New tech to capture 3D images from a kilometre away

Researchers have developed a new laser powered camera system that creates high-resolution 3D images of objects from up to a kilometre away. 

A standard camera takes flat, 2D pictures. To get 3D information, such as the distance to a far-away object, scientists can bounce a laser beam off the object and measure how long it takes the light to travel back to a detector. 

The technique, called time-of-flight (ToF) navigation systems for autonomous vehicles, and other applications, but many current systems have a relatively short range and struggle to image objects that do not reflect laser light. Researchers have tackled these limitations and reported their findings in the journal Optics Express. 

The research team, led by Gerald Buller, professor at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, describes a ToF imaging system that can gather high-resolution, 3D information about objects that are typically very difficult to image, from up to a kilometre away. 

The new system works by sweeping a low-power infrared laser beam rapidly over an object. It records, pixel-by-pixel, the round-trip flight time of the photons in the beam as they bounce off the object and arrive back at the source. 

The system can resolve depth on the millimetre scale over long distances using a detector that can "count" individual photons. 

The ability of the new system to image objects like items of clothing that do not easily reflect laser pulses makes it useful in a wider variety of field situations, said Aongus McCarthy, the first author of the study. 

"Our approach gives a low-power route to the depth imaging of ordinary, small targets at very long range," McCarthy said. 

"Whilst it is possible that other depth-ranging techniques will match or out-perform some characteristics of these measurements, this single-photon counting approach gives a unique trade-off between depth resolution, range, data-acquisition time, and laser-power levels," he said. 

The primary use of the system is likely to be scanning static, human-made targets, such as vehicles. With some modifications to the image-processing software, it could also determine their speed and direction. 

One of the key characteristics of the system is the long wavelength of laser light the researchers chose. The light has a wavelength of 1,560 nanometres, meaning it is longer, or "redder," than visible light. 

This long-wavelength light travels more easily through the atmosphere, is not drowned out by sunlight, and is safe for eyes at low power. 

Ultimately, McCarthy says, it could scan and image objects located as far as 10 kilometres away.

How to Activate SSL on Your Yahoo Mail Account Easily ?

▶ Yahoo has recently introduced SSL encryption to their email users. If you have one, then learn to activate SSL on your Yahoo mail account and increase its security further.

▶ SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer, is a protocol that encrypts data at the sender and decrypts data at the receiver making unauthorized access to the data practically impossible.

▶ Just login to your Yahoo mail, click on Settings icon at the top left of the screen, now choose Mail Options from the drop down list. Next, scroll to the bottom of the page and tick the Turn on SSL and click Save at the top. That’s it.

▶ For a detailed step-by-step tutorial along with screenshots, scroll down the article.

▶ I would strongly recommend all Yahoo Mail users to turn this feature on for greater security of your emails.

For those of you who don’t know, Yahoo was the first company to start a search engine and not Google. Yahoo! Inc. was founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994.

Again, Yahoo was first to even start their free email service called Yahoo! Mail. It was started in the year 1997.

But as years passed, Google out of its sheer innovation and simplicity has simply taken over Yahoo.

However, Yahoo! Mail is still the third largest web-based email service provider and the most popular webmail service provider in the US.

Currently, Yahoo! offers three versions of Yahoo! Mail. The traditional “Yahoo! Mail Classic” introduced in 1997, the second version introduced in 2005 included a new Ajax interface, drag-and-drop, improved search functionality, keyboard shortcuts, address auto-complete, tabs, and more and the final was in Oct 2010, which included a new design, improved performance, improved search functionality, and improved Facebook integration.

In spite of all those firsts, Yahoo is the last of its competition to introduce SSL encryption for Yahoo Mail users. Google and Microsoft already have SSL encryption enabled by default on their Gmail and Outlook services.

Yahoo has automatic SSL protection enabled for their apps on Android, iOS and Windows 8, however not for signed in users in a desktop web browser.

Just do a quick check if you want to verify this, the account login page uses the SSL (you will notice a https:// in the address bar), but once you are logged-in, there will be no SSL (you will only see http://) .

Now most of you would ask me – What is SSL and why do we need it? Does it make any difference?

What is SSL? Why do we need it?

SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer.

It is a protocol that encrypts data at the sender and decrypts data at the receiver making unauthorized access to the data practically impossible.

Thus, having SSL enabled on your Yahoo! Mail can prevent unauthorized parties from gaining access to sensitive, confidential, or personal information that you send in your emails.

Well, if you thoroughly want to know more about SSL and its working, here is the SSL webopedia link for you.

In my opinion, SSL is very important for any email service. Even though it’s optional for Yahoo Mail users, I would strongly  recommend you to turn it on for security purposes.

So, in this article, you will learn to activate SSL on your Yahoo mail account.

How to activate SSL on your Yahoo Mail Account?

1. Just login to your Yahoo Mail.

2. On the right top of the screen, you will find the Settings icon, just click on it and select Mail Options as seen in the screen-shot below.

3. Now, scroll down to the bottom of the page, you will find a checkbox saying Turn on SSL – “Make your Yahoo! Mail more secure with SSL (i.e. preventing others from accessing your account at Internet cafes)”.

Just tick the checkbox.

A notification pops up telling you that Yahoo! Mail needs to refresh once you hit on the save button. Click on OK.

Next, click Save at the top of the screen.

4. Now, you should see a lock and https:// as seen in the screen shot below.

Also Read:

• Quick Online Security Tips For School, College Students and Everyone
• How did the Internet start? Did You Know?

