"Linux fans rejoice!" writes Hot Hardware. " Pine64's newest smartphone is officially available for pre-order." PinePhone Pro Explorer Edition pre-orders opened up Tuesday. Devices that are pre-ordered before January 18th will be shipped from Pine64's Hong Kong warehouse by January 24th and should arrive by early February.... According to Pine64, the PinePhone Pro Explorer Edition is the "fastest mainline Linux smartphone on the market." It uses a Rockchip RK3399S SoC that is composed of two ARM A72 cores (1.5GHz) and four A53 efficiency cores (1.5GHz)....

Consumers will also likely be pleased with the price of the device. The PinePhone Pro Explorer Edition currently rings in at $399 USD. The production run is purportedly "large" and interested consumers should therefore be able to easily purchase the device at this price.
Liliputing adds: While the PinePhone Pro has better hardware than the original PinePhone, Pine64 plans to continue selling both phones indefinitely. The first-gen phone will continue to sell for $150 to $200, offering an entry-level option for folks that want to experiment with mobile Linux, while the higher-priced PinePhone Pro should offer a hardware experience closer to what folks would expect from a modern mid-range phone....

In addition to the PinePhone Keyboard, the recently launched PinePhone wireless charging case, fingerprint reader case, and LoRa cases should all work with either phone.

But the new phone has a faster processor, more memory and storage, higher-resolution cameras, a higher-speed USB-C port and support for WiFi 5 and Bluetooth 4.1. And those features should make it a little more viable as a replacement for an iPhone or Android device... if you're comfortable running work-in-progress software.
They also add that "Thanks to the recent launch of the $50 PinePhone Keyboard, you can also think of the PinePhone Pro as a $400 phone that can be used as a $449 mini-laptop...."

And the Pine64 site's January update also points out that "Pico 8 Raspberry Pi port works on the PinePhone," adding "yes, it does run DOOM."

It's been 518 days since Apple kicked Fortnite off of the App Store after Epic Games tried to bypass its payment system. Now the popular free-to-play battle royale is once again playable on iPhones, sort of. From a report: Starting next week, Fortnite will be available on iOS by way of streaming, as part of an upcoming closed beta for Nvidia's GeForce Now game streaming program. "Fortnite on GeForce NOW will launch in a limited-time closed beta for mobile, all streamed through the Safari web browser on iOS and the GeForce NOW Android app," Nvidia announced on its blog today. "The beta is open for registration for all GeForce NOW members, and will help test our server capacity, graphics delivery and new touch controls performance."

GeForce Now, subscriptions for which range from free to $200 a year for the premium tier, lets users stream games they already own to PCs, tablets, and smartphones. It's one way to make blockbuster PC games portable, or to play them on rigs with beefier specs than the ones people already have at home. In Fortnite's case, GeForce Now subscribers will soon be able to stream the shooter to iOS devices and play it using touch controls via Apple's Safari. The browser workaround is one way companies like Microsoft have been able to get their game streaming platforms on iPhones despite Apple's ban on allowing them inside its App Store. Now its bringing back the game that kicked off a massive, messy, year-long legal battle that's still raging to this day.

Google took to Twitter this weekend to complain that iMessage is just too darn influential with today's kids. Ron Amadeo writes via Ars Technica: The company was responding to a Wall Street Journal report detailing the lock-in and social pressure Apple's walled garden is creating among US teens. iMessage brands texts from iPhone users with a blue background and gives them additional features, while texts from Android phones are shown in green and only have the base SMS feature set. According to the article, "Teens and college students said they dread the ostracism that comes with a green text. The social pressure is palpable, with some reporting being ostracized or singled out after switching away from iPhones." Google feels this is a problem.

"iMessage should not benefit from bullying," the official Android Twitter account wrote. "Texting should bring us together, and the solution exists. Let's fix this as one industry." Google SVP Hiroshi Lockheimer chimed in, too, saying, "Apple's iMessage lock-in is a documented strategy. Using peer pressure and bullying as a way to sell products is disingenuous for a company that has humanity and equity as a core part of its marketing. The standards exist today to fix this."

