10 top technology trends for 2015

Computing everywhere

As mobile devices continue to proliferate, Research agency Gartner  predicts an increased emphasis on serving the needs of the mobile user in diverse contexts and environments, as opposed to focusing on devices alone.

According to David Cearley of Gartner, as phones and wearable devices become part of an expanded computing environment, it's the overall environment that will need to adapt to the requirements of the mobile user. This will create significant management challenges for IT organizations as they lose control of user endpoint devices. It will also require increased attention to user experience design.

The internet of things
The internet of things

The combination of data streams and services created by digitizing everything creates four basic usage models ? manage, monetize, operate and extend. These four basic models can be applied to any of the four "internets."

Enterprises should not limit themselves to thinking that only the Internet of Things (IoT) (assets and machines) has the potential to leverage these four models. For example, the pay-per-use model can be applied to assets (such as industrial equipment), services (such as pay-as-you-drive insurance), people (such as movers), places (such as parking spots) and systems (such as cloud services). Enterprises from all industries can leverage these four models.

3D printing

Worldwide shipments of 3D printers are expected to grow 98% in 2015, followed by a doubling of unit shipments in 2016.

New industrial, biomedical and consumer applications will continue to demonstrate that 3D printing is a real, viable and cost-effective means to reduce costs through improved designs, streamlined prototyping and short-run manufacturing.

Advanced, pervasive and invisible analytics

Analytics will take center stage as the volume of data generated by embedded systems increases and vast pools of structured and unstructured data inside and outside the enterprise are analyzed.

Organizations will have to find ways to manage how best to filter the huge amounts of data coming from the IoT, social media and wearable devices, and then deliver this information to the right person, at the right time. Big data remains an important enabler for this trend.

Context-rich systems

Ubiquitous embedded intelligence combined with pervasive analytics will drive the development of systems that are alert to their surroundings.

Context-aware security is an early application of this new capability, but others will emerge. By understanding the context of a user request, applications can not only adjust their security response but also adjust how information is delivered to the user.

Smart machines

Deep analytics applied to an understanding of context provide the preconditions for a world of smart machines. This foundation combines with advanced algorithms that allow systems to understand their environment, learn for themselves, and act autonomously.

Prototype autonomous vehicles, advanced robots, virtual personal assistants and smart advisors already exist and will evolve rapidly, ushering in a new age of machine helpers. The smart machine era will be the most disruptive in the history of IT.

Cloud computing

The convergence of cloud and mobile computing will continue to promote the growth of centrally coordinated applications that can be delivered to any device.

In the near term, the focus for cloud/client will be on synchronizing content and application state across multiple devices and addressing application portability across devices. In the future, games and enterprise applications alike will use multiple screens and exploit wearables and other devices to deliver an enhanced experience.

Software-defined applications and infrastructure

Software-defined networking, storage, data centers and security are maturing. Cloud services are software-configurable through API calls, and applications, too, increasingly have rich APIs to access their function and content programmatically.

To deal with the rapidly changing demands of digital business and scale systems up ? or down ? rapidly, computing has to move away from static to dynamic models

Web-scale IT

Web-scale IT is a pattern of global-class computing that delivers the capabilities of large cloud service providers within an enterprise IT setting.

The first step toward the Web-scale IT future for many organizations should be DevOps ? bringing development and operations together in a coordinated way to drive rapid, continuous incremental development of applications and services.

Risk-based security and self-protection

Organizations will increasingly recognize that it is not possible to provide a 100% secured environment.

Security-aware application design, dynamic and static application security testing, and runtime application self-protection combined with active context-aware and adaptive access controls are all needed in today's dangerous digital world.

This will lead to new models of building security directly into applications. Perimeters and firewalls are no longer enough; every app needs to be self-aware and self-protecting.

10 tips to protect your Android device

1:

          Android is the most popular mobile platform in India as well as the world. One of the major reasons for its popularity is the flexibility it offers in terms of customization and the abundance of third-party apps.