SSL supported browsers for Yahoo! Mail

These are some of the browsers that currently support SSL for Yahoo Mail on Windows PC:

• Firefox 3.5 and higher
• Chrome 5.0 and higher
• Internet Explorer 7.0 and higher
• Safari 4.0 and higher

Final Thoughts

It’s good to see Yahoo making some efforts to better its email service.

This is definitely a welcome feature as it would protect your emails from unauthorized access from other people.

Hope this article helped you to activate SSL on your Yahoo mail account.

Check out this Yahoo! Help page for additional information about enabling or disabling SSL.

Gadgets are new status symbols

Posted By: Er.Somesh Bhardwaj

People not only judge each other on what they drive, what they wear and where they live, they are now judging each other on what electronics they whip out to use in public. 

The iPhone seems to carry cachet for many users and Apple's devices are often seen as the "highest-end consumer products" in the gadget world, said Coye Cheshire, associate professor of sociology at the Berkeley School of Information. 

There also seems to be a well-formed iPhone oriOS hipster identity, at least according to Hunch, a taste-predictor engine that uses internetbehavior research to predict what different people will like. 

Those with Apple products made up 32 per cent of 15,818 users surveyed in 2011; they seemed to skew older than 35, and were more likely to be female and have a graduate degree than people using other products. 

These users are also more likely to be liberal and make more than 200,000 dollars a year. They're extroverted, enjoy spending money and define themselves as "high-maintenance." 

"The iPhone became a status symbol because people equated smartphone with iPhone," said Roslyn Layton, a Ph.D. candidate in Internet economics at the University of Copenhagen. 

Android users, on the other hand, seem to skew more rural (86 per cent more likely than iPhone users to live in a rural area), are more likely to vote conservatively (20 per cent more than iPhone users) and are 10 per cent more likely to be male. 

Android users may be making a statement against the iPhone. Most people have reference groups, or people they hang out with or aspire to be, said Brent McFerran, a marketing professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business. 

"People either want to be like that group or disassociate themselves from another group by doing the opposite," he said. 

Some may make an even bigger statement by using other smartphone operating systems. The Hunch survey seemed to relegate BlackBerry and the Windows Phone to a footnote, with BlackBerry users labeled as introverted city folk (equally likely to be male or female) who like to travel; it summed up Windows Phone users as politically moderate, suburban soccer moms. 

The Mac is another Apple product with a controversial identity. According to an April 2011 survey by Hunch, PC users tend to be suburban and rural, while Mac users are far more likely to be overeducated, vegetarian urbanites. PC users are more like to stop by the meme site I Can Haz Cheezburger, while Mac users want a peek at the Huffington Post. 

But Hunch also reported that Mac users consider themselves early adopters, while PC users are "later adopters." 

The Apple owners are also more likely to be ages 18 to 34, compared to the PC users' 35-to-49 demographic. More than half of Hunch's 388,315 respondents owned PCs, representing a much bigger chunk than the Mac users' 25 percent. 

Tablets have all kinds of users. However, most are considered leisure users, according to Frank N. Magid Associates. Unlike the first wave of tablet owners, people in the second wave tend to use the device occasionally, are less tech savvy, and more likely to be female and older than 50. 

Some experts say that making judgments based on the technology people use says something about wealth and privilege.

PlayStation 4 will launch globally in 2013, GameStop boss claims

Posted by : Er.Somesh Bhardwaj

A senior official at retailer GameStop has proclaimed that the Sony PS4 console will launch globally in 2013, something the manufacturer is yet to do.

When Sony announced the PS4 with a "Holiday 2013" release date it did not offer a specific timeframe or indicated whether the launch would be staggered - as Sony has in the past - across the various territories.

Recent rumours that the console wouldn't be arriving in Europe until 2014, but GameStop's Michael Hogan has revealed, perhaps inadvertently, that everything is on track for this year.

The company's vice president of strategy business and brand development said in a conference call with financial investors: "We know that Sony will introduce the PlayStation 4 globally in 2013, but we are still waiting to see what Microsoft's final plans are."

European complexities?

Rumours earlier this month have suggested that Sony would launch in the United States and Japan by the end of the year, but the European roll-out would have to wait until 2014.

The rumours had cited so-called "complexities involved in European distribution" as the reason for holding back.

Whether that was ever the case remains to be seen, but if Hogan's comments are on the money, you can all get the PS4 on that letter to Santa once again.

We expect to hear more about the official PS4 release date schedule at E3 in May and, who knows, perhaps we'll even get a glimpse of the actual console too!

Google Glass to be tested by 8,000 people

Google has chosen 8,000 people, including celebrities and tech opinion former's  who will get the chance to test its much-awaited 'wearable computer' Glass. 

Those who wanted to become 'Glass Explorers' had a week in February to submit their reasons why they should, in 50 words, via Google or Twitter. 

They were also asked to pay 1,500 dollars and collect their Glass frames from Los Angles, San Francisco or New York. 

The Glass wearable computers display information in a smartphone-like format, are hands-free, can interact with the internet using natural language voice commands and use Google's Android operating system. 

Among the well-known names who impressed the #fiberglass judges were actor Neil Patrick Harris, who now plays womanising Barney Stinson in How I Met Your Mother, and Souljaboy, a US rapper whose dance craze swept the nation, SKY News reports. 

According to the report, former House of Representatives speaker and Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich said he would take his 'on tours of zoos and museums to share the animals and fossils'. 

The names of around 4,000 people accepted by Google via Twitter have been collated and posted online by Stanford computer science PhD student Andrej Karpathy. 

His research showed 26 per cent of people chosen have fewer than 100 followers, 61 per cent fewer than 1,000 and seven percent have more than 10,000 followers. 

The Glass wearable computers display information in a smartphone-like format, are hands-free, can interact with the internet using natural language voice commands and use Google's Android operating system.