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Comment Re:SOP (Score 3, Interesting) 129

by strick1226 (#36003104) Attached to: RIM Announces BlackBerry 7 OS
The notable difference here is that, unlike the personal computers running ever-changing versions of OS X and Windows, the BlackBerry hardware platform has changed very little over the years. Thanks to a combination of weak, battery-sipping CPU's and a bloated java-based OS It's long been a clunky, rather unresponsive UI if you pressed the devices to do much of anything beyond the basic calendar and messaging apps.

I'd like to think RIM have a chance now that they're finally making some noteworthy changes to the hardware, but it's also entirely possible they're simply too late to the latest-generation smartphone party. If they managed to switch to the QNX platform on their phone devices I bet the investors would be much happier.

I really wonder, though, if they won't just cease making phones and tablets altogether and roll full Android support into BES for corporate environments. Better do it before Google makes a corporate management platform, though! :)

Comment Troubling Signs, at the Very Least (Score 4, Insightful) 305

by strick1226 (#35976774) Attached to: RIM Collapse Beginning?
The fact that the Playbook tablet was released without a native RIM Email client--and also did not include the official BlackBerry Messenger app--made me stop and reconsider just where Research in Motion finds itself these days.

The news that RIM suddenly just renamed BlackBerry OS 6.1 as OS 7 strikes me as an additional sign of desperate moves, too; the OS isn't a major change, as it's not the desired/anticipated move to QNX base or anything.

I used BB's for years, and appreciated them for their excellent email support at the time. The truth is, though, once I had a taste of the Android platform, my days with RIM were over. The nearly-perfect Google data sync and number of applications are big advantages but, for my wife and I, it really came down to the fact that the browser didn't lock up the whole damned phone when a website became unresponsive.

Perhaps they can pull themselves together here--it's not an impossibility--and they're still in much better shape than Microsoft in regards to the smartphone market.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Cellphone Carriers Try to Control Signal Boosters (nytimes.com)

Submitted by digitaldc
digitaldc writes: To boost signal reception, you may need a cellular signal booster, or repeater.

"The devices, which cost from $250 to $1,000, depending on how much they increase a signal, work by first capturing cell signals through an external antenna, ideally affixed to the roof of a dwelling. A coaxial cable then transmits the signal inside the house to an amplifier and internal antenna, which strengthen and retransmit it to cellphones. Before, Mr. Kirkland said, he might have had one or two bars indicating signal strength.

“I can walk around my whole home now with full strength reception,” Sean Kirkland said. “I couldn’t be happier.”

But will Mr. Kirkland’s solution remain legal? In March, CTIA-The Wireless Association, which represents cellular service providers, filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission demanding stricter regulation of signal boosters. The commission is considering whether to let Mr. Kirkland and an estimated one million other homeowners continue to use them.

Submission + - Paper questions whether gravity is a force (nytimes.com)

Submitted by couch_warrior
couch_warrior writes: An article in the NYTimes describes a paper by physicist Erik Verlinde, in which he questions whether gravity is a fundamental force at all. Instead he appears to propose that the effects of gravity are simply the accumulated effects of increases in entropy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/13/science/13gravity.html

While it is not stated in the article, an analogy might be made to the former belief that "fire" was an element. It was easy to observe that when you let the fire out of wood, you were left with ashes (earth). Therefore fire+earth=wood. However, "fire" is simply the aggregate release of energy as the carbon and hydrogen in the wood combine with oxygen and are reduced to a lower entropic state. Gravity, like fire, may not be a "thing" all by itself, but rather a cumulative effect of a net reduction in entropic states.
Networking

