Lenovo Yoga Book review: Innovative tablet/laptop hybrid with combined virtual keyboard and digitizer

Pros

Excellent build

Thin and light

Smart mix of touch keyboard and pen input

Good battery life

Available running Windows or Android

Cons

Accurate keyboarding requires practice

Underpowered as a Windows 10 device

Short on storage and expansion ports

Lenovo has a history of taking a sideways look at regular products and bringing new ideas into the market. Take the Yoga Tab 3 Pro with its built-in projector for example.

The new Yoga Book takes innovation a step further. It's a 10.1-inch tablet-sized device that opens up like a mini laptop. But where you might expect to see a physical keyboard there's a blank slab that caters for touch-based keyboarding and stylus input. Lenovo has produced versions of the Yoga Book for both Windows (£549.99 inc. VAT/$549) and Android (price TBC). I was sent a Windows unit to review.

Lenovo says the Yoga Book is a redefinition of the tablet, in which handwritten and typed input are seen as equally important and are equally catered for in hardware. To achieve this, Lenovo has implemented a digital keyboard and a Wacom-powered digitizing pad which share the same user area, which Lenovo calls the Create Pad.

Lenovo's Atom x5-powered Yoga Book offers a 10.1-inch touchscreen, a 360-degree hinge, a combined virtual keyboard/digitizer and a stylus.

Image: Lenovo

Both Android and Windows versions of the Yoga Book look the same and have the same specifications. While Lenovo is clear that the Yoga Book is a tablet and not a laptop replacement, it's inevitable that the form factor and Windows 10 option will appeal to those seeking an ultraportable laptop.

If you're among them, you'll need to think carefully about the specifications, which are reasonable for a tablet, but underpowered for a laptop.

The Lenovo Yoga Book runs on an Intel Atom x5-Z8550 processor supported by 4GB of RAM, which will restrict it to low-level workloads. Knocking out a few documents and doing some web browsing should be fine, but don't expect this device to cope well with multiple browser tabs or handle compute/graphics-heavy tasks.

Top ZDNET Reviews

The 64GB of internal storage might be a stretch for laptop users looking for a lightweight alternative to their current device, particularly as the available capacity was just 39.2GB on my review sample thanks to the pre-installed copy of Windows 10 Pro.

The 9.6mm-thick Yoga Book has Micro-USB and Micro-HDMI ports, a 3.5mm audio jack and a MicroSD card slot.

Image: Lenovo

Ports and connectors are on the sparse side for traditional laptop users too. There's just a single Micro-USB port for charging and connecting external kit, plus a Micro-HDMI connector for an external monitor or projector. The USB connector is not Type-C, which some might see as an oversight on such a forward-looking device. Still, it does mean that legacy external storage devices can be used -- I had no trouble working to and from a portable hard drive, for example. There's also a MicroSD card slot to expand storage capacity plus a headset jack, and that's your lot.

The design and build quality of the Yoga Book are both impressive. The magnesium alloy chassis is reasonably solid, although it's possible to flex both sections, the lid being slightly more bendable than the base.

The Yoga Book's 400-nit 10.1-inch IPS screen delivers excellent image quality at 244ppi (1,920 x 1,200 pixels).

Image: Lenovo

Extremely thin and light at 256.6mm wide by 170.8mm deep by 9.6mm thick (10.1" x 6.72" x 0.38"), the Yoga Book drops into the pocket of a bag very neatly. Weighing just 690g (1.52lbs), it's no problem to carry around from place to place.

There is an air of the ThinkPad Carbon X1 about the general look and feel of the Yoga Book, with a smattering of Lenovo Yoga 900 thanks to its 360-degree hinge. This is a feat of engineering, as it has been redesigned for the Yoga Book into a smaller, three-axis version that's more compact than previous versions.

A 'watchband'-style 360-degree hinge supports multiple usage modes.

Images: Lenovo

The hinge rotates very smoothly and holds the screen firmly at whatever angle is most convenient. I had none of the qualms I usually have with fully rotating laptops about damaging the keyboard when holding the device with the screen facing outwards, because there isn't a keyboard to damage. The 690g weight does mean that some may find extended one-handed use challenging, but the hinge means it's easy to set the device down at a good viewing angle if two hands aren't available.

The 10.1-inch IPS touchscreen has a resolution of 1,920 by 1,200 pixels (244ppi) and delivers a sharp, bright picture with good viewing angles. We found it perfectly adequate for web browsing and video viewing.

The Create Pad, which occupies the space where you'd usually expect to see a physical keyboard, is much more interesting. This is the 'business end' of the Yoga Book -- the element that will make or break it as a device.

The Create Pad is flat, smooth and dark when the Yoga Book is opened up, with just a very pale impression of a keyboard visible. Power up and this illuminates to depict a standard keyboard. The actual configuration varies depending on whether the Yoga Book is running Windows 10 or Android. My Windows 10 Yoga Book offered the usual range of QWERTY keys, cursor keys, Fn keys and a touchpad with mouse button strips to its left and right.

The virtual keyboard can deliver both haptic and audio feedback as you type.

Image: Lenovo

The keyboard can deliver haptic feedback and audio touch tones as it is typed on. Both are easily toggled in system settings (on both the Windows and Android versions of the Yoga Book). Even having just one of these switched on is noisy and will be unacceptable in quiet offices or other workspaces. Yet I found having one or other turned on vital to ensure typing accuracy.

Working without any feedback slowed my typing pace to around two-thirds of its usual speed in order to approach 100 percent accuracy. Possibly with a longer acclimatisation period I might get up to full-speed typing without feedback, but it's a bit concerning that what's usually second nature required a fair bit of adjustment. I'm sure some people will adjust more quickly to using a digital keyboard all the time, but equally some will find it trickier than I did.

The pressure-sensitive (2,048 levels) Real Pen gives creative type plenty of scope to express themsleves.

Image: Lenovo

Given the keyboarding issues, a lot rests on the added value provided by pen support. A long press on a pen icon sitting above the keyboard on the Create Pad disables the keyboard and returns it to a smooth, black slab. Now the provided stylus can be used, interfacing with a Wacom digitizing pad that sits under the keyboard layer. This supports 2,048 levels of pressure sensitivity.

The stylus worked flawlessly, with drawn and written input appearing on screen in real time. The Wacom layer does a great job of ignoring anything that's not the pen, be it a wrist or a finger that's attempting to write something. That's good news, and finger-input is easily made direct to the screen.

You can write with real ink on real paper using optional stylus nibs and the Book Pad, generating a digital copy the same time.

Image: Lenovo

Lenovo provides a range of replacement tips for the stylus, and you can also purchase ink nibs if you want to keep a written record as well as a digitized one. Lenovo provides a small paper-holder called the Book Pad, which affixes to the Create Pad by magnets and can be refilled with any paper. Draw or write onto the paper, and the Yoga Book captures the input digitally while a paper copy is also produced. You can't close the Yoga Book with the Book Pad in place, and over-energetic attempts to do so might end up damaging the device.

There is a plus in that the stylus doesn't need charging, but a minus in that there's no housing for it on the Yoga Book itself. To be fair, it's way too thick to expect a housing to be provided, but still, that means anyone wanting to use it will need to ensure it is kept handy. Sadly absent from the gamut of stylus-friendly services onboard the Yoga Book is conversion of handwritten input to editable text.

Lenovo has given the Yoga Book an 8,500mAh battery, which delivers a claimed 13 hours for the Windows model and 15 hours for the Android model. After a typical morning's use testing the former, the battery went from a full charge to 77 percent, at which point the device informed me there were 7 hours 32 minutes remaining, so at least you should get a full day's work from it on battery power.

Conclusions

Lenovo's ambition with the Yoga Book is impressive. It certainly is a reinvention of the tablet format, and the idea of combining a virtual keyboard and a drawing surface is really interesting. The hardware design is superb, and battery life is good too.

That said, I'm not yet convinced that the digital keyboard is as good as physical alternatives, which will be a significant issue for some. I'll certainly need to use the Yoga Book for a longer period to see how well I adjust to the keyboard. That said, this is definitely an idea with great potential, and if Lenovo has a line of Yoga Book devices in the pipeline, I'm keen to see how this innovative idea progresses.

Read more reviews

Source: Lenovo Yoga Book review: Innovative tablet/laptop hybrid with combined virtual keyboard and digitizer

New MacBooks mark Apple's return to high-end laptops in age of the tablet

Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, looks on as guests inspect a new MacBook Pro. Photograph: Tony Avelar/EPA

Apple released its latest laptops on Thursday, a new range of computers to replace the ageing range of Retina MacBook Pros. They are thinner and lighter than their predecessors, with a new touch bar at the top of the keyboard and a fingerprint sensor replacing the power button.