The "solution" Google is pushing here is RCS, or Rich Communication Services, a GSMA standard from 2008 that has slowly gained traction as an upgrade to SMS. RCS adds typing indicators, user presence, and better image sharing to carrier messaging. It is a 14-year-old carrier standard, though, so it lacks many of the features you would want from a modern messaging service, like end-to-end encryption and support for non-phone devices. Google tries to band-aid over the aging standard with its "Google Messaging" client, but the result is a lot of clunky solutions that don't add up to a good modern messaging service. Since RCS replaces SMS, Google has been on a campaign to get the industry to make the upgrade. After years of protesting, the US carriers are all onboard, and there is some uptake among the international carriers, too. The biggest holdout is Apple, which only supports SMS through iMessage. "Google clearly views iMessage's popularity as a problem, and the company is hoping this public-shaming campaign will get Apple to change its mind on RCS," writes Amadeo in closing. "But Google giving other companies advice on a messaging strategy is a laughable idea since Google probably has the least credibility of any tech company when it comes to messaging services. If the company really wants to do something about iMessage, it should try competing with it."

Further reading:
Eddy Cue Wanted To Bring iMessage To Android In 2013
Apple Says iMessage On Android 'Will Hurt Us More Than Help Us'

Slashdot reader PolygamousRanchKid quotes a report from Apple Insider: Apple's color-coding of SMS communications in green in iMessage plays a role alongside other feature in getting teenagers to switch from Android to iPhone, a report claims, with a pressure to fit in with their peers promoting moves to turn their messages blue. The use of green and blue to show whether a message to a user is made through iMessage or via other devices has become more than a simple convenience indicator for users. It's also a form of status indicator, showing the user not only owns an iPhone, but can also make use of features on the platform that others cannot. In a profile of the color-indication system by the Wall Street Journal, teenagers and students explain how not having an iPhone and seeing green messages are seemingly a negative to them.

New York masters student Jocelyn Maher said she was mocked by her friends and younger sister when dating, if the potential suitor used Android. 'I was like, Oh my gosh, his texts are green,' and my sister literally went Ew, that's gross,'' said Maher.

Apple is apparently well aware that iMessage is a serious draw to its users, with it surfacing in the Epic-Apple trial as part of a series of claims it was used to lock users into its ecosystem. Epic pointed to statements by senior Apple management that the company had blocked the creation of an Android version of iMessage.
The Wall Street Journal headlined its piece, "Why Apple's iMessage Is Winning: Teens Dread the Green Text Bubble."

The programming language of the year has been announced by the TIOBE Index: Python!

But noting that the TIOBE index is based on the number of search results for a programming language across popular search engines, a headline at The Next Web asks: "What does this title even mean?" [TIOBE] takes services such as Google, QQ, Sohu, Amazon, and Wikipedia to calculate the results. TIOBE uses "+" programming" query and a special formula to devise these ratings that change every month. You can read more about the whole process here. The programming language of the year title is decided by the jump in ratings year-on-year. Python overtook C# by a margin of 0.13% — almost a photo finish.

The index doesn't indicate the best or most efficient programming language, nor does it measure the amount of code written in a language across the internet. It simply gives us a high-level understanding of resources and pages available on the web related to them.

There's a huge amount of criticism towards the TIOBE index, especially as it uses one query and doesn't consider non-English languages. The organization said that it's trying to introduce more parameters to calculate the ratings.
TIOBE's annual award is being called "prestigious" — by the announcement at TIOBE.com: The award is given to the programming language that has gained the highest increase in ratings in one year. C# was on its way to get the title for the first time in history, but Python surpassed C# in the last month.

Python started at position #3 of the TIOBE index at the beginning of 2021 and left both Java and C behind to become the number one of the TIOBE index. But Python's popularity didn't stop there. It is currently more than 1 percent ahead of the rest [with a "rating" of 13.58%]. Java's all time record of 26.49% ratings in 2001 is still far away, but Python has it all to become the de facto standard programming language for many domains. There are no signs that Python's triumphal march will stop soon.
In fact, this makes the second year in a row Python has won TIOBE's annual award.

