kragniz - Slashdot User

Submission + - cheap swarm robot (ieee.org)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 18, 2011 @12:14PM

An anonymous reader writes: hey're fairly simple little robots about the size of a quarter that can move around on vibrating legs, blink their lights, and communicate with each other. On an individual basis, this isn't particularly impressive, but Kilobots aren't designed to be used on an individual basis. Costing a mere $14 each and buildable in about five minutes, you don't just get yourself one single Kilobot. Or ten. Or a hundred. They're designed to swarm in the thousands,

Submission + - Enterprise applications with Javascript (slashdot.org)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 18, 2011 @12:03PM

An anonymous reader writes: I have followed the discussions about the .NET plattform in windows 8, the problems with Oracle, Java and Google and recently — I read the article Are Java and .NET becoming legacy platforms?. I use Java and CSharp and I am very confused about the strategic plan of Microsoft and Oracle. Should we really program business applications with HTML5 and JavaScript? This must be a joke or a bad dream! Maybe — the hidden winner is c++. Do you want to program stable and secure applications with JS?

Submission + - Military Drone attacks are not "hostile" (huffingtonpost.com)

Submitted by sanzibar on Saturday June 18, 2011 @10:35AM

sanzibar writes: Not satisfied with the legal conclusion of the DOJ, the Obama administration finds other in-house lawyers willing to declare a bomb dropped from a drone is not "hostile".

The strange conclusion has big implications in determining the Presidents compliance with the law. If drone strikes are in fact hostile and he continues his Libyan campaign past Sunday, he may very well be breaking the law.

Submission + - Greenpeace glovepuppets the UN. Again (theregister.co.uk)

Submitted by sanzibar on Saturday June 18, 2011 @10:10AM

sanzibar writes: an article on the register about the latest scandal at the IPCC.

Mark Lynas, the climate activist who once threw a custard pie into the face of Bjorn "Skeptical Environmentalist" Lomborg, has found himself under fire from other climate activists.

Earlier this week it emerged that an report on renewable energy for the IPCC had drawn heavily on an earlier paper authored by Greenpeace activist and staffer Sven Tenske, together with a lobby for the renewable energy industry called the European Renewable Energy Council. Tenske ended up as a lead author on the IPCC's report too, and in an astonishing coincidence, ended up making the same recommendations.
Mark Lynas called foul, saying the reliance on such a tainted and obvious source of propaganda damaged the cause of activists.

Submission + - First exploit on quantum cryptography confirmed (physicsworld.com)

Submitted by

Vadim Makarov

on Saturday June 18, 2011 @09:57AM

Vadim Makarov writes: "The Physics World reports researchers demonstrating a full eavesdropper on a quantum key distribution link. Unlike conventional exploits for security vulnerabilities that are often just a piece of software, spying on quantum cryptography required a box full of optics and mixed-signal electronics. Details are published in Nature Communications, and as a free preprint. The vulnerability was known before, but this is the first actual working exploit with secret-key recording confirmed. Patching this loophole is in progress.

Disclaimer: I am one of the researchers who worked on this."

Submission + - Hackers target world's largest payroll company (mobiledia.com)

Submitted by jhigh on Saturday June 18, 2011 @08:04AM

jhigh writes: American Data Processing (ADP), the largest payroll provider in the world, can now be added to the list of large corporate networks that have been breeched. The company announced that they were the victim of an intrusion that affected one of their clients, although they did not say which one.

Submission + - Gordon Murray's F1-Style Batmobile Unveiled[VIDEO] (gizmocrazed.com)

Submitted by

Mightee

on Saturday June 18, 2011 @07:08AM

Mightee writes: "The latest version of the Batmobile has been unveiled, and it looks Awful!! Designed by Gordon Murray of the McLaren F1 Team, the car produced for Batman Live World Arena Tour, has been unveiled at the "Batman Live" stage show in Europe.

Unlike previous versions of the Batmobile, this one is based on a Formula 1 car design containing a couple of lithium batteries and a hydrogen fuel cell to make the car environment efficient.

Other features include a carbon fibre body, front-mounted lasers and virtual wheels ringed in LEDs — diodes fitted in the wheel create a high voltage field, that can lift the car 40mm off the ground."

