Stuf 2 Kno

The Rise of AI-Powered Personal Assistants: A Look at the Future of Our Devices

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Fri, 20 Dec 2024 02:30:00 +0000

If you’ve been paying attention to tech news lately, you’ve probably noticed the growing buzz around AI-powered personal assistants. From Siri and Alexa to Google Assistant and ChatGPT, these virtual helpers have quickly evolved from basic voice-activated tools to powerful, intelligent systems that can manage tasks, make recommendations, and even hold conversations. But how much have they really changed the way we interact with our devices—and what does this mean for the future of tech?

Getting Smarter Every Day

When I first started using a voice assistant, it was a fun gimmick—something to ask for the weather or play a song while I cooked. But these days, personal assistants are becoming far more than that. They’re increasingly integrated into our everyday lives, from controlling smart home devices to assisting with work tasks like scheduling meetings or drafting emails.

For example, I’ve noticed that Google Assistant seems to understand context much better now. If I ask it about an upcoming meeting, it'll pull up my calendar, but also ask if I want a reminder to prep beforehand. This seems like a small improvement, but it’s these little details that show just how far AI assistants have come. And let’s not even get started on the integrations with third-party apps like Spotify or Todoist—they’re now capable of working across devices and services seamlessly.

Are They Really That Smart?

Now, here's the thing: even though these assistants are getting smarter, they’re still not perfect. Take voice recognition, for example. I’ve had moments where I’ve asked my assistant to turn on the lights, only for it to misinterpret my command and start playing a random playlist instead. Maybe it’s just me, but I feel like I shouldn’t need to repeat myself for something as simple as a light switch!

Even so, there’s no denying that these AI assistants are improving at an impressive rate. The true challenge, though, will be their ability to think critically or make nuanced decisions—things that go beyond preset commands or surface-level responses. We're not yet at the point where a personal assistant can hold a deep, insightful conversation about the stock market or help solve complex problems like a human expert would. But we’re definitely heading in that direction.

Looking Toward the Future

In the next few years, I suspect we’ll see even more integration between AI assistants and other emerging technologies, like augmented reality (AR) and the Internet of Things (IoT). Imagine asking your assistant to overlay helpful information on a live video feed while you’re on a business trip or getting real-time context about a product while shopping in a store. This could all be powered by AI, turning your assistant into a more immersive, hands-on tool than we ever thought possible.

And then there’s the idea of personalized assistants that know you so well they can anticipate your needs before you even ask. I’m not sure how comfortable I’d be with an AI that knows my preferences so well, but the possibilities are endless. Maybe someday, they’ll be able to remind you to take a break, check in with your mental health, or even suggest articles based on your mood.

Conclusion

Whether we’re ready for it or not, AI-powered personal assistants are here to stay—and they’re only going to get smarter. While we may not be at the point of full-blown sci-fi assistants just yet, it’s clear that the future of tech is leaning heavily on artificial intelligence. It’ll be interesting to see where we go from here, but I’m excited (and a little nervous) about what’s coming next.

Surviving Starlink Beta

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Tue, 30 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I was approved for the Starlink beta at the beginning of March 2021, and have been using it not quite daily since. It was very simple to set up, just as advertised. I am not yet using it as my main service, as I ordered a mount to put it up on my antenna pole. The speed is quite good, although there is a little noticeable drag as it switches between satellites. One thing I found amusing was as I was testing the speed, I was testing on dslreports, and it allows you to set the type of service. However, when I set it to satellite, the server said my response time was too fast for me to be on satellite, and I had to set a different service type. I hope the speed lives up to the promises, and I am happy that this service has come out for my location, as I doubt fibre will ever happen here.

Leaving LastPass for Bitwarden

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Mon, 29 Mar 2021 23:49:00 +0000

Now that LastPass is beginning to charge for logging in on more than one device many are leaving the service. I must admit I have been a stalwart LastPass user for several years, and was dreading the change to a different service. However, I have moved over to Bitwarden, and even though they don't include as many things as the old LastPass did, they are still quite good, and I plan on staying there. Since they are more open-source some things aren't quite as well integrated as LastPass was, and I still have not been able to get their Chrome extension to work. Nevertheless, I am happy with the offering, and, ironically, I may start paying for some of their premium services!
Have you switched away from LastPass, or are you wondering what I'm talking about? Let me know in the comments!

