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RoamBi iPhone app makes data uberpretty

A data report reader may not seem like the most exciting candidate for an iPhone app, but if you're working in the field--or are even just a numbers nut--the new RoamBi app will catch your eye.

RoamBi (short for 'roaming business intelligence') is good-looking, all right, and it manages to cram a breadth of information into its gorgeous charts and graphs. Unlike many mobile versions of spreadsheet readers, you'll almost never need to scroll through a tiny spreadsheet to analyze your data.

The service also includes a Web publisher where individual operators or corporate employees can import reports … Read more

Displays have a long way to go

Today I take my lead from a Reuters article that describes two alternative display technologies that may some day replace (or at least augment) LCDs in mainstream computer systems.

Both are on the market today. OLED (organic light-emitting display) technology, used on some cellphones, creates what amounts to an array of tiny LEDs. This approach is theoretically superior to the way LCDs work, which is to combine a white backlight with colored filters and tiny shutters (the liquid crystals) for each pixel. All the light generated by the OLED is visible to the user, but most of the light in … Read more

Self-cleaning aquarium for all parents

Now this, friends, is one invention worth crowing about: a self-cleaning fish tank. It's something that practically every parent must endure at some point, when a child brings home that first goldfish from the school carnival.

Unlike standard aquariums, the "biOrb" has a special ceramic system that "provides a massive home for filter bacteria," according to its U.K. distributor, Reef One. The only maintenance required is a regular changing of the cartridge in the aquarium's built-in filter.

T3 adds that the spherical tanks come in a variety of colors and can hold 15 liters … Read more