The mobile phone in your pocket is already a museum piece. Well, seriously, it may well be perfectly snazzy-looking and contemporary for the time being. But as we speak there are design engineers all over the world who are actively involved in ensuring your model will be superseded within the next six months or so! So what are the current design trends currently being drafted?

Windows phones

Where most users of smart phones such as iPhones or samsung s8 or LG g6 these days are offered the straightforward choice of black or white for their shells, there is every likelihood that you might have a transparent option in the not-too-distant future. See-through or 'window' phones will give the user the appearance of clutching a small rectangle of frosted glass. As well as looking fantastic, current weather conditions will be reflected on the screen. You can use your finger as a stylus, or blow at the screen to switch between various modes.

3D

Just as three-dimensional technology has already infiltrated cinema and television screens, this is another way forward for mobile phones. Using hologram-creation technology, three-dimensional images will be projected from the phone screen. This will give the like of Google Maps a whole new range of user-friendly possibilities.

Dexterity

Currently your mobile phone is most probably a small, neat rectangle that fits squarely into a pocket. Increasingly innovative designs will be employed, with some phones becoming 'leaf-shaped', with built-in plastic stems. This will allow the phone to be wrapped around a wrist, arm or neck for safekeeping.

Solar panels

Not only will you be able to power-up you phone for free, you'll be able to keep an eye on your phone to a far greater extent than if it was battling to get noticed amongst the papers, coffee cups and post-it reminders on your cluttered desk!

With the recent diplomatic crisis news, hopefully there will be no disruptions to the FIFA World Cup 2022 taking place in Qatar with total of 64 games will be played to decide the winner.

The use of so-called goal line technology has been sparking furious debate in footballing circles for a number of years. There have been a number of high profile incidents and international matches where the use of technology could have eradicated refereeing decisions since proved to be erroneous.

So what are the pros and cons of introducing goal line technology? Those in favour point to the way that tennis has adopted this technology, vastly improving the flow of matches during top tournaments. Those archive clips of Wimbledon players (most noticeably the likes of Americans John McEnroe or Jimmy Connors) furiously arguing with umpires or line judges about where or not a ball delivered at over 100 kilometers-per-hour had actually skiffed the line, now seem so quaint and amusing. The fact is, knowing that the Hawkeye system will bleep the moment a ball has gone out of play enables the players, and the spectators, to simply relax and get on with enjoying the sport. Slow motion replays allow referees to guarantee pin-point accuracy in decision-making. The level of trust between officials and audience is greatly enhanced.

Hawkeye was introduced by the International Tennis Federation in 2003. However, when the same technology was tabled before FIFA, the world football administration authority, five years later, it was dismissed out of hand. Apparently football's top officials were unimpressed following tests of video replay and the Hawkeye motion analysis system, when applied to their own sport. The main sticking point was the degree of accuracy that technology could offer.

FIFA remained to be convinced that neither video replays nor Hawkeye analysis would lead to accurate decisions in 100% of instances. Another bugbear for footballs officials was the fact that technology, while having the potential to eliminate a lot of refereeing shortcomings, would also greatly slow down games.

Those in favour of introducing technology point to the fact that bad referee decisions undermine the sport completely. Not only do the officials look foolish in the eyes of thousands of spectators (or millions where the games are being televised), players tend to react badly too, swamping the match officials, so that the game tends to grind to a halt in any case.

Football's rule books were cobbled together in a different era. So the task for its ruling bodies is maintaining a precision balancing act between what tradition demands, and the need to move with the times. As in any other walk in life, when deliberate brake are imposed on natural evolution, then the outcome is always negative. By embracing new technology football will continue to prosper as the world's most popular spectator sport. Television audiences are saturated with video replay. Managers now have access to it in their dugouts. Fans in the stadium can access it in their hand-held devices. Why should the referee alone be denied it?

As more and more of us switch from computers to laptops, one of the key questions asked by customers is ‘how can I improve my laptop for gaming?'