They are £750 more than the machines they replace were – though their price has also gone up. The larger of the two new MacBook Pros, the 15in with Touch Bar, is the first laptop the company has released with a starting price of more than £2,000 for more than a decade: it begins at an eye-watering £2,349, with build-to-order options taking it well north of £4,000.

Apple's former cheapest laptop, the £749 MacBook, is also being retired. With the next cheapest going up in price due to post-Brexit currency swings, there is now only one Apple laptop available for less than £1,000: the £949 13in MacBook Pro, an almost two-year-old computer that is likely to never see another update.

It too has been quietly replaced by another top-end machine, 2015's MacBook: a £1,249 ultralightweight laptop with one port, one headphone jack, a mobile processor and a width of just 13mm.

After a long period as a mid-market manufacturer of some of the most popular laptops on the market, then, Apple is back to making premium computers for the very top end of the market.

"Apple has always had a firm strategy on the high-end of the market with adding a few models towards the mid-range to attract new user groups," says the Gartner analyst Annette Zimmermann. She argues that the new models' touch bar is the perfect feature to reposition the overall range towards the high end, as well as taking on competition from other computer manufacturers that have been building their own touchscreen devices.

The shift has been rapid, and reflects the changing shape of the PC market, Apple's attempts to refashion its line-up of computers and mobile devices for that altered world, and some new competition from an old foe, says Ben Wood from the analysts CCS Insight.

"We shouldn't forget that the last significant update to the MacBook Pro family was 2012," he says. "I think it's a real indication of the broader malaise in the notebook market that Apple was able to get away with selling a four-year-old product as successfully as it has. All they had to compete with was some nasty black plastic from Dell or HP."

But over those four years, the PC market has shrunk consistently. In 2015, 164.4m units were sold, according to TrendForce, while that is expected to fall to 157.4m this year. The cause is obvious: the rise of mobile and tablet computers have allowed users to do more with less, be that replacing a laptop with an iPad, or simply never buying a full computer in the first place and going online with a smartphone.

Apple unveils new MacBook Pro with new Touch Bar feature – video

Different companies have responded in different ways: first, by focusing less on their computer divisions as they chased the market to mobile, but later, by recognising that the smaller size of PC industry allows for greater segmentation of the market. One of the first to really push that to its limits was Apple's old foe Microsoft.

Since 2012, Microsoft has been building its own line of hardware, based on its Surface range of tablets. Where the initial devices were intended to act as iPad competitors, in recent years the company has positioned the latest Surface devices as hybrid tablet/laptops capable of doing the work of either.

This month, it stepped up the competition even further, introducing the Surface Studio, a $3,000 (£2,460) desktop machine intended to provide the perfect working environment for the likes of visual artists who can make the most of its 28in touchscreen.

"We could be entering a new arms race in these premium computing devices," says Wood, "with Microsoft stepping up and giving Apple a run for its money. Apple is currently saying that they see a clear distinction between touch-based products, like the iPad and iPhone, and Macs, where they are going to great lengths to avoid putting touchscreens on the main device. Microsoft has a different strategy."

Apple's motivation to redefine its laptops may also have been driven by a desire to more fully distinguish between its iPads and its MacBook range. Until last week, the most expensive iPad, the 12.9-inch iPad Pro with Wi-Fi and mobile data, was more expensive than Apple's cheapest laptop. That posed a problem for Apple, which struggled to explain what the two devices were for: if a laptop is best for work on the move, who would pay more for an iPad?

Now, it can more consistently structure its messaging: iPads are cheaper, hardier portable devices with all-day battery life, but if your main computer is to be portable, a premium laptop is the way to go.

The downside for British customers is that Apple has picked perhaps the worst possible time to enact the change. Thanks to the collapse in the value of the pound, the company repriced its entire line – even older, unchanged computers – raising the price of some by as much as £500 to account for the new exchange rate. That means customers who were holding off until new computers came out have suddenly found that the older computers are more expensive as well.

Apple said: "Apple suggests product prices internationally on the basis of several factors, including currency exchange rates, local import laws, business practices, taxes, and the cost of doing business. These factors vary from region to region and over time, such that international prices are not always comparable to US suggested retail prices."

Source: New MacBooks mark Apple's return to high-end laptops in age of the tablet

Apple’s iPad Problem Could Overshadow Smartphone Decline

One of the biggest stories to come out of Apple's latest quarterly earnings report was the third consecutive decline in iPhone sales. However, the revenue numbers for the iPad tell a very different story and forecast major tablet problems for Apple in the years ahead.

The report notes a drop of 6% in iPads sold but an overall revenue change of 0%. In essence, they sold less than they did in the previous quarter but ended up making roughly the same in revenue.

This quiet detail of the company's latest earnings report is made possible because the average price of an iPad purchase has risen $26. This trend can very much be attributed to Apple's new positioning on tablets.

Where once they were offering a tablet for everyone, they're now firmly selling themselves at the high-end of the market – pitching themselves to power users and designers who stop just short of buying a full-blown MacBook.

Unfortunately, the longevity of this approach is already coming under scrutiny as a result of falling demand for tablets globally.

The IDC reported that worldwide shipment of tablets declining for the seventh quarter in a row as of August.

The reason for this is relatively straightforward: most users already own one. Telsyte found that two in three Australians have access to a tablet. Although they predict Apple will remain a market leader for the next two years, beyond that, there's a lot of important questions to be asked.

In terms of market share, 21 percent of media tablet sales were Windows-based devices, 35 percent were Android-based, and 44 percent used iOS – with Telsyte expecting sales of Windows-based tablets to exceed Android-based units within the next 18 months.

While Telsyte noted Apple holds an impressive retention rate of 80 per cent, it's difficult to envision how the company can iterate and innovate on their current iPad lineup beyond annual component improvements.

Most of the competition Apple now faces in the high-end of the market comes from 2-in-1 tablets but it's unclear where they could take the iPad without eating into the customer base already catered to by their MacBooks.

Some have speculated that the company might look to merge the iPad and MacBook categories into a single product range. However, consolidating these two categories into a single revenue stream reads as a remarkably out-of-character for the company.

The iPad was seen by many as a parting gift from Steve Jobs that gave the Apple incredible commercial momentum that carried them through the years following his death. However, if they can't chart a new course for the product, being squeezed out of the category they pioneered is a very real possibility.

Source: Apple's iPad Problem Could Overshadow Smartphone Decline

Apple's MacBook Pro isn't the touchscreen laptop it ought to be

You only have to look at the Pro's Touch Bar's features to imagine what could have been. Some of these elements wouldn't be practical with a touchscreen (you can only fit so many editing buttons on-screen at a time), but many of them are. Why should you scrub through a video timeline on your keyboard when you could manipulate it directly on the display? Many everyday activities, such as choosing emoji in Messages or playing music in iTunes, practically beg for direct finger input. This isn't to say that Apple's Touch Bar implementation is clunky. So far, it appears to be very thoughtful. It's just a perpetual reminder that there's a more direct way to meld touch with conventional computing, and Apple is passing up the opportunity.

It's understandable why the company would implement a navigation strip instead of redesigning macOS for touchscreen support. The Touch Bar is no doubt a challenge (including for developers who want to support it), but reworking an entire operating system is a massive undertaking that can easily run into trouble. Ask Microsoft how hard it was to design a touch-native platform that still appeals to non-touch users -- Windows 8's touch-first interface spooked some PC buyers, and even Windows 10's more balanced strategy has its problems. Dive deep into Windows' settings using only a touchscreen and you'll quickly grow frustrated.

However, Windows also shows that you don't have to redo an entire operating system for touchscreens to be useful. There's a good reason why the Surface line and other hybrid laptop/tablet PCs are thriving in an otherwise shrinking market: more often than not, you can use whatever interface makes sense at a given moment. Want to play a touch-oriented game, or navigate a spreadsheet with a trackpad? You can do both. The MacBook Pro's input will likely be very effective in most cases, but it comes across as inflexible. Apple's rejection of finger input in macOS may prevent incidents where touch works poorly, but it also denies you situations where touch would work beautifully.

Lately, Apple has had a simple answer to those calls for a proper touchscreen interface: buy an iPad Pro. And for certain users, it has a point. The iPad has one of the better big-screen touch interfaces you can find, and it's refreshingly easy to use compared to a traditional PC. But it just isn't going to fit the needs of many Mac buyers, especially customers who can justify premium machines like the MacBook Pro. It doesn't have many of the things pros need, whether it's raw performance, an accessible file system or sophisticated multi-app windowing. If anything, the iPad Pro rubs some salt in the wound. It's a reminder that Apple's touchscreen experiences stop where the Mac lineup begins, and that other PC makers aren't asking you to give up touch just because you want to run AutoCAD or Photoshop.

