rsmiller510 writes "The EE Times reports this week that Dell has released a hybrid laptop running both Linux and Windows clearly aimed at business travelers. Linux for quick tasks and Windows for more intensive ones, but will such a machine really fly in the business world?"

exmoron writes "I work at a small university (5,500 students) and am in a position to potentially influence future software purchasing decisions. I use a number of FOSS solutions at home (OpenOffice.org, Zotero, GIMP, VirtualBox). My university, on the other hand, is a Microsoft and proprietary software groupie (Vista boxes running MS Office 2007, Exchange email server, Endnote, Photoshop, Blackboard, etc.). I'd like to make an argument that going open source would save the university money and think through a gradual transition process to open source software (starting small, with something like replacing Endnote with Zotero, then MS Office with OpenOffice.org, and so on). Unfortunately, I can't find very good information online on site licenses for proprietary software. How much does a site-license for Endnote cost? What about a site license for MS Office for 2,000 computers? In short, what's the skinny on moving to open source? How much money could a university like mine save? Additionally, what other benefits are there to moving to open source that I could try to sell the university on? And what are the drawbacks (other than people whining about change)?"

TheAmit writes to tell us that many recently laid off IBM employees have been offered jobs if they will only move somewhere it is cheap to employ them. IBM's new Project Match program offers some financial assistance for moving and immigration help for visas. "However, the move has not gone well with the IBM staff union. Slamming the offer, a union spokesperson said that not only were jobs being shipped overseas, but Big Blue was trying to export the people for peanuts too. He added that at a time of rising unemployment IBM should be looking to keep both the work and the workers in the United States. "

jonr writes "Phantom OS doesn't have files. Well, there are no files in the sense that a developer opens a file handle, writes to it, and closes the file handle. From the user's perspective, things still look familiar — a desktop, directories, and file icons. But a file in Phantom is simply an object whose state is persisted. You don't have to explicitly open it. As long as your program has some kind of reference to that object, all you need to do is call methods on it, and the data is there as you would expect."

mr_sifter writes "LCD monitor manufacturers have constantly pushed panel response times down with a technique called 'overdrive,' which increases the voltage to force the liquid crystals to change color states faster. Sadly, there are some side effects such as input lag and inverse ghosting associated with this — although the manufacturers themselves are very quiet about the subject. This feature (with video) looks at the problem in detail. The upshot is, you may want to test drive very carefully any display boasting low integer millisecond pixel response times."

mario_grgic writes "Recently announced Google Earth version 5.0 adds interesting new features like images of ocean floors and some detailed images of Mars. But it also brings another unwelcome change for Mac OS X users. Google Software update daemon is installed when the application is launched for the first time. The user is greeted with an uninformative message that does not really explain what is about to happen. After the user accepts, Google Update Agent is downloaded and installed. It updates all Google applications and not just Google Earth. Also, it runs on an unchangeable schedule of its own (instead of, say, only when one of Google's apps is launched), consuming system resources. Worst of all it can not be simply removed, since it is downloaded and installed again once Google Earth is launched. Users really have only two choices: live with it, or uninstall all Google apps. There's a discussion about the updater in this Google Group, including details of a way to disable it (not for the faint of heart). So fellow Slashdotters, has Google crossed the line?"

sundancing alerts us to a political dustup in the state of Utah, which doesn't have bars like the rest of the country does. Instead, "private clubs" require you to fill out an application and pay a fee if you want to have a drink outside the home. While there is pressure to reform this arrangement — one argument is that it's bad for tourism — the head of the state senate recently floated a proposal to create a database of every bar patron's visits. Now Utah's governor has called that idea "almost Orwellian," adding that "it's very difficult to legislate adulthood," and its supporters seem to be backing off. The idea of requiring bar patrons to swipe their drivers licenses as proof of age is still on the table, though.

snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister argues in favor of Mono, asking those among the open source community who have 'variously described Mono as a trap, a kludge, or simply a waste of effort' to look past Miguel de Icaza and Mono's associations with Microsoft and give the open source implementation of .Net a second chance, as he himself has, having predicted Mono's demise at the hands of open source Java in 2006. Far from being just a clone of .Net for Linux, McAllister argues, Mono has been 'expanding its presence into exciting and unexpected new niches.' And for those who argue that 'developing open-source software based on Microsoft technologies is like walking into a lion's den,' McAllister suggests taking a look at the direction Mono is heading. The more Mono evolves, the less likely Microsoft is to use patent claims or some other dirty trick to bring down the platform."

