TCL teases a 5G device, headset and its first foldable at CES

TCL is hardly a household name in the smartphone space. That’s hardly surprising, however, as the Chinese electronics company is better known for sub-brands like Alcatel and BlackBerry (hardware, not software — long story). Late last year, the company began really pushing its branded devices in Europe, a strategy it’s set to expand upon with some more cutting edge devices.

The company’s been teasing the launch of both a 5G and foldable handsets since last year, and is finally offering a little more info — on the former, at least. The TCL 10 5G will be its first 5G handset, following the release of an Alcatel branded router last year. The device is set for a Q2 launch in the U.S. and Canada.

It’s one of three TCL 10 devices set for launch, with pricing on the line starting at under $500. It’s clearly that budget will continue to be a primary selling point for the line, though one assumes the 5G model will carrier a not insignificant premium on top of that. The device will be powered by Qualcomm’s 5G SoC line. The chipmaker introduced the 765 late last year, with the intent of offering a more affordable entry-point for the next gen wireless technology..

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And then there’s the matter of the foldable. At press time, we don’t have much information about the device, first alluded to at last year’s Mobile World Congress. What we do have, however, are a lot more renders. The fact that it’s still listed as “Foldable Smartphone Concept” doesn’t give one a lot of confidence that it’s ready for primetime.

The images do, however, point to a form factor similar to Samsung’s Galaxy Gold, along with what appears to be a quartet of rear-facing cameras. More information, one assumes, at Mobile World Congress late next month So, something to look to in Barcelona, I guess.

And who can forgot Project Archery? Just kidding. Forgetting it would required that you’ve heard about it in the first place. I’m going to go out on a limb and say probably you have not. The device was announced — or, rather, alluded to at last year’s IFA. It’s a wearable display with a “cinematic viewing experience.” We’ve seen those come and go over the years. TCL’s shown off the 2.0 version of the product, but offered up no additional information.

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Powerful Geocoding Meets Handy Features With the Positionstack API

Computers work in absolutes. Thus, if you want a computer to do something, you need to tell it exactly what to do and how to do it. Take addresses, for example: We’re used to typing in rough approximations of addresses, but a computer won’t understand those—at least without a little help.

This is exactly what positionstack does for geocoding. With the service’s API and a little bit of code, you can easily add maps and location information to your website, but that’s just the beginning. Let’s look at it.

What Positionstack Does

In short, positionstack does both forward and reverse geocoding, but that won’t make much sense if you don’t know what geocoding is. The most common use case for geocoding is taking the way humans deal with addresses—street names and numbers, for example—and converting them into coordinates.

Reverse geocoding performs the opposite process. If you have a given set of latitude and longitude coordinates, you can use reverse geocoding to turn these into a human-readable address, or at the very least, usually a city name.

The company behind positionstack has created several web services aimed at businesses. They’re all easy to learn and integrate; check out our overview of serpstack for another example.

Why You Might Need a Geocoding API

A simple use for geocoding is to help a customer find their way to your business. They can enter their address, or the address they might be traveling from, into a form on your website. Using the positionstack API, you turn that address into coordinates. From there, the customer can use an embedded map to help them find your local office.

Of course, that’s just one option. There are countless APIs and other services that use coordinate-based location data. Using positionstack, you can interoperate with many of these, and build a custom seamless user experience.

Reverse geocoding can be notoriously inaccurate. However, with positionstack we found the reverse geocoding to be not just accurate, but also quick. This also bears out in other reports we’ve seen from developers using the service. All you have to do is call the reverse API endpoint with the coordinates you need.

One of the other key features of positionstack is how easily it understands textual input. The forward geocoding API easily handles even loosely structured addresses, meaning you have less work cleaning up user input before passing it to the API. This can be handy—especially for prototyping—and isn’t easy to do.

Pricing for Positionstack

When you sign up for a positionstack account, the initial offering is completely free. This is great if you’re using the API for personal projects, and with a limit of 25,000 requests, you shouldn’t run out anytime soon. The free tier is also handy for evaluating the service without committing to yearly or monthly billing. Support is limited at this tier, but considering the price, that’s understandable.

Updating to the Basic tier adds several features, including HTTPS encryption and extended rate limits. It also has support for JSON, XML, and GeoJSON formats, plus embeddable maps and support for multiple languages. This tier also raises the request limit to 10,000 per month and 100,000 overall. It’s priced at $9.99 per month or $7.99 per month if you pay yearly.