Submission + - Wireless PCIe to enable remote graphics cards (techreport.com) 1

Submitted by J. Dzhugashvili
J. Dzhugashvili writes: If you read Slashdot, odds are you already know about WiGig and the 7Gbps wireless networking it promises. The people at Atheros and Wilocity are now working on an interesting application for the spec: wireless PCI Express. In a nutshell, wPCIe enables a PCI Express switch with local and remote components linked by a 60GHz connection. The first applications, which will start sampling next year, will let you connect your laptop to a base station with all kinds of storage controllers, networking controllers, and yes, an external graphics processor. wPCIe works transparently to the operating system, which only sees additional devices connected over PCI Express. And as icing on the cake, wPCie controllers will lets you connect to standard Wi-Fi networks, too.
Iphone

Submission + - Silent recall of iPhone 4 by Apple? (tekgoblin.com) 1

Submitted by tekgoblin
tekgoblin writes: With all of the reception issues and now proximity sensor issues with the iPhone 4, who wouldn't expect a company to recall a defective product. Well Apple has made no mention of a recall but Gizmodo has gotten a report of something like this actually happening. This is a transcript of the actual letter that they received:

I've been following all of the iPhone 4 stuff since I got mine the day before release. I was able to replicate the signal issue. I also had the proximity sensor issue, causing inadvertent mute button pushing. There were a few other software issues I was experiencing so I consulted Apple at the Fifth Avenue store in New York. They replaced my phone. The diagnostic showed that the OS was corrupt and certain utilities were failing. [They claimed that] all phones with a proximity sensor issue were being sent back to Apple for further study. Well, when I got the new phone it was different. It was different hardware. The black [plastic] bezel isn't as black on the new one. I couldn't see the proximity sensor at all on the previous iPhone 4, now I can. The stainless steel band on the new phone is less 'steel-y' and more matte. I've also tried to replicate the signal drop and failure. While I can't say for sure that it is entirely fixed, there is certainly huge improvement. I'm guessing they coated the steel with something, took some black out of the bezel and sent them out without saying too much about it. I also think Apple is willing to warranty a phone for any reason except the signal issue. The guy next to me said that he had to press the home button several times before the phone would come back from stand-by. This happened once. The Apple tech ran the diagnostic, everything was fine. They still replaced his phone. I think they're doing a 'silent recall'.

It would be nice for Apple to publicly apologize for the mistakes they made with the iPhone 4, both their attitudes and non-acknowledgment of the problem in the first place. And to then offer free replacement to people that actually have both of the problems, being reception and proximity. I do not see Apple doing this in the near future, but I do hope that they are still investigating the cause of the issue and not relying on a 'software' fix.
Music

Submission + - Pink Floyd manager: don't stop file-sharing (pcpro.co.uk) 1

Submitted by Barence
Barence writes: The former manager of Pink Floyd has labelled attempts to clamp down on music file-sharing as a "waste of time". "Not only are they a waste of time, they make the law offensive. They are comparable to prohibition in the US in the 1920s," said Peter Jenner, who's now the emeritus president of the International Music Managers' Forum. "It's absurd to expect ordinary members of the public to think about what they're allowed to do [with CDs, digital downloads, etc]... and then ask themselves whether it's legal or not." The comments come as Britain's biggest ISP, BT, said it was confident that Britain's Digital Economy Act — which could result in file-sharers losing their internet connection — would be overturned in the courts, because it doesn't comply with European laws on privacy.
Iphone

Submission + - BlackBerry copies iOS 4 feature in server upgrade (infoworld.com)

Submitted by GMGruman
GMGruman writes: The iPhone usually takes the knocks for not being a secure as a BlackBerry and urged to catch up to BlackBerry capabilities. But it turns out that sometimes the iPhone is ahead in this game and it's BlackBerry-maker Research in Motion that is playing catch-up: RIM today announced an update to its BlackBerry Enterprise Server that adds a feature that Apple's iOS 4.0 already offers: the ability to distinguish between corporate and personal information and manage them separately. That way, if you leave your company and keep your BlackBerry, your pesonal accounts, contacts, and so forth aren't wiped out even as your corporate data is removed.
Hardware