But it's as good a conversation-starter as any. ZDNet reminds us that Microsoft hired Python creator Guido van Rossum in 2020 to work on improving Python's efficiency, while the second most popular language on TIOBE's annual list, C#, "is a language designed by Microsoft technical fellow Anders Hejlsberg for the .NET Framework and Microsoft's developer editing tool Visual Studio."

And ZDNet also spottted a few other patterns in TIOBE's year-end look at programming language popularity: There were several movers and shakers this year. Rust, a systems programming language that deals with memory safety flaws, is now in 26th position, ahead of MIT's Julia, and Kotlin, a language endorsed by Google for Android app development. Rust was a stand out language in 2021, gaining backing from Facebook, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.

Apple's Swift for iOS and macOS app development jumped from 13th to 10th place, while Google's Go inched up from 14 to 13, according to Tiobe. Kotlin moved from 40th to 29th. Google's Dart dropped from 25th to 37th position, Julia fell from 23rd to 28th position, while Microsoft TypeScript dropped from from 42 to 49.

The top 10 languages in Tiobe's list for January 2022 were Python, C, Java, C++,C#, Visual Basic, JavaScript, Assembly Language, SQL, and Swift.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from XDA Developers: In January of 2020, Sonos filed two lawsuits against Google, claiming that the latter stole its multiroom speaker technology and infringed on 100 patents. In September, Sonos then sued Google alleging that the company's entire line of Chromecast and Nest products violated five of Sonos' wireless audio patents. A judge (preliminarily) ruled in favor of Sonos. Now it's gone from bad to worse for Google, as the preliminary findings have been finalized by the U.S. International Trade Commission. As a result, Google is not allowed to import any products that violate patents owned by Sonos, which Sonos argues includes Google Pixel phones and computers, Chromecasts, and Google Home/Nest speakers.

These products produced by Google are often made outside of the United States and imported, hence why this is a big deal for Google. In the ruling (PDF) (via The New York Times), Google was also served a cease & desist in order to stop violating Sonos' patents. It has been theorized that as a result of the lawsuit, Google had removed Cast volume controls in Android 12, though it was recently added back with the January 2022 security patch. Sonos has previously said that it had proposed a licensing deal to Google for patents the company was making use of, but that neither company was able to reach an agreement. [...] There are still two more lawsuits pending against Google filed by Sonos, meaning that it's unlikely this is the last we've heard of this spat.

Alphabet's Google used the annual CES technology conference to showcase upcoming deeper ties among its devices and preview support for unlocking more cars with Android phones. From a report: The enhancements announced Wednesday included more quickly pairing accessories with devices running Google's Android and Chromebook laptop software, unlocking devices with Google software via smartwatches running Google's Wear OS and sharing content across products. The new features mirror work Apple has done with its software and hardware, an effort that has led consumers to buy more types of Apple devices. The Cupertino, California-based technology giant has long touted its ecosystem as superior to Google's because of tight integration, and now Google is trying to rival that experience.

Facebook parent company Meta Platforms has stopped development of a new software operating system to power its virtual reality devices and upcoming augmented reality glasses, The Information reported Wednesday, citing people familiar with the decision. From a report: Shelving the project, which had been underway for several years and involved hundreds of employees, marked a setback for the company's attempt to own the underlying software behind its Oculus VR headset and future augmented or mixed reality devices. The screens of its planned devices aim to overlay digital images on the real world or weave real-world objects into VR apps.

Meta uses an open-source version of Google's Android operating system to power Meta's existing Oculus Quest VR devices. But Meta wanted to create an OS from scratch to power them and future devices, a project that became known internally as XROS. XR is a catch-all term for VR, AR, and mixed reality. In MR, the wearer of a headset could view and use real-world objects, such as a keyboard, to do work or play games in a VR-like app. Instead, the company has told some staff it would continue to modify an open-source version of Android, which Google developed for smartphones but which other companies have used to power various devices, the people familiar with the matter said. Meta's modified version of Android, known internally as VROS, powers existing Oculus VR headsets.

