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Windows

Vista an Uneasy Sleeper 395

Posted by CmdrTaco from the just-like-most-3-year-olds dept.
Emmy King writes "
One thing we just can't wrap our mind about is the terrible, broken, and completely pitiful support for waking Vista up from a Deep Sleep or hibernation.
Anytime you attempt to wake Vista up from Hibernation or "Deep Sleep" (S3-induced sleep mode), it dies. It's either a BSOD, or a driver error, or a broken network, no DWM, lack of sound... the list goes on, and on. So much for an operating system to "power" the future! (No pun intended!) That's with properly-signed drivers and no buggy software on multiple PCs..."
Software

Novell "Forking" OpenOffice.org 370

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the patent-office-dot-org dept.
l2718 writes to mention that In the wake of their recent deal with Microsoft, Novell has announced a new version of OpenOffice.org which will support Microsoft's planned Office formal, Open XML. From the article: "The translators will be made available as plug-ins to Novell's OpenOffice.org product. Novell will release the code to integrate the Open XML format into its product as open source and submit it for inclusion in the OpenOffice.org project. As a result, end users will be able to more easily share files between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org, as documents will better maintain consistent formats, formulas and style templates across the two office productivity suites."
Businesses

Steam Should Be a Seperate Company? 73

Posted by Zonk from the accepting-applications-via-pneumatic-tube dept.
simoniker writes "As part of a larger in-depth interview over at Gamasutra, 3D Realms' Scott Miller has called for Valve's Steam digital distribution service to spin off as a separate company, suggesting: 'I would rather there emerge a leader in the market that isn't associated with a game company.' He further adds: 'I'm not a big fan of using Steam, because I'm not a fan of a strong competitor of ours having access to our download stats and revenue totals. I'd rather keep that private. Not only that, but we're lining their pockets as well.'"
Wireless Networking

Submission + - What's not illegal in Singapore?

Submitted by jginspace
jginspace writes: Surprised this hasn't been posted, a 17-year-old from Singapore is is facing three years' jailtime for accessing his neighbour's wireless network.

Yup, the neighbour complained and now the unfortunate Tan Jia Luo is facing charges under the computer misuse act and is scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday.

It must be great having such lovely neighbours.
Microsoft

Microsoft Debuts MySpace-Like IT Site 181

Posted by Zonk from the get-together-and-talk-cisco dept.
snib writes "Microsoft has launched Aggreg8, a 'social networking and collaboration space for the IT community.' Apparently, the owner of the popular open-source RSS reader of the same name sold the domains to Microsoft for $5000 in August in order to host what was then called 'Microcosm.' Microsoft hopes their new service, which utilizes Windows Live ID (formerly .NET Passport) authentication, will become a 'MySpace-like forum for developers to share scripts, tools, or best practices, or even to just connect with others within the profession.'"
Media (Apple)

Submission + - iTunes doesn't care about podcasts

Submitted by elcid73
elcid73 writes: I listen to a large variety of podcasts with different publishing schedules and levels of interest that has led me to believe that the simple podcast managment of iTunes has failed to meet my needs.
iTunes applies a blanket approach to podcast subscriptions that assumes they are all consumed in the same manner; its a music manager first that has been adopted for podcasts. It should instead embrace the many ways that audio is being published and subscribed to. One suggestion would be to move the concept of playlists over to podcasts and allow us to set download/sync options on playlists instead of each individual podcast.
I plan to evaluate ODEO, Juice, Songbird shortly, but what other software/projects are out there for someone who loves the "whole iPod experience" but feels left out here? Is anyone else despondent with iTunes for podcasts?
Education

Submission + - Tech Jobs for a Student?

Submitted by
Nick Manley
Nick Manley writes: "I turned 17 back in August and have been fascinated with technology my entire life. I have a special interest in software and computer programming. While my classmates might settle for a job at McDonalds or Burger King, I really want to find a job or at least an internship where I can really learn more about my field and expand my knowledge to become a better software developer. I wanted to know if anyone has any recommendations for someone like myself, without any college education, to get a head start on my career that doesn't include selling iPods to kids at Best Buy."
Linux Business

Submission + - Microsoft and Novell partner up

Submitted by
Joe Barr
Joe Barr writes: "In the second major headline story involving Linux over the past week, Microsoft and Novell today announced a "set of agreements" which will enable the two to collaborate in three different areas — virtualization, management, and document formats — while continuing to compete for market share. These are indeed interesting times. Linux.com has the story."
Software

