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The Android application development market is a thriving segment that has opened up lucrative employment opportunities across the globe. Companies that used to previously offer services only in software consulting are increasingly shifting their paradigm towards application development for Android, for the applications being developed on an open source mobile platform.

It presents all the vital programming applications and tools necessary for application development on Android devices by incorporating programming language like Java. A number of smart-phone attributes are utilized by the Android application developers including use of the phone’s background services or accessing location details, etc which is one of the biggest benefits of using an open source software.

The Android application development market is the largest growing mobile technology and is extensively used by customers globally due to easy availability in almost all mobile phone networks, thus increasing its reach to more people. Android applications are sourced on Wifi, GPS, SMS, multimedia, Google maps and so on. The applications are at times available at very nominal cost or completely free of charge depending on its goal and use.

Companies who are involved into software consulting are now offering android platform support to stay abreast with the latest technological innovations. Lately, these firms have noted a phenomenon that clearly shows the popularity in android application development is proportional directly to the increase of its user base. Therefore, software companies are favoring to employ more skilled and proficient mobile application developers in a bid to provide better services to their clients.

These days, a number of developers are coming up with specialized knowledge in android application development which is further utilized by these software consulting firms. Contributing ahead to the growing success of android application development, these firms tries, tests and delivers new technologies by assembling with clients in order to develop unique and interested applications.

The android market acquires a considerable share of applications that comes from the 3^rd party developers. These applications require proper authorization before they are used for retrieving features like the address book of the users or writing or reading the user’s memory cards. However, all companies make sure to carry out a feasibility test before going about with any project.

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However, media organizations must educate themselves about the current trends, opportunities, challenges as well as issues present in mobility to reap full advantage out of it. This blog intends to talk about the latest mobility trends, guiding media organizations to leverage them for monetization while staying strong with a firm subscriber base.

Traditional communication applications like voice calls and SMS have now become passé with rapid propagation of tablets and smartphones. Smarter and sophisticated applications like music apps, video streaming, social networking and mobile browsing are ruling the mobility scene. The modern day phones not only connect the users but they have turned into channels of infotainment.

Mobile devices are now used for anything and everything and are filled with loads of features. Users can now carry out a wide range of tasks on their mobile devices like going through daily newspapers and magazines, comparing local deals, watching videos, shopping as well as accessing the popular social networking sites.

Immense growth has been noticed in the media and entertainment industry over the past couple of years. Latest innovations like the new content formats, creative advertising models as well as content monetization strategies are exponentially going to drive the industry towards tremendous success by the latter half of 2012. This is bringing hope among those media companies who are grappling to cope up with their dropping revenues and are now looking at mobility as their sole option to strengthen revenue and enhance goodwill and reader loyalty.

Trends that will influence the media and publishing industry

• Lately, mobile advertising is getting more exposure than its web counterpart. This is because mobile is considered as a default medium that is used more or less by everybody among us and therefore is a better way to target a wide range of audience from all walks of life. Mobile devices have now turned into storehouses of latest news and information that gives us instant accessibility to international news, connects us with our friends and acquaintances through the popular social networking sites and also helps us to shop to our heart’s content. All these reasons are compelling advertisers to look at mobile as a mainstream promotional tool to target specific segments. Mobile advertising budget was pegged at $1bn in 2011 which is soon to jump at a whopping $4.5bn by the end of 2012.
• Use of mobile applications is soon going to exceed the usage rate of desktop applications for which publishers must work for a strong mobile footfall. Since the use of mobile devices have increased over the past few years which is further fuelled by the application platforms like Android and Apple.
• Publishers can now monetize on mobile applications while increasing the use of analytics to boost advertising revenue. The presence of highly interactive and real time mobile features has opened up new avenues of revenue generation to the brands and advertisers that is also helping them to target audiences with specific ads based on their permission and preferences. Use of advanced technologies like geo targeting coupled with certain analytic tools is helping out advertisers in running highly influential location-centric campaigns which are even measurable and traceable.
• Effective promotional results are expected out of the popular social media channels due to the increasing number of audiences and the building interactivity observed lately. This is surely going to make a huge difference for the publishing and media industry to reach wide audience base through digital innovations.

Mobile technology is considered as a long term benefit for the publishing and media industry and therefore, it must venture in this area for building personalized user services and targeting options driven by analytics for brands and advertisers.