Submission + - NanoNote goes Wireless (qi-hardware.com)

Submitted by

dvdkhlng

on Saturday June 18, 2011 @06:56AM

dvdkhlng writes: "Even though completely copyleft, the NanoNote hand-held platform failed to get the attention of many due to its low specs and the lack of wireless connectivity. The objective to keep things open had its price, and especially wireless technology is a mine-field of patents and NDAs.
Now a few gifted hackers designed an add-on card to bring wireless to the NanoNote. It's not what you would expect: WLAN compatibility was sacrificed, going for the less encumbered IPv6 over 802.15.4 standard instead. The resulting dongles won't win a price for the highest bandwidth but excel at simplicity, energy efficiency and manufacturability.
Want to see the ugly details? Designs, source code and production documentation are published under open source licenses."

Submission + - Google Nexus 4G Rumored To Have 720p Screen (gadgetizor.com)

Submitted by dkd903 on Saturday June 18, 2011 @06:55AM

dkd903 writes: Google has already announced that the next Nexus device will arrive in late 2011. Now, the most outstanding feature of the device — A 720p screen resolution, which means 1280×720 pixels. That is the kind of screen resolution we see in tablets now. We are guessing the screen has to be quite large with this kind of resolution.

Submission + - she's "too educated" to be kicked off train.. (everythingnew.net)

Submitted by

hasanabbas1987

on Saturday June 18, 2011 @06:40AM

hasanabbas1987 writes: "The incident happened in New York when a woman traveling on New York Metro North Train line argued with the train employees that she was “too educated” to be told to quiet down and will not stop from using the “F-bomb” in her conversation on the cell phone.

“Do you know what schools I’ve been to? – “How well-educated I am?” — “I’m sorry do you think I’m a little hoodlum?”

These were words said by the woman to the train staff and then she demanded that she be given her money back and the train be stopped."

Submission + - US in Peace Talks with Taliban (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by mayberry42 on Saturday June 18, 2011 @06:05AM

mayberry42 writes: Afghan President Hamid Karzai says his government and the United States are negotiating with Taliban fighters to bring peace to the country. It is the first official acknowledgment of such talks to end the decade-long war through negotiation.

Submission + - Windows 8 M3 Build 7989 Leaks (winbeta.org)

Submitted by

BogenDorpher

on Saturday June 18, 2011 @04:51AM

BogenDorpher writes: "Earlier today, two new screenshots were leaked to the internet showcasing Windows 8 Build 7989. We saw a new wallpaper and a new boot-up screen that indicated a leak of build 7989 was eminent. The wait is finally over as Build 7989 has leaked to the internet."

Submission + - Teen Builds Nuclear Bomb Detector (gizmodo.com)

Submitted by

DaneM

on Friday June 17, 2011 @09:05PM

DaneM writes: "An enterprising teenage boy named Taylor Wilson, 17, has created a homemade, hand-held nuclear bomb detector. It utilizes a small fusion reactor that he made when he was 14, and detects nuclear materials by shooting neutrons at closed containers and exciting any nuclear materials inside--which, in turn, causes more radiation to be produced, and is detected by the device. This may provide a simpler, more effective alternative to searching containers visually, one-at-a-time. No information is given about how safe such a practice is. Taylor also has some choice things to say about how science is, in fact, very cool."

Submission + - After 7 years, MyDoom worm is still spreading (sophos.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 17, 2011 @12:06PM

An anonymous reader writes: Researchers at Sophos have revealed that the MyDoom worm, which spread via email and launched denial-of-service attacks against websites belonging to SCO and Microsoft, is still spreading on the internet after more than 7 years in existence.

The firm suggests tongue-in-cheek, that it would be nice if computer users updated their anti-virus software /at least/ once every 5 years to combat the malware threat.

Submission + - Osage Oppose Wind Power at Tallgrass Prairie

Submitted by

Hugh Pickens writes

on Friday June 17, 2011 @09:37AM

Hugh Pickens writes writes: "The Tulsa World reports that Principal Chief John D. Red Eagle of the Osage Nation says the tribe, although not opposed to alternative energy development in general, has found significant reasons to oppose wind farms on the tallgrass prairie, "a true national treasure" whose last small fragments remain only in Osage County and in Kansas. The Osage County wind farms would not be built in the Nature Conservancy's Tallgrass Prairie Preserve, located northeast of Ponca City, but would be visible from it and Preserve Director Bob Hamilton has urged the county and the state to steer wind development to areas of the county that are not ecologically sensitive. "Not all areas in the Osage are sensitive," says Hamilton. "What makes the tallgrass prairie so special is its big landscape. It's not just local — it has global significance." The Osage also fear that large wind farms will interfere with extracting oil and gas, from which royalties are paid in support of tribal members as the Osage retain their tribal mineral rights owned in common by members of the tribe. "They weren't thinking about the mineral estate — just about compensating landowners," says Galen Crum, chairman of the tribal Minerals Council. "How are we supposed to know the price of oil in 50 years?""

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