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The Truth About New Jet Pack Hype 205

Posted by Zonk from the up-in-the-sky-it's-a-bird-it's-a-plane dept.
An anonymous reader writes "This week a sub-$100,000 rocket belt was unveiled and will be on sale this summer, but that's the sad thing: it's still not a real jet pack. Here's a fascinating inside look at the human-flight industry, full of law-suit scandals, technical difficulties, fuel-economy woes and endless delays. The good news? It all points to the next generation of rocketeer research, with real applications for medical rescue and military technology actually coming on the horizon. From the article: 'With a little patience, and a little funding, we could actually have the pleasure of grumbling over regulatory issues we never dreamed possible. Like being limited to specific kinds of air strips, because the jet strapped to your back is classified by the FAA as an ultralight. Or being required to wear a ballistic parachute, because Amarena's Thunderjet design could reach altitudes as high as 10,000 feet (and, for the record, speeds of up to 160 mph, provided someone can solve wind-resistance issues).'"
Biotech

Caltech Creates Electronic Nose 154

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the smells-like dept.
eldavojohn writes "Researchers have created an electronic nose that can detect odor and identify which odors are a concern to it. From the article, 'The Lewis Group a division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Caltech have a working model of an electronic nose. The efforts of Caltech scientists has led to an array of simple, readily fabricated chemically sensitive conducted polymer film. An array of broadly-cross reactive sensors respond to a variety of odors. However, the pattern of differential responses across the array produces a unique pattern for each odorant. The electronic nose can identify, classify and quantify when necessary the vapor or odor that poses a concern or threat.'"
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft on Linux and Windows Interoperability (technet.com)

Submitted by markstinson
markstinson writes: I thought many would find it entertaining. Time to spread some more jam on that Microsoft & Novell sandwich. It's the latest from Microsoft's Port 25 on "Linux and Windows Interoperability: On the Metal and On the Wire" giving at both OSCON in Portland and at LinuxWorld in San Francisco. It even comes with slides.
http://port25.technet.com/archive/2007/08/13/Inter operab-on-the-metal-and-on-the-wire.aspx
NASA

Submission + - Is Clean Air causing Global Warming?

Submitted by LightSail
LightSail writes: In a startling study, NASA adds another possible cause for global warming: Clean Air. Read at http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0703/26sunscre en/ Aerosol dust has dropped 20% since 1991, leading to a significant increase of in sunlight reaching the ground. Even more interesting is that the sunlight decreased steadily from 1960 to 1990. This Global Dimming would have helped temperatures to stay stable despite increased green house gas levels. Then the increased sunlight would add to the slight increase due to green house gases and elevate the global tempters. The failure to account for the increased sunlight in global warming computer models has lead to the hysterical over-reaction by environmentalists. They over-state the effects of green house gases: they missed what may the most important climate changing factor- clean air and sunshine
Media

Submission + - Council of the EU now supports Linux

Submitted by Daveski_2
Daveski_2 writes: An update to the previous story http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/31/ 1950225 titled ' Council of the EU Says "We Cannot Support Linux"'

Previously the Council stated on its FAQ that
'The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union can be viewed on Microsoft Windows and Macintosh platforms. We cannot support Linux in a legal way. So the answer is: No support for Linux.'

Which has now been changed to
'The live streaming media service of the Council of the European Union can be viewed on Microsoft Windows and Macintosh platforms. The open source community can follow the public events in the Council, broadcasted through video streaming on the Internet, via means of an open source player like VLC which is available at no cost on the Internet and which is running on several platforms as e.g. MS WINDOWS as well as several LINUX distributions.'
Google

Submission + - Google Mail can be down up to a whole working day!

Submitted by
VincenzoRomano
VincenzoRomano writes: "While browsing one of the Google Apps pages I have found that they guarantee

99.9% uptime for email

Unless maths is an opinion, this yelds to a yearly downtime for about 8 hours and 45 minutes a year. Which in turn becomes 1 working day from the end user perspective. With no service and possible lost emails.
While this could make sense for a small ISP, it doesn't for such a giant, even if they (almost) clearly and unanbiguously state it.
So either this is a typo or an outdated piece of information, or they seriously think that GMail can stay down that long and still be an acceptable service level agreement.

For the sake of completeness, 99.99% uptime equals to little more than 52 minutes a year with no service and 99.999% uptime gives you a maximum of 5 minutes and 15 seconds of unavailability in a year."
Linux Business

Submission + - Desktop Linux Gotchas

Submitted by
stinkymountain
stinkymountain writes: "Desktop Linux isn't exactly a no-brainer for corporate users, as least not yet. An article in Network World http://www.networkworld.com/techinsider/2007/03260 7-guide-linux-migration-tips.html. lists six different issues that need to be addressed before desktop Linux can be successfully deployed. That includes everything from addressing end users fears about their pet macros not working to making sure basic corporate apps are supported to ironing out links between the desktop OS and backend directories."
Google

Google Antiphishing Site Exposed Private User Data 69

Posted by kdawson from the self-phishing dept.
Juha-Matti Laurio writes "Google has removed a few user names and passwords posted inadvertently to a phishing blacklist it compiles and makes publicly available on the Web. This information was submitted to Google by Firefox users with the browser's internal antiphishing toolbar. This feature, developed in cooperation with Google, enables users to report potential phishing sites to Google's blacklist database. Google has reportedly implemented a new mechanism detecting login data in submitted URLs to prevent sensitive information from getting posted to the list." The article notes that news of this minor lapse may obscure the ongoing problem of sensitive data exposed on the Web and findable via Google and other search services.

Fear of Snakes May Have Driven Pre-Human Evolution 553

Posted by Hemos from the snakes-on-a-plane dept.
Krishna Dagli writes "An evolutionary arms race between early snakes and mammals triggered the development of improved vision and large brains in primates, a radical new theory suggests. The idea, proposed by Lynne Isbell, an anthropologist at the University of California, Davis, suggests that snakes and primates share a long and intimate history, one that forced both groups to evolve new strategies as each attempted to gain the upper hand. Early primates developed a better eye for color, detail and movement and the ability to see in three dimensions — traits that are important for detecting threats at close range. Humans are descended from those same primates. "

DS Sells 20 million, 17 Million More by March 2007 115

Posted by Hemos from the surprising-success dept.
Wowzer writes "Nintendo announced today that sales of its hand-held, dual-screened video game player, the Nintendo DS, have topped 20 million worldwide (guesstimates say 21,270,000). Nintendo expects DS (Lite) sales to be 17 million between April 2006 and March 2007. From today's financial report: 'The company raised its full-year sales forecast of the DS handheld game players to 17 million units for the year ending March 2007, up from 16 million unit sales projection made in May. Sales of DS game titles are projected to rise to 75 million units, from 70 million.' The report refers to PSP owners as just combat-game fans, while the DS is said to target a wider audience with more diverse games such as the 6 million seller Nintendogs." I will say, I was very skeptical when I first heard about the DS and the split screen — but having played a number of different games, I've found I like it. But I have not played Nintendogs, unlike some other people I know.

Colorado Sheriffs To WarDrive For Safety 297

Posted by Zonk from the for-great-justice dept.
rwx writes "The Sheriff's Department in Douglas County, Colorado says it's going to start warning computer users that their networks may be vulnerable to hackers. It plans on equipping its patrol cars with devices that detect unprotected computer networks, and distributing brochures to computer users in vulnerable areas, instructing them on how to password protect their networks."

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