loafing_oaf - Slashdot User

Submission + - SPAM: IT pros mad as hell about new Carr book

Submitted by alphadogg on Wednesday January 09, 2008 @11:41PM

alphadogg writes: IT professionals are mad as hell about Nicholas Carr's new book, "The Big Switch: Rewiring the World from Edison to Google," which predicts the demise of the corporate IT department and its replacement by utility computing. "This article proves that Nicholas Carr can still get a book published regardless...of his extreme lack of knowledge of logic, business, economics and information technology," says one writer, who calls Carr "a talentless hack with an English Lit degree.''
Link to Original Source

Journal SPAM: 5-Year-Old Boy Detained as US National Security Threat 1

Journal by Jeremiah Cornelius on Wednesday January 09, 2008 @10:33PM

It's a case of a mistaken identity for a 5-year-old boy from Normandy Park. He had trouble boarding a plane because someone with the same name is wanted by the federal government. "When his mother went to pick him up and hug him and comfort him during the proceedings, she was told not to touch him because he was a national security risk. They also had to frisk her again to make sure the little Dilling

Submission + - Intel off One Laptop Per Child board (olpcnews.com)

Submitted by jbm on Thursday January 03, 2008 @10:40PM

jbm writes: Intel and the rest of the OLPC organization divorce over irreconcilable differences.

Submission + - MS is not redoing their website in Silverlight

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 03, 2008 @10:28PM

An anonymous reader writes: Unlike previously stated, Microsoft is not going to redesign microsoft.com in Silverlight. Instead they rewrite in Silverlight just the Download Center. From the article:

The sitewide redesign was actually just an overhaul of the Microsoft Download Center, something that gets a lot of traffic but is a far cry from redoing Microsoft.com in Silverlight.

Submission + - Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Linux with Wine (blogspot.com)

Submitted by

twickline

on Thursday January 03, 2008 @08:48AM

twickline writes: "Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Linux with Wine, howto guide with screenshots. The scoop is this game was was announced on April 25, 2007 and It was released on November 6, 2007 in North America... Full DirectX 9.0c games now play on Linux with Wine, less then two months after release! So who needs TransGaming now?

http://wine-review.blogspot.com/2008/01/call-of-duty-4-modern-warfare-on-linux.html"

Submission + - Norway mandates open formats for government (edholden.com)

Submitted by

Random BedHead Ed

on Friday December 21, 2007 @01:38PM

Random BedHead Ed writes: "According to a few articles, the Kingdom of Norway has mandated the use of open formats for all government documents. The original press release is in Norwegian, but roughly translated (via The Inquirer via Groklaw):

"The government has decided that all information on governmental websites should be available in the open formats HTML, PDF or ODF. With this decision, the times when public documents were only available in Microsoft's Word format comes to an end."
The mandate also specifies that HTML should be use for general posting of information on the Web, PDF should be used when page layout must be preserved, and ODF should be used when providing forms for citizens to fill out."

Submission + - Over 400 Scientists Dispute ManMade Global Warming

Submitted by

bagboy

on Friday December 21, 2007 @01:26PM

bagboy writes: "A U.S. Senate Report claims over 400 prominent scientists around the world disputed the "consensus" of man-made global warming. Many of these scientists also claim numerous colleagues "share their views but are afraid to speak out for fear of retribution". The U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works site has additional information."

Submission + - Bill Clinton - Supreme Court Justice? (blogspot.com)

Submitted by GHalt on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @07:21PM

GHalt writes: Could Bill Clinton be appointed as a Supreme Court Justice?

Submission + - China pressuring US for cheap green-technologies (wsj.com)

Submitted by

Trintech

on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @06:43PM

Trintech writes: "At a U.N. conference on climate change, China is asking developed nations like the US to offer cutting-edge renewable technology to poor developing countries at a reduced price. American companies though are not receptive to selling their technologies at a reduced price and also worry that countries like China will not respect the intellectual-property rights of their technologies. China argues that this is for the public good and will help combat climate change."

Submission + - Announcing Windows Vista SP1 Release Candidate (RC (blogspot.com)

Submitted by marulez on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @06:40PM

marulez writes: Today we're making available the release candidate (RC) of Windows Vista SP1 via Microsoft Connect, and tomorrow subscribers to TechNet and MDSN will have access to those RC bits too. In addition, the RC will be available to the public next week via Microsoft's Download Center. The release candidate phase of beta software is typically the final phase before the RTM (release-to-manufacturing) of a product and indicates that the code has attained a significant level of performance and stability. Let me call out several changes made since the Beta release of Service Pack 1 — many of which came about as a result of direct feedback from our Beta-testing community (thank you!):

Submission + - For Sleepy Drivers, Coffee vs. Napping (nytimes.com)

Submitted by

Ant

on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @06:24PM

Ant writes: "A New York Times blog says that sleepy drivers, who don't want to stop their journey, have two choices: pull over and take a short nap or load up with caffeine to stay awake. It asks what's the better option? French researchers decided to find out, testing the driving performance of two dozen sleep-deprived motorists... Seen on Blue's News."

Submission + - The Leopard Windows API Myth (roughlydrafted.com)

Submitted by DECS on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @06:03PM

DECS writes: Some ideas just won't die. Proponents of the Mac OS X Leopard Windows API Myth are so convinced that Apple desperately needs to wedge Microsoft Windows into Mac OS X that they'll run with any hint that might suggest a plausible way for this to happen. The latest take on the subject is that Mac OS X Leopard loads PE files and requests Windows DLL files, which more than a few pundits have determined must be a new development because Tiger didn't do this. Therefore, they've decided that the only sensical conclusion to jump to is that Apple is secretly implementing the Windows API so that Macs will be able to run Windows programs natively. They're wrong, here's why.
PE U: The Mac OS X Leopard Windows API Myth

Submission + - Study Shows Why the Flu Likes Winter (nytimes.com)

Submitted by

Ant

on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @05:59PM

Ant writes: "The New York Times (no log in should be needed) says New York/NY researchers believe they have solved one of the great mysteries of the flu: Why does the infection spread primarily in the winter months? The answer, they say, has to do with the virus itself. It is more stable and stays in the air longer when air is cold and dry, the exact conditions for much of the flu season. Seen on Blue's News."

Submission + - AMD releases Linux kernel patch for TLB erratum (techreport.com)

Submitted by J. Dzhugashvili on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @05:28PM

J. Dzhugashvili writes: AMD has released a Linux kernel patch that fixes the translation lookaside buffer (TLB) bug in its quad-core Phenom and Opteron processors. (News of the bug made Slashdot's front page yesterday.) The patch is meant to resolve the problem with a minimal (1%) performance penalty, unlike the 10-20% hit induced by AMD's forthcoming BIOS fix. However, the patch's release isn't without caveats: it's for 64-bit versions of Linux only, and AMD warns that it "has only received minimal functional testing" and that it's not ready for mainstream use. The code and the associated explanation do shed some light on the erratum itself and how the patch deals with it, though.

Submission + - Vanderbilt U spends $500K 'playing nice' with RIAA 1

Submitted by

newtley

on Wednesday December 05, 2007 @05:19PM

newtley writes: "Vanderbilt University is great with robots, but not so good with the RIAA. Its Cindy Franks admits the school has so far spent half-a-million-dollars of taxpayer money trying to keep on the good side of the corporate music industry and its adherents. It's even touting Napster as part of the attempt. But all that money and effort notwithstanding, "Last year we had 20 students (sued) for the whole year," InsideVandy has her saying. ""This year we have had 32 students in October alone.""

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