One of the first points to note is that advances in technology mean you don't need to have a dedicated gaming laptop to enjoy playing computer games. Serious gamers will still benefit from taking on-board all the appropriate technology that is available, especially if their taste is at the more cutting-edge side of the market. However, nowadays even notebooks are perfectly capable of providing excellent gaming platforms.

As far as technological advancements go, there have been many factors which have led to this improvable in the gaming potential of even the cheapest laptops. Foremost amongst these are the improvements that have been made to processors, such as the Core 2 Duo. This is now available in budget machines, while the Atom processor is now available in dual-core spins. All these innovations help to propel gamers through multi-threaded games at an excellent pace.

As well as advances in processors, memory capabilities have come forward in leaps and bounds. A capacity that would previously have been unheard of for laptops, such as 1GB, is now available as standard. Not only that, it is also easy to upgrade any laptop's memory to 2GB or even more yourself.

The most noticeable area where there have been advances in the technology affecting gaming PCs has been through improvements to graphics.

Intel's Graphics Media Accelerator was once the frequent target of complaints by gamers – but this has come on immensely. It can now be utilized for playing games that once would have required computers causing many thousands of dollars.

In order to get computer games performing at reasonable speeds, you really need to select lower quality settings. The one point to note is that there are the occasional games out there that demand DX10 hardware. Even this isn't necessarily as limiting as it first appears. Intel offers support for the DX10 API with the GMA X3100, 4500 and HD ranges. For compatibility reasons, most games offer a DX9 codepath in any case. In addition, all the Intel chips support the revision of

Microsoft's API. And while DX11 hardware has been available for a while, there are no DX11-only titles on the shelves, and few under development.

Your machine's desktop display is the biggest barrier to a favorable gaming experience. Best to drop this as low as it will go, until your reach the ideal minimum of 30fps. Experimenting with settings will eventually produce the optimum combination.

As well as being at the forefront of expanding economies, Asia has long been respected as a hub for innovative business ideas. A lot of this is down to Asian customers being more receptive to ideas that are more innovative, and perhaps ‘quirkier' than those their conservative western counterparts would willingly take on-board.

Take the concept of the vending machine. Sure, in the UK they are fairly ubiquitous. You'll find one at your local gymnasium dispensing cool drinks. There'll be one at the railway station offering a range of chocolate bars or crisps. But they are not exactly the type of invention to inspire their customers with any sense of reverence. This is not the case in the Far East. In Singapore, vending machines can dispense a whole lot more than packets of crisps or fairly insipid coffee. You'll be able to order a carton of mashed potato smothered in piping hot, delicious gravy.

Korea is another burgeoning Asian economic power that treats its retailers with due respect. The Emart supermarket here has built-in three-dimensional QR (machine-readable) codes that will only work when the sun has arrived at a certain point overhead. The idea behind this simple but devilishly effective marketing ploy has been to ensure that sales are inspired at certain times of the day – previously it had been noted that sales tended to slump over lunch time.

These QR codes are one noticeable aspect of how innovation is being harnessed in Far Eastern markets. Mobile phones are another important tool. The technology is also filtering over to the west, with the Canadian grocery firm Sobey's using QR codes to provide information on products, such as point of origin. This helps customers in many ways – by hovering over items with their phones they can be taken to web pages with further data. This can also allow interactivity, or transactions to take place.

There are other incentives being offered to customers that make their shopping experience as pleasant as possible. In Sweden, the retailer ICA are allow about field communication. Shoppers buying their lunch at ICA can adopt contactless payment systems. Anyone taking regular advantage of this is rewarded with a free lunch.

Technology is increasingly being used in-store for the benefit of both retailers and customers. In Thailand, Tesco are growing lettuces in water, making for fresher food, and eye-catching displays. This is so much more appealing than the sight of rows of uninteresting green vegetables lined up on a supermarket shelf, slowly wilting beneath the bright lights.

Another revolutionary idea likely to pave the way for future Asian shopping experiences is ‘smart trolleys'. These will scan products the moment they are placed inside, allowing customers to keep a close eye on their goods and budget accordingly, as well as flagging up the fact they are still within the amount they originally wished to spend – so it is too early to stop!