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Comment Flying with stopped engines ? (Score 1) 382

Just a random though: has anyone checked how long, and over what distance, the plane could fly from its cruise altitude once its engines stop ? If, in such a situation, the pilots tried something similar to what has been done with flight 1549 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Airways_Flight_1549), it might be an interesting approach to try to approximate a circular search zone (rather than an area).
Privacy

Submission + - Employer Demands Facebook Login from Job Applicant 2

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Alex Madrigal reports in the Atlantic that the ACLU has taken up the case of Maryland corrections officer Robert Collins who was required to provide his Facebook login and password to the Maryland Division of Corrections (DOC) during a recertification interview so the interviewer could log on to his account and read not only his postings, but those of his family and friends too. "We live in a time when national security is the highest priority, but it must be delicately balanced with personal privacy," says Collins. "My fellow officers and I should not have to allow the government to view our personal Facebook posts and those of our friends, just to keep our jobs." The ACLU of Maryland has sent a letter to Public Safety Secretary Gary Maynard (PDF) concerning the Division of Correction's blanket requirement that applicants for employment with the division, as well as current employees undergoing recertification, provide the government with their social media account usernames and personal passwords for use in employee background checks. After three weeks the ACLU has received no response."

Submission + - President Decrees Formation of IP Cops (whitehouse.gov) 1

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward writes: "On February 8, President Obama issued a decree that clamping down on IP and increasing spending on copyright cops would somehow stimulate the economy's creativity, so he created "Intellectual Property Enforcement Advisory Committees" of all the heads of our departments to do what they must to please the RIAA and MPAA. As usual, Biden was leading the charge.

From the article:
"To ensure that the Administration does its best to protect these innovations and creative products, today the President issued this Executive Order, which establishes a Cabinet level Senior Intellectual Property Enforcement Advisory Committee comprised of the heads of the Departments responsible for intellectual property enforcement, including the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, Commerce, Health and Human Services, State, Treasury, Agriculture and USTR. The Executive Order also establishes the Intellectual Property Enforcement Advisory Committee comprised of representatives from the agencies responsible for designing and carrying out the Administration’s strategy for stopping intellectual property theft."

Gotta love that doublespeak."

Comment Re:Ubuntu Only? (Score 3, Informative) 88

by compudj (#34216030) Attached to: Kernel Tracing With LTTng On Ubuntu Maverick

So far, LTTng has been mainly integrated in embedded distros: WindRiver Linux, Montavista Linux and STLinux currently ship with LTTng. The interesting news that is particular about Ubuntu here is that, by installing the LTTng packages from PPA, it is now possible to easily deploy the LTTng kernel and userspace tracers on a desktop-oriented distribution.

Comment K42: these problems were already tackled (Score 5, Informative) 462

by compudj (#33749616) Attached to: Linux May Need a Rewrite Beyond 48 Cores

The K42 project at IBM Research investigated the benefit of a complete OS rewrite with scalability to very large SMP systems in mind. This is an open source operating system supporting Linux-compatible API and ABI.

Their target systems, "next generation SMP systems", back in 2003 seems to have become the current generation of SMP/multi-core systems in the meantime.
Government

Submission + - Quebec gov sued for ignoring Free Software (facil.qc.ca)

Submitted by
Mathieu Lutfy
Mathieu Lutfy writes: "The CBC is reporting that "Quebec's open-source software association is suing the provincial government, saying it is giving preferential treatment to Microsoft Corp. by buying the company's products rather than using free alternatives. [...] Government buyers are using an exception in provincial law that allows them to buy directly from a proprietary vendor when there are no options available, but Facil said that loophole is being abused and goes against other legal requirements to buy locally.". The group also has a press release in English."
Microsoft

Submission + - Quebec sued over closed source loophole (protected.against.spamholes)

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward writes: "Quebec open source group Facil (rough translation here) has filed a lawsuit in that province's superior court to open up the Quebec government's software procurement to open source solutions. Currently the Quebec government claims a loophole to excuse them from purchasing software other than the usual closed-source suspects (e.g. MS, Oracle). The group cites policies adopted in some European nations to promote open source products.

See CBC News: "Quebec government sued for buying Microsoft software"."
The Courts

Submission + - Government sued for buying Microsoft software (www.cbc.ca)

Submitted by tundra_man
tundra_man writes: An open-source software association in Quebec, Canada, is suing the provincial government in an attempt to ban a loophole which allows the government to continue to buy proprietary software despite available open-source alternatives. "Quebec's open-source software association is suing the provincial government, saying it is giving preferential treatment to Microsoft Corp. by buying the company's products rather than using free alternatives.". I can't say I agree or disagree with this course of action but I do wish the various governments in Canada would consider sending less tax dollars to Redmond.

The 13 Enemies of the Internet 203

Posted by Zonk from the we-get-to-pick dept.
Hennell writes "Reporters without borders has just released its annual list of internet enemies, a list of countries 'that systematically violate online free expression.' A couple of countries have been removed, but Egypt has been added. A detailed summary can be read on the BBC Website." From that article: "The blacklist is published annually but it is the first time RSF has organized an online protest to accompany the list. 'We wanted to mobilize net users so that when we lobby certain countries we can say that the concerns are not just ours but those of thousands of internet users around the world,' said a spokesman for RSF. Many of those on the internet blacklist are countries that are regularly criticized by human rights groups, such as China and Burma."

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