The Professional and Business tiers add just one additional feature: batch requests. These tiers significantly raise the request limits, which makes sense if you’re using positionstack for your business.

The Professional tier supports 50,000 monthly requests and 1,000,000 requests total. It comes at a cost of $49.99 per month, or $39.99 per month with yearly billing. Meanwhile, the Business tier supports 3,000,000 total requests and up to 250,000 monthly requests. You’ll pay $99.99 per month or $79.99 per month with yearly billing for this.

If you need something other than the standard tiers, positionstack also offers custom pricing and features tailored to your needs.

Getting Started With the Geocoding API

As with other services from this developer, getting started with positionstack is easy. You need two items: your API key and the API endpoint. Get your key by signing up on the positionstack website. The API endpoint is listed below:

https://api.positionstack.com/v1/forward

The API handles both JSONP callbacks and Access-Control (CORS) headers. This lets you easily work with positionstack, no matter what technologies you already use.

For a very simple example, here is a sample text query which will return geocoding data:

https://api.positionstack.com/v1/forward
? access_key = YOUR_ACCESS_KEY
& query = 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington DC

Advanced API Features

There are plenty of geocoding services available, so an offering like positionstack has to go above and beyond to compete. The service does this primarily by adding a few killer features.

In addition to the standard forward and reverse geocoding API endpoints, positionstack supports more advanced functionality. For example, if you’re on any tier above the basic free tier, API responses will include a map_url object that points to an embeddable map to include on your website.

If you’re dealing with international customers, the Country module may come in handy. All you need to do is add the country_module HTTP GET parameter to your API request and you’ll get much more country data. This includes currency information, the spoken language, and even an icon of the country’s flag.

The Country Module isn’t the only extra module you’ll find included in positionstack. The service also offers a Sun Module, a Timezone Module, and a Bounding Box module.

Try Positionstack for Free

If you’re not sure whether positionstack will meet your needs, you don’t need to spend any money to find out. As mentioned earlier, the service offers a free tier that lets you get to know it. While you don’t get every single feature, it exposes enough of the API to let you determine whether it will work with your existing code.

Once you’ve seen how easy it is to use the API, you might want to see some of the other services the developer offers. For using weather data on your website, take a look at our rundown of weatherstack, which should work well with geocoding and location data.

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How to Access the BIOS on a Windows 8 Computer

Windows 8 is may be a few years old now, but it’s still commonly used. And one change that you might not be aware of on newer Windows machines is a different method for accessing a computer’s BIOS. No longer do you press a certain key during the boot process to reveal the BIOS—instead, an option to access the BIOS is located in Windows 8’s boot options menu.

How Accessing BIOS Changed in Windows 8

Traditionally, computers displayed a message like “Press F2 to enter setup” at the beginning of the boot process. Pressing this key entered the computer’s BIOS.

However, machines that come with Windows 8 preinstalled use a modern update to BIOS called UEFI.

On some machines, especially those with solid state hard drives, the boot process can be so fast that you might not have time to see the message about entering BIOS. In these cases, you can opt to enter the BIOS from Windows itself.

Microsoft’s blog post about this on the Building Windows 8 blog describes how this new system came to be. With the increased boot speed, some systems had a less than a 200-millisecond window of opportunity to press a key. Even the best key-tappers at Microsoft could only press a key once every 250ms.

That meant to access the BIOS, frantic tapping, luck, and several computer reboots were all necessary.

The new system does away with this problem. It also brings some much-needed consistency to Windows 8 computers—they’ll all have a consistent way of accessing the BIOS.

Windows 8 Hardware vs. Old Computers With Windows 8

Note that this new method only applies if you purchased a new computer with Windows 8 preinstalled. If, on the other hand, you’ve installed Windows 8 on an existing computer that uses the legacy BIOS system, you’ll access the BIOS in the same way as always by pressing the key that appears during your boot process.

This key is often F2 or Delete, but it can also be other keys.

The exact key depends on your computer—if you don’t see the appropriate key displayed on your screen during the boot-up process, consult your computer’s manual.

How to Enter Windows 8 BIOS

In order to access the BIOS on Windows 8, you need to restart your computer into the boot options menu. There are several ways to do this.

The easiest one to find is in the PC Settings application. Press Windows key + C to reveal the Charms bar, click Settings, and select Change PC settings to access it.

