October 28, 2019

Lyon Convention Centre

69463 Lyon

France

Open Source Summit Europe (OSSEU) is the leading conference for developers, architects, and other technologists – as well as open source community and industry leaders – to collaborate, share information, learn about the latest technologies and gain a competitive advantage by using innovative open solutions. Over 2,000 will gather for OSSEU in 2019. Learn More

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Back in 1999, the first Wi-Fi-enabled laptop was introduced, and it wasn’t long before connectivity became a driving force in how the workplace evolved. Laptop sales began to overtake desktop PCs. As people realized the benefits of portability, open offices became a thing, as did laptops in conference rooms and coffee shops. And a few years later, smart phones made connectivity even more central to modern work and life.

At MWC Barcelona (formerly Mobile World Congress), we’re seeing a similar evolution. Announcements this week from telecoms and eSIM service enablers, demonstrate momentum toward building the infrastructure to provide the connectivity and capacity that LTE-enabled devices have been missing. These services are critical for customers to take advantage of 5G. The result is a wave of product innovation in both the consumer and corporate spaces like we haven’t seen in years.

Next Generation PCs

Over the past few months, we have seen the rise of LTE-enabled PCs that have extended battery life such as the ASUS NovaGo, HP Spectre x360 13, Lenovo Yoga C630 WOS and Samsung Galaxy Book2. These PCs marry the experience of a phone—awakening quickly, instantly connected and ready to go—with improved power availability.

Surface is also adopting this innovation with both the Surface Pro (5^th Gen) and Surface GO available in LTE-enabled versions, offering our customers the perfect balance of performance, portability with additional connectivity options.

LTE-enabled PCs offer an always connected experience. You may not realize how frictionless the hunt for connectivity can be until you experience one of these PCs for yourself. No longer will you need to click on anything to connect, or duck into a coffee shop to get a signal, or ask your server what the Wi-Fi password is, or wait for a file to download on your hotel’s painfully slow connection. It’ll just be there, ready to go whenever you are—and more importantly, wherever you are. The beach, a park, or the back of a taxi.

These capabilities have been available as a PC add-on for some time. But with these new PCs it’s native, and while they work well with today’s 4G LTE connections, upcoming 5G connectivity will make for a transformative experience in personal computing.

Enabling constant connectivity with eSIMs

A big part of making that ubiquitous connectivity happen on a broader scale is the move from physical SIM cards in connected devices to electronic SIMs, or eSIMs.

eSIMs come with several advantages. For consumers, they bring the ability to stay connected by purchasing a data subscription on demand, when and where they need it. Since eSIMs can be updated over the internet, there is no need to visit a provider’s store.

Enterprises, meanwhile, get much more security and control with eSIMs in both phones and PCs. They can create multiple profiles for users traveling to different countries, enabling employees to be constantly connected to resources in the cloud. If a device is ever lost or stolen, it can be wiped first and then the connectivity disabled, without having to worry about whether it’s connected to the internet.

Since Microsoft announced Windows 10 support for eSIM back in 2016, we’ve seen much more interest in cellular-enabled devices, not only from PC makers, but also from the hardware vendors who create modems that now support eSIMs. As manufacturers and service providers roll out support for eSIMs in the coming months, expect to see them become a centerpiece for the connected computing movement.

5G: the newest technology disruptor

With so much potential just around the corner, there’s no doubt that 5G has MWC buzzing this week. As 5G capabilities begin to become available around the world, people are working to understand and prepare for the inevitable innovation and disruption it will bring across industries.

The high throughput of 5G enables extraordinary reductions in latency. Besides things like extremely fast downloads, improved clarity and reliability, the ability to deliver so much data, so quickly, opens up a world of possibilities for new technology solutions.

5G can enable and extend the intelligent edge, reaching drones flying remote inspections, allowing them to return high-definition video feeds and data analytics instantly. Autonomous vehicles in factories, warehouses or airports can be controlled and continually tracked to within one centimeter. New types of collaborative experiences can be enabled, putting everyone in the same virtual room. We’re talking untethered AR and VR and real-time gaming from anywhere.