ATSC 3.0 or NextgenTV

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Mon, 14 Sep 2020 04:20:00 +0000

In case you've missed it, changes are coming to our beloved broadcast TV! After several years of great HD content, with the best signals available, it was apparent that the local stations were getting left behind in the push to UHD, or 4K. To remedy this situation, several markets in the US have already started to rollout the new channels, and over the next couple of years, this service will be in most major markets.

In order to receive these new signals, you will either require a UHD TV with an ATSC 3.0 tuner built in, or purchase an external tuner. If you don't have a UHD TV yet, and your HD TV is working fine, you may want to wait until all of the manufacturers have added them. So far, only a couple have added them to their higher end sets. I will be following up with more on this over the next few weeks. So stay tuned!

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 - Dead Battery Part Deux

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Tue, 30 May 2017 21:53:00 +0000

So, after pulling the plug between the battery and the mainboard for about 5 minutes, and then doing a hard reset a couple of times as per my very old post, I then trickle charged the tablet all night, then put it back on the cube it came with for another whole night, and then finally tried a new boot, and ... success! It now runs, and seems to be working as well as ever. Of course, this is a $160 device from 4 years ago, so I am not too upset about it. Eventually these devices will be made to e-readers, and will function quite well as such, even if I need to spend $30 each for a new battery.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 - Dead Battery

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sun, 28 May 2017 19:15:00 +0000

My oldest child's Tab 2 finally went completely unresponsive today. He had charged it up, and was using it in some family Minecraft time, when it went off. At first I thought it may have been a system crash, but after reading some forums, and trying my previous boot loop repair, there have been no results. I took the back off using a guitar pick as a pry tool, (which worked really well, by the way) and unplugged the battery from the mainboard for a couple of minutes. After plugging the battery back into the board, I then plugged the Tab in to power and tried to boot it, but nothing seemed to be helping, and even after several tries at the boot loop fix I still was having no response. I then replaced the back, and plugged it into a usb charger that is not it's own. This has been reported to be a trickle charge solution, so I will let this charge overnight, and then plug it back into its own charger to see if then it will be able to charge the battery. After 4 years of regular use, I am pretty sure that the battery is coming to end of life. I have looked on Amazon and there are kits with a DVD and tools for $80, or plain battery for $30. Unless you have no tools whatsoever, don't bother with the kit. The back is pretty straightforward to remove, and there is a good tutorial on iFixit for replacing the battery. I will post when I receive my battery, and let you know if this fixes the issue.

Hyperloop Dreams for Europe

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Thu, 10 Mar 2016 14:49:00 +0000

http://www.engadget.com/2016/03/10/hyperloop-transportation-technologies-slovakia-contract/

Hyperloop Competition Wrap-Up

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Thu, 04 Feb 2016 13:08:00 +0000

Great article! I would have loved to be there, but still saddened by the absence of much Canadian representation, especially from Ontario. We have some great engineering programs, why are none of them building the future?

http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/3/10904424/hyperloop-design-competition-report-texas-elon-musk

The first working Hyperloop could arrive by the end of 2016

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sat, 30 Jan 2016 01:33:00 +0000

Too bad it's not being built in Ontario.

The first working Hyperloop could arrive by the end of 2016:

Android GPS and Compass Fix

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Wed, 27 Jan 2016 23:05:00 +0000

I use my phone as a GPS device, but sometimes the connection to the satellite radio signals is slow to connect or easily lost. Other times, I have merely wished to use my phone as a compass, but it was obviously wrong, spinning around.
I discovered a great little app to calibrate my phone so it would function as it should. The app is called GPS Status and Toolbox. There is a free and a Pro version, and the free will work for most purposes, but please consider supporting the developer.

Hyperloop Moving Forward

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Wed, 27 Jan 2016 15:09:00 +0000

The test track construction deal news.

Full story here: Hyperloop

Game Deals

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Fri, 22 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

Sometimes I like to play games on my computer. What I don't like doing is paying full price for games, especially when I know there will be a sale sooner or later. I used to wait for the Steam sales, trying to find the best price, which was quite frustrating.
Then, I found CheapShark. Not only can you look for the best deals on 17(!) different stores all at once, you can also see the lowest price that game has ever been at, then set a notification email to be sent to you if the game ever hits a price you are willing to pay.
For instance, I wanted to get 'Sniper Elite: Nazi Zombie Army' but when I looked at it on Steam, the price was $17. Then I checked on CheapShark. The historical low was $4.75, and I was willing to pay $10 for the game. That Friday I got a notification that the game was again on for $4.75. So, I got both parts 1 and 2 for half the price I had planned to pay only three days earlier for just the first part!
The next site I recommend is Humble Bundle. Here game publishers give away large sections of their catalogue for a great price to support a great cause. Happy gaming and savings!