"Chinese telecom giant Huawei said on Friday its annual revenue had fallen by nearly a third from the previous year," reports Agence France-Presse, "as it continued to be weighed down by U.S. sanctions that have hit its smartphone sales..." The firm's revenue for this year fell by 29% year-on-year to 634 billion yuan ($99.5 billion), said rotating chairman Guo Ping in an annual new year message... Huawei's revenue has fallen in 2021 due in part to the offloading of its budget phone brand Honor, which was sold [in late 2020]...

Huawei's travails have forced it to quickly pivot into new business lines including enterprise computing, wearables and health tech, technology for intelligent vehicles, and software. The United States has barred Huawei from acquiring crucial components such as microchips and forced it to create its own operating system by cutting it off from using Google's Android operating system...

The group is the world's biggest supplier of telecoms network gear and was once a top-three smartphone producer along with Apple and Samsung. But it has fallen well down the smartphone ranks owing to US pressure.

In October, the group said its January-September sales volume had fallen 32%.

"T-Mobile had another data breach," writes Slashdot reader motang. "This comes after the massive breach that affected millions of users this past summer." According to Android Police, a small number of accounts had their data viewed by an unknown individual -- including names, addresses, phone numbers, plan rates, and number of lines -- or fell victim to an unauthorized SIM swap, with a third subset of users facing both. From the report: For its part, the company has contacted individuals who were targeted in this breach, alerting them to specify what was or wasn't viewed and highlighting that this hacker stole no payment or password data to its knowledge. However, T-Mobile has yet to report any specifics about how many customers were directly affected. [...] It seems possible that this is another example of poor security practices, though we'll have to wait until T-Mobile delivers more information. The T-Mo Report was first to report the data breach.

An anonymous reader shares a report: The Motorola Razr was part of the first wave of foldable phones back in 2019, being the first to offer a clamshell form factor akin to the classic Razr feature phones. Motorola would follow up with the Razr 5G in late 2020, but Samsung's Galaxy Z Flip line had stolen its thunder by then. Now, Lenovo executive Chen Jin has revealed on Weibo that a third-generation Motorola Razr foldable is in the works. According to machine translation, the new foldable phone will have improved power, a tweaked interface, and a better appearance. It also seems like the phone could launch in China first.

Phoronix reports: The Linux 5.17 kernel when it kicks off next month is slated to introduce a new driver "x86-android-tablets" just for dealing with all the quirky/buggy x86 tablets out there.

Longtime Linux developer Hans de Goede of Red Hat has been responsible for numerous x86 laptop/tablet improvements in recent years along with other desktop-related improvements at Red Hat. He has now queued up into the x86 platform drivers tree the x86-android-tablets driver he wrote for dealing with the mess of x86 (mostly Android) tablets that don't behave properly out-of-the-box with Linux.

As part of the ACPI DSDT (Differentiated System Description Table), many x86 tablets have simply invalid entries and other problems that cause issue when trying to run mainline Linux on said hardware. Hans explains as part of the commit currently in the platform-drivers-x86 "for-next" branch....

"This driver, which loads only on affected models based on DMI matching, adds DMI based instantiating of kernel devices for devices which are missing from the DSDT, fixing e.g. battery monitoring, touchpads and/or accelerometers not working."

This new x86-android-tablets driver will basically be a catch-all solution for overrides based on device matching. Hans ended the patch message with, "This is the least ugly option to get these devices to fully work and to do so without adding any extra code to the main kernel image (vmlinuz) when built as a module."

In the moments before a 6.2-magnitude earthquake struck the northern California coast on Monday, roughly half a million phones began to buzz. From a report: An early-alert system managed by the US Geological Survey sent warnings out before the ground started to shake, giving residents in the sparsely populated area vital time to take cover. The earthquake brought significant shaking but minimal damage in Humboldt county, about 210 miles north-west of San Francisco, and officials said it was an excellent test of the alert-system. It was the largest magnitude quake that's occurred since the system, known as ShakeAlert, was officially rolled out across the west coast. "We got some reports from folks that they got up to 10 seconds' warning before they felt shaking. That's pretty darn good," said Robert de Groot, a ShakeAlert coordinator with the USGS.

