3d illusion arts: Walyou

Walyou

Zuta Pocket Printer, the mobile robot printing machine
The Best Improvised Comic Book Ever Made
Google Chrome can now run Android Apps on PCs
Scientists Create Molten Metal Batteries for Storing Renewable Energy
LG Wine Smart Is the Latest Android Flip Phone

Zuta Pocket Printer, the mobile robot printing machine

Posted: 23 Sep 2014 07:00 AM PDT

It would seem that everyone prefers digital copies of each and every document nowadays, as printers just weren’t handy. That is, up until now.

The one device that hasn’t changed all that much ever since the mobile revolution is the printer: albeit smaller, they’re still bulky, awkward, take a lot of space, and for some reason they seem always more inconvenience than they’re worth. Acknowledging all of these issues is that the team behind the Zuta Pocket Printer decided to launch a Kickstarter campaign (which was very successful and has already been funded) to realize their vision: a small, portable printer.

The idea was simple: getting rid of the entire printer, and keeping only the useful parts, IE, the head, and using wheels to allow it to travel around on its own. By simply laying the paper down, the Zuta will run over it printing our documents in good quality, and fitting in our pockets afterwards. But do not take our word, and see the creators themselves demonstrating the technology just below these lines. Basically? It’s a robot that runs around and prints at your command, from PCs, laptops, mobile devices or anything.

While the Zuta Pocket Printer isn’t out yet, it’s already been crowd funded, and should be underways soon.

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories, Microsoft's Universal Mobile Keyboard Brings Android, iOS and Windows Together and DipJar Doesn't Do Cash, Only Takes Credit Cards.

The Best Improvised Comic Book Ever Made

Posted: 23 Sep 2014 06:00 AM PDT

An exquisite corpse is when a collection of words or images is collectively assembled as each collaborator adds to a composition in sequence, either by following a rule or by being allowed to see only the end of what the previous person contributed.

It’s great for passing the time when the internet is down, and it works extremely well when it’s not just writing lines but actually drawing pictures and creating an improvised comic book, although there has to be some talent for that. Good thing this came up at the Rose City Comic Con.

Obviously – There are rules:

And there’s one rule that didn’t make the picture: The final artist gets to see all the panels made before him, so he can wrap things up nicely and logically, more or less.

Via: Kirk Damato / Artists (By order of panels): Aubrey Aiese / Wook-Jin Clark / Zachary Sterling / Kel McDonald / Joe Pi / Kyle Shold / Jennie Breeden / Anne Notation / Molly Nemecek / Dan Schkade / Wendi Chen / Enfu / Erik Larsen / Jim Zub / Tavis Maiden / Jeffrey Cruz / Lukas Ketner / Elle Skinner / Christopher Sebela / Buster Moody / Jason Copland / Royce Southerland / Matt Fraction / Ethan Nicolle / Ibrahim Moustafa / Justin Greenwood

For more comic books not being taken too seriously, check out the Hawkeye Initiative.

Google Chrome can now run Android Apps on PCs

Posted: 23 Sep 2014 05:00 AM PDT

archon-google-chrome-android-app-hack-by-vladikoff

Google has been hard at work to make Android apps available on Chrome OS, but a hacker took advantage of this functionality, and now apps can be used on the browser itself.

Google’s App Runtime for Chrome (ARC) has allowed some clever users to revolutionize the app world, and thanks to the brains, hacks and ideas of software developer Vlad Filippov (known online as Vladikoff) even the regular Google Chrome browser can run any app. What this means is that now users get to use their favorite apps on desktop and laptop computers all around the world.

This Chrome modification is called ARChon, and requires at least Chrome 37 set in Developer mode to work. Users only need to install ARChon as a Chrome extension, and then run the apps from there. It sounds more complicated than it is, and users interested in this only have to refer to YouTuber FuturGamerX’s tutorial to see exactly how it works. Although the narration is in Spanish, the instructions are crystal clear.

Vladikoff’s ARChon is, obviously, not available in the Chrome store but can be acquired for free at his GitHub page. Keep in mind, this project is incredibly recent and new, so expect bugs, crashes and program failures as the internet irons out the code. For starters, apps that require Google Play services (for example, Twitter) are not usable just yet, but this door has just opened, and who knows what else is coming.

