Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×

Submission + - Haiku debates kernel switch to Linux... or not. (osnews.com)

Submitted by taikedz
taikedz writes: A very interesting discussion is taking place in the Haiku mailing list. A developer has created a working prototype implementation of the BeOS API layer on top of the Linux kernel, and he is wondering if the project is worth pursuing.

Both 'sides' make a lot of compelling arguments, and it gives a lot of insight into decisions that went into the Haiku project, both past and present.

Submission + - How Facebook could accidentally make its engineers into military targets (thebulletin.org) 1

Submitted by Lasrick
Lasrick writes: Adam Henshke and Patrick Lin write that because of a lack of clear rules for cyberwarfare, technology workers could find themselves fair game in enemy attacks and counterattacks. 'If they participate in military cyberoperations—intentionally or not—employees at Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Sprint, AT&T, Vodaphone, and many other companies may find themselves considered “civilians directly participating in hostilities” and therefore legitimate targets of war, according to the legal definitions of the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols.' This is a fascinating read about the myriad questions that cybersecurity raises--among them: Would nations ever target Google engineers if a cyberattack was launched with gmail? Could a company be justified in launching it's own military operations if it were under cyberattack from a hostile country? Great read.

Submission + - Northrop Grumman Gives Early Look at its XS-1 Experimental Spaceplane Design (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: Northrop Grumman, in partnership with Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic, has unveiled the preliminary design it is developing as part of DARPA’s XS-1 Spaceplane project. Looking like a windowless update of a 1960s Dyna Soar orbiter, it’s the next step in producing launch systems that will dramatically reduce the costs of getting into orbit.

Submission + - Future hack: New cybersecurity tool predicts breaches before they happen (dailydot.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new research paper outlines new software that scans and scrapes web sites from today and the past, learns patters about what happens prior to a security breach, and then accurately predicts what websites will be hacked in the future. The new tool is up to 66% accuracy.

The classifier is focused on Web server malware or, put more simply, the hacking and hijacking of a website that is then used to attack all its visitors.

If it is possible to accurately predict which sites and servers are most at-risk, it becomes easier to keep an eye on and warn against dangerous websites, the researchers say. Website operators can be alerted ahead of an attack, and search engines can easily know which websites to keep an eye on for potential exclusion from search results.

The algorithm is designed to automatically detect whether a Web server is likely to become malicious in the future by analyzing a wide array of the site’s characteristics: For example, what software does the server run? What keywords are present? How are the Web pages structured? If your website has a whole lot in common with another website that ended up hacked, the classifier will predict a gloomy future.

The classifier itself always updates and evolves, the researchers wrote. It can “quickly adapt to emerging threats.”

Submission + - Would Scottish independence mean the end of UK's nuclear arsenal? (thebulletin.org)

Submitted by Lasrick
Lasrick writes: The referendum on Scottish independence on September 18th affects more than just residents of the United Kingdom. All of the UK's nuclear deterrent is located in Scotland (no wonder they want independence), and Alex Salmond and the Scottish government have pledged to safely remove and permanently ban nuclear weapons from Scottish territory within the first term of a newly independent parliament. Although the polls seem not to favor Scottish independence, you would think the British government would have some sort of contingency plan to quickly and safely remove these weapons from Scottish soil. Nope. There's no contingency plan.

Submission + - Leg Exoskeleton to sit anywhere without requiring Chair

Submitted by rtoz
rtoz writes: A switzerland based start-up company has created a low cost leg Exoskeleton that allows you to Sit anywhere. It is named as "Chairless Chair".

This device offers a wearable alternative for work areas where chairs or stools would take up too much floor space.

According to the makers of this device, the Chairless Chair offers better posture than a conventional chair by keeping the back straight.

Freedom of movement of the user is not reduced by this device. The users can walk, run, and climb stairs while wearing this device.

Although the focus is on production lines, the device has many other potential applications in our daily life.

Submission + - Dramatic Shifts in Manufacturing Costs Are Driving Companies to US, Mexico (yahoo.com)

Submitted by hackingbear
hackingbear writes: According to the new Boston Consulting Group Global Manufacturing Cost-Competitiveness Index, the often perceived as low-cost manufacturing nations — such as China, Brazil, Russia, and the Czech Republic — are no longer much cheaper than the U.S. In some cases, they are estimated to be even more expensive. Chinese manufacturing wages have nearly quintupled since 2004, while Mexican wages have risen by less than 50 percent in U.S. dollar terms, contrary to our long-standing misconception that their labors were being slaved. In the same period, the U.S. wage is essentially flat, whereas Mexican wages have risen only 67%. Not all countries are taking full advantage of their low-cost advantages, however. The report found that global competiveness in manufacturing is undermined in nations such as India and Indonesia by several factors, including logistics, the overall ease of doing business, and inflexible labor markets.

