Thurrott Daily: May 12

Tech tidbits from around the web.

5/12/2016 5:34:17 PM

You can now preorder some cool new Lumia cases from Mozo

Most of you probably know that Mozo makes amazing cases for Microsoft’s new Lumias, transforming physically pedestrian devices into something special. Well,Mozo now has some new cases available for preorder, and they’re really nice looking. Shocker.

The pre-ordering option for the new range of products will be opened this Friday: discover the Wooden and Colorful Polycarbonate lines for 950/950XL and explore the Candy Blast for 650!

You can preorder these new cases at Mozo’s web site. If you’re familiar with this stuff, you know you need to move quickly.

“Italian military to drop Microsoft Office for LibreOffice”

Sometimes the jokes just write themselves.

Oh, and. They’ll be back.

FTC could be taking a second look at Google Search

As you may recall, I was incensed when the FTC failed to sue Google for antitrust violations, despite having found multiple instances of abuse. Well, it may not be over yet.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission officials are asking questions again about whether Alphabet Inc’s Google has abused its dominance in the Internet search market, Politico reported, citing sources familiar with the discussions.

The inquiry appears to be in the early, information-gathering stage, the news website reported.

Google Chirp to compete with Amazon Alexa

I wonder what took so long. And I wonder why Microsoft isn’t doing this with Cortana too. Anyway, Recode has the scoop:

A product team at Google is working on a hardware device that would integrate Google’s search and voice assistant technology, akin to the Amazon Echo, Recode has learned.

Google’s device will resemble its OnHub wireless router, according to several sources. We don’t know if it has a name yet, but internally the project goes by “Chirp.”

Chirp is a silly name. But that’s the problem with Google: Unlike Apple, Amazon or Microsoft, it doesn’t have a human name for its personal digital assistant. And that was clearly a mistake.

Google is selling Cardboard VR in Canada, the UK, France, and Germany now

I’m a big fan of Google Cardboard, and Android Police says (poorly, what’s up with the writing?) that the Google Store is now selling this low-cost VR solution in more countries.

You can now buy Google Cardboard in Canada, the United Kingdom, France, or Germany.

Skip the post and just go get Cardboard. It’s really neat.

Google provides its Gboard keyboard on iOS

Well, well. It looks like Google isn’t going to let Microsoft be the only high-profile firm making cool software keyboards for iOS. Today, it announced the release of Gboard.(Another terrible Google name.)

iPhone users—this one’s for you. Meet Gboard, a new app for your iPhone that lets you search and send information, GIFs, emojis and more, right from your keyboard.

Say you’re texting with a friend about tomorrow’s lunch plans. They ask you for the address. Until now it’s worked like this: You leave your texting app. Open Search. Find the restaurant. Copy the address. Switch back to your texts. Paste the address into a message. And finally, hit send.

Searching and sending stuff on your phone shouldn’t be that difficult. With Gboard, you can search and send all kinds of things—restaurant info, flight times, news articles—right from your keyboard. Anything you’d search on Google, you can search with Gboard. Results appear as cards with the key information front and center, such as the phone number, ratings and hours. With one tap, you can send it to your friend and you keep the conversation going.

This looks legitimately interesting. Unfortunately, third party keyboards are reallybuggy in iOS. I hope Apple fixes that.