         Apps can even be side-loaded, bypassing Google’s Play Store app marketplace. However, all this also makes Android vulnerable to security threats and malware. Moreover, with our increasing reliance on smart phones and tablets, we’re storing more private data than ever before, leaving us more vulnerable to data thefts.

      So how do you protect yourself from losing precious personal and work data accessed via Android devices? Here are 10 tips to help you secure your Android gadgets:

2.Use a screen lock

        The most basic security measure for every Android device, a screen lock allows you to guard the device by using a pattern, PIN or password.

         The lock can be activated through the Android device’s Security Settings. Following the activation of the lock, the device can be set to lock automatically after a specific time period or by pressing the Power key.

3. Encrypt your device

         Android allows you to encrypt all the data on your device. You’ll need to key in a password or PIN each time the device is turned on to decrypt all the data.

         If the phone gets into the wrong hands, there’s no way to access the data without a password or PIN if the device is restarted. This way, your sensitive data stays safe though the device becomes a little slow.

      It can be activated through the Android device’s Security Settings.

4. Using personal device for work? Talk to IT

        According to security solutions firm ESET, around 30-40% of devices in workplaces are vulnerable to threats unless users are educated about risks.

      If you plan to use your personal device for work, check with your workplace’s IT team before configuring it to access and store work related data.

5.Activate Google’s Android Device Manager

       Even if you lose your device, the Android Device Manager feature allows you to track a (connected) device on Google Maps.

       It also enables you to ring the device at full volume for five minutes and even erase all the data.

       To verify if it's enabled, you can go to the Settings menu on your device and tap on Security. It can be enabled through the Device Administrators setting under Security Settings.

6. Don’t store sensitive data on SD card

   Make sure you don’t store sensitive information such as copies of credit cards and personal IDs on external storage cards since it is easy to remove them and access the data stored.

 If you need to store important information, keep it on internal storage.

7. Don’t install apps from unknown sources

          While apps on the Google Play Store are not curated as diligently as Apple’s App Store, it is still the safest place to download and install apps on Android platform.Installation files (APKs) sourced from third-party sites should be dealt with caution as they might hide malware or spyware.

8.Don’t root your phone

By rooting your phone, you can install custom Android ROMs and even some incompatible apps.

However, apps with root access get unhindered access to your device’s file-system, exposing it to more damage in case a malicious app is installed. It also voids your phone’s warranty.

9.Keep your device software up to date

     Google releases software updates that also include several security patches.

      Check for software updates using the device Settings, where you’ll find a System Updates option in the About Device menu.

10.Sign out or use incognito mode while browsing

Remember to sign out of Chrome while browsing the web on an Android device or use incognito mode, especially if you share devices and PCs. Chrome records your search and browsing history and syncs it across all devices on which you’ve signed-in.

       

Project Leviathan

       

An ambitious group of students , in Canada ,is building a human-powered water vehicle that they hope will set a new world speed record.

          With project Leviathan, as the vehicle is known, the students will attempt to reach a blistering pace of 23 miles per hour (37 km/h), breaking the current speed record of 21 mph (34 kph) that was set by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, in 1991.

       The vehicle itself has to be perfected for both aerodynamic and hydrodynamic performance.

        The vehicle is powered completely by human pedalling, which drives a propeller in the water. The twin-hulled craft resembles a catamaran, but underneath each hull is a submerged wing, or hydrofoil, like those found on some racing boats.

        Once we hit that sweet spot [of] 5 to 8 meters per second (11 mph), it will start to come out of the water onto the hydrofoils. An onboard computer controls the front hydrofoils to keep the boat stable, a feature that previous human-powered watercraft lacked. The pilot can also change the angle of the propeller blades to optimize them for different speeds.

Construction of the speedy vehicle is not yet complete , but it should be complete fast.

The Internet in 2025

           

          Friends.....What if the Internet were 100 times faster than it is today? How would this super-high-speed connectivity affect the economy, health care and education ?

