Opera Open VPN – Available
for Apple mobile devices and soon to be available for the desk top web browser
Opera has created a free VPN. If you are unfamiliar a VPN is a Virtual Private
Network which allows a user to connect to a computer network to either have
access to network assets (files or computing resources) or mask their online
activities and location. There are a wide variety of reasons to use a VPN but
the main use that concerns most people is protecting their personal information
while on an open / unsecured Wi-Fi connection such as our Library Free network
or hotspots at businesses. I have used it for two weeks and have found it to be
quick, gives you the option of which country you would like your location to be
connected in, and it blocks some ads and cookies. Opera is continuing to work
on it to make it faster and more secure. Right now it is a very nice free VPN
option for mobile devices.
Opera Browser – Available
for Android, Apple devices, Linux, and Windows devices this web browser uses
several techniques to reduce load time and power usage while surfing the web. If
you make a change to the setting you can take advantage of built in ad
blocking. Users that download the “Surf Easy” extension can use Opera’s free
VPN. In my use of both the mobile and desktop versions I have found decreased
RAM usage, faster load time, and less battery usage compared to Chrome or
Firefox. http://www.opera.com/
Aioply Vision –
an app created for the blind and visually impaired that says what items are in
real time or what color it sees in real time. It doesn’t know everything it
sees but users can tell it what it is pointed at helping it learn. http://www.aipoly.com/
Hound – You may
be familiar with Siri, Alexa, Cortana, or Ok Google’s digital assistants. This
one is faster and does a lot more. For instance you can say, “Find Asian
restaurants near me”, you can then say “exclude Korean and Chinese”, and then
say “open after 9pm”. Each time it remembers your previous statements and
continues to give you results. It does a good job of looking back in time or
ahead at weather information, like asking, “What’s the chance of rain next
Tuesday in Potland Oregon”. It does a bunch of things, available for Android
and iOS http://www.soundhound.com/hound
New York Times article about Windows 10 upgrade problems, why they happen and how to avoid them http://goo.gl/Z9VPcB
IFTTT Recipes and Do
Button – If This Then That has a lot of new recipes that can automate tasks
between apps and home automation equipment. The Do app has some new recipes
that you can tap on a button and it can do things like send preset e-mail, open
a door lock, change thermostat, or turn on lights (of course this all depends
on the equipment you have).
Fast.com – a
webpage created by Netflix that quickly measures your internet connection speed
This week was Google’s Developer Conference, Google IO, they released information
about new products, updates, features. You can read about them here: http://goo.gl/Ha4zop
Wired Magazine had a very thorough article about virtual
reality, augmented reality, and mixed reality in which it featured one of the
most promising and mysterious companies Magic
Leap. Funded at 1.4 billion dollars it has the backing of some of the
biggest names in technology. It’s a long article but if nothing else, skip down
to the video of what it looks like looking through Magic Leap glasses http://www.wired.com/2016/04/magic-leap-vr/
