Submission + - Nintendo Power's final cover (arstechnica.com)
skade88 writes: Ars Technica has a review of the last ever Nintendo power. Its bitter sweet seeing a part of my childhood ending.
Submission + - Firefox 20 Will Finally Fix Porn Mode (ehsanakhgari.org)
darthcamaro writes: Unlike every other major browser vendor, Mozilla today does not allow users to have their private porn mode browser window open at the same time as a regular browser window. That's now set to change. This is a flaw that has been in Bugzilla since 2008 and has been the subject of heated discussion for years.
Submission + - Would you buy a Linux smartphone? (networkworld.com)
colinneagle writes: I was a huge, huge fan of Maemo – a Debian-based Linux distro focused on phones, such as the amazing Nokia N900 (the old Linux-powered one with a keyboard... you know, the one that Nokia killed off because they hate awesome things). So when Nokia stopped working on Maemo... and then stopped working on Meego (the successor to Maemo), I was, to put it mildly, bummed out.
Luckily, a rag-tag group of engineers (who seem to feel the same way about Maemo/Meego that I do) left Nokia and started their own company to continue this important work. That company, Jolla, has just introduced the first version of its OS, named "Sailfish." And, here is why all nerds should care about this: You get full, RPM-based package management. On your phone. You see, Sailfish is based on a project called "Mer." Mer is based on MeeGo. And MeeGo utilized RPM as the package management system. (There's your technological genealogy lesson for the day.)
In short, there are plenty of apps. And, from a tech-nerd perspective, it has all the right goodies.
But they've got one other thing to offer that looks, well, pretty damned slick. They call it "true multitasking."The idea is simple. Running apps can be pinned to your main home screen as small-ish tiles. So you can keep interacting with multiple apps at the same time, without needing to switch back and forth between a bunch of full-screen apps. Which, at least for a demo, sounds like something I very much want on my phone.
Luckily, a rag-tag group of engineers (who seem to feel the same way about Maemo/Meego that I do) left Nokia and started their own company to continue this important work. That company, Jolla, has just introduced the first version of its OS, named "Sailfish." And, here is why all nerds should care about this: You get full, RPM-based package management. On your phone. You see, Sailfish is based on a project called "Mer." Mer is based on MeeGo. And MeeGo utilized RPM as the package management system. (There's your technological genealogy lesson for the day.)
In short, there are plenty of apps. And, from a tech-nerd perspective, it has all the right goodies.
But they've got one other thing to offer that looks, well, pretty damned slick. They call it "true multitasking."The idea is simple. Running apps can be pinned to your main home screen as small-ish tiles. So you can keep interacting with multiple apps at the same time, without needing to switch back and forth between a bunch of full-screen apps. Which, at least for a demo, sounds like something I very much want on my phone.
Submission + - Wal-mart files a formal complaint about employee demands for fair wages (cnn.com)
ourlovecanlastforeve writes: In a delicious spout of irony Wal-Mart has filed a complaint with an unnamed federal agency claiming unfairness of actions by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union and its subsidiary known as OURWalmart; that they are trying to force the store into collective bargaining.
Submission + - Young Students Hiding Academic Talent to Avoid Bullying
jones_supa writes: "The recent anti-bullying survey conducted by ABA brings up some interesting findings. According to it, more than 90% of the 1,000 11-16 year-olds surveyed said they had been bullied or seen someone bullied for being too intelligent or talented. Almost half of children and young people (49.5%) have played down a talent for fear of being bullied, rising to 53% among girls. One in 10 (12%) said they had played down their ability in science and almost one in five girls (18.8%) and more than one in 10 boys (11.4%) are deliberately underachieving in maths – to evade bullying. Worryingly, this means our children and young people are shying away from academic achievement for fear of victimisation."
Submission + - Quitting MacBook Pro For Chromebook (infoworld.com)
snydeq writes: "Simon Phipps provides an in-depth account of an ongoing shift from a MacBook Pro to a Chromebook. ' My experiences using a Chromebook for a month have been so good I believe it deserves serious consideration. ... The Chromebook line is probably the most successful Linux desktop/laptop computer we've seen to date. Most of the software on the device is open source and it relies heavily on open standards. The options for updating it yourself are openly discussed, and enterprising hackers have even loaded full GNU/Linux distributions onto it. ... It reminds me very much of the experience of adjusting to thin client computing five years ago. I can imagine it fitting easily into a corporate environment, especially using the administrative control features Google sells for business users. Businesses open to using a thin client desktop should be evaluating Chromebooks and Chromeboxes — they are today's open source equivalent of yesterday's proprietary thin clients and Sun Rays.'"
Submission + - The depraved, insane games lurking in the underworld of Steam Greenlight (redbull.co.uk)
An anonymous reader writes: Steam Greenlight's been up and running for a few months, and there are now hundreds of pitches for games on the community site for fans to vote on. Some of them are impressive, high concept 3D games, and as this article points out, some of them are most definitely not. You can find everything from jousting dishwashers to civil war simulators where you play a fish trying to topple Gaddafi — and if enough people vote for them, Steam will actually put them up for sale.
