Samsung Galaxy S5 Firmware Update Speeds-Up Camera App and More

Samsung has rolled-out a firmware update for its flagship smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S5, enabling users to experience a faster access to gallery app and slightly more precise fingerprint sensor.

Besides the faster opening of the gallery app, the update also boosts the camera app opening speed of the Galaxy S5, reports Sammobile. This, when paired with the already existing 0.3 second autofocus feature of the handset, would offer even better ISOCELL camera experience to users.

The Galaxy S5 update additionally enhances the fingerprint scanner accuracy and the fingerprint reading time. The general performance of the Galaxy S5 (Review | Pictures) has also been improved along with better RAM management.

The Galaxy S5 firmware update, named G900FXXU1ANE2, is currently available for UK customers (International model - SMG900F) and might soon reach other regions, via OTA or Samsung Kies software. However, for those who can't wait to get their hands on the latest update, they can manually install it from Sammobile, though we do not recommend this.

This is not the first update for the Samsung Galaxy S5 handset since its launch at the MWC 2014. Last week, Samsung announced its latest Knox 2.0 security suite for the Galaxy S5, a suite that will be rolled out to other Samsung Galaxy devices through OS upgrades in the coming months.

The Knox Workspace includes a series of core security enhancements for devices from erratic kernels to third-party apps. Some of the features in Knox Workspace: TrustZone-protected certificate management, Knox key store, real-time protection for system integrity, two-factor biometric authentication and the generic framework of Knox.

The Korean tech giant also gave a stability update , version XXU1ANCE, to its Galaxy S5 just before the release.

FireChat for Android launched, lets users chat without a data connection

A new mobile messaging application called FireChat is empowering nearby smartphone users to stay in touch even when there's no cellular service or Internet connection.

In just two weeks since its release on the iPhone, FireChat already has provided a flicker of hope for people pining for more effective, secure and affordable ways to communicate. That's because the free messaging app harnesses a technology called wireless mesh networking, which might someday allow a myriad of devices to connect like links in a chain.

The technique might someday be used to tie together thousands of devices with built-in radios and make it possible to be online without having to pay for the access. It could also enable online communications in remote areas or disaster zones without Wi-Fi or cellular signals. Furthermore, the conversations in these so-called "off-the-grid" networks can't be easily hacked into by spies and mischief makers or shut down by governments trying to stifle free speech.

"We trying to create networks built by the people for the people," said Micha Benoliel, CEO of Open Garden, maker of the FireChat app.

Open Garden, a San Francisco startup with just 10 employees, is taking another step toward its ambitious goal with Thursday's release of a FireChat app for Android phones.

FireChat could be an even hotter commodity on Android given the demographic differences between that platform's user base and the typical iPhone owner. The app already has been installed on more than 1 million iOS devices.

(Also see: FireChat lets you chat without a data connection)

Many smartphones running on Google Inc.'s free Android software are cheaper than Apple Inc.'s iPhone. That has made Android phones the top-selling mobile devices in less affluent countries, including in regions where Internet access is inadequate or expensive.

Google is among the big Internet companies intrigued with mesh networking's potential to bring more of the world online.

Sundar Pichai, Google's executive in charge of Android, has touted mesh networks as a way to connect wearable computers, such as the company's Glass eyewear. Mesh networks also could be used to bring a wide variety of everyday appliances online, helping to build an Internet of things instead of just websites.

FireChat's reach so far is limited. When connecting off the grid, iPhone app users have only been able to send text and photos to other FireChat users within a range of 30 to 100 feet.

Later this year, Open Garden plans to upgrade FireChat's iPhone app so off-the-grid users will be able to hopscotch through a daisy chain of devices to extend the reach of a local network. If this works, a FireChat user sitting in the right-field bleachers of a baseball game would be able to text with a friend on the other side of the stadium if enough other iPhone users in the ballpark also are on FireChat.

This extended range will be available immediately on FireChat's Android app because Open Garden released a mesh networking app for that operating system nearly two years ago.

FireChat's iPhone app piggybacks on an often overlooked feature called the Multipeer Connectivity Framework that Apple Inc. included in its latest mobile operating system, iOS 7, released last September. Apple says more than 80 percent of people using its mobile devices rely on iOS 7.

For now, Android phones and iPhones with the FireChat app won't be able to engage in off-the-grid conversation. Open Garden, though, believes it will eventually be able to make mesh networking work on phones running on different operating systems.

As the mesh networking software improved, Benoliel realized Open Garden needed to come up with application to demonstrate what the technology could do. In that practical sense, FireChat is similar to the word processing and spreadsheet programs that Microsoft released decades ago to help broaden the appeal of its Windows operating system for personal computers, said Christophe Daligault, Open Garden's marketing chief.

