100_Monkeys_Typing - Slashdot User

Submission + - First billion dollar open source software vendor (yahoo.com) 1

Submitted by

head_dunce

on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @04:14PM

head_dunce writes: "Red Hat is coming out way on top in this economy. Total revenue and subscription revenue for this quarter is up 28% year-over-year. Jim Whitehurst, President and Chief Executive Officer of Red Hat said, "Based on the strong first half results, we believe Red Hat remains well positioned to finish fiscal 2012 as the first billion dollar open source software vendor.”"

Submission + - Adobe Pushes Emergency Flash Player Security Fix (securityweek.com)

Submitted by wiredmikey on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @04:01PM

wiredmikey writes: As expected, Adobe today released a security update for its Flash Player. The out of cycle update addresses critical security issues in flash player as well as an important universal cross-site scripting issue.

Adobe reported that one of the vulnerabilities (CVE-2011-2444) is being exploited in the wild in active targeted attacks designed to trick the user into clicking on a malicious link delivered in an email message.

To illustrate the importance of keeping systems up to date, including Adobe Flash products, the fact that the RSA cyber attack was executed using a spear phishing attack with an embedded flash file should serve as a friendly reminder. RSA was breached after an employee opened a spreadsheet that contained a zero-day exploit that installed a backdoor through an Adobe Flash vulnerability.

Submission + - Opportunties From the Twilight of Moore's Law (bunniestudios.com)

Submitted by

saccade.com

on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @04:01PM

saccade.com writes: "Andrew "bunnie" Huang just posted an excellent essay, Why the Best Days of Open Hardware are Yet to Come. He shows how the gradually slowing pace of semiconductor density actually may create many new opportunities for smaller scale innovators and entrepreneurs. It's based on a talk presented at the 2011 Open Hardware Summit.

Are we entering an age of heirloom laptops and artisan engineering?"

Submission + - Google Prepares Fix to Stop BEAST SSL/TLS Attacks (theregister.co.uk)

Submitted by OverTheGeicoE on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @03:54PM

OverTheGeicoE writes: It was reported yesterday that researchers had found a way to break the most commonly used SSL/TLS encryption in browsers. According to the Register, Google is pushing out a patch to fix the problem. The patch doesn't involve adding support for TLS 1.1 or 1.2. FTFA: "The change introduced into Chrome would counteract these attacks by splitting a message into fragments to reduce the attacker's control over the plaintext about to be encrypted. By adding unexpected randomness to the process, the new behavior in Chrome is intended to throw BEAST off the scent of the decryption process by feeding it confusing information." The fix is supposedly in the latest developer version of Chrome.

Submission + - EFF System To Warn Of Certificate Breaches (infoworld.com)

Submitted by

snydeq

on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @03:35PM

snydeq writes: "With its distributed SSL Observatory, the Electronic Frontier Foundation hopes to detect compromised certificate authorities and warn users about attacks, InfoWorld reports. 'The EEF, along with developers at the Tor Project and consulting firm iSec Partners, has updated its existing HTTPS Everywhere program with the ability to anonymously report every certificate encountered. The group will analyze the data so that it can detect any rogue certificates — and by extension, compromised authorities — its users encounter, says Peter Eckersley, technology projects director for the EFF.'"

Submission + - Mac VMs Compared: VMware Fusion vs. Parallels (infoworld.com)

Submitted by

snydeq

on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @03:26PM

snydeq writes: "InfoWorld's Galen Gruman provides a comparison of leading commercial Mac VMs, VMware Fusion 4 and Parallels Desktop 7, both of which have been updated to take advantage of Mac OS X Lion. 'In addition to supporting Lion as a host, both take advantage of Apple's change in policy that lets users run the desktop version of Mac OS X Lion in virtual machines. Prior to Lion, Apple restricted such usage to Mac OS X Server,' Gruman writes. 'The bottom line is that gamers and simulation users will get a bigger bang from Fusion, whereas number crunchers will do better by Parallels Desktop.'"

Submission + - An FPS minus the shooting (arstechnica.com) 1

Submitted by phaedrus5001 on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @03:11PM

phaedrus5001 writes: Ars has a story about a first person shooter under development that involves no shooting on the part of the player; at least, not shooting bullets. The game, Warco, has the player in the role of a war correspondent. The object is to immerse yourself in dangerous situations armed only with a camera.

From the article: "Players will experience the process of filming conflicts, going into dangerous situations armed with nothing but a camera. They will then edit the footage into a compelling news story."

While an interesting and different concept, it should be even more interesting to see if the developers can actually convince a publisher to release the project.