Submission + - NetFlix caught stealing DivX subtiles (google.com)
An anonymous reader writes: NetFlix release it's service in Finland and was caught stealing movie subtitles from local DivX community site.
How were they caught? NetFlix forgot to remove endorsement to the pirate site from the subtitles ;)
How were they caught? NetFlix forgot to remove endorsement to the pirate site from the subtitles
Submission + - Kaspersky's Exploit-Proof OS Leaves Security Experts Skeptical (csoonline.com)
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 + - Apple and Swiss Federal Railways reach agreement over iOS 6 clock design (edibleapple.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Back in late September, Apple received a lot of criticism after it was discovered that the clock design it used in iOS 6 on the iPad was essentially the same as a Hans Hilfiker design to which both the trademark and copyright were owned by the Swiss Federal Railways service. Apple had not paid for the right to use said design but rather implemented it with no permission.
Now, a few weeks later, the two sides have reportedly reached a licensing agreement.
Now, a few weeks later, the two sides have reportedly reached a licensing agreement.
Submission + - MapReduce Making Further Inroads in Academia (datanami.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Most conversations about Hadoop and MapReduce tend to filter in from enterprise quarters, but if the recent uptick in scholarly articles extolling its benefit for scientific and technical computing applications is any indication, the research world might have found its next open source darling...
Submission + - iPhone 5 to be revealed by Apple on September 12 (cnet.com)
sw_crafter writes: Apple is holding an event on September 12 in San Francisco, during which the iPhone 5 is likely to be revealed. Various rumors and/or leaks seem to indicate that the new cell phone may have 4G LTE, a larger screen, a larger battery, and a new 8-pin docking connector. Other changes to the layout of various parts of the phone are likely, such as the headphone jack position and the camera(s).
Submission + - 'Magic Carpet' Could Help Prevent Falls Among the Elderly
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Falls are a major cause of injury and death among over 70s and account for more than 50% of hospital admissions for accidental injury, so being able to identify changes in people's walking patterns and gait in the natural environment, such as in a corridor in a nursing home, could help identity mobility problems early on. Now BBC reports that researchers have shown off a "magic carpet" that can detect falls and may even predict mobility problems. Beneath the carpet is a mesh of optical fibers that detect and plot movement as pressure bends them, changing the light detected at the carpet's edges. These deflected light patterns help electronics "learn" walking patterns and detect if they are deteriorating. With over 19,700 deathes in the elderly in the US in 2008 from unintentional fall injuries and 2.2 million nonfatal fall injuries among older adults treated in emergency departments, spotting subtle changes in a person’s walking habits may help identify changes that might go unnoticed by family members or care-givers. “The carpet can gather a wide range of information about a person’s condition; from biomechanical to chemical sensing of body fluids, enabling holistic sensing to provide an environment that detects and responds to changes in patient condition,” says Patricia Scully from The University of Manchester’s Photon Science Institute. “The carpet can be retrofitted at low cost, to allow living space to adapt as the occupiers’ needs evolve – particularly relevant with an aging population and for those with long term disabilities – and incorporated non-intrusively into any living space or furniture surface such as a mattress or wall that a patient interacts with.""
Submission + - The Julia Language hits a new speed milestone (walkingrandomly.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Julia, a new language for technical computing, has recently hit a new speed milestone. Across all of its micro-benchmarks, Julia is at worst only 2x slower than the compiled C equivalents. That’s compiled language performance from a MATLAB-like scripting language.
Submission + - TextMate 2 released as open source (macromates.com)
DaBombDotCom writes: Allan Odgaard, the author of the popular text editor for Mac OS X, TextMate has posted on his blog:
"Today I am happy to announce that you can find the source for TextMate 2 on GitHub.
I’ve always wanted to allow end-users to tinker with their environment, my ability to do this is what got me excited about programming in the first place, and it is why I created the bundles concept, but there are limits to how much a bundle can do, and with the still growing user base, I think the best move forward is to open source the program.
The choice of license is GPL 3. This is partly to avoid a closed source fork and partly because the hacker in me wants all software to be free (as in speech), so in a time where our platform vendor is taking steps to limit our freedom, this is my small attempt of countering such trend."
"Today I am happy to announce that you can find the source for TextMate 2 on GitHub.
I’ve always wanted to allow end-users to tinker with their environment, my ability to do this is what got me excited about programming in the first place, and it is why I created the bundles concept, but there are limits to how much a bundle can do, and with the still growing user base, I think the best move forward is to open source the program.
The choice of license is GPL 3. This is partly to avoid a closed source fork and partly because the hacker in me wants all software to be free (as in speech), so in a time where our platform vendor is taking steps to limit our freedom, this is my small attempt of countering such trend."