In the PC Settings application, select the General category and click the Restart now button under Advanced startup. Your computer will restart and you’ll enter the Windows 8’s boot options menu. From here you can access the UEFI BIOS and change other settings.

You can also hold Shift while clicking Restart in the Shut Down menu to restart your computer into the boot options menu. This is a quick way to restart into the boot options menu, as you can access the Shut Down button from the Charms anywhere on your system.

Those who prefer to use the Windows command line to access the BIOS in Windows 8 can do so. There’s a shutdown command that’s one of the essential Windows command prompts you should know.

Here’s the command you need to use:

Shutdown.exe /r /o

Accessing UEFI BIOS

Once you’ve restarted and accessed the boot options menu, you can enter UEFI BIOS. To do this, click the Troubleshoot tile.

This will reveal an Advanced Options screen with a variety of tools. The UEFI Firmware Settings tile will take you to your computer’s BIOS.

If you don’t see the UEFI Firmware Settings tile here, your computer doesn’t use UEFI. That means you’ll need to access the BIOS in the traditional way, by pressing a specific key during the boot-up process. See the earlier section above for more information.

If there’s an error booting Windows, you won’t be locked out of the BIOS. The boot options screen will appear when you start your computer. From here, you can repair Windows or enter your BIOS.

Once you’ve entered the BIOS, you can perform the tasks you want. These could include tasks such as changing the boot device order, setting fan curves, overclocking your processor, or performing troubleshooting by detecting what hardware is being picked up by your system.

How to Access the BIOS on Windows 10

If you have updated your operating system recently, you might wonder how to access BIOS from Windows 10. Once again, if you have installed Windows 10 onto older hardware, then you’ll access BIOS by pressing a designated key during the boot process. This is the same as older hardware running Windows 8.

However, if you bought a computer with Windows 10 preinstalled, you’ll need a different method to access BIOS. To do this, start by going to Windows settings. You can access this by pressing Windows key + I.

From the settings menu, choose Update & Security, then choose Recovery from the menu on the left. You’ll see a list of options on the right, including a title saying Advanced startup. Beneath this header is a button saying Restart now.

When you hit this button, your computer will restart. During the startup, you’ll see the boot options menu. Like the Windows 8 instructions, go to Troubleshooting and then to UEFI Firmware Settings, then click Restart. This will restart your computer once again, and it will boot into UEFI BIOS.

UEFI Vs. BIOS

UEFI is rather different from traditional BIOS, even though they perform similar functions. BIOS tends to be in a limited color scheme and does not support the use of a mouse, so you need to navigate using your keyboard. The functions are somewhat limited too, with the ability to perform tasks like changing the boot device order or changing the system time and date.

UEFI is a more up to date version of BIOS. It is in full color, and you can navigate using a keyboard and mouse. It’s more like Windows, so it’s not so intimidating to new users. You can also do a lot more with UEFI. For example, you can set fan curves to adjust how fast the fans in your system spin at given temperatures. Or you can overclock your processor, using automatic overclocking wizards which set everything up for you based on your cooling solution.

Technically UEFI is a replacement for BIOS. But in practice, people use the terms interchangeably.

It’s Important to Secure Your BIOS

This shows you how to access BIOS from Windows 8, in case you need to make any changes to your system.

While you’re working on BIOS, it’s a good idea to set a password to keep your system more secure. If you have any problems with this process, then see our article on how to reset the BIOS password.

Spend some time on its screen and understand how the BIOS works and how it can help you optimize your computer.

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How to Create Self-Updating Microsoft Excel Charts in 3 Easy Steps

If you’re like me, you love the idea of Excel charts and can think of dozens of useful applications for them. But what happens when you need to add more data? It can seem like a lot of manual work to make changes. Well, no more! I’m going to show you how to make a graph in Microsoft Excel that updates automatically.

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Once you set it up all you’ll have to do is add data to the spreadsheet, and the chart will automatically graph it.

All you do need to understand are the fundamentals of Microsoft Excel charts to get started.

Why Use Excel Charts?

Charts allow you to use data in Excel to make decisions. They’re a nice change from staring at rows and columns of numbers.

They help shorten the decision-making process, as you can immediately see your results and where changes may need to happen. The difficulty in handling data and charts is that you constantly have to go back to the chart and update it for new data.

Creating charts in Microsoft Excel may seem intimidating, but it’s easy to create a chart in Excel and even one that updates automatically.

