Easy programming learning

As programming becomes a compulsory subject at elementary school starting from 2020, interest in programming learning is increasing year by year, but learning may be troublesome even for adults. Therefore, the programming e-learning site Progate has released an application that makes it easy to learn their curriculum with smartphones. Currently it is only iOS version, but of course they are also preparing the Android version.

In this application, you can learn about programming with a curriculum equivalent to the web version. UI/UX is optimized for smartphones, and you can practice coding with original keyboard. Since the code you wrote is reflected in the preview screen immediately, you can learn while checking whether the code is correct or not.
The users they are assuming are kids of elementary ~ high school students who do not have PCs. Many cute illustrations are used for teaching materials to make them familiar with coding, and each time they do the curriculum one by one, their level will go up. That is exactly like a game. Now, you can learn with this application in the beginer level of HTML and CSS, but the curriculums are going to increase with future updates.
Application download is free.

Make shopping among family smart

Ask someone in the family to shoping for daily necessities...That is what everyone is doing, but often due to forgetful or contact mistakes, it's become troubles of families. Startup IRITEC has released the iOS version of the utility application FamilyMemo that solves this.

This is an application that shares shopping memos within the family. For example, if you notice that your famiry have run out of shampoo, and write it in this application, other family members can know that information, and somebody in your family will buy it.

Family members who have completed shopping while watching shopping memo can inform other family that they completed their shopping by checking the items. Adding items are easy, you can manage shopping memo you use only by yourself and shopping notes shared by your family on separate tabs. So, if you live alone, this app will be useful. Unfortunately, the Android version of this has not been released yet.
Downloading iOS version is free.

Cutest home robot MyRoom Robi

Various home robots have been released in Japan until now, but there is nothing more lovely robot than he.
Toy company Takara-Tomy will release a personal talk robot Myroom Robi that can talk about various topics on February 28th.

Robi is a humanoid robot series developed by robot creator Tomotaka Takahashi, Myroom Robi is it's the third. He has a TV remote control sensor, a temperature sensor, a humidity sensor, a human sensor, and an illuminance sensor, uses them to recognize the environment inside the room and talks variously. For example, "It's dark. Why don't you turn on the room light?", "Achoo! It's cold!", "I want to be a snowman", these talk variations are over 2000 kinds and the contents of the talks change according to the season.
If you register your schedule in him, he will tell you according to the date. In addition, he can sing, tell the fortune telling information and play wirh the game. If you want him to have a rest, he enter quiet mode by touching his forehead for 3 seconds. His size is 170 × 170 × 130 mm and works with four alkaline AAA batteries. The price is 10,584 yen(including tax).

Make unattended sales smart

Now, Mobile payments are rapidly spreading and this may further accelerate it. IoT gadget maker Cerevo showed an micro-mini vending machine Qvie with 3G / 4G communication function at CES 2018. The price of this is yet to be determined, but they will release this this summer.

Qvie consists of a cargo unit that puts items and a head unit that has a payment function. The head unit has electronic paper display and NFC, customers can pay by scanning the QR code with a smartphone camera or holding a smartphone supporting NFC, and when payment is completed, the cargo unit is unlocked. The head unit has 3G / 4G communication function, and troublesome setting accompanying communication is unnecessary. In addition, the head unit and the cargo unit have large capacity batteries, so they works about one month continuously.

If you want to sell various items, you can connect multiple cargo units to one head unit and use them simultaneously. Furthermore, you can check sales data such as unlocking time of cargo unit, its number of times, sales amount in real time from smartphone. The size of the head unit is 44 × 45 × 150 mm and the cargo unit is 159 × 383 × 305 mm(Including legs). The weight is yet to be confirmed.

Enjoy karaoke everywhere --- Bluetooth Karaoke microphone

In Japan, January is the rush month of the New Year party. This microphone is useful if you are a party organizer and it is troublesome to book a karaoke room.

This Bluetooth karaoke microphone links with smartphones or tablets and converts every place into a karaoke room. When you choose your favorite tune from mobile application that link with this, you can sing with that tune that played from a speaker at the bottom of microphone. Of course this has the function to lower the volume of the vocal only. In addition, you can also adjust the volume of microphone itself and echo. If you want to sing tunes which JOYSOUND karaoke machine has, link with Karaoke JOYSOUND application. Or, if you want to sing the tunes on the CDs, use the I - O DATA's gadget CD Reco and its application. The size of this is 220 x 64 x 64 mm, and the weight is 210 g. Battery capacity is 2200 mAh, it works for about 5 hours with 3 hours charging. The color variations are gold, silver and pink, and the price is 5,378 yen (including tax).