Happy holidays! As we close in on the end of another fantastic year of Xbox gaming, where we saw the likes of Gears of War 4, Forza Horizon 3, and Dead Rising 4 arrive on our favorite console, we’re eagerly awaiting the arrival of 2017 and all the excitement that year hopes to bring. While our news may have been lighter this week as we enjoyed time with our families, we still have Major Nelson to help us close out the year with a small look back on all the great things that came to Xbox. Be sure to come… Continue reading This Week on Xbox – December 30→
This Week on Windows: We’re showing you tips and tricks to help you get the most out of your Windows 10 PC! Happy Holidays! Topics in this episode include:Getting started with Windows 10CortanaMicrosoft EdgeWindows HelloXbox play anywhere/Windows … Continue reading This Week On Windows: Happy Holidays! | This Week On Windows→
Artificial intelligence (AI) made incredible strides in 2016, and the growth appears set to accelerate as we enter the New Year. A team of Microsoft researchers has released a dataset of 100,000 questions and answers that other AI researchers can use – for free – in their quest to create systems that can read and answer questions as well as a human. The MS MARCO dataset is based on anonymized … Read more »
All I can say is that this was a pretty awesome year! Just LOOK at the stuff we highlighted! Just look at all these great projects from around the world! Wow…
It’s you, our readers, project authors and the Microsoft Development community that keeps the Coding4Fun and Kinect blogs going. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Finally, thank you for a great 2016 and I’m really looking forward to a mind blowing 2017!
In this short interview recorded during the MVP Summit, Glenn Versweyveld talks about Kliva, an open-source Strava client for Windows. Strava is a running and cycling tracking social network.https://github.com/AppCreativity/Kliva Continue reading Glenn Versweyveld – Kliva | On .NET→
The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a visualization environment that enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together imagery from the world’s best ground- and space-based telescopes for the exploration of the universe. WWT blends terabytes of images, information, and stories from multiple sources into a seamless, immersive, rich media experience. Explorers of all ages will feel empowered to explore and understand the cosmos using WWT’s simple and powerful user interface.
What if you could hook the WWT up to the Kinect, providing a one-of-a-kind experience? And what if they provided the source too?
Starfield
Starfield is an installation by the French art collective Lab212. It involves a swing, the projection of a star field in front of it and a Microsoft Kinect.
As the visitor rides the swing, the camera tracks the angles of the ropes and from there calculates the visitors eye position in three-dimensional space. Based on this information, the emplacement of the stars adapt in real-time to create the illusion of swaying through outer space.
The Starfield installation was initially created in 2012 by Cyril Diagne and Tobias Muthesius and was a instant hit on the internet. When preparing it for the exhibition at the MuDA the idea came up to hook it up with the WorldWide Telescope, an open-source software which allows to visualise the entire observable universe in 3D. The MuDA’s partner Microsoft then put Cyril Diagne, one of the artists behind the artwork, in touch with Jonathan Fay, the lead architect of the WorldWide Telescope.
Starfield uses the incredible open-source software WorldWide Telescope to let the visitors explore hundreds of terabytes of sky, earth and planet data of the observable universe.
This collaboration enables visitors to now experience the installation with a new dimension. From accurate star constellations to the tiniest craters of the earth’s moon, the entire universe known to humanity can be explored while sitting on a swing, swaying back and forth and daydreaming about space and belonging.