1. Set Up an Excel Spreadsheet

To create a chart that will update automatically you need to set up a spreadsheet that can house the data you want to use. The formatting is important because you want to be able to add more data without having to re-arrange everything.

Here is a basic layout with some neat formatting:

Input your information and make sure that each column has a header. The headers are important for labeling data in your table, and your chart.

For this project, I’m creating a chart that tracks sales of each Harry Potter novel at a bookshop.

This format works best because you can extend entries into new rows below. In this example, as new sales data is recorded you would add it to the spreadsheet starting in row 11. Here is the table with a new row added to show how easy it is to add information.

Now that the range is formatted, headers are labeled, and data is filled, you’re ready to move on to the next step.

2. Create a Table

In Microsoft Excel, tables a powerful way to work with a range of data.

In addition to making your data look neat and tidy, they have many more tools to organize and sort your information. The goal here is to create a table that feeds data to a chart. Linking these two pieces together allows the chart to check for new data in the table and automatically update.

To create a table, select all the data you would like to turn into an Excel chart. Then head to the Insert tab and select Table. Alternatively, you can use the shortcut CTRL + T.

In the Create Table prompt, you can adjust the cells included in the table. Since you are using headers in the range, check the box labeled My table has headers, then press OK.

Your data will now be transformed into an Excel table! Notice the formatting change, which means it has been converted from a regular range. You can also change the color scheme if the default isn’t quite your favorite.

Now that the information is neatly arranged in a table, it’s time to create a chart.

3. Insert a Chart and Add Data

Highlight the table and head to Insert > Charts to choose what kind of visualization to use. The chart will depend on what kind of data you’re working with. For my example, I’m using a line graph. This allows me to compare several different columns worth of data in one chart, and it works very well with automated updates.

Here is the line chart comparing the book sales by date, Excel will automatically color the lines for you. If you move your mouse over any point on the line, Excel will show you that value in your table.

Now we can test out how well our chart works by adding new data into the table. Fortunately, this is by far the easiest part of the process.

To add more data, simply add another row at the bottom of your existing chart. Since the Date column dictates the values on the X-axis of your chart you will want to start there.

The Excel table will match the formatting of previous rows, so your date will automatically match what you have entered so far. This is a neat feature built into Excel tables.

You may see a dialog warning you that the table inserted rows into the worksheet — this is fine. Your chart should have already updated to include the new entry on its X-axis.

Now you can add all your new data, and the chart will update automatically with the new information.

Above, you can see that I added a sales count of 10 for each book to prompt the chart to update.

Now you can update the chart over and over again, simply by adding more rows to the table. However, you may have to tweak its size and formatting to present all the data properly, depending on how much you’re planning to add.

Make Microsoft Excel Work for You

One of the most powerful aspects of Microsoft Excel is the ability to create sheets that update automatically and save you time. This might be something as simple as creating a basic self-updating chart, as we’ve seen here. It might be something more challenging like learning how to make a box and whisker plot in Excel.

By putting in a little effort up-front, you can save plenty of time later on. Challenge yourself to learn something new in Microsoft Excel, and it will pay off in the long run. If you’re wanting to try out some more charts, check out these six Excel charts to learn a little more.

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The 6 Best Browser Strategy Games to Play for Hours

While you may think that browser strategy games don’t have as much depth as console strategy games, some do. And not only are the best browser strategy games free to play, you can easily access them through any web browser.

With that in mind, here are the best browser strategy games to play for hours. These games will appeal to many types of strategy gamers. Some may look a bit dull on the surface, but they’re all hiding some serious strategic depth.

1. Blight of the Immortals

Not many games would so proudly proclaim themselves “the slowest real-time game you’ve ever played.” But Blight of the Immortals does—and it works.

You might think repelling zombie hordes would be a fast and frantic affair, but this is a more leisurely-paced game. Each turn lasts six hours, so players are encouraged to check in every once in a while instead of playing in real-time. Plus, you can plan your units’ moves ahead of time, so you don’t have to wake up in the middle of the night to make your next move.

Blight of the Immortals feels a lot like a board game. At the beginning of each match, you construct your deck out of available cards. During your turn, you’ll have five cards to play, each of which gives you a special hero power. By training, managing, and efficiently battling with your armies, you can try to survive.

You’ll need to manage your resources and play the right cards at the right times to defeat your opponents. By spending the coins you earn from playing, you’ll add more heroes to your deck. It’s an addictive combination. Neat touches, like burning defeated soldiers to prevent them from becoming zombies, make Blight of the Immortals a surprisingly thematic and engaging game.