This isn't to dismiss the MacBook Pro by any means. Based on our initial hands-on time, it's an impressive system that could satisfy many owners (at least, those that don't want a built-in SD card reader). You may well enjoy the Pro for years without once wishing that you had a touchscreen. But it's also a tantalizing glimpse of what could have been, or possibly where Apple will go. And when a large chunk of the industry is welcoming touchscreens with open arms, it's hard not to wonder whether or not Apple is heading in the right direction. The Touch Bar is a safe choice for now, but it wouldn't be shocking if Apple had to change course and embrace touch in a bigger way.

Click here to catch all the news from Apple's "Hello Again" event.

Source: Apple's MacBook Pro isn't the touchscreen laptop it ought to be

DARPA develops digital copilot for military aircraft

ALIAS can fly a military helicopter and then move into another aircraft and fly that too— and ALIAS is not human.

Driverless cars may have been making headlines of late, but DARPA's ALIAS program has also been making great strides in the development of "digital pilot" technology.

The brainchild of the legendary institution DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), ALIAS easily drops into an aircraft and becomes an invisible, automated co-pilot for a human pilot.

And ALIAS is so good that it has the potential to eventually fly all sorts of military aircraft on its own— and it could even fly commercial jets like the ones Americans take to visit family or go on vacation.

Two teams are currently joining forces with DARPA to make ALIAS a reality: Aurora Flight Sciences and Lockheed Martin Sikorsky. One company will go on to win the ultimate ALIAS contract.

What is it?

ALIAS stands for Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System (ALIAS). It is sort of like an automation kit that is a combination of hardware and software. And it makes aircraft very smart, enhanced with a digital co-pilot.

Aurora Flight Sciences has been working on a version with a robotic arm, and the team held a successful test on October 17 with a Cessna.

Related: These hackers could save your life in a disaster

DARPA invited FOX Firepower to watch as Lockheed Martin Sikorsky put their ALIAS through a battery of thorough testing on October 19 in New York. The tech was successful in both a helicopter and fixed wing.

Lockheed's ALIAS kit is about the size of a small briefcase, meaning a pilot can easily plug it into the aircraft. In a way, it amps up its own smarts and by linking the aircraft to a controller on the ground.

Remarkably, the same ALIAS smart tech can fly both rotary-wing and fixed-wing aircraft.

After the mission, the pilot can easily pull the kit from the helo and then take that very same kit over to a fixed wing aircraft.

The ALIAS tech has built upon five decades of plane automation. And it also leverages cutting-edge innovation for drones.

Related: AUSA: New tanks, stealth Chevy trucks, flying radios and more

What sort of tech advances does it take to achieve state of the art digital co-pilots? Tech like a ramped up tablet user interface, "machine vision" that allows ALIAS to read the data displayed in the cockpit and methods to actuate flight controls. Going forward, tech like speech recognition could be incorporated.

How does it work?

From takeoff through to landing, ALIAS can help with an entire mission. If something unexpected happens, like a system failure in flight, then ALIAS could support handling it or even address the problem itself. ALIAS could constantly monitor the health of the aircraft and enhance the maintenance, response and safety of the aircraft.

DARPA Program Director Dr. Daniel Patt explained.

"It has the brains to figure out how to fly the aircraft by itself," he said, gesturing to the tablet in his hands. "This tablet actually talks to that system, talks to the brains of ALIAS…"

How capable is ALIAS?

"The brain has learned and it knows how to fly the aircraft, how to hold the aircraft in a perfectly still hover inside a tiny one foot box, it will beat the performance of a human pilot… If you tell the aircraft to crash into the ground it won't let you do that," he said. "It will keep you safe."

At the Lockheed Martin Sikorsky testing, it was clear that the tech is so smart that someone on the ground can pilot it effectively with a bare minimum— if any— flight training. The interface is a tablet very similar to those folks would use at home. Using a finger, the user can instruct ALIAS to make the helo fly higher, to hover, to fly a complex pattern, or pretty much anything you could think to do.

Related: A new combat vehicle that swims for the Marine Corps

During the testing, I flew the helicopter using a tablet on the ground and effortlessly controlled the altitude, the speed, the direction and flight plan.

Why a digital co-pilot?

Dr. Patt detailed how ALIAS will be groundbreaking.

"In the long term, we envision this technology really changing the role of the human on board – so instead of trying to memorize what every button does and trying to know where to find the right procedure in the manual if something goes wrong, we can have a computer that does that," he said. "And the human can focus on the big picture mission objectives."

Aircraft these days already have a very high level of automation like autopilot, but this is a whole other level.

Even in highly-advanced, highly-automated aircraft, pilots must manage a high volume of emerging data, handle complex tasks and rapidly respond to any emergency that might arise.

As a digital teammate, ALIAS could free up the highly skilled human pilots to focus on tasks that require their special skill sets, talent and experience. Tasks like focusing on an enemy threat.

If an aircraft is enhanced with ALIAS, then it could reduce the number of personnel needed to fly military missions. It is hoped it could also be used to improve handling, reliability as well as safety and mission performance overall.

Lockheed Martin Sikorsky's Director of Autonomy Igor Cherepinsky stressed it is absolutely not about replacing human pilots, but instead about supporting them and giving them a smart teammate.

What's next?

After this flight-testing phase, DARPA will move ALIAS to Phase 3 and that could include testing voice-recognition. This would allow pilots to interact with ALIAS like they would a human copilot in terms of flying the aircraft.

There's potential, for example, for ALIAS to be used to augment the U.S. Army Blackhawk fleet. This tech has progressed so quickly, and is so smart and so promising, that ALIAS cyber co-pilots could be flying the skies in both military and civilian aircraft within the decade.

Older StoryPrevious
Source: DARPA develops digital copilot for military aircraft

Hands on: Surface Dial could be Microsoft's next cult classic

This is an input device made for digital artists.

Move over, mouse and keyboard. Take a seat, Surface Pen. Microsoft has a new input device: the Surface Dial, a silver hockey puck designed to make life simple for digital artists.

Mice move, pens draw; the Dial turns. Tap the Dial, and a radial menu appears. Turn the Dial, and you can quickly access the corresponding shortcut. It's as simple as that.

The $100 Surface Dial (already available for preorder) was designed as a peripheral for the Surface Studio. It will work with the Surface Pro 3, Surface Pro 4, and Surface Book as well, but with the Studio, it can control the tablet while resting on the screen—an interaction that simply isn't there on the older tablets.

Mark Hachman

The Dial can be used on screen, or off.

In some sense, though, the Dial is a solution in search of a problem. Within the Maps application, the Dial can only currently be used off-screen, as a sort of mouse replacement. Spin the Dial one way, and the map zooms out. Tap the Dial and enable "Tilt," and the Dial controls the map's orientation. 

For artists whose spend their days in a drawing application, however, you can begin to see the potential. Consider the various gradients and percentages that can be applied to the opacity of a line, or the contrast of a scene. Generally, these controls are governed by slider bars in a control panel. An artist may have to adjust one, then draw, making adjustments back and forth until everything looks right.

Mark Hachman

A closer look at the Dial's radial menu...

With Surface Studio you can have one hand on the Dial and the other on the Surface Pen, even leaning on the screen. Adjustments can be made quickly—and even, apparently, on the fly—though it depends on the app. Microsoft executives demonstrated a CAD app that required a stepped adjustment—draw, adjust the thickness of the line, then draw again. Other apps, however, will enable Dial users to draw one continuous stroke, adjusting the properties of the line as it's being drawn.

Mark Hachman

...and a second-level radial menu that appears in some cases.

Snap judgment: a niche audience

In 2012, Microsoft flirted with a radial menu for OneNote, and the Dial is that design motif in physical form. I wouldn't call the peripheral a necessity—in fact, for basic tasks it simply isn't as fast or functional as a mouse's thumbwheel. In PowerPoint, for example, one of Dial's options is to zoom the window. But the "tap" on the Dial is a bit more than a tap: The Dial requires you to hold it down for about a second before it triggers the radial menu. In some applications, where the mousewheel is already programmed for the same action, the Dial becomes useless.

Mark Hachman

The Dial takes a pair of AA batteries, held on by a magnetic cover.

In a specialized artistic application, however, the Dial becomes far more useful. As a massive tablet, reclined in a way that gives the artist full access to a digital painting, fumbling with a keyboard shortcut or control panel is a chore. In that sense, the Dial smooths out the workflow and keeps the artist's attention focused on their creation.

That's a pretty limited niche, however. I think it's fair to say that most Surface users rarely touch the Surface Pen, and even fewer will use the Dial.  But I also expect that Microsoft's odd little hockey puck will probably attract a cult following.