OnCamera™

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 23:49:00 +0000

This seems like a great 21st century tool to protect yourself, especially here in Canada where personal protection tools are severely limited. Any thoughts?

OnCamera™

Internet Speed

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Thu, 21 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

Most of you know it's a good idea to test your internet speed once in awhile to make sure you're getting what you pay for. Less often you may think of testing your speed on your phone or portable device, especially if you don't want to install yet another app that will feed you ads, or ask you to install java.

One of my favorite sites for testing internet is testmy.net. This requires only a browser, and will effectively test with no need for any other installs or downloads. It can also be set to test over a period of time to give you a picture or your consistent network connection speed. No apps, no flash, no java. In fact, there are some issues with the flash based tests that can create a cache that will give a faster result than your actual speed.

Give testmy.net a try!

Location Automation

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Wed, 20 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

As I said yesterday, I found that by disabling wifi on my phone while at work, I was able to save a tonne of battery power. The only issue then was having to remember to do this every day. Ideally, I would have wifi at home, but then disable it upon departure. I took a look at Google Play to see what was available, and there were so many options, I almost despaired. Then I decided to look at the ratings, and found one of the highest rated was a little app called Llama - Location Profiles. I've been really happy with this software as it will let me turn on or off my wifi, but it is also capable of MUCH more. Give it a try, you might like it as much as I do.
Llama scans a given area to determine what cell towers are in proximity, and assigns that area to those towers, so are not using extra battery to determine location by GPS. Very smart. The default operation of the device is to set your profile volume based on location, and time. There are other apps that do this, but none with the amount of customization Llama will give you. Trust me, I'm barely scratching the surface here.
Hopefully someone picks up development, as it hasn't been updated since 2014. Works well for me in Lollipop 5.1.1

Extend Cell Battery Time

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Tue, 19 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

One big drawback of an old phone is a tired battery. The main reason my father-in-law got a new phone and gave me his old one was battery issues. His phone wasn't even lasting him the day! Of course, being me, the first thing I did was upgrade the OS from 4.2.2 to 5.1.1, which helped with some of the battery issues. Next was to turn off active desktop, which is a huge battery hog. Then, as I never use Bluetooth, I turned that off. Doing all these got me through the workday, but after using Map for GPS on my way home, I would be down into battery saving mode, which I set at 15% or less. Last Wednesday, I tried turning off my wi-fi while at work, which saved me a bunch of power. When I got out of work, the phone said I still had 5 hours of battery life, or 41%! Next time, I'll tell you how I automated this process.

Stock Market Stuf

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Mon, 18 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

There's just so much information online about the markets, and how to invest, that it can be really overwhelming. Who should you listen to, what should you read? Is it worthwhile to start spending money to get better information, or have someone 'teach' you how to invest?

If you've read much of my blog, you'll know that I'm of the opinion that there ought to be some sort of free tool to help you accomplish your goal. To that end, I have found several sources I enjoy very much. As a reference, I often use Investopedia. There you will find excellent articles on many aspects of investing and the market, to help you find your way. If you discover, as I did, that you are a fan of technical analysis of stocks and pricing, you may enjoy stockcharts.com as much as I do. For an excellent graphic representation of current market movement, I recommend finviz. There you will also find a great deal of information concerning market winners and losers of the day's trade.

For a really good series of lessons on options trading, I cannot recommend highly enough the team over at tasty trade and dough. In fact, if you are new to trading, start at dough. There is so much great information, and moving through the training there will equip you very well to survive and possibly thrive in today's economy.

If you find yourself tempted to buy into the 'expert' newsletters that promise you'll be able to make huge amounts of money in short periods of time, please take a look at Stock Gumshoe. There you will find many years of broken promises, and analysis of what you are likely to be paying for and how to get this information for yourself at a much lower cost.