Many are calling this the “year of infrastructure” as providers build out 5G capabilities across industries. On one hand, you have the telecommunications industry deploying the infrastructure and innovating with new services. And on the other, the entire ecosystem of connected computing device makers of all types, working to tap into the possibilities.

The results will be truly transformative. In our homes, in our cars, at our work, in our stadiums, in our entertainment centers, every industry, from precision agriculture to precision medicine, from personalized retail to personalized banking—every walk of life could see real changes in the coming years.

Microsoft partners and network providers jump in

With all of this going on, we’re very excited about some of the big announcements from our partners and device makers here at MWC. Partners are critical to making this a reality—device makers, silicon manufacturers, mobile operators, eSIM enablers, mobile device management providers (MDMs) and ISVs, all need to establish a new “connected computing” approach to business. And we’re hearing that’s just what they’re up to.

Devices

Qualcomm Technologies announced a new 5G-enabled Snapdragon X55 modem in the lead up to MWC, their second-generation 5G modem after the X50, which was announced in October, 2016.

This 5G modem will enable connectivity for smartphones, mobile hotspots, fixed wireless access points, extended reality devices, automotive applications, and larger-screen devices like LTE enabled PCs, laptops, tablets, which are critical to the ecosystem. For Microsoft this is foundational technology that underpins the sexier intelligent edge solutions to come, a key part of the full picture: PCs connected to a cloud service via 5G, with all of that computing power served up as if you were right there at the server farm.  They also announced Wi-Fi 6, which will play an important role for both consumers and in the enterprise.

Telecommunications services

Another foundational element will be onboarding service providers and offering up mobile data plans that let users get the most from LTE-enabled PCs and 5G. Mobile Plans is a Windows experience that provides consumers with an easy way to top off a data plan with their existing carrier, or sign up for additional data plans with local MNOs if their carrier is not available based on location. On that front, we’ve been working with Telstra in Australia for more than a year, and in the next few weeks they will launch a marketing push, offering customers who wish to sample the new technology, a 30-day trial that includes 30GB free data to use in Australia. Telstra joins our growing ecosystem of mobile operators including GigSky, KDDI Japan, Swisscom, Tele2 and Ubigi.

eSIMs

With eSIMs coming on in a big way, a new ecosystem has evolved, working together to address the productivity, connectivity and manageability gaps that commercial customers are currently experiencing. This week, several of these players are announcing new releases and partnerships within this category at MWC. As an example, IDEMIA and Mobile Iron will be sharing the offering for their common customers and mobile operators in support of the Windows commercial solution for eSIM. Wandera showcased its Windows connected PC solution, which helps enterprise customers define policies that govern how mobile data can be utilized by both users and mobile apps across a variety of network scenarios (physical SIMs, eSIMs, Wi-Fi, etc.). We are also excited to continue to work with mobile operators, such as C Spire and KDDI, as we get closer to deploying eSIM within the organizations of their customers.

Consumers are also benefitting from two new partnerships that will make it much easier for mobile operators to deliver support for easy connectivity with eSIM through Microsoft’s “Mobile Plans” app. Shown for the first time at MWC this week, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Microsoft demonstrated the expansion of “Digital Identity” with HPE’s Device Entitlement Gateway (DEG), a software product that enables mobile network operators to safely and securely connect to the Windows 10 eSIM platform.

Microsoft is also partnering with Amdocs to take advantage of their “Digital eSIM platform” offering to streamline the Mobile Operator onboarding process into Mobile Plans.

Just like the Wi-Fi revolution at the turn of the century, we expect this transformation to connected computing and 5G to take time. But as we’re seeing this week in Barcelona, the entire ecosystem is working to sort out the challenges and make this a new era of continuous, instantaneous, high-speed connectivity.

Updated February 27, 2019 12:22 am

ID. is the first vehicle generation to be connected to the Automotive Cloud

Volkswagen is preparing its digital ecosystem for the core markets of the future ID. model family. The ID. will be the first vehicle to use the Automotive Cloud and is to be launched in Europe in 2020. Production is to start in China the same year and a member of the ID. family will roll off the production line in the USA from 2022 onwards.