FireChat's development was driven by the popularity of other mobile messaging apps such as Snapchat and WhatsApp that enabled smartphone users to text and send pictures to their friends and family without having to pay smartphone carriers.

Like texts and photos sent on Snapchat, nothing transmitted through FireChat is saved. All content evaporates once the app is closed. FireChat also allows all its users to remain anonymous, another feature that is becoming popular on a variety of mobile messaging apps, such as Wickr and Rumr.

There still aren't enough people using FireChat to ensure users will find someone nearby to message. To pique people's interest in the app, FireChat offers an "everyone" option that allows users to enter a digital chat room with up to 80 other random users located in the same country. This option requires a Wi-Fi or cellular connection.

Dailigault concedes FireChat's chat room isn't as high-minded as mesh networking.

"We are finding a lot of people are using it when they are just looking for something to do for a few minutes," Dailigault said. "Some of the discussions there are turning out to be more interesting than anything they can find on Facebook.

FireChat lets you chat without a data connection

Move over WhatsApp. Here comes a revolutionary chatting app that has taken the mobile messaging to another level.

With this, you are able to send and receive messages even when you do not have an actual Internet or Wi-Fi data connection.

Yes, you read it right.

This iOS-enabled app uses Apple's Multipeer Connectivity framework essentially a peer-to-peer feature that lets you share messages with other app users nearby.

"FireChat allows the device to connect directly to others nearby using Bluetooth, peer-to-peer Wi-Fi or traditional Wi-Fi networks so you do not actually need a data connection," Micha Benoliel, CEO of Open Garden firm that developed the app was quoted as saying.

The Apple's Multipeer Connectivity APIs can be used for everything from collaborative editing and file sharing, to multiplayer gaming and sensor aggregation, said a report in wired.com.

How does it function?

The app browses for other users nearby while simultaneously broadcasting to peers that it is available to connect to. According to the company, this "Nearby" mode works best when the devices are within 30-feet.

This allows you to be invited into a "session" with multiple users. Each user has to be within range of just one member of the chat, so the mesh can spread outwards and cover a lot more range as more people join in.

Once a session invitation is accepted, you can directly communicate with those other users independent of a cellular signal or Wi-Fi access.

This creates what is called "wireless mesh network".

According to Benoliel, "Messages also get deleted as soon as you close the app so you remain anonymous."

However, in "Nearby" mode, you do not have any choice over who receives your messages they go out to anyone within range, the report added. There is also an "Everyone" mode, which sends the messages over a data connection so you can chat with friends who are not physically nearby. This is being segmented into chatrooms of 80 users each as the initial rush of downloads made it untenable to keep all users on a single chat.

Apple sold 700 million iOS devices by last October. Many are already using the latest Multipeer Connectivity-supporting version of iOS.

Within a week of its launch, FireChat has been being downloaded from the App Store more than 100,000 times a day.

HTC says BlinkFeed app will be available for other Android devices

HTC is not being greedy with its new version of BlinkFeed home screen introduced in HTC One (M8), and has decided it will allow other Android devices to install it via the Google Play store. It has not detailed an exact timeline for this release however, with this week's Play Store listing of the app still showing as incompatible, and without a list of supported devices.

The Taiwanese manufacturer made the announcement in a statement, saying, "Following its popularity with HTC users, HTC will now make HTC BlinkFeed available to other Android devices, launching on the Google Play store soon." The company did not detail the availability of the other Sense-based apps that recently made their way to the Google Play store.

The roll-out via the Google Play store would give HTC a chance to spread the feature to a larger number of users and would allow the firm give away more frequent updates to HTC smartphones as standalone apps. Earlier, the firm updated its BlinkFeed and native Sense apps via system update roll-outs, which can be a cumbersome process with other disadvantages.

The new BlinkFeed version has been introduced in the freshly announced HTC One (M8) alongside the new Sense 6.0 user interface. It features a revamped free-scrolling gesture along with larger images and the option to remove the top weather clock if not set on the default home location. New content managerial options and some UI tweaks are also available.

Details of the BlinkFeed app, such as size and the Android version compatibility, are not yet known. App permissions have been listed, but do not hint at anything significant. The full functionality of the app, and how different it is from the implementation on the One (M8), can only be experienced when HTC makes the app available for download.

Other apps such as HTC Service Pack, HTC SenseTV, HTC Guide and HTC Gallery also made their way to the Play Store ahead of the HTC One (M8)'s launch on Tuesday.