2. Gridland

This game might not seem like a strategy game at first. Most match-three games aren’t very strategic, but Gridland is different—it’s one of the best browser strategy games with a single-player mode. You’ll need to think cleverly about the matches you make to succeed.

The game contains two phases: day and night. During the day, you’ll gather resources to build up your settlement. At night, you’ll use weapons and defenses to survive attacks from various creatures. You’ll have to find those matches quickly if you want to make it.

Gridland is surprisingly engaging when you get into it, making it one of those addictive web games perfect for short breaks. Discovery is a big part of this game, so we won’t go into any more detail. There’s really no way to properly describe it—just go check it out.

3. Card Hunter

Card Hunter is a tactical collectible card game (CCG) that you can play in your browser or through a downloaded app. It blends roleplaying and deck building with a sense of humor that any card player or roleplayer will appreciate.

You can play in both single and multiplayer modes—the more you play, the more cards you collect. In this way, it’s a lot more player-friendly than some of the pay-to-win online games out there. Each battle is a turn-based strategic face-off in which you play cards to move and attack.

The real fun of Card Hunter is managing your characters’ decks. You’ll need to give them the right combination of eight types of cards to defeat the minions and monsters you encounter. Whether you’re a long-time card-game player or not, this is one you’ll keep coming back to for hours on end.

4. Kingdom Rush

Looking for free, single-player strategy games? Kingdom Rush is your best bet. If you’re familiar with the game, you probably know its mobile version. As you can see, it’s also available for your browser.

If you’ve never played Kingdom Rush, get ready for extremely strategic tower defense. There are lots of tower types, multiple upgrade paths, tons of minions with different strengths and weaknesses, and some really interesting stage layouts.

There are even boss fights where you’ll need to plan ahead to make sure you have the best towers to quickly deal a lot of damage. However, you also have to make sure you’re able to take down the minions sent ahead. It looks cute and goofy (and it is), but there’s also a huge amount of strategic depth in this game.

5. Forge of Empires

You may know Forge of Empires as one of the best free mobile games, but it actually started out as a strategy browser game. This addicting game transports you through time, starting with the Stone Age.

You start by constructing a city using the resources and technology of each era. In the single-player mode, you play to construct a settlement covering a whole continent. On the other hand, multiplayer mode allows you to compete with other players.

Forge of Empires isn’t all about building—you’ll have to wage wars and manage your finances strategically if you want to succeed.

6. Elvenar

Elvenar comes from InnoGames, the same developers that created Forge of Empires. When you start the game, you choose your race: elf or human. Both races have different architectural and military styles. No matter which race you choose, your goal remains the same—you must work to expand your town.

As you build more residencies and workshops around town, you’ll notice an influx of coins and building supplies. Both of these resources are essential in constructing cultural buildings to keep your residents happy.

Once you’ve achieved a healthy balance in your town, you can begin to explore other regions. These expeditions help you unlock even more building types that will make your town even better.

Elvenar features compelling gameplay that means it should be regarded as one of the best free browser games to kill time.

Find Your Favorite Browser Strategy Games

These browser strategy games will keep you busy for hours collecting cards, building decks, trying new strategies, and competing against other players. They may only be strategy games for your web browser, but they’re still highly addictive.

Do you need more games to keep you entertained? These online FPS browser games should satisfy that craving.

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6 Ways to Use Mac Automator With Your Browser

Automator is one of the most underappreciated tools on your Mac. It takes a while to get the hang of, but once you have an idea how to use it, you can automate all kinds of useful tasks, from opening URLs to downloading images.

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One of the best ways to use Automator is with its browser commands. These can save you a lot of time with regular actions in Safari or your web browser of choice.

Let’s take a look at several ways to use Automator with your browser.

1. Open a Webpage at a Specific Time Every Day

Many of us visit and revisit certain webpages at the same time every day. Maybe you need to open the same webpage every day before you start working, or maybe you’ve got a Pinterest board of motivational quotes you like to read every Monday morning.

