PSA: Interactive Starry Night now available for the iPad (video)

Greek Artist Petros Vrellis is a big admirer of Vincent Van Gogh, which prompted him to produce an interactive version of Starry Night. It took him a patience-sapping six months to produce the original PC version, where finger swipes redirect the painter's famous daubs into a light and sound show. Of course, there was such a clamor from users all desperate to have a go, that he managed to produce an iPad app in a little under a month. Now you can pick it up from the App Store at the source link, or head on past the break to see this new version in action (you really do have to see it).

Continue reading PSA: Interactive Starry Night now available for the iPad (video)

PSA: Interactive Starry Night now available for the iPad (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 30 Mar 2012 09:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  iTunes  | Email this | Comments

MEMC ELECTRONIC MATERIALS MICROSOFT MILLICOM INTL CELLULAR MOBILE TELESYSTEMS NANYA TECHNOLOGY

How to Overclock a CPU: Getting Started

Overclocking a CPU sounds seductive, right? Adjust a few settings on your phone or tablet, and the device goes faster. Games play without laborious, stuttering, forced slow-motion effects, and everything loads quicker. Well, like everything in life, these adjustments involve a tradeoff. Just as there are risks in taking your car out for a rural run and heavy-footing it, there are implications for a CPU speedup.

NUANCE COMMUNICATIONS NOVELLUS SYSTEMS NOVELL NETWORK APPLIANCE NETGEAR

Color vulnerable to simple GPS hack, lets you spy on anyone, anywhere

Color, the $41-million-in-funding location-oriented photo sharing startup, is susceptible to simple GPS spoofing. With nothing more than a jailbroken iPad or iPhone, you can use FakeLocation to trick Color into thinking you're somewhere else. Within seconds you can be browsing photos that were snapped thousands of miles away. With a little digging, you can pore through photos not intended for your eyes.

Of course, such a hack isn't illegal as such -- every photo you take with Color is public. With FakeLocation you are simply circumventing Color's very limited location-oriented security mechanism. It does undermine Color's usefulness (and uniqueness), though -- if nefarious types can sit in their bedroom or basement and eavesdrop on classy dinner parties and wild night club soirees, people might be less inclined to share personal photos with those around them.

Fortunately, both for Color and its users, this is an easy security hole to plug -- at least in the short term. The app (or server-side) code simply checks to see if the user has 'teleported' an impossibly large distance, without any intermediate steps in between. In the long term, though, Color's users must be aware that its social graph is completely public. Color's users must realize that every photo they upload is visible by anyone, from any place.

After the break, just to elucidate a little on Color's actual business model and ultimate intention, we have two amazing quotes from Bill Nguyen, Color's founder.

Continue reading Color vulnerable to simple GPS hack, lets you spy on anyone, anywhere

Color vulnerable to simple GPS hack, lets you spy on anyone, anywhere originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 29 Mar 2011 05:36:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

PROGRESS SOFTWARE PLANAR SYSTEMS PEROT SYSTEMS PALM OSI SYSTEMS

Jetbus is a retro-tastic physics game, with a bus

Once upon a time, there used to be a DOS game with a caveman and a human powered helicopter. The caveman would shuttle around the screen, madly trying to get customers to where they wanted to go.

Jetbus is not that game, but it's obviously inspired by it. You're driving a yellow school bus which has jets. I guess the jet engine takes quite a bit of space inside the bus, because you can only pick up one person at a time.

There are several doors on the screen, each with its own number. As you pick up a person, the status bar at the bottom of the screen shows you which number door you have to take them to.

You must fly your bus carefully, because if it gets bumped around too much, you lose. You earn money on each level, and can visit the garage to buy better jets and damping, power-ups, or even a whole new vehicle.

So while this game isn't made as well as the original that inspired it, it does provide a few minutes of fun. And now, which one of you guys remembers the original and feels like pointing to it in the comments?

Jetbus is a retro-tastic physics game, with a bus originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

SUN MICROSYSTEMS STANDARD MICROSYSTEMS SRA INTERNATIONAL SPSS SPANSION

43% of recent U.S. smartphone buyers bought iPhone

Nielsen has wrapped up their latest market research data, and in the three months leading up to February, 43% of U.S. smartphone buyers got an iPhone. By comparison, 48% had bought an Android phone, and 5% picked up a BlackBerry.

