For getting things done, we've got Siri, Alexa, Google Assistant, and Cortana--your mileage may vary as to just how useful and/or responsive any of them are. But what about an A.I. companion designed to support you spiritually by helping you strengthen mindfulness? A couple of ex-Google employees have recently released Maslo, a "voice journal with personality and smarts" that "interacts with empathy and playfulness." "We encourage personal curiosity and believe in growing into identities that are bigger versions of who we are now," say the developers, Ross Ingram and Cristina Poindexter. Could Maslo become your digital bestie?

Be it a conversation about the latest model of cell phones, television sets, school curricula, job opportunities, disruptive start-ups, seasoned firms or data breach controversy – all of them are abuzz with tech jargons. Terms like Big Data, IoT, AI, ML or crypto seem to be all pervasive. Let's take a look what they all mean. Big data is the large volume of data that is generated on a day-to-day basis. "Data" can mean anything from databases to photos, videos and sound recordings to written text and sensor data.

We live in a world of talking digital helpers, from Siri, to the Google Assistant, to Amazon Alexa, and Microsoft's version, Cortana. While Amazon and Microsoft announced back in August of last year that the two companies would be collaborating to make their two virtual assistants work together, today we saw a version of that in action. If you're imagining Alexa and Cortana freely talking to each other like two robotic hosts in Westworld, you are out of luck. However, what they showed was still interesting. Meghan Saunders, general manager for Cortana at Microsoft, and Tom Taylor, a senior vice president for Alexa at Amazon, joined each other on stage for a demonstration.

Google has been rolling out news at a steady rate since last week, in what feels like a bit of a last-minute clearinghouse ahead of tomorrow. The company's already taken the wraps off of news about Android TV, Google Home, Wear OS Assistant, you name it. If this were practically any other company, we'd be concerned that there's nothing left to discuss. The next few days are going to be jam-packed with developer news and a whole lot of information around the company's consumer-facing offerings over the next year and beyond. Android, Assistant, Wear OS, search and the like are going to take center stage when the company kicks off the festivities tomorrow at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View.

SAP is continuing to add smart features to its cloud enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution - S/4HANA Cloud - as it looks to help customers automate processes and react faster to information held in their core systems. It has also integrated S/4HANA with CoPilot, its digital assistant, allowing users to take action through a natural language interface, like Microsoft's Cortana. The 1805 release of S/4HANA Cloud, which is out today, will include 12 new'scenarios' to help customers optimise common processes. Nine of these are machine learning solutions and three are CoPilot'conversational UI scenarios'. Sven Denecken, SVP head of product management said of the announcement: "With enhanced machine learning capabilities, businesses can now have intelligent interactions that anticipate the needs of their end users – incorporating intelligent self-learning mechanisms, and liberating users from mundane tasks for higher level thinking. This will further support the journey to automation and the intelligent ERP."

A mysterious, cone-shaped device, shown in a demo Monday at Microsoft's Build event in Seattle, hinted at a big leap in capability for the company's digital assistant: the ability to see and identify people. In the ruthless war among Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, and Google's Assistant, this is a feature we haven't yet seen from the competition. What we don't know is what this prototype is, and whether it will ever come out. Microsoft's official, overshadowed demonstration showed us the conference room of the future. Microsoft incorporated Cortana, the Surface Hub, and Skype's translation and transcription features, together with PowerBI and Microsoft Teams, into a cohesive working environment.

Fin is an on-demand, artificial intelligence service that uses human and computer intelligence to be a smart assistant. Sam Lessin is the co-founder and co-CEO or Fin, and he joins Cheddar to detail the special Mother's Day offering. Fin wants to help you shop for mom so you don't physically have to.

Google may be set to address one of the Android operating system's biggest security flaws. Android users may be surprised to learn that the current OS allows apps to track your network activity by studying your TCP/UDP connections, which indicate a server you may have accessed. That's likely to change, however, as Google is expected to roll out greater restrictions in its upcoming Android P software at its annual I/O developer conference, which kicks off on Tuesday. Google may be set to address one of the Android operating system's biggest security flaws. Among the other announcements that are predicted include updates to the Google Home, a standalone Google News app and new features or integrations for Google Assistant.

Facebook's reputation has taken a hit in recent weeks amid increasing privacy concerns. The social media giant appears to be trying to win people back with the prospect of finding love after announcing a dating service at last week's F8 conference. On Sunday, the company confirmed there would be no advertisements, Recode reported. Facebook on Tuesday provided few details about the service but confirmed that it would be free. Competing dating apps like OkCupid, for example, frequently show users ads while they are browsing potential matches.

The Kinect will never die. Microsoft debuted its motion-sensing camera on June 1st, 2009, showing off a handful of gimmicky applications for the Xbox 360; it promised easy, controller-free gaming for the whole family. Back then, Kinect was called Project Natal, and Microsoft envisioned a future where its blocky camera would expand the gaming landscape, bringing everyday communication and entertainment applications to the Xbox 360, such as video calling, shopping and binge-watching. This was the first indication that Microsoft's plans for Kinect stretched far beyond the video game industry. With Kinect, Microsoft popularized the idea of yelling at our appliances -- or, as it's known today, the IoT market.