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Electronista: Jaguar’s flagship sedan, the 2012 XJ, will come with a smartphone dock that will show the phone’s screen on the car’s built-in navigation screen, Pocket-Lint learned. Demonstrated at BlackBerry World in Orlando this week with a BlackBerry Torch, users will have the ability to control the phones with the car’s interface and not the phone’s. This includes contact info, music, GPS and more, but browsing the web will be locked out for safety reasons.

Multiple popular phones will be supported, which likely means iPhones and Android devices will be compatible.

The Jaguar engineer in charge of the project also suggested users could use the car’s Dual View screen to allow the driver and passenger to see different things, though multitasking would have to be supported by the phone itself. The Dual View feature allows passengers to view movies from a car’s entertainment system, while the driver can see the navigation screen or other images on the screen. Passengers may also be able to connect their own phone in addition or instead of the driver’s.

Whether the dock will be standard equipment or an option isn’t being revealed. What, if any other Jaguars will also get the dock remains to be seen.

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Engadget: Back in February, General Motors debuted its MyLink smartphone integration for the Chevy Volt and Equinox on the Engadget Show, letting drivers control their iOS, Android, and BlackBerry smartphone apps via voice or touchscreen. The company announced today that it will be offering the same technology — albeit rebranded as the tongue-twisting IntelliLink — on several 2012 Buick and GMC models, including the Buick LaCrosse, Regal, Verano, and the GMC Terrain. IntelliLink offers up a fairly similar feature set as its Chevy counterpart — connecting to iPhones and Android handsets via Bluetooth or USB, and leveraging Nuance voice recognition and Gracenote databases to control the likes of Pandora and Stitcher Radio. Autoblog reports that IntelliLink will hit the Buick Verano first, followed by the LaCrosse and Regal, though you might be more interested in the Terrain — owners will also be able to control their vehicle’s rear-view camera with IntelliLink, and who doesn’t like manipulating megapixels in the name of pedestrian safety?

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Cnet UK: Until last year, we all agreed that a computer without a keyboard was as useful as a wicker soup bowl. But this year the touchscreen wonder-windows poured out of CES like ants from an overturned log. Never fear, though — we won’t let you flail around with the fails. Here’s our pick of the best tablets from Las Vegas.

Motorola Xoom

The Motorola Xoom could be the 10.1-inch iPad-smasher that Android fans have been waiting for. This sleek but heavy tablet sports a dual-core processor, cameras front and back, and a mini-HDMI port for hooking it up to your telly.

It’s also the device that Google used to show off the tablet-centric version of its Android software, Android 3.0 Honeycomb. Android’s user interface has received a refresh that means it should take full advantage of the Xoom’s big screen. We loved the Samsung Galaxy Tab, a 7-inch tablet that runs on Android 2.2, so the Xoom should be even better.

The Xoom could prove something of a shock to the wallet, though. It’s early days, but a listing on UK site Handtec offered the Xoom at the eye-watering price of £720, although the price has since been removed from the listing.

Check out the hands-on photos in our Xoom preview, which we’ll be updating with a full review just as soon as the tablet zooms into our office.

Asus Eee Pad MeMo

The Asus Eee Pad MeMo runs Android 2.3 Honeycomb and is a more portable package than the Xoom. This 7-inch tablet looks classy and elegant, and, at 389g, the MeMo is considerably lighter than the 730g Xoom too.

Its 1,024×768-pixel resolution makes the MeMo’s relatively small screen as sharp as the edge of an oatcake, and we found we could use the tablet with one hand. But, despite its diminutive dimensions, the MeMo is still packed with features, including a stylus that works with the capacitive touchscreen to allow pressure-sensitive writing and drawing.

Hold your mitts up to the screen against our hands-on photos to see how the MeMo could look in your hands, and read our Memo preview to get all the gory details on this upcoming gadget.

BlackBerry PlayBook

RIM has ducked out of the Android and Windows 7 tablet battle, instead chucking its own operating system onto its first tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook. This could prove especially handy if you also use a BlackBerry phone, but we’re reserving judgement on the fledgling software until we can put it through its paces properly.

The PlayBook’s dual-core processor is all about multi-tasking. An all-new browser that supports Flash and HTML5 should help repair BlackBerry’s reputation for supplying out-of-date surfing software.

