It’s a big week in tech as the Apple WWDC and E3 kick into full swing. From the newest generation games to new operating system naming conventions, Tech2U is here to give you the scoop on the hottest News from Apple WWDC & E3.
Apple has released there newest operating system for Macs which they are calling macOS Sierra. Sierra will now include Apple’s AI Siri which has been enhanced for the new systems. Siri is now much more capable and can answer commands such as “Show the PDFs in my Downloads Folder,” or “Show my photos from yesterday”. Along with the vast Siri improvements, Sierra hosts a variety of new features such as optimized storage, copying on one device and pasting in another, and auto unlocks of your Mac device when you are wearing an Apple watch.
iOS 10 and the Apple watch also boast a host of new features, both including a new hand writing feature. Writing characters on the screen will now transform them into actual text and can make typing and writing on the Apple watch a much more enjoyable and intuitive experience on the small screen. Along with the dynamic hand writing, text messages will now include predictive emoji’s, bubble effects, and even optional full-screen effects.
Overall we think Apple had a great developers conference and we are excited to play with all of the new macOS features. Siri is a big winner this time around and the AI is slowly moving away from the gimicky software it started out to be and is closing on to the point of reliability and actual usability which is exciting.
The Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3, has shown year after year the amazing growth of the video game industry. This year is no different and Microsoft has come out firing with two new consoles. The Xbox One S is the continuation of the Xbox One series gaming consoles. The Xbox One S is an overall great improvement of the Xbox One, featuring a 4k video player and support for 4k gaming. The more surprising Xbox Project Scorpio
has us at Tech2U very intrigued. Microsoft is aiming to challenge the performance that PC gamers have long enjoyed by releasing a high end console boasting very comparable specs to a fully fledged gaming PC. The Scorpio is set to release in late 2017 and will be VR ready which is a must in today’s growing VR market. Sony also announced there own Playstation VR that is set to come out in October and will have an arsenal of over 50 titles by the end of the year.
App of the Week:
Streaks is a fun little app to help you stay on task and form great habits. With a list of to-do’s and quick visual reminders, Streaks makes doing the mundane fun again and even lets you build up “streaks” by completing your goals in a row. The app can be found for $3.99 on your respective app stores.
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Video Transcription:
Interviewer: This week, a big week if you follow tech news, with two major conferences — one held by Apple announcing their latest software update and another all about gaming. Mike Wisby from Tech2U is here to share the latest news from Apple’s worldwide developers conference and the Electronic Entertainment Expo, E3. So Mike, welcome. What did Apple announce?
Mike: So Apple have standardized their operating system names now, so it’s macOS instead of OS X which is OS 10. Now that falls in line with iOS, tvOS and watchOS. So it makes it very simple for them just to tell you what the OS does. iOS 10 is gonna be a major release, and that’s gonna happen in the fall. You can also sign up for a beta in July, if you wanna be one of the first ones to test it out.
What they’re doing, there’s a lot of things, they had a two-hour conference about it, and I’m just gonna try and summarize it for you. MACs are gonna be opened up to developers. So that means that you’re gonna see more integrations in what MACs are gonna do. You’re gonna see things pop up and things like that perhaps.
iMessages are gonna have a real nice sort of reboot. It’s gonna have predictive emojis, so as you’re typing, it’s gonnna suggest emojis for you that fit what you’re saying.
Interviewer: Whoa, I don’t even have to think about emojis anymore.
Mike: They’re really making it simple, really cool.
Interviewer: It’s like multiple choice.
Mike: Exactly, yeah. And the cool thing is it’s gonna actually highlight words that they have emojis for, so you can really simplify it if you really just wanna talk in nonstop emojis, you can do that.
Interviewer: What about the Electronics Entertainment Expo? What came out of that that’s most interesting?
Mike: They’re actually gonna be releasing a new Xbox very soon. It’s called the Xbox One S, and it’s a slimmed-down version, so it’s not so bulky, and it actually has a 4K video support. So that’s really cool. And they also announced a new project for a new console called Xbox Project Scorpio and it’s gonna be the most advanced console ever.Iit’s gonna be VR ready. They’re gonna launch that next fall, but they gave us really early announcement about that, so you can kind of predict what you’re gonna buy, so maybe don’t buy the latest console. Wait for the new one next year.
PlayStation, in October, are releasing a VR version, and they expect 50 titles by the end of the year.
Interviewer: Okay. Anything else you wanna add to Tech News? Anything you else coming out?
Mike: Yes. Microsoft actually bought Linkedin this week for $26.2 billion. That’s a lot of money. That’s a huge amount of money, and we’re all kind of curious as to what they’re gonna do with that. Microsoft don’t maybe not have a history of buying out companies and making them useful. They bought out Nokia last year and we haven’t really seen much with that, but we’re gonna see what they do with that. We kind of expect that they’re gonna integrate it with their current business products, it’s gonna be more of a business world [SP] kind of thing.
Interviewer: Will the Linkedin name stay, you think?
Mike: I think so. I don’t think we’re gonna see much difference with the consumers. It’s gonna be staying the same, I think.
Interviewer: You have an app of the week for us
Mike: Yes, app of the week this week is Streaks.
Interviewer: Streaks
Mike: Streaks. Not like the streaks you get on windows or the other kind of streak where you take off your clothes and run [inaudible 00:03:02].
Interviewer: Oh, streaking.
Mike: [Inaudible 00:03:04] streaking. It’s Streaks, it rewards you for actually continuously hitting your goals. So you can say, it’s Streaks, you can pick up the six different things that you wanna become a habit, and you can do that and it kind of gamifies your life. If you wanna walk the dog every day, and maybe you don’t every day, same time, this will reward you by doing a streak of that. If you wanna do it five days in a row, it will just give you a little badge saying, “Hey, well done. You did it.”
Interviewer: Wow, we gotta work for something.
Mike: That’s right
Interviewer: The pride of Great Britain, Mike Wisby. Thank you, my friend.
Mike: Thank you very much.
Interviewer: Tech2U, always great to have you here. Okay, when we come back…
