Puma develops robot to help train runners

Serious runners always need to better their times to make sure they stay competitive. But you won’t always have your fastest running buddy with you. Enter the Puma BeatBot robot. The ‘bot was created by Puma’s advertising agency: J. Walter Thompson New York with the help of a robotics engineer from NASA and a group of MIT students. This robot comes with nine downward-facing infrared sensors capable of tracking straight and curved lines on the ground. It can follow the existing lane-marking lines and make 100 steering adjustments a second so it stays on target. It runs on an Arduino microcontroller and a 9-axis accelerometer. It has front and rear row LEDs so you can keep an eye on it and it has forward and backward-facing GoPro cameras to record your performance.

Puma isn’t saying what the maximum speed of the BeatBot is but it can keep up with Usain Bolt’s 100-meter dash world record of 44.7km/h (27.4mph). It can be used with the accompanying smartphone app where you can input the distance you plan to go and the time you’d like to beat. And then you place the BeatBot o the starting line alongside you and wait for it to beep three times before you start running. It’ll move along with you on its own line and determines the speed and distance it travels by counting the wheel revolutions it does. If you end up beating it, then you meet your goal. Puma isn’t saying if this’ll make it into stores. But it could also just be for sponsored runners to use for training.

Source: Gizmag

Huawei and Xiaomi will reportedly release their own curved devices

There might be more curved devices in our future and this might be thanks to Samsung and LG. There are reports that Xiaomi and Huawei plan to release their own devices that come with curved displays with panels taken from LG and Samsung, respectively.

LG will reportedly be supplying Xiaomi with the panel they’ll need to build the Mi Edge or Mi Note Edge, using the screen LG uses for its G Flex series. The phone will supposedly run on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor, 4GB of RAM, and a 16-megapixel camera. It’ll reportedly be priced at US$463 (around CA$590). Meanwhile, Huawei is rumoured to be tapping Samsung and its tech to create the Mate Edge. Their edge phone will supposedly be using Huawei’s in-house Kirin 950 chipset and will have 4GB of RAM as well. Cost of this device is reportedly $617 (around $790). Of course at the moment, this is all still speculation. We have to wait for confirmation from the brands. So right now, take these rumours with a grain of salt.

Source: Android Community

IBM makes quantum computing available to the public via the cloud

IBM today opened up its cloud-powered quantum computing capability to the public. Because of this never done before move, researchers and scientists will have access and can run experiments on an IBM quantum processor connected to the cloud. They will be able to explore the vast possibilities of quantum computing, and help discover new applications for the technology that could lead to solving problems that are impossible to solve with today’s supercomputers. 

The cloud-enabled quantum computing platform, called IBM Quantum Experience, will allow users to run algorithms and experiments on IBM’s quantum processor, work with the individual quantum bits (qubits), and explore tutorials and simulations around what might be possible with quantum computing. 

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Facebook trying out Snapchat-like disappearing messages on Messenger

Facebook seems to be taking the cue from Snapchat and is testing out disappearing messages on its Messenger for iOS. The screenshots posted by Twitter user @iOSAppChanges show that users can set time limits for their messages, whether these be for a minute, after 15 minutes, an hour, four hours, or one day. This could appeal to users, especially the young crowd who use apps like Snapchat, who don’t want to have their messages stay online. It could also give its users more control over their private communications and even help deter Facebook from getting embroiled in its own Apple vs. FBI-like battle since it can no longer access these disappearing messages.

Source: MacWorld