02 March 2018

Galaxy S9’s display takes honors alongside its camera


 Earlier this morning Samsung’s Galaxy S9’s camera was awarded the highest-yet score from DxOMark, and now its screen gets the best-of-all-time nod from DisplayMate and display wonk Ray Soneira. The margins between the victor and the vanquished, however, are growing thinner every generation. Read More

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Galaxy S9’s display takes honors alongside its camera


 Earlier this morning Samsung’s Galaxy S9’s camera was awarded the highest-yet score from DxOMark, and now its screen gets the best-of-all-time nod from DisplayMate and display wonk Ray Soneira. The margins between the victor and the vanquished, however, are growing thinner every generation. Read More

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Making Healthcare Data Work Better with Machine Learning




Over the past 10 years, healthcare data has moved from being largely on paper to being almost completely digitized in electronic health records. But making sense of this data involves a few key challenges. First, there is no common data representation across vendors; each uses a different way to structure their data. Second, even sites that use the same vendor may differ significantly, for example, they typically use different codes for the same medication. Third, data can be spread over many tables, some containing encounters, some containing lab results, and yet others containing vital signs.

The Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) standard addresses most of these challenges: it has a solid yet extensible data-model, is built on established Web standards, and is rapidly becoming the de-facto standard for both individual records and bulk-data access. But to enable large-scale machine learning, we needed a few additions: implementations in various programming languages, an efficient way to serialize large amounts of data to disk, and a representation that allows analyses of large datasets.

Today, we are happy to open source a protocol buffer implementation of the FHIR standard, which addresses these issues. The current version supports Java, and support for C++, Go, and Python will follow soon. Support for profiles will follow shortly as well, plus tools to help convert legacy data into FHIR.

FHIR as the core data model
Over the past few years, as we’ve been partnering with academic medical centers to apply machine learning to de-identified medical records, it became clear that we needed to address the complexity of healthcare data head-on. Indeed, for machine learning to be effective on medical data, we need a holistic view of what happened to each patient over time. And as a bonus, we want a data representation that is directly applicable in a clinical setting.

While the FHIR standard addresses most of our needs, making healthcare data substantially easier to manage than “legacy” data structures and enabling large-scale machine-learning independent of vendors, we believe the introduction of protocol buffers can help both application developers and (machine-learning) researchers use FHIR.

Current release of protocol buffers
We’ve taken care to make our protocol buffer representation suitable for both programmatic access and database queries. One of the provided examples shows how to upload FHIR data into Google Cloud BigQuery and have it available for querying, and we are adding other examples that upload directly from bulk data export. Our protocol buffers adhere to the FHIR standard (they are in fact auto-generated from it) but make for more elegant queries.

The current release does not yet include support for training TensorFlow models, but keep an eye out for future updates. We aim to open-source as much as possible of our recent work, to help make our research more reproducible and applicable to real-world scenarios. Furthermore, we are working closely with our colleagues in Google Cloud on more tools for managing healthcare data at scale.

Acknowledgements
We enjoyed great discussions and helpful feedback from the FHIR community, including Grahame Grieve, Ewout Kramer, Josh Mandel and others. Thanks to our colleagues at DeepMind, the Google Brain team and our academic collaborators.

5 Best Linux Operating Systems for Gaming


best-linux-os-gaming

When people think of gaming, Linux isn’t exactly the first operating system that comes to mind. The vast majority of the consumer market still uses Windows which is where the majority of games are played. But does that mean you can’t game on Linux? Definitely not! Here are five Linux distributions made specifically for gaming. 1. SteamOS From the company (Valve) that changed the way we bought games comes SteamOS. The SteamOS experience is probably the closest you’re going to get to a games console. Built on Debian, it’s touted as being optimized for a “Living room experience” or as...

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7 Simple Tips for Instagram and Snapchat Success


simple-tips-instagram-snapchat

Whether you love them or hate them, there’s no denying it: celebrities, especially those like the Kardashians, have millions of followers because they’re famous for something (or not). But what about the rest of us, the average Joes and Janes of the world, who just want more followers on Instagram and Snapchat? While we may not attain celebrity status, there are a few ways to obtain some success with your Instagram and Snapchat pics. 1. Have a Hook One of the best ways to stand out from the crowd is to be unique and have a hook. Not everyone cares...

