T3 India

Google

Oppo makes its way into the smartwatch market with the Oppo Watch

by

The new Oppo Watch – the square-shape design of which is very similar to that of the iconic Apple Watch, and several other similarly designed smartwatches out there – has been launched with some quality features like an AMOLED display, Oppo’s own Dual-Chip Endurance System and more.

The Oppo Watch is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 3100 which uses a ‘twin endurance mode-powered’. Oppo claims that the 430 mAh battery can be fully charged in just 75 minutes through the Watch VOOC Flash Charging technology. More so, the Oppo Watch is equipped with a dual-curved flexible 1.91” AMOLED screen, which offers a 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut.

When it comes to the functionality, Oppo Watch works in tandem with Google Fit and runs on Google’s Wear OS.  The Oppo Watch does offer fitness and heart rate tracking features, in addition to monitoring sleep quality, and being water resistant to up to 50 meters. It also gives users ‘Get Up’ reminders and provides information on breathing.

Furthermore, Wear OS by Google also enables users to access Google’s Voice Assistant which is integrated with the Oppo Watch, which can run for up to 36 hours on ‘smart mode’ and up to 21 days on ‘power save mode’. The Oppo Watch also has an in-built GPS and is bolstered with a myriad of sensors like Ambient Light sensor, Tri-axial acceleration sensor and gyroscope, geomagnetic sensor, optical heart sensor, and the biometric sensor.

The Oppo Watch offers several watch faces and it will also creatively build a watch face based on any image made by the users. Features like ‘quick reply’, mobile payment, message notifications, online music, and schedule management play an integral role in making this a smartwatch worth its price.

The Oppo Watch comes in 2 variants – the 41mm dial and the 46mm, the former being only 3atm water resistant and offering a 300mAh battery life. The latter costs Rs. 19,990 and the former costs Rs. 14,990. The Oppo Watch is available on Amazon and Flipkart.

Tech giants Apple and Google are joining forces to combat COVID-19

by

Apple and Google have decided to put their rivalry and differences aside for the next few months, and are teaming up to create and embed a feature on Android and Apple devices to inform users if they had been in close contact with infected individuals. Once created and finalised, the technology giants are planning to deploy this feature in to the operating systems of iPhones and Android devices around the world.

We all know the specifics of how dangerous and contagious the disease is, and that it can be transmitted through close proximity to those affected. With buildings, societies and colonies being sealed off in Mumbai, Delhi and other places around the world – public health authorities have identified that ‘’contact tracing” is an important tool to possibly curb the spread of COVID-19.

Thus, applying this principle to the core of designing the new tool and feature, Apple and Google plan to enable smartphones to constantly log other devices they come near. This has been labelled as ‘Privacy-safe contact tracing using Bluetooth Low Energy’. Both giants will release application programming interfaces (APIs) in May that aid public health authorities navigate both, Android and iOS devices. These official apps will be available for users to download through the app stores.

Briefly, through the tool, people who are infected with the coronavirus would notify the public health app with their test results. The public health app then would send notifications and/or alerts to phones that had recently come into proximity with that person’s device – without revealing the identity of the infected person. The following slides provided by Apple and Google’s press release help understanding this better.

Even though the fact that these two giants are joining forces to help slow down the pandemic is great news, on the downside, privacy issues are an ongoing concern and it also raises questions as to the amount of unprecedented access Apple and Google will have to individuals’ lives.

However, in their press release, Apple and Google have stated that this new tool wouldn’t collect personally identifiable information or user location data. To enable this feature on their phones, explicit users consent is required. Also, people who test positive are not identified to other users, whether they’re using Google or Apple smartphones and the data will only be used for contact tracing by public health authorities to curb the pandemic.

Google CEO, Sundar Pichai tweeted that the contact tracing approach is “designed with strong controls and protections for user privacy.” Apple CEO, Tim Cook tweeted that contact tracing “can be done without compromising user privacy.” And that this new feature “respects transparency and consent.”

You can find more information on the technical specifications and other related items to this feature here.

All you wanted to know about the Huawei saga

by

The top tech story this week is not the new Macbooks or the new Redmi device but the fact that Huawei’s smartphone business could cease to exist. Despite being one of the top brands in the world, an executive order by the US President prohibits any US company to deal with the Chinese brand. This, as you’d expect, doesn’t bode well for Huawei as it uses technologies from Intel, Broadcom and Qualcomm along with the Android OS with Play services access from Google. The most recent development is the suspension of support from ARM, which In short, after the temporary license is over (till August 19), US companies will not be able to deal with anything related to Huawei.

