RDB's Blog: April 2018

Thursday, April 26, 2018

Opera R2 Event Unveils Opera Touch and Latest Desktop Version

Opera Software ASA has whole array of internet products including Opera Browser for desktop, Opera Mini and Opera Mobile.

Opera Software sold its assets - browser, privacy and performance apps, and the Opera brand to a Chinese consortium named olden Brick Capital Private Equity Fund I Limited Partnership (a consortium of Chinese investors led by Beijing Kunlun Tech Co and Qihoo 360) in 2016, and rebranded as Otella.

In 2017 August Opera sold its Opera Max (browser + data compression + VPN like service) to Samsung. And Opera Max was withdrawn from Google Play Store. Later rebranded Samsung Max was launched in February 2018 for Galaxy smartphones only.

In January 2017 Opera launched its new browser project Opera Neon under banner of Opera Reborn. Later many features of Neon (social networking focus) came to Opera Browser.

Opera has launched two new stuffs in the R2 event on April 25, 2018. Opera desktop got a new version with some new user friendly features.

Opera Touch is the second product - another mobile browser available for Android only. Apple iOS version is coming soon.

5G Update: 5G Readiness Index List & 5G-FWA vs FTTH

China, South Korea, U.S.A., Japan, Germany, the U.K., France, Canada, Russia and Singapore are the top 10 countries in the 5G Readiness Index List prepared by Analysys Mason.

Reasons of 5G readiness as seen in China - proactive government policies and industry momentum while in United States mobile operators urge to become global leader on technical prospective.

New debate is landed upon 5G domain - Fiber to the home (FTTH) vs mmWave 5G Fixed Wireless Access (or simply 5G-FWA) while telecom analysts are seeing 5G is destined to be in track after 2020.

Technogy means progress and progress often comes with a technical competition. If you can remember we had seen GSM vs CDMA, 3G vs EVDO, LTE vs WiMax and FTTx vs Wireless Broadband. The next competition is destined to be in between Fiber to X vs 5G- FWA (Fixed Wireless Access) as global analysts are expecting.

It's been leaked that Flickr is going to be acquired by SmugMug on 20th of April, 2018 by USA Today.

However being a Flickr user, I got mail from Flickr on 21st of April confirming the same i.e. Flickr got a new parent - SmugMug.

Globally most of the mobile service providers already on LTE or deploying LTE on their network. As far as we are concerned about Indian landscape, here the big players all are offering LTE.

As the global trends show the universal acceptance of VoLTE (Voice over LTE) – for offering voice calls over IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) architecture based LTE networks, here in India apart from BSNL, all serious players (Airtel, Reliance Jio, Vodafone/Idea) are launching VoLTE or already launched it. Reliance Jio is completely on VoLTE, while Vodafone is offering it in ten circles, followed by Bharti Airtel in nine circles. Idea Cellular has opened the VoLTE to its employees, which is expected to go official for the users in some circles very soon, but there’s no word on the same.

Reliance Jio is completely on VoLTE, as the telco doesn’t have any legacy voice network on 2G/3G. Others telcos have the Circuit Switched Fall Back mechanism based voice on 2G/3G and data on LTE initially, later they are moving on to VoLTE.

Why is VoLTE gaining momentum in the country? The reason is simple – better spectrum efficacy, refarming of spectrums that is being used on 2G/3G networks, better services like HD voice and video calling are the main reasons.

List of Courier/ Delivery/Logistic Services in India

Previously Indians meant post is equal to Indian Post. If we can remind our childhood days, we had seen the postman in the afternoon hours, riding on a bicycle and delivering the letters.

As India saw telecom boom, the letters, fax, telegram went off their popularity, and so the India Post - the monopoly they started loosing. And private players entered in the market. Probably in 2005 I used first pvt delivery/post or simply courier services and that was DTDC. Later Bluedart became my choice.

However the boom in the delivery business came along with the e-commerce boom. I can remember the enjoyment in my brothers' face, when first delivery (a book, of course) from Flipkart came to my house. Later with food delivery chains (via app and phone call) the delivery business reached the last mile connectivity with delivery boys (or Captain Delivery) riding on motor bikes carrying a huge bag on his back.

I am hereby listing the postal/logistic services available in India.

Coorg Travel in March 2018

Coorg is a district of Karnataka, located near Kerala border. It's now known as Kodagu (Coorg is British name). The main town is Madikeri (British name Mercara).

We took Airavaat club class bus from Bangalore. These buses start from Old Mysore Road Sattelite Bus Stand (at outskirt of Bengaluru) at 11:30 pm and reach at Madigari Mercara bus stand by 5:30 am.

There are many hotels around the bus stand, but there are also many homestays and resorts which are bit away from main town. The homestays are preferred over hotels as homestays often give you excellent viewpoint locations.

We were recommended Eishwara Inn but did not get a booking on Goibibo/MMT as it was weekend. Hence we did not book any hotel.

ACT Broadband to Connect Google Homes to Internet

Google has just entered into smart home products market of India with their Google Home and Home Mini Speakers (AI driven), which are competing against Amazon's Echo speakers.

Both products priced at Rs 9999 and Rs 4999, are available on Flipkart exclusively and will be available in offline stores in coming days.

ACT Fibernet to Power Google Home Users with High-Speed Fiber Broadband Connectivity

ACT Fibernet is Google’s Fiber broadband partner for Google Home launch

Bengaluru, 10 April, 2018: ACT Fibernet, India’s largest fiber-focused wired broadband ISP (Internet Service Provider) today announced its partnership with Google to support its newly launched Google Home smart speakers with high-speed fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) connectivity. As part of this, ACT Fibernet will work in conjunction with Google to leverage the adoption of next-gen technology and will offer a bundle of special plans for its customers.

New Social Platform Hello from Orkut Going to Launch Officially in India on 11.04.2018

Hello, another social platform by Orkut Büyükkökten is going to be launched in India on 11th of April, 2018 officially.

Yes, he is the guy behind Google's Orkut social networking site, which is now shut down in favor of Google Plus.