Kozminski Techblog

The original umbrella went from shading people from the sun and protecting from  rain, to being a high tech gadget.

The umbrella as we know it, with its whales and its canvas, will it soon be obsolete? This is, in any case, the Chinese inventors’ bet of the Air Umbrella. This umbrella has only a handle, which hides an air propulsion system that generates, as soon as it is activated, a sort of dome-shaped air shield capable of deflecting raindrops.

24 hours from the closing of their fundraising on the crowdfunding site kickstarter.com, they had already raised almost $ 100,000 which is 10 times the amount sought.

The Air Umbrella consists of a cylindrical handle containing a lithium battery, with a switch at its lower end and a half-sphere at its upper end surmounting an engine through which air passes. In this half-sphere, a fan draws air to its base to drive it at high speed towards the periphery, creating a virtual protective dome above the wearer’s head. Prototypes developed to date have a range of 15 to 30 minutes depending on size. The wind would be powerful enough for two people to be protected from drops. It will obviously be possible to adjust the air power to extend the protection. If in theory the idea seems to work, one is entitled to question the effectiveness of this system in practice. In addition, by protecting you, the Air Umbrella could well water your neighbors even more on the sidewalks.

Air Umbrella

AirBlow 2050

The design of the Air Umbrella is a little more different from the AirBlow 2050’s. While the latter retains the rounded shape of the handle of an umbrella, the first has totally revised the appearance of the umbrella to make it more design and futuristic.

The producers of the object, installed in China are making great efforts to improve the appearance, grip and battery life of the product.

There is also the question of the ecological impact of such an invention: why use a lithium battery to protect itself from the rain, while a simple canvas can do just as much without energy expenditure?

Sources:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1243275397/air-umbrella

http://www.iflscience.com/technology/air-umbrella-may-revolutionize-dealing-rainy-days/

https://www.cnet.com/news/umbrella-keeps-you-dry-with-invisible-force-field-of-air/

The least we can say is that the MOOV Now brand is easily recognizable thanks to its perforated silicone strap. What differentiates itself from the strong competition of the market of “wearables”. Now is quite discreet and can be forgotten. Its size is ideal for both men and women. At the same time there is no screen! Yes as you may have guessed, no screen on this minimalist bracelet that makes it strong and weak.

The MOOV Now is an activity bracelet that has many smart sensors that measure: steps, calories burned, activity time but also the range of motion and several measures specific to running, swimming and cycling. Via the GPS of the smartphone, the MOOV Now can measure the altitude difference, the speed, the distance … The analysis of the sleep is also available. The strong point of this bracelet is its battery: 6 months of autonomy. No need to recharge the bracelet every week. It connects Bluetooth to the smartphone, is compatible with Apple Health. It is completely waterproof up to 50m deep. Innovation is especially the coaching part in real time thanks to artificial intelligence.

The associated mobile app with MOOV Now plays a very important role in the tracker experience. This one does not have a screen, all information goes through the iPhone or Android app. This means that the bracelet is smartphone dependent (no problem for me). The app Moov is easy to use, clear and pleasant to use with a menu of 3 tabs “Activities”, “History” and “My Progress” as well as shortcuts to the categories “Running”, “Cycling”, “Swimming” “,” Cardio “and” Boxing “.

This bracelet is a good motivator thanks to his coach who speaks to you.

Unlike the session mode of the Nike + FuelBand, to record an activity it is imperative to choose the session before starting. It is vital to remember that it is not possible to tag an activity posteriori. Not annoying but must have the reflex. Therefore, we choose for example free running session, the app asks us to place the Now at the ankle and press the tracker, recognize it, then GO! It’s the same for biking. Depending on the session we can have feedback in real time.

For swimming it’s the same thing but with the bracelet on the wrist. Therefore, without a screen, it is impossible to know where we are at. One of the shortcomings of MOOV Now because we can count its lengths, we are not safe to be wrong. On the other hand, when one analyzes the session after having dried one’s hands to access one’s smartphone, the data is extremely advanced. It gives us absolutely precise data about our swimming training: number of lengths, type of swimming, number of movements by length and even the time of turn!

In addition to all those benefits stated above, the Now of MOOV is affordable to everyone! It cost between USD 50 and USD 80.

Sources:

https://welcome.moov.cc/

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/moov-now

http://www.trustedreviews.com/reviews/moov-now

https://www.wareable.com/sport/moov-now-review

http://www.mantality.co.za/moov-fitness-coach.html

cTrader is an ECN forex trading platform developed by Spotware. Since its launch cTrader has become a platform of choice for many major ECN brokers like Pepperstone and a serious competitor of the famous MetaTrader platform. Visually, the cTrader platform is extremely clean and attractive. The designers have gone to great lengths to make the interface intuitive and easy to use.

cTrader is the first retail forex trading platform to offer three types of market depths (order book). The standard depth allows aggregate quotes from liquidity providers to be viewed to help traders become familiar with market dynamics. The depth of the prices shows the available liquidity for each price. The depth of the VWAP (Volume-weighted average price) shows the average price exchanged for a certain period.

