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Software

Submission + - Breaking should not be hard to do (automatedbusinesslogic.com)

Submitted by
MaxTardiveau
MaxTardiveau writes: "I'm always amazed to see how little consideration people put into software breakups, i.e. when you have to, or want to, stop using a main component of your system. Here are a few thoughts on this topic (featuring Demi Moore, no less), and an example of handling this often-painful issue gracefully."

Submission + - unwinding vertebra (eurekalert.org)

Submitted by
mcswell
mcswell writes: "Daniël Noordermeer and Denis Duboule, two researchers at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and the University of Geneva claim to have discovered how vertebrae get build in sequence in embryos (and by extension, how ribs, arms and so forth wind up in the right place). The story is that the DNA strands contain a linear series of HOX genes, and that the strands slowly unwind over a period of two days, successively exposing each HOX gene, thereby allowing it to be transcribed to form the segments of the vertebra.

Snakes, it seems, have a defect that causes the system not to shut down; eventually it "runs out of steam."

The same process is said to apply in many invertebrates, including worms (presumably segmented worms) and insects.

The report is coming out in the journal Science (behind a paywall)."
Science

Submission + - Science Recover Genome of Black Death, Hope to Rec (nytimes.com) 1

Submitted by Richard.Tao
Richard.Tao writes: From the "what could possibly go wrong?" section of news today scientists have recovered the RNA of the virus that caused the plague through digging through an English mass grave and compiling the genetics of the virus's. Though the plague still persists, scientists have believe the ancient strain was different due to a different onset of symptoms.
Security

Submission + - New lab zaps aircraft with lightning bolts (networkworld.com)

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "A new laboratory has opened that will study the impact of lightning strikes on airplanes, particularly new aircraft that are made up of carbon composite materials. The $2.5 million Morgan-Botti Lightning Laboratory at Cardiff University in the UK says its facilities will generate up to 200,000 Amps. "To put this in context, an average lightning strike has 32,000 Amps and the maximum amount of electricity powering a house is about 100 Amps," the University stated."
Science

Submission + - Geology as art (integrity-logic.com)

Submitted by
MaxTardiveau
MaxTardiveau writes: "When I see a geological map, it doesn't make a whole of of sense to me. Perhaps that helps me appreciate their abstract beauty. The fact that they are actually not at all abstract, and represent the very ground we stand on, makes them that much more appealing to me.
Here are a few examples from around the US."
Programming

Submission + - The Case For Declarative Business Logic (automatedbusinesslogic.com)

Submitted by MaxTardiveau
MaxTardiveau writes: Why are we still writing business software like we used to 30 years ago? If you can prototype your app in a spreadsheet, why not extend that paradigm to the app itself? A declarative approach can eliminate most of the tedious coding for entire categories of business software. Nobody should ever have to write another accounting system the old fashioned way.

Submission + - First observational test of the 'multiverse' (scienceblog.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The theory that our universe is contained inside a bubble, and that multiple alternative universes exist inside their own bubbles – making up the ‘multiverse’ – is being tested observationally by UK physicists, who are searching for disk-like collision patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. Though CMB is generally thought of as a uniform schmere of radiation extending in all direction in our universe, in fact, they say, if a multiverse exists, there ought to be imprints, trapped in the muck like footprints, of where our universe banged into others.

Submission + - Type Ia Supernova Could Soon "Fry" Earth (spacedaily.com) 3

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Space Daily reports that T Pyxidis is on the verge of becoming a type Ia supernova. They say, "Astronomers have uncovered evidence that a massive, explosive white dwarf star in a binary star system with a Sun-like star in our Milky Way Galaxy is growing in mass and is much closer to our solar system than previously thought....An interesting, if a bit scary, speculative sidelight is that if a Type Ia supernova explosion occurs within 1,000 parsecs (1 parsec = 3.26 light-years) of Earth, then the gamma radiation emitted by the supernova would fry the Earth, dumping as much gamma radiation (~100,000 ergs/square centimeter) into our planet, which is equivalent to the gamma ray input of 1,000 solar flares simultaneously. The production of nitrous oxides in Earth's atmosphere by the supernova's gamma rays would completely destroy the ozone layer if the supernova went off within 1,000 parsecs."
Microsoft

Submission + - Who uses tablet pcs? 2

Submitted by lyberth
lyberth writes: With all the hype about Apples new iWhatever I wonder who is using the MS (or other OS) versions of tablet pcs? I have met alot of people that are very into this hype, but when I ask what they would use it for, how they would use it and where, i get no good answers. So i figure if anyone will know, it will be the Slashdot guys. So please: give the Who, How, Where about the tablet pcs.
Does anyone really use them?

Comment Re:Don't you love weasel language (Score 1) 124

by MaxTardiveau (#30637086) Attached to: Ideas For Exploiting NASA's SRTM Data
Well, as other posters have pointed out, there is little value in mapping the surface of the oceans (at least with this technology).

If you think that land north of 60N and south of 56S represents a major portion of the earth, you need to stop using Mercator projection maps. and graduate to something like the Gall-Peters projection.

Having said that, it's absolutely true that the SRTM data set does not cover Iceland, most of Norway and Sweden, northern Russia, etc... It's not that NASA doesn't like Nordic people, it's just a limitation due to the space shuttle's orbit.

Comment Re:Best GIS software ? (Score 1) 124

by MaxTardiveau (#30636616) Attached to: Ideas For Exploiting NASA's SRTM Data
To answer your original question -- all the screenshots in the article are from our iPhone apps, which cover about 20 U.S. states so far. They come with many layers, one of which is the SRTM data limited to (typically) 180-meter resolution, because you only have so much storage on a phone. The 30-meter resolution data is obviously even better than what I showed (nine times better, in fact :-)

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Thus spake the master programmer: "After three days without programming, life becomes meaningless." -- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"

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