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Facebook’s wider Kremlin Brexit ad sweep draws a blank


 Facebook has claimed to have found no further evidence of co-ordinated Russian-backed ad purchases on its platform targeting the 2016 Brexit vote in addition to the ad buys it previously reported.  Read More
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Google expands snippets to answer more questions right in the search results


 For years, Google’s “featured snippets” have offered quick answers to users’ search queries by pulling information from web pages and placing it in a box above the search results. This week, Google began rolling out a new snippet experience for web searchers with multiple answers to the question posed in the search box – something that addresses the problem of… Read More
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Is Your New Phone Carrier-Locked? Here’s How to Unlock It


unlock-carrier-locked-phone

Is your phone unlocked? Sure you might know the passcode, and it may be rooted or jailbroken. But does your carrier prevent you from inserting a SIM card from one of its rivals? Is your smartphone (or mobile internet-capable tablet) locked to one single carrier? If so, it’s carrier-locked. But what if you want to use a SIM card from another carrier (or network)? The answer is that you’ll need to unlock your phone. Here’s what you need to know. Is It Legal to Unlock Your Phone? A few years ago, it was illegal to unlock your smartphone. Until 2014,...

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eBay Launches “Under $10” for Bargain Hunters


Everybody likes a bargain, right? If money is tight you won’t be able to buy a Sonos One or PS4 Pro without saving up for months or sticking it on a credit card. However, retail therapy doesn’t have to cost a fortune. As eBay is demonstrating with “Under $10”. “Under $10” is exactly what you’d expect: a new section filled with products all costing under $10. Sometimes considerably less. It’s fair to say eBay isn’t the force it once was, but this is a reminder that eBay is one of those websites for bargain hunters. Everything Under $10?! The “Under...

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Everything You Need to Know About Bulletproof Hosting Services


bulletproof-hosting

There is a lot of amazing content online, but there’s a lot of awful stuff too. Mainstream media often tells you that the really awful stuff is hiding, just a single click away. While finding this kind of content isn’t quite that easy, it is out there. Out of sight… but not entirely out of mind. Nefarious content like this uses a “special” type of secure server, known as bulletproof hosting. But why doesn’t the government just take down these servers? And how do the hosts get away with hosting such horrifying content? What Is Hosting? Before understanding what bulletproof...

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Snap reportedly working on new Spectacles, including two-camera version


 Snap, Inc. calls itself a “camera company” so it shouldn’t be all that surprising that it’s working on new versions of its Spectacles hardware (especially since we reported just that last June). But a new report from Cheddar has surprised some with news that Snap is working on a refresh of their hardware´set to launch later this year, as well as a two-camera version… Read More

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7 of the Most Useful iPhone Settings You Aren’t Using


iphone-settings-useful

The iPhone’s Settings app is a labyrinth of well-hidden options and useful customizations, but they’re not immediately apparent if you don’t know where to look. Even more confusingly, some of the best settings aren’t in the Settings app at all. Today we’re going to investigate some of the lesser-known iPhone settings. Keep reading to find out more. 1. Invert the Screen Colors We’re all accustomed to how an iPhone looks. The various on-screen menus have used a light grey tone for years. Perhaps you’re getting bored of the color scheme, maybe you just want to create a talking point with...

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Fire! 9 Tank Games That Put You in the Action


tank-games

Tank games are a blast. You roll around in a nigh-invincible metal behemoth running over obstacles, mowing down buildings, and taking potshots at the enemy. But there’s also a lot of great variety. Some games are fast-paced tactical battles, while others require that you manage mechanized minutiae. You might be in charge of a battalion, or on your own in a one-against-many battle where your greatest resource is your wits. From the ultra-realistic to the slightly crazy, you can find good tank games that mix armored warfare with the tactical or strategic gameplay you’re looking for. And, of course, plenty...

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Social media handed “one-hour rule” for terrorist takedowns in Europe


 The European Commission is still considering whether to regulate social media platforms to ensure they promptly remove illegal content — be it terrorist propaganda, child sexual exploitation or hate speech but also commercial scams and even copyright breaches.  Read More
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Google’s Song Maker experiment makes making songs easy


 Google has added a new instrument to its Chrome Music Lab: Song Maker. As the name implies, Song Maker is all about making songs. It’s essentially an easy to use sequencer that lets you draw melodies in the browser (though it doesn’t feature some of the automation in the Music Lab’s Melody Maker tool). It’s no FL Studio, but it’s fun and you get to choose between… Read More
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The Samsung Galaxy S9+ camera bumps the Pixel 2 for DxOMark’s top spot


 You know the drill, right? A new flagship comes out and bumps the last big name out of the top spot. We’re still a couple of weeks out from the Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+ release date, but the premium handset just got the DxOMark treatment, and it seems the company’s got another feather to put in its flagship’s cap. The site posted a 99 for the S9+, edging out the Pixel 2’s… Read More

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The Samsung Galaxy S9+ camera bumps the Pixel 2 for DxOMark’s top spot


 You know the drill, right? A new flagship comes out and bumps the last big name out of the top spot. We’re still a couple of weeks out from the Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+ release date, but the premium handset just got the DxOMark treatment, and it seems the company’s got another feather to put in its flagship’s cap. The site posted a 99 for the S9+, edging out the Pixel 2’s… Read More

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Did You Know Windows 10 Has a Hidden Currency Converter?


