Category: Project Tango

Google’s Project Tango will be shut down on March 1, 2018 as the company turns their attention, and that of developers, to the software-only ARCore.  The news came from the Project Tango Twitter account where the Google team behind it thanked developers for their work over the past three years on the hardware-software Augmented Reality solution.

We’re turning down support for Tango on March 1, 2018. Thank you to our incredible community of developers who made such progress with Tango over the last three years. We look forward to continuing the journey with you on ARCore. https://t.co/aYiSUkgyie

— Tango (@projecttango) December 15, 2017

The news should not be shocking at this point for developers or consumers for that matter. Google has been clear over the course of 2017 that ARCore, which is now in Developer Preview 2, will be the company’s AR solution going forward.  It has a lot of benefits including being hardware independent.

Today’s Deal is on the first Project Tango enabled phone, the Lenovo Phab 2 Pro.  Right now you can pick one up in Grey for $370.25 on Amazon.  That’s a healthy saving off the original price of $499.  For those who may not recall what exactly Project Tango is from Google, it is devices and apps that work in augmented reality.  These apps and now the Phab 2 Pro allow you to do thing like measure distances, fly through the solar system and other things all from the device.  A good example is the Lowe’s Vision app for Tango. It allows you to measure a space in your house and virtually put an appliance or other furniture you buy from Lowes in your house.

As for the Phab 2 Pro, you are getting a lot of horsepower in the package from Lenovo, starting with the 6.4″ display that renders 2560 x 1440.  Coupled with this is the Snapdragon 652 octa-core process running at 1.8GHz.

One of the interesting tidbits that came out of CES 2016 this week was an announcement yesterday from Lenovo and Google around Project Tango.  The companies announced that such a devices will be available sometime this summer, bringing what has been a somewhat quiet project for Google this past year to the market.

So what exactly is Project Tango?  By Google’s definition it is…

Project Tango technology gives a mobile device the ability to navigate the physical world similar to how we do as humans

Now that’s a bit broad but essentially what it does is bring a whole new level of awareness to your device through various sensors.  These sensors allow for the device to understand motion, depth perception and area learning so your device learns and becomes aware of its surrounding.  The most obvious example of this would be a game being played in the physical work of your house with things like walls being walls and sofas being barriers as you play.  But really, the potential of this technology is hard to grasp.

One of the best articles explaining Project Tango I have read is from Mike Elgan for a piece he wrote for Computer World.  I highly recommend reading it to get a grasp of what it is and how it could impact so many facets of life.