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Software

Submission + - ESA announces the 2012 edition of the Summer Of Code In Space (SOCIS) (esa.int)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The 2012 ESA Summer of Code In Space (SOCIS) starts Mentoring organization (i.e. open source space-related projects) that want to participate can apply from now until 15/07/2012.

Modeled after the Google Summer of Code, SOCIS is an European Space Agency (ESA) initiative and offers students the opportunity to be paid to develop open source code for space related open source projects.

To learn more about the program, check out the timeline, visit our documentation center, or head to our mailing list.
Google

Submission + - Search Terms Predict Impact of Racism on US Election 1

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Garance Franke-Ruta writes about a new study of racially charged search terms on Google that aims to predict the effects of the Bradley effect, a theory proposed to explain observed discrepancies between voter opinion polls and election outcomes in some US elections where a white candidate and a non-white candidate run against each other. "How much we are under-representing people who are intolerant and therefore unlikely to vote for Obama is an open question," says Andrew Kohut, the president of Pew Research Center. "I suspect not a great deal, but maybe some. And 'maybe some' could be crucial in a tight election." The study found that the percentage of an area's total Google searches from 2004-2007 that included the racially charged search for the word "n****r" is a is a large and robust negative predictor of Obama's vote share. "A one standard deviation increase in an area's racially charged search is associated with a 1.5 percentage point decrease in Obama's vote share, controlling for John Kerry's vote share," writes Stephens-Davidowitz in the study. "The statistical significance and large magnitude are robust to controls for changes in unemployment rates; home-state candidate preference; Census division fixed effects; prior trends in presidential voting; changes in Democratic House vote shares; swing state status; and demographic controls." The results imply that, relative to the most racially tolerant areas in the United States, prejudice cost Obama between 3.1 percentage points and 5.0 percentage points (PDF) of the national popular vote in the 2008 election. This implies racial animus gave Obama's opponent roughly the equivalent of a home-state advantage country-wide. "It cannot come as a shock to anyone that Obama is not seen as the cat's meow in places like West Virginia, southern Mississippi or southern Oklahoma," writes Franke-Ruta. "Where racial animus might intersect with the Electoral College to matter — eastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania, parts of Florida — on Election Day is something to contemplate.""
Security

Submission + - Break into any of 879,046 MySQL servers in less than a second (scmagazine.com.au)

Submitted by mask.of.sanity
mask.of.sanity writes: Some 879,046 servers are vulnerable to a flaw that undermines password controls in MySQL and MariaDB systems.

The brute force flaw allows one in every 256 log in attempts to override authentication controls. Any password combination will do, as long as the username is correct.

256 log in attempts would take less than a second.

Submission + - FunnyJunk v. Oatmeal: Can Creators Be Liable For Infringement Accusations? (litigationandtrial.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Funny as it might sound, FunnyJunk's threat of litigation against The Oatmeal raises a very important issue: the extent to which artists can complain in public about perceived or actual infringement of their works by user-generated content websites. Does it matter if the content creator accused the website of condoning or participating in the infringement?
Linux

Submission + - GlusterFS 3.3 Released (gluster.org)

Submitted by Dishwasha
Dishwasha writes: A bit belated, but the long awaited GlusterFS 3.3 has been released. GlusterFS is an open source, fully distributed storage solution for the world’s ever-increasing volume of unstructured data. It is a software-only, highly available, scale-out, centrally managed storage pool that can work with POSIX filesystems that support extended attributes, such as Ext3/4, XFS, BTRFS and many more.

Major features also quoted from the website:
* Unified File and Object storage – Blending OpenStack’s Object Storage API with GlusterFS provides simultaneous read and write access to data as files or as objects.
* HDFS compatibility – Gives Hadoop administrators the ability to run MapReduce jobs on unstructured data on GlusterFS and access the data with well-known tools and shell scripts.
* Proactive self-healing – GlusterFS volumes will now automatically restore file integrity after a replica recovers from failure.
* Granular locking – Allows large files to be accessed even during self-healing, a feature that is particularly important for VM images.
* Replication improvements – With quorum enforcement you can be confident that your data has been written in at least the configured number of places before the file operation returns, allowing a user-configurable adjustment to fault tolerance vs performance.
Crime

Submission + - 50 Years later US Marshals remind Alcatraz escapees: We're still after you (networkworld.com) 2

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "It has been 50 years since the only prisoners to escape the US Penitentiary Alcatraz in San Francisco pulled off one of the most legendary unsolved crimes in American history. Still 50 years later the US Marshals Service says it remains "diligent in the manhunt for Frank Morris and brothers Clarence and John Anglin as they are the only men to escape from Alcatraz Island in San Francisco who remain unaccounted for."