Source: Hands on: Surface Dial could be Microsoft's next cult classic

And for our next trick, says Google while literally wheeling out a humongous tablet ...

Pic Google's latest tablet, the Jamboard, weighs 93 pounds (42 kilograms). It could inflict grievous bodily harm if it toppled onto you. But Google made sure to have the four-wheeled stand that supports the unwieldy screen certified by safety testing firm UL.

"UL was worried about it tipping over in an earthquake," said Prabhakar Raghavan, VP of apps for Google Cloud.

In California, where Google is based, people worry about that sort of thing.

The Jamboard is not your typical Android tablet. It's a 55-inch 4K Ultra HD touchscreen display designed to support real-time collaborative meetings across multiple locations. Equipped with HDMI 2.0, USB Type-C, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, NFC, mic, speakers, and camera, the device will cost about $6,000 when it goes on sale in early 2017, a price that includes one year of the $250 annual management dashboard fee.

Compared to Microsoft's $8,999 Surface Hub, a comparable team collaboration system that debuted in March, it's a bargain.

As of Tuesday, Google plans to begin accepting requests to join its Early Adopter Program.

In a press briefing on Monday, Google employees in the company's New York and San Francisco offices demonstrated real-time Jamboard collaboration in conjunction with live video conferencing and Google Hangouts.

Raghavan described the wheel-mounted tablet as an attempt to integrate the whiteboard brainstorming sessions that happen in corporate meeting rooms with the collaborative capabilities enabled by Google's cloud-based apps.

"It's always been painful that the results of this creative output are kind of squandered," said Raghavan. "So we set about to solve this problem. And we think we've found an answer."

The answer is a giant touchscreen fed by client apps running Android or iOS phones or tablets, backed by Google cloud services for authentication and real-time sharing.

"This is not just about collaboration between two physical boards," said Google product manager TJ Varghese. "We have companion apps that run on smartphone or tablet both for Android and for iOS."

The tablet app on a handheld tablet provides all the same functionality as the tablet app on the Jamboard. The phone app provides fewer capabilities – it's intended as an input tool for notes, images, and Drive files. In each case, participants can move content from their devices into the shared Jamboard for everyone to see.

"We really don't want people to take photos of whiteboards anymore," Varghese explained. "The phone app allows you to walk into a room and actually wirelessly look for a board nearby. And if there is content, you can request access and just take it with you."

In fact, Google's press herders didn't want visiting journalists to take pictures of the Jamboard at all. It's not clear why, given that the device is pleasant enough to look at with its white bezel and red trim. In any event, The Register was provided an image of the beast.

"We didn't want to design something that just looked like a black box on the wall, just like any other display," said Varghese. "We wanted this to be something that you would use at a workplace, inspire creativity, and also fit like modern furniture in your workplace."

To demonstrate the device, Googlers sent virtual sticky notes, some converted to text through voice recognition software, to the Jamboard display screen. The device can handle input from Docs, Sheets and Slides, as well as images from Google Drive, not to mention its built-in camera. It can also find images through Google Search.

Jamboard sessions – jams – are intended as in-the-moment events, and they can also be saved for later review, as a sequence of slides.

There's a bit of boxed smarts, for example line straightening and handwriting amelioration, which makes the results of brainstorming look a bit less windblown. Raghavan suggested that more advanced capabilities – such as the ability to convert an image of spreadsheet data into a functioning spreadsheet – could be added in the future.

Much of the device's potential will be determined at some later time. Google plans to provide developers with APIs to access the device at some point, to allow for the creation of customized corporate apps. And obviously desirable capabilities like transcriptions of everything said in a conference room hosting a Jamboard session await implementation.

How big is the market for such devices? In four months of sales, Microsoft is said to have convinced more than 500 corporate customers to order its Surface Hub.

Google customers beta testing the Jamboard at the moment include Instrument, Spotify, and Netflix.

Google didn't have any data to share that suggested whether the Jamboard might enhance meeting productivity, but Varghese insisted Jamboard testers found the product useful. Among the 30 teams testing the Jamboard, 85 per cent of those involved over the past year used the device at least once a week, he said.

In response to the suggestion that Google employees involved in product "dog fooding" were required to dine at the company trough, Jonathan Rochelle, director of product management for G Suite, insisted there was no such mandate.

"That is not how we operate dog food here," he said. ®

Sponsored: IBM FlashSystem V9000 product guide

Source: And for our next trick, says Google while literally wheeling out a humongous tablet ...

The Reality Of AR/VR Competition

Virtual, augmented and mixed reality have a competition problem.

But while most AR/VR companies will tell you how much better they are than their nearest direct competitor, they're picking the wrong fight. The main event isn't between Oculus (Facebook (NASDAQ:FB)), HTC, Sony (NYSE:SNE), Samsung (OTC:SSNLF) and Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) for VR, or Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Magic Leap (Private:MLEAP), Meta and ODG for AR (including mixed reality). There are far bigger and scarier competitors out there.

Status Quo

Status Quo is AR/VR's biggest competitor (and I don't mean the band that opened Live Aid).

People spend almost 11 hours a day using electronic media. That means out of the average 79 years folks spend on the planet, over 34 of them are devoted to media. What could be so fascinating that we give almost half of our lives to it?

Click to enlarge

TV (live and time shifted) makes up 48% of media time, phone/tablet 20%, radio 18%, online PC 9% and everything else 6%. And while most media are flat to down, smartphones and tablets have done what was previously thought impossible. They grew the media market. Phone/tablet time has more than doubled to over two hours a day in the last two years alone. And this skews even more strongly the younger you are. Old farts complaining about young people glued to their phones aren't just being grumps - they're being right.

So the biggest question is how does AR/VR compete with TVs, phones and tablets?

Everything else

Click to enlarge

And that's not all.

While folks choose to spend half their lives with electronic boxes, they spend even more time doing things they can't avoid. Work and sleep each take up almost seven hours a day on average, which when combined with media time adds up to the full 24 hours it takes the Earth to spin around once.

There isn't much AR/VR can do about sleep, as even mighty mobile hasn't conquered that barrier. But what about work (and other aspects of life)? This is where the triumph of mobile has clear lessons for AR/VR, but also where VR and AR start to diverge.

Plurality rules

The keen eyed will have spotted that the 24 hours of media, sleep and work don't allow any time for eating, sport, chores, family, socializing, commuting and the other noble pursuits - which clearly some of us like to do. And this is where Plurality comes in. It's been a major driver of mobile's success.

Click to enlarge

Plurality (or second screening in relation to TV specifically) is where folks do more than one thing at the same time. 87% of people use their phone, tablet or (to a lesser extent) PC as a second screen while watching TV. Some would argue that TV has actually become the second screen now, with people watching it while using their phones.

But that's not all for Plurality and mobile. The average person checks their phone over 40 times a day (over 70 times per day if you're younger). Folks eat, do chores, look after family, socialize, commute and more while using them. The smartphone is the first thing many people see as soon as they open their eyes in the morning (and other unmentionable morning things - hence waterproof phones).

Yes. Yes. But what about VR?

The beauty of VR is its total immersion. That's one of the reasons it will be big.

But VR is all consuming by nature, which gives it a Plurality challenge that mobile did not face. Try walking down the street or interacting meaningfully with someone outside your headset while in VR. And while you can second screen your TV or smartphone with VR streaming, you're still doing it inside VR rather than in the world around you.

So in terms of time, VR has to cannibalize one of the other demands on your allotted 24 hours a day. This is a hard competitive problem with mass consumers (so grandpa and your niece, not core gamers). VR will need to knock something else off its pedestal to grab a big chunk of their time without the benefit of Plurality. It's battling head on with the Status Quo and Everything Else.

And AR?

AR has harder technical challenges to solve than VR, which is why it is currently focused on more forgiving enterprise users and not mass consumers yet. But the most aggressive AR roadmaps are launching for mass consumers in 2017 going into 2018 - so it's just a question of time.

When consumer AR gets here, it will have the same competitive advantage mobile had - Plurality. In fact AR could have an even greater advantage than mobile did.

No need to take it out of your pocket. No looking down to check it. No small screen to limit what you see. Nobody looking over your shoulder to see you playing Candy Crush at work. No bumping into things while you're checking WeChat.

And this isn't just conjecture. Ever seen a couple of kids walking down the street playing Pokémon Go together? Even with that sort of very basic AR, its Plurality is already well proven.

What about competition within AR/VR?

Click to enlarge

Industry competition is even more exciting, because so far nobody is dominant in any part of AR/VR. It's just too early in the market's development for anyone to dominate yet. So while there is a healthy level of competition, it's all to play for and the rules are being written right now.

