With a host of improvements rumoured for the next Kinect, it’s a little surprising to see that there’s still room for the current Kinect to get better: Microsoft has added face tracking capabilities to Kinect through a software update. Which means, Kinect will be able to read and react to your facial expressions.
Like the Start menu, come Windows 8, the Aero Glass interface we’ve come to love (or adjust to) will be no more, according to a post on Microsoft’s development blog. Apparently, Redmond has “moved beyond” the design, which debuted way back in 2006 with Windows Vista, and is keen to embrace an approach it feels is “clean and crisp”.
So Giz hit up the Nokia preview event in Sydney tonight, and there’s lots of news to share. Alex will have more hands-on thoughts for you in the morning, but for the moment, here’s what we’ve learnt…
Windows 8 is built on the idea that the web has great functions but a lousy user experience — and it uses apps to pull everything into a bright, clean parallel world. FastCo Design’s Austin Carr shows how Windows 8 will make using the web a better, more pleasant experience.
Windows 8 is stirring up a fair deal of controversy for Microsoft. Now, Intel has come out as saying that it thinks that running the new OS on ARM hardware is going to prove difficult.
If you’re used to freely choosing which browser you use in Windows, brace yourself: Mozilla is claiming that Microsoft is planning to limit user choice for browsers on tablets running Windows 8.
Kinect has drawn a huge amount of interest — not just from gamers but computer scientists, engineers and artists. Now, it seems Microsoft is branching out, because one of its latest research projects offers gesture control powered by just a computer’s speakers, microphone and some inaudible sound.
That story that came via the Korea Herald the other day, proclaiming that LG was getting out of providing Windows Phone 7 hardware? Not so, says LG, although it is “focusing” on Android.
Following Microsoft’s investment in a Nook spin-off and the continued success of Barnes & Noble’s ereading empire, we can expect to see some serious changes in the future. In fact, William Lynch, who heads up Nook, has already let a few of them slip.
Skype’s peer to peer underpinnings are one of those things that everybody knows about, but underneath the surface, Microsoft has made changes to the system; while it’s still peer to peer based, it’s backed up with, of all things, Linux supernodes.
