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Comment Re:4 tens is awfully nice (Score 1) 287

by Geraden (#30460900) Attached to: I'd prefer to allocate my work hours ...
This is why I like second shift even better than the normal day shift. I am typically up until midnight anyhow, and the ability to have a couple of daylight hours to get things done is very nice, especially in the wintertime, when it's just starting to get light at 8am, and already dark by 5pm.

Comment Re:Fedora? (Score 1) 236

by Shimdaddy (#30138886) Attached to: Fedora 12 Released
Fedora also ships with selinux enforcing by default, and was one of the first distros to do so. As far as I know, you still have to install it in Ubuntu. Also, I'm not sure what you're talking about with the "lots of daemons running and ports open" stuff -- this hasn't been my experience at all.
Intel

Intel Allows Release of Full 4004 Chip-Set Details 124

Posted by timothy from the cool-move-from-the-valley dept.
mcpublic writes "When a small team of reverse engineers receives the blessing of a big corporate legal department, it is cause for celebration. For the 38th anniversary of Intel's groundbreaking 4004 microprocessor, the company is allowing us to release new details of their historic MCS-4 chip family announced on November 15, 1971. For the first time, the complete set of schematics and artwork for the 4001 ROM, 4002 RAM, 4003 I/O Expander, and 4004 Microprocessor is available to teachers, students, historians, and other non-commercial users. To their credit, the Intel Corporate Archives gave us access to the original 4004 schematics, along with the 4002, 4003, and 4004 mask proofs, but the rest of the schematics and the elusive 4001 masks were lost until just weeks ago when Lajos Kintli finished reverse-engineering the 4001 ROM from photomicrographs and improving the circuit-extraction software that helped him draw and verify the missing schematics. His interactive software can simulate an ensemble of 400x chips, and even lets you trace a wire or click on a transistor in the chip artwork window and see exactly where it is on the circuit diagram (and vice-versa)."
Communications

New Kind of Orbit Could Ease Mars Communications 127

Posted by kdawson from the crossing-gravitational-gradients dept.
japan_dan writes "An interesting way to enable Earth-Mars communication when the Sun occludes the direct radio line-of-sight: ESA proposes placing a pair of continuous-thrusting relay satellites, using a solar electric propulsion system — one in front and ahead of Mars, the other behind and below — with both following non-Keplerian, so-called 'B-orbits'. This means the direction of thrust is perpendicular to the satellites' direction of flight, allowing them to 'hover' with both Earth and Mars in view. Quoting from the Q&A: 'We found that a pair of relay satellites would only have to switch on their thrusters for about 90 days out of every 2.13-year period, and this solution would only increase the one-way signal travel time by one minute, so it could be effective.'" Here is the paper describing non-Keplerian orbits (PDF).

Comment Re:A shot in the arm? How about cooler chips? (Score 4, Funny) 195

by Shimdaddy (#29518147) Attached to: AMD Radeon HD 5870 Adds DX11, Multi-Monitor Gaming
So, to be clear, you just want:
  • Games that are as good as StarCraft, which is a very solid contender for best game of all time
  • Computers to be as cheap as netbooks but as powerful as top-of-the-line desktops
  • Desktops that are ridiculously powerful but don't produce heat

Reasonable.
Cellphones

Snow Leopard Drops Palm OS Sync 290

Posted by timothy from the exclusivity-demands-it dept.
adeelarshad82 writes "It's been just a little over a month since Apple blocked iTunes sync with Palm Pre, and now Apple takes that strategy one step further by blocking Snow Leopard sync with Palm-OS powered smartphones. Even though Palm has officially retired Palm OS and is now focusing hard on its next-generation WebOS in the Palm Pre, the company is still selling Palm OS-powered smartphones; two current models are the Treo Pro on Sprint and the Centro."

Comment Re:Reduced Effort in World of Warcraft (Score 1) 520

by Shimdaddy (#29147185) Attached to: Ask Blizzard About Starcraft2, Diablo III, WoW, or Battle.net

This is, of course, a tactic to entice new players.