CTrader’s charts offer 26 time units and 6 zoom levels to suit all trading strategies. A double click at the top of each graph makes it possible to place an order very quickly. The platform has all the necessary tools for technical analysis (trend indicators, oscillators, volatility measures, etc.) It is also possible to create custom indicators via the cAlgo algorithmic trading platform.

All graphics are detachable and act as a stand-alone desktop application. Where other platforms only show the average price or the Bid / Ask lines, cTrader shows both the buy / sell lines on each chart, as well as the entry points, stop loss and take profit which are Editable directly on the graph.

For short-term traders and scalpers, cTrader can display charts in ticks with a new bar for each tick or with an aggregated view of up to 55 ticks per bar.

The cAlgo platform, which is integrated with cTrader, enables the creation of trading robots and customized technical indicators in a way very similar to the Expert Advisors used on the Metatrader platform.

cMirror is a mirror trading application that allows traders to offer their trading strategies and signals. Other traders (investors) can copy the strategies automatically into their trading account.

Trading Central constantly analyzes more than 7000 values. Every day, specialized analysts propose investment strategies for all asset classes: equities, indices, currencies, commodities and interest rates.

Trading Central’s data showing likely scenarios are fully integrated into the cTrader platform. Trading signals can be created quickly in the direction of the most likely scenario with a Take Profit and Stop Loss suggested by Trading Central.

The platform is available for mobile and tablet devices, which means there are versions for Android and iOS. These mobile versions include a lot of the features of the desktop version. In addition to mobile support, there is also a web version that compares very favorably with the competition. cTrader therefore provides all the necessary support for traders who want to be permanently connected to the markets.

Sources:

https://spotware.com/ctrader/trading/ctrader-trading-platform

https://www.icmarkets.com/forex-trading-platform/ctrader/

http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/forex/14372-features-ctrader-ecn-platform.html

https://www.fxpro.pl/trading/products/download

https://financefeeds.com/ctrader-gets-9-new-features-as-platform-diversity-race-hots-up/

The public toilet door handles are certainly one of the dirtiest spots in the world. The hands of all the people who have been there have landed on it. A public toilet door handle contains, average, 1000 colonies per millimeter of infectious bacteria. And it’s huge!

But would not it be extraordinary if these nests with germs, that are the door handles, could have a system of self-cleaning that would get rid of bacteria?

This question, 2 young teenagers from Hong Kong have asked. And they even managed to find a solution, inventing a self-cleaning door handle, which exploits the kinetic energy of door movement.

Sun Ming Wong, 17, and King Pong Li, 18, have developed an anti-bacterial door handle that generates all the energy needed for its operation since the door moves. Titanium Oxide is known as one of the best anti-bacterial agents that exist, our two inventors of genius, have decided to coat the handle of this mineral, and to activate its anti-bacterial properties through an exhibition of UV light. it is important to note that UV rays boost the anti-germ properties of Titanium Oxide.

In order to have a permanent UV contribution, and thus increase the efficiency of the mineral, the handle has been designed in the form of a transparent glass cylinder. This cylinder is held at both ends by 2 metal rings. An LED bulb is incorporated inside the handle, it will be the latter that will emit UV rays. And to operate this LED bulb, the handle is equipped with a kind of gear that collects and the kinetic energy produced by the different movements of the door.

During the laboratory testing phases, this ingenious system was able to eliminate 99.8% of the bacteria. In other words, this is a real success because they have managed to find the best way to have clean door handles permanently, that consume no fossil energy, and that pose no danger to health. In addition, the concept is very sustainable as no detergent will have to be used to clean those door handles. What about the cost? Know that the calculations of our young inventors, the manufacture of a unit would cost only $ 13. Which, let’s face it, is not very expensive paid to no longer have to worry when you touch a door handle whatsoever, since it is immediately cleaned and disinfected after a small movement of the door .

The in-shop price is approximately EUR 70, which is an affordable price when it comes to home furniture and an even better price for health.

In addition, this kind of design has become fashionable.

Designer: Choi Bomi

Sources:

http://www.yankodesign.com/2010/12/16/what-a-sterile-door/

https://tomorrowsgadgets.wordpress.com/sterilizing-door-handle/

https://prezi.com/pnqhcz7xz44n/auto-sterlizing-door-handle/

https://inhabitat.com/chinese-teens-create-13-door-handle-that-instantly-kills-99-8-germs-on-contact/

He looks at you with his big eyes, pronounces your name, but can also get angry and make big eyes. This is Cozmo. And no, it’s not a miniature animal but a mini-robot that we owe to the Californian company Anki. We would believe it straight out of an animated film as it seems endowed with human emotions. It took four years of research, experimentation, testing and failure for his creators to lead to its creation. At Anki, the desire has always been to find ways to apply robotics to consumer products. And for that, it had to bring in artificial intelligence.To “make alive”, Anki has endowed his robot with elements that seemed to him inescapable: facial and sensitive recognition to judge movements to make and recognize its environment; an artificial intelligence to understand and act; an interactive content developed from a real animation studio. To complete the whole thing, it is endowed with animated eyes.