One of the nice things about seeing this from inside the industry is that while folks will trash talk each other, the community remains a collaborative one. There seems to be a good understanding that the better everyone does, the better everyone does (it's why our quarterly VR/AR CEO forum Reality Check gets hundreds of competing CEOs, corporate divisional heads and VC Partners doing deals and working together).

So roll on AR/VR competition. It's going to be a blast.

Editor's Note: This article discusses one or more securities that do not trade on a major U.S. exchange. Please be aware of the risks associated with these stocks.

Source: The Reality Of AR/VR Competition

Saints HC Sean Payton takes a jab at his friend Bill Belichick over tablet problems

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has a longstanding history of technological problems. He doesn't understand car clocks. He has no time for InstaFace or MyBook or Tweeter. And he certainly doesn't like the tablets that the NFL has issued for team use on the sidelines.

Belichick isn't alone. Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin said that the Steelers have "had some technological issues on the sidelines, particularly in recent years, so that's nothing new." Chiefs head coach Andy Reid says that he doesn't use the tablets and is "pretty good without them."

But Belichick's friend and Saints head coach Sean Payton had to get a fun little jab at Belichick's expense.

"I think inside they've functioned," Payton said, via NOLA.com. "Outside it's more challenging because of the glare. I don't think there's been a lot of talk actually. I think there's just been talk in one city. Any type of sunny day or you're looking down...the consistency comes with the prints, the pictures, I think that they're working on it."

Payton seems to have a little fun by saying Belichick's the only one complaining about the tablets.

MMQB's Albert Breer notes that he thinks Belichick will "go back to" the tablets "if the NFL starts allowing coaches to use video on the sideline," but until that feature is available (if it ever is), Belichick will go back to his hard papers.

The purpose of the tablets is to allow coaches to swipe through images and stills that were historically performed with printed out papers. The goal was to have a more immediate method of review, but Belichick hasn't been able to get the "consistency" from the tablet that he has been able to get from the papers.

And we know how important "consistency" is to Belichick.

Source: Saints HC Sean Payton takes a jab at his friend Bill Belichick over tablet problems

Nigerian women abuse fertility drugs — Ajayi

An In Vitro Fertilisation specialist and Managing Director, Nordica Fertility Centre, Dr. Abayomi Ajayi, tells ARUKAINO UMUKORO about the dangers of fertility drugs

What are fertility drugs?

Like the name suggests, they are drugs that enhance fertility in a woman and increase their chances of getting pregnant. Fertility drugs can be divided into two; the ones for women and the ones for men.  As of now though, fertility drugs for women are more common than the ones for men. There are no proven fertility drugs for men.

Again, there is the need to understand that people most of the time mix virility with fertility. But while there are some drugs that can help a man's libido, there are no drugs that can help his fertility.  For a man to be fertile, the man should be able to produce all the sperm cells. There are claims that some drugs might help to boost sperm, but as of now, there is no drug that is qualified to be called a sperm booster. There are so many drugs that people use or try but there is none that is proven. Hormonal imbalance is responsible for about five per cent of male infertility.

How do fertility drugs boost the chances of women to get pregnant?

Fertility drugs for women are mainly used when a woman is not ovulating or releasing eggs. Fertility drugs can either be in tablet form or injectable drug. They could be used for ovulation induction or to help women in the area of hormonal imbalance. But the ovulation induction drugs are the more popular ones. Fertility drugs in tablet form are the most abused type. There is a commonest type that is the most abused. People do not understand the dangers of abusing fertility drugs.

How are the drugs abused?

This is because most of these drugs can be easily purchased or sold over-the-counter without any proper investigation or prescription by a qualified doctor. It is so bad that women with blocked tubes still go to buy this type of fertility drug for ovulation induction. People use it anyhow because it is commonly available. One cannot treat what one does not anything about. A proper medical test has to be done to ascertain the problem first. Fertility drugs should never be used without a doctor's prescription and supervision. They should be properly monitored to see the effects. The doctor must scan continuously to see that the drugs are producing eggs. There is no specific time frame but the doctor needs to be sure that she is not producing too many eggs. Also, the woman can produce more than one egg and more than one embryo. The doctor should be responsible enough not to replace too many in IVF.

From your experience, would you say fertility drugs have helped a lot of women to have children?

Yes, but the major causes of infertility and in most part of the world is either the woman's tubes are blocked or the man's sperm count is bad. These two things are not amenable to drugs. But when the problem is one that the woman is not ovulating, which about 10 to 20 per cent of women in Nigeria might have, then such a case can be helped with fertility drugs. The important thing is that the person must have a good assessment before taking any kind of drug, including ovulation induction drugs.

What is your advice to women who may have taken several fertility drugs but it has not helped them to get pregnant?

I would like to emphasise that the first thing is for them to have a proper assessment to know if they should be taking fertility drugs in the first place. I have seen many cases where the man is the problem. He has a low sperm count but the woman is still busy taking fertility drugs. For such women, they are not likely to get pregnant in that type of situation.

What are some of the side effects of taking fertility drugs?

About 60 to 80 per cent of women who take these tablets will ovulate, if their problem is that they are not ovulating. But the side effects include having a slight headache and what we call hot flashes. This happens when a woman is in a well-ventilated or air-conditioned room, but still feels a sudden heat flow inside her body that later disappears. It is transient. Also, this effect could be most frightening for some people who, after using these tablet, could have ovarian stimulation, where the woman produces too many eggs. And that could range from mild to severe. But the majority of women who use the tablets would have the mild one. It has been reported that some people have had severe hyper-stimulation from taking the tablets. That is why the injectable drug is more dangerous.

Also, a side effect could be women having multiple births because the woman produces more eggs and the doctors tend to replace more embryos than nature would normally do. For some women, they see this as a good side effect.

What is the link between fertility drugs and In Vitro Fertilisation?

There is a link because the injectable is what we use in In Vitro Fertilisation. We could look at the injectable drugs from three sides: The first group is the one that triggers or encourages the growth of eggs. The second group is the one that triggers ovulation, and the third group is the one that prevents the woman from ovulating until everything is ready. There is something called premature ovulation when one is using ovulation drugs, especially for IVF. So, these drugs prevent premature ovulation.

Is there a particular age range for women to use fertility drugs?

Anybody who wants to conceive can use fertility drugs maybe as from the age of 18. Sometimes, women who are above 50 years old still use the drugs. But that becomes an abuse because a woman at that age is already menopausal. There should be evidence that the woman can ovulate first. These drugs should not be self-prescribed. They should only be taken on the advice of a doctor who should also monitor their usage.

How would you rate the use of fertility drugs in Nigeria in the last 10 years?

The use of fertility drugs has increased tremendously because of the increase in awareness and interest in IVF treatment. The fertility drugs industry is flourishing in Nigeria as a result. About 25-30 per cent of babies born from IVF are from multiple births.

Are there enough specialists in Nigeria to handle this aspect?

No, we do not have enough specialists. That is one of the problems. Many people who do not have any business in prescribing fertility drugs are doing so. The thing is that the drugs can be very dangerous if not used correctly and they could kill. A woman who has an ovulation stimulation ranging from the very mild to the severe form could lose her life. That is why there is need to train medical professionals in this aspect.

Risk factors that can affect fertility in both men and women:

Overweight or severely underweight

Stress may affect fertility or sperm count

Sexually transmitted diseases such as chlamydia

Smoking

Excessive alcohol consumption

Exposure to toxins such as lead or certain pesticides

Certain medical conditions, such as endometriosis

Factors leading to infertility in women include:

Ovaries not ovulating (releasing eggs)

Blocked fallopian tubes so sperm can't meet the egg

Eggs are not viable

Shape of the uterus makes it hard for a fertilised egg to implant

Endometriosis

Reproductive cancers

Conditions (celiac disease, Cushing's disease, sickle cell disease, diabetes) that can lead to lack of menstruation, called amenorrhea

In some cases, there is no known reason for a woman's infertility.

How infertility is diagnosed in women

The diagnosis of infertility is not always straightforward. Your doctor will begin with a general physical and gynaecologic exam, and ask about medical history, medications, menstruation cycle, and sexual habits.

Your doctor may ask you to track your ovulation each month by recording your morning body temperature and testing with a home ovulation test kit.

Other ways to establish ovulation include ultrasound images and blood tests. If ovulation is normal, other tests may be needed to determine the cause of infertility.

Ovarian reserve testing: to determine how effective the eggs are after ovulation.

Genetic testing: to evaluate whether a genetic abnormality is interfering with the woman's fertility.

Pelvic ultrasound: high-frequency sound waves create an image of the woman's uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries.

Thyroid function test: up to five per cent of infertile women have an abnormal thyroid.

