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Submission + - Nano safety worries scientists more than public (presscue.com)

Submitted by
Nanotech Coward
Nanotech Coward writes: "The unknown human health and environmental impacts of nanotechnology are a bigger worry for scientists than for the public, according to a new report published today (Nov. 25) in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. The new report was based on a national telephone survey of American households and a sampling of 363 leading U.S. nanotechnology scientists and engineers. It reveals that those with the most insight into a technology with enormous potential — and that is already emerging in hundreds of products — are unsure what health and environmental problems might be posed by the technology."
Portables

Submission + - Panasonic Toughbook CF-30 - not your average noteb (dealgiant.co.uk)

Submitted by
sahernasir
sahernasir writes: "This notebook has been specially designed to endure rugged work conditions, having an extremely strong casing shell and high level of shock prevention for the Hard Disk. Keeping in mind external usage it also features a touchscreen display which can be read even under direct sunlight.

Basic Specs include Intel Core Duo 1.6 GHz, 80 GB Hard Drive, 512 Ram and Windows XP Operating System.

The downside of this machine is it being slightly overweight and high"
Businesses

Submission + - Looters List by Nation / Business?

Submitted by g8orade
g8orade writes: I just read this story about a new type of solar panel's arrival in the near future. When a posting points to an accelerated disruption in a fundamental industry, it would be interesting to know the relation to and potential interference from taxing agencies or other entrenched interest (in addition to the direct competition).
  • OLPC vs. Wintel / Apple, seems mostly the direct competition, hardware and OS
  • Electric car vs. gas car, (gas tax pays for roads, run by the state)
  • Tax Reform, harder to manipulate the tax code, provide favors to any group
What are the best news sources (world wide, nation state by nation state) to understand whom one is likely to encounter when a given industry will be disrupted, because they are funded by the sale of the disrupted product? (In the case of the solar panels, Oil, Coal, Natural Gas, and what is funded currently by taxing them? Who besides them directly has power based on them that would decline?).
Programming

Submission + - Good code documentation generation software

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Natural Docs looks like a nice generator for code documentation. It's multi-language, with a more natural commenting style than Javadoc. It seems to be in fairly steady development, and has a slick homepage.

A quick browse of Wikepedia reveals a zillion documentation generators. This isn't really a surprise — once again the OSS ecosystem thoroughly fills a technological niche! Robodoc and Doxygen are other leading players. Wikipedia is (rightly) very neutral in its comparison. I'd be interested to learn if there is a reason to prefer one more than the others (say, from the point of view of wanting to support a new language).
The Internet

Submission + - Indian firm touts 'alternative internet'

Submitted by Stony Stevenson
Stony Stevenson writes: An Indian technology firm has unveiled details of what it claims is a virus and spam-free "internet alternative". NetAlter Software said that it has patented a "true P2P" system that offers a domain-less alternative to the web and the internet. The company said that the NetAlter system will "offer a secure, trusted, spam-free and virus-free software and network for end users and businesses".

The system will also provide a collaborative platform for developers and service providers to share code or content and do business in the network.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Wireless tickles computer buyers' fancies

Submitted by Stony Stevenson
Stony Stevenson writes: A survey of over 9,000 computer users in 18 countries by Ipsos MORI has found that wireless connectivity is the most important buying consideration for today's buyers, beating enhanced processing power, portable connectivity and even the internet.

"There is only so much more power people need from their processors. The priorities are now about working smarter, not faster," said Marcus Harvey, director of the consumer printer division at Lexmark, which sponsored the research.
Security

Submission + - Chinese military hacks Pentagon (ft.com)

Submitted by teh_commodore
teh_commodore writes: FinancialTimes online tells us of a security breach of the Pentagon at the hands of the Chinese PLA in June. Officials are calling this "the most successful cyber attack on the US defence department."

"The PLA has demonstrated the ability to conduct attacks that disable our system...and the ability in a conflict situation to re-enter and disrupt on a very large scale," said a former official, who said the PLA had penetratedthenetworksof US defence companies and think-tanks. Hackers from numerous locations in China spent several months probing the Pentagon system before overcoming its defences, according to people familiar with the matter.
Security

Submission + - Sony in new root kit investigation (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by szlwzl
szlwzl writes: Looks like sony's rootkit is still causing problems, some of their fingerprint scanning usb drives are installing the same rootkit as featured on their cds last year.
Space

Submission + - Best Space Photo captured at Mount Palomar (letsgodigital.org)

Submitted by Ilse Jurrien
Ilse Jurrien writes: This is a scoop, check out LetsGoDigital A team of astronomers led by Cambridge University have taken some of the best space photos of the stars that are sharper than anything produced by the Hubble telescope, at 50 thousandths of the cost. The researchers, from the University of Cambridge and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), used a technique called "Lucky Imaging" to take the most detailed space photos of stars and nebulae ever produced — using a camera based on the ground at Mount Palomar. Space Photos from ground based telescopes are usually blurred by the Earth's atmosphere — the same effect that makes the stars appear to twinkle when we look at them with the naked eye. http://www.letsgodigital.org/en/16544/best-space-p hoto-picture/
The Internet

Submission + - Public rallies behind free wireless broadband

Submitted by thefickler
thefickler writes: A proposal to deliver free wireless broadband to 95% of the US population is finding public support, even as it looks like it will be rejected by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). According to the company behind the proposal, M2Z Networks, more than 1000 people from 49 states have written to the FCC in an attempt to reverse a draft order by FCC Chairman Martin that is believed to deny the application.
Microsoft

Submission + - France rejects OOXML but proposes convergence (vnunet.fr)

Submitted by
neutrino38
neutrino38 writes: "Following internal meetings, the French national standardization organisation AFNOR rejected OOXML standard [fr] as member of the relevant ISO comitee.

The decision was mainly based on the fact that an equivalent standard ODF is already approved. However, in a detailed comment, the organisation proposes to work on a convergence path:

OOXML would be split into two parts, the core would be a simplified version that would be rendered ISO compliant on date format metric system adoption, by adoptiong other existing relevant XML DTD already in force and by excluding the proprietary VML vector graphic description.

Then, ODF would be revised to converge with this Core-OOXML. Finally, compatibility with existing Microsoft documents would be described in a Extended OOXML which would not be mandatory as a standard."
Microsoft

Submission + - Eric S. Raymond on Microsoft's bahavior (opensource.org)

Submitted by
walterbyrd
walterbyrd writes: "According to ESR's blog: "Microsoft's behavior in the last few months with respect to OOXML has been egregious. They haven't stopped at pushing a "standard" that is divisive, technically bogus, and an obvious tool of monopoly lock-in; they have resorted to lying, ballot-stuffing, committee-packing, and outright bribery to ram it through the ISO standardization process in ways that violate ISO's own guidelines wholesale.""

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