Submission + - Inside the Fake PC Recycling Market (osnews.com) 1

Submitted by
snydeq
snydeq writes: "OSNews' Howard Fosdick reports on the 'fake recycling market' — one in which companies exploit cheap shipping, inexpensive labor, and a lack of safety and environmental law to export computers and other e-waste to China and Africa where it is 'recycled' with a complete lack of environmental and safety rules. 'This trade has become a thriving business. Companies called "fake recyclers" approach well-meaning organizations — charities, churches, and community organizations — and offer to hold a Recycling Day. The charity provides publicity, legitimacy, and a parking lot for the event. On the designated day, well-meaning residents drop off their old electronics for recycling. The fake recycler picks it up in their trucks, hauls it away for shipping, and makes money by exporting it to Chinese or African "recycling" centers. Nobody's the wiser,' Fosdick writes. Of course, the international community has, in fact, devised a set of rules to control e-waste disposal under the Basel Conventions, but the U.S. — 'the international "bad boy" of computer recycling — is one of four countries that have not ratified and do not adhere to these international agreements."
Google

Submission + - Android 2.2 Bests iOS 4 in JavaScript performance (linuxpromagazine.com) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Ars Technica pitted an iPhone 4 against a Froyo-enabled Nexus One and the results are overwhelmingly in Android 2.2's favor. For the test Ars ran both devices through both the SunSpider and V8 benchmarks. Android outperformed iOS 4 in both instances, several times over.
Linux

Adobe (Temporarily?) Kills 64-Bit Flash For Linux 272

Posted by Soulskill from the how-rude dept.
An anonymous reader writes "It seems that with the release of the 10.1 security patches, Adobe has, at least temporarily, killed 64-bit Flash for Linux. The statement says: 'The Flash Player 10.1 64-bit Linux beta is closed. We remain committed to delivering 64-bit support in a future release of Flash Player. No further information is available at this time. Please feel free to continue your discussions on the Flash Player 10.1 desktop forums.' The 64-bit forum has been set to read-only."
Businesses

Why No Billion-Dollar Open Source Companies? 487

Posted by Soulskill from the free-as-in-give-us-money dept.
Glyn Moody writes "If open source is such a success, why aren't there any billion-dollar turnover open source companies? A recent briefing by Red Hat's CEO, Jim Whitehurst, to a group of journalists may provide an answer. Asked why Red Hat wasn't yet a $5 billion company, as he suggested it would be one day, he said getting Red Hat to $5 billion meant 'replacing $50 billion of revenue' currently enjoyed by traditional computer companies. If, as is likely, that's generally true for open source companies, it means they will need to displace around $10 billion of proprietary business in order to achieve a billion-dollar turnover. Few are likely to do that. Perhaps it's time for managers of open source startups to stop chasing the billion-dollar dream. If they don't, they will set unrealistic ambitions for themselves, disappoint their investors, and allow opponents of free software to paint one of its defining successes — saving money — as a failure."
Programming

Submission + - HTML5 vs. Flash: The Case for Flash (infoworld.com) 4

Submitted by
snydeq
snydeq writes: "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner offers 7 reasons why Web designers will remain loyal to Flash for rich Web content, despite 'seductive' new capabilities offered by HTML5. Sure, HTML5 aims to duplicate many of the features that were once the sole province of plug-ins (local disk storage, video display, better rendering, algorithmic drawing, and more) and has high-profile backers in Google and Apple, but as Wayner sees it, this fight is more about designers than it is about technocrats and programmers. And from its sub-pixel resolution, to its developer tools, to its 'write once, play everywhere' functionality, Flash has too much going for it to fall by the wayside. 'The real battle is in the hearts and eyes of the artists who are paid to create incredibly beautiful objects in the span of just a few hours. The designers will make the final determination. As long as Flash and its cousins Flex and Shockwave remain the simplest tools for producing drop-dead gorgeous Websites, they'll keep their place on the Internet.'"

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