Hodentek Mobile

In my previous post here I ranted on the Nokia Lumia Icon I bought from Verizon. http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2014/07/windows-phone-81-is-out-but-where-can.html In this post I will describe what else has happened since. I have not been able to find anything about Nokia Lumia Icon alias Nokia Lumia 929. I have posed the question to the Windows Phone Central. When I bough the Nokia Icon phone from Verizon the OS version was 8.0.10521.155 Then I installed Windows 8.1 Preview for developers and this version was 8.10.12397.895 There has been other updates. The following were the updates I agreed to install on the same day. 8.10.14147.180;  8.10.12400.899; and 8.10.14157.200 The update 8.10.14147 appears the latest according to: http://www.wpcentral.com/new-update-windows-phone-81-update-1-rolling-out-developer-preview-users Is it? I have 8.10.14157.200. The last updates took quite a bit of time that included updating some 20 files. This is OK. I am ...

The price ($33 or under Rs 2000) is low enough to get customers in droves considering that India is the fastest growing market for smartphones. Mozilla OS can easily benefit and get a significant market share and it is already made its mark in over 15 countries. Cloud FX sartphone just costs Rs 1999 and at that price quite a significant numbers can afford. Facebook and Twitter makes it all the more attractive. Presently English, Tamil and Hindi are supported and I am sure more will be supported in due course. Cloud FX phone is manufactured by Intex Technologies, India(LTD) and the phone is sold through SnapDeal.com. Here are other phones you can buy: http://www.snapdeal.com/product/intex-cloud-fx/1356760619#bcrumbSearch:cloud%20fx Feature details from the above site:  Firefox OS  3.5 Inch Capacitive Display  Dual SIM  1GHz CPU  2MP Camera  1250 mAh Battery  Facebook and Twitter  Pre loaded Games  Multiple Languages(English,Hindi...

In a previous post the Intel XDK was described with some details in the context of developing cross-platform apps for smartphones and tablets. The installation of Intel XDK was also described. Herein the details of type of projects that you can create are described. There are several options available for creating projects with Intel XDK. Double click the icon or click the XDK icon on the taskbar to open the Welcome to the Intel XDK Pane as shown. Click on the Visit the Intel XDK Introduction and the Intel XDK Documentation gets  displayed. This is quite a comprehensive documentation that discusses all aspects of Intel XDK including developing cross-platform HTML5 based apps for smart phones and tablets; deploying to devices; monetization etc. In the left hand side there are different ways to work with projects. You could create a blank project but then you do not get many of the design editors you find in others such as Start with App Designer etc. If you ...

There are lots and lots of Apps. In fact there are over a couple of million Apps including all of the major brands, Apple, Google, Blackberry, Microsoft with Apple at the top and Microsoft in the bottom. But this is a growing market. The variety is truly bewildering, different size devices; different operating systems(OS); different programming languages;  and different orientations. Windows Phone Apps is for example based on Microsoft's Window 7, 8, 8.1 OSs using .NET. With Windows OS and Visual Studio one can build Apps for all of Microsoft devices covering Phone, Tablet and Desktop. However Microsoft Windows Apps sans Html5/CSS/Javascript is OS specific. Even for apps built with Html5/CSS/Javascript the WinJS file is required (or recommended) in most cases. Apple Apps can be used on both iPad and iPhone as long as certain files specific to each device profile is available, in general iPhone apps can be used on iPad but not the other way. However the so called iOS Universal ...

Automobiles are changing in many different ways. All electric automobiles will enter main stream although right now they are still in their infancy. Hybrids like Toyota Prius will fill up the transitional period before going all electric like TESLA, Nissan Leaf, Mahindra Reva and others being developed in many parts of the world. Of course they too will have a short run as hydrogen/Oxygen based fuel cells will surely takeover to address the pressing issue of pollution. Actually car using hydrogen/oxygen fuel cells they are available already in Japan or will be available soon. http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2014/07/toyota-fchv-concept-vehicle.html The other areas where there is a lot of interest are driverless cars and cars equipped with better navigational features.  Head Up Display, displaying drive parameters like speed; traffic conditions, turn-by-turn driving directions, maps, and other vital navigational information right in front of the driver without the driver taki...

Microsoft was one of the earliest companies that wanted to bring a smart watch to the market, but the timing was not good. Samsung came out with a smartwatch not too long ago. Now Microsoft is going again at it and so are Google and Apple. Microsoft's smartwatch running Windows features: Fitness tracker, music player and messaging device Detachable watch face gets charged from a dock. Microsoft filed a patent and the watch looks like this, http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/06/technology/innovation/microsoft-smartwatch/index.html Microsoft's Watch Concept looks similar to Moto360 but probably with lot more stuff if you go by the Watch Concept. Watch the video on this page: http://microsoft-news.com/check-out-this-awesome-microsoft-smartwatch-concept - running-windows/ Samsung's Galaxy Gear smartwatch does a lot of cool things but take a look at this review: http://money.cnn.com/2013/10/03/technology/innovation/galaxy-gear/?iid=EL Items that received bad reviews...

There is a price war, compare apples with 'Chinese Apples'. Xiaomi is a challenge to smart phone makers from Apple to Samsung . They are not only way-off cheap but as good and in some cases better than the available ones. Xiaomi has announced the next version, Xiaomi Mi4 today in China. In India Xiaomi Mi3 started selling in July and they were sold out in India within moments they started selling, it appears from all accounts. More units are on the way. Read here: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Xiaomi-Will-Sell-15-000-Xiaomi-Mi3-Units-in-India-on-August-5-453227.shtml Here is a picture of its availability in India from the above site: That was Mi3 unit and Xiaomi has recently announced the Mi4 which is available in China and it has already earned the nick name, 'Apple of China'. The high end Xiaomi Mi4 touted as the fastest smart phone uses the 2.5 GHz Snapdragon 801 processor; a 3080 mAhs battery; 3GB Ram; 5 inch touch screen; full HD display resoluti...