Whatsapp voice calling for iOS
WhatsApp, the popular mobile messaging service owned by Facebook, has released a major update to its iPhone app last week. The update includes the highly-anticipated WhatsApp Calling feature, which rolled out to every Android user late last month. The WhatsApp Calling feature is comparable to Skype and the FaceTime Audio service on iOS. Data charges may apply while using it.
WhatsApp version 2.12.1 also includes an iOS 8 share extension, a quick camera button in chats, the ability to edit your contacts right from WhatsApp and an option to send multiple videos at once. You can also crop and rotate videos before sending them. The iOS 8 share extension lets you share photos, videos and links to WhatsApp from other apps. And the quick camera button lets you seamlessly capture photos and videos or choose a recent camera roll photo or video.
Google’s doodle for earth day
Google marked Earth Day 2015 with a special Doodle, which includes “a totally scientific and 1,000 per cent accurate personality quiz,” telling you which animal most closely represents your personality. Earth Day is an annual event, celebrated on April 22, when events worldwide are held to demonstrate support for environmental protection. It was first celebrated in 1970, when around 20 million Americans took part in rallies across the country to spread the message of environmental awareness.
It is now coordinated globally by the Earth Day Network, and celebrated in more than 192 countries each year. This year’s activities include a cleanup of the Great Wall of China, beach-litter removal in lebanon and an attempt to protect 25,000 acres of rain forest in Indonesia. “For April, we’re partnering with our friends at Google.org, who will match donations to the following animal-loving organisations up to $20,000. That means every $1 you donate to one of these groups is worth $2 to protect wildlife around the world.”
Participating organisations include the Jane Goodall Institute, Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust, World Wildlife Fund, WildAid, Zoological Society of london and Virunga Fund.
Facebook shifts News Feed
Facebook said last week that it was reconfiguring its News Feed, in a move aimed at giving people more information about what is happening to “the friends you care about.” Facebook unveiled changes which decrease reliance on “referral” traffic -- or the sharing of news articles or other content. “The goal of News Feed is to show you the content that matters to you,” said a blog post by Facebook’s Max Eulenstein and lauren Scissors. One of the key changes aims “to ensure that content posted directly by the friends you care about, will be higher up in News Feed so you are less likely to miss it,” the blog said.
To make room, Facebook will push down items such as commentary on a news story or another person’s post. Facebook also will relax its previous rule that prevented people from seeing multiple posts from the same source. While the changes could drive down the so-called referral traffic — such as articles shared from newspapers — Facebook is reported to be in talks with media
25 years of Hubble discoveries
One of NASA’s crowning glories, the Hubble Space Telescope, turned 25 years old last week. With 1 million-plus observations, including those of some of the farthest and oldest galaxies ever beheld by humanity, no man-made satellite has touched as many minds or hearts as Hubble. NASA celebrated Friday’s anniversary with ceremonies at the Smithsonian Institution and Newseum in Washington.
“Hubble has become part of our culture – very much,” said NASA’s science mission chief John Grunsfeld, a former astronaut who flew on the final three Hubble repair missions. A look at Hubble’s quarter-century in orbit about 350 miles above Earth:
A full decade in the making, Hubble rocketed into orbit on April 24, 1990, aboard space shuttle Discovery. NASA wanted an observatory free of the atmosphere’s distortion and, in some cases, absorption of light. The telescope was named for American astronomer Edwin Hubble, who in the 1920s determined that the universe is expanding.
Sky-high excitement turned into bottomless agony when it quickly became apparent that the telescope’s primary mirror had been botched during manufacturing, resulting in blurry eyesight. Three years later, with NASA’s reputation and entire future on the line, a team of astronauts managed to restore Hubble’s promised vision with replacement parts.
Shuttle astronauts visited Hubble five times, from 1993 to 2009, to make improvements and repairs to the 43-foot-long observatory, about the size of a school bus. By the time Atlantis blasted off on the last servicing mission, NASA put the investment in Hubble at $10 billion.