Source: www.drugs.com

Copyright PUNCH.                All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH.

Contact: [email protected]

Source: Nigerian women abuse fertility drugs — Ajayi

Patriots' Bill Belichick's Brutally Honest Microsoft Surface Tablet Takedown Prompts Response From MSFT

Microsoft Surface tablets have come under fire by one of the most successful head coaches in the history of the National Football League and by extension one of the most successful NFL teams, so the exposure is significant. Patriots head coach Bill Belichick is done with using tablets on the sidelines. 

As outside observers of a sport, it's sometimes easy to dismiss the complexities surrounding the games we watch. While in all team sports, coordination between team staff is important, it's downright imperative in the game of Football and for the NFL. Depth charts, team formation photos, phone calls -- there are many bits of information can make or break a play. Football is quite literally coordinated warfare, so if one element in the system fails, it could upend an entire series, or even cost a team the game.

Variability is something New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick can't tolerate. And who could blame him? The team's mantra is "do your job" and you can't argue with Belichick's track record for success. Belichick has been the head coach of a leading NFL team for 16 years, and has been part of the league since 1975, when he was a special assistant to the Baltimore Colts. He knows how to do his job with the tools he's been given. However, when a new tool is introduced and it fails him, the unapologetic, brutally honest Belichick is going to tell it like it is. This week, unfortunately for Microsoft, Belichick's ire was targeted at the Surface tablet.

In between plays, during last weekend's match-up against the Cincinnati Bengals, Belichick became impatient after his Surface tablet wouldn't cooperate, so he threw it to the ground. We learned more during the press conference following the game, where the typically very succinct Belichick went on a five-minute rant about everything that he feels is wrong with using Microsoft Surface on the Football field.

Belichick says that tablets are "too undependable", and that notion isn't based on a single incident, but several. "There are very few games where there aren't issues in some form or fashion with that equipment." While he admits that he doesn't understand how all of the technologies surrounding the Surface work, he does know that his faithful IT pro has to struggle each week with getting everything working as it should. Ultimately, given the number of problems he has encountered, Belichick is keen on reverting to the old-school method of using paper pictures to help establish plays.

It's important to note that Belichick didn't specifically call out the brand of tablet that failed him, but given the NFL's well-known multi-million dollar contract to outfit NFL teams with Surface PCs, it's obvious there was only one brand he as speaking of. Not to mention, in December last year, the Dallas Cowboys had similar frustrations with Microsoft Surface and had to resort to paper as wel l. 

Even though Belichick was speaking of tablets in general for the job he has to do, it's still quite a slap in the face to Microsoft, so Redmond was compelled to respond in a new blog post. In it, the company's Corporate VP of the Windows and Devices Group Yusuf Mehdi tries to undo some of the damage Belichick has caused with his statements, going so far as to include quotes from some of the league's biggest figures.

New Orleans Saint's quarterback Drew Brees says that Surface has helped reduce the hassle of fiddling with binders during a game, which can be difficult in less-than-ideal weather. "Now you walk to the sideline and it's seamless," says Brees. Even Seattle Seahawks' quarterback Russel Wilson has joined in on the fun, saying, "Every second counts and having Microsoft Surface technology on sidelines allows players and coaches to analyze what our opponents are trying to do in almost real time."

With opinions on both sides of the fence, who's right? Chances are good that the answer is "everyone." If the Surface worked without incident, chances are good that Belichick would have been content to continue using it. But when an integral piece of a equipment disrupts the game, something has to be done. For Belichick at least, Surface wasn't doing its job. 

Source: Patriots' Bill Belichick's Brutally Honest Microsoft Surface Tablet Takedown Prompts Response From MSFT

Saints HC Sean Payton takes a jab at his friend Bill Belichick over tablet problems

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick has a longstanding history of technological problems. He doesn't understand car clocks. He has no time for InstaFace or MyBook or Tweeter. And he certainly doesn't like the tablets that the NFL has issued for team use on the sidelines.

Belichick isn't alone. Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin said that the Steelers have "had some technological issues on the sidelines, particularly in recent years, so that's nothing new." Chiefs head coach Andy Reid says that he doesn't use the tablets and is "pretty good without them."

But Belichick's friend and Saints head coach Sean Payton had to get a fun little jab at Belichick's expense.

"I think inside they've functioned," Payton said, via NOLA.com. "Outside it's more challenging because of the glare. I don't think there's been a lot of talk actually. I think there's just been talk in one city. Any type of sunny day or you're looking down...the consistency comes with the prints, the pictures, I think that they're working on it."

Payton seems to have a little fun by saying Belichick's the only one complaining about the tablets.

MMQB's Albert Breer notes that he thinks Belichick will "go back to" the tablets "if the NFL starts allowing coaches to use video on the sideline," but until that feature is available (if it ever is), Belichick will go back to his hard papers.

The purpose of the tablets is to allow coaches to swipe through images and stills that were historically performed with printed out papers. The goal was to have a more immediate method of review, but Belichick hasn't been able to get the "consistency" from the tablet that he has been able to get from the papers.

And we know how important "consistency" is to Belichick.

Source: Saints HC Sean Payton takes a jab at his friend Bill Belichick over tablet problems

Bill Belichick rants about “undependable” tablets, Microsoft forced to release statement

Bill Belichick is the best coach in the NFL and keeps adding to his legacy as arguably the greatest the sport has ever seen. He does it by tirelessly preparing himself, his staff and his players before, during and after games. It seems as if the "during"-aspect is undergoing some changes, though.

During today's conference call, Belichick once again pointed out his displeasure with the league-provided Microsoft tablets each team can use on the sidelines. Consequently, New England's head coach will no longer use them for in-game analysis (via Ryan Hannable):

Frankly, this does not come as a surprise. Belichick has visibly been frustrated with the tablets multiple times in the past, most notably during last year's AFC Championship Game. Afterwards, the coach called it a "pretty common" problem; today's remarks echo this.

With Belichick going back to the old-school method of coaching (pencil and print-outs), we no longer will see scenes like this:

As opposed to the tablet, at least the .gif will live on.

Here's the full text from Belichick:

"As you know Phil [Perry], there are multiple communication systems on the sideline. As you probably noticed, I'm done with the tablets. I've given them as much time as I can give them. They're just too undependable for me. I'm going to stick with pictures as several of our other coaches do as well because there just isn't enough consistency in the performance of the tablets, so I just can't take it anymore.

"The other communication systems involve the press box to the coaches on the field, and then the coach on the field, the signal caller, or the coach-to-quarterback, coach-to-signal caller system. Those fail on a regular basis.

"There are very few games that we play, home or away, day, night, cold, hot, preseason, regular season, postseason, it doesn't make any difference; there are very few games where there aren't issues in some form or fashion with that equipment.

"And again, there's a lot of equipment involved, too. There are headsets in the helmets, there's the belt pack, that communication, there's a hookup or connection to internet service or that process and so forth with the coaches and the press box.

"So, there are a number of pieces of equipment, there is a number of connections that are on different frequencies. Again, not that I know anything about this but as it has been explained to me there are a lot of things involved and inevitably something goes wrong somewhere at some point in time. I would say weekly we have to deal with something.

"Dan Famosi is our IT person and he does a great job of handling those things. This is all league equipment so we don't have it. I mean we use it but it isn't like we have the equipment during the week and we can work with it and 'OK, this is a problem. Let's fix this.' That's not how it works. We get the equipment the day of the game, or I'd say not the day of the game but a few hours before the game and we test it and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Usually by game time it is working but I would say not always.

"And then during the game sometimes something happens and it has to be fixed, and first of all, you have to figure out what the problem is. Is it a battery? Is it the helmet? Is it the coaches' pack? Is it the battery on the coaches' pack? I mean you know, again, it could be one of 15 different things.

"So, I would just say there are problems in every game. There were problems last week but there were problems the week before that, too. Some are worse than others. Sometimes both teams have them, sometimes one team has them and the other doesn't have them. There's an equity rule that's involved there on certain aspects of the communication system but not on all aspects meaning what happens on one side then the other team has to have the same. If ours are down then theirs has to be down and vice versa, but it's only true in certain aspects of the communication system; not everything.

"Overall there is a lot of complexity to the technology. There is complexity to multiple systems and there are a lot of failures, and so I know on our end Dan does a great job to fix those as quickly as possible. He has very limited access. I don't know how much urgency there is on the other part from the league standpoint. However much urgency there is for them to have everything right, I don't know, I'm not involved with that. But yeah, it was a problem last week. It's basically a problem every week.

"The degrees aren't always the same but we're usually dealing with something. But as far as the tablet goes, I mean there was an experiment in a couple of the preseason games. It was one preseason game. We actually had two because it was our home game and Carolina's home game where we had video on the tablets.

