Comment Re:200 miles or 400 km? (Score 1) 230
Good point, but even with high resolution images it may be hard to pinpoint the furthest "headwaters" as they may be just a trickle.
Comment Re:200 miles or 400 km? (Score 1) 230
Beware of false precision. If the instrument is only precise to 100 km and they measured 400 km, then it would be correct to report 200 miles and not 249 miles.
Comment Re:Why C? (Score 1) 13
It's designed to run on microcontrollers with kilobytes of RAM. C++ and OO are possible, but C tends to fit better.
Comment Re:Can't keep this up (Score 1) 137
Go to the linked article, it uses "something remarkable" where Slashdot used "Earth-shaking" in the summary. Not sure if Slashdot changed the word, or if NPR revised the article. Either way, the over-hype is as much the fault of the media as it is NASA.
Kaspersky's Exploit-Proof OS Leaves Security Experts Skeptical 196
CWmike writes "Eugene Kaspersky, the $800-million Russian cybersecurity tycoon, is, by his own account, out to 'save the world' with an exploit-proof operating system. Given the recent declarations from U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and others that the nation is facing a 'digital Pearl Harbor' or 'digital 9/11' from hostile nation states like Iran, this sounds like the impossible dream come true — the cyber version of a Star Wars force field. But on this side of that world in need of saving, the enthusiasm is somewhat tempered. One big worry: source. 'The real question is, do you trust the people who built your system? The answer had better be yes,' said Gary McGraw, CTO of Cigital. Kaspersky's products are among the top ranked worldwide, are used by an estimated 300 million people and are embraced by U.S. companies like Microsoft, Cisco and Juniper Networks. But while he considers himself at some level a citizen of the world, he has close ties to Russian intelligence and Vladimir Putin. Part of his education and training was sponsored by the KGB, he is a past Soviet intelligence officer (some suspect he has not completely retired from that role) and he is said have a 'deep and ongoing relationship with Russia's Federal Security Service, or FSB,' the successor to the KGB and the agency that operates the Russian government's electronic surveillance network."
Submission + - Fujitsu Building Robot To Pass Math Exams (itworld.com)
itwbennett writes: "Pity those poor Japanese students who attend cram schools, either full time or in addition to their regular schooling, to have a shot at passing the grueling math entrance exams for Tokyo University. If Fujitsu has its way, those students will be upstaged by a robot. The company has set a goal for the year 2021 of building an artificial intelligence robot that can pass the exams."
Submission + - Harry Potter's Emma Watson most dangerous celebrity to search for on Web (networkworld.com)
alphadogg writes: Emma Watson, best known for her portrayal of Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter movies, has been named most dangerous celebrity to search for on the Web in McAfee's annual report. "Searches for the latest Emma Watson pictures and free downloads have more than a 12% chance to land on a malicious site that has tested positive for spyware, adware, spam, phishing, viruses or other malicious stuff," according to McAfee, whose study is based on the company's site ratings technology. Such searches appear to be even more dangerous when Watson's name is linked with terms such as "nude pictures" and "fakes," as cybercrooks bait bad websites to nab unsuspecting Web surfers, often offering them free downloads.
Submission + - China's Yangtze River Turns Red (ibtimes.com)
redletterdave writes: "The Yangtze River, the third longest river in the world traditionally known as the "golden watercourse," mysteriously blushed for the first time on Sept. 6. Residents in the surrounding area near the city of Chongqing, where the Yangtze connects to the Jialin River, literally stopped in their tracks when they noticed their once golden river had turned a shocking shade of red. Residents have carefully crept down to the riverbanks for the past few days to save some of the red, tomato juice-like river water in bottles. Early predictions from scientists say the red water was likely a result of pollution, but investigators are still investigating the unknown cause."
Submission + - No Opt-Out For Ads On New Kindle Fires (cnet.com) 1
An anonymous reader writes: Lost amid the announcements for Amazon's new tablets and e-readers was the news that their latest Kindle Fire tablets would include advertisements. So-called 'Special Offers' would place ads on the devices' lock screens in a similar fashion to the lowest price Kindle e-readers. However, on the e-readers, you had the option to 'buy out' the ads by simple paying the difference in price between the cheaper device and the regular version. But Amazon has no confirmed there is no way to opt out of the ads on the new Kindle Fire tablets.
Serious Problems With USB and Ethernet On the Raspberry Pi 202
First time accepted submitter rephlex writes "The USB controller used in the Broadcom BCM2835 (which is the SoC the Raspberry Pi uses) has buggy drivers which have been causing problems for many of its users. In addition to this, the Pi can only supply an unusually low amount of current to its USB devices, just 140 mA approximately, and using a powered hub to sidestep this limit exacerbates the issues caused by the USB drivers. Even Ethernet is affected as the Ethernet controller used on the Raspberry Pi is connected to the SoC via USB. This has resulted in packet loss and even total loss of network connectivity in certain situations. Attempts have been made in the past to fix the buggy USB drivers as there are other devices which use this problematic controller. None of these attempts seem to have achieved very much."
Does Recent Goodwill Undo Years of Patent Trolling For Intellectual Ventures? 90
CowboyNeal writes "Controversial patent-holding company Intellectual Ventures has been
covered on Slashdot before, but a recent CNET article takes
a look inside the company, at how they work, and what they have planned for
the future. Read below to find out if they are merely a patent-troll, or if their shrewd tactics belie a
more noble master plan?"
Comment Re:Architecture (Score 1) 136
Pouring of concrete is analogous to software going to golden master. The architecture design effort that agile would apply to is everything that leads up to that point. Also architecture isn't just about making buildings that don't fall down, not every defect leads to jail time, some defects just mean the building isn't as nice as the client hoped for.
Comment Re:Who needs fast data rates? (Score 2) 275
I forgot the latency through the earth which is about 42ms. So actually you would need to transmit at 100b / (150ms - 42ms) = 952bps just to break even.
Comment Re:Who needs fast data rates? (Score 1, Informative) 275
Hong Kong to US is about 150ms latency using conventional technology verizon. So taking your own example of needing 100 bits to transmit a useful message (I don't know if that is realistic), the message would need to be transmitted faster than 666bps just to break even with existing communications. Given the cost of neutrino detectors and the current state of technology it just doesn't seem likely.
Why We Love Firefox, and Why We Hate It 665
An anonymous reader sends this quote from Conceivably Tech:
"Admit it. You are in a love-hate relationship with Firefox. Either Mozilla gets Firefox right and you are jumping up and down, or Mozilla screws up and you threaten to ditch the browser in favor Chrome. Mozilla's passionate user base keeps Firefox dangling between constant ups and downs, which is a good thing, as long as Mozilla is going up. Unfortunately, that is not the case right now. Mozilla's market share has been slipping again at a significant pace. There has been some discussion and finger-pointing, and it seems that the rapid release process has to take the blame this time. Are we right to blame the rapid release process?"
What do you find most annoying or gratifying about Firefox these days?
