Kinect for Windows

Microsoft's Xbox 360 accessory Kinect comes to Windows PC's.

Kinect is an array of sensors which allow you to interact with technology in a completely new and intuitive way. There is no ergonomically designed controller... there is only you! Kinect works by using a variety of cameras, both visual and infrared to detect your position in 3D. The software can identify and track your joints/skeleton to allow for a 'virtual' you to carry out movements in an Xbox 360 game. Kinect is also a microphone and can accept data input as spoken word.

In May 2012 version 1.5 will bring greater power to the Kinect software. This will enable skeletal tracking of seated people and great language support, as reported by Engadget. The update will also include "Kinect Studio" to give developers more tools to develop applications for use with the kinect sensor.

Microsoft have removed the limitation of using the Kinect sensor on an Xbox 360 games console and allowing it's use for Windows PC's. This technology is really powerful when applied to all sorts of applications. Microsoft highlight on their webpage, Kinect for Windows Features, applications such as in stroke patients recovery, interacting with presentations in schools and interacting with computers in "minority report" stlye.

For more information see Microsofts Kinect for Windows page.

Do you use Kinect for Windows? We would love to hear from you about your experiences. Feel free to comment below or contact Web Warp Blog using Facebook or Twitter.

Emoticons on iOS: Emoji Keyboard

Everyone uses the classic smiley face :-) or winking ;-) but on the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad you could be showing your emotions in a lot more detail! These faces look great on the retina display too.

To enable the Emoji keyboard follow these quick and simple instructions below!

Facebook chat goes cross platform

You don't have to log in to www.facebook.com to instant message your Facebook friends anymore. Facebook are positioning themselves as a one stop shop for messagaging by making their system cross-platform and compatible with all types of devices and systems. Facebook chat nows allows access through several channels including:

• Messenger app for iOS, Android, Blackberry
• The latest beta version of the Skype desktop client
• Messenger for Windows
• iChat or Messages beta chat client's on a Mac
• Pidgin chat client
• Adium chat client

To set up Facebook chat to work on third apps apps using Jabber see the instructions on Facebooks page: Facebook Chat Set Up

Windows 8 Consumer Preview

Microsoft have released Windows 8 Consumer Preview for developers, enthusiasts and curious consumers to try. The next version of Windows build's on both the popular and stable Windows 7 and the Windows 8 Developer Preview released a couple on months ago.

The differences from Windows 7 to Windows 8 are around a new user interface called Metro. The Metro display replaces the traditional "start" menu. Many apps are then optimised for the Metro UI which brings larger buttons and more intuitive menu options to reduce clutter. This is far better for touch operated devices such as touch screen laptops and tablet devices. The classic desktop and windows explorer UI are still there for desktop users.

Is this release of Windows trying to be all things to all devices? Perhaps Android will be a better OS for tablets as it's optimised to touch screen operation from day one. To decide yourself you can download the developer preview to run on and old machine, or as a virtual machine.

Android Market becomes Google Play

Google have rebranded the Android Market as Google Play. The Android Market is similar to Apple's App Store and is a one stop shop on your Android powered mobile device to download applications such as games, utilities, news, weather, etc.

Google's rebrand brings the Android Market place into a larger store for Android powered devices. Google Play brings the addition of music, books and movies to Android powered smart phones and tablets. This puts Google Play firmly in the realms of competing with Apple's iTunes Store and iBooks store.

To upgrade to Google Play in your Android device simply visit the Android Market where you will be requested to accept the Terms and Conditions associated with Google Play. A cool feature of Google Play is the ability to purchase apps on a desktop and have the new app wirelessly pushed to your Android mobile device. This is much like Apple's iTunes in the Cloud feature of iCloud, but Google's requires no setting up to speak of.

Let is know what you think of Google Play by commenting below.

3rd Generation iPad Announced

As per the rumours the Apple event earlier revealed their latest iPad to the world.

This 3rd generation iPad features an incredible screen, a retina display. This was widely predicted as the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 4S both currently include retina displays. It should be noted that it is a huge achievement to create s retina display on the scale of the iPad. It has 4 times as many pixels as the iPad 2 screen, which means it has a larger than number of pixels than a 1080p HD TV! (Speaking of TV, there is a new Apple TV, subject of a further blog post).

This extra screen needs some extra power from the graphics processor. So Apple have created the A5X chip to the the new iPad. It includes a quadcore GPU.

Also predicted prior to the event, the new iPad will connect to new 4G LTE networks for much faster connections than 3G.

The storage capacities, form factor (9.7" screen) and colour options, remain the same. But the camera improves from a 0.3 MP camera to 5.0 MP camera including the advanced optics developed for the iPhone 4S. This is a huge step forwards and makes the iPad a handy camera to have, instead of a casual snapper. The camera records 1080p HD video too.

To compliment the upgraded camera there are new apps, including iPhone and an update to iMovie. These all run on an update to iOS 5 called iOS 5.1.