First lighthouse projects for connected vehicle services

Volkswagen and Microsoft are also working on first lighthouse projects for connected vehicles. They are concentrating on communication and navigation solutions as well as personalized services: These will leverage self-learning algorithms facilitating the use of services in the vehicle and offering occupants extended functions. Automated linking into telephone conferences and the transfer of prepared navigation destinations will only be the first steps, which will also include the integration of Microsoft Skype and Microsoft Office.

Volkswagen Development Center in Seattle makes progress

Progress is also being made with the establishment of the new Development Center in Seattle. Volkswagen had established this location for the development of the Automotive Cloud at the end of 2018. The idea of the Development Center is to learn from Microsoft’s highly developed culture of agile collaboration and digital leadership and transferring this culture to the center’s own organization. At the center, first developer teams are now starting on project work. Microsoft is providing support for the development of the new center in areas including the recruitment of specialists and project management.

CEOs speak about importance of partnership in Berlin

The two CEOs of Volkswagen, Herbert Diess, and Microsoft, Satya Nadella, visited the Volkswagen Digital Lab in Berlin on Wednesday. They spoke to media representatives about the importance of their strategic partnership and the challenges faced in the digital transformation of the automotive and IT industries.

For Volkswagen, Berlin is an important software development location. Apart from the Digital Lab, other competence centers have their headquarters here. These also include Carmeq, a subsidiary of Volkswagen which is moving ahead with the development of software for the new vehicle operating system “vw.os”. About 650 specialists at three locations are concentrating on “vw.os” as well as the development of software for driver assistance, driving convenience and infotainment functions.

Note for editors:
A film of the joint visit of Herbert Diess and Satya Nadella to the Digital Lab as well as other images will become available in the Volkswagen Newsroom in the course of Wednesday.

A Pokémon Direct has been officially confirmed, scheduled to air tomorrow, 27th February.

Pokémon fans all around the world have been eagerly anticipating news for the promised, upcoming Generation 8 games for some time, with many believing that news would drop tomorrow on ‘Pokémon Day’. Now, Nintendo has confirmed that a Pokémon-specific Direct is indeed happening. Surely this is it?

As you can see, the message states that “roughly seven minutes of new information” will be shown, although nothing more specific than that has been shared. Naturally, this means we can’t be certain that the new Switch games will be featured, but we can certainly dream about it.

The presentation will start at 2pm GMT, so that’s 6am PT / 9am ET / 3pm CET.

So, go on then. Share your wildest fantasies for what you want to see in the comments below, and make sure to pop right back here to Nintendo Life tomorrow to watch the Direct live!

The RISC-V Foundation will be hosting a free, Getting Started with RISC-V event in Irvine. This 1 day event will showcase innovative RISC-V implementations from members of the Foundation.

The half-day Irvine event on April 3 will feature engaging presentations, demos and networking opportunities.

Learn more

Digital card games can be a tough genre to get into. If you haven’t been playing Hearthstone regularly, you may feel lost within the confines of its lore-rich world. And if you’re not willing to invest hours to practice, you may find yourself left out of the fun everyone else is having. Knights of the Card Table easily subverts these issues, combining the fun of dungeon crawling with quickfire card battles with plenty of unique layers to its gameplay. Wrapped up in a fun aesthetic and playful motif, it’s one of the best card battlers to hit mobile devices in some time – though it’s not without its unique frustrations.

Knights of the Card Table has you exploring various “dungeons” at the behest of a kooky dungeon master as a plucky young adventurer of your choice. You have a male player first, and the second unlockable character is a female you can swap to, if you so choose. Exploring dungeons and completing them is done solely via selecting a stage on a map, and then taking part in card battles that span several “floors”.

You’ll find that most decks are full of enemies, like spiders, beehives, and even jerky mailmen and bullies. Typically, five cards will be drawn from the deck and displayed to you (though sometimes some will remain unflipped, leaving them a mystery). When you clear one card out, another will appear. You’re in control here, however, of the card order you play in. So if you have three enemies on the play field followed by two restorative items, you can play the restorative items as needed, rather than having to wait to get to them.

