Archive for the ‘Microsoft’ Category

Newest Kinect hack: a grocery cart that loyally follows disabled shoppers (video)

Microsoft’s Kinect is the gift that keeps on giving for hackers, spawning everything from glasses-free teleconferencing to Tesla coil manipulation to uh, well, Android dance parties. But Luis de Matos’s wi-Go project is one of the most socially conscious we’ve seen: it adds a laptop and (despite its name) a Kinect to a shopping cart, enabling the cart to follow a wheelchair user. Improving on the B.O.S.S. bot we saw a half-decade ago, the wi-Go could allow anyone — including the disabled or elderly — to shop independently, regardless of physical capability. De Matos doesn’t offer many technical details, but see the video above for a before-and-after demonstration.

Newest Kinect hack: a grocery cart that loyally follows disabled shoppers (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 05 Jun 2011 02:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Kinect lets you play poker standing up

In this week’s installment of 101 ways to use your Kinect we have the motion gaming controller from Microsoft giving us the ability to play poker. The folks over at Poker Listings made use of the open-source Kinect software available out there, and with the use of some macros, configured the Kinect to recognize the gestures to play online poker. Folding, checking, placing a bet, and even raising can all be done with simple hand motions.

While admittedly it looks silly playing poker standing up, waving your hands like a mad man, it does make the game a lot healthier. After all, instead of sitting in front of the computer and clicking mouse buttons, you’re standing and actually using energy waving your arms all over the place. Last time I checked, it burns a lot more calories than clicking a mouse. If you’re keen on finding out how to set up your own Kinect for poker playing head over to Poker Listings’ website. Hit the break for a video demonstration of how it works:

Kinect lets you play poker standing up, By Ubergizmo. Top Stories : LG Optimus 2X Review, EVO 4G Review,

Unofficial Windows Phone 7 updater removed

Remember the Windows Phone 7 updater by Team ChevronWP7 that allowed you to update your WP7 phone regardless of what model it may be and the warning Microsoft issued about it possibly putting your phones into an unserviceable state? There were disputes over the whole issue, with some folks saying that they’ve received notifications to official updates even after updating their phone unofficially. Well it looks like it does’nt matter anymore. Regardless of whether it negatively affects your WP7 device or not, the ChevronWP7 updater has been pulled off the internet because Microsoft told the developer that the tool was “breaking phones.” So there might be a possibility that users who updated their phones with the unofficial updater could be stuck on NoDo forever. The developer is working on how to rectify the solution, but until then it looks like a system restore of the phone to its original state should do the trick, which not many users are willing to do for now. I guess we’ll have to wait for the next WP7 Update to arrive first. Read the blog post about the updater being removed.

Unofficial Windows Phone 7 updater removed, By Ubergizmo. Top Stories : Atrix Review, Motorola Xoom Review,

Microsoft lodges antitrust complaint against Google with European Commission, ignores irony

So Microsoft doesn’t like anticompetitive behavior, huh? Since when? Brad Smith, General Counsel for the Redmond rabblerousers, has posted a lengthy blog post outlining Microsoft’s concerns with “a pattern of actions that Google has taken to entrench its dominance” in online search and ads, which he claims is detrimental to European consumers. Funnily enough, half the post is about Google’s legal issues in the US, but we’ll set that aside for now. What this boils down to is that Microsoft is finally taking the gloves off — Google accused it of pushing other companies to do its dirty work — and is now adding its name to the list of objectors to Mountain View’s stranglehold on search in Europe. The European Commission is already taking a regulatory looksee at Google’s tactics, so this isn’t sparking off a new investigation, but it does add the glamor of two big names locking legal horns yet again. Hit the source link for Brad’s exposition of Google’s villainous wrongdoings.

Microsoft lodges antitrust complaint against Google with European Commission, ignores irony originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 31 Mar 2011 03:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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No Angry Birds for WP7 Yet, Even if Microsoft Thought So [Angry Birds]

They’ve now removed the Angry Birds icon and passed it off as a mistake, but for a while yesterday Microsoft must’ve been quaking at the thought of Rovio dispatching the Angry Birds flock their way. More »

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