An Android application aims to make shopping easier

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Prepared to ditch your wallet, cash and charge cards? A mobile payment app lets users make purchases with their smartphone without taking the device out of their pocket or purse.

Developed by electronic payment startup Square, the application called Card Case allows customers to pay for products and services at local merchants automatically by simply providing their name to complete the transaction.

“You walk in, say your name, and walk out. It’s a seamless payment experience,” said Megan Quinn, director of products for Square.

The application automatically opens a tab when it detects that a customer is within 100 meters (328 feet) of the business, as lengthy as they have enabled the functionality within the application and approved the company.
The user’s arrival, along with their name and photo, is announced on the merchant’s app giving them the ability to charge products and services to the customer’s credit card.

“You can pay without ever reaching for your purse, taking out your wallet, or even your phone,” said Quinn. “It requires no new or unusual customer behavior — you don’t have to wave your phone, or preload money.”

By giving the merchant access to customers’ names up front, and removing the transactional aspect, the company hopes to provide a personal touch, helping customers feel like regulars even at unexplored shops.

“We’ve removed the mechanics of the transaction and brought it back to the relationship and conversation between the merchant and their customer,” Quinn explained, adding customers tend to return to places where they feel comfortable.

Over 20,000 merchants have signed up for the application over the U . s . States in eight days, including coffee houses, bakers, barbers as well as maqui berry farmers market stalls.
Although other companies have announced mobile payment apps, many have implemented Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, which uses a chip in smartphones to send encrypted payment data when the phone is waved in front of the merchant’s reader.

Last week, PayPal announced an update to their Android app that uses this technology to allow users to swap payments between each other by tapping their phones together. The Google Wallet app available for the Nexus S, uses the technology to allow payments anywhere MasterCard PayPass is accepted.

“NFC is an interesting technology that has the potential to power many interesting new applications,” said Quinn. “We just don’t think it’s necessary to help small businesses grow.”

There is currently no NFC chip included in iPhones, and NFC equipment amongst merchants is not yet mainstream.

Card Case, available for iOS and Android smartphones is only available in the United States, but the company plans to expand to international markets in 2012.

Asus Transformer How To: Automatic Saving of Antipaper Notes HD to External SDCard

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Since I take notes in class and there is always uncertainty of having to completely wipe your device at any given moment and lose everything, I felt it would be in my best interest to keep my notes stored on the external hard drive.

I couldn’t find the option to do so, so I made a script that will create a folder on the SD card called Antipaper/Notebooks and then move your notebooks there and delete the original folder (/data/data/com.pancerola.and.antipaper.notes/files/) and turn it into a symbolic link pointing to /Removable/MicroSD/Antipaper/Notebooks so that all future notebooks are stored there instead.

MANUALLY BACKUP YOUR NOTEBOOKS LOCATED AT /data/data/com.pancerola.and.antipaper.notes/files/ BEFORE YOU ATTEMPT THIS. MY SCRIPT HAS TO DELETE THE FOLDER TO MAKE A SYMBOLIC LINK

Troubleshooting: Sometimes the files folder doesn’t want to be deleted, you may have to delete it manually in root explorer and then run the script again. If your notebooks are blank, that means they didn’t copy properly, copy the backups to the Antipaper/Notebooks folder on the SDCard. I’m asking you to make a backup for a reason.

Installation Instructions:

Using Script Manager:

Open the file, run as root and click run. If all goes well you shouldn’t see that the link failed to be created.

/dirty scripting

Click

HP Touchpad and Android Honeycomb? It’s true!

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HP’s flubbed Touchpad tablet PC is in this news again, and like virtually the rest of the major Touch pad tales, that one has Hewlett packard running in circles.

Since its sudden demise, the internet has been abuzz with people trying to get the Android OS onto the HP TouchPad. A Chinese developer by the name of Chompers has just released a very rough, but publicly available download of his hack.

HP Touchpad

In his current version, Android installs as an app into webOS, then boots into the Android OS from there. Forum members at PreCentral have tested it, but report it’s still buggy and almost nothing works, but as a proof of concept it’s ahead of the briefly mentioned and still not unavailable CyanogenMod.

Android Ice Cream Sandwich leaks show a true treat

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We might have to wait a few more days until we obtain to see our first official view of Ice Cream Sandwich, but that does not mean we can not take a peek in the meantime. Android fans were treated to a number of leaks now, which provide a clear look at the following release of Android, including screenshots, video, and applications.

A number of images showing the basic aesthetics of Ice Cream Sandwich appear to confirm the influence of Honeycomb’s navigation and layout. Starting with the unlock screen, it’s obvious that this version of Android is not going to be a minor upgrade.

The process for adding icons and widgets, for example, should be nearly identical to the process found on most of today’s Android tablets. What’s more, the experience shouldn’t be diminished by a smaller screen size. Some readers will notice that the launcher and navigation buttons closely resemble the leaked video from last week, lending credibility to the admittedly strange set of occurrences.

A video of the purported Galaxy Nexus gives us a basic look at how things will work, including adding widgets and accessing applications. Although there’s a definite 3.0 presence to the experience, new and longtime Android users should have no problem adapting to the interface.