Either way, you can save yourself some time by making Automator open those webpages for you. Here’s how:

1. Open Automator from the Utilities folder in your Applications (or search for it with Spotlight using Cmd + Space). Create a New Document, then choose Calendar Alarm.
2. Select Internet from the sidebar and drag the Get Specified URLs action to the workflow on the right. Remove the default URL and add the page you want Automator to open (for this example, we used the MakeUseOf homepage).
3. Now drag the Display Webpages action into the workflow and place it below the previous action. You’ll see one produces output and the other takes input, so they’re connected.
4. Hit the Run button in the top-right corner to test the alarm. Automator should open the webpage you entered in your default browser. If it doesn’t, double-check that you followed all the instructions above.
5. Finally, go to File > Save to save the project. When you do so, Calendar opens a new event (in our case, it’s called “Display MakeUseOf”). Edit the event in your calendar to repeat whenever you want Automator to open that URL.

In the example above, Automator will open MakeUseOf every Friday at 5:50pm. Make any desired changes here so the page displays at your preferred days and times.

2. Open a Specific Set of Webpages Using Automator

There are probably groups of webpages you always open together. For some, that might mean five different social media accounts. Others may always open their work email, calendar, and to-do list.

Why not create an Automator application to open a list of URLs at once?

1. Create a New Document in Automator and select Application as the document type.
2. Again, go to Internet and drag Get Specified URLs into the workflow, then add the list of webpages you want Automator to open at the same time. We used a few Hearthstone-related pages.
3. Add the Display Webpages action below Get Specified URLs, and you’re set.
4. Save the application with a meaningful name, then launch it using Spotlight to open a huge number of webpages with just a few keystrokes!

We called this Automator application “hearthstone-read,” and can use it to open four URLs in an instant.

3. Download All the Images From a Page

This is a workflow automation, which means you need to run it from within Automator. Even though opening Automator might seem like an extra step, this is still a much quicker way to download all the images from your active webpage.

1. Create another New Document in Automator and select the Workflow option.
2. Again, go to the Internet category in the sidebar. This time, add Get Current Webpage from Safari to the workflow. Unfortunately, this workflow only works with Safari, but in many ways Safari is a better browser than Chrome for your Mac anyway.
3. Below that, add Get Image URLs from Webpage and set the Get URLs of images dropdown to on these webpages.
4. Add Download URLs to the bottom of the workflow and set your preferred download location. We chose to stick with the Downloads folder.
5. To download all the images from a specific webpage, open that page in Safari and run this workflow in Automator. Depending on how many images are on that page, it might take a while to download.

After downloading images, you can resize them, rename them, or reorganize them using other Automator workflows.

4. Download All the Audio or Video Files From a Page

You can do something similar with audio or video files by using a slightly more complicated workflow. This makes it possible to download all the audio or video files on a particular webpage from within Automator.

1. Create another Workflow in Automator the same way as before.
2. Add the Get Current Webpage from Safari action again.
3. This time, add Get Link URLs from Webpages.
   1. If you select Only returns URLs in the same domain as the starting page, you only get audio or video files hosted on the same domain as the page you’re on. Conversely, if you don’t select it, you get all the files linked from the page, no matter where they are.
4. Now add the Filter URLs action to the workflow. How you set up the filter depends on what you want to download. For example, if you only want MP3 files, set the Path to contain .mp3. For MP4 videos, set the Path to contain .mp4, and so on.
5. You can also include a number of criteria and choose Any of the following are true.
6. Now you’ve filtered the URLs, add the Download URLs action and choose a download folder.
7. Then run the workflow from within Automator to download your chosen media from any open pages in Safari.

5. Launch a Website as a Standalone App

If you ever wished a website would release its own app, or if you prefer to use multiple browsers windows rather than multiple tabs, you might like to use Automator to open a specific webpage as its own app.

This is a great option if you want to create a dedicated Google search app with Automator.

1. Fire up a new Automator document and choose Application.
2. The first action is to Get Specified URLs, where you need to enter the URL of the site you want to turn into an app. As an example, we used the Google search page.
3. Now add the Website Pop-up action, which creates an app wrapper for the site. You can choose from a number of different settings to change the size and appearance of the website.
4. Now save Automator as an application and give it a clear name; we called ours “Google Search.” To launch your web app, just double-click the Automator file.

6. Open Articles That Contain Specific Phrases

RSS feeds are still useful for tasks like creating your own news feed. But some feeds are overrun with articles, making it hard to find the ones you want.

If you’re looking for specific topics or phrases, create an Automator workflow to open articles that match a search query in a specific feed.