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A smarter way to invasive mobility- Ubiquitous Computing

Ubiquitous computing and mobility goes hand in hand. On one hand, mobility ensures smooth operations and easy connection on your smart devices while you are on the move. Conversely, ubiquitous computing enables the environment get in touch with you in unassuming ways. While mobility replaced personal computers to present smart devices like smart-phones or iPads, ubiquitous computing ascertains to send important information flawlessly into an organizational setting, where many small devices keeps track on you, link with you, thinking for you. As of now, the present patterns of mobility are all designed with GUI based and menu-driven tools, ubiquitous computing assures to understand human interactions on a natural level ranging from speech, movement and even presence.

Understanding the notion of a ubiquitous setting

The term ‘ubiquitous computing’ was first coined by Mark Weiser who was a researcher at Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center. Based on one of his article published in 1991 in the journal Scientific American, he quoted- “The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it.” Presently, we are passing through the age of invasive computing wherein localization and scalability are added to mobility. The incorporation of these technologies, coupled with adaptability and context awareness gives rise to smarter devices and leads to ubiquitous computing.

Even if thought centuries ago, Mark Weiser’s mastermind concepts seem true to us as smart devices are increasingly integrating with each other, behaving as a single mechanism. In order to make devices best work in ubiquitous computing, 2 important theories must be clearly defined- the Machine-to-machine (M2M) and Internet of Things (IoT) communication. IoT communication is associated with the connection of ordinary things to the Internet, which are set with sensors. It is often perceived as an outline for ubiquitous computing. On the other side, M2M communication is a precise division of the IoT where 2 machines conduct interaction, most of the time over the online media while exchanging data.

Workings of Ubiquitous Computing

Ubiquitous computing comes successful with the judicious incorporation of different components that interact with one another while behave as a single mechanism. Diagram 1 displays an example of ubiquitous computing stack. The lower part of the stack is called the ‘physical layer’. Small sensors are worn carried and embedded to machines, people, homes, animals, cars, fields, campuses and buildings. These days many smart-phones are available in the market that comprises a series of sensors capturing different bits of data from the surroundings. Apart from camera and microphone, multiple sensors like compass, GPS and accelerometer and so on are also integrated.

Just on top of the sensors are located the infrastructure of wireless communication that can be presented by the 802.11 network family. Recent standards like 802.11 n have lower levels of latency. In combination with the mesh networks, such standards maintain connectivity of devices and sensors. ZigBee is a cost effective alternative to keep multiple devices connected. NFC or Near Field Communication is another standard technology that influences RFID and can be efficiently used in ubiquitous computing.

Creation of an effective ubiquitous environment calls for a broad spectrum of components like smart devices, software and communication frameworks, social network and the web along with information and process modeling. All these components can be operated across various platforms, materials, environments and protocols and makes a superb scenario for two-way innovation. For gaining ultimate success in ubiquitous computing, it is essential to look at areas where the main stage is set.

Foreseeing the new wave technology of ubiquitous computing

Presently we are standing at a point where majority of us are tech-savvy and are pretty ready to adapt to this new wave technology that can be used efficiently in offices, educational organizations, and customer communities and so on. The individuals of today can be tagged as ‘Digital Natives’ who don’t hesitate from experimenting with the latest technological innovations. Since they are born in a wired world, they expect to be in touch with everything possible around them. They work on various smart gadgets, have preference over flawless data transfers and even show great willingness in sharing large amount of personal data.

Keeping in mind about customer demands and preferences, markets are too offering personalized services. Trusted information is the need of the hour. Proactive, prompt and user-oriented advertising and promotions can give enterprises a competitive edge. According to the leading analyst, Gartner- only context aware computing is going to drive in about $140 billion potential consumer demand by the year 2015. To top it all, developments in technologies like networks, sensors, social computing, embedded devices; unified communications and service centric architecture are riding us closer towards the goal of ubiquitous computing.

Even technology companies are teaming up to create a more connected and smarter world on a grand scale. For example, Cisco and IBM are assisting a Dutch utility entity while the beautiful city of Amsterdam is making smarter utilization of energy, educating consumers about energy consumptions.

