As I See Tech

I got a new smartphone. It's my first replacement since a long time. I'm excited to talk about it. Actually, more about the process of getting to it. For some people, the choice may be quick and easy. For the rest of us, it can take a lot of researching and shortlisting and choosing. At the end of it all is a well thought out decision. Or at least justified.

We've all seen what's possible. Different companies are doing it. Some parts perhaps better than others. But not all parts are in a single model. Obviously, these companies are not talking to each other. Likely, not sharing what they know. Thus, towards the end of 2018, leaks and all, there is still no perfect smartphone.

This is a desperate call to keep Windows 10 Mobile powered devices alive. For capable devices like Nokia Lumia ICON and higher, let them get the latest version of Windows 10 Mobile with all features activated including the wallet for wireless tap payments, for example. Let the users decide if it's worth keeping for much longer.

At their most basic, and by default, programming languages are not thread-safe. Programs written using these program languages are also not thread-safe by default. Thus, in order to create thread-safe programs, programmers must apply extra steps to ensure thread safety -- and these features must be specially provided and supported by the language. Now, what if a programming language is thread-safe by default?

We have been trapped in the smartphone's candy form factor since the iPhone launched in 2007. That's for more than a decade already! The business side of it shows easy success. However, it also stopped many companies to explore and innovate with new designs. Here are some ideas that I think companies should really seriously start pushing out in the wild...

Let me just drop this pseudocode here: https://gist.github.com/etmendz/435c8dd2a6d4982292ef37c364deef4f. Trainable, multi-tasking, and self-learning. ;-)

Google's Material design is beautiful. Microsoft's Fluent design is beautiful. Now what if we can have both of them in one beautiful Material Fluent or Fluent Material design? And what if it gets developed and maintained as the global standard UI/UX guidance.

Once in a while, a developer can be challenged by a new problem that puts him/her in the zone. This one happened recently and it's exhilarating! I have never encountered this problem before. Honest! And this is how I (eventually) solved it...

Modern robots are big, heavy and powerful. In many ways, they are designed to simulate what we already see as functional: hands, wrists, arms, elbows, feet, ankles, legs, knees, thighs, joints, hips, etc. Components that simulate these are common in the field of robotics. It is our nature to simulate the whole. But what if we stop a bit, step back a little and start small again?

Amazon's Prime Videos allows me to watch content from my Amazon Prime subscription, and to also buy/rent content not part of Prime. The convenience is beautiful. Now, I'm thinking, a brilliant competitor can be a merger of Netflix and Vudu. Right?

E-mail was created to intuitively simulate the experience of physically sending mails. This was cool and all. However, today's capabilities and demand for media rich instant messaging, audio/video calling, and collaborative communication redefine how we should be able to interact digitally, and, most important, how we can keep track of them all.

The web has used markup and markdown languages since forever. But what if we can use mark, just "mark", instead? Better yet, just like how HTML and XML are made standard, why not make Simple Object Notation (SON) and its variants standard for the web as well? Perhaps with the intent to replace markup and markdown in the near future.

Exposing our young generation to general computing and coding is still treated as special events in schools. There are hour of code events, learn to code tours, coding/programming electives and what have you. Why not make computing and coding one of the standard subjects in K-12?

We've seen roofs with or made of solar panels. We've seen solar panel glass windows. We've seen solar panel driveways. We've seen solar panel roads. How about solar panel buildings, bridges, houses, parking lots, etc.? We've seen them once or twice. We heard or read about them once or twice. But why aren't they everywhere?

Fingerprint scan, iris scan and facial recognition are popular biometric security features for devices and applications. More biometric technologies can be developed in the future. However, is there a global guiding standard that defines the amount of accuracy and detail that each of these technologies must meet in order to be considered effective and secure?

Companies recommend that we activate/install malware/virus protection software in our PCs and devices. If early detection is key, why not make them built-in to modems and routers, where malware/viruses are less likely to do harm to the user's actual PC/device? Sounds good? Read on...

For the most part, what we do with our devices include asking questions, issuing commands, finding information, launching applications, getting things done, etc. If you can voice it out, the computer can do it. If you can type it in and press enter, the computer can handle it. It's really just like sending messages and getting replies back, or receiving messages and replying back. So what if your basic OS UI is like a chat messenger?

Microsoft designs their Surface devices and Windows 10 to be compatible with digital pens. In fact, support for the pen is built-in. However, the pen is sold separately and risks getting separated from the device even with the magnetic watchamacallit on the side, which seems more like an afterthought to the overall design. Now what if, Microsoft makes the pen part of the Surface? Sounds good? Read on...

If you've seen that scene in the Iron Man movie where Tony Starks held up a transparent smartphone, you may be among the viewers in the theater who gasped and itched to search for that device on the Internet. And like everyone else who actually did, you were disappointed to find out it was all just Hollywood being Hollywood. But then again, what's the chance we can really own something like it? Let's count the ways...

In general, a cache is stored data that is supposedly faster to access than building or getting the data from a data source each time it is requested. A cache microservice can be created with the pure purpose of managing caches which include creating them, storing them, expiring them and broadcasting events about them. Sounds good? Read on...