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Submission + - Advice for a College Dropout? 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: "I dropped out of college today," begins the touching inaugural post on Life of a Dropout, which will strike a chord with anyone who's done or contemplated doing the same. "Life had gotten messed up to such extent that suicide seemed to be a much much better option. So when I woke up today I got a third person view of my life, and felt like I had to get out of this situation and prevent myself from doing any harm to myself. I have been in this college for 3 years now, and the only good it did to me was that it allowed me to meet awesome people and as a result I developed as a software developer." So, any words of advice or encouraging anecdotes for a dropout/developer who's trying to start things afresh?

Submission + - Linux Dev's Purported 4096 bit RSA Key Factored 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A PGP subkey for Kernel developer Peter Anvin from a public Sks Keyserver was discovered to be divisible by 3. The weak key was discovered by a web service which calls itself the Phuctor which has since factored two other keys as a chews on an sks keyserver dump. Whether the key was generated weak or if it was strong before becoming corrupted on a keyserver it is extremely troubling that such a weak key representing such an important Linux developer could be served.

Submission + - Ask Slashdot best way to solve a unique networking issue

Submitted by petro-tech
petro-tech writes: I work as a service technician, maintaining and repairing gas pumps and POS equipment.

In my day to day activities, one that consumes a ton of time and is relatively regular is the process of upgrading the software on pumps.
This is done by connecting to the pump via direct ethernet from my laptop, then running a manufacturer provided program that connects to the device and pushes the new software.

Some sites have 8+ pumps with 2 devices in each, and at 20-30 minutes apiece this can be quite time consuming.

Unfortunately the devices are not actually on a network, and as such cannot be updated remotely, also since they are not on a network, they are all configured with the same IP address. Additionally the software doesn't allow you to specify the adapter to use.

I would like to be able to get to a site, connect a cable to each pump, and load them all at the same time.

The only way I can figure to accomplish this with the software we've been provided is to do this:

Get a 16 port powered usb hub, with a usb-ethernet adaptor in each port. Set up 16 VM's with extremely stripped down XP running on each, with only one usb-ethernet adaptor assigned to each VM. Set xp to boot the application for loading software as its shell. and load each device that way at the same time.

Is there a better way to accomplish this?

Submission + - Rust 1.0 released (rust-lang.org)

Submitted by TopSpin
TopSpin writes: Rust 1.0 has appeared and release parties in Paris, LA and San Francisco are taking place today. From the Rust Programming Language blog; `Today we are very proud to announce the 1.0 release of Rust, a new programming language aiming to make it easier to build reliable, efficient systems. Rust combines low-level control over performance with high-level convenience and safety guarantees. Better yet, it achieves these goals without requiring a garbage collector or runtime, making it possible to use Rust libraries as a “drop-in replacement” for C.'

Submission + - Galaxies Die by Slow 'Strangulation'

Submitted by HughPickens.com
HughPickens.com writes: BBC reports that results of a study of the spectrum of light emitted by 23,000 red, passive galaxies and 4,000 blue, star-forming ones shows that when galaxies stop making stars, their death is usually a slow process that chokes them of the necessary cool gases over about four billion years. Astronomers surveyed thousands of galaxies, living and dead, to assess whether the transition is rapid or slow. In the dead galaxies they detected high levels of metals, which build up during star formation and point to a slow strangulation process. "Metals are a powerful tracer of the history of star formation: the more stars that are formed by a galaxy, the more metal content you'll see," says Dr Yingjie Peng. "So looking at levels of metals in dead galaxies should be able to tell us how they died."

Astronomer Andrea Cattaneo from the Observatoire de Paris compares this tell-tale evidence to the high levels of carbon dioxide seen in a strangled human body. "During [strangulation], the victim uses up oxygen in the lungs but keeps producing carbon dioxide, which remains trapped in the body," wrote Dr Cattaneo. "Instead of building up CO2, the strangled galaxies accumulate metals — elements heavier than helium — produced by massive stars." On average, living, star-forming galaxies were four billion years younger than the dead ones. This matches the amount of time that the astronomers calculate would be needed for the galaxies to burn up their remaining gas supply during the strangulation. "This is the first conclusive evidence that galaxies are being strangled to death," says Peng. "What's next though, is figuring out what's causing it. In essence, we know the cause of death, but we don't yet know who the murderer is, although there are a few suspects."

Submission + - Node.js And io.js Will Officially Merge Under Node.js Foundation

Submitted by rjmarvin
rjmarvin writes: The Node.js and io.js forks of the open-source JavaScript V8 runtime platform have announced official plans http://sdtimes.com/node-js-and... to merge development under the Node.js Foundation.The merger was put to a vote on GitHub by io.js developer Mikeal Rogers, who initially proposed the merger in February, and the io.js technical committee voted to approve the merger yesterday https://github.com/iojs/io.js/.... According to Rogers, the team will continue releasing io.js versions while the convergence takes place. The move comes shortly after Node.js project lead TJ Fontaine announced http://blog.nodejs.org/2015/05... he is stepping down from the project, which will now be openly governed by the foundation.

