It’s all about connections, this metaverse, and social media tools abound to enable them on the Web. We created the =I= NetConnect to let your friends and colleagues connect to you from within virtual worlds. The possibilities are endless.

Are you a musician in Second Life, working to be discovered? An =I= Netconnect next to a tip jar gives your audiences the ability to connect to you across the metaverse. Your NetConnect may have buttons for your SoundCloud or Vimeo sites, for example, and there’s room for up to 12 buttons. The screen (shown with the =IcaruS= logo) can be customised to show your own logo.

Are you an educator or researcher, using Second Life as a teaching and study medium? You may be a frequent lecturer or presenter in different venues, which are ideal places to find new people to connect to you – newfound colleagues, research collaborators, students and others. With the NetConnect, your audiences can link to you through your LinkedIn, SlideShare or Tumblr accounts. It even serves as a presentation aid for you!

Even when you simply want to let other people connect to you beyond SL – you can wear the =I= NetConnect Badge, which is a miniature, wearable version for your avatar. It’s especially good in those places where you cannot rez the full size NetConnect.

You can configure custom buttons for any of your networks, but the =I= NetConnect comes with a selection of presets:

Give your fans and followers or just the curious a great way to see your social links.

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Filed under: =IcaruS= - Second Life Blog
Tags: « 3D • =I= NetConnect • =IcaruS= • community • metaverse • social media • virtual products »
by IcaruS
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Android devices are de rigueur these days with smartphones and tablets, due to their high spec and capability coupled with value for money. But far fewer of us have Android (Unix/Google) PCs, so how well do these devices work with Windows? “Very well” is the short answer. Below are a few useful apps that take advantage of that. In particular, we are looking at transferring files between your PC and Android device, bearing in mind what’s free to use. You could just plug it into your USB device, but we will be looking at doing it wirelessly (there’s little point in having a portable device and having to be stuck to your PC to use it, is there?).

Splashtop 2

This app lets you take control of your PC from your Android device, putting your desktop and all of its capability onto your Android screen. It’s in 2 parts, with a server app for the PC running in the tool tray and your viewing app on the device. It can be used in touchscreen mode, as a trackpad (including mousewheel) and using your device keyboard or the touch keyboard on the desktop.

The audio from your PC will even pipe through to your device too, so running games and audio apps isn’t a problem. On a wifi network its surprisingly fast frame rate and when screen sharing or using remote desktop tools, it doesn’t close the display on the PC when you are using it too. The Windows 8 Metro view (or whatever they’re calling it these days) works really well – it’s aimed at touchscreen devices, so XBox games can be run from an Android tablet, for example.

AirDroid

This works the other way round, sharing what’s on your Android with your PC.

It has extra little features, like a snapshot option, and your common folders like Photos, Music, etc are easily accessible, along with some basic device information, like available storage space and battery life, etc. It displays like a PC desktop, opening folders and such in a similar way. It’s easy to access by just typing the given address into a web browser.

Wifi File Transfer

Similar to AirDroid, this makes your device accessible thru a web browser, but it shows it in more of a directory structure format, making it easy to transfer files in either direction.

Tonido

Tonido crosses over into what we will be looking at next time: a streaming option, not just file transfer. This app displays all your drives and folders from your PC to your device, but files such as music and video can be streamed and played to your device without having to download them. This is a big advantage if you have a 40-gigabyte music folder, for example. You can select and stream them from the desktop so as not to fill up your device’s storage. The free version works as well as the paid version; the main benefit of the paid version is the available cloud storage space – Tonido offer plans with more than 2 gigabytes cloud storage, similar to Dropbox. It isn’t really needed if you are just using it for file transfer and streaming, so it’s a good choice if you like to stream movies or music from your PC.

There are other apps that are specific to this task that we will look into next time, but Tonido pretty much does all this anyway. It just lacks some features, like a graphic equilizer, and minor aesthetics.

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Filed under: =IcaruS= - OS
Tags: « =IcaruS= • Android • apps • smartphones • technology • windows 8 »
by IcaruS
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Got the latest remote control toy for your smartphone? It seems to be a growing trend for smartphones users, but by no means is it a new one. In late 2003, Sony released the RC-100 for P800 and P900 touchscreen smartphones; this nifty little bluetooth car connected to your phone for charging with accompanying software that had a throttle, gears and a steering wheel with which to control the car from the screen. This was one of the first accessories Leon got for his P900 phone back in 2004. He still has the RC-100 today – it is a great exercise device for his cat!

Back then, smartphones weren’t mainstream as certain companies had not joined the bandwagon yet or put their marketing engines behind them to excite the masses, but they were there, none the less, for those who wanted smartphones for practical uses rather than as fashion accessories (though the car could hardly be called practical – just fun).

These sorts of accessories will continue to grow as tablets increase in the mainstream. They make great presents for people who you know have a smartphone/tablet device.

These sort of ‘add-ons’ can also be good for people who bought their smartphone ‘because it was the thing to have’ but then find they don’t really use most of its features. It was bought ‘to keep up with the Joneses’ rather than to fill a practical need. It’s probably not the best example of a smartphone accessory, but it’s an example.

Probably a better example is the Jawbone wrist strap that monitors your movements and can display activity graphs.

Whether practical or just fun, we will see rapid continued growth in these sorts of accessories for smartphones in the near future.

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Filed under: =IcaruS= - OS
Tags: « =IcaruS= • apps • smartphones • technology »
by IcaruS
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