Up until a couple of years ago, I used to turn to RescueTime to figure out how I spend my time online. Then it got too complex, and I stopped using it. Personal Activity Monitor is like a vastly dumbed-down version of RescueTime, and I mean that as a compliment. It’s free and bare-bones — all it does is track what applications you’re using and for how long.

A big drawback at this point is that it doesn’t integrate with Web browsers to help you analyze how you spend your time on the Web. Still, if your work doesn’t require constant Web app use, knowing how long you’ve used a browser overall might be enough to help you manage your time.

Personal Activity Monitor tracks time you spend using desktop apps originally appeared on Download Squad on Sat, 05 Mar 2011 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/05/personal-activity-monitor-lets-you-quickly-see-what-you-spend-ti/

PLANAR SYSTEMS Apple AVNET QUANTUM ECLIPSYS

It’s almost officially summer! No more bundling up to go outside. The sun is shining and the outdoors are calling you away from your computer (because you need an excuse to stand up). And ice cream. Who doesn’t love going out and grabbing a double scoop? Actually, I’ll tell you who doesn’t: me. There’s just never the exact flavor I want. Sure, I ask for a tiger tail with pralines and cream and a round of whisky for a wake-me-up, but always the same reply. You know what? It doesn’t even matter anymore, now that I have my own Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker. And it only takes directions from me. So you can take your ice cream dictatorship and help the next person in line. Me? I got my own concoction at home. Let’s go. My machine also makes a mean frozen yogurt or sorbet. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/mfCRxLg0gB0/this-ice-cream-maker-is-your-just+the+right+flavor-deal-of-the-day

MOODYS SAIC INVENTEC RACKABLE SYSTEMS SANDISK

Shot Shot Pirate is very satisfying, because each level is short and to the point. You know what you have to do and you just do it.

As you may have gathered from the name, you’re cast in the role of a pirate. Your goal is to shoot at a diamond and make it fall off a tower of bricks. The height of the tower changes as you progress through the levels. It’s not enough to just make the diamond fall off the tower of bricks – it has to fall below a certain line (drawn on the screen) for the level to be completed.

There are also different kinds of bricks, with some heavier than others, and different kinds of ammo. You only get a certain amount of ammo for each level, and when it’s gone, you lose. But don’t worry! If you don’t make it on the first try, it’s very easy to restart the level and just give it another shot (or three).

All in all it’s a cute game. I’ve seen similar games with better graphics and music, but the game delivers on its main promise – a few minutes of pure time wasting!

Shot Shot Pirate is a fun, simple physics game originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 24 Feb 2011 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/02/24/shot-shot-pirate-is-a-fun-simple-physics-game/

COMMUNICATIONS HOLDINGS EASTMAN KODAK CO QUALCOMM QUEST SOFTWARE SIEMENS

Flexible displays have tickled our imaginations for years. And before the end of 2012, we’ll finally see companies employing flexible displays in their products. But while the possibilities are tantalizing, don’t let your imagination run wild.

Source: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/apple-flexible-displays/

VEECO INSTRUMENTS DIEBOLD ATandT NINTENDO IBASIS

The University of Michigan and The New School for Social Research has found that if you want someone to tell you the truth, you should text them. Dispensing with the lie detector for job interviewees, academics found that people gave more honest and detailed answers via SMS than over the phone. The team believes it’s due to the lack of time pressure and not having to produce a pleasing answer for your interrogator. If the findings continue to provide similar results, it looks like Steve Wilkos could be replaced with a smartphone.

Texting: the truth serum of the 21st century originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 May 2012 15:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/17/texting-stops-lies/

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES (IBM) BHARTI AIRTEL IRON MOUNTAIN INORATED VISHAY INTERTECHNOLOGY TAKETWO INTERACTIVE SOFTWARE

These are Maggie and Kyle. Look at them. They are so happy. It’s not surprising. When this photo was taken, Kyle had just asked Maggie to marry him. Using Pandora no less. And she said yes. True love! More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/cT-vU_ng4hE/this-guy-proposed-using-pandora-radio

NETWORK APPLIANCE JDA SOFTWARE GROUP AMERICA MOVIL VERISIGN F5 NETWORKS

Speaking at Peter Thiel’s class at Stanford last week, investor and entrepreneur Mark Andreessen called out retail as a “particularly promising” vertical for tech innovation.

We?re seeing and will continue to get e-commerce 2.0, that is, e-commerce that?s not just for nerds. The 1.0 was search driven. You go to Amazon or eBay, search for a thing, and buy it. That works great if you?re shopping for particular stuff. The 2.0 model involves a deeper understanding of consumer behavior. These are companies like Warby Parker and Airbnb. It?s happening vertical by vertical. And it?s likely to keep happening throughout the retail world because retail is really bad to start with. There are very high fixed costs of having stores and inventory. Margins are very small to begin with. If you take away just 5 or 10%, things collapse.”

