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Cyanogen partners with Truecaller to build a native smart dialer app

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Cyanogen has inked a deal with Truecaller to work on a smart dialer app. Truecaller offers smart caller ID capability to let users see the caller’s name on a device’s screen and later report it in case of a spam call.

Right now, users have to download the Truecaller app for Android to enjoy the caller ID functionality. Read more »

Flickr redesign brings new Uploadr, Camera Roll, Search and other features

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Yahoo!-owned photo-sharing service Flickr just rolled out a complete design overhaul of its service for web, desktop, and mobile. The new Flickr also includes new features to make the experience more than just a cosmetic facelift.

New unified search is one major improvement in the new design, which makes image search fast and intuitive. Read more »

Check out the engineering video of the Samsung Galaxy S6 edge

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After being mocked for building plastic flagship for years, Samsung has certainly given its best with the new Galaxy S6 edge smartphone. While the company can’t stop bragging about the aesthetics of the curved display, its latest video is focusing on the engineering behind it.

Don’t worry, you won’t get an hour long boring walkthrough of the entire process – the video is just a snapshot of it in under a minute and a half. Read more »

Original Snake game maker to release Snake Rewind for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone

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Before the Angry Birds and Candy Crush Saga, the most popular mobile game was Snake that came preloaded on the Nokia’s monochrome era phones. Taneli Armento, created the original Snake game for Nokia phones and has now teamed up with Rumilus Design to release the iconic Snake game for smartphones.

Snake Rewind is the modern day reboot of the original snake game and will certainly include the gameplay and the elements from of the original game. Obviously the new game will be improved with eye pleasing visuals plus a slew of interesting features such as letting the user play the game even after the snake has crashed. Read more »

Reddit announces Original Video to bring Ask Me Anything to life

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From weird images to latest breaking news, reddit front page has quickly turned into a window to a large number of user-shared content. Unlike many other community-drived websites, reddit accommodates a myriad variety of popular to niche communities and labelled them as subreddits.

Alex Ohanian, co-founder of reddit, has now announced the new reddit Original Video site to drive its original content plan at the on-going TechCrunch Disrupt conference. With Original Video, reddit plans to transform its Ask Me Anything subreddit to video style and give more control over it. Read more »

AppleBot now crawls the web to power Siri and Spotlight searches

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Apple is now running its web crawler dubbed AppleBot to scour the web and aid search services used in Spotlight for Mac and Siri for iOS. All the search queries will now be routed and powered by AppleBot, not by Google or Bing. Support documents don’t mention when the change was initiated.

AppleBot operates similarly as the GoogleBot, and crawls the web to discover new pages as well as ones that have been updated. Read more »

Microsoft goes bold with middle finger emoji in Windows 10

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A month ago, Apple sparked a conversation about the emojis by including the racially diverse ones in the OS X 10.10. 3 and iOS 8.3 update. While those ripples were disrupting the pond, Microsoft has gone a step ahead by throwing in a bold emoji in the Windows 10.

One of the latest builds of the Windows 10 Technical Preview includes the bold middle finger emoji. Often referred as the finger or flipper, that emoji comes along with various skin tones as well. Technically being referred a “reverse hand with middle finger extended”, this emoji sounds nothing close to profane one at least in the Unicode Consortium’s listing. Read more »

Microsoft Office 2016 Public Preview now available as free download

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A public preview version of Microsoft Office 2016 has been released for all Windows users to download and try out. Microsoft is working to release the next version of its productivity suite by the second half this year.

Microsoft Office 2016 brings in new tricks including Universal Apps, which were showcased during the BUILD 2015 conference last week. Read more »

LG Call app lets you make call from Watch Urbane

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Earlier this week, LG had released the Watch Urbane smartwatch running the Android Wear platform on Google Play Store. The Watch Urbane indeed is looker and with its attractive price is one of the more interesting propositions on the market.

Now to sweeten the deal even further an LG Call app for the Android Wear platform has been released to let the Watch Urbane owners make a call directly, without the need for you to take the phone out from your pocket. Read more »

VLC for Android gets support for video playback in the background

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VLC for Android is a video player, which plays almost any video as well as audio file format from the get go. A new update brings the app a step higher than other video players by adding background playback for video.

The new version of VLC for Android also gets a new look for album view and audio player alongside more Lollipop-centric effects. Read more »

HTC Camera app update brings RAW file support for One M9

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Google has brought the much awaited support for the RAW file format images with the Android 5.0 Lollipop update. While many handset makers have not considered this special file format support in their respective camera apps, few are already marching ahead with it for the glory.

HTC has pushed a new update for its Camera app and added the RAW file format support but only for the flagship One M9. Hopefully this feature is made available to other HTC phones as well. Read more »

Microsoft shares new Windows 10 design for phones

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Microsoft made a bunch of announcements such as the Microsoft Edge, Windows Universal Platform, Continuum, and more at the BUILD 2015 conference. While the conference was mostly about desktop platform, Joe Belfoire, VP for Operating Systems Group promised to share more about Windows 10 for phones.

Now Microsoft shared a quick look at the upcoming design changes in the user interface with the Windows 10 for phones. The new design language has been created for more flexible controls – in Microsoft terms “Adaptive UX”. Read more »

Samsung and Marvel release Avengers themed Galaxy S6 edge promo

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Samsung has teamed up with Marvel Worldwide to work on a limited edition Avengers superheroes themed Galaxy S6 edge. Both companies have worked together to release the first promo dubbed ‘Assemble’ showing the Galaxy S6 edge Avengers edition smartphone.

The promo comprises of a Marvel’s fictional superhero characters – Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Black Widow, Thor, and Hawkeye. In the promo each character gets a briefcase which packs a special customized edition of the Galaxy S6 edge to match with the persona of the superhero. Read more »

Microsoft makes Skype calls free to and from Nepal as part of relief efforts

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A devastating earthquake shook Nepal and affected thousands over the weekend. Ongoing rescue efforts and relief drives are being multiplied to search for those trapped or stranded, and bring them to a safe place. The earthquake also crippled the communications system for several hours but has been restored to keep the ball rolling.

While many US based mobile operators are waiving off charges and making international calls to Nepal cheaper, the software companies are making VoIP calls free. Google has discounted the rates of the Google Voice calling. In the mean time, Microsoft has announced it will offer free calls to landlines as well as mobile phones made to and from Nepal. No Skype credit is required for these calls. Read more »

Motorola Moto 360, LG G Watch R prices slashed on the Google Play Store

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Earlier this month, Motorola Moto 360 smartwatch got a $70 price cut and the leather strap model was available for purchase from Amazon and Best Buy. That coincided with the arrival of the Apple Watch.

Now even the Google Play Store is offering the Motorola Moto 360 smartwatch for $180 and this price cut is said to be permanent. Along with that, the LG G Watch R model also got a $50 price cut and is available at a new effective price of $250. Read more »