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If you have a top budget Android phone and often receive pictures from your friend's iPhone, you may have noticed the .heic file format. While the HEIC file format has been around for a while, its popularity skyrocketed when Apple adopted it with the introduction of iOS 11 in 2017. This image file format packs compressed data, location, date, and more. HEIC is often known as High-Efficiency File Format and offers several advantages over existing file formats like JPEG and PNG.
I haven't been the biggest fan of Google Images since it removed direct image links, but the service has been working on a few useful features behind the scenes. Starting this week, contextual information about images will appear when you tap on them, similar to what you would get from regular web searches.
Google's machine learning wizardry is capable of more than just AR emoji. As proven by features like Live Relay, computational recognition of sound and images can lead to incredible quality-of-life improvements for people hard of hearing or sight. Google's newest trick? Chrome will soon add captions to every image on the web.
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- One day ahead of Nokia's MWC press conference, the company's teasing another photo sample. This one's not quite the epic scene that our last pic was, and instead looks to be highlighting low-light performance. Of course, just how impressive it really is depends a lot on how dim the original scene was. Not knowing more, we'll just have to patiently await tomorrow's announcements.
Just earlier today, nature photographer Konsta Punkka published an impressive-looking sample to Instagram that was "captured and edited entirely on a [unnamed] Nokia phone." It's a little speculative, but with our expectations of an MWC announcement for the camera-focused Nokia 9 PureView, it's possible that the photo came from the phone. Previous teasers and leaks of the device have shown off a huge 5-camera layout with Zeiss optics.
IFTTT, the service that connects all of your smart gadgets, services, websites, and various other sources with each other in an automated "if this happens here do that there," has made one neat improvement to its Notifications channel on Android. Previously, when you created an applet that triggered a notification on your phone, you could only personalize the message it displayed and it always opened the IFTTT app when tapped. Now you can also change its name, add a custom URL to be opened when you tap it, and append a custom image.
Google Drive is pretty great, as long as your files are in Google's format. You can certainly open other types of documents, like Microsoft Office files or PDFs, but you can't do much more than look at them (or convert them to Google Docs format). If you regularly work with non-Docs files, you'll be happy to hear that you can now comment on more types of documents.
The September 2017 Android security update is here, and the bulletin contains the usual details about vulnerabilities that could be affecting various Android devices. Images and OTAs that include the September patches should protect against any possible issues, but so far they're only available for the Nexus 9 on Android 7.1.1. There are no Android 8.0 Oreo images with September patches for Pixel or Nexus devices live yet, but it shouldn't be too long before they are added.
Android 8.0 Oreo made its official debut a little over a week ago, but since then, only devices enrolled in the Android Beta Program have received an official OTA to 8.0. Verizon Pixel phones began receiving the official version earlier today, but it looks like other devices haven't been as fortunate. Luckily, Google has just uploaded factory images and OTAs for Nexus and Pixel devices to their respective pages.
Google's shiny new Pixel phones and the slightly older Nexus 5X and 6P, and the Pixel C tablet have had access to the latest and most tasty flavor of Nougat for a month now, but the Nexus 6 (from 2014, if we're keeping score) has been puttering along on the more outdated 7.0 build. As promised, the 7.1.1 update is now available for Nexus 6 owners in both full system image and over-the-air update form - though of course, it may be a while before you see the actual OTA roll out to your phone.
Google is no stranger to testing new features or design tweaks on its live products, and search has been receiving quite a bit of attention lately. It doesn't necessarily come as a surprise, then, to see new design tweaks appearing for some users in Google's image search results.
It may have become the underdog now compared to the ubiquity of Chrome, but Firefox isn't letting that excuse hinder its improvement and development. The latest beta of Firefox for Android proves that by fixing some issues, adding support for requested regional features, and enhancing performance thanks to a few HTML5 additions.
HTC is expected to take another crack at this whole Nexus thing within a matter of weeks, and a leaked image of the company's tablet has hit the web courtesy of @upleaks. The image isn't particularly crisp, but if you look past the blurriness, you can see a 4:3 Android tablet that looks not unlike last year's installments in the Nexus line.
If you've been keeping up with any tech blogs over the past couple of weeks, you know that the next Nexus phone has been a hot topic. We saw rumored specs and rumored hardware photos that only added to the confusion created back when we first reported on a possible 5.9" Nexus. Today, however, we have something special to share. We've been provided with new information about the next Nexus phone, and can confirm that it will be a 5.9" device called the Nexus 6.
Yes, @evleaks has officially retired from leaking gadgets, but it appears Mr. Blass had one more treat for the tech community - images that appear to show the Moto X+1 in two variants, both emblazoned with Verizon logos. One is all-black, while the other sports a white front and a wooden back.
Two days ago, Google Glass received the XE16 update that bumped the device up to KitKat, introduced photo bundles, brought in sorted voice commands, and added a number of other features. This release was different for a few reasons, the most notable of which being the long wait (the last release was XE12 back in December).
Samsung devices are selling like gangbusters, and while this could be taken as a sign that many people are fine with TouchWiz as it is, that hasn't stopped a flood of critics (including us, on occasion) from lambasting the company's sense of design. Either the icons are too childish, the interface is overly cluttered, or it just feels bloated. The interface hasn't had a makeover in quite some time, but the latest image shared by @evleaks suggests that things may be about to change.
Just a few days ago, Google Glass got a hefty update to XE12 with new Glassware, a new (official) wink gesture for taking photos, a lock screen, and other tweaks.
Hot on the heels of its release, the Nexus 5's factory image and drivers (including those from Qualcomm) have already been posted. As usual, the Nexus 5's newly uploaded assets are right in line with the rest of the Nexus family, though no other members of the family have gotten a 4.4 update just yet. Those developers or enthusiasts who want something to play with can hit the appropriate link below to grab the image and/or drivers.
Nexus 4, 7, And 10 KitKat Factory Images And Proprietary Binaries Will Be Released 'In The Coming Weeks' Following Respective OTAs
Nexus 4, 7, And 10 KitKat Factory Images And Proprietary Binaries Will Be Released 'In The Coming Weeks'
Just a quick note to anyone waiting for full OS factory images and drivers for existing Nexus devices (outside of the Galaxy Nexus, which bit the dust with KitKat) - as is customary, they will follow over-the-air updates released according to Google's favorite timeline: "in the coming weeks."
After many many leaks, we've got an official look at the Nexus 5 via the Play Store - the Nexus collection for the US is showing the icon for the Nexus 5 listing, along with the official description copy. Unfortunately though, the phone's actual listing is inaccessible.