SONUS NETWORKS SONIC AUTOMOTIVE SKYWORKS SOLUTIONS SILICON LABORATORIES SI INTERNATIONAL

Install the Windows Phone 7 NoDo update regardless of your carrier

Some of you who own Windows Phone 7 devices are still waiting for your pre-NoDo preparation update -- never mind NoDo itself. A few workarounds have been posted, but unfortunately they didn't work unless your carrier had completed testing and was ready to schedule the update.

Now, however, the Chevron WP7 team's Chris Walshie has delivered a handy little utility that will allow you to update any Windows Phone 7 device -- regardless of your carrier.

1. Download and install the Windows Phone Support Tool (x86 or x64) and the ChevronWP7 Updater (x86 or x64)
2. Launch ChevronWP7 Updater and select your language. If your language isn't listed, stop and do not update.
3. If were running WP7 build 7004 (you can verify in Zune) then run the updater twice.

Once the process completes, you should be able to copy and paste to your heart's content. Let's just hope all this update foolishness gets sorted out before we're supposed to receive Mango.

Install the Windows Phone 7 NoDo update regardless of your carrier originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 04 Apr 2011 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

RF MICRO DEVICES RED HAT RADISYS RACKABLE SYSTEMS QUEST SOFTWARE

Add-on turns a smartphone camera into a joystick (video)

One of the more irritating aspects of touchscreen gaming is almost certainly the inevitability of blocking the screen as you play -- particularly with smaller devices like smartphones. A new peripheral being developed by Kelo University takes an interesting approach to the problem -- using the device to transform the gadget's camera into a three-axis joystick of sorts by detecting the movement of markings on the add-on. According to its creators, the accuracy of the joystick depends largely on the precision of the phone's hardware. Check it out in action after the break.

Continue reading Add-on turns a smartphone camera into a joystick (video)

Add-on turns a smartphone camera into a joystick (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 30 Mar 2012 16:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Diginfo  | Email this | Comments

IKON OFFICE SOLUTIONS IDT IBASIS HYPERCOM HEWLETT PACKARD CO

NBA T-Shirts with Players' Twitter Handles Are So Very Stupid and Wonderful [Twitter]

The NBA is making Twitter-themed t-shirts with a hashtag and the team's logo on the front, and a star player's Twitter handle on the back. It's calling these "____ Has Handle." They are impossibly stupid and ugly and horrific and oh my god I want one. More »

TELETECH HOLDINGS TECHNITROL TAKETWO INTERACTIVE SOFTWARE SYNTEL SYNTAXBRILLIAN

Overworked and In Danger: The Full Foxconn Labor Report [Foxconn]

The Fair Labor Association, a workers' rights watchdog group, was hired by Apple to inspect its Foxconn operation—under a considerable amount of flak recently. So what'd they find? Illegal working hours, legal pay, crooked unions, and danger. More »

AUTOMATIC DATA PROCESSING AVNET BHARTI AIRTEL BT GROUP CANON

RIM Co-Founder Jim Balsillie Steps Down From Board Ahead Of Grim Earnings [Rim]

In advance of today's earnings call, RIM announced that co-founder Jim Balsillie has left the board of the company he built. More »

QUANTA COMPUTER RESEARCH IN MOTION ROGERS COMMUNICATIONS SAIC SATYAM COMPUTER SERVICES

Line Grapefruit is a tricky Flash "path" game

Okay, see that snaking line coming in from the right on the screenshot? That's you. And see those large round circles? Those are supposedly grapefruits, only they won't sit still - they keep moving up and down and cutting across your path. And if you touch one, you die!

That's what you have to deal with in Line Grapefruit. But that's not all - you're also on a time limit. In fact, you have a very limited amount of time to make it through the "path" (for lack of a better word). You need to snake your way through the winding trail without touching anything. The good news is that a grapefruit only kills you if it touches the end of the line - once you've made it past the grapefruit, nothing happens if it crosses the path you've made.

This is not an easy game, but it's quite unique - I can't recall seeing another game quite like it.

Line Grapefruit is a tricky Flash "path" game originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 01 Apr 2011 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

RESEARCH IN MOTION ROGERS COMMUNICATIONS SAIC SATYAM COMPUTER SERVICES SES

Qmadix Snap-On Cover w/ Holster for iPhone 4S, iPhone 4 only $14.95 [Daily deal]

For today only, the iMore Store has the Qmadix Snap-On Cover w/ Holster for iPhone 4S, iPhone 4 on sale for only $14.95!. Get them before they're gone! Get the Qmadix Snap-On Cover w/ Holster for iPhone 4S, iPhone 4 now!

DIODES INORATED DIEBOLD DELL CYPRESS SEMICONDUCTOR ACCENTURE