How Fast is My Phone

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Fri, 15 Jan 2016 17:00:00 +0000

You may have wondered how fast your own phone is, especially compared to other phones on the market. Some of you may have heard of 'benchmarking' a computer to see how it measures up to other similar devices. This is often done by PC gamers to determine the speed of their computer, and to make sure they have things set up properly. However, it can be educational to look at the performance of the phone you currently own, and compare it to another one that you are thinking of upgrading to, or to compare to your friend's phone. While there are several different apps that you can use, I chose to use Geekbench 3. It was simple to use, and within just a couple of minutes I had my result to let me know that the Nexus 4 was a faster phone than the Moto E2. Happy testing!

Touch Phone Stuf

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Thu, 14 Jan 2016 22:09:00 +0000

I am not an early adopter. I did have a Sony Reader pretty early on. Sometimes I miss it, but it was not the most rugged device. So, with much fanfare, I finally got a smartphone. In September, I got myself a Motorola E2 with LTE, but then my cell provider has no LTE in my home area. Anyway, my father-in-law got himself a new Galaxy Grand Prime, and subsequently gave me his old Nexus 4. I must say that it is nice to have a Nexus. It has integrated nicely with my Google accounts, finally populating my Fit information online, which the E2 had never done.
Needless to say, there will be more blogs as I share what I am learning with this 'new' technology.

if this then that

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Wed, 14 Jan 2015 02:54:00 +0000

To some of you, this may not be news, but I've just discovered IFTTT. The power of this site able to manage my different social media, and bring it together is the first step, but as time goes on, I'm sure I will find many more uses for this great tool.

To sum up, you set the site to notice when something happens, which creates a 'trigger', which then makes something else happen. As you can imagine, this can be set up to create a whole chain of events, based on a single event. Really powerful, and really cool. If you haven't tried it yet, check it out. There are all kinds of 'channels' ready to automate your life all ready to go.

Enjoy!

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 Charging Loop

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sun, 11 Jan 2015 18:45:00 +0000

I'm finally blogging about this, because I've had to do this several times for my kids' Tab 2's when they fully discharge the battery.
The battery and the device will be 'out of sync' and will not report correct voltage, then the internal charger will 'loop' showing a charging cycle start, then crash and restart the charge again with the same result of crash and restart.
Remove the charging cable from the device, then hold down the power button for a full minute. Time yourself. It must be at least 60 seconds. This will reset the charger. When you plug it in again, it will show nothing at all. Wait at bit, then push the power button again, briefly. It should then start the proper charging cycle. Allow for a full charge before removing from power.
Hope this helps!

How to Convert mp4 to mkv

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sun, 07 Dec 2014 17:08:00 +0000

So a friend gives you a really nice home movie that they shot in HD and also in 5.1 audio. Then they kindly compressed it all into an mp4 file with aac audio so that it would be simple for you to play.

Except....your surround system doesn't know what to do with aac, and all you hear is 2 channel stereo audio. Not the end of the world, of course, but a bit frustrating.

To fix this, you need to change the audio to ac3 (Dolby® Surround) so that you can enjoy the full experience. The problem is that mp4 files do not support ac3 audio! Now we turn to our old friend mkvmerge gui, and we can remux that mp4 into a nice mkv file in short order. On a modern PC this should take less than one minute.

Now you have a nice new and shiny mkv file, but your audio is still in aac. Using Popcorn MKV Audio Converter, you can change that aac 5.1 to glorious ac3 5.1 in less than 5 minutes. Now you can finally enjoy your friend's creativity in the manner in which it was intended.

Please note that this could also be accomplished on pro video conversion tools that are available, and also on great freeware programs such as Handbrake. However, a conversion process is quite processor intensive, and would take a much longer time (possibly more than one hour) to accomplish what these 2 pieces of freeware can in only a few minutes.

Safe Gmail for Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sun, 27 Oct 2013 15:56:00 +0000

I have been struggling with this for awhile now, both with searches, and with the settings in Gmail, hoping to find a way to set things so that my children can safely correspond via with their friends and family without Dad and Mom having to worry what kind of spam they'll receive.

I'm happy to say that today I may have found an answer via a blog post.

From angelabeegle.wordpress.com
____________________________________________________________________________
How to make a Kid-Safe Gmail account, with whitelist (new Gmail format)

March 20, 2013

So, you want your kid to have an email address with unlimited “buddies”, but you want those buddies to be screened by you, and you don’t want to pay for this service. No problem. Gmail to the rescue!

Go to gmail and ‘create an account.’ Pick a name that hasn’t been used by anyone, proceed through the registration process, and at last you will reach the brand shiny new Inbox.