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/sCt4RLMyMmQ/

MICROSOFT VARIAN SEMICONDUCTOR EQUIPMENT ASSOCIATES GOOGLE TOTAL SYSTEM SERVICES THQ

Comcast’s bandwidth policy has come under fire from several directions lately, and today it’s announced plans to test two new systems for managing capacity. In a company blog post, VP Cathy Avgiris describes the new “flexible” approaches it will be testing out in certain markets that start off by raising the limit to 300GB (from 250GB where it’s been since 2008) per month. One of the plans involves offering 300GB as a base on its Essentials, Economy, and Performance internet packages, and higher limits on its Blast and Extreme tiers, with extra data available as an add-on, possibly $10 for 50GB or so. The other plan simply bumps all tiers to 300GB per month and offers the additional blocks of data as needed. For markets where it’s not testing the new plans, it’s suspending enforcement of the 250GB cap entirely for now, although it says it will still contact “excessive” users about their usage.

We’re currently on a conference call concerning the changes and Comcast is reaffirming its belief that the FCC has decided it can “manage” data usage on its network, and that it will continue to do so in a “non-discriminatory” way. Particularly since the launch of its Xfinity TV Xbox 360 app others like Netflix and some consumer and networking watchdogs would beg to differ, it will be interesting to see if these approaches change anything. Executives on the call noted “noise” around the Xbox 360 app in making the change, but also pointed to an “ongoing internal discussion” and simply that times have changed from four years ago. The words that keep coming up so far are choice and flexibility, as well as mentioning that even today, very few customers approach the previous 250GB limit. In response to a question, Avgiris indicated the median usage for customers is still around 8-10GB per month.

…developing

Comcast rethinks bandwidth caps, trials two new policies that involve higher 300GB monthly limits originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 May 2012 13:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/S6WY9u39iXQ/

LIBERTY GLOBAL MOBILE TELESYSTEMS GRUPO IUSACELL UNISYS TIBCO SOFTWARE

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your st…

Source: http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/Mashable/~3/qF5jLgvtiGA/

GOOGLE SEAGATE TECHNOLOGY VIEWSONIC NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS ACER

Flipboard is a graphically stunning social media aggregator that organizes your friends? tweets, posts and links into a magazine-like spread. But now that experience isn’t just visual: In an update yesterday evening, Flipboard added sound to the mix, so you can enjoy your favorite podcasts and music through the app.

Source: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/flipboard-app-adds-audio/

JDA SOFTWARE GROUP AMERICA MOVIL VERISIGN F5 NETWORKS NVIDIA

Shipments of HTC’s One X and Evo 4G LTE smartphones have been delayed by U.S. Customs enforcement as the result of a December Apple patent lawsuit win over the Taiwanese smartphone maker.

Source: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/05/apples-patent-win-delays-shipments-of-two-htc-smartphones/

GRUPO IUSACELL UNISYS TIBCO SOFTWARE TRANSACTION SYSTEMS ARCHITECTS NOVELLUS SYSTEMS

Dropbox offers a lovely client for Android, but it’s lacking true “sync” functionality. You can merely browse your Dropbox, pull files into the device, and manually upload specific files.

DropSpace is a little Android app that makes Dropbox on Android work like Dropbox – that is, you get real folder synchronization in the background.

When you run the app you’re prompted for your Dropbox credentials. After logging in to Dropbox, you get to select which device folders you’d like to sync to the cloud. It’s a straightforward mapping process: You select a folder on the device, and then specify where in Dropbox it should go.

The interface is rather clunky, at least for now. The biggest annoyance is that you can’t edit your “sync list”: if you add a folder and then wish to remove it, you must delete the entire list of folders and start over.

In terms of functionality, it works quite well. I tested it with the camera folder, and it was nice to be able to take my photos using the lean default Camera app and have them sync up to the cloud instantly.

DropSpace adds real Dropbox sync to Android originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 04 Mar 2011 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/04/dropspace-adds-real-dropbox-sync-to-android/

DIRECTV GROUP AUTOMATIC DATA PROCESSING AUTODESK ELPIDA MEMORY ROCKWELL AUTOMATION

Ever since the advent of the first radios and TVs, home entertainment has been a relatively high-tech enterprise, but in the past few years, there has been a revolution in the quality of sights and sounds available. This arena continues to be an experimental space for new and improved technologies that enhance viewing and listening experiences.

Source: http://ectnews.com.feedsportal.com/c/34520/f/632000/s/1f6933dc/l/0L0Stechnewsworld0N0Crsstory0C7510A40Bhtml/story01.htm

LINEAR TECHNOLOGY PEROT SYSTEMS JACK HENRY and ASSOCIATES IXYS EARTHLINK

This is the Kororodesku, a diorama-like workspace designed by Tokyo-based Torafu Architects, that is one part desk, one part office cubicle, and entirely charming. Its plywood frame can be purchased with an interior polyester veneer in any one of over 1,000 different colors, making the Kororo desk an irresistible addition to just about any home office decorating scheme. [Inhabitat]

More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/-NwaO9EgQio/

IXYS EARTHLINK LEVEL 3 COMMUNICATIONS ADOBE SYSTEMS FEI COMPANY

Bing’s new HTML5-and-CSS3-enhanced search interface, which was first demonstrated back in September 2010 to showcase the power of IE9, has started to roll out.