Google Search app for Android gets song recognition

Google is not yet done with adding features to its Google Search app for Android, with a new feature announced shortly after the announcement of camera voice command feature on Thursday. The search giant's latest Google Search app feature lets users know relevant information about any song that's playing - similar to Shazam and SoundHound.

"So we're down to the Top 10 on #Idol . Whether you're tuning in for CJ's soulful country, Jena's piano power, or Caleb's rawk... if you happen to miss the name of one of the songs while watching, just tap the mic in your #GoogleSearch app (or say "Ok Google") and say "Listen to TV." You'll find out the title, artist and other cover versions," stated the post by Google on its Google+ account.

Much like the freshly announced camera voice-command feature for the Google Search app, this feature can also be accessed by tapping the mic icon in the Google Search app or widget, or by saying 'Ok Google', and then saying the voice command - 'Listen to TV'. The app will then listen to the playing music, recognize the song title via Google's boundless wealth of knowledge, and then give the relevant song information - such as its artist, album name and more.

The new Google Search feature is said to eliminate the extra hassle to download a dedicated widget and makes it easier to manage, as all this is wrapped-up in one single app. This feature will theShazam and SoundHound music apps hard, as before this feature by Google, they have been the most popular apps available in the Google Play store offering the same functionality.

For now, the Google Search app on Play Store has not yet been updated, and doesn't yet feature the new camera and song recognition voice-commands. We can expect the updated Google Search app for Android to be rolled out globally soon

Facebook v8.0 app for iOS brings improved private photo sharing, and more

Facebook, on Tuesday, released the updated version of its Facebook app for iOS. The new update is a renewed effort by the social-networking giant to improve on the niche segment of private sharing. The version released-v8.0 allows users to select specific people who will be able to see the users' photo albums in their feed.

Facebook had already rolled out the feature for individual statuses and photos over the last few months. The new version extends the same feature to entire photo albums as well - Facebook calls it a "A simple way to see and choose a photo album's audience." The option to select the photo albums, according to reports, has a lot of similarities to Snapchat.

The sharing of the photos is set to 'Friends' by default. A tap to the same will reveal a pre-made friends list, or options to create a new custom list. Essentially, every time users wants to share photos, they will have to either use the pre-made list or create a new one. Facebook has been trying to push private sharing, which it calls 'micro sharing' since 2007. It has ever since then met with mixed success on the same. It might also be possible that like Facebook's other endeavours, like Groups and Smart Lists, this feature might take time to be accepted by users or might fly under the radar (like its predecessors) completely.

And Facebook is not the only one to try private sharing as a feature. Path tried using it by letting a user share with their closest friends but that backfired. Snapchat allowed users to select specific people that a user wanted to share information with, and met with success. On the other handInstagram Direct, which is a photo messaging feature didn't take off, and Snapchat's Stories didn't make much headway with the mainstream audiences either.

In addition to the photo-sharing feature, Facebook on the iTunes page says the updated design "makes it easier to post and share on iPad", and also touts other "improvements for reliability and speed." The app doesn't come with any major changes as users may have expected with a major version number change, save the private photo sharing option. It will be interesting to see how it is accepted by users in the future.

QuizUp trivia app for Android now available for download via Play Store

QuizUp, the hit trivia game that was introduced on iOS in November 2013, has now been launched for Android, and is available for free on the Google Play store.

The QuizUp app has been developed by Plain Vanilla Games, which is an Iceland-based company. The QuizUp app is based on trivial pursuit, where a player can choose from over 400 topics, ranging from TV shows and books to sports and music, and can compete against other players in a particular topic that consists of seven multiple choice questions.

A single QuizUp game focuses on one particular topic and includes two players playing up to 7 rounds (6 regular rounds and 1 bonus). Notably, the QuizUp is a speed-based game and a player scores more points for quick answers.

Some of the popular QuizUp trivia topics listed in the Play Store listing include TV shows, all the top shows; books, bestsellers and authors; movies, all genres such as horror, comedy etc. and actors, directors, famous quotes; sports, such as football, baseball, basketball and more; games, popular video games, classics, and music, like rock, pop, classics, boy bands, hip-hop among others.

There are some additional games such as general knowledge, art, business, science, geography, history, education and lifestyle. The Play Store's QuizUp app listing says, "The world's largest trivia game is finally available on Android!"

In January, Apple announced the popular apps and developers of 2013 which included QuizUp. The Cupertino-based company said, "2013 saw surprise hits like Ellen DeGeneres' Heads Up, ProtoGeo's Moves, Simon Filip's Afterlight and Kevin Ng's Impossible Road. Many of the year's biggest successes like Candy Crush Saga, Puzzles & Dragons, Minecraft, QuizUp and Clumsy Ninja were created by international developers."