Categories
Mobile Software and Apps

Hack To Transform Android Phone Camera Into A WebCam For Computer

Want to video chat with your friend over your computer but don’t have a webcam? No worries. DroidCam is a new application on the Android market that will let you easily turn your Android phone into a webcam for your computer. The application connects the camera on your Android phone to your computer using a desktop client that needs to be installed. Once done, the phone camera can seamlessly function as a webcam and can be used with a number of third party chat applications including MSN, Skype, etc.

What’s interesting is that DroidCam connects wirelessly over Wi-Fi and so there is no cable-hassle involved. Do note though that the application is currently compatible with only a Windows or Linux computer. If you are a Mac user, then you are out of luck at the moment.

Check out the application from the Android market and let us know how it works in the comments below.

Categories
Mobile Software and Apps

Built-In Video Chat For Android Coming With Gingerbread

Google is reported to be working on a new built-in chat functionality that will enabled video chatting over the Android platform. This new feature is expected to be incorporated in the upcoming Gingerbread version of Android – likely to be called Android 3.0.

Of course, this is no confirmation but a piece of rumor gathered from sources. According to those who claim to be in the know, Google has built this new chat functionality using the same protocols that power a similar video chatting functionality on GTalk; Google’s desktop chatting client. While it is not clear, it can be then assumed that the new video chatting feature will integrate the experience of Gtalk and the Android chat application so that users may communicate with friends irrespective of whether they are online from a desktop or from an Android phone.

What follows next is pretty logical. Google could bring in the voice calling functionality that was introduced to users of Gmail chat not so long ago to the Android platform. That could be pretty revolutionary for VoIP calling.

Categories
Apple Software and Apps

Group Video Calling On FaceTime Coming Soon

Apple has been taking on Skype with their new FaceTime video calling feature. In that case, it only makes sense for the company to bring in the group video calling feature that has been introduced in the latest version of Skype, right? Developers looking into the iOS firmware have stumbled upon a piece of code referencing FaceTime that reads,

<key>AllowsMultipleConnections</key>
<false/>

What this could mean is that jailbreakers could now bring in new copies of iOS firmware that could set this function to ‘true‘ that could let jailbroken iPhone users to do group video calling from FaceTime rightaway. Anyway, it is still unclear whether Apple would bring this functionality to the iPhone anytime now. We have heard recently about the company’s plans to introduce FaceTime on the Windows and Mac platforms. Considering that the iChat tool on Mac already supports group chatting, it is possible that Apple may set this function to true on the desktop computers while retaining the two-way chat for the iPhone. What do you think?

Categories
Mobile Software and Apps

Movicha Cross-Platform Phone-To-Desktop Video Chatting Application

Never mind which smartphone you are toting. If you are looking for a way to video chat with your friends on a desktop PC or Mac, here is a simple and free application that will get the job done. Movicha; acronym for Mobile Video Chat, is an application that is available for the iOS, Android, Symbian, Windows Mobile, OS X and Windows platforms that lets users on one of these platforms video chat with other users on one of these compatible platforms. Blackberry OS is expected to be supported soon which means almost all of the smartphone segment is covered.

According to the developers,

iMovicha supports multiple operating systems in mobile and laptop platforms. Video call can either be mobile-to-mobile or laptop-to-mobile or laptop-to-laptop. iMovicha key features: Video Calling, Voice Calling, IM, Presence Group Management, Contact Management, Preference Management

While this application is free to download, do remember that iOS users will need a jailbroken iDevice. Nevertheless, this is a pretty interesting application that you can check out by visiting the website here.

Categories
Gadgets Samsung

Samsung Galaxy Tab Video Calling Demoed

The Samsung Galaxy Tab does a great job in letting users video chat with their friends and family. The tablet is seamlessly integrated with applications like Qik and Fring that make video chatting all the more fun and easy. However, like it is with several other devices, you do have restrictions on how you use it. For instance, video chatting is presently available only via Wi-Fi. Those users looking to connect via 3G will have the video cut and you will have to contend with an audio-only chat. Also, as we had noted earlier as well, the Galaxy Tab does not come with phone calling feature if you are in the United States.

Nevertheless, the device is still value for money. Check out a demo of the Qik application on Samsung Galaxy Tab in the video embedded below.

[via Phandroid]

Categories
Google

Gmail Video Chat Application For Linux Launched

It has taken a long time coming. Google has announced that voice and video chat functionalities of Gtalk that was hitherto unavailable on Gmail when you were running Linux will now become available. To get started, users simply have to go ahead and download the tiny installer file and reload Gmail to start using the feature.

The Gtalk plugin for Gmail has existed on other platforms like Mac and PC for quite sometime now and it is not clear why it took so long for Google to make the feature available for the penguin lovers.

But here’s some spoilers though. The video chat application for Linux currently supports only Ubuntu and Debian based distros. RPM support is expected to launch soon.

It’s not clear if Google shall be releasing the source code though.

Categories
Apple Gadgets

Video Chat On iPad/iPhone Coming Soon

There has been lot of evidence in the past couple of weeks to suggest that Apple has been purposefully delaying the launch of video chat facilities for the iPhone and iPad even though most of the backend seems to be already ready.

Developers have reported evidences of references to a forward facing camera and video chat functionalities being present on the iPhone OS 3.2 SDK. Now folks at 9to5Mac have dug out more evidences pointing towards the same. A few icons built specifically for the iPhone OS 3.2 SDK show dedicated icons for video chat functionality. Also, the script has references to iChat which is another indication of the imminent video chat feature.

The question now is has Apple deliberately decided to delay the launch of the feature in order to spice up the sale of iPad 2.0 or was the decision to include video calling functionality called off at the last minute owing to potential bugs.

Knowing how Apple goes about its business, the former scenario is pretty much possible.

[via 9to5Mac]