Leaked Samsung App Wants to Track Everything You Do

Samsung calls the Galaxy S4 your “life companion,” but it could take that idea one step further with its next smartphone release. Newly leaked screenshots from an unnamed Samsung phone showcase an app that creates a virtual diary based on your activity.

The app, which is said to be called Life Times, collects information from other apps and services on your phone including call logs, messages, photos and social networks. It then presents your recent activity in one centralized location, which Samsung appears to be touting as a digital diary. With the tagline “Every time is your episodes,” it’s clear Samsung is attempting to build on the suite of personalized apps it introduced with the Galaxy S4.

MORE: Samsung Galaxy S5 Rumors: Specs, Features and More

Judging by the leaked screenshots, which were exclusively obtained by Sam Mobile, users will be able to choose which services integrate with Life Times. The app is likely to be compatible with Foursquare, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn since they’re listed in the interface, but we’ll have to wait to hear from Samsung to know for sure.

The Samsung news blog also claims the screenshots were taken on a phone with the model number SM-G900H, which is rumored to be a variant of the Galaxy S5. The website couldn’t confirm that the screens were taken from Samsung’s next flagship, however.

Life Times sounds suspiciously similar to Sony’s LifeLog app, which was unveiled at CES 2014. Sony’s virtual assistant does exactly as its name implies- it obtains data from your phone to create a timeline of your day that you can playback in chronological order. This means that if you snapped a photo on your way to work, it’ll show up on your timeline for that day. Sony’s offering is meant to work with its SmartBand fitness tracker as well, which is expected to cost around $135 when it launches.

The leak also suggests Samsung is making a bigger push to create its own app ecosystem and decrease its reliance on Google. Samsung is expected to make some fairly significant announcements regarding its work with Tizen at next month’s Mobile World Congress, further hinting that a Samsung-branded OS could be in the works.

Lisa has been reporting on all things mobile for Laptopmag.com since early 2013. When she’s not reviewing gadgets, she’s usually browsing patent databases or interviewing experts to track down the hottest tech trends before they even happen. Lisa holds a B.A. in Journalism from SUNY Purchase and has contributed to The International Business Times, The New York Daily News and Guitar World Magazine.

From Laptopmagazine. Product reviews and advice for best reference

Dell XPS 27 Touch review: Looks are everything

When it comes to its high-end all-in-one PC lineup, Dell seems to be operating on the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” principle. The XPS 27 Touch packs a speedy new Haswell CPU under its hood, but that’s the only significant departure from earlier models.

Our review unit, which costs $2100 as of July 17, 2013, sports a quad-core Intel Core i7-4770S processor; 8GB of DDR3/1600 memory; a discrete video card (Nvidia’s GeForce GT 750M); and a roomy 2TB, 7200 rpm hard drive augmented by a 32GB mSATA SSD cache. That’s impressive for any all-in-one, and it helped the XPS 27 Touch deliver a Desktop Worldbench 8.1 score of 262, which means it’s more than two and a half times faster than our reference PC, Acer’s Aspire U. It’s also significantly faster than Vizio’s CA27T-B1. The displays on both of those models are limited to 1920 by 1080 pixels, but they’re also considerably less expensive (selling for $1000 and $1550 respectively).

The Dell XPS 27 Touch produced a high Desktop Worldbench 8.1 score (for an all-in-one, that is).

Nevertheless, the Dell’s score places the XPS 27 Touch solidly in the upper half of all the desktop systems we’ve tested so far, although it’s nowhere near the custom-built gaming rigs we’ve evaluated (Primordial Computer’s over-the-top, quad-Titan Medusa hit 385, while Micro Express’s single-GPU MicroFlex 47B scored 421). Unlike most all-in-ones, however, the XPS 27 will satisfy the gamers in your family—as long as their expectations aren’t too hardcore. In our Dirt Showdown, with the game’s resolution at 1024 by 768 pixels and image quality set to low, the XPS 27 delivered a strong 125.7 frames per second. Compare that to our reference PC, which relies on the integrated GPU in its Intel Core i5 3230M processor: It delivered Dirt Showdown at just 47.5 fps.

The XPS 27 Touch is a very reasonable gaming PC, provided you’re willing to compromise on resolution and image quality.

As befits a new AIO of the Windows 8 era, the XPS 27 is outfitted with a 10-point touchscreen display (this was an optional feature on previous models). Dell boasts that it’s the company’s “brightest and most versatile touch display” to date. I agree, it’s the best touchscreen I’ve seen from Dell. It’s extremely bright, and images and text look fantastically crisp and clear thanks to its 2560-by-1440 resolution. Multitouch gestures are smooth and easy to perform, and the bezel-less design makes using Windows 8 a breeze. But the display is not perfect. I have the same minor complaint about this screen as I had about Dell’s earlier XPS One 2710: Colors, especially skin tones, have a tendency to look oversaturated.

