The Bots Are Coming

How will you interact with the technology in your life in the coming year?

Currently we are forced to interact with computers in unnatural ways. Humans are forced to learn how to use their technology. What if the technology could learn to interact with us on our terms?

This is a future we are building here at nsquared. One of the many ways this future will come true is through the use of conversational agents, also called chat bots, or just bots.

The team at nsquared has been working closely with Microsoft on their Bot Framework,Language Understanding Intelligence System (LUIS), and other machine learning technologies. These technologies enable us to build rich conversational software applications that talk to our customers on the channels they are already using to communicate with each other; Skype, Slack, Facebook, SMS, and others.

At nsquared we have been building Bot applications, as well as training materials to teach developers how to build better conversational bots.

Contact us at enquiries@nsquaredsolutions.com to find out how we can help you.

Microsoft Build 2017 Conference In Seattle, Washington State

Only a few more sleeps till the exciting (well we find it exciting) Microsoft Build 2017 conference in Seattle, Washington State, to kick off on May 10^th to 12th.

Dr Neil Roodyn will be attending deep technical sessions, learning new technologies and getting advance notice of Microsoft’s new plans. 

He will be meeting and learning, from more than 5,000 developers in the industry, from all over the World and yes, the place will be a buzz with it’s own tech speak.

The Build up is underway. Announcements are thick and fast. You can feel the excitement. We’ve had updates to Cognitive Services that help developers build apps that understand people and the world around us.  The current SDK for the Windows Creators Update feature was shipped. Also announced Azure Managed Disks and VM scale sets, for ease of use and scale benefits to PaaS to IaaS developers.

Microsoft Build 2017, May 10-12 in Seattle, in person or Live Streamed will teach you as developers, how to put these latest and coming innovations to create:

·       AI-powered apps we have yet to imagine

·       Apps that make your customers more productive

·       Cutting edge, intelligent cloud apps

·       Mixed-reality experiences

·       Mobile experiences for nearly any device

·       Simplified end-to-end development ops experiences

There will be keynotes, deep technical sessions, hackathons and opportunities to collaborate and code with your fellow technologists and engineers. 

There’s never been a more exciting time to be a developer.

 Click here to watch the conference via live stream

Microsoft Surface Dial

          Microsoft  Surface Dial by Microsoft

This week Dr Neil Roodyn is in Beijing and Tokyo for the Microsoft Partner hack for Surface Dial.

The Surface Dial, is not to be confused with Pocket Dial, like with your phone. 

Surface Dial, which looks like a round grey block of Camembert, is a standalone device that works with Surface Studio, Surface Book and Surface 4. As it’s using Bluetooth, it should work with any device supporting it.

Surface Dial is simply charged by two AAA batteries, which under normal workday use, should last you for a year. Surface Dial really zings with the Surface Studio, as you can simply position it on the screen to access its functionality. On other devices, like Surface Book and Surface 4, it needs to be placed next to the device for off-screen functionality.The main smarts behind Surface Dial is to give users another device for their "other hand" to trigger added functionality, without using your mouse or touch screen access.

Some of its features include:

1.Press and hold for menu
2. Rotate freely/continuously
3. Click activates a switch
4. Dynamic tactile feedback in custom increments
5. Zoom in or out, change colours
6. On-screen detection (only for Surface Studio).

There is a growing list of apps that support the Surface Dial like Windows Maps, Spotify, OneNote, or Groove Music, as well as graphics programs. Not all apps listed are Store applications either. So check the list online. However support differs from app to app, so do your homework before you start.


For Now
It appears that the Surface Dial has been developed specifically for designers and photographers, so it won’t help you with writing content. The Dial loses some functionality when off-screen, which I’m sure they will work on. It will also take a bit of time getting used to, especially when placed on the screen and not next to it.

But isn’t that the same with all new innovations?


You can check out all the videos of Dr Neil explaining how to use the Surface Dial on Microsoft Channel 9 here


Here are some of Dr Neil's photos from this weeks Microsoft events 

 

Expectable Technology

Last week the nsquared team hosted a panel discussion and networking event around the topic Expectable Technology at the newly refurbished nbn Discovery Centre. 

What will the future look like? How do societies evolve through technology? What sorts of technology were at one point expected to take off, but never did? These were some of the discussion points that our panel of tech experts discussed. 

Thank you to our panelists John Lambert, Marisa Warren, Maria Shvedova, Oliver Lawson and Neil Roodyn for providing the audience with food for thought. We were really happy to have such a great audience full of thought-provoking questions and comments as well.

Don't worry if you missed out, you can watch the full video here or a watch the highlights of the evening here.

If you would like to hear more about our upcoming events, please contact us at events@nsquaredsolutions.com

Microsoft Ignite 2017; Developing for Surface Dial and Surface Studio

Have you thought about how designers might use computers in the future? 

Last week at Microsoft Ignite, the Gold Coast Tech conference, nsquared director Dr Neil Roodyn gave a series of talks about some of the latest developments in computing. 

Over 20 years after Bill Buxton envisioned Active Desk, we have the Surface Dial and Surface Studio. The Surface Dial can be used on its own or with the Surface Studio, the super high resolution screen which makes graphics look amazing. 

In this talk Developing for Surface Dial and Surface Studio Neil takes us through some detailed code for customisable menus, some art demonstrations, and examples of where the Surface Dial and Surface Studio have already been used.