terevos - Slashdot User

RubyGems' Module Count Soon To Surpass CPAN's 206

Posted by timothy on Monday December 20, 2010 @07:33AM from the we-finally-know-who's-counting dept.

mfarver writes "According to the data gathered by modulecounts.com, the total number of modules checked into RubyGems (18,894, and growing at about 27/day) will probably exceed CPAN (18,928, and growing about 8/day) this week."

Comment counting chickens before they hatch (Score 1) 422

by terevos on Tuesday November 30, 2010 @10:20AM (#34387898) Attached to: The 5-Year Console Cycle Is Dead

Seems that this is pure speculation. They are counting their chickens before they hatch. The Wii was launched in 2006. The average is 5, but sometimes 6 years. That means that it could be as long as 2012 until a new Wii is launched. I'm guessing a new Wii will be launched in 2012.

TSA Saw My Junk, Missed Razor Blades, Says Adam Savage 609

Posted by timothy on Tuesday November 23, 2010 @08:07PM from the happy-24th dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The TSA isn't the most respected of governmental agencies right now, but at least it comes by the poor reputation honestly. The lack of standards, inconsistent application of searches and policies, and occasional rude agent all combine to make flying an unpleasant experience. It's often derided as 'security theater,' which describes the experience of Mythbuster Adam Savage before a recent flight. Savage was put through the full-body scanner, and while he joked that it made his penis feel small, no one seemed to notice the items he was carrying on his person. The video tells the rest of the story."

Google Maps Adds Drone Imagery 141

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 14, 2010 @10:42PM from the hook-'em-horns-but-closer dept.

joshuadugie writes "Slashdot carried a story a while ago that Google had purchased drones for unknown purposes. Google Maps has now added new non-satellite imagery (at UT Austin, for example) when you zoom in close enough. Mystery solved!" I'd like to think that there really are (or were) drones over Austin, but would also like to see Google's explanation for the close-up images.

FCC Approves Changes To Cable Box Rules 439

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 14, 2010 @07:40PM from the crack-in-the-castle-wall dept.

GovTechGuy writes "The FCC issued an order Thursday that should make it much easier and cheaper for consumers to purchase and install third-party cable boxes made by manufacturers such as TiVo. The rules are aimed at spurring competition in the cable box market; currently consumers overwhelmingly choose to rent a box from their cable provider rather than buy their own. Lawmakers have complained the current cable box technology is outdated and doesn't allow consumers to leverage new sources of video content such as the Web or streaming services from providers such as Netflix. The new rules should result in a smarter, more advanced cable box in the near future."

HDCP Encryption/Decryption Code Released 225

Posted by timothy on Wednesday September 29, 2010 @08:06AM from the didn't-take-long dept.

rtj writes "We have released an open-source (BSD licensed) implementation of the HDCP encryption/decryption algorithms. The code includes the block cipher, stream cipher, and hashing algorithms necessary to perform an HDCP handshake and to encrypt or decrypt video. The code passes the test vectors provided in the HDCP specification and can encrypt video at a rate of about 180 640x480 frames/second on a 2.33GHz Intel Xeon CPU. This isn't quite fast enough to decrypt 1080p content in real-time on a single core, but decryption can be parallelized across multiple cores. There are also many opportunities for further optimisation, such as using SSE instructions. We are releasing the code in hopes that others will further optimize it and use it in their HDCP-related projects."

Destroy Entire Websites With Asteroids Bookmarklet 65

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday September 29, 2010 @02:50AM from the take-that,-ads-with-sound dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Have you ever visited a website and been so frustrated by the content, layout, or adverts that you'd love to destroy it? Well, now you can. If you head on over to the erkie GitHub page there's a JavaScript bookmarklet you can drag and add to your bookmarks toolbar. Then just visit any website and click the bookmarklet. An Asteroids-style ship should appear that you can move around with the arrow keys. Press space and it will start firing bullets which destroy page content."

Comment No one denies that the earth is getting warmer (Score 1) 1657

by terevos on Friday July 30, 2010 @09:21AM (#33081702) Attached to: Global Warming 'Undeniable,' Report Says

No one denies that the earth is getting warmer, but there are people that deny the cause of it (natural vs. human). "Global Warming" describes the ideology that humans are the cause of the earth getting warmer.

Submission + - Google Open Sources VP8 Video Codec (openvideoalliance.org)

Submitted by soDean on Wednesday May 19, 2010 @01:19PM

soDean writes: Google, Mozilla and Opera announced a new open video format today called WebM. As part of the WebM project, Google is is freely licensing the VP8 compression technology. This new open video format will use a modified Matroska video container (.webm). WebM format support is available today in Firefox, Chromium, and Opera development builds. All videos that are 720p or larger, uploaded to YouTube after May 19th, will be be encoded in WebM. The Open Video Alliance has the full scoop.

Submission + - Google Wave Open to All (informationweek.com)

Submitted by tonyfugere on Wednesday May 19, 2010 @01:11PM

tonyfugere writes: After a year of testing by invitation only, Google Wave has been opened to the public. From what I have seen, it looks like it could be beneficial for documenting brainstorming sessions beyond simple instant messaging protocols. It is also great for entertaining the masses.

Submission + - Google Shopping List has been broken since April 4 (google.com)

Submitted by terevos on Thursday April 29, 2010 @10:00AM

terevos writes: Google Shopping List has been broken since the beginning of April and has not done anything about it. There are a number of people who were using it to track wishlists and book recommendations, etc. It's now a month later and there has been no response and no indication that they are working on it. Do you have a Google Shopping list? And are you having trouble accessing it? The Google Help forum is here. Add your comments to the list if you're also experiencing this issue.

Comment Working on it != it's coming out (Score 1) 2

by terevos on Friday April 23, 2010 @01:16PM (#31957506) Attached to: Google Backpedals on Turn-By-Turn GPS for iPhone

Working on it != it's coming out

I'm certain that they were working on bringing it to the iPhone.. however, that does not mean it will definitely come out for the iPhone. No lying involved.

Submission + - 4G iPhone Misplacer Invited to Germany for Beer (erictric.com)

Submitted by eldavojohn on Friday April 23, 2010 @09:17AM

eldavojohn writes: You may recall the hapless engineer who left a fairly sensitive iPhone at a bar recently. Well, in a PR stunt, Lufthansa has invited him to visit Germany on their dime after citing his latest Facebook status, "I underestimated how good German beer is" as well as his obvious passion for German beer and culture. It's not clear if Gray Powell has decided to "pick up where he last left off" (as the letter puts it). I know what my decision would be.

Submission + - Caltech Lab "Grows" Cheap, Efficient Solar Panels (wired.com)

Submitted by thomst on Friday April 23, 2010 @06:59AM

thomst writes: Wired publishes a photo tour of the Atwater Research Group's lab-scale factory for "growing" a new kind of solar panel. Based on silicon "wires" embedded in a rubber matrix, the new technology uses only 1% as much silicon as traditional solar panels, is more efficient, requires fewer hazardous materials, and is a lot less wasteful of expensive silicon. Pretty cool stuff.

Submission + - It's official: Dell to offer pre-installed Ubuntu

Submitted by OSS_ilation on Tuesday May 01, 2007 @08:52AM

OSS_ilation writes: In a joint statement released today, Dell Inc. and Canonical Ltd. announced that Dell will now offer laptops and desktop computers pre-installed with Ubuntu Linux 7.04. The computers will be sold via Dell's web site, said Canonical's director of operations Jane Silber. "We have worked with Dell to get Ubuntu fully supported and fully certified on Dell hardware," she said. "Ubuntu has the full endorsement of Dell."

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