pswPhD - Slashdot User

Submission + - Oracle vs Google legal war begins a new chapter (thomsonreuters.com)

Submitted by Dupple on Wednesday February 13, 2013 @07:04AM

Dupple writes: Oracle says a U.S. judge erred when he threw out its billion-dollar copyright claim against Google over parts of the Java programming language that Google incorporated into the Android mobile platform, according to a court filing.

Oracle's intellectual property battle against Google has attracted intense interest from software developers, many of whom believe the structure of a programming language should not be subject to copyright protection.

In an appeals brief filed on Monday at the Federal U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Oracle said Google's use of Java structure was "decidedly unfair."

"Copyright protects a short poem or even a Chinese menu or jingle," Oracle wrote. "But the copied works here were vastly more original, creative, and labor-intensive."

Submission + - Opera officially announces gradual transition from Presto to WebKit and Chromium (opera.com)

Submitted by jeditobe on Wednesday February 13, 2013 @06:44AM

jeditobe writes: ...To provide a leading browser on Android and iOS, this year Opera will make a gradual transition to the WebKit engine, as well as Chromium, for most of its upcoming versions of browsers for smartphones and computers...

Please sjgn the petition to force Oera Software commit Presto engine to opensource. https://t.co/l2FNSL3E

Submission + - Mobile Phone Sales Decline Despite Smartphone Boom (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by

DavidGilbert99

on Wednesday February 13, 2013 @06:32AM

DavidGilbert99 writes: "Everyone is buying a mobile phone these days right? Even people in third world countries are getting connected and some people in developed countries have multiple handsets for work and personal use. So sales must be going through the roof?

Not so according to Gartner, whose latest figures suggest mobile phone sales declined by 1.7% in 2012. This was despite the smartphone market booming — up almost 40% in the final quarter of 2012 — and was down to "tough economic conditions, shifting consumer preferences and intense market competition" according to Gartner's principle research analyst Anshul Gupta."

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: What is your favorite monitor for programming?

Submitted by BadassFractal on Wednesday February 13, 2013 @04:00AM

BadassFractal writes: I'm in the market for a new large desktop monitor (or two) which I intend to use almost exclusively for programming and all sorts of software development-related work. I'm trying to keep the cost down reasonable, and I do enjoy as large of a resolution as possible. What do people "in the know" out there use these days for that purpose? I'm thinking a 1920x1200 24" would be good, unless there's an affordable 2560xFoo option out there. I keep hearing about nameless Korean 27" screens, any thoughts on that one?

Thanks!

Comment Re:No jail for patent trolling - jail for ID theft (Score 1) 63

by pswPhD on Tuesday February 12, 2013 @09:05PM (#42877573) Attached to: Judge Hints At Jail Time For Porn Copyright Troll Prenda Law

IANAL but...

Actually it is worse than that (for John Steel and Brett Gibbs). Reading the court order, they are guilty (at least accused) of 1) failing to comply with a court order and 2) fraud on the court (and therefore perjury). If they fail to show up to the March 11th hearing then you can add contempt of court to that list.

It will be interesting to see how this ends.

Comment Re:What a quitter! (Score 3, Insightful) 542

by pswPhD on Monday February 11, 2013 @12:27PM (#42860073) Attached to: Pope To Resign Citing Advanced Age

Damn, now it makes perfect sense...Noah was only ~250 years old when he died. Makes the whole bible seem more legit.

The whole point of the Bible is to state God existence, and the nature of that God.
So, if we assume an omnipotent God exists and wanted somebody to live for ~900 years, He has the strength and ability to be able to do so.

Submission + - PG County MD considers copyright ownership of student and teacher works (washingtonpost.com) 1

Submitted by schwit1 on Sunday February 03, 2013 @02:59PM

schwit1 writes: A proposal by the Prince George’s County Board of Education to copyright work created by staff and students for school could mean that a picture drawn by a first-grader, a lesson plan developed by a teacher or an app created by a teen would belong to the school system, not the individual.

It’s not unusual for a company to hold the rights to an employee’s work, copyright policy experts said. But the Prince George’s policy goes a step further by saying that work created for the school by employees during their own time and using their own materials is the school system’s property.

