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Software

Submission + - Help the ecosystem - Support the product!

Submitted by
TheViciousOverWind
TheViciousOverWind writes: "Under the term "Greenware" transfz.com just launched their new search application. The program itself is free, but you can donate or subscribe on the website. Half of the money is for putting bread on the programmers table, the other half will be used to plant trees (one tree per $1 through the ReLeaf Project). — The program itself is very extendable, and, in under a minute, you can write a plugin to do your own searches using your own searchengine.

The author explains on the website why he came up with the term "Greenware": "After having spend 6 months programming Transfz, as well as writing bad HTML/CSS and help files, I re-remembered that the development of the information technology we use daily has only come to see the light due to a functional biosphere. Even more importantly; unless the biosphere stays functional we can't even keep using the technology we have developed."

Will we see more of this kind of "Supporting the ecosystem" software in the future?"
Sci-Fi

Submission + - Steven Hawking to make zero G flight

Submitted by tatsu69
tatsu69 writes: Yahoo! News reports that Steven Hawking 'plans to go on a weightless flight on April 26... The modified Boeing 727 generally soars to 32,000 feet at a sharp angle and then plunges 8,000 feet so passengers can experience 25-second snippets of zero gravity during the descent. Zero Gravity will pick up the bill, which normally is $3,750. The company also plans to have two seats on the flight auctioned off by two charities.'
Media (Apple)

Submission + - iTunes' opening it doors to indie film producers?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: After ten months of negotiations (read: pestering), Apple has agreed to sell downloads of the 'indie' snowboarding film, That, through the company's iTunes video download store. This is the first time that Apple has accepted content that doesn't come from an established or major distributor; essentially cutting out the 'middleman', so that a small video producer can sell their content directly through iTunes. So does this mean that iTunes is ready to embrace the long tail, and help small independent filmmakers monetize their content?
Software

Submission + - Selling open source to upper management

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: I am the single member of the IT department at a small nonprofit. We were looking to replace our commercial content management system with a custom combination of open source solutions (Lucene, Jackrabbit, etc.) However, since I was the sole developer, progress was slow and we have little resources to recruit potential volunteers.

Recently, we had a closed source, commercial vendor demo their version of a content management system, and immediately upper management was willing to go along with their proposal, even at the expense of project requirements.

Although I understand and accept the decision (and am quite relieved I am not expected to deliver as the sole developer), I am interested to know if there are resources for promoting open source software in a manner like closed source, commercial software. If not, is this a challenge within the OS community? It seems that OS solutions are primarily promoted to technical implementors rather than upper management. Of course, many technical implementors do not have the marketing skills to promote open source, but are there resources to help us do so?
Microsoft

Submission + - EU claim MS still not compliant

Submitted by Zo0ok
Zo0ok writes: EU is still not impressed with the way Microsoft complies with the March 2004 decision. Microsoft is given four weeks to respond and can look forward to more penalties if they fail to comply. EU FAQ available.
Internet Explorer

Submission + - Online addict dies after 7 day marathon session

Submitted by
watomb
watomb writes: ""BEIJING: An obese 26-year-old man in northeastern China died after a "marathon" online gaming session over the Lunar New Year holiday, state media said on Wednesday.

The 150-kg man from Jinzhou, in Liaoning province, collapsed on Saturday, the last day of the holiday, after spending "almost all" of the seven-day break playing online games, the China Daily said, citing his parents."
http://www.ciol.com/content/search/showarticle1.as p?artid=94845"
Music

Submission + - Boycotting the RIAA?

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: ExtremeTech asks: Will boycotting the RIAA for a month do anything? Is it a practical campaign? Is DRM evil, or is it a tool most often used for evil?
Security

Submission + - Plan9 kernel exploit made public

Submitted by
swehack
swehack writes: "The month of February saw a very rare case of a kernel exploit for the plan9 operating system made public on the Dailydave mailing list. The author mentions how he kindly waited for Bell Labs to patch the vulnerability but also that the exploit lasted quite a while in private use. One can only speculate what one would do with a private plan9 kernel exploit."
Censorship

Submission + - Dell censors IdeaStorm Linux dissent

Submitted by thefickler
thefickler writes: It seems pointless seeking ideas and feedback if you 're going to ignore and delete the ones you don't like. That's exactly what Dell is doing with its IdeaStorm web site, which has been set up by the company to solicit ideas and feedback. It deleted a post that linked to an article that criticized its handling of the "preinstalled Linux" issue.
Software

Submission + - Wil Wheaton reviews Linux audio players

Submitted by ForeverFaithless
ForeverFaithless writes: Wil Wheaton has reviewed several popular audio players on Linux, including XMMS, Amarok, and Banshee. Wil comes to the conclusion that Amarok is his favorite of the bunch, stating "I have never loved a music player as much as I love Amarok, and I've never had as much fun flipping through my library and learning more about my favorite artists."
Programming

Submission + - Sourceforge closed CompileFarm. Now what?

Submitted by int32
int32 writes: Anyone used sourceforge's CompileFarm? Well I did a lot. As of now, I've just found that its single distinguishing feature was abandoned some weeks ago: https://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?forum_id=6 65363 . CompileFarm was the project where you could compile and test your application on a bunch of various architectures on different unices. Was really helpful for portability, especially for testing your code on both 32 and 64 bit platforms... well, no more. It sucks, but show must go on. Therefore, questions to the slashdot crowd: how do you test your C/C++ code for portability? Are there (free) alternatives to CompileFarm?
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft investing in new copy protection

Submitted by daniel_howell
daniel_howell writes: According to this article, Microsoft is in investing in a different approach to copy protection. The technology in questions imprints a file with a combination of a "watermark" and a "fingerprint", identifying who bought the music (or video or whatever) and who has the rights to use it. I guess the eventual idea is to combine it with web-crawling technology such as the prototype in this story, and then go after file sharers directly.

It all sounds a bit Big Brother — but it has to better than selling me something that doesn't let me play the file where I want. And it is in line with most copy protection laws around the world, not just the USA.
Slashdot.org

Submission + - Slashdot Funnies

Submitted by R3d M3rcury
R3d M3rcury writes: I was going through the links in the 'Funnies' section and I found that a bunch seem to have been discontinued.

Mikey — Appears to have been taken over by a squatter.
Dr. Fun — Has been discontinued.
After Y2K — Updating sporadically at best. Looks like the last one was in 2004.
Helen — Ended at the end of last year.

Also, the Fifth Wave has moved to http://www.gocomics.com/thefifthwave/

Anyway, it might be time to clear out those five. Perhaps replace them with AppleGeeks, Ctrl+Alt+Del, Joy of Tech, Sheldon, and Evil, Inc.. Of course, that's just my list. What other comics do people think would be entertaining for Slashdot readers?

Slashdot Top Deals

The best book on programming for the layman is "Alice in Wonderland"; but that's because it's the best book on anything for the layman.

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