Futurepower(R) writes "CNN's use of software called Octoshape presents an incredibly abusive EULA. If you agree to the EULA, you agree that CNN can use your bandwidth, and that you will pay any costs. Also, you lose the right to monitor your own network traffic. You can't even use information collected by your own firewall. Quoting the EULA: 'You may not collect any information about communication in the network of computers that are operating the Software or about the other users of the Software by monitoring, interdicting or intercepting any process of the Software. Octoshape recognizes that firewalls and anti-virus applications can collect such information, in which case you not are allowed to use or distribute such information.' "

NIckGorton writes "Research is now underway in the US to seek FDA approval for an artificial liver. The Extracorporeal Liver Assist Device (ELAD) filters blood through a cartridge containing immortalized human liver cells with fiber tubes running through that allow the patients blood to interact with them. This allows the matrix of liver cells to perform both the metabolic (cleansing the blood of toxins/waste) and synthetic (producing albumin, clotting factors, etc) functions of the patient's failing liver. A small trial in China showed a statistically and clinically significant difference in 30 day survival with ELAD."

An anonymous reader writes "PGP and GnuPG have been utilizing webs of trust to establish authenticity without a centralized certificate authority for a while. Now, a new tool seeks to extend the concept to include scientific publications. The idea is that researchers can review and sign each others' works with varying levels of endorsement, and display the signed reviews with their vitas. This creates a decentralized social network linking researchers, papers, and reviews that, in theory, represents the scientific community. It meshes seamlessly with traditional publication venues. One can publish a paper with an established journal, and still try to get more out of the paper by asking colleagues to review the work. The hope is that this will eventually provide an alternative method for researchers to establish credibility."

spirit_fingers writes "I'm the IT manager for a west coast design company that has a small branch office in Beijing with 5 employees, a few workstations and a couple of servers. Recently, it came to my attention that the Beijing office has been routinely installing and using pirated software on their computers — MS Office and Adobe Creative Suite, mostly. We're very buttoned up about being legal with our software here at the home office, and I consider it unprofessional and risky for our Beijing office to be engaging in this practice. When I called the local office manager on this, he shrugged and replied, 'Well, every other shop here does it.' So I was wondering if there are any IT manager Slashdotters here in the the US who may have experienced something similar with their colleagues in APAC, and how they handle a situation like this." Click the link for more of this reader's thoughts on the subject.

Barence writes "Linus Torvalds has rejected the argument that Linux developers should pool their resources behind a single distribution. 'I think multiple distributions aren't just a good thing, I think it's something absolutely required. We have hundreds of distros, and a lot of them are really for niche markets. And you need that — simply because different markets simply have different requirements, and no single distro will take care of them all.' The calls from the Linux community have been growing due to Linux's failure to show significant market share growth."

Pandanapper writes to tell us Yahoo is reporting that if you find yourself watching an ad on a video screen in a public venue, the ad may be watching you as well. "Small cameras can now be embedded in the screen or hidden around it, tracking who looks at the screen and for how long. The makers of the tracking systems say the software can determine the viewer's gender, approximate age range and, in some cases, ethnicity -- and can change the ads accordingly. That could mean razor ads for men, cosmetics ads for women and video-game ads for teens."

tsamsoniw writes "Singapore-based Atlantis Resources Corporation, which brings to the table tidal-turbine technology, is partnering with Scotland-based datacenter developer Internet Villages International) to construct a tidal-powered 150MW 'Blue Datacenter,' InfoWorld reports. If all goes to plan, the facility will eventually be powered entirely by clean energy produced by tidal-current turbines in the Pentland Firth, the stretch of water between the far north Scottish mainland and Orkney. The firth's currents could generate 700 megawatts of electricity by 2020." And reader Mike writes "Here's something to raise a glass to: recently the Rothes consortium of whiskey and scotch distillers announced that they have partnered with Helius Energy to install a power plant fueled entirely by whiskey by-products. The completed plant will use biomass cogeneration to convert draff and pot ale from the distillery into 7.2 MW of electricity — enough to power 9,000 homes."