This week, Samsung’s 4K all-in-one VR headset design was revealed, Apple’s patent for tech to track hand gestures emerged, a Sydney man implanted his travel card into his hand and Volvo admits their self-driving cars are incredibly confused by kangaroos.
I think this might be the first issue to feature a kangaroo in the image!
Virtual Reality
Have we properly considered personal space in virtual reality?
Want to make an engaging virtual reality app? There is so much involved in calculating appropriate personal space!
Samsung reveals 4K ExynosVR standalone reference design with eye-tracking
This is exciting! A look at Samsung’s all-in-one VR headset.
Samsung field patent for magnetic controllers for VR
The controllers would have “more visceral and accurate hand-tracking”.
Oculus now supports mixed reality capture natively
It is now easier for devs to record mixed reality videos.
Design a pleasant user experience inside the VR
A well thought out look into designing for VR. Worth a read!
Palmer Luckey donates to software that breaks Oculus exclusivity
This is good! Palmer still cares about keeping VR games cross-platform!
Equal Reality is moving fast, and we want your help to improve diversity with virtual reality
Our friends at Equal Reality are working on reducing unconscious bias using VR and they’re doing incredibly well. They’ve got a mobile VR prototype too!
GoogleVR Cardboard: Switch between normal mode and VR mode at run-time
How to toggle VR mode in Unity-based Cardboard apps.
Manus VR showcase physical interaction ahead of dev kit shipments
Here’s a short preview video of these tracking gloves!
Making VR accessible for people with physical disabilities
Walkin VR is making it easier for people with physical disabilities to use VR.
You won’t escape Google ads in VR
Google ads are coming to VR at some point, but Engadget say they might not be as grating as you think.
Thermoreal lets you feel heat, cold and even pain in VR and AR
Yep. The one thing we’ve been asking for is to feel pain in VR. Thanks.
Augmented and Mixed Reality
Apple invents a 3D depth mapping camera for hand gesturing interfaces for future Macs and smartglasses
More of a glimpse into Apple’s plans for their AR future.
Windows Mixed Reality – Acer and HoloLens side-by-side
This YouTube video shows Acer’s VR headset and HoloLens working together.
Alpha Glass gives you a dose of AR without looking like a Glasshole
These AR glasses are looking for crowdfunding from devs who want AR glasses that don’t look as bulky or obvious.
Augmented reality studio castAR reportedly closes its doors
castAR, formed by Valve’s former AR team, has reportedly shut down.
Apple ARKit user puts a color changing Tesla Model 3 in his driveway before the car’s release
The power of AR!
Wearables
Sydney man has Opal card implanted into hand to make catching public transport easier
We spoke about insertables with Kayla Heffernan in May, now this Sydney guy has done some hackery to make his public transport journey easier!
What’s going on with those Android Wear 2.0 notification issues?
If you’ve been having issues seeing some notifications on Android Wear 2.0, it turns out… you’re not the only one!
Fitbit working on Charge 3 and Blaze 2 trackers for 2018
The company isn’t pulling everything to its smartwatch, which I’d say is a good thing. Its other trackers are still being improved.
How much sleep do Fitbit users really get? A new study finds out
Always interesting to see studies that use connected devices like Fitbits!
Heart rate variability: why we are glad to see Fitbit and Garmin embrace it
If you’re working on wearables for health, consider measuring heart rate variability too, rather than just the typical heart rate monitoring.
Artificial Intelligence, Autonomous Vehicles and Robotics
Lessons from giving Melissa, a virtual assistant, its own UI interface
Tanay Pant, a friend of Dev Diner, spoke with us about bringing a UI interface to his open-source AI chatbot, Melissa.
Run Google Assistant on your Amazon Echo
An implementation of the Google Assistant API wrapped as an Alexa skill!
Teaching robots to learn about the world through touch
Research published on teaching the Baxter robot about objects through repeated interactions with them.
Microsoft squeezed AI onto a Raspberry Pi
They’ve found a way to compress their neural networks to occasionally be able to run on a Raspberry Pi. That’s not easy to do!
Instagram unleashes a smart algorithm to blast away nasty comments
Let AI take care of those trolls so we don’t have to. Hooray!
MIT CSAIL research offers a fully automated way to peer inside neural nets
Peeking into those mysterious neural nets is a tough challenge to solve!
Volvo’s self-driving cars can’t get their heads around kangaroos
You know what’s challenging for self-driving cars? Kangaroos. Just ask Volvo.
Artificial synapses could lead to smarter AI
By replicating our brain’s 100 trillion synapses, scientists hope to boost the versatility of artificial neural networks.
The reality of automating customer service chat with AI today
Using AI in customer service is a common use case, here are some real world considerations that need to go into implementing such a system.
Adobe launches voice analytics for Siri, Alexa, and other intelligent assistants
Adobe Analytics Cloud can now track the performance of assistants like Alexa, Siri, Google Assistant, Cortana, and Samsung’s Bixby.
Volvo and Autoliv aim to sell self-driving cars with Nvidia AI tech by 2021
Volvo, Autoliv and Nvidia are making real steps to get to self-driving cars!
Ford creates a new dedicated robotics and AI research team
I’m surprised they didn’t already have one?
Internet of Things
The state of boards: small, simple hardware rules
A great look at microcontroller boards and single-board computers.
Alibaba is about to launch an Amazon Echo competitor for China that only speaks mandarin
Amazon Echo-like devices are popping up everywhere!
How to make your own smart speaker
Seeing as everyone else is making a smart speaker, why not you too? Right?
CIA contractors fired for stealing from hacked IoT snack machines
Not our snacks! Let them take anything but our snacks!
Manage a fleet of drones
Controlling a fleet of drones using NodeJS, Raspberry Pi, AWS IoT and Amazon Alexa! (Thanks Malcolm for this link!)
Google accidentally pushed Bluetooth update for home speaker early
Looks like you can start pairing with Bluetooth devices even sooner!
Google Home rolls out multiple account access in UK
I assume this was on purpose.
Android Things developer preview 4.1 is out, with improvements to Play services and more
It’s a small update but useful to know for anyone working with this!
Got questions on emerging tech? Feel free to DM me on Twitter, Snapchat me (devdiner) or just send me an email and ask! That’s what Dev Diner is here for 🙂
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Charlie Fink on how the world will be painted with data
Charlie Fink, an AR/VR consultant, speaker, Forbes columnist and author — most recently of his new book "Convergence, How The World Will Be Painted With Data" — was kind enough to take a moment to answer a few of my questions about his new book all about augmented reality.
How to completely disable the camera on the the Amazon Echo Spot
How do you make sure that your Amazon Echo Spot camera is never going to record your every move in the bedroom? It's a fantastic bedside clock, but people are often not comfortable with a camera staring at them beside their bed. We've got it totally disabled. Here's how!
Voice interfaces got you confused?
Learn to build for the Amazon Echo, Google Home, Facebook Messenger, Slack & more!