If you need a currency converter today, you have many options to choose from. Google Search, for example, can easily return currency conversions. Dedicated currency converter apps and websites are plentiful as well. But if you want to stay away from the web and mobile devices, here’s some good news: the Windows 10 Calculator has a “hidden” currency converter feature that may be right up your alley. How to Convert Currency in Windows 10 The currency converter was introduced with the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update build. Currency conversion is available for nearly all major currencies. Launch the Calculator app on Windows 10 (type “calculator”...

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A Brief Guide to Uber’s Different Ride Types and Options


If you’re new to Uber, the many ride options can be pretty confusing. If you’re not sure which ride is right for you, find out all about the options here. Uber’s Economy Options UberX The standard Uber option is UberX. You along with up to three others with you ride door-to-door alone in a sedan. If you’re bringing a car seat with you, it could add up to $10 to your fare. UberXL This option is similar to UberX, except that instead of a sedan you’re getting picked up in an SUV or van. You can also bring along five...

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How to Set a Repeating Alarm on Amazon Echo


setup-amazon-echo-dot

Of all the things Alexa can do, one of the simplest but most useful tasks is setting an alarm. There’s no need to fumble with an old-fashioned clock radio; just tell Alexa when you need to get up and she’ll jolt you out of slumber. If you wake up at the same time every day, there’s no reason to set your Echo alarm every night, though. You can be more productive (and keep the noise down at night) by setting a repeating alarm. Here’s how. How to Set a Repeating Alarm on Amazon Echo Method 1 For the easiest method,...

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Instagram code reveals unreleased voice and video calling


 Instagram wants to be your phone, not just your camera. And it wants to be better at it than Snapchat. Files buried in Instagram and the Instagram Direct standalone app’s Android Application Packages (APKs) are files and icons for “Call” and “Video Call”. APKs often show files for unreleased features that are lying dormant in an app waiting to be surfaced when… Read More
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Google’s new YouTube Stories feature lets you swap out your background (no green screen required)


 Google researchers know how much people like to trick others into thinking they’re on the moon, or that it’s night instead of day, and other fun shenanigans only possible if you happen to be in a movie studio in front of a green screen. So they did what any good 2018 coder would do: build a neural network that lets you do it. Read More
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Google’s new YouTube Stories feature lets you swap out your background (no green screen required)


 Google researchers know how much people like to trick others into thinking they’re on the moon, or that it’s night instead of day, and other fun shenanigans only possible if you happen to be in a movie studio in front of a green screen. So they did what any good 2018 coder would do: build a neural network that lets you do it. Read More

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Instagram code reveals unreleased voice and video calling


 Instagram wants to be your phone, not just your camera. And it wants to be better at it than Snapchat. Files buried in Instagram and the Instagram Direct standalone app’s Android Application Packages (APKs) are files and icons for “Call” and “Video Call”. APKs often show files for unreleased features that are lying dormant in an app waiting to be surfaced when… Read More

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Mobile Real-time Video Segmentation




Video segmentation is a widely used technique that enables movie directors and video content creators to separate the foreground of a scene from the background, and treat them as two different visual layers. By modifying or replacing the background, creators can convey a particular mood, transport themselves to a fun location or enhance the impact of the message. However, this operation has traditionally been performed as a time-consuming manual process (e.g. an artist rotoscoping every frame) or requires a studio environment with a green screen for real-time background removal (a technique referred to as chroma keying). In order to enable users to create live in the viewfinder we designed a new technique that is suitable for mobile phones.