The most notable addition to the new interface is is smooth page transitions — the fade in and out — and navigation tabs (maps, images, videos, etc.) now persistently float at the top of the page. WinRumors is also reporting that a feature reminiscent of Google Instant search is being added to Bing, with page elements smoothly transitioning in and out as you type in your search query.

If you want to try out the new Bing UI, your best bet is to set your locale to United States – English and pray that you’re part of the initial roll out. Alternatively, just wait a few days until MIX 2011, Microsoft’s Web developer conference, which is when the new Bing UI should be officially launched.

Bing begins roll out of HTML5-enhanced search interface originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 08 Apr 2011 06:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/04/08/bing-begins-roll-out-of-html5-enhanced-search-interface/

ANIXTER INTERNATIONAL KLATENCOR DLINK VERIFONE HOLDINGS ORACLE

According to the folks in the Android Central Forums, a new update labeled as IML74K.US_epad-9.2.1.24-20120503 is currently rolling out to the Asus Eee Pad Transformer. A few things noted about the release after some testing indicates face unlock is now included, wallpapers no longer appear to be flickering and some other bug fixes seem to of have been addressed. Have you got the update on your device yet? If so, jump into the Android Central Forums and let us know.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/tmd8_-k5chc/story01.htm

ARROW ELECTRONICS AMKOR TECHNOLOGY SYKES ENTERPRISES INORATED TEXAS INSTRUMENTS ASUSTEK COMPUTER

The Global Innovation Series is presented by BMW i, a new concept dedicated to providing mobility solutions for the urban environment. It delive…

Source: http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/Mashable/~3/0XNHkS7LZMI/

MOBILE TELESYSTEMS GRUPO IUSACELL UNISYS TIBCO SOFTWARE TRANSACTION SYSTEMS ARCHITECTS

Nortel, once one of the biggest telecoms company in the world but now in the death throes of bankruptcy, has selected Google’s $900 million bid for its patent portfolio as the stalking horse bid. This doesn’t mean that Google will automatically win Nortel’s massive array of telecoms patents, but it does mean that Google is the preferred buyer.

Google, which has a history of lobbying for patent law reform, has been the target of many patent litigation suits. Google’s relative infancy means that it has a lot less patents in the vault than big-hitters like Microsoft, Oracle and IBM, and buying Nortel’s portfolio of 6,000 patents could provide better protection against patent litigation in the future. It’s worth noting that both Apple and RIM have showed interested in the portfolio, too.

Mashable speculates that the patents — which are nearly all telecoms-related — will be used to defend against Oracle’s attacks on Android’s use of Java. We reckon that Google is simply looking to cover its future endeavors in the world of networking. In the absence of patent law reform, and continued threats to net neutrality, owning a bunch of telecoms patents sounds like a very sensible move.

Google bids $900 million for Nortel’s patents to protect against litigation trolls originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 04 Apr 2011 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/04/04/google-bids-900-million-for-nortels-patents-to-protect-from-li/

SPSS INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES SRA INTERNATIONAL ELECTRONIC ARTS INTERNATIONAL RECTIFIER

One of the most memorable moments of TechCrunch Disrupt NYC last year was office hours with Paul Graham, who is the heart and co-founder of Y Combinator. We are doing it again this year. But because Graham is back in Silicon Valley with a newborn baby, we’re doing it in a slightly different way. Over the past few years, we’ve heard that it’s not only hard to find engineers. It’s hard to find great design talent. And if Apple’s still unbelievable and mind-boggling rise over the last 15 years shows anything, it’s that design matters. Design and simplicity made the difference between Instagram and every other photo-sharing app. It revived Path. It made Square stand out among all of the other credit card readers. So we’re changing Office Hours to focus on design. Design Office Hours will be held on-stage at Disrupt NYC on Wednesday, May 22nd, from 11:55am to 12:30pm. Just like we did last year at New York during Disrupt, six companies will be chosen from the completed applications below to spend time on-stage with some talented design experts.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/_-k6T1-zMPE/

KEY CHINA MOBILE EPICOR SOFTWARE SAIC TRIDENT MICROSYSTEMS

Up until a couple of years ago, I used to turn to RescueTime to figure out how I spend my time online. Then it got too complex, and I stopped using it. Personal Activity Monitor is like a vastly dumbed-down version of RescueTime, and I mean that as a compliment. It’s free and bare-bones — all it does is track what applications you’re using and for how long.

A big drawback at this point is that it doesn’t integrate with Web browsers to help you analyze how you spend your time on the Web. Still, if your work doesn’t require constant Web app use, knowing how long you’ve used a browser overall might be enough to help you manage your time.

Personal Activity Monitor tracks time you spend using desktop apps originally appeared on Download Squad on Sat, 05 Mar 2011 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/05/personal-activity-monitor-lets-you-quickly-see-what-you-spend-ti/

SAIC TRIDENT MICROSYSTEMS NETGEAR COMMUNICATIONS HOLDINGS EASTMAN KODAK CO