"But for me personally, it's a personal decision, I'm done with the tablets. I'll use the paper pictures from here on because I've given it my best shot. I've tried to work through the process but it just doesn't work for me and that's because there's no consistency to it. Long answer to a short question; sorry."

Here is Microsoft's statement in response:

"We respect Coach Belichick's decision, but stand behind the reliability of Surface. We continue to receive positive feedback on having Surface devices on the sidelines from coaches, players and team personnel across the league. In the instances where sideline issues are reported in NFL games, we work closely with the NFL to quickly address and resolve."

Source: Bill Belichick rants about "undependable" tablets, Microsoft forced to release statement

The NFL and Microsoft are standing by the Surface tablet, even if Bill Belichick is not

Despite Bill Belichick's verbal and physical bashing of Microsoft's Surface tablet, the technology giant and the NFL are standing by the piece of sideline hardware.

Following Belichick's lengthy denunciation Tuesday of the tablet's reliability, both Microsoft and the NFL, which are corporate partners, put out statements in response to the Patriots coach.

Per ESPN's Mike Reiss, Microsoft said Tuesday they "respect" Belichick's decision to ditch using the Surface on the Patriots sidelines, but that they stand by the tablet's dependability.

"We continue to receive positive feedback on having Surface devices on the sidelines from coaches, players and team personnel across the league," said the NFL's statement Tuesday. "In the instances where sideline issues are reported in NFL games, we work closely with the NFL to quickly address and resolve."

In a separate statement provided Tuesday afternoon to ESPN's Darren Rovell, the NFL said that multiple factors "related to or outside Microsoft's technology" can cause issues within their communications system.

For his part, Belichick said earlier Tuesday that he is "done" with the tablets, which he called "too undependable," citing previous problems that he and team experienced with them on the sidelines.

"I'll use the paper pictures from here on because I've given it my best shot," he said.

Close

Get the Globe's scoop on the Red Sox for free.

Get 108 Stitches, the Globe's free newsletter for Sox stats and analysis.

Thanks for signing up!

Source: The NFL and Microsoft are standing by the Surface tablet, even if Bill Belichick is not

Epinephrine pill might break the EpiPen scandal and give patients their first valid alternative

An alternative to the EpiPen might soon make it to a pharmacy near you. An epinephrine tablet that dissolves under the tongue comes to shake auto-injectors' monopoly on the market.

Last month, Heather Bresch as CEO of Mylan went through a pretty harsh Congressional hearing to explain the skyrocketing prices of the EpiPen, Mylan's signature product. The price increases have left many without access to epinephrine, vital for people with allergies going into anaphylactic shock. During the hearing, representatives voiced concerns that Mylan has control over the market as competitors have a hard time going past EpiPen's patented design — so most offered alternatives, which relied on other types of auto-injectors, never got approved (you can be a pirate and make your own — but be warned if done incorrectly this may be fatal).

A small team of researchers including Mutasem Rawas-Qalaji, a pharmaceutical researcher at Nova Southeastern University in Florida, thinks they've found a way to solve this problem. They propose delivering the substance through a pill.

Working a bit like an ordinary orally disintegrating tablet (ODT), the treatment is designed to be administered under the tongue. That's because delivering epinephrine through the stomach is pointless — the hormone breaks down before finding its way to the liver or blood. ODTs are meant to dissolve on the tongue and provide an alternative to liquid drugs or standard pills for patients who have trouble swallowing. They're also used to bypass the digestive system altogether when delivering a drug. Rawas-Qalaji plans to have the pill dissolve in the blood-rich area of the under-tongue — so the epinephrine gets directly into the bloodstream.

He also spent the last few years tweaking the pill, making the epinephrine crystals it contains smaller and smaller to make sure that it will dissolve and be absorbed in seconds — there's no time to wait during an anaphylactic shock. Still, it's a much more inefficient way of doing things than just injecting the epi into muscle because a lot of the hormone gets lost in the mouth. While a pen holds roughly 0.3 mg of epi, the latest version of the tablet holds some 20 mg just to deliver an equivalent dose.

Dr. Mutasem Rawas-Qalaji and his epi tablets.Image credits Mutasem Rawas-Qalaji.

But an EpiPen has flaws of its own apart from the cost, however. A Texas Uni study published last year found that only 16% of patients use the devices correctly. Most people don't jam them with enough force into the leg or don't hold it in place for the recommended ten seconds. They're also bulky making them inconvenient to carry around, and they expire after about a year.

If approved, the tablets could solve a lot of EpiPen's problems — it would be cheaper, simpler to use, smaller, more portable, and more stable. Rawas-Qalaji believes they could last up to seven years on shelf.

"So if you don't use them you don't have to go and buy another one," he said.

As far as price is concerned, he couldn't give an exact figure — it would depend on the manufacturer. He's confident that the tablets can be sold "at a price that's affordable and makes sense […] to fill a gap and meet the needs of the patients."

Still a while to go

But there's still a lot of work to be done before anyone's putting these pills anywhere near their tongue.

"It's a good idea. We'd love to have it. Patients would love to have it. There's a lot of appeal," says Robert Wood, an allergist at Johns Hopkins.

"But the risk of it not working is that people die."

Wood says that the only way to make sure the pills work is to test them on people actually going through anaphylaxis — that means finding patients with severe allergies and asking them to expose to a potentially deadly allergen to test a drug that should work. Which, unsurprisingly, isn't something that would fly with your average review board.

Rawas-Qalaji agrees that it isn't ethical or feasible to do things that way, so he's doing the best he can to make the pills as efficient as possible without endangering anyone. So far, he's tested the tablet on rabbits. In the future, he plans to give the tab to healthy volunteers, then measure the epi concentration in their blood. If it's equivalent to those from people given the EpiPen, the pills should work in stopping anaphylaxis. Wood also pointed out that the swollen mouth of a patient in shock might react differently to epinephrine than a healthy mouth.

"The swelling and other related unanswered questions have been discussed with FDA," Rawas-Qalaji said for Popular Science.

"We had a good agreement of what can be tested and what [can]not."

With input from the FDA, and help from specialists in allergies, Rawas-Qalaji and his team hope to start clinical trials sometime in the next few years. He also wants to get FDA approval for the tablets well before Mylan's patents are up in 2025.

Enjoyed this story? Like ZME Science on facebook:
Source: Epinephrine pill might break the EpiPen scandal and give patients their first valid alternative

Consistency in the Omnichannel Experience

Summary: A consistent user experience, regardless of platform, is one of the 5 key components of a successful omnichannel user experience. Consistency across channels builds trust with customers.

Users engage with organizations across various channels, including the web, email, mobile devices, kiosks, online chat, and by visiting physical locations (such as storefronts or service centers). Any organization with a multichannel ecosystem should aim that independent channel interactions coordinate to create one cohesive, consistent customer experience.

Our user research on omnichannel user experience identified 5 key components of a successful omnichannel experience:

Consistency

Seamlessness

Optimization

Orchestration

Collaboration

This article discusses consistency in the omnichannel experience.

The Importance of Consistency in the Omnichannel Experience

As users move from channel to channel to complete a specific task or many different tasks over time, they are exposed to various channel experiences. These channel experiences are influenced by elements such as visual design, content, tone of voice, and functionality. Creating consistency among these elements on every channel improves the customer experience as well as the brand image. The benefits of consistency in the omnichannel user experience include:

Familiarity and Confidence. A consistent experience sets expectations for future interactions with your organization and builds user confidence.

Learnability. Consistent experiences are more learnable for users who have interacted with your solutions on various other channels.

Efficiency. When designs and features are consistent, customers can complete tasks faster and more efficiently on the channel of their choice in the context of their everyday lives.

Trust. Users crave consistency and companies that can provide consistent experiences across channels will quickly earn users' trust and build credibility.

Where Consistency Should Be Applied

There are 3 main areas of the experience where consistency should be applied across the channel ecosystem. Being consistent across all 3 elements will create a holistic omnichannel experience in which your brand DNA is woven like a golden thread through every touchpoint of the customer journey.

Core functionality. Your efforts to achieve consistency should be first and foremost directed at your main offerings. Ask yourself what features and functionality support the lifeblood of your business: what are the most common and important tasks that customers need to complete? Your channel experiences should at minimum support these core tasks on every channel.

It's true that different channels have different capabilities, and some tasks may be optimally supported on one channel. However, we cannot assume that, because a channel is not ideal for a particular task, it will not be selected for that task. Some people may not have access to the optimal channel at a given moment in time — for example, although applying for jobs is best done on a desktop computer, a fairly big segment of the population does not own such as device.