Via Technabob

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories, Google's Android L Will Offer Data Encryption by Default and Google Launches First Android One Smartphones in India.

Scientists Create Molten Metal Batteries for Storing Renewable Energy

Posted: 22 Sep 2014 02:02 PM PDT

The American engineers who created the liquid metal batteries point out that these won’t have a consumer application anytime soon, but are rather aimed at the grid.

Scientists have been very creative lately when it came to new ways of storing renewable energy, but most designs were for consumer electronics. These molten metal batteries, on the other hand, are meant for storing renewable energy in the grid, as there’s no way people could have the conditions for handling liquid metals at a temperature of 450C.

In an interview with BBC News, Prof Ian Fells, a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and former chair of the New and Renewable Energy Centre, commented that “Sometimes, when the wind is blowing strongly, we have spare capacity available – if only we could store it, so that we could use it when the wind isn’t blowing. Using these molten metal electrodes is, it seems to me, a very good idea.”

The project’s senior researcher Prof Donald Sadoway, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, explained how the liquid metal batteries are supposed to work: “It’s this back and forth, of the top layer disappearing into the bottom layer to generate electricity, and then reconstituting the top layer by consuming electricity, that gives you the rechargeability of the battery.”

Sadoway added that “We wanted to decrease the operating temperature. We were thinking, we’ll take a bit of a compromise on the voltage, if it’s offset by an even better compromise on the melting point.” The 450C temperature is key to the efficiency of the batteries, and represents a clear improvement over the 700C of a previous design.

Prof Fells pointed out that the cost of this project is much lower than its alternatives: “All of these strategies are scientifically possible – it comes down to the cost. If people can make the case that this one is economic, then it’ll do well.”

Dr Frank Marken, a physical chemist at the University of Bath, while not extremely impressed by the idea, admitted that the MIT engineers have their merits: “It’s not revolutionary in the idea – but it may be revolutionary in terms of the application. One tricky aspect of this is how much do you lose in each cycle? And what they’ve done here is very clever. It needs a higher temperature, but they don’t lose much energy.”

This looks like very good news, even though it might take a while until the whole project is put into practice.

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LG Wine Smart Is the Latest Android Flip Phone

Posted: 22 Sep 2014 01:32 PM PDT

Just when everybody believed that flip phones are dead, buried and long forgotten, LG launched another one. Mind you, it’s not a feature phone, but a smart one that’s running Android 4.4 KitKat.

Bar phones with gigantic touchscreens now represent the main form factor when it comes to these mobile gadgets. Despite of that fact, some smartphone manufacturers still swim against the tide and launch either sliders or flip phones. If it wasn’t LG who committed this sin, we probably could’ve turned a blind eye, but it’s the maker of the G3, one of the best smartphones around, that we’re talking about. While this could seem an illogical strategy for the Korean company, there are a few things that might explain the launch of LG Wine Smart in this day and age.

LG Wine Smart is not a bad phone, considering its specs, but it definitely won’t appeal to anyone looking for a flagship. It packs a 1.2 Ghz quad-core CPU, 1GB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage that can be furthermore expanded via a microSD card, and a 1,700 mAh battery. Given the form factor, LG only included a 3.5″ display with a 480×320 resolution, something that in the age of QHD displays looks like ancient technology.

The form factor and the specs suggest that this phone was built with an older audience in mind. After all, seniors are not that picky when it comes to technology. The extra-loud speaker and the emergency alert option also hint at the fact that the device was made for the elderly.

To be frank, I cannot wrap my mind around the name of this flip phone. Why call it Wine Smart, LG? When did smartphones have anything to do with wine? It’s not even a reference to the device’s color, as neither red, nor purple are to be seen. If anything, the name sounds more like an advice, but even so, it has nothing to do with smartphones. On the other hand, wine makes people a lot more communicative, and phones represent a means of communication, so there may lie the key to this flip phone’s name.

Wine Smart will only be available in South Korea, and it’s probably for the best that it’s not getting a global launch. Maybe older people should get a taste of the latest technology, as well!

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