Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×

Submission + - NIST closed due to funding lapsed? (nist.gov) 1

Submitted by sonofusion82
sonofusion82 writes: Not sure if this is a hacker prank or real, but all the NIST website just shows the following notice when I was trying to find some info about their PRNG:

"Due to a lapse in government funding, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is closed and most NIST and affiliated web sites are unavailable until further notice. We sincerely regret the inconvenience."

Submission + - 2013 Retina Macbook Pro Update Preview: What To Expect Read more: http://www.ap (appstorechronicle.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The 15 and 13 inch Retina Macbook Pros are (likely) receiving an update on October 15th, and tons of people have asked me “Will the Retina Macbook Pro have?”.
Based on these requests, and the quantity of misinformation out there, I’m releasing a guide as to what to expect for the retina macbook pro, which should be confirmed on the release date, of October 15th. If you’re interested, also check out our popular guide to Apple rumors 2013.

Submission + - Vacuum Dust Linked To Infant Botulism (ibtimes.com)

Submitted by minty3
minty3 writes: According to a new study, the aerosolized dust vacuum cleaners create contains bacteria and mold that can lead to serious diseases including infant botulism.

Submission + - FreeBSD 9.2, FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 Released (phoronix.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team has announced the release of FreeBSD 9.2. FreeBSD 9.2-RELEASE has ZFS TRIM SSD support, ZFS LZ4 compression support, DTrace hooks and VirtIO drivers as part of the default kernel configuration, unmapped I/O support, and numerous other minor features. FreeBSD also announced FreeBSD 10.0 Alpha 4 on the same day, which is the next major feature release of the open-source BSD operating system.

Submission + - VMWare updates VMWare Fusion, VMPlayer, and VMWare Workstation lines (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Billly Gates
Billly Gates writes: Virtualization is criticial for anyone in I.T. or runs Linux and needs to run some Windows program. In just a year's span VMWare has its next generation of client software releases using a Microsoft like release schedule. The information and features is here as well as here . Both the Mac oriented Fusion, and PC oriented Workstation include support for Windows 8.1, MacOSX Maverick (fusion/player on Mac), SATA drivers, integration with tablet features such as light controls and sensors, 64 GBs of ram support, 16 virtual CPU support, USB 3, and better SSD support. However, VMWare crippled its fusion product for the Mac and offers are more expensive VMWare Professional Fuse that offers the same features such as creating restricted or expired VMs as well as the VMWare Player. For those who do not want to pay $299 for the retail price or $250 there is always the FOSS Oracle Virtualbox which offers many of its features and is also cross platform for all major host and guest platforms.

Submission + - New Alternative to WiFi has a Range of Nearly a Mile (qz.com)

Submitted by vikingpower
vikingpower writes: Robotics engineer Taylor Alexander needed to lift a nuclear cooling tower off its foundation using 19 high-strength steel cables, and the Android app that was supposed to accomplish it, for which he’d just paid a developer $20,000, was essentially worthless. Undaunted and on deadline—the tower needed a new foundation, and delays meant millions of dollars in losses—he re-wrote the app himself. That’s when he discovered just how hard it is to connect to sensors via the standard long-distance industrial wireless protocol, known as Zigbee.

It took him months of hacking just to create a system that could send him a single number—which represented the strain on each of the cables—from the sensors he was using. Surely, he thought, there must be a better way. And that’s when he realized that the solution to his problem would also unlock the potential of what’s known as the “internet of things” (the idea that every object we own, no matter how mundane, is connected to the internet and can be monitored and manipulated via the internet, whether it’s a toaster, a light bulb or your car).

The result is an in-the-works project called Flutter.

Submission + - Monster Storm Reveals Water On Saturn (csmonitor.com)

Submitted by cold fjord
cold fjord writes: The CS Monitor reports, "A thunderstorm bigger than our planet churned Saturn's atmosphere like an egg beater, reaching deep into Saturn's gassy interior and flinging water up to the ammonia-gas cloudtops. ... From December 2010 through August 2011, a superstorm raged across Saturn. The storm moved west, leaving behind a wake so enormous that ultimately the head collided with its own tail, encircling the giant gas planet with a belt of turbulence over 9,000 miles wide and 190,000 miles long. And in studying it, scientists found water. This massive thunderstorm – the head alone was bigger than planet Earth – churned Saturn's atmosphere like an egg beater, reaching deep down into Saturn's gassy interior, finding water vapor, and flinging it up with "hundreds of miles per hour of upward motion ... Scientists have suspected for years that water vapor must be hiding in Saturn's lower atmosphere, but finding proof was tricky. "As far as water in measurable quantities, at the level of the visible cloud tops – this is the first indication," says Dr. Sromovsky. The first scientists who studied the storm noted its size and power, but missed the scent of water. " More at Universe Today.

Submission + - Leaked Documents Detail al-Qaeda's Efforts To Fight Back Against Drones (washingtonpost.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Washington Post reports, "Al-Qaeda’s leadership has assigned cells of engineers to find ways to shoot down, jam or remotely hijack U.S. drones ... In July 2010, a U.S. spy agency intercepted electronic communications indicating that senior al-Qaeda leaders had distributed a “strategy guide” to operatives around the world advising them how “to anticipate and defeat” unmanned aircraft. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) reported that al-Qaeda was sponsoring simultaneous research projects to develop jammers to interfere with GPS signals and infrared tags that drone operators rely on to pinpoint missile targets. Other projects in the works included the development of observation balloons and small radio-controlled aircraft, or hobby planes, which insurgents apparently saw as having potential for monitoring the flight patterns of U.S. drones... Al-Qaeda has a long history of attracting trained engineers ... Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed architect of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, holds a mechanical-engineering degree ... In 2010, the CIA noted in a secret report that al-Qaeda was placing special emphasis on the recruitment of technicians and that “the skills most in demand” included expertise in drones and missile technology. "
Transportation

Elon Musk Admits He Is Too Busy To Build Hyperloop 253

Posted by timothy from the if-you-can-bear-through-the-intrusive-ads dept.
DavidGilbert99 writes "It sounded like the future — a 600mph train taking people from San Francisco to Los Angeles in just 30mins. In fact it sounded like a future too good to be true. And so it seems to have proven. As Alistair Charlton at IBTimes reports, Elon Musk, the man behind PayPal, Tesla and Space X has admitted that Hyperloop is a step too far and he should never have mentioned it in the first place — 'I think I shot myself in the foot by ever mentioning the Hyperloop. I'm too strung out.' Oh well, let's hope SpaceX works out a bit better ... " Considering that SpaceX has already sent materials to the ISS and retrieved the capsule, it seems to have worked out pretty well so far.

Slashdot Top Deals

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion

Close