The U.S. tech firm Google’s forceful suspension is the pivotal reason of the controversy wherein there will be no Google services access to Huawei phones.  Thus the Chinese brand has been put in the ‘entity-list’ by the US president Donald Trump due to the trade-clash. Presumably, neither of the companies would want to break ties given the gigantic losses they stand to incur. The temporary license is likely to allow companies such as Google to continue providing service and support, including software updates or patches, to Huawei smartphones that were available to the public on or before May 16. It also allows Huawei to engage in the development of standards for fifth-generation (5G) telecom networks.
The Android used on smartphones and tablets is made of multiple layers of software. In the west, these software layers are stacked from top to bottom like this:
• User interface which is the part users interact with called Emotion UI (EMUI) for Huawei or Magic UI for Honor.
• Google services – Google Play and the various Google apps (Gmail etc).
• Android operating system.
• System software that controls the various bits of hardware of the phone.

The Chinese company is still prohibited from buying American-made hardware and software to make new products without further, hard-to-obtain licenses which restricts Google Mobile Services (GMS) for the upcoming devices and limits the earlier system updates as well. Albeit it will not have much impact on the customers in China as most of the Google services, for instance YouTube, etc. are already banned in the country, but it’ll be a major blow for its western users.
As stated by the brand, “Huawei will continue to provide security updates and after-sales services to all existing Huawei and Honor smartphone and tablet products, covering those that have been sold and that are still in stock globally,”.

“In short, this license will allow operations to continue for existing Huawei mobile phone users and rural broadband networks,” Ross said.

Despite of the deprivation of Google’s services, Huawei does not lose all access to Android, as the core operating system is an open source project called the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). Any manufacturer can modify and install it on their devices without having to get permission. Huawei will be able to deliver Android version updates via the AOSP, but will lose early access to the updated versions provided by Google such as the current beta of Android Q. New phones will not be certified, and as a consequence will not be able to have GMS pre-installed that includes a suite of Google’s own apps including:
• The Play stores for apps, music and other media
• Google Photos
• YouTube
• Google Maps
• Google Drive cloud storage
• Google Duo video calls

Some of these services will still be accessible via the web, but many would find that less convenient.

“The U.S. government’s actions at the moment underestimate our capabilities,” Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei said in an interview with CCTV, countering the Pandits’ belief of selling the ‘Android blockaded phones’ being an uphill task, as the company has been preparing for such a scenario since a long time.

Sources said that the company is working on a ‘plan B’ that could come as a rescue for its users alike the one which is already being used in its smartwatches, but the blockade of Android will be the major issue. Moreover selling a smartphone without Google services won’t be a cake walk as in practice, all the major vendors rely on a lot of support from Google.

Night Sight will drastically improve your low-light photos

by

Low-light photos are the bane of today’s smartphones and while they’ve improved over the years, they still have a long way to go. Google is doing their bit by introducing Night Sight on their Pixel phones that drastically improves low-light photos.

With the help of computational photography and machine learning, Night Sight measures the hand shake as well as stillness in the photo. If the phone is stable and the subject is still, the mode will try capturing more light to minimise noise whereas if shaky, Night Sight will use shorter exposures that will result in less details but reduction in motion blur.

We’ve been using out the mode for the last couple of days, testing it in virtually no lighting condition and we’re mighty impressed. The camera app automatically suggests to turn on the Night Sight if the light is less than adequate and while the subject wasn’t visible in the viewfinder, the mode captured the subject. Of course, there was some noise but to capture something that’s difficult even for the naked eye to see is really impressive.

The mode is a part of Google Camera app and is rolling out to Pixel 3 and 3 XL users now and will soon be available for the remaining Pixel phones.

Google announces Pixel 3, Pixel 3 XL

by

At a global event in the US, Google announced the new Pixel devices – Pixel 3 and the Pixel 3 XL. The phones take over from last year’s Pixel phones with a larger display, improved camera performance and wireless charging support.

Google maintains the phones’ two tone design that includes a soft-touch Gorilla Glass 5 at the back and textured coating and option of three colours – Just Black, Clearly White and Not Pink. Interestingly, the design now makes the phone IP68 compliant to make it water and dust resistant and now supports wireless charging, making it par with the other high-end devices. Oh, and there’s a notch on the Pixel 3 XL. 

The phones are powered by Snapdragon 845 with 4GB RAM and also comes with a custom-designed security chip called Titan M that enhances mobile security by protecting unlock credentials, disk encryption, app data, and the integrity of the operating system code itself.

Running on Android Pie, the phones heavily rely on AI that helps the 12.2MP dual-pixel camera at the back take excellent photos with features like Top Shot, Super Res Zoom, Night Sight, Photobooth and even Playground, which is the next version of AR Stickers. 

The phones go on pre-order from October 11 and will be available on Flipkart and other retail stores from November 1 at the following prices:

Pixel 3 (64GB): ₹71,000
Pixel 3 (128GB): ₹80,000
Pixel 3 XL (64GB): ₹83,000
Pixel 3 XL (128GB): ₹92,000