ShakeAlert issues warnings through a series of agencies and apps including the MyShakeApp, public wireless emergency alert systems, and the Android operating system, powered by Google. A data package is created from information provided by USGS sensors and -- within seconds -- shows up on phones. Some apps that provide alerts are available to download but even some who didn't have an app on their phone were notified. Affected individuals are instructed to drop, cover, and hold on. Having extra seconds to do so can save lives. This event provided an opportunity for the scientists and system operators to test and improve ShakeAlert so it will be even better when the next big earthquake strikes. "We can run as many simulations and tests as possible but we are really going to learn the most from real earthquakes," de Groot said. "It's giving us the chance to use the system and learn how to do a better job of alerting people."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: A security researcher found a Bluetooth vulnerability in a popular at-home COVID-19 test allowing him to modify its results. F-Secure researcher Ken Gannon identified the since-fixed flaw in the Ellume COVID-19 Home Test, a self-administered antigen test that individuals can use to check to see if they have been infected with the virus. Rather than submitting a sample to a testing facility, the sample is tested using a Bluetooth analyzer, which then reports the result to the user and health authorities via Ellume's mobile app. Gannon found, however, that the built-in Bluetooth analydzer could be tricked to allow a user to falsify a certifiable result before the Ellume app processes the data.

To carry out the hack, Gannon used a rooted Android device to analyze the data the test was sending to the app. He then identified two types of Bluetooth traffic that were most likely in charge of telling the mobile app if the user was COVID positive or negative, before writing two scripts that were able to successfully change a negative result into a positive one. Gannon says that when he received an email with his results from Ellume, it incorrectly showed he had tested positive. To complete the proof-of-concept, F-Secure also successfully obtained a certified copy of the faked COVID-19 test results from Azova, a telehealth provider that Ellume partners with for certifying at-home COVID-19 tests for travel or going into work.

While Gannon's writeup only includes changing negative results to positive ones, he says that the process "works both ways." He also said that, before it was patched, "someone with the proper motivation and technical skills could've used these flaws to ensure they, or someone they're working with, gets a negative result every time they're tested." In theory, a fake certification could be submitted to meet U.S. re-entry requirements. In response to F-Secure's findings, Ellume says it has updated its system to detect and prevent the transmission of falsified results.

The number of people using Android Apps on Chromebooks grew 50 percent year over year, according to a blog post from Chrome OS product managers Fahd Imtiaz and Sanj Nathwani this week. The execs cited internal Google data recorded from 2020-2021. From a report: In 2021, as some smartphones moved to Android 12, Google worked on updating Chromebooks to support Android 11, while attempting to boost security and performance by bringing Android on Chrome OS to a virtual machine, rather than a container. The company also improved its general usability, using runtime improvements to make the resizing and scaling of Android apps on Chromebooks work better, as well as app rendering. As the developer-focused blog noted, Chromebooks on Chrome OS 93 or newer (the latest is Chrome OS 96) automatically run Android apps made for mobile devices in a window that's set to stay in a "phone or tablet orientation." And, yes, you can turn this feature off. Additionally, Imtiaz and Nathwani pointed to Android's Nearby Share feature coming to Chrome 96 for Android 11 and Android 9 apps as another way to try to get developers excited about making their apps fit devices with larger screens.

Apple plans to add a 48-megapixel camera lens to the iPhone next year, followed by a periscope lens in 2023, according to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. MacRumors reports: In a research note today with TF International Securities, obtained by MacRumors, Kuo said these iPhone camera upgrades over the next two years will help to boost Taiwanese manufacturer Largan Precision's market share, revenue, and profit. Kuo did not provide any further details, but he has previously claimed that the 48-megapixel camera will be limited to iPhone 14 Pro models and allow for 8K video recording, up from 4K currently. These high-resolution 8K videos would be suitable for viewing on Apple's AR/VR headset that is expected to launch next year, he said.