ROBERT CARDINThe dual-articulated hinge enables you to adjust the display’s height as well as its angle.

Dell’s XPS 27 Touch is a nice, attractive system, but I do wish the company had paid a little less attention to looks and a little more to usability. This AIO is super pretty, and the changes I want would probably make it a little less so. While the media card reader and two USB 3.0 ports are conveniently located on the left side of the bezel, the HDMI ports (in and out), Thunderbolt/Mini DisplayPort, gigabit ethernet, and four additional USB 3.0 ports on the back of the display are obscured by the stand and are difficult to reach.

ROBERT CARDINMany of the XPS 27 Touch’s I/O ports are obscured by the double-articulated stand (which enables you to adjust the height as well as the angle of the display).

I’m also not a fan of the four touch-sensitive buttons on the lower left corner on the front of the display. A proximity sensor causes these unlabeled buttons to light up when you hover your finger over them, although the only one you might use on a regular basis is the Eject button for the DVD burner. And speaking of optical drives, if you want a Blu-ray/DVD combo, you’ll need to move up to the $2600 model, which also comes with 16GB of memory and Windows 8 Pro. But if you get your movie fix via Internet streaming, you won’t care.

Aside from those quibbles, the Dell XPS 27 Touch is an exquisite all-in-one.

Sarah is a freelance writer and editor based in Silicon Valley. She has a love/hate relationship with social media and a bad habit of describing technology as "sexy."
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Make Web Apps More Manageable With Minimalist for Everything

Google Reader and Gmail are two of the most customizable Web apps available today. Need a different inbox layout? Sure thing. Want to change the colors or visual density? No problem. Still, some interface elements, like the Google Bar at the top of the window, will never go away, no matter what you do. If you wish they did, try free Chrome extension Minimalist for Everything.

Each module can contain numerous interface elements which you can easily remove, no coding needed.Using user-side JavaScript and CSS (cascading stylesheets) to customize websites is not a new idea. Greasemonkey and Stylish have been around for years, and some browsers now support user styles and user scripts natively. There are many such scripts and styles, each letting you tweak a certain website or group of websites. But they are not easy to customize: For example, the dark Tumblr stylesheet turns the Tumblr control panel dark, but it comes with just that particular color scheme. To configure it, you need be familiar with CSS, and then unpack and edit its compressed code. Not something most of us do for fun.

Minimalist for Everything brings a new level of refinement to the scene. Instead of an all-or-nothing proposition, now you can decide how much of a user style you want to apply. The add-on ships with modules for Google Reader and Gmail, which you can use turn on and off bits of the interface without writing any code. For example, maybe you want to hide Google's legal disclaimer from the footer, or maybe you want the Gmail search bar, but not the search button. Just find the right checkbox, tick it, and you're done. The interface is very friendly, and it's easy to find just the part you want to hide.

Modules can contain both CSS and JavaScript, for complete control over the Web app being customized .But what if you hide the top Google bar, only to discover you do use it now and then? No problem--hover over the top of the window and click the grey bar that appears: The Google bar will pop down. The two styles that ship with Minimalist for Everything contain many such collapsible elements, ideal for netbook computers and small displays.

To get this level of flexibility, user stylesheets and scripts need to be written specifically for the Minimalist for Everything add-on. If you're not a Web developer, you will probably just use the two modules that ship with the add-on. But if you are familiar with CSS and JavaScript, you can use the add-on's built-in tools for authoring new modules. There are no built-in debug facilities yet so writing the right CSS selectors can be tricky, but it took me about five minutes to create a module that selectively hides elements from the YouTube sidebar.

Minimalist for Everything currently has only rudimentary export/import functionality.You can also use Minimalist for Everything to install "regular" user styles, but then you don't get the level of configuration the add-on can offer for its own modules. The biggest missing piece in the Minimalist for Everything puzzle is an online repository that would let users exchange modules. Such a website would surely foster a thriving community of modders and customizers. Until that happens, Minimalist for Everything remains a powerful way for Chrome users to unclutter Google Reader and Gmail.

Note: The Download button takes you to the Chrome Web store, where you can download the latest version of the software.

--Erez Zukerman

From PCWorld. Visit Amazon Computer and Notebook Center here

The New iPad Hits 8 a.m. Friday, March 16: Everything You Need to Know

Campers, get your tents packed! The all-new Apple iPad is coming to Apple stores physical and digital in the U.S., Canada, France, Japan, Switzerland, and several other countries at 8 a.m. local time Friday morning. Apple CEO Tim Cook mentioned the third-generation iPad would be available on March 16 during last week’s signature keynote, but the specific time and list of countries are new details.

If you can’t wait to get your hands on Apple’s new slate and its eye-popping Retina display, here’s everything you need to know.

From Laptopmagazine. Visit Amazon Computer and Notebook Center Here