Submission + - What You Eat Affects Your Genes (discovermagazine.com)

Submitted by purkinje on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @03:08PM

purkinje writes: Tiny bits of genetic material, called microRNAs, can make their way from the food you eat into your blood stream, and change how your genes are expressed, according to a new study. A team of Chinese scientists found tiny bits of white rice microRNA floating around in people's blood after a meal. When they looked at what was happening on a cellular level, they found that the microRNAs were changing gene expression, decreasing levels of a receptor that filters out LDL (bad) cholesterol. When the scientists gave mice both rice and a chemical to block the microRNAs, their levels of that receptor returned to normal---showing that the microRNAs weren't just swimming through the blood stream, but acting on genes in the animals' cells.

Submission + - WikiLeaks Founder's Unauthorized Autobiography (guardian.co.uk)

Submitted by macwhizkid on Wednesday September 21, 2011 @01:54PM

macwhizkid writes: After signing a major book deal for his autobiography, Julian Assange backed out (allegedly worrying about self-incrimination) but failed to return his £500,000 advance payment. The publisher is understandably unhappy with this outcome, and intends to publish the "world's first unauthorized autobiography" from an early draft Assange submitted. The book will be in stores tomorrow, but I'm still hoping it'll be published early on WikiLeaks...

Comment Obliqatory Simpson Quote (Score 2) 347

by 100_Monkeys_Typing on Tuesday January 25, 2011 @02:11AM (#34990956) Attached to: How Chrysler's Battery-Less Hybrid Minivan Works

"The word "unblowupable" is tossed around a lot these days..." - Homer Simpson

Comment Re:Exploration (Score 1) 108

by 100_Monkeys_Typing on Saturday July 03, 2010 @10:38AM (#32785658) Attached to: NASA Tests Hardware, Software On Armadillo Rocket

The word and concept of "exploration" is not necessarily human related. Animals and robots acting on our behalf can and do "explore." Why did the chicken cross the road? I would argue: "to find new resources and to expand it's knowledge of the surrounding area." Sounds like exploring to me. I don't necessarily disagree that humans should at some point wander around Mars and beyond, i think that the available tech for human travel beyond LEO is still too costly to bring us enough return on our investment.

Comment Re:No it isn't (Score 1) 1186

by 100_Monkeys_Typing on Monday June 28, 2010 @06:00PM (#32723378) Attached to: Tattoos For the Math and Science Geek?

Most jobs are "at will." This can translate to someone not liking your tattoo or color of your skin and finding a way for you to be let go. Ever been 1 minute late to work? Failed to make finish a project on time? Checked your bid on ebay on the company computer? These are all reasons a company could give for letting you go. Trying to prove intent in a unemployment hearing is pretty pointless.
I don't disagree with the law or it's intent, but the reality is the law can only be used in extremely flagrant cases.

3rd-Grader Busted For Jolly Rancher Possession 804

Posted by samzenpus on Monday May 10, 2010 @11:10AM from the step-away-from-the-candy dept.

theodp writes "A third-grader in a small Texas school district received a week's detention for merely possessing a Jolly Rancher. Leighann Adair, 10, was eating lunch Monday when a teacher confiscated the candy. Her parents said she was in tears when she arrived home later that afternoon and handed them the detention notice. But school officials are defending the sentence, saying the school was abiding by a state guideline that banned 'minimal nutrition' foods. 'Whether or not I agree with the guidelines, we have to follow the rules,' said school superintendent Jack Ellis."

High Fructose Corn Syrup Causes Bigger Weight Gain In Rats 542

Posted by timothy on Wednesday March 24, 2010 @05:30PM from the subsidies-cause-fatter-corn-farmers dept.

krou writes "In an experiment conducted by a Princeton University team, 'Rats with access to high-fructose corn syrup gained significantly more weight than those with access to table sugar, even when their overall caloric intake was the same.' Long-term consumption also 'led to abnormal increases in body fat, especially in the abdomen, and a rise in circulating blood fats called triglycerides.' Psychology professor Bart Hoebel commented that 'When rats are drinking high-fructose corn syrup at levels well below those in soda pop, they're becoming obese — every single one, across the board. Even when rats are fed a high-fat diet, you don't see this; they don't all gain extra weight.'"

The Lost Film That Accompanied Empire Strikes Back 195

Posted by timothy on Wednesday March 10, 2010 @05:00PM from the first-reel dept.

An anonymous reader writes "'Alien' and 'Star Wars' art director Roger Christian was given £25,000 by George Lucas in 1979 to make a 25-minute medieval B-feature called 'Black Angel.' This spiritual tale of a knight on a strange quest was inspired by Christian's near-fatal fever when he fell ill in Mexico making 'Lucky Lady.' 'Black Angel' made a huge impression, not least because it shared the dark tone of 'Empire Strikes Back.' John Boorman showed it to the crew of 'Excalibur' as a template for how he wanted his film to look, and 'Black Angel' went on to influence films such as 'Dragonslayer' and 'Legend' throughout the 1980s and beyond. But it has not been seen by anyone since 'Empire' finished its theatrical run. Two weeks ago Roger Christian unearthed a print of a film that was thought lost forever, and in this interview he talks about 'Black Angel,' and provides the only picture from the film that has ever hit the Internet."

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