Submission + - Astronomers spot one-in-10-million phenomenon in early universe (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: Find one quasar—a rare, superbright galaxy core in deep space—and you’d think yourself pretty lucky. So a team of astronomers is wondering how it managed to find four closely spaced quasars all at once, a lucky break they calculate is a one-in-10-million chance. The quartet and its environs, snapped some 10 billion years ago, look like a galaxy cluster—a huge conglomeration of galaxies seen in the present-day universe—during its formative years. But current numerical simulations of how galaxy clusters form suggest they should be in areas with much hotter and less dense gas. So is this a cosmic fluke, or is it time to rewrite our theories of how the universe’s largest structures form?

Submission + - Are We Entering A "Golden Age Of Quantum Computing Research"? (fastcompany.com)

Submitted by Lashdots
Lashdots writes: Last month, an elite team at IBM Research team announced an advance in quantum computing: it had built a four-qubit square lattice of superconducting qubits, roughly one-quarter-inch square, that was capable of detecting and measuring the two types of quantum computing errors (bit-flip and phase-flip). Previously, it was only possible to address one type of quantum error or the other. The next step is to correct quantum errors.

In a blog post, Mark Ritter, who oversees scientists and engineers at IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Laboratory, wrote: "I believe we’re entering what will come to be seen as the golden age of quantum computing research." His team, he said, is "on the forefront of efforts to create the first true quantum computer." But what would that mean, and what other big next steps are there?

Submission + - Is Agile Development a Failing Concept? (dice.com) 1

Submitted by Nerval's Lobster
Nerval's Lobster writes: Many development teams have embraced Agile as the ideal method for software development, relying on cross-functional teams and adaptive planning to see their product through to the finish line. Agile has its roots in the Agile Manifesto, the product of 17 software developers coming together in 2001 to talk over development methods. And now one of those developers, Andy Hunt, has taken to his blog to argue that Agile has some serious issues. Specifically, Hunt thinks a lot of developers out there simply aren’t adaptable and curious enough to enact Agile in its ideal form. 'Agile methods ask practitioners to think, and frankly, that’s a hard sell,' Hunt wrote. 'It is far more comfortable to simply follow what rules are given and claim you’re ‘doing it by the book.’' The blog posting offers a way to power out of the rut, however, and it centers on a method that Hunt refers to as GROWS, or Growing Real-World Oriented Working Systems. In broad strokes, GROWS sounds a lot like Agile in its most fundamental form; presumably Hunt’s future postings, which promise to go into more detail, will show how it differs. If Hunt wants the new model to catch on, he may face something of an uphill battle, given Agile’s popularity.

Submission + - RTFM? How to write a manual worth reading (opensource.com) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Definition: RTFM (Read The F'ing Manual). Occasionally it is ironically rendered as Read The Fine Manual, a phrase uttered at people who have asked a question that we, the enlightened, feel is beneath our dignity to answer, but not beneath our dignity to use as an opportunity to squish a newbie's ego.

Have you noticed that the more frequently a particular open source community tells you to RTFM, the worse the FM is likely to be? I've been contemplating this for years, and have concluded that this is because patience and empathy are the basis of good documentation, much as they are the basis for being a decent person.

Submission + - Red Hat takes a stand against container fragmentation. With standards (zdnet.com)

Submitted by Iamthecheese
Iamthecheese writes: With Docker, kubernetes, and a little help, Red Hat wants to reform software containers.

How much standardization should happen here? Obviously some coughslackwarecoughcough distros avoid as much change as possible, which precludes package standardization. Others try to fit themselves to a universal standard whenever possible, even if it departs from traditional philosophies. What about your favorite distro? Will you be pushing to support this?

Submission + - Google Confirms Cops Can Wiretap Your Hangouts (vice.com)

Submitted by Errorcod3
Errorcod3 writes: In the wake of all the Edward Snowden revelations, a seemingly endless series of encryption apps, all promising some degree “NSA-proof” security, have come out trying to take advantage of this new anti-surveillance business opportunity.

But despite some apps’ relative success, the reality is that most people probably just use mainstream messaging apps like iMessage or Google Hangouts.

Apple has long maintained that conversations over iMessage and Facetime use end-to-end encryption, meaning “no one but the sender and receiver can see or read them,” as the company said after the PRISM revelations. That claim has turned out to be partly true: normally, Apple can’t read your iMessages, but they can if they really want to.

Submission + - Is IT work getting more stressful, or is it the Millennials? (computerworld.com)

Submitted by dcblogs
dcblogs writes: A survey of IT professionals that has been conducted in each of the last four years is showing an increase in IT work stress levels. It's a small survey, just over 200 IT workers, and it doesn't account for the age of the respondents. But some are asking whether Millennials, those ages 18 to 34, are pushing up stress levels either as IT workers or end users. The reason Millennials may be less able to handle stress is that they interact with others in person far less than other generations do, since most of their social interactions have been through Internet-based, arms-length contact, said Billie Blair, who holds a doctorate in organizational psychology. This generation has also been protected from many real-life situations by their parents, "so the workplace tends to be more stressful for them than for others," she said. Others are wondering if Millennials are more demanding of IT workers. Millennials are also expert users, and "are no longer in awe of technology specialists and therefore demand higher service levels," said Mitch Ellis, managing director of executive search firm Sanford Rose Associates in St. Louis.

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