At each new meeting, his camera allows him to scan a face to which you associate a name. He will then be able to recognize you later and be happy to see you … or not, according to the memory you will have left him. It can also detect a human from an animal (it mimics the sound of a cat or a dog if it recognizes it). His big eyes on his screen are so extremely expressive as for a human and eye contact extremely important.

The good news is that getting started takes only 5 minutes. Of course it must be loaded, but the settings via the application to download for free are all that simple. It works on iOS, Android or Kindle devices.

Via the application, we have access to various commands. Two games are included in which we challenge Cozmo with his interactive cubes. At first, it is very easy to win, but the more you play, the more it learns. And it seems that he is learning faster than the average human. In other words, he is likely to gain the upper hand quickly.

There is also an explorer mode. This is to direct it remotely (via the WiFi that serves for all orders). We can see the world from its height and through its eyes.

This innovative creature has people thinking in its pros and cons.

The most valuable aspects of Cozmo are:

– it recognizes its owner

– can be programed

– is always learning

The main defects are that it does not roll on carpets and works only with the application turned on.

As for today, Cozmo prices’ vary between USD 179.99 and USD 249.99 and may be purchased with additional gadgets (e.g. case).

Sources:

https://www.anki.com/en-us/cozmo

https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/anki-cozmo-hands-on/

https://www.theverge.com/2016/10/14/13276752/anki-cozmo-review-ai-robot-toy

https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/14/anki-cozmo-review/

http://www.trustedreviews.com/reviews/anki-cozmo

“Star Wars: The Last Jedi” premiered and its main character Rey seeks to learn the ways of the Force from Luke Skywalker, it raises some questions:

What resembles the Force? Can objects be manipulated instantly from a distance?

“These aren’t the forces that you are looking for”

Obi-Wan Kenobi told Luke Skywalker in the strange Star Wars film that the Force “surrounds us and penetrates us; it binds the universe together.”

Modern physicists know that there are actually 4 elemental forces: the two nuclear forces, the electromagnetic force, and the gravitational force. All of these play a role in contracting matter together, from the minute of atoms to the largest of planets.

However, these are substantially not the forces we are looking for. Old Ben Kenobi, Yoda, and, eventually, Luke, could communicate telepathically over the distances and move objects with their minds.

Are these feats possible? What do the laws of production contend about this?

“I find your lack of faith disturbing”

Einstein’s theory of relativity put some strict limits on how fast we can communicate — the ultimate speed limit is the speed of light.

So, if you needed to send a message to Alderaan to warn the citizens of an Imperial attack, there would always be a delay. Even if you wanted to, you couldn’t warn them in time to evacuate because it takes time for light to travel to transmit the message.

Ben Kenobi couldn’t possibly have felt a disturbance in the Force only a few instants after the Death Star destroyed Alderaan. Or could he?

“It’s true, all of it”

What does quantum physics say about information transferred over large distances? Unfortunately, we cannot break Einstein’s speed limit, even if we had the Millennium Falcon.

However, through a trick of quantum mechanics, you can link two particles in a special way, separate them, and then observe the effects of one upon the other over large distances. This is known as quantum entanglement — placing two objects in the same entangled quantum state. And it is weirder than anything that Star Wars creator George Lucas could come up with (Jar Jar Binks excluded, of course).

It can be demonstrated in the lab with particles of light. When these two particles, or photons, are separated over large distances, they are still correlated with each other. If you measure one particle, the other particle’s state will be determined immediately no matter how far it is away. Einstein didn’t like this idea, since it was “spooky action at a distance.” However, modern physics experiments have shown that entanglement is real — particles can be connected over large distances.

As Han Solo would say: “It’s true. All of it.”

In fact, George Lucas was influenced by quantum theory when he was writing the original script for Star Wars. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, New Age thinkers proposed that quantum entanglement is a “force” that really does bind us all together.

It is well known in physics experiments that the observer can become entangled with the object that they are measuring, changing the measurement.

The Force may actually be with you

The forces we experience on Earth may not operate like the powerful, people-projecting, weapon-deflecting one in “Star Wars” — but force fields do happen here.

But channeling enough force to project a hologram to a distant battle is, of course, unrealistic.

Still, some force fields on Earth are nearly as mysterious as those in the movies.

A report in The New York Times about the US government’s efforts to investigate potential UFO sightings described an incident in which pilots saw something bizarre on their screens in flight.

“They’re seeing an object that seems to have a force field — as they describe it — around it, that’s hovering before it suddenly disappears out of the sky as soon as they think they’re getting a radar lock on it,” Times Reporter Helene Cooper said on The Daily podcast.

References:

http://www.businessinsider.com/science-of-star-wars-the-last-jedi-is-sound-2017-12?IR=T/#the-force-may-actually-be-with-you-3