Like the Xoom, the PlayBook eschews buttons on its face — there’s no big home button, as there is on the iPad, or multiple menu buttons, like on most Android tablets. Instead, there’s a power button on the top, along with some media-control buttons.

Take a look at our hands-on photos of this bloated ‘Berry and read our extensive PlayBook preview for all the details you can stomach.

Samsung TX100

Windows tablets haven’t exactly set the world on fire, and now the world’s biggest OS is running scared, what with the rise of Android and iOS on big screens. But, for some people, staring through Windows is the only way they can get any work done.

The Samsung TX100 could be the solution for Windows fans who aren’t ready to abandon the Land of a Thousand Menus in favour of a mobile phone on steroids. This 10.1-inch tablet packs a cunning surprise — it has a slide-out keyboard that transforms it into a touchscreen netbook.

When we copped a feel of the TX100, we found it felt slim, despite its Qwerty keyboard, and its USB and HDMI ports should help it compete for bag space with your laptop. With a claimed 9 hours of battery life and an Intel Atom CPU, we’ve got high hopes that the TX100 will represent the best of both worlds, rather than the horrific result of a cross-breeding exercise that should have been exposed at birth on an ice flow.

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Automotive news: Smartphones present drivers with both a useful enhancement and a dangerous distraction.

Consumers accustomed to being connected wherever they go don’t want to give that up when they get into a car. Drivers stuck in traffic want to put that time to productive use.

So automakers and suppliers are devising innovative and safe ways to pair cars and smartphones so consumers can monitor the condition of the vehicle as well as new postings on Facebook.

“The automobile is no longer a communications dead zone that prohibits drivers from staying connected to friends and family,” said Anna Buettner, an analyst at iSuppli, a consulting firm that specializes in automotive electronics.

“With the expanding array of communications options, many drivers are willing to take the risk of an accident simply because they want to read or reply to a text message or check and update their preferred social media site,” Buetner wrote in a recent report. “Finding and implementing a way to safely integrate social networking and other apps in the car is more feasible than fighting the trend.”

Differing strategies

Multimode wireless connectivity–Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and cellular–governed by flexible programmability is speeding the integration of smartphones into vehicles. But even when the goal is the same, approaches differ among automakers. The integration strategies of General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co., for example, are dramatically different.

Ford’s strategy centers on its Sync voice-activated system. Sync, developed with Microsoft Corp. and launched late in 2007, provides multiple hard and wireless connections with smartphones and other mobile devices that drivers might bring into the vehicle.

Sync revolutionized the control of MP3 players and cell phones by allowing drivers to control them through the vehicle’s existing audio controls and structured voice commands. Ford says its research has shown that Sync makes using these devices less distracting. The automaker has improved and expanded the Sync interface several times.

“We know we can do better things for our customers by allying with the companies that provide the devices and services customers already use,” said Derrick Kuzak, Ford group vice president for global product development. “What we see emerging is a mutually beneficial collaborative community where our shared customer–anyone who drives a car and owns a smartphone–is the true beneficiary.”

Ford also has introduced an application programming interface for smartphones that allows smartphone apps to run and be controlled through Sync.

The first programs to use the new Sync API are OpenBeak, Pandora and Stitcher. The vehicle’s center screen mimics each app’s smartphone appearance and function. OpenBeak provides a direct link to the Twitter social media site, while Pandora and Stitcher are popular Internet radio applications that compete with satellite radio.

Additional apps are expected to become available through the online stores operated by Apple, Android and BlackBerry.

Built-in, not brought

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Techwatch: The success story for Google continues to roll onwards when it comes to the company’s operating system Android.

Figures from research firm NPD have indicated that Android has overtaken BlackBerry in the US smartphone market in the second quarter, with a market share of 33% compared to Rim’s 28%.

And now according to a Reuters report, CEO of Google Eric Schmidt has stepped forward with a bold statement regarding just how many Android devices are being flogged.

Schmidt claims that some 200,000 smartphones and other devices which are powered by Android are sold every single day. Which is quite a staggering number when you think about it.

And one that led Schmidt to tell Reuters that mobile ad revenue would eventually outstrip the money Google makes from the PC advertising arena, although he wouldn’t be drawn on committing to any sort of a rough date when this might occur.

All this is certainly much better news for Google than the fate of its Wave project, which was officially canned this week.