Challenges associated with Ubiquitous Computing

It is now apparent that ubiquitous computing is capable of creating a smart world that is highly instinctive about human needs. But this technology has its drawbacks too. User information available in a detailed form will face ethical issues, especially while using the same for fulfilling any purpose. Another problem is with device heterogeneity that arises due to the use of wide range of networks, appliances, decision support algorithms and content specific content- connected together, all the same time. To cope up with these issues, several government bodies are trying to find out standards in these areas. GISFI or the Global ICT Standardization Forum for India is an authoritative body working in the information and communication technologies area and has even initiated operations major areas like service-centric networks, IoT and green ICT.

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After taking out the automated mechanism to delete Apps accounts offline, Google still has not reactivated it yet. As soon as this problem surfaced, requests for removing and re-adding domains started to pile up soon which made things worse for the Apps Administrators who consequently came across a series of issues like lack of access to the email accounts of the users.

Finally, Google employed a manual process to handle these requests soliciting the affected administrators to give an account of their domains in a designated way in the discussion forum- ‘Official Apps’. The issues were then queued up sequentially to be dealt with manually.

On January 10^th, someone named ‘Ricky’, identified as one of the Google officials posted in the discussion forum thread stating that “because of a related issue last week, we have temporarily disabled the domain deletion mechanism.”

The official further added that the domains to be deleted would need two more weeks to near completion. Once the mechanism is reactivated, Google would announce the update on the discussion forum thread. Since then, there hasn’t been any update from Google and the automated system remains inactive.

Domains are deleted by Apps administrators for a variety of reasons and that certainly includes the intention to resume them immediately in the form of a primary or a sub-domain. When the process gets stuck in midpoint for a substantial time period, it can cut short business communication like emails and other operations for which people use Apps.

Apart from the main discussion thread, there are many other forums too where Apps administrators are reporting their concerns with majority of them active presently on the threads. While some users have commented that Google can fix this hassle pretty easily by informing the Apps Administrators suggesting possible solutions, rest are showing apprehensiveness pointing towards the fact that Google still hasn’t added the concern to its Apps Known Issues list yet.

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Best Applications Related to Keyboards are:

• TouchPal: TouchPal allows the users to type anything blindly as per their wish. The key features of the TouchPal keyword are support to multiple languages, voice input, a back-up dictionary in the SD card, superb experience with sliding, detection of language large keys, to name a few. The user can also carry out the task of cut, copy and paste from the keyboard itself.
• SwiftKey X: It is the most modern keyboard. It could be said so for the reason that it makes use of the artificial intelligence to help the users with the prediction of the consecutive word when a text is being typed by a user. The users just need to move their fingers from one particular key to another. The user should not any point of time lift off their fingers from the screen.
• ICS Keyboard – This application works with almost all the Android phones. It is available to the users in different languages such as English, Russian, Italian, German, Swedish, French, Czech, Portuguese and others as well. Its features are multi-touch, high intensity custom vibration, built-in-dictionary and auto correction. It needs a mention here that for the display of the domain names, the users need to press the”/” key for a few minutes.
• Go Keyboard – Its features are auto correct, multi point touch keyboard, correct dictionary, import of contacts and complete support to slide input. It also includes a host of options related to customization, such as placing of the various keys, the smiley characters, changing of the text size and others as well. It has to itself different kinds of themes and the users can download any particular theme of their choice.
• Swype: Swype has made possible for the users of the Android to download the new application directly from the website related to the inserting of the text. The text can be easily inserted with the help of the stylus or the finger. Its features include a database of numerous words and thus the users can afford to make mistakes while inserting words or text. It provides support to various languages such as English, German, Italian, Spanish and French.

Apart from these few, there are other applications as well, which the users can check out for their own benefit.

Wiliam Alsup, the judge had mentioned that “The piecemeal approach suggested by Oracle as a trial alternative will not be adopted, ’’. He also said that “The [court's schedule] simply does not permit that luxury. If Oracle wishes to voluntarily dismiss any damages claim, it will have to do so with prejudice; otherwise, a dismissal is nothing more than an invitation to piecemeal litigation.”.

The judge also said that he would not give out a date for the trial until Oracle puts forward an appropriate method related with the damages.

However, amidst all this, it has been stated by Oracle that “While this case awaits trial, more than 700,000 Android-based devices are activated every day, all fundamentally built around the copyrighted Java APIs and the enhanced performance enabled by Oracle’s patents,”. Oracle also said that “Each day’s worth of activations likely generates approximately $10m in annual mobile advertising revenue for Google.”.

Thus, it remains to be seen that out of these two, which one emerges to be the winner.

