nk497 - Slashdot User

Submission + - Cookie consent banners draw complaints (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Wednesday December 19, 2012 @06:30AM

nk497 writes: "Earlier this year, the UK's data watchdog the ICO started enforcing an EU rule that means websites must ask visitors before dropping cookies onto their computers. However, it was willing to accept "implied consent" — telling visitors that cookies are used on the site, and assuming they were fine with that if they keep using the site. That led to banners popping up on every major website, including the ICO's site, warning users about cookies.

Now, the ICO has revealed that many of the cookie-related complaints it's received in the past six months are actually about those banners — and the law itself. The ICO said people "are unhappy with implied consent mechanisms, especially where cookies are placed immediately on entry to the site", adding "a significant number of people also raised concerns about the new rules themselves and the effect of usability of websites.""

Submission + - Raspberry Pi gets its own app store (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Monday December 17, 2012 @09:00AM

nk497 writes: "The Raspberry Pi now has it's very own app store. The Pi Store includes games, apps and software, as well as development tools and software. Most of the 24 submissions so far are free, with one game costing £1.99. While the foundation behind the cheap and cheerful computer clearly prefer free apps, they added that they "hope that the Pi Store will provide young people with a way to share their creations with a wider audience, and maybe to a make a little pocket money along the way"."

Submission + - Apple's US manufacturing plans called a "publicity stunt" (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Friday December 07, 2012 @06:26AM

nk497 writes: "Apple CEO Tim Cook grabbed headlines by saying the firm would move production of at least one line of Macs to the US — but the move has been dismissed as a gimmick by corporate responsibility group SumOfUs. "Moving part of its supply chain back to the US is not going to change the fact that its business model rests on the exploitation of hundreds of thousands of Chinese workers in sweatshop-like conditions," Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman, the group's executive director said. "Apple has spent $650 million just on advertising for the iPhone alone since it launched. They’re talking about spending less than 20% of that on this shift... Apple is talking about moving a tenth of 1% of its global production costs. That’s not at the level of a fundamental business model shift, [it's] a small token offering to appease consumers here in the US.""

Submission + - Dell's Ubuntu Ultrabook goes on sale - for more than Windows version (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Thursday November 29, 2012 @12:29PM

nk497 writes: "Dell's "Project Sputnik" laptop is now on sale. The XPS 13 Developer Edition comes with Ubuntu 12.04 pre-installed, and costs $1,549 — $50 more than the same model running Windows. The Ubuntu Ultrabook is the result of a skunkworks project to optimise the open-source OS to run on Dell projects, to create better laptops for developers. The idea of the project was to create a laptop for developers, based around "the idea that developers are the kings of IT and set the agenda for web companies, who in turn, set the agenda for the whole industry", Dell said."

Submission + - Harwell Dekatron: rebooting the most dependable computer ever (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Thursday November 22, 2012 @11:35AM

nk497 writes: "The National Museum of Computing in the UK has brought another historical computer back to life — this time, it's the 2.5 tonne Harwell Dekatron, AKA the WITCH. Built in 1951, the massive machine is the "oldest working digital computer". It's now been reassembled from parts held by a museum in Birmingham, and is fully functioning again — complete with blinking lights and brilliant whirring sounds. The reboot was attended by two of the three developers — both in their 90s — as well as by the volunteers who rebuilt it."

Submission + - Tablet sales to "double this Christmas" (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Friday November 16, 2012 @07:19AM

nk497 writes: "The CEA — the body behind the CES tech show — has predicted that tablet sales will more than double this Christmas, grabbing the largest slice of the consumer electronics market. Analysts with the CEA expect 32m will be sold in the US alone over the Christmas period, up 112% from last year, which is handy as the group's research showed 16% of people had tablets on top of their their wishlists, followed by smartphones at 8%, laptops at 7% and ereaders at 4%."

Submission + - Firefox: browser ballot glitch cost us 9m downloads (pcpro.co.uk) 2

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nk497

on Wednesday October 31, 2012 @11:06AM

nk497 writes: "Microsoft's failure to include the EU browser ballot in Windows 7 SP1 cost Mozilla as many as 9 million Firefox downloads, the organisation's head of business affairs revealed. Harvey Anderson said daily downloads of Firefox fell by 63% to a low of 20,000 before the ballot was reinstated, and after the fix, downloads jumped by 150% to 50,000 a day. Over the 18 months the ballot was missing, that adds up to six to nine million downloads — although it's tough to tell if the difference has more to do with Chrome's success or the lack of advertising on Windows systems.

The EU is currently investigating the "glitch", and Microsoft faces a massive fine for failing to include the screen, which offers download details for different browsers to European Windows users, as part of measures ordered by the EU to balance IE's dominance."

