Well that was a gruelling couple of days of golf, wasn’t it? The 2018 US Open from Shinnecock Hills has already claimed some major scalps with Jordan Spieth, Rory McIlroy, Jason Day and, yes, Tiger Woods, all cut after the first two rounds. You can watch the highs and the very many lows of the climax of the US Open from anywhere in the world – and there’s even a live stream to enjoy, too.

From the carnage and deluge stands one man alone – the Mighty Dustin Johnson. DJ takes a four stroke lead into the weekend and will now well fancy his chances of a second US Open title.

The chasing pack include last year’s champ Brooks Koepka, Henrik Stenson and English contingent Justin Rose, Ian Poulter and Tommy Fleetwood. So it’s not all going to be plain sailing for Johnson.

And because it looks as though the official US Open website will be hosting a live stream of the main golf action, we can tell you how to watch it all – even if you’re outside the United States. Keep reading to see how to get a US Open golf live stream from any corner of the Earth.

Watch all the action at USOpen.com

Well here’s a stroke of good news (pun very much intended) – it looks like the official tournament website, USOpen.com, will be live streaming some of the best action. The schedule currently says that it will be showing a live stream of featured groups every single day, as well as shots at holes, 7, 9 and 11.

Although we can’t yet confirm, we think it’s a pretty safe assumption to make that the featured groups on rounds three and four will be the leaders.

Aside from the US Open live stream, we have more US watching options below.

How to watch the US Open golf in the US

There are number of options you can watch the US Open golf if you’re stateside:

– The live stream from USOpen.com. Although you’ll be limited to what the website wants to show you and we doubt the coverage will have the sheen and depth of most dedicated broadcasters.

– Following the lead of the likes of WWE and UFC, the PGA has got itself all modern and produced its very own subscription golf service. PGA Tour Live costs $5.99 per month (or $39.99 for a year) and hosts all the action from over 30 events. Plus, it has its own iOS, Android and Apple TV apps so you can access anywhere.

– If you’re at home and have cable, then Fox is the official broadcaster. Fox has confirmed that it will have 4K cameras at the event on certain holes as well, letting you watch the action in ultra HD.

– The Golf Channel is available from most cable providers as well and has comprehensive coverage of the event.

– If you’re outside the US this weekend but want to access one of the above options, then you can use a VPN service to effectively transport your computer, phone or tablet’s IP back to a US location.

How to watch the US Open championship: UK stream

Live stream the US Open action in Canada

Images courtesy of usopen.com

http://www.techradar.com/news/how-to-watch-us-open-live-stream-golf-online-free-wherever-you-are

If the America’s Cup is the Formula One of sailing, then the Volvo Ocean Race must be the sport’s equivalent of the marathon. Held every three years, the race is a gruelling round-the-world epic comprising 45,000 nautical miles, staged across ten legs.

The 2017-18 edition started in Alicante, Spain in October and will finish in The Hauge, Netherlands on 30 June, taking in another ten cities on six continents in the process. In total, sailors will spend as many as 118 days sailing, up to 21 days at a time.

Whereas the America’s Cup is as much about boat design as it is about sailing, all seven teams in the Volvo Ocean race use the same vessel – The Volvo Ocean 65 – using the same equipment. This means the only way to gain an advantage is to be better sailors.

Team AkzoNobel

Dutch team AkzoNobel is competing in its first race and one of its main priorities, besides assembling an expert crew, was to see how technology could help its sailors maximise their ability.

“The yachts are identical which means the only difference is the crew – their skill and strategic decision making,” Ryan West, who looks after technology on board, explains to TechRadar. “The conditions these guys work in are horrendous.

“The sailors’ entire lives are contained by keeping the boat safe and going as fast as they can … the fleet is super tight so were looking for any gains. So we wanted to see if we could use crew biometrics offshore.”