Beyond simply supporting the task, the core features and workflows should be consistent across all channels. A very similar interaction style on all different channels will be familiar, will strengthen the brand, and will offer users the opportunity to take advantage of any knowledge acquired in previous interactions with the company.

Getting a travel-insurance quote from the Singapore-based bank, DBS, is very different on desktop versus tablet: on the desktop, users view a product-detail page before being routed to a 3rd party site to get a quote; on tablet, they can get a quote immediately, without even viewing product information.

On the DBS website, users navigate to the insurance-product page where they can read about the policy before getting a quote. The DBS tablet application hides policy information and directs users to the quote form.

After getting a quote through both channels, one test user commented, "Compared to the desktop this (the tablet) is much easier. But now the problem is that I don't know what I'm being covered for. On the tablet, they give me the pricing right away. I had a hard time finding it on desktop. I had to dig for it."

In order to read information about the insurance policy on the tablet application, users must discover the details in the Key Benefits section.

Although consistency across channels is important, it's vital for organizations to understand when it's okay to compromise consistency in order to provide an appropriately optimized experience on each channel. In a future article, we will discuss the need for optimizing the experience for various devices and designing for the context of each devices' role in the customer journey.

Customer Data. To customers, you are one company. They don't draw dividing lines between channels like organizations do. For this reason, they expect to see real-time, consistent, and valid data as they move from one channel to the next. Delivering consistent information across all channels means organizations must create integrated backend systems that share and update data on the fly.

One study participant was a member of a meal-delivery subscription service. When she received the wrong ingredient in her most recent delivery, she called customer service to complain and also update her delivery schedule over the phone. The representative gave her a credit and adjusted her schedule. Following the phone call, she logged into her account to see whether the updates had been applied, and was frustrated when she did not see them in her online account. She called customer service again, and was assured that the information would be available the next day.This lack of data continuity across channels caused the user to question the organization's capabilities and forced her to add unnecessary touchpoints to an already problematic journey. People should not be expected to understand complexities in backend technologies and processes to confidently transact with companies.

Visual Design. A consistent visual story across each channel can go a long way toward making an organization appear buttoned up, unified, and fully integrated to their customers. Nespresso's visual design is consistent and cohesive across every channel: (1) The desktop website shows a graphic of the product packaging. (2) The mobile app uses has the same color palette and images of the coffee pods as on the desktop. (3) The the order confirmation email tells the same visual story. (4) Finally, when the coffee arrives at your door, it looks just as it did at every touchpoint of the customer's journey, a perfect ending to the visual story.

Marriot Hotels' visual design varies greatly across channels. Extreme visual inconsistencies across channels might signal different functionality, flows, or offerings. They can cause customers to question the purpose for the differences and ultimately reflect poorly on the brand.

Marriott Hotels website booking experience The booking flow on the Marriott Hotels' tablet application has a different look-and-feel than the desktop site

Consistency: 1 of 5 Recommended Cross-Channel Characteristics

As companies and organizations design for the larger user experience, it's important to consider consistency across all channels. Consistent experiences create trust in the organization. Each interaction is part of the overall user experience with a company. If the user experience isn't consistent across channels, users will question the organization's credibility.

In addition to being consistent, cross-channel experiences must be optimized, seamless, orchestrated, and collaborative.

Our full day course on Omnichannel Journeys and Customer Experience covers these recommended characteristics further.

Share this article: Twitter | LinkedIn | Google+ | Email

Source: Consistency in the Omnichannel Experience

BEST INDIA VIAGRA AND PRICE - cialis tablets for sale

BEST PRICE 100MG GENERIC VIAGRA - buy viagra without a prescription . Obtain Payday Loan Today. BEST PRICE 100MG GENERIC VIAGRAWe strive to get you an easy payday loan without any delay and match the best lender for your needs.All you need is a car or property to offer as security.Right around the corner from our Hilton Garden Inn. buy viagra without a prescriptionMany people searching regarding Fast Cash Payday Financial products also looked for online intended for Payday Lending options With Quick Approval, Damaging Credit Personal loan, and also Missouri Payday cash advance.Obtain Rapidly Payday Loan On-line.The ECB, whose main task is euro stability, has lost control.Best4Loans Ltd is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.You have to dale carnegie public speaking course singapore able to put a bet on the underdog when the match goes in-play so make a note of the start time of the match on the 'Rules' tab for the match.Reordered EASY Order a meal using the re-order feature.This is unlike many legit money making sites that dale carnegie public speaking course singapore its plans to US residents only.If you've checked your paperwork and have found all names responsible for paying back the loan are not covered under the insurance - which is unfair in itself as either could be chased for money if you get behind with payments - and were told or thought that all names were covered, go to how to reclaim.Though attainable, it dale carnegie public speaking course singapore not as easy as 1-2-3 steps.While it's true that you can't borrow your way out of debt, consolidating all of your high interest loans into one HV Debt Consolidation loan with a great rate could save on the amount of interest you're charged on your debts each month, which can add up fast!You are able to likewise ask a colleague who once borrowed it.No matter what your emergency situation is, an installment loan may be able to provide access to the cash you need.Choose the amount you want to borrow and the time you want to take to repay Tell us a f ew details about yourself and your financial situation.We are willing to put our faith in you.To learn about loan options use these Quick Links:Discover your Options Look at the bad credit loan "map" below to help you narrow down your options.All aspects and transactions on this site will be deemed to have taken place in the state of Nevada, regardless of where you may be accessing this site.There has been a lot of media coverage for the last couple of years that seems to emphasize on the negative points of these products without exploring the benefits conclusively.The Page 597 common scheme was, in fact, the Commonwealth's theory of the case.NerdWallet is just getting started in its educational campaign against predatory lending and is working with the Gateway Foundation and Alabama Appleseed to provide Alabama consumers with alternatives to payday loans.Don't forget to add that you plan to take your complaint to the Ombudsman if it's rejected again.Some lose the cars they need to get to work, or they struggle to pay rent after lenders make their electronic withdrawals.Jennifer secured two loans last fall by writing personal checks from her checking account.Read more…The majority of lenders use credit checks when assessing a loan application.It would also reward loyalty, with an anniversary bonus of 2.To do this, you should always get rid of the ad's border, type all of your content using the same font as the ad, and match the font's color to how to make money online for free paypal rest of your site. buy viagra without a prescriptionWith the cashback, this equates, typically, to 7.Putting aside funds for the very purpose of immediate cash flow problems.Do not include ".By visiting our Website and submitting your application, you understand and agree that we may contact you via the phone number or e-mail address you enter on your loan application to assist you with your loan or to discuss other products and services that Lending Stream may provide for you.I t will just take hours and you money will be transferred from the bank you wish to get it.But just under the GPA on the scale of importance in a college app?Not everyone qualifies for a loan.When money gets tight, the easiest thing to do is to get a payday loan also called a cash advance loan.To avoid a hold or running out of funds, you could pay cash for certain purchases or try to maintain a higher card balance.It will base its Asia operations in Shanghai.Payday loans no guarantor is the financial assistance that make you sure having funds to being prevent from your entire cash crisis with no hassles and without any further delay.AKRON, OH, 44302 Phone: 330-376-4136 Fax: 330-376-8681 L.Too many banners can actually hurt a company because it's too distracting.Find the contact details for the main banks in the PPI reclaiming's getting easier MSE News story.If you know you owe a tax balance meaning the IRS didn't make a mistake, you filed the return correctly, and the balance can't b e reduced by filing an amendment , there is one way to avoid a levy, and it's the same way to remove the levy: Get into an agreement with the IRS to pay the balance.RestrictionsYou must be employed and over the age of 18 years old.And last night there were calls for the Government to clamp down on the loan firms amid fears that thousands of families could be plunged into spiralling debt.Put in a little money from each paycheck until you have a good amount, such as 0.And they got machine guns.You earn money by doing free offers, surveys, watching ads, shopping online, participating in live contests and referring your friends and family members to the site.Consumer debt by online payday loans can easily make a vicious circle that you come additionally and further straight to debts each and every successive payday loan addition.However, the results of our financial services tools, blog content and reviews are based on objective analysis.The repayment fees are set in accordance with Aus tralian Government regulations and are calculated depending on your loan amount.We may share the personal data You submit or that We collect with third parties involved in the process of providing the products and services You may request. BEST PRICE 100MG GENERIC VIAGRAAlso i have a full UK diving license.To apply for a bad credit installment loan, you will need to supply the following information: Age.Well, continue to reading this post to discover one of the fastest way to make Paypal money fast.Quite the contrary: cars depreciate like crazy.Kate 800 Pts Twice a day MEDIUM Order twice on the same day.Copyright © All rights reserved.
Source: BEST INDIA VIAGRA AND PRICE - cialis tablets for sale