Submission + - Apple stays on EPEAT's green list after MacBook checks (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Friday October 12, 2012 @05:22AM

nk497 writes: "Apple has kept its place on a controversial green registry, despite previously suggesting its products wouldn't meet the necessary requirements. Earlier this year, Apple walked away from EPEAT — a green buying guide — leading to speculation that new MacBook Pros wouldn't meet its recycling requirements. After a bit of a backlash, Apple rejoined the group, and EPEAT said it would verify the devices in question. According to EPEAT's CEO, the group looked at all "ultralight" unibody laptops on the registry, finding all conformed to the four issues in question: whether they were upgradable, if tools were easily available, and if the battery and screen could be removed easily for recycling. The ideas behind some of those decisions may raise eyebrows: anything is upgradeable if it has a high-speed connection, such as to allow an external hard drive, and tools are "easily available" if they can be bought online — rather than if it uses standard screws."

Submission + - Motorola kills off smartphone-powered laptops (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Monday October 08, 2012 @05:35AM

nk497 writes: "Motorola is killing off its Webtop system, which let handsets such as the Atrix be used to power a laptop, after poor sales. Our review praised the Atrix handset, but said using it in laptop mode was "slow and unresponsive" — and the £300 for the "lapdock" alone was too much to pay given a full netbook can be bought for less. Canonical unveiled its own version of Webtop, Ubuntu for Android, in February, but hasn't yet released the system, despite saying the code was finished."

Submission + - Why Ultrabooks are falling well short of Intel's targets (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Tuesday October 02, 2012 @10:43AM

nk497 writes: "When Paul Otellini announced Ultrabooks last year, he predicted they would grab 40% of the laptop market by this year. One analyst firm has said Ultrabooks will only make up 5% of the market this year, slashing its own sales predictions from 22m this year to 10.3m. However, IHS iSuppli said that Ultrabooks have a chance at success if manufacturers get prices down between $600 to $700 — a discount of as much as $400 on the average selling price of the devices — and they could still grab a third of the laptop market by 2016."

Submission + - Raspberry Pi production moved to Wales from China

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nk497

on Thursday September 06, 2012 @10:23AM

nk497 writes: "The Raspberry Pi foundation has revealed one of its manufacturers is moving production from China to the UK, to Pencoed, Wales. When the cheap computing board was launched at the beginning of the year, founder Eben Upton said the group was forced by costs and taxes to manufacture in China, when it preferred to stick to the UK. Now, manufacturer Premier Farnell has contracted Sony to make 30,000 of the boards a month — creating 30 local jobs. No word yet on whether the other Raspberry Pi maker, RS Components, will do the same."

Submission + - Nokia: memory card slot would have "defiled" our phone (pcpro.co.uk) 1

Submitted by

nk497

on Wednesday September 05, 2012 @05:45PM

nk497 writes: "Nokia unveiled its flagship Lumia 920 Windows Phone 8 handset today, but it doesn't feature an SD card slot. There's a reason why: Nokia's designers didn't want to "defile" the design. "We started with the premise that we wanted an uncompromised physical form," executive vice president, Kevin Shields, said. "To put an SD card slot in it would have defiled it." He said most people don't use the storage in their phone, although the Nokia Lumia 820, which has only 8GB of storage, does include a micro-SD card slot behind its removable cover, which Shields claims doesn't compromise the design."

Submission + - Is it time to knock infected PCs off the internet? (pcpro.co.uk) 1

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nk497

on Monday September 03, 2012 @12:42PM

nk497 writes: "Malware could block your access to the internet – but in some cases by those on the right side of the security fence, who are deploying tactics such as blocked ports, letters in the mail and PCs quarantined from the net to combat the most damaging threats. The DNS Changer clean up saw some PCs prevented from accessing the web. Should such tactics be used more often to prevent malware from spreading — or is that taking security a step too far?"

Submission + - Hard drive makers recover, but prices remain high (pcpro.co.uk) 1

Submitted by

nk497

on Thursday August 30, 2012 @11:12AM

nk497 writes: "Hard drive manufacturers have mostly recovered from last year's floods, with production levels back to normal — but prices haven't fallen back to pre-flood levels. Last year, Samsung's Spinpoint F3 1TB drive was £49; when the floods hit it jumped as high as £109. That device is now available for about £65. Analyst Fang Zhang suggested prices might be propped up by consolidation in the market; a pair of big acquisitions last year have left the market with only three major players, Western Digital, Seagate and Toshiba."

Submission + - Intel sets team on thwarting car hackers (pcpro.co.uk)

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nk497

on Monday August 20, 2012 @04:58AM

nk497 writes: "Intel has set up a team of McAfee researchers to protect computer systems in cars, hiring Barnaby Jack — the researcher who forced ATMs to spit out cash and cause medical pumps to release lethal doses of insulin. Bruce Snell, a McAfee executive who oversees his company's research on car security, said the car industry was concerned about the potential for cyber attacks because of the frightening repercussions. "If your laptop crashes you'll have a bad day, but if your car crashes that could be life threatening," he said. "I don't think people need to panic now. But the future is really scary." The move comes as Ford and other car makers start to invest in ways to keep car code secure."

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