Each sailor is active for four hours before taking a four-hour break to sleep and eat. Conditions are harsh, with huge waves, snow and extreme heat among the challenges to overcome. AkzoNobel wanted to see how health data could help them optimise these schedules and monitor the tiredness and fatigue of the crew.

It worked with SAP to see how this could be done. The two main obstacles for the team were that any technology could not interfere with sailing and that race rules forbid the use of Internet-powered aids.

This meant any system had to be easy to use and cope with harsh conditions. A lot of research was conducted into the type of device that should be used, with the team settling on a Garmin wearable because it couldn’t tear any clothing and had a 5-6-day battery life meaning it wasn’t an imposition to keep charged.

The wearable collects data such as sleep, heart rate and nutrition and automatically connects to a Raspberry Pi-based unit running SAP Leonardo’s IoT platform and an Android device (not connected to the Internet of course).

Analytical capabilities

This use of edge computing means that data can be acted upon offshore and have an immediate impact. Great focus has been placed on presenting each sailor’s data to them in an intuitive way so they take an interest and can make changes that boost performance.

“The more information they have, the better decisions they can make,” says West.

On-shore, this data is analysed using SAP’s HANA analytics platform and paired with ship data such as positioning, sea temperature, wind speed and wave height to see if there are any patterns. For example, one sailor might not sleep at all during particular conditions, or when sailing within a particular time zone.

This means team management can more effectively allocate shifts and reduce fatigue.

“We’re not looking for big changes,” continues West, explaining that a one percent gain over 118 days at sea can be significant. “Sleep is one of the things we feel we can affect more. We’re never going to give them ten hours [but can help].”

Athlete view

Watch Captain Chris Nicholson is a six-time veteran of the race, having previously represented Australia at Olympic Games and World Championships. He is extremely receptive to the system, believing it can help get the most out of the team.

“I’ve always wanted to know [about his fitness data] but we’ve never had a way of doing it,” he tells TechRadar. “As soon as you go offshore there’s no data and I’ve been frustrated for 16 years that we’ve not tracked the sports science aspect of sailing enough.”

He says that previously, sailors would have to write their sleep patterns and nutritional intake in a paper log. Not only was this time-consuming and a chore, it was also inaccurate.

“We used to write in it that we slept for an hour and a half or something,” he recalls. “Now [This data] shows I don’t sleep well during the middle of the afternoon.”

He adds that if his team has the wind, he will keep pushing, often ignoring his allocated rest break. However the data could eventually prove that if he does this too often, he may be too fatigued later on in the race, thus negating any potential advantage.

The team will also be able to see if the optimum route for the boat is too physically demanding and therefore it might be best to take an alternative route in order to save the crew’s strength.

Nicholson’s hope is that in the future, the app will integrate with data from the team’s doctor and physiotherapists to become even more effective.

But given that the Volvo Ocean Race is meant to be a test of sailing ability, does Nicholson not fear that technology distorts the spirit of the competition? In short, no – so long as the boats don’t start sailing themselves.

“The same analogy would be if you take protein powder or go the gym or not,” he argues. “It’s a big area of gain and I think it’s an area that should be explored. All the benefits go to the wider sailing industry. We could make the boats autonomous, but that would detract from the experience.”

Future biometrics

Although AkzoNobel claim the tool has been effective this time round, the truth is that the analytical capability will be more effective in the next staging of the race. This is because the team will have a dataset for the entire race and a historical precedent to base future learnings on.

“Just the fact we have data on how many calories are burned in the Southern Ocean is massive,” says Ryan.

AkzoNobel has been open and transparent about its use of analytics from the outset, keen to ensure that no rules are broken. This means that any other team could have employed a similar system but chose not to do so.

“it’s a huge investment in time and effort,” says West, adding that even if a team opted to include biometrics for the next race, AkzoNobel would still have the advantage of a historical data set.

Ryan and Nicholson are speaking in Cardiff ahead of the two final stages of the race. The next stopover is in Gothenburg, before the race concludes in the Netherlands at the end of the month.