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SlashPhone: MySpace and Research In Motion (RIM) are joining forces to develop an integrated MySpace Mobile experience customized for BlackBerry smartphones.

The new MySpace for BlackBerry smartphones application will be fully optimized and provides instant, push-based messaging to BlackBerry and MySpace users. The application will be available in all BlackBerry markets globally.

As part of this collaboration, RIM is also creating a BlackBerry community page on MySpace for users to access the latest BlackBerry smartphone news, content, videos, games, ringtones, skins and other unique and engaging features.

The MySpace for BlackBerry smartphones application is designed with features  including a full messaging interface, including comments, bulletins and messaging.

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I4U: The market for software to protect mobile devices such as smartphones has yet to take off despite brisk sales of devices such as Research in Motion Ltd’s BlackBerry and Apple Inc’s iPhone.

Symantec Corp Chief Operating Officer Enrique Salem estimates that it is currently worth a few hundred million dollars a year.

“It is growing. But given the number of handsets, the number of smartphones, you would think it would be growing at a much higher rate,” Salem told the summit. “I can’t give you an exact number but it is not as fast as you might think.”

Like Symantec, McAfee Inc sells security products for mobile devices and has more in the works.

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Absolute Gadget: To get a Blackberry device from its users would require you to prise it out of their cold, dead hand but they may well very soon be chucking it away – to get their hands on this new phone that departs from the usual design by going all clamshell-like. 

According to Boy Genius Report, Research-in-Motion will be launching the clamshell phone, called the Kickstart, before the end of the year. It should sport a Suretype keyboard as well as a digital camera, an external LCD and, a tiny navigation trackball and a 2.5-inch LCD.

It is rumoured that the new phone will come with an updated version of RIM’s own Operating System, the Blackberrry Device Software 4.6, which should be able to cope with videos.

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Camera Core: Blackberry devices have always been popular when it comes to their email services. This tool is very useful, especially for professionals always on the go – where they can just pop-out their PDA and get their email virtually anywhere. However, a lot of people are still not comfortable with bulky PDA’s like the Blackberry and would still opt for those compact clamshell type phones. Well, Samsung has the answer for those users. The Samsung SGH-T719 offers the best of BlackBerry e-mail in a sleek package.

The SGH-T719 is a clamshell type phone and comes with the BlackBerry Connect software, which brings BlackBerry’s push e-mail technology to devices not manufactured by Research In Motion. With this technology on a Samsung product, emails are easily retrieved and accounts are kept up to date, plus, you still get the compact phone that some users can’t let go of.

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The Register: Finding your misplaced possessions may soon become a problem of the past. Boffins at a Japanese university have invented a pair of smart specs that recognise objects and record their locations to help you find them later.

The prototype glasses – which you definitely won’t find in Specsavers – have a camera mounted on one side that records everything you see and a small display on the adjacent side that faces your eye.

Their inventor, Professor Kuniyoshi, from the Tokyo University School of Information Science, told The Times that a software algorithm written into the special specs’ hardware allows individual items, such as your iPhone or your BlackBerry, to be recognised.

If, god forbid, you forget where you left either of these items, then simply say “Where’s my iPhone” into a microphone built into the glasses. The over-eye display then plays back video footage of the last time the camera recorded any view with an iPhone in it.

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Electronista: Research in Motion yesterday filed a lawsuit against rival cellphone designer Motorola, claiming both infringement on patents relating to its handset technology as well abusive licensing practices for its own licenses. Responsible for creating the BlackBerry smartphone line, RIM filed the complaint this weekend in a Northern District of Texas court and argues that Motorola is attempting to exclude competition both by refusing to license certains patents in its phones and by charging “extortionate” licensing fees for those patents it owns, penalizing RIM for using similar technology.

The patents address some of the most important technology at the heart of both firms’ devices, including the ability to connect through Wi-Fi as well as keyboards optimized for thumb typing.

Motorola has so far dismissed the complaint, calling its own patents “critical” to business and saying that it will protect its intellectual property against challenges from competitors.

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Slashgear: This little 5cm square gadget connects to your favorite audio system via a headphone jack (which could be split into a pair of RCA jacks with the right cable) and then streams music from your A2DP enable device. That list would include your cell phone or possibly MP3 player.

It looks like its USB powered, so you could feasibly integrate it into your car as well, provided you have an audio in jack on your car stereo, that would save you from having to buy a new head unit with A2DP built in.

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