"No matter where the leads take us, or how many man hours are spent on this historic case, the Marshals Service will continue to investigate to the fullest extent possible," said David Harlow, assistant director, U.S. Marshals Investigative Operations Division in a statement."

Submission + - The Oatmeal Threatened With Lawsuit, Responds By Raising $50,000 For Charity (theoatmeal.com)

Submitted by kelarius
kelarius writes: The lawyers for image sharing website FunnyJunk.com sent a letter to Matthew Inman (the owner of theoatmeal.com) threatening a lawsuit and demanding $20,000 to make the whole thing go away. In response, Inman made a joke about trying to raise the $20,000 and donating it to the National Wildlife Fund and the American Cancer Society. Over the course of three hours, he has managed to raise over $50,000 and it appears that the amount is still going up.
Privacy

Submission + - Hunting for child porn, FBI stymied by Tor undernet (muckrock.com)

Submitted by
v3rgEz
v3rgEz writes: "Documents released by the FBI provide an unusual inside look at how the agency is struggling to penetrate "darknet" Onion sites routed through Tor, the online privacy tool funded in part by government grants to help global activists. In this case, agents were unable to persue specific leads about an easily available child pornography site, while files withheld indicate that the FBI has ongoing investigations tied to the Silk Road marketplace, a popular, anonymous Tor site for buying and selling drugs and other illegal materials.

Gawker also has coverage:

http://gawker.com/5916994/dark-net-kiddie-porn-website-stymies-fbi-investigation"

Submission + - FunnyJunk steals The Oatmeal's cartoons, sends him $20K extortion demand (theoatmeal.com)

Submitted by Sarusa
Sarusa writes: From the Oatmeal: 'Almost exactly a year ago I published a blog post about my comics being stolen, re-hosted, and monetized on FunnyJunk's website. The owner of the site responded and some of the comics were taken down, He still had a ton of my comics hosted without credit, but the energy it would take to get him to take them down wasn't worth it. I thought the issue was done and over with so I let him be.

A few days ago I was served papers informing me that the owner of FunnyJunk is going to file a federal lawsuit against me unless I pay him $20,000 in damages.'

The text is not quite safe for work, as The Oatmeal rarely is, but well worth reading.
Programming

Submission + - If programming languages were music instruments (wordpress.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Some of my friends at work have been thinking , what if programming languages were music instruments ? wich one will represent wich instrument ?
We threw some ideas and this list emerged ..
Businesses

Submission + - 2013 H-1B Visa Supply Nearly Exhausted (informationweek.com) 1

Submitted by
CowboyRobot
CowboyRobot writes: "Last year work visas did not run out until late November, but this year the pool of visas is almost entirely claimed and it's still only June.
One interpretation of this is that the tech industry is hiring much more actively than it was a year ago.
Some companies, such as Microsoft, have been lobbying to increase the number of available visas (currently limited to 65,000) while others argue that offering visas to foreign workers reduces job prospects for Americans."
Facebook

Submission + - Biggest Web Trackers of Them All: Google, Facebook (itworld.com)

Submitted by
itwbennett
itwbennett writes: "A new report from Evidon, whose browser plug in Ghostery tracks Web trackers, makes it plain that 'if you want to worry about somebody tracking you across the Web, worry about Google,' writes blogger Dan Tynan. Google and Facebook, and their various services, occupy all of the top 5 slots on the Evidon Global Tracker Report's list of the most prolific trackers. 'And if you have any tracking anxiety left over, apply it to social networks like Facebook, G+, and Twitter,' adds Tynan."
Science

Submission + - DNA Modifications Change as We Age (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: As we age, the core of our biological being—the sequence of our DNA, which makes up our genes—remains the same. Yet recent research suggests that more subtle chemical changes to our DNA occur as we age. Now, a comparison of the DNA of a newborn baby with that of a centenarian shows that the scope of these changes can be dramatic, and they may help explain why our risk of cancer and other diseases increases as we get older.
Hardware

Submission + - Phone Recharging Could be Possible From Street Lights (pensanyc.com)

Submitted by
SmartAboutThings
SmartAboutThings writes: "If the latest concept from Pensa will be transformed to reality, then New Yorkers will soon be able to recharge their gadgets right in the middle of the street. The urban infrastructure might integrate solar-powered street lamps with futuristic designs and extra functionality. Aside from lighting the streets at night, the artsy lamps will offer for the pedestrians a pit stop where they can “refuel” their devices."
NASA

Submission + - NuStar to Launch on Wednesday from Plane (nasa.gov)

Submitted by
TWToxicity
TWToxicity writes: "NuSTAR, which stands for Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope ARray, is set to launch from Kwajalein Atoll in the central Pacific Ocean on June 13, no earlier than 8:30 a.m. PDT (11:30 a.m. EDT).