Submission + - Programming / I. T. job opportunities for older retrained workers? 1

Submitted by 12_West on Sunday February 03, 2013 @12:17PM

12_West writes: I seek opinions from the Slashdot community about entry level job opportunities as programmers (or other I.T. Staff) for seniors who want to switch careers and continue to work full time. I do not want to retire, nor go part time, as long as I can get up and drive myself in to work.
I'm currently 58 years old, working as an industrial electrician in a maintenance department setting for a building products manufacturer. I like the work, but it is becoming hard on my aging body, so, I would like to begin gradually retraining and hope to switch careers in about 4 years. A lower paying, less physical job would be just fine as there will be pension money coming in.
I'm not currently a programmer, but have done some hobbyist level coding in Qbasic and MS-DOS batch files "back in the days". I also have some exposure to the Rockwell Automation RSLogix programmimg tools that are now going obsolete. So, I will be retraining whether I switch careers or not.
Your input is most welcome, I thank you!

Submission + - Sony to make its last MiniDisc system next month (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 03, 2013 @11:15AM

An anonymous reader writes: The BBC reports that Sony, the creators of the MiniDisc audio format, are to deliver their last MiniDisc stereo system in March.

Launched over 20 years ago in late 1992 as a would-be successor to the original audio cassette, MiniDisc outlasted Philips' rival Digital Compact Cassette format, but never enjoyed major success outside Japan.

Other manufacturers will continue making MiniDisc players, but this is a sign that- over ten years after the first iPod- the MiniDisc now belongs to a bygone era.

Submission + - Multiple minds smooths your ship's path (newscientist.com)

Submitted by FatLittleMonkey on Sunday February 03, 2013 @05:58AM

FatLittleMonkey writes: My mind to your mind... my thoughts to your thoughts... Researchers at the University of Essex have shown that combining the output from two non-invasive "brain-computer interfaces", computer-interpreted EEG signals, led to a much clearer signal of the subjects' intention than the output from a single subject. To test this idea, they had two subjects try to steer a simulated space-ship at a target planet, by thinking of one of eight possible directions. While a single user could achieve 67% accuracy, this jumped to 90% when two minds were combined. Researchers believe the technique also compensates for individual lapses in attention, and thus may have applications in real-world space missions.

Comment Re:DSLR... sorta (Score 3, Interesting) 316

by pswPhD on Thursday January 31, 2013 @05:58PM (#42755715) Attached to: Current favorite still-image camera type:

I actually find the opposite.
Having a half decent DSLR around my neck means I actually use the thing to take pictures. The camera on my phone is rubbish and so it stays in my pocket most of the time.

Comment Re:unlicensed code (D)DOS (Score 1) 320

by pswPhD on Wednesday January 30, 2013 @04:49PM (#42742067) Attached to: Pushing Back Against Licensing and the Permission Culture

I have not used github, but I assume that there is version information and a date and time attached to different versions of the code. It should therefore be easy to prove the the open source/permissive license code existed first.

Comment Re:I am a scientist who has made "code" (Score 1) 84

by pswPhD on Tuesday January 29, 2013 @09:01PM (#42733435) Attached to: How Open Source Could Benefit Academic Research

I've done research in Chemistry, and have heavily used open source quantum chemistry codes (mainly NWChem and Quantum Espresso. I am grateful to these guys for releasing these codes.

MY code on the other hand is not available. most of it is a bundle of scripts designed for one process that would make all the programmers on /. cry. the rest is in Fortran, which compiles using one compiler on one machine, and seg faults everywhere else. It's not open source because no one in their right mind would want it.

That said, if you want the raw data, all anyone needs to do is ask.

Submission + - New Kickstarter campaign to make LiveCode Open Source (kickstarter.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 29, 2013 @06:39PM

An anonymous reader writes: RunRev, makers of LiveCode, have kicked off a Kickstarter campaign: if £350,000 is raised within 30 days, the company will make an Open Source version of Livecode available under GPL v3 so anyone can use it to program apps for mobile and desktop. LiveCode builds on the concept behind HyperCard and has been successful as a commercial product for 10+ years.

Comment paranoia (Score 1) 212

by pswPhD on Monday January 28, 2013 @07:30PM (#42721125) Attached to: How Do You Backup Your Data?

While writing my PhD thesis, I had it backed up onto the following:
2 external hard drives in my control
file-server at uni (which is itself backed up onto an external hard drive)
USB stick
both partitions (linux/windows) on my laptop
email to the parents

So the missing option is "all of the above"

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