I'm pretty sure this is only partially correct. It serves two purposes: 1) It helps people who play recruit their friends. If I'm high-level, and you don't have any characters, if Blizzard can make you get to my level faster, that means the game is more fun for both of us. 2) It helps people roll new alts. You're less locked into your character if the barrier to a new, more interesting one is lower. Blizzard has also said that the newer content is better than the old content -- the designers / artists / writers / etc. have simply gotten better at making the game. Thus, they want you to spend more time in the newer areas, as they're (generally) higher quality.
Patents

How To Vet Clever Ideas Without Giving Them Away? 539

Posted by timothy from the don't-clever-ideas-want-to-be-free? dept.
Rival writes "As an inquisitive and creative geek, I am constantly coming up with 'clever' ideas. Most often I discover fundamental or practical flaws lurking in the details, which I'm fine with. As Edison said, 'I haven't failed; I've found 10,000 ways that don't work.' Other times, I discover that someone else has beaten me to the idea. I'm fine with that, too. At least I know that I've come up with a great idea, even if I'm not the first. There are times, however, when I can find no flaws with an idea and nobody else seems to have thought of it. I'm not conceited enough to think my idea is genius; I just assume that I'm not knowledgeable enough to see what I'm missing. In these times, I often want to ask a subject matter expert for their thoughts. On the admittedly long chance that an idea is genius, however, what is the best way to ask for another's insights while mitigating the risk of them stealing or sharing the idea? Asking a stranger to sign a contract before discussing an idea seems like a good way to get a door closed on my face. What are your experiences and suggestions?"
Image

Study Finds Delinquent Behavior Among Boys Is "Contagious" Screenshot-sm 245

Posted by samzenpus from the if-you-lie-down-with-dogs-you-will-get-up-with-fleas dept.
According to a new study, if everyone else was committing a crime, you would too, at least if you are a boy. The 20-year study showed what every grandmother could tell you; children from poor families, with inadequate supervision and bad friends were more likely to end up in juvenile court. What was more surprising is that exposure to the juvenile justice system seemed to increase the chance that the boy would engage in criminal activity as a young adult. "For boys who had been through the juvenile justice system, compared to boys with similar histories without judicial involvement, the odds of adult judicial interventions increased almost seven-fold," says study co-author Richard E. Tremblay.
Supercomputing

BOINC Exceeds 2 Petaflop/s Barrier 114

Posted by kdawson from the faster-faster-for-science dept.
Myrrh writes "Though an official announcement has not yet been made, it would appear that the BOINC project as a whole has exceeded two petaflop/s performance. The top page features this legend: '24-hour average: 2,793.53 TeraFLOPS.' According to last month's Top500 list of supercomputers, BOINC's performance is now beating that of the fastest supercomputer, RoadRunner, by more than a factor of two (with the caveat that BOINC has not been benchmarked on Linpack)."

Germanium Diodes Mean Progress Toward Silicon-Chip Lasers 66

Posted by timothy from the everyone-make-lasery-noises-now dept.
David Orenstein writes "Teams at Stanford and MIT have each reported getting strong light signals from germanium-based diodes on silicon at room temperature. Engineers have long sought to do this because, with further refinement into lasers, such diodes would allow for optical interconnects on chips. Optical interconnects could operate much faster and with less power than electrical (metal) ones that are becoming bottlenecks on current chips."
Privacy

The Technology Keeping Information Flowing in Iran 174

Posted by CmdrTaco from the learn-a-new-word-today dept.
Death Metal writes "Iranians seeking to share videos and other eyewitness accounts of the demonstrations that have roiled their country since disputed elections two weeks ago are using an Internet encryption program originally developed by and for the US Navy. Designed a decade ago to secure Internet communications between US ships at sea, The Onion Router, or TOR, has become one of the most important proxies in Iran for gaining access to Web sites such as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook." A related story was submitted anonymously about the efforts of hactivists to keep the information flowing inside the data-locked nation.
The Almighty Buck

$33 Million In Poker Winnings Seized By US Govt 465

Posted by samzenpus from the mine-now-I-take-it dept.
An anonymous reader writes "A New York Times story reports that, 'Opening a new front in the government's battle against Internet gambling, federal prosecutors have asked four American banks to freeze tens of millions of dollars in payments owed to people who play poker online. ... "It's very aggressive, and I think it's a gamble on the part of the prosecutors," Mr. Rose said. He added that it was not clear what law would cover the seizure of money belonging to poker players, as opposed to the money of the companies involved.' Many players are reporting that their cashout checks have bounced."

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