emaveneau - Slashdot User

London Stock Exchange To Abandon Windows 438

Posted by timothy on Friday July 03, 2009 @09:24AM from the don't-weld-shut-the-doors-then dept.

BBCWatcher writes "Computerworld's Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols reports that the London Stock Exchange is abandoning its Microsoft Windows-based trading platform: 'Anyone who was ever fool enough to believe that Microsoft software was good enough to be used for a mission-critical operation had their face slapped this September when the LSE's Windows-based TradElect system brought the market to a standstill for almost an entire day .... Sources at the LSE tell me to this day that the problem was with TradElect ...'"

iTunes DRM-Free Files Contain Personal Info 693

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday January 13, 2009 @03:39AM from the musical-steganography dept.

r2k writes "Apple's iTunes Plus files are DRM-free, but sharing the files on P2P networks may be an extremely bad idea. A report published by CNet highlights the fact that the account information and email address of the iTunes account holder is hidden inside each and every DRM-free download. I checked, and I found I couldn't access the information using an ID3 tag editor, but using Notepad I found my email address stored inside the audio file itself."

Submission + - Hacking my Passport

Submitted by

choongiri

on Tuesday November 14, 2006 @05:55PM

choongiri writes: "I recently renewed my UK passport, and the new one contains an RFID chip. I have read lots of discussion here and elsewhere about the potential security implications of RFID in passports, and that got me wondering — what would it take to hack my passport? I know very little about how RFID works, so how would I go about reading the data that is held on my passport, and testing it to see if it can really be read with the cover closed, from across the room, and so on? Have any slashdotters tried reading their own passport RFID chips? Finally, is it really true that I could microwave my passport for a couple of seconds to deactivate the chip, and what would the implications of this be for me crossing borders. I live in Canada, so crossing into the US is an issue."

Submission + - MS Patent Applications Reveal Search Technology

Submitted by

eldavojohn

on Sunday November 05, 2006 @04:11PM

eldavojohn writes: "In the roughly 90 patents they applied for on November 2, 2006, Microsoft reveals that it is apparently pushing its research in the search engine market. There are a few patents that reveal improved ranking methods and document classification but the real interesting ones revolve around linking related queries, optimizing search, identifying results that are spam and using a Bayesian classifier to measure feedback from the user. If that's not enough, there's even a few I don't quite understand. Another notable Microsoft application for a patent is the model for assisting children in authoring stories so you can't accuse Microsoft of not thinking of the children. Microsoft regularly applies for many patents but never so many revolving around search."

Submission + - funding cut for Arecibo observatory

Submitted by

satorchi

on Sunday November 05, 2006 @04:10PM

satorchi writes: "In a recent Senior Review conducted by the National Science Foundation, a panel of experts recommended the reduction of funding to Arecibo Observatory, the world's largest radio telescope. Unless other sources of funding are found, Arecibo faces severe cuts in its program, with the prospect of closure around the year 2011.

Development of the global project called the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is cited as a reason to decommission Arecibo, but with the SKA coming online around the year 2020, closure of Arecibo in 2011 is some ten years premature. Until SKA is up and running, Arecibo remains the world's most sensitive radiotelescope."

Submission + - Use Oracle skills to quickly learn DB2

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 03, 2006 @01:22PM

An anonymous reader writes: There are many similarities between Oracle and DB2. This article shows you how to use your current knowledge of Oracle 10g to quickly gain skills in IBM DB2 9 for Linux, UNIX, and Windows.

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