, then you’ll probably be glad to hear it’s being totally revamped. A new UI should do a better job of pushing fresh content at you, and its appearance will be consistent regardless of whether you’re outputting in standard or high def. Searching has been improved to handle abbreviations and misspellings, and a dynamic list of suggestions will try to work out what you’re looking for as you type. Also, Vita and PSP content will be separated, new filters will be available and content hubs will offer everything linked to a certain title, à la the Xbox 360 Marketplace. Sound good? Well, there’s not long to wait – it’ll be launching in PAL regions (Europe, Asia, Australia and others) on October 17th, while North Americans will receive it almost a week later, on October 23rd.

Filed under: Gaming, Software, Sony

PlayStation Store update hitting PAL regions on October 17th, North America on October 23rd originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 11 Oct 2012 11:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Joystiq  |  VG247, Sony PlayStation Blog  | Email this | Comments

Google’s social networking efforts are getting a boost with new versions of its Google+ apps for Android and iOS alike. While both platforms are now sporting the ability for managers of pages to post and comment on items on the go (expect quicker “We’re at CES 2013” check-ins on the Engadget G+ page) there are some individual changes for each. For Android there’s a redesigned home screen widget, one-click access to photos in posts and a new ‘Find People’ function. Meanwhile on Apple hardware it gains iOS 6 / iPhone 5 support, as well as the ability to edit posts, save photos to the camera roll and search for people and posts on the iPad. We tried out the page management feature which is nice to have, but appears to only be accessible by actually signing out and signing back in again. Hit the links below to grab the updated apps at their respective stores and give them a try.

Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Software, Mobile, Apple, Google

Google+ app updates bring iPhone 5 support, new widget on Android and more originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Anish Acharya (Google+)  |  Google Play, iTunes  | Email this | Comments

For some Twitter users, the social network’s own app offerings just don’t cut it, which is why a lot of people are into TweetDeck, which is one of the more popular Twitter clients, and it’s available across most platforms. Today, the client received a redesign that gives it a new theme, improved fonts, and some other welcomed improvements.

The update is mostly subtle, but the update brings enhanced and adjustable fonts, as well as a brand new “lighter theme” that features dark text against a light background, instead of the dark background and lighter text that the client used in the past. It’s definitely a huge change, though, for those that enjoy a lighter look to their apps. If you’re a fan of the darker background, you can still select that one if you’d like.

As far as the new font improvements, you can change the size of the font in the settings pane. You can select Small (13 pt.), Medium (14 pt.) or Large (15 pt.) font sizes. It certainly doesn’t provide a lot of size adjustment, but it’s nice that users can make the text slightly larger or smaller if need be.

The update is available now for Windows and Mac users, as well as Chrome users. Windows users will need to restart the app in order to implement the changes, while Chrome users will need to restart Chrome itself. The updated Mac app is available for download in the App Store as well.

TweetDeck redesigned with new theme, adjustable fonts is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

First, we must congratulate the entire XBMC team on reaching the tenth anniversary of one of the project’s first betas hitting the internet, when Yet Another Media Play (YAMP) and Xbox Media Player joined forces to create something beautiful. It’s outlived the original console by far, powered other projects and spinoffs (Boxee, Plex, GeeXBox — just to name a few) and is still going strong. Just to show how much progress it’s making there’s a new monthly build that adds two features most will have to wait for XBMC 12 Frodo to try out. If you like to live on the edge, the September cycle includes mainline PVR support, which pulls in TV broadcasts thanks to PVR add-ons like MythTV or MediaPortal, as well as integrated support for the Raspberry Pi. Other tweaks include performance enhancements on Android, better picture zooming and rotation on mobiles and much, much more. Hit the source links for a full changelog and details on what dangers running a build hot off the presses may entail.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD

XBMC celebrates 10 years, latest build works in mainline PVR and Raspberry Pi support originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Oct 2012 08:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mozilla is still keeping up with their promise for rapid releases of their Firefox web browser, and it actually just seems like yesterday when the company released Firefox 15 to the public. However, version 16 is out today and it comes with some pretty substantial features for several different platforms.

A few of the new features are aimed at consumers, but a significant portion are for developers. The biggest feature seems to be the new Developer Command Line, which Mozilla says “provides easy keyboard control over Firefox Developer Tools and is intuitive, completing commands and parameters for you.” Other new developer-based features include CSS3 Animations, Transitions, Transforms, Image Values, IndexedDB, and Values and Units.

For regular consumers, a couple of new features are coming your way. For Firefox’s Android app, there’s now a new Safari-like reader mode that provides users with distraction-free reading of any kind. Mac users can also now enjoy VoiceOver support, and all three desktop operating systems (OS X, Windows, and Linux) are getting web app support as well.

On top of all the new features are the usual handful of bugfixes and overal performance improvements. The full list of release notes can be found here, and if you’re interested in trying out the new features, Firefox 16 is available now for download.

Firefox 16 launches with new developer tools, Reader Mode for Android is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.