Submission + - Broadband Subscribers Eclipsing Cable TV Subscribers (wired.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: High-speed internet has become an everyday tool for most people, and cord-cutters have dramatically slowed the growth of cable TV, so this had to happen eventually: broadband internet subscribers now outnumber cable TV subscribers among the top cable providers in the U.S. According to a new report, these providers account for 49,915,000 broadband subscribers, edging out the number of cable subscribers by about 5,000. As Re/code's Peter Kafka notes, this means that for better or worse, the cable guys are now the internet guys. Kafka says their future is "selling you access to data pipes, and pay TV will be one of the things you use those pipes for."

Submission + - The Quiet Before The Next IT Revolution

Submitted by snydeq
snydeq writes: Now that the technologies behind our servers and networks have stabilized, IT can look forward to a different kind of constant change, writes Paul Venezia. 'In IT, we are actually seeing a bit of stasis. I don't mean that the IT world isn't moving at the speed of light — it is — but the technologies we use in our corporate data centers have progressed to the point where we can leave them be for the foreseeable future without worry that they will cause blocking problems in other areas of the infrastructure. What all this means for IT is not that we can finally sit back and take a break after decades of turbulence, but that we can now focus less on the foundational elements of IT and more on the refinements. ... In essence, we have finally built the transcontinental railroad, and now we can use it to completely transform our Wild West.'

Submission + - Nintendo's 'Virtual Boy' HMD Could Get a New Game 19 Years After Discontinuation (roadtovr.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: ZeroTransform, an indie VR studio, is running a Kickstarter for Vanguard V, a slick action-arcade title for virtual reality (http://kck.st/UzXcuJ). Far beyond the Kickstarter's goal of $198,000 is a stretch goal to develope a version of the game for Nintendo's 'Virtual Boy' head mounted display, nearly two decades after its discontinuation. After uncovering 'The VB Sacred Tech Scroll' (http://bit.ly/1uk6eeN), a 95 page document that spills the secrets of the Virtual Boy's hardware/software interface, ZeroTransform's Tech Director, says the studio is ready, willing, and able to create a version of Vanguard V that will run on genuine Virtual Boy hardware (http://bit.ly/1r5PLum).

Submission + - Injecting Liquid Metal Into Blood Vessels Could Help Kill Tumors

Submitted by KentuckyFC
KentuckyFC writes: One of the most interesting emerging treatments for certain types of cancer aims to starve the tumour to death. The strategy involves destroying or blocking the blood vessels that supply a tumour with oxygen and nutrients. Without its lifeblood, the unwanted growth shrivels up and dies. This can be done by physically blocking the vessels with blood clots, gels, balloons, glue, nanoparticles and so on. However, these techniques have never been entirely successful because the blockages can be washed away by the blood flow and the materials do not always fill blood vessels entirely, allowing blood to flow round them. Now Chinese researchers say they've solved the problem by filling blood vessels with an indium-gallium alloy that is liquid at body temperature. They've tested the idea in the lab on mice and rabbits. Their experiments show that the alloy is relatively benign but really does fill the vessels, blocks the blood flow entirely and starves the surrounding tissue of oxygen and nutrients. The team has also identified some problems such as the possibility of blobs of metal being washed into the heart and lungs. Nevertheless, they say their approach is a promising injectable tumour treatment.

Submission + - Tests Show T-Mobile Smartphones Offer Most Battery Life (laptopmag.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Laptop Mag battery tested the leading phones on all four major U.S. carriers and found that the same models on T-Mobile typically last 1 to 3 hours longer on a charge. This trend is not new, but has continued for over 3 years of testing.

Submission + - Microwave Links: Chicago to New York. The new new thing in 1949! (blogspot.com)

Submitted by sumoinsanity
sumoinsanity writes: Everything old is new again. There has been much fuss about High Frequency Trading firms using microwave links as a new medium for communications. We Slashdot geeks need to be ready to repudiate such such rubbish with the simple truth that it was new 65 years ago next month. I hope you'll forgive the engineering cliffhanger at the end of the article.

Slashdot Top Deals

Receiving a million dollars tax free will make you feel better than being flat broke and having a stomach ache. -- Dolph Sharp, "I'm O.K., You're Not So Hot"

Close