Chumby's smart alarm clock relaunches with 1,000 apps

Remember Chumby? You probably haven't heard much about the snuggly tiny computer/smart alarm clock since its makers' company disbanded, but now it's back from its semi-retired state. Its current owner, Blue Octy LLC, just announced that it's relaunching Chumby's full service (it went offline in 2013), which comes with 1,000 apps and faster, more efficient performance. The device, for those who haven't heard of it before, first launched in mid-2000s, way before everyone has a smartphone to take the place of many other gadgets, and was meant as a high-tech alternative to the bedside clock radio. It's one of those things people used to call "internet-connected devices" and could display Facebook, Twitter and RSS feeds, even video streams.

Unfortunately, the device needs to connect to the Chumby network to function. So, when its original creator (Chumby Industries Inc.) went out of business last year, Blue Octy launched a limited service that lets owners use the device as an alarm clock and a music player, at least. This development gives them the power to make the gadget more useful, though it obviously won't be free. It'll cost $3 per month to restore Chumby to its former glory -- after all, the company needs money to keep the service running.

Samsung Launches Terrain Home Android Launcher With Google Now-Like Features

Samsung has released a new home screen app dubbed Terrain Home: Sidebar and Search on Google Play, a launcher that brings some features that are similar to the Google Now launcher.

The beta version of the Terrain Home app comes from a Samsung-backed startup, Terrain, which is funded by Samsung Accelerator. The Terrain Home app brings three main feature according to the Google Play listing, namely - sidebar, search, and apps drawer. The app essentially lets users swipe in different directions to access the sidebar (right), search (up), and apps drawer (left).

The Terrain Home sidebar is where users can organize their favourite apps, tools, contacts and news content. Users can pick content from the library and add them in the form of cards.

The apps drawer on Terrain Home is meant for quick navigation, with a search function and alphabetical indexing.

The Terrain Home search feature functions as a local phone search, enabling users to find content such as contacts or apps on their phone quickly.

"Search with Android is Web first," stated Dwipal Desai, founder and CEO of Terrain to Recode. "We wanted search that is phone first."

The Next Web notes that the Terrain Home cards, like Google Now cards, can be stacked in any order. It has been also noted that developers who want to add a card to Terrain, can sign-up now for an SDK, which is said to arrive in coming few weeks.

Developers will continue work on the Terrain Home screen app after it gets a decent fan base. Desai further added that in order to reach out to more users, Samsung might make distribution deals to ensure the app doesn't remain unknown. The beta version of Terrain Home application is sized at 7.4MB and requires Android 4.1 and later OS versions to run.

Alleged iPhone 6 Compared With Samsung Galaxy S5 in Leaked Image

Apple's much-anticipated next iPhone, expected to be called the iPhone 6, has been speculated about and leaked in images several times over the past few months. And it seems there's no stopping till the date Apple officially reveals its next-generation iPhone devices - leaks have been tipping there will be two display size variants - 4.7- or 5.5-inch.

After being compared with the Apple iPhone 5 on Thursday, a new leaked image posted byGSMArena shows the alleged iPhone 6 pictured beside the Samsung Galaxy S5.

The alleged wider, thinner iPhone 6 seems to feature a 4.7-inch display, and is slightly shorter than the Galaxy S5 (which sports a 5.1-inch display) in side by side comparison. The alleged iPhone 6 in the leaked image also appears to be thinner than the Galaxy S5 , which is 8.1mm thick.

Apple's rumoured iPhone 6 is widely anticipated to sport curved edges, doing away with its currentstraight-edge design. Further, the next iPhones' sides are said to house the power button positioned on the right panel of the device, instead on the top panel seen on current iPhone models. Meanwhile, the side panels are likely to include a slightly modified volume buttons.

A Taiwanese celebrity named Jimmy Lin on Thursday posted an image of the alleged iPhone 6 compared alongside iPhone 5 and also shared his first-hand experience with the unannounced iPhone. According to Lin, the alleged iPhone 6 with 4.7-inch display had a great display and was easy to grip despite of its large display size.

A recent report claimed that Apple's next iPhone would hit the shelves on September 19.

The Cupertino-based company has been rumoured to be testing a higher screen resolution on at least one of the two iPhone models likely to debut this year. An earlier report suggested that one of the two alleged iPhone 6 models would come with a 960x1704 pixels resolution screen, compared to the 640x1136 pixels resolution found on the current iPhone models that sport 4-inch displays.

We remind readers however, that nothing is official yet, and that all such leaks must be taken with a pinch of salt.