       The experts generally believe that, if technological change advances as they expect, it will bring about the types of connectivity humans have been dreaming about for quite some time.

      The specific types of applications that might be possible with a faster Internet are really anyone's guess??

      The  benefit from more bandwidth is augmented reality. Internet experts are enthusiastic about the possibility of a future filled with avatars, interactive gaming and holograms.

        Humans and machines will also be brought closer together by the so-called Internet of Things, some experts predicted. In a world with faster Internet, smart devices won't be trendy or superfluous; they'll be the norm, according to Hal Varian, chief economist at Google.

              Similar advancements might be made in the field of education, according to some of the survey respondents. Apps that track and aid in every learning ability or disability are likely in the future, wrote Breanne Thomlison, founder of BTx2 Communications, a marketing and strategies firm. In fact, the whole system of education in the United States, and elsewhere in the world, will likely have to change to keep up with these fast-paced technological advancements, some experts said.

       "Time in school will need to radically change, since the talking-head, expert teacher is less and less valuable," wrote Ed Lyell, a professor of business and economics at Adams State University in Alamosa, Colorado. "The role of teacher-coach will be even more important yet require a different emotional and intellectual skill set than that which most educators now possess."

       The Pew Research Center report also noted several other possible trends, such as the belief that superfast Internet service in some parts of the world, but not others, could generate a new digital divide.

New Solar Battery

          A new kind of solar cell could store electrical energy without any help from traditional batteries, according to a new study.

         

           Researchers at Ohio State University, in Columbus, have developed what they're calling the world's first solar battery — a hybrid device that combines the energy-capturing abilities of a solar cell with the energy-storing capabilities of a battery.

         

          The new cell could lower the cost of harvesting renewable energy from the sun by as much as 25 percent, according to the researchers.

      

•       The key to the device's success is a mesh solar panel that allows both sunlight and air to enter the cell. This porous material represents a departure from the solid semiconductor materials typically used to make solar cells. Allowing both light and oxygen into the cell enables the chemical reactions that typically occur inside a battery to occur within the solar cell itself.

      A loss of electricity naturally occurs within any solar cell when the electrons released by the cell's semiconductor materials travel outside the cell and into a battery. Only about 80 percent of the electrons produced by solar cells successfully complete this journey. But the new solar cell is designed to ensure that 100 percent of the electrons captured find their way into a battery, the researchers said.

       

       This high efficiency is possible because the conversion of sunlight to electric current isn't happening inside the solar cell before being transferred to the battery. Since the battery is located inside the cell, electrons are not able to escape, the researchers said.

       

       The hybrid solar cell-battery is made up of three electrodes, or materials that conduct electricity. The first electrode is the mesh solar panel (which is really a collection of solar cells), the second electrode is made of a thin sheet of porous carbon and the third electrode is a sheet of lithium metal. Between these three electrodes is an electrolyte that can shuttle charges back and forth.

         

       When the battery is in use — a phase known as "discharge" — the lithium metal and porous carbon electrodes are connected to an external circuit. Lithium ions can then travel to the carbon electrode and form lithium peroxide. This chemical process drives an external electrical current.

     

       To recharge the solar battery, light hits the mesh panel and generates electron-hole pairs, which can carry an electrical charge. One of the most important features of the device is that it uses added molecules, known as redox shuttle additives, to transfer these charges from the mesh solar panel to the lithium electrode, where they cause the lithium peroxide to decompose into oxygen and lithium ions.

       

      The oxygen is released out of the cell, but the lithium ions, as well as electrical charges, are stored inside the battery in the lithium electrode.

       

     “Basically, it's a breathing battery,”. “It breathes in air when it discharges, and breathes out when it charges.”

       

SMART BATTERY

            Scientists in Stanford University have developed a "smart" lithium-ion battery that gives ample warning before it overheats and bursts into flames. The battery is designed for conventional lithium-ion batteries now used in billions of cellphones, laptops and other electronic devices, as well as a growing number of cars and airplanes.