From the inbox, click the icon of a gear (tools) in the top right corner. Scroll down to ‘Settings’ and click.

At the top of the page, from the row of blue links, choose ‘Filters’.

At the bottom of the page, from a pair of blue links, choose ‘Create a New Filter’

It will pop up a box with areas for ‘From,’ ‘To,’ ‘Subject,’ ‘Has the Words,’ and ‘Doesn’t Have’.

Click on ‘Doesn’t Have.’

Type this exactly: -{ followed by the PERMITTED email addresses only into this box. Separate each permitted email address with Boolean OR, or the pipe symbol | (space | space). Leave the other boxes empty. Click ‘Create Filter With This Search”. Type } to close the group. When you update this in future, make sure to put new email addresses inside the curly brackets, separated by pipe symbols. What this means is: Everything NOT inside these curly brackets.

(stuf2kno edit: {} brackets are NOT needed, Gmail will automatically use them. Also, if you don't want Gmail to warn you about special characters, use Boolean 'OR' not pipe '|')

Now you will see a page with a series of clickable boxes. Click the box that says ‘Skip Inbox, Delete it’. Click ‘Save or Update Filter’. That’s it! Because other emails (from spammers or anyone else) “Don’t Have” the correct email address, they simply get deleted. They do end up in the trash and are thus actually preserved on the account, but you have to LOOK for the trash. A parent could log in weekly (or daily) and empty out the trash if desired.

Repeat the process above and make a second filter, except WITHOUT the -{ }. Put the same list of email addresses in it. When you get to the check box step, click ‘Never Send it to Spam’.

(stuf2kno edit: remember, you DON'T need to use the {}, ever)

To update the list of email addresses, you merely to to ‘Filters’. This will show you all the filters you’ve created and let you edit any or all.

There now. I can read this and remind myself how to do it if I ever need to do this again.
___________________________________________________________________________

My child only has access to their email from their Android device, not through the computer. That way, they cannot easily change their settings and filters.

original page

UltraHD or 4K Television

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 18:49:00 +0000

HD is so over. 1080p just isn't enough pixels anymore. After all, it's only 2 megapixel, and cameras have been shooting well over that resolution for over a decade. Isn't it time for a higher resolution screen?
LG, Samsung and Sony have all introduced higher resolution screens they are calling UltraHD. This isn't particularly news, since these sets have been available for some time. They have, however already dropped dramatically in price. The first set from Sony were in the astronomical range of $25,000 last year, but this spring, Sony has announced the release of sets priced much lower at $5,000 and $7,000, 55" and 65" respectively.
If you're anything like me, those are still some crazy numbers for a TV. Some good news though, a little known company out of China by name of Seiki is selling a 50" UltraHD through Tigerdirect at the rock-bottom price of $1499.99. That's not much more than a regular 50" LED!
The biggest downside of adopting 4K or UltraHD at this time is the lack of content. Sony will be shipping their UltraHD player and content delivery system soon, and RedOne has announced a 4K player shipping soon. Content delivery is handled through the Internet to local storage for either player, but no announcements about how that will exactly be accomplished have been forthcoming. Another source for 4K video is through YouTube, but you will need a player to deliver this content. Probably the least expensive way to do this is to get a video card for a desktop computer that will be able to handle UltraHD. The newest generation of Radeon video cards can provide this for you at a great price.

Windows Multiple Virtual Desktops

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen) — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 18:19:00 +0000

A co-worker of mine recently ditched Windows altogether and moved over to Mac OS-X. Being OS agnostic myself, I applaud this decision, and was happy he had made the choice. If you read through my older blogs, you will see that I have advocated the use of Linux, especially Ubuntu as an alternative to Windows. The only thing that has held me back from truly changing my OS to something other than what Microsoft offers, is my love of trying all types of new software, and my adolescent love of gaming.
One feature that I have appreciated in both Linux and Apple is the built-in use of virtual desktops. Both of them feature this application, and is one of the things Mac lovers will talk about when they discuss their love for their computer. When my coworker began discussing this new-found fascination with me, I was surprised that he was not aware that there are several options. Of course, these are all third-party programs, but they do work well.
Another thing you will discover when reading my blog is that I love freeware, and my virtual desktop program of choice is Dexpot. It's easy, it's powerful, and it uses very little system resources.
If you've had virtual desktop envy when watching your friends on their Mac, try this out, you'll like it!