AnotherDaveB - Slashdot User

Why is the iPlayer a multi million pound disaster?-> 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Friday November 23 2007, @04:22AM

AnotherDaveB writes "The story of the BBC's iPlayer is of a multi-million pound failure that took years to complete, and was designed for a world that never arrived. More was spent on the project than many Silicon Valley startups ever burn through, but only now can we begin to piece together how this disaster unfolded."
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Opalescent plastic could be both pretty and handy 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Saturday August 04 2007, @12:19AM

AnotherDaveB writes "A group of researchers from the University of Southampton, in England, and the German Plastics Institute in Darmstadt, led by Jeremy Baumberg, have discovered how to create a plastic with th Opal's iridescent properties. Their invention could be used to make a sparkling substitute for paint, banknotes that are hard to counterfeit and chemical sensors that can act as visible sell-by dates."

BBC Trust backs calls for Linux iPlayer-> 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Wednesday July 25 2007, @09:47AM

AnotherDaveB writes "The BBC Trust had a useful and constructive meeting with the Open Source Consortium. The meeting provided an opportunity to hear the OSC's concerns and explain what action the trust has taken to ensure that the new BBC iPlayer becomes platform neutral as soon as possible. Officials reiterated that the BBC Trust is fully committed to users of both the Linux and Mac operating systems having full use of the BBC iPlayer. However, the trust is aware that achieving this is dependent on the actions of third parties outside the BBC's control. It was a condition of approval for the BBC's on-demand services that platform neutrality be achieved within a reasonable period."
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Italian parliament bets house on SuSE Linux 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Friday July 13 2007, @03:50AM

AnotherDaveB writes "ITALY'S parliament is about to undertake Europe's largest governmental migration yet to open sauce. The IT department of the Italian parliament presented plans on Wednesday to begin migrating some 3500 desktop PCs, including those of its 630 MPs, away from Windows to SuSE Linux starting this September. The Camera dei deputati will also run SuSE on all of its two hundred servers."

Plods to get helmet cams-> 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Thursday July 12 2007, @11:20AM

AnotherDaveB writes "British police are to be fitted with helmet cameras after successful trials. The Register has the story."
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BBC Trust to hear open sourcers' iPlayer gripes 0

Submitted by AnotherDaveB on Thursday July 12 2007, @06:27AM

AnotherDaveB writes "The BBC Trust has asked to meet open source advocates to discuss their complaints over the corporation's Windows-only on demand broadband TV service, iPlayer.

The development came less than 48 hours after a meeting between the Open Source Consortium (OSC) and regulators at Ofcom on Tuesday. Officials agreed to press the trust, the BBC's governing body, to meet the OSC. The consortium received an invitation on Wednesday afternoon.

The Register has the story."

Microsoft Attacks IBM Over ODF

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 10 2007, @09:50PM

An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has severely criticised IBM, saying Big Blue is pushing the OpenDocument Format standard to the detriment of Microsoft's Open XML standard. Darren Strange, senior product manager for Microsoft Office 2007, said: "The difference in view is that [IBM] are espousing 'one standard fits all', which is hard for us. IBM seems keen for ODF to be the only standard for everyone. The issue is about choice — there's room in the world for more than one open standard. And it's all XML — technically speaking, we speak the same language.""

MS removes features from MS Virtualization Tools

Submitted by

untouchableForce

on Thursday May 10 2007, @09:45PM

untouchableForce writes "Microsoft has dropped three features of it's virtualization tools that are to ship with the next version of Windows Server. The three features that have been dropped are:

Live Migration

Hardware Hot Swap Compatibility

Ability to use more than 16-CPU Cores

The cutting of these features comes after the beta release of this product was delayed last month but claimed to still be on schedule. One has to wonder if they are still on schedule if they are cutting features. Considering the massive delay's suffered by windows vista, and it's slow adoption rate among corporation could this be an opportunity for alternative OSes to pick up additional market share?"

The End of .Mac and Google Apps?

Submitted by mattnyc99 on Friday May 04 2007, @05:08PM

mattnyc99 writes "In his weekly tech column for Popular Mechanics, Glenn Derene predicts that everyone will have a home server to network their house within 10 years—rendering Apple's .Mac accounts and Google's productivity software useless. As prices for products like HP's MediaSmart Server drop and as processing power becomes more pervasive, Derene says, "you'll ultimately need a centralized server—that high-powered traffic cop—to coordinate the non-stop exchange of information between your new multitude of devices." Do Slashdotters buy this trend-spotting? And would they buy one of these?"

Artificial Snot Enhances Electronic Nose

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 30