1. First, create a Workflow in Automator.
2. Add the Get Specified URLs action with the URL of the feed (or feeds) you want to search. As an example, we used the RSS feed of BBC World News.
3. Now, create a filter using the Filter Articles action. Let’s say we want to pull out any articles about the president; we could set the filter to pick up articles with “president” in the title or in the summary.
4. Add the Get Link URLs from Articles and Display Webpages actions to finish up.
5. When you run the workflow, you should get a lot of tabs with articles that match your search criteria. Be careful with this workflow, however, as it can result in an enormous number of new tabs.

Learn to Do Even More With Automator

It’s a bit complex at first, but Automator can be a hugely useful tool for making your Mac more efficient. It takes a while to get used to the app, but after spending some time with it, you should be able to create all sorts of useful workflows, services, and apps to make you more efficient every day.

While we focused on using Automator with your web browser here, there are plenty of other useful Automator apps to create as well.

Read the full article: 6 Ways to Use Mac Automator With Your Browser

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Echodyne steers its high-tech radar beam on autonomous cars with EchoDrive

Echodyne set the radar industry on its ear when it debuted its pocket-sized yet hyper-capable radar unit for drones and aircraft. But these days all the action is in autonomous vehicles — so they reinvented their technology to make a unique sensor that doesn’t just see things but can communicate intelligently with the AI behind the wheel.

Echodrive, the company’s new product, is aimed squarely at AVs, looking to complement lidar and cameras with automotive radar that’s as smart as you need it to be.

The chief innovation at Echodyne is the use of metamaterials, or highly engineered surfaces, to create a radar unit that can direct its beam quickly and efficiently anywhere in its field of view. That means that it can scan the whole horizon quickly, or repeatedly play the beam over a single object to collect more detail, or anything in between, or all three at once for that matter, with no moving parts and little power.

Echodyne’s pocket-sized radar may be the next must-have tech for drones (and drone hunters)

But the device Echodyne created for release in 2017 was intended for aerospace purposes, where radar is more widely used, and its capabilities were suited for that field: a range of kilometers but a slow refresh rate. That’s great for detecting and reacting to distant aircraft, but not at all what’s needed for autonomous vehicles, which are more concerned with painting a detailed picture of the scene within a hundred meters or so.

“They said they wanted high resolution, automotive bands [i.e. radiation wavelengths], high refresh rates, wide field of view, and still have that beam-steering capability — can you build a radar like that?” recalled Echodyne co-founder and CEO Eben Frankenberg. “And while it’s taken a little longer than I thought it would, the answer is yes, we can!”

The Echodrive system meets all the requirements set out by the company’s automotive partners and testers, with up to 60hz refresh rates, higher resolution than any other automotive radar, and all the other goodies.

An example of some raw data – note that doppler information lets the system tell which objects are moving which direction.

The company is focused specifically on level 4-5 autonomy, meaning their radar isn’t intended for basic features like intelligent cruise control or collision detection. But radar units on cars today are intended for that, and efforts to juice them up into more serious sensors are dubious, Frankenberg said.

“Most ADAS [advanced driver assist system] radars have relatively low resolution in a raw sense, and do a whole lot of processing of the data to make it clearer and make it more accurate as far as the position of an object,” he explained. “The level 4-5 folks say, we don’t want all that processing because we don’t know what they’re doing. They want to know you’re not doing something in the processing that’s throwing away real information.”

More raw data, and less processing — but Echodyne’s tech offers something more. Because the device can change the target of its beam on the fly, it can do so in concert with the needs of the vehicle’s AI.

Say an autonomous vehicle’s brain has integrated the information from its suite of sensors and can’t be sure whether an object it sees a hundred meters out is a moving or stationary bicycle. It can’t tell its regular camera to get a better image, or its lidar to send more lasers. But it can tell Echodyne’s radar to focus its beam on that object for a bit longer or more frequently.

The two-way conversation between sensor and brain, which Echodyne calls cognitive radar or knowledge-aided measurement, isn’t really an option yet — but it will have to be if AVs are going to be as perceptive as we’d like them to be.

Some companies, Frankenberg pointed out, are putting the responsibility for deciding what objects or regions need more attention on the sensors themselves — a camera may very well be able to decide where to look next in some circumstances. But on the scale of a fraction of a second, and involving the other resources available to an AV — only the brain can do that.

EchoDrive is currently being tested by Echodyne’s partner companies, which it would not name but which Frankenberg indicated are running level 4+ AVs on public roads. Given the growing number of companies that fit those once narrow criteria, it would be irresponsible to speculate on their identities, but it’s hard to imagine an automaker not getting excited by the advantages Echodyne claims.

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