Submission + - Predicting hard drive failure

Submitted by
pontcysyllte
pontcysyllte writes: "Some years ago I was local tech support for cc:Mail. This product had the uncanny ability to predict a hard drive head crash or similar failure. I had direct experience of this capability at two different customer sites. That is, when I was contacted to explain error messages being sent to the email administrator, I could look them up in the manual(*) and advise customers to: (1) back up your email database immediately; and (2) swap the hard drive out and replace with a new unit as a matter of urgency (the old drive could be used in a non-critical area). In both cases the old hard drive failed a few weeks later. Does anyone know how this was achieved? I can make guesses of course, but it would be interesting to know the facts. cc:Mail was highly dependent on its mail database, which was a single file containing all users' messages at that post office (excluding attachments), so it was crucial. I have a vague memory of a white paper... (*) Perhaps some readers remember the days when decent software produced meaningful error codes and came with technical manuals which in many cases not only listed each code but explained which program module(s) might flag the error, what conditions might cause them to do so and what this might mean to the user."
Media

Submission + - Blu-ray's Hardware Woes Stacking Up

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The bad news just keeps on coming for Blu-ray. First, Sony halved its U.S./Japanese launch shipments of its Blu-ray powered PlayStation 3, blaming a shortage of blue lasers. Then, in the last two weeks, both Sony and Pioneer delayed the releases of their new Blu-ray players, refusing to cite reasons. And this week, at Blu-ray backer LG's annual dealer show, a previously announced LG Blu-ray player was nowhere to be found. LG product development director Tim Alessi had this to say: "we will provide an announcement when the time is right."

My Dream App For the Mac 249

Posted by Hemos from the with-celebrity-judges-but-no-simon-cowell dept.
Steve Streza writes "My Dream App, a Mac contest in search of the next killer app, features Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki, and Xbox and zune creator J. Allard as guest judges for its final round. Visitors can vote for their 3 favorite app ideas, and receive free licenses to both Overflow 2 and the Apple Design Award winning PhotoPresenter. Voting is open until Tuesday at 8:00 PM EDT, at which point the three winners will be announced. The winners, who will have emerged from an initial pool of more than 2,700 entrants, will see their app idea realized as a Mac shareware application and earn royalties on sales. "

MythTV 0.20 Released 281

Posted by Hemos from the build-your-own dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The latest version of MythTV, the open source PVR application for Linux, has been released. New features (as documented in the release notes) include a new menu system, an improved internal DVD player, support for DVB radio channels, and mouse support. There is also a new plugin – MythArchive – which allows recordings be written to DVD. You can download MythTV from MythTV.org."

Apple Unveils 24" iMac 487

Posted by CmdrTaco from the thats-a-lotta-disposable-screen dept.
beren12 writes "Apple today announced a new model in the lineup of iMacs, a new 24" HD model. It comes with a 1920x1200 LCD, 2.16GHz or 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 1-3 GB Memory, 250 or 500GB SATA Drive, NVIDIA GeForce 7300GT or 7600GT with 128MB GDDR3 Video card. Also posted is a new lower end iMac, which looks very similar to the education iMac. Also available is a small speed boost to the Mini line, which now sports a Core Duo 1.83GHz Processor. "

Steve Irwin Dead 1004

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the fighting-muffin-to-the-chest dept.
mkosmo writes "News.com.au is reporting that Steve Irwin was killed in a freak accident while filming one of his well known documentaries. Surprisingly it wasn't a crocodile, it was a sting-ray."

Phantom Goes Software Only 74

Posted by Zonk from the oooo-spoooky dept.
Daysaway writes "Gamasutra is reporting that the Phantom Game Service will be replacing the Phantom Game Console. The company formerly known as Infinium Labs has stated that the Phantom hardware was originally designed to run on a Windows XP platform, so it is not a stretch to believe this service will be launched sometime in the very near future." From the article: "A recent update to Phantom Entertainment's website, though, indicates that 'The Phantom Game Service was originally engineered to run on a Windows XP embedded operating system on a Phantom Game Receiver managed by Phantom content servers over the Internet.' The site now suggests that: 'The Company intends to modify the Phantom Game Service software to run as client software on personal computers operating Windows XP and Windows XP Media center operating systems.'"

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