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Sales for the fourth quarter, for Sony Ericson were just about €1.3 billion. Thus it is a down from $1.7 billion. However, the total amount of loss is €207 million. It is quite low if taken into account the profit revenue of €8 million in the fourth quarter of the last year. These facts have been stated by the company.

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In the opinion of Geoff Blaber, the CCS Insight Analyst, the two reputed organizations. Motorola and Sony Ericson have been witnessing for the previous two years a rise and fall between profits and losses.  Blaber also stated, “I think, the fact that we are now also seeing HTC beginning to struggle indicates that all is not well for a large proportion of Android manufacturers. It is very, very difficult for them to make money,”.

It is also highly expected that Apple has approximately sold 30 million iPhones in the last quarter of the previous year. $287 is the all total fourth quarter revenue of Apple. However it is a reduced amount with respect to Apple’s expectations.

Thus it hints at the fact that the vendors who are highly dependent on the Android for powerful functional operations of the Smartphones are going through tough times.

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Almost two years ago, the users of the mobile handset devices spent about 64 minutes on a regular basis for browsing of the Internet on the tablet or the Smartphones and 43 minutes for browsing through the applications. According to the report of the same survey, at present the users browse the web for just 72 minutes and spend 92 minutes on the web applications each day.

According to Flurry, it is Facebook, the most popular social networking website that is responsible for the growing trend towards the use of web applications.

It has also been estimated that the emergence of the HTML 5 web applications would arrest the attention of the users. HTML5 Report stated that, “The mass emigration to HTML5 will discharge a need to rest on companies like Apple and Google, that take adult to 30% of all revenues generated from applications.”

However, it remains to be seen that whether the HTML 5 succeeds in compelling the users to spend more number of hours on the web applications as compared to web browsing.

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iCrossing, a reputed analytics firm, has analyzed in detail the growing trend pattern of Facebook. After analyzing, it has arrived at the decision that this social networking website would have more than one billion users by the month of August of this year.

According to iCrossing, “Using a process of linear regression on the data from the end of 2008 onwards we expect Facebook to hit a billion active users around August 2012. Looking at the data from 2006-mid 2008 it looks like Facebook was growing at an exponential rate, however more recent data suggests it’s growing in a linear fashion,”

According to iCrossing, the user number of Facebook has either completely stopped or has significantly reduced down, in countries such as the U.K or the U.S.  In Brazil as well as India, the number of users is ever increasing. 17 million people of Brazil and 14 million people of India have signed up with Facebook in the last nine months.

In India, the Facebook user number has grown from 22 million to 36 million and in Brazil there has been an increase to 30 million from 13 million. Only 16 % of Brazil’s population and 3 % of India’s population use the Facebook, whereas 47% of U.K’s population and 49 % of America’s population have signed up with Facebook. However, it is estimated that the user number would increase remarkably as far as India and Brazil is concerned.

If Facebook hits the mark of I billion users, it would acquire the third position in terms of population. China and India respectively hold the first two positions.

The social network of Google, known as the Google + is giving a tough competition to Facebook. It could be said so for the reason that it could reach a mark of 400 million users by the end of this year according to a recent prediction. Although the number 400 million is far behind one billion, Facebook needs to remain alert.

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The other types of the Windows Phones as well as the Lumia would connect with the varied products of the Microsoft, like the Xbox game console.

The Windows Smartphones are appealing for their broader screens that have the ability to identify the voice and the touch feel. These devices focus more on the list of contacts and the lets the users to categorize the contacts under separate groups. This device helps in creating communication with the users, who have signed up with Windows Messenger, Facebook Messaging and Twitter Thus it forbids the creation of separate applications for different ways of communication.

Steve Ballmer at this show also showed as well as demonstrated the fact that the phones on the start screen include tiles for each and every family member and friends, which “puts people first”. Whereas the start screen of the iPhone, a product of the Apple, displays a few applications, such as maps, a calendar and a Safari browser.

Kate Lewis, an Analyst of Yankee Group has mentioned that 9% has said that they would  purchase a Windows Mobile Phone and 80%  of  has said that they would either purchase an Android device or an iPhone device.

According to Kate Lewis, “Opportunities within the smartphone market abound, but we’ve reached a critical point where graves could be dug”, for quite a number of software firms.

Microsoft also publicized its newly established and robust relationship with the entertainment and the media world.

These new devices would surely appeal you.