On a related note, the chaps at Android Police have stumbled upon Google+ 2.0 and Music 4.0 apps that support the Ice Cream Sandwich experience. Each title has its own set of changes, some of which may go unnoticed by casual users.

Hard-core Android enthusiasts will recognize that the Music app shows a much cleaner experience, with modified options and controls, less obtrusive buttons, and the ability to rate music with a thumbs up or thumbs down. Presumably this last item will tie into the Google Music cloud experience that learns your preferences and queues up more of what you want to hear and less of the other stuff.

Finally we come to a minor video, although it’s still something that diehards always seem to find interesting: the boot sequence. A member of MyDroidWorld has posted what looks to be the new boot-up animation for Ice Cream Sandwich, which looks nothing like its predecessors.

Depending on how long we have to wait before Samsung and Google take the stage together–Samsung’s Galaxy Nexus launch scheduled for CTIA has been delayed–we could find ourselves looking at a number of increasingly bigger leaks.

Here is a new Amazon tablet: $ 199

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Amazon Kindle Fire pictures

After months of conjecture, it is here: Amazon’s tablet, the $199 Kindle Fire, was unveiled Wednesday.

Smaller sized and cheaper than Apple’s major iPad, the Kindle Fire has a 7-inch screen and runs on a heavily customized version of Google’s Android operating-system. The tablet offers Wi-Fi connectivity, but no 3G or other cellular connection. It also lacks a camera and microphone, two features found in most rival tablets.

The Kindle Fire has a 7-inch IPS display with 1024-pixel by 600-pixel resolution, plus a dual-core processor, 8GB of storage and 7.5 hours of video playback. The Fire has a USB port for file transfers, but no cameras and no microphone. The tablet measures 7.5-by-4.7-by-0.45 inches, and weighs 14.6 ounces.

Amazon Kindle Fire pictures

But this tablet is not supposed to be about tech features. It’s intended to be a dead-simple slate for consuming Amazon content. The interface has a search bar on top, which could search locally, in the cloud, and on the Web. Below that is a strip of content categories, followed by a stylized list of recent content. On the bottom of the screen, users can pin their favorite apps, books, and other media.

Amazon’s digital storefronts include e-books, movies, Television shows, music, and applications. Several magazine publishers are also bringing their periodicals to the tablet. Although the Kindle Fire doesn’t offer much internal storage, any content purchased from Amazon may be stored online in cloud storage for free. There’s no mention of Google services, so don’t expect Google Maps or the Android Market to be built in.

For browsing the Web, the Kindle Fire utilizes a new browser called “Amazon Silk,” which taps Amazon’s cloud computing services to render pages faster. An e-mail app is also built-in, with support for multiple mail services in a single inbox.

Amazon says the Silk browser resides both on the Fire and on its own servers. For each page request, Silk divvies up the work between the tablet and the cloud. The result, according to Amazon, is faster page loads and lower latency.

The Kindle Fire costs $199, including a free month of Amazon Prime, and ships November 15. Amazon’s taking pre-orders on its Website.

Amazon Kindle Fire pictures

New Kindle E-Readers

Amazon isn’t abandoning its E-Ink readers with present day tablet announcement. Amazon also announced new Kindles along with the Kindle Fire tablet.

The Kindle Touch uses the same infrared touch system found in Barnes & Noble’s Nook and Sony’s touch screen e-readers. Amazon is touting what it calls the “EasyReach” system with this Kindle, which lets users tap a short horizontal strip along the top of the screen to call up the menu, a narrow vertical strip along the left side to go back one page, and the rest of the screen to go to the next page.

The Kindle Touch costs $99 with Special Offers–a service that displays ads and deals on the device’s home page–and $139 without them. A 3G model will cost $149. Amazon’s taking pre-orders now, ahead of a November 21 ship date.

In addition to the touchscreen Kindle, Amazon will launch a non-touch Kindle with Special Offers for $79. This model drops the physical keyboard of previous Kindles in favor of a small set of buttons on the bottom bezel, along with the usual left and right bezel buttons for page turns. Amazon says this model is 30 percent lighter than previous Kindles. Without Special deals, this Kindle costs $109. Both editions ship today.

Best Price: Get a NOOK The Simple Touch Reader

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You better hurry up. Limited because the price reduction! Get a NOOK The Simple Touch Reader – Refurbished for $107 at Buy.com! Valid through 09/30/2011. Shop for the best books, magazines and newspapers right on your NOOK with just a touch. Turn pages, look up words, highlight passages, adjust the font size and style-just by tapping the infrared-powered touchscreen.

NOOK features the most advanced E Ink® Pearl technology. The high-contrast 16-level grayscale touchscreen displays text as crisp and clear as a printed page, so you can read easily-even in bright sun. 50% more contrast than NOOK 1st Edition.

At 7.48 ounces, NOOK is lighter than a paperback and super thin, yet holds up to 1,000 books, magazines and newspapers-so it’s easy to take your entire library with you anywhere.

Get a NOOK The Simple Touch Reader – Refurbished for $107 at Buy.com! Valid through 09/30/2011