The final leg is “only” five days, leading to suggestions from some of the team that they ignore the shift pattern altogether.

“Our guys are saying they’re not going to sleep… but it’s still five days!” laughs Nicholson. “After three days without sleep you’ll go crazy.”

http://www.techradar.com/news/how-biometric-technology-helps-sailors-go-around-the-world-in-the-volvo-ocean-race

WordPress has been around since 2003 and is the most popular blogging software on the market, powering almost a third of the known web. It has also now established itself as the content management system (CMS) of choice.

Its professional-grade software, combined with its flexibility and ease of use has made it popular with web developers and complete beginners alike.

A CMS is the user interface application used to upload, edit and manage all content on a website without having to learn code. This spelt the gradual decline of web design software like Dreamweaver. In other words, if you wanted to add a new page to your website, this is where you would log in and follow a few simple steps to do that.

WordPress is already powering a quarter of all websites and we predict no end to its popularity and have explored some of the issues surrounding hosting with WordPress below. 

1. Why is WordPress so popular? 

• it is reasonably easy for beginners 
• It is widely supported 
• It is great for learning 
• WordPress is fully Open Source 
• It is extremely flexible 
• It is as powerful as enterprise grade CMSes.

When it comes to choosing the perfect web hosting to host your future WordPress website, other than finding a reputable, reliable and responsive web hosting provider, make sure that your web hosting package has the following: 

• Linux server : Most hosting companies will allow you to choose between Linux and Windows. Go for Linux. Linux is compatible with several development languages. Unless that is, you plan to use Windows-specific applications, in that case, Windows hosting is likely to be the best choice.
• A good control panel such as cPanel or Plesk : Without a control panel, you’ll have to rely on the web hosting company for even the most basic changes. This is not ideal. cPanel, for example, is an easy-to-use system that even non-professionals can use to customise their sites. 
• PHP support : PHP is a server-side scripting language for web development, although it is also used as a general purpose programming language. 
• LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) : As a solution, LAMP is used for building dynamic websites and applications. Although some of its components are interchangeable, it is generally found in this configuration.
• MySQL databases : MySQL is an open source relational database system that is a central component of the LAMP open source web application software stack.

2. Shared hosting, dedicated server and VPS for WordPress

Unless you need a private, dedicated server for hosting your web site, we recommend choosing a shared hosting package to start with. This keeps costs low and will be adequate for most small business sites and blogs.

However, if you have a high-traffic website, then a shared hosting plan might not be right for you. Traffic spikes can quickly overload a shared hosting account’s capacity, especially if your site has a lot of plugins or a badly designed theme.

If your blog has a moderate to high amount of traffic and gets periodical spikes in traffic, then you should strongly consider a VPS.

Additionally, if you are running a site for business purposes – entrepreneurial bloggers, small businesses and eCommerce sites – then it is important to have a “well-oiled machine” that is always up and running smoothly.

If your site crashes periodically or doesn’t load quickly, then you could be losing money as visitors move along to other websites with better performance.

3. Managed hosting for WordPress

If you are considering a VPS, then we highly recommend a managed WordPress hosting provider, as they specialise in WordPress and can deliver even better performance than any VPS.

Running a serious business with lots of traffic? You’ll probably want a managed hosting package for that. When you choose a managed WordPress hosting company, they will handle all of the backend tasks associated with your WordPress-powered website.

They focus on what they do best so you can focus on what you do best. In addition to hosting your site, they provide WordPress-specific knowledge and expertise.

This specialty service allows them to focus on such things as WordPress performance, security, optimisation and other necessary services specific to WordPress. Having people who know the ins-and-outs of WordPress and all of its features will ensure that your website gets the best care possible.

• This is an adapted excerpt from an eBook called “The ultimate guide to web hosting”, published by TechRadar Pro in association with Planet Hippo

http://www.techradar.com/news/what-is-wordpress-hosting-learn-more-about-the-worlds-most-popular-cms