Kuo also previously claimed that iPhone 14 Pro models may support both 48-megapixel and 12-megapixel output, which would likely be achieved with a process known as pixel binning. Already in use on some Android smartphones, like Samsung's Galaxy S21 Ultra, pixel binning could allow iPhone 14 Pro models to shoot 48-megapixel photos in bright conditions and 12-megapixel photos in low-light conditions to preserve quality. Further ahead, Kuo reiterated his belief that at least one iPhone 15 model will gain a periscope lens in 2023, paving the way for significantly increased optical zoom. This lens would have folded camera optics, where light absorbed by the image sensor is bent or "folded," allowing for increased optical zoom while maintaining a compact design appropriate for smartphones.

Google's Pixel 6 line may have served as Android 12's big debut for higher-end phones, but Android 12 (Go edition) plans to bring many of the enhancements and features of Android 12 to lower-end phones, too. Google on Tuesday unveiled a host of new features for the Go edition that are set to roll out to devices in 2022. From a report: Google says that in addition to speed enhancements that'll help apps launch up to 30% faster, Android 12 (Go edition) will include a feature that'll save battery life and storage by automatically "hibernating apps that haven't been used for extended periods of time." And with the Files Go app, you'll be able to recover files within 30 days of deletion. Android 12 (Go edition) will also help you easily translate any content, listen to the news and share apps with nearby devices offline to save data, Google says. The company said Android Go has amassed 200 million users.

The U.K.'s antitrust watchdog has given the clearest signal yet that interventions under an upcoming reform of the country's competition rules will target tech giants Apple and Google -- including their duopolistic command of the mobile market, via iOS and Android; their respective app stores; and the browsers and services bundled with mobile devices running their OSes. From a report: So it could mean good news for third-party developers trying to get oxygen for alternatives to dominant Apple and Google apps and services down the line. Publishing the first part of a wide-ranging mobile ecosystem market study -- which was announced this summer -- the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said today that it has "provisionally" found Apple and Google have been able to leverage their market power to create "largely self-contained ecosystems"; and that the degree of lock-in they wield is damaging competition by making it "extremely difficult for any other firm to enter and compete meaningfully with a new system." "The CMA is concerned that this is leading to less competition and meaningful choice for customers," the watchdog writes in a press release. "People also appear to be missing out on the full benefit of innovative new products and services -- such as so-called 'web apps' and new ways to play games through cloud services on iOS devices."

Apple has released a new Android app called Tracker Detect, designed to help people who don't own iPhones or iPads to identify unexpected AirTags and other Find My network-equipped sensors that may be nearby. CNET reports: The new app, which Apple released on the Google Play store Monday, is intended to help people look for item trackers compatible with Apple's Find My network. "If you think someone is using AirTag or another device to track your location," the app says, "you can scan to try to find it." If the Tracker Detector app finds an unexpected AirTag that's away from its owner, for example, it will be marked in the app as "Unknown AirTag." The Android app can then play a sound within 10 minutes of identifying the tracker. It may take up to 15 minutes after a tracker is separated from its owner before it shows up in the app, Apple said.

If the tracker identified is an AirTag, Apple will offer instructions within the app to remove its battery. Apple also warns within the app that if the person feels their safety is at risk because of the item tracker, they should contact law enforcement. [...] The Tracker Detect app, which Apple first discussed in June, requires users to actively scan for a device before it'll be identified. Apple doesn't require users have an Apple account in order to use the detecting app. If the AirTag is in "lost mode," anyone with an NFC-capable device can tap it and receive instructions for how to return it to its owner. Apple said all communication is encrypted so that no one, including Apple, knows the location or identity of people or their devices.

Google is bringing Android games from Google Play to Windows laptops, PCs, and tablets, the company announced on Thursday. Gizmodo reports: Google announced a standalone Google Play Games launcher that lets gamers play mobile titles on Windows PCs at The Game Show Awards on Thursday. The upcoming app will allow players to close out of their game on one device and resume playing where they left off on another. This means you could switch between a Chromebook, Windows PC, and Android phone without losing saved data. The app, which is being built and distributed by Google, runs games locally on your system, no cloud streaming required. So far, Google has only teased the service in a brief video clip, so some important details haven't been revealed. We do, however, know it is set to arrive sometime in 2022.