NuSTAR is to be launched from a Pegasus XL rocket carried by an Orbital Science Corp. L-1011 "Stargazer" plane. It will orbit at 550 km above Earth's surface. A week after launch, NuSTAR will deploy its 10 meter boom , which allows the telescope to focus X-rays and capture images that will help scientists survey black holes in other galaxies, study the black hole at the heart of the Milky Way, and study supernovae to discover hoe atomic elements are formed."
Cloud

Submission + - Adopt The Cloud, Kill Your IT Career (infoworld.com)

Submitted by
snydeq
snydeq writes: "IT professionals jumping into the cloud with both feet beware: It's irresponsible to think that just because you push a problem outside your office, it ceases to be your problem. ''t's not just the possibility of empty promises and integration issues that dog the cloud decision; it's also the upgrade to the new devil, the one you don't know. You might be eager to relinquish responsibility of a cranky infrastructure component and push the headaches to a cloud vendor, but in reality you aren't doing that at all. Instead, you're adding another avenue for the blame to follow. The end result of a catastrophic failure or data loss event is exactly the same whether you own the service or contract it out.'"

Submission + - Tech hiring: Best house in a bad neighborhood? (itworld.com)

Submitted by bdking
bdking writes: Relative to the rest of the U.S. workforce, tech professionals have weathered the deep recession and stumbling recovery reasonably well, with Q1 unemployment among tech workers at 4.4%, slightly more than half of the overall Q1 jobless rate of 8.3%. But tech pros remain reluctant to switch jobs until they gain more confidence in the economy.
The 2000 Beanies

Submission + - Committee lowers Nobel Prize. (thelocal.se)

Submitted by
Snirt
Snirt writes: "The Nobel Committee has chosen to lower this year's Nobel prize winnings by two million kronor ($283,030) due to turbulence in the current economic climate.

The prize now stands at 8 million kronor, down from the 10 million of 2011. “The reason behind this decision is that the financial markets are really unstable and there are reasons to suspect that this turbulence will continue for a while still,” said Lars Heikensten, head of the Nobel Committee, to the TT news agency. “Long term, we aim to raise the figure, even though we think that the Nobel Prize’s value should lie in the prize itself and not the prize money,” he said. While Heikensten admits that it was a “tough decision” to cut the prize money, he told the news agency that it’s not the first time the prize sum has been altered, adding that it has been lowered and raised several times over the past few years."
HP

Submission + - Force Dell to give the user a choice of Ubuntu or Windows on all desktops... (ideastorm.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: It is common knowledge that Dell, HP and other OEM PC manufacturers are currently engaged in a commercial conspiracy with Microsoft to deprive consumers of the ability buy laptops and desktops with alternative OS's to ensure a perpetual and complete Windows OS monopoly on all non-Apple hardware. Windows 8 Logo certification for OEM's will also include putting UEFI Secure Boot on all BIOS chips ensuring that all future laptops and desktops are locked down to prevent users from using or installing alternative operating systems, supporting the monopoly.

Dell has a special forum called "Ideastorm" where consumers can post product ideas and sometimes Dell responds directly such as the recent Project Sputnik laptop idea where they plan on making a special Ubuntu laptop for Web Developers. Recently a friend of mine posted an idea on Ideastorm to require Dell to make Ubuntu, Red Hat or Fedora available on all Dell Desktops and Laptops and provide driver support for them. I would love for Slashdot readers to support his idea and up-vote it and provide comments so that Dell will respond directly to this problem...

Click here to view the ideastorm entry and make comments so that Dell knows that we are fed up and sick and tired of their die hard support of the Windows Monopoly and to finally open up their machines and allow more user choice...

Link: http://www.ideastorm.com/idea2ReadIdea?v=1339431400221&Id=087700000008iglAAA

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