Health Dranks will restore hearts (you start out with three), while Power Milk will give you a damage bonus. You’ll want to avoid the Poison, of course. Meanwhile, Spell Tomes like Fireball and Freeze can tear through enemy cards and give you an extra edge against them. In terms of power you’re facing off against, you can check the top left and right ratings on each card. The orange shape represents the enemy’s power, while the heart is their HP. Your dungeon explorer’s card shows this information as well.

One of the most useful game mechanics that requires you to think ahead a bit and strategize is the concept of card streaks. If you use three of the same card type in a row, you’ll get some pretty decent bonuses, buffs, or a selection of additional treasure. These card streaks largely rely on luck for you to trigger them, since you can’t see every card coming up in the deck, but when you can pull them off, they can do some staggering amounts of damage.

When you run out of hearts, you can opt to bring your character back to life by spending one of your “pops” to revive them, but after that it’s game over and you’ll have to start over. You’ll typically have plenty of pops to bring you back, but you don’t earn them as readily as gold,

Enemies don’t attack in a turn-based manner, either, unless you attack them first. You don’t even have to arrange the cards on the “table,” so to speak, in the order you want to play them. You can simply tap on the one you want to activate. This doesn’t apply anymore, however, when you run across “locked” cards that have a chain around them. This means you can’t swap them out with other cards or change position with them, and tapping them to move them ahead won’t work. You’ll have to get to them when they come up, which can be frustrating, but it does add a satisfying amount of challenge to the game.

As the game wears on, there are additional elements introduced as you rank up higher. There are trap cards, such as explosive dynamite, that you must tap and activate to get out of the way, because in order to continue on to the next dungeon floor you must complete the deck, whether you use all of the Health Dranks or Power Milks or have to succumb to dynamite damage.

Unfortunately, sometimes that means each dungeon floor can become extremely repetitive. You might get four Health Dranks in a row, or perhaps you’ll get Power Milk over and over again, with four enemies right behind one another at the end. This leaves you with no health options, and no way to recover if you don’t happen to roll the dice that can knock out the enemies before you.

After you complete a dungeon, you can head out and purchase additional gear. You get gold pieces and pops as a reward for killing off enemies and stacking items you don’t need like Health Dranks, but some items need an inordinate amount of pops for you to purchase them. Considering you get only a handful when you complete dungeons, it can take quite a long time to unlock certain items. Gold takes a much shorter time to accrue, but you need gold and pops for many of the items on offer. This is one huge frustration. You get your first few weapons quickly, since they’re decently affordable, but you’ll find yourself playing for quite a while if you dare desire an additional character to play as. This will undoubtedly be a turnoff for players looking to try out some of the various personalities.

That’s annoying, because Knights of the Card Table has a fun, silly Adventure Time vibe, and wouldn’t feel out of place in terms of its visuals on a channel like Nickelodeon or Cartoon Network. So not being able to see everything the game has to offer in a decent period of time feels like a slight to the player. With the game already costing $5, it would have made much more sense to ditch the semi-premium currency and opt for a fairer way to hand out new characters, weapons, and shields.

If you’re not looking to jump into any sort of difficult card battler with multiple novels’ worth of lore or want to try something without the need for learning an entire rulebook, Knights of the Card Table is a fantastic place to start. It’s light, humorous, and perfect for newcomers to the genre, especially with its quirky exterior, which will no doubt attract fans looking to explore. You can play with one hand, start and stop at your leisure, and collect a wide variety of kooky characters and accessories eventually, and it’s well worth settling in to play. Just don’t expect to unlock things left and right – it will undoubtedly take patience, but it will keep a smile on your face the entire time.

Note: This is a premium game on iOS, however the Android version is free-to-play and there are IAPs for the in-game currencies.  At the time of writing, current IAP options include:

• Various ‘big’ bundles that come with varying combinations of new heroes, Ad removal, Gold and Pops (£9.49 – £10.99)
• Gold-only bundles (£4.59-£8.99)
• Pop-only Bundles (£4.59 – £37.99)
• You can also watch ads for small amounts of Gold/Pops.