Today, we are excited to bring precise, real-time, on-device mobile video segmentation to the YouTube app by integrating this technology into stories. Currently in limited beta, stories is YouTube’s new lightweight video format, designed specifically for YouTube creators. Our new segmentation technology allows creators to replace and modify the background, effortlessly increasing videos’ production value without specialized equipment.
Neural network video segmentation in YouTube stories.
To achieve this, we leverage machine learning to solve a semantic segmentation task using convolutional neural networks. In particular, we designed a network architecture and training procedure suitable for mobile phones focusing on the following requirements and constraints:
  • A mobile solution should be lightweight and run at least 10-30 times faster than existing state-of-the-art photo segmentation models. For real time inference, such a model needs to provide results at 30 frames per second.
  • A video model should leverage temporal redundancy (neighboring frames look similar) and exhibit temporal consistency (neighboring results should be similar)
  • High quality segmentation results require high quality annotations.
The Dataset
To provide high quality data for our machine learning pipeline, we annotated ten of thousands of images that captured a wide spectrum of foreground poses and background settings. Annotations consisted of pixel accurate locations of foreground elements such as hair, glass, neck, skin, lips, etc. and a general background label achieving a cross-validation result of 98% Intersection-Over-Union (IOU) of human annotator quality.
An example image from our dataset carefully annotated with nine labels - foreground elements are overlaid over the image.
Network Input
Our specific segmentation task is to compute a binary mask separating foreground from background for every input frame (three channels, RGB) of the video. Achieving temporal consistency of the computed masks across frames is key. Current methods that utilize LSTMs or GRUs to realize this are too computationally expensive for real-time applications on mobile phones. Instead we first pass the computed mask from the previous frame as a prior by concatenating it as a fourth channel to the current RGB input frame to achieve temporal consistency, as shown below:
The original frame (left) is separated in its three color channels and concatenated with the previous mask (middle). This is used as input to our neural network to predict the mask for the current frame (right).
Training Procedure
In video segmentation we need to achieve frame-to-frame temporal continuity, while also accounting for temporal discontinuities such as people suddenly appearing in the field of view of the camera. To train our model to robustly handle those use cases, we transform the annotated ground truth of each photo in several ways and use it as a previous frame mask:
  • Empty previous mask - Trains the network to work correctly for the first frame and new objects in scene. This emulates the case of someone appearing in the camera's frame.
  • Affine transformed ground truth mask - Minor transformations train the network to propagate and adjust to the previous frame mask. Major transformations train the network to understand inadequate masks and discard them.
  • Transformed image - We implement thin plate spline smoothing of the original image to emulate fast camera movements and rotations.
Our real-time video segmentation in action.
Network Architecture
With that modified input/output, we build on a standard hourglass segmentation network architecture by adding the following improvements:
  • We use big convolution kernels with large strides of four and above to detect object features on the high-resolution RGB input frame. Convolutions for layers with a small number of channels (as it is the case for the RGB input) are comparably cheap, so using big kernels here has almost no effect on the computational costs.
  • For speed gains, we aggressively downsample using large strides combined with skip connections like U-Net to restore low-level features during upsampling. For our segmentation model this technique results in a significant improvement of 5% IOU compared to using no skip connections.
    Hourglass segmentation network w/ skip connections.
  • For even further speed gains, we optimized default ResNet bottlenecks. In the literature authors tend to squeeze channels in the middle of the network by a factor of four (e.g. reducing 256 channels to 64 by using 64 different convolution kernels). However, we noticed that one can squeeze much more aggressively by a factor of 16 or 32 without significant quality degradation.
    ResNet bottleneck with large squeeze factor.
  • To refine and improve the accuracy of edges, we add several DenseNet layers on top of our network in full resolution similar to neural matting. This technique improves overall model quality by a slight 0.5% IOU, however perceptual quality of segmentation improves significantly.
The end result of these modifications is that our network runs remarkably fast on mobile devices, achieving 100+ FPS on iPhone 7 and 40+ FPS on Pixel 2 with high accuracy (realizing 94.8% IOU on our validation dataset), delivering a variety of smooth running and responsive effects in YouTube stories.
Our immediate goal is to use the limited rollout in YouTube stories to test our technology on this first set of effects. As we improve and expand our segmentation technology to more labels, we plan to integrate it into Google's broader Augmented Reality services.

Acknowledgements
A thank you to our team members who worked on the tech and this launch with us: Andrey Vakunov, Yury Karthynnik, Artsiom Ablavatski, Ivan Grishchenko, Matsvei Zhdanovich, Andrei Kulik, Camillol Lugaresi, John Kim, Ryan Bolyard, Wendy Huang, Michael Chang, Aaron La Lau, Willi Geiger, Tomer Margolin, John Nack and Matthias Grundmann.





The Best To-Do App: Why Remember The Milk Wins


best-todo-app

Are you always searching for the best to-do app for organizing your life? After a decade of testing dozens of to-do apps, I have settled on the one that provides more features and flexibility than any other out there. That to-do app is Remember The Milk. Remember The Milk may be the one for you too if you’re looking for something better than one you use today. However, before jumping in head-first, it’s important to know whether the reasons we’ve used to make this claim are the same reasons that matter to you. Let’s Compare the Best To-Do Apps In...

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Facebook ends its experiment with the alternative ‘explore’ news feed


 Facebook is ending its short-lived (and misguided) experiment with the alternative news feed feature called “Explore.” In a blog post today, Facebook head of news feed Adam Mosseri wrote: We constantly try out new features, design changes and ranking updates to understand how we can make Facebook better for everyone. Some of these changes—like Reactions, Live Video, and… Read More
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