            Lithium-ion batteries can destroy devices when they overheat, and while these cases rarely occur, they still pose a huge problem. In addition to smartphones, this issue affects laptops, e-readers, cars, planes and other machines powered by a lithium ion battery. Boeing grounded a 787 fleet in 2013 after the lithium-ion batteries on the plane caught fire.

                                      

          These batteries come with a lithium oxide cathode and a graphite anode, which are separated by a thin, porous polymer sheet designed to let ions move between the two electrodes, Science Now reported. Overheating and catching fire can occur when a lithium-ion cell overcharges, leading to tiny chains of lithium called "dendrites" coming out of the anode and piercing through the polymer separator and touching the cathode. This can lead to an electrical current moving through the dendrites to the cathode to short-circuit the cell.

         The research team's "smart" separator consists of a 50-nanometer thin layer of copper placed between two polymer sheets. The copper layer is connected to a third electrode in order to measure voltage. The voltage between the anode and the copper layer goes down to zero when the dendrites get to the separator. This alerts smartphone users that they should change their battery while it is still working safely, which gives them a chance to avoid the battery exploding

         Manufacturing defects, such as particles of metal and dust, can pierce the separator and trigger shorting, as Sony discovered in 2006. Shorting can also occur if the battery is charged too fast or when the temperature is too low — a phenomenon known as overcharge.

         The copper layer acted like a sensor that allows you to measure the voltage difference between the anode and the separator. When the dendrites grow long enough to reach the copper coating, the voltage drops to zero. That lets you know that the dendrites have grown halfway across the battery. It's a warning that the battery should be removed before the dendrites reach the cathode and cause a short circuit.

          You might get a message on your phone telling you that the voltage has dropped to zero, and the battery needs to be replaced and the early-warning technology can also be used in zinc, aluminum and other metal batteries. "It will work in any battery that would require you to detect a short before it explodes.

NEW LAUNCHES OF APPLE

          Apple launched a new version of its iMac desktop computer in California, with a 27inch retina display. It will go on sale today, starting at $2,499.

          The new iMac brings the high resolution retina display – first introduced on the iPhone and iPad, then the MacBook Pro in 2012 – to the desktop.

        The main feature of desktop is that the “retina 5K” display will have a native resolution of 5120x2880 pixels, leading to a 14.7 megapixel display.That boosts the resolution and pixel density, but in keeping with Apple’s approach to mobile devices, it uses it to make text, icons and pictures sharper and easier to read, rather than simply making everything much smaller and adding more screen real estate.

              The new iMac maintains the slim all-aluminiumdesign, introduced in 2011 along with Apple’s Thunderbolt port for fast external connections, while the internals are upgraded with a 3.5Ghz quad-core Intel i7 and an AMD Radeon R9 M290X graphics card.

        Since 1998 the iMac has seen several revisions, moving to an articulated flat screen in 2002 and then to the basis for the current aluminium bodies in 2004. Apple continued to update the iMac internally, switching to Intel processors from IBM Power PCs.

          The iMac has steadily replaced the Mac Pro as the machine used by most desktop Mac users, including publishers and artists, with only video producers clinging to the more expensive, but more powerful Mac Pro.        

                 

         

         On December 27, 2012, the US Patent & Trademark Office published two display related patent applications from Apple. The first patent generally relates to liquid crystal displays (LCDs), and, more specifically, to a coated chassis for an LCD. According to Apple, the chassis could be made from a non-conductive material and be operable to support displays found on the iPhone, iPad, MacBook and even the touchpad on MacBooks. The coating could advantageously prevent or reduce noise in the device's antenna usually caused by the LCD. Because the conductive material adds little or no bulk to the device, it's able to maintain a compact size. 

     The second patent relates to LCDs that include a panel having an array of metal oxide TFTs, which may be configured to reduce visual artifacts by providing reduced RC loading and parasitic capacitance, thus improving overall image quality. In one embodiment, the display may be a high-resolution LCD display having more pixels per inch, such as a Retina Display.