Tag Archives: SDK

Kinect for Windows coming February 1: hardware is $249, SDK is free

January 15, 2012News, Technologydeveloper tools, developers, Kinect, Kinect for Windows, Kinect SDK, Microsoft, motion sensor, price, release date, release date & price, SDKScott Meisner

When Kinect for Xbox 360 launched in November 2010, it changed the way gamers interacted with their Xbox consoles and games just like Nintendo did with the Wii. Since its release, Kinect owners have taken the power into their own hands by hacking the motion-sensing peripheral to make it function in all kinds of ways. Microsoft quickly took notice and announced in the fall that they would release an SDK to allow for more innovation with Kinect. Microsoft shares its plan in a blog post:

With Kinect for Windows, we are investing in creating a platform that is optimized for scenarios beyond the living room, and delivering new software features on an ongoing basis… In addition to support for Windows 7 and the Windows 8 developer preview (desktop apps only), Kinect for Windows will also support gesture and voice on Windows Embedded-based devices and will enhance how data is captured and accessed within intelligent systems across manufacturing, retail and many more industries. We are building the Kinect for Windows platform in a way that will allow other companies to integrate Kinect into their offerings and we have invested in an approach that allows them to develop in ways that are dependable and scalable.

Kinect for Windows hardware will be made available on February 1 in twelve countries (United States, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, and the UK )and will sell for $249.99 in “limited quantities at first.” The accompanying SDK and developer tools will be free. Preorder today at Amazon and let your imagination run wild.

[Via Microsoft]

The “Kinect Effect” leads to Microsoft-backed SDK coming in 2012

November 1, 2011News, Technology, Videodeveloper software, hacks, Kinect, Kinect for Xbox 360, Kinect SDK, Microsoft, open source, SDK, Video gamesScott Meisner

We all know the Kinect motion sensor was created to work in tandem with Microsoft’s video game console Xbox 360 to reinvent and enhance the gaming experience by “making you the controller.” But shortly after the device hit the market the open source community (read: hackers) cracked open the magical sensor and figured out ways to make it useful beyond the realm of gaming. Kinect hacks became so popular that I thought it’d be neat to highlight some of the most inventive ones in a post titled “Kinect, hacked” last December. Rather quickly Microsoft caught wind of all the amazing ways people have tinkered with their sensor and they shared plans to release a Kinect SDK into the wild that would give the general public official access to Kinect APIs and other developer tools. In a blog post today Microsoft executive Frank Shaw announced that the SDK is coming in 2012. In his own words:

To further fuel innovation and imagination, we will offer a Kinect for Windows commercial program early next year. We recognize the intense commercial interest in harnessing the capabilities of Kinect, and are working with a wide range of companies and developers to create a great set of tools and APIs. In fact, our commercial pilot program has already received more than 200 applications from top companies in more than 20 countries spanning 25 unique industries, eager to explore the possibilities of Kinect beyond Xbox 360!

It’s really great that Microsoft is acknowledging the open source tinkerers and giving them a means to further their creativity. Watch what the “Kinect Effect” has spawned over the last year in the video above. My favorite is the application created for hospitals in Spain enabling surgeons to scroll through medical images in the operating room with gestures so they could avoid the need to rescrub. Pure genius. To see more related videos head over to Microsoft’s Kinect Effect website.

[Via MicrosoftBlog]

Google I/O 2010: WebM, Android 2.2, Google TV & more

May 21, 2010News, Technology, VideoAndroid, Android 2.2, Android Market, cell phones, developers, Froyo, Google, Google I/O 2010, Google TV, Google Wave, mobile OS, SDK, Television, TV, video codec, WebMScott Meisner

This week thousands of developers gathered at Google I/O 2010 in San Fransisco to find out what Google’s got up their sleeve for the next year (and beyond) and how their contributions can make things better for the end user. At this year’s event Google introduced a new video standard, demoed their latest software revision of Android, and pulled the veil off their latest foray into a whole new market–television.

WebM: Flash, HTML5, h.264–these are all video codecs that power different types of video players on the Internet. WebM is a new video codec developed by Google. The plan for the WebM format is to make it open-source and royalty-free from the get-go. WebM is packaged into three parts: VP8, a high-quality video codec under a royalty-free license; Vorbis, an already open source and broadly implemented audio codec; and a container format based on a subset of the Matroska media container. According to Google, “VP8’s efficient bandwidth usage will mean lower serving costs for content publishers and high quality video for end-users. The codec’s relative simplicity makes it easy to integrate into existing environments and requires less manual tuning to produce high quality results.” So far, the following companies are backing the new WebM standard in their browsers: Google (duh), Mozilla, Opera, and Adobe. (Mozilla already updated their Firefox to support it, Opera says their browsers will support it “soon”, Adobe will inject VP8 support into Flash too, and Chrome support comes on on May 24.) Google will also implement it in the YouTube player (HTML5 & WebM, sittin’ in a tree…). WebM also has a list of hardware supporters including AMD, ARM, Broadcom, NVIDIA, Skype, and T.I. But the big question is if Microsoft and Apple will adopt it. At this point, there’s no word if Apple will jump on the bandwagon (big surprise there), and Microsoft has stated it will support WebM in Internet Explorer 9 (but users will be required to install the VP8 codec themselves). If there’s any tech company out there who can develop and push out a new open source video codec it’s Google. With the on-going battle for dominance between the aging Flash and up-and-coming HTML5, it will certainly be interesting to see if Google can emerge out victorious with WebM.

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