WhatsApp gives group admins more power
It doesn’t look like the team responsible for the updates at WhatsApp read our articles. Last week we told them they could take a break after they released yet another update. Well, they’ve done it again. The update, currently still in beta, will allow admins of group chats the ability to delete messages sent by the group’s members. The ability to delete WhatsApp messages isn’t new, you’ve been able to do that for ages. You’re even able to delete your messages for other people, provided you didn’t send them too long ago. But you’ve never been able to delete the message of other people.
This info comes courtesy of WABetaInfo which, if you haven’t worked it out yet, cover all things related to Info regarding WhatsApp’s beta program. The update will mean admins and moderators will be given more control over their group chats and will now be able to remove unwanted or inappropriate messages. When a message in a group chat is removed it will say as much and let you know which admin didn’t like what you said.
Source: XDA-Developers
The next Mass Effect game will use Unreal Engine
Job listings for an associate technical director in the Bioware team with Unreal Engine experience point to the developer moving away from using EA’s in-house Frostbite engine for the next title. The first three Mass Effect games (the really good ones) were made using Unreal Engine 3 and the first two Dragon Age games used the Bioware-developed Eclipse Engine. This change over is, according to Dragon Age creative director Mike Laidlaw, why they needed to cancel Dragon Age 2’s planned expansion. The change to Frostbite was also blamed as the cause of some of the problems Mass Effect Andromeda faced.
If you’ve seen any footage of games made in Unreal Engine 5 you’d be as excited as we are. The technology was first unveiled last year with a real-time PS5 demo. Recently, a playable demo that also acted as marketing for the new Matrix film was released and only helps to elevate the hype for the tech. This will hopefully mean that the next Mass Effect game won’t suffer the same woes as Andromeda did.
Source: PC Gamer
SpaceX’s two-for-one special
SpaceX has broken another record. On Saturday, the company launched the Turksat 5B mission into orbit late into the evening from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The launch was live-streamed but if you missed it you can check it out here. In a tweet, the company wrote “This was the third launch and landing of this booster, which previously supported launch of CRS-22 and Crew-3.” The payload, Turksat 5B, was a communications satellite for military and commercial purposes.
Further away, at the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, the company launched another 52 satellites into orbit to add the SpaceX Starlink constellation. The window between the two launches, 15 hours 17 minutes, makes it the companies new record between Falcon 9 launches. The previous record was 44 hours. Those weren’t even the last launches for the year. Tomorrow, 21 December, SpaceX will launch one more Falcon 9 to resupply the ISS. Bully for them.
Source: Digitaltrends
Korean Air will use drones to inspect planes
In what is thought to be an industry first, Korean Air has started using a swarm of drones to carry out safety inspections on its aircraft, drastically reducing the time it takes to complete the task. A press release issued by the company stated, “Whereas maintenance specialists previously had to perform a visual check of the aircraft fuselage from heights of up to 20 meters, drone inspections improve workplace safety and allow for increased accuracy and speed.”
The airline has even designed and produced its own drones for the job. The quadrocopter measures one metre across and weighs 5.5kg. The company uses four drones at once, with high-tech cameras capable of identifying details as small as 1mm. The drones use custom software that allows them to fill in if one of the four fails. The airline says using the drones allows them to reduce the time it takes to complete the inspection, from 10 hours to four. The system is still in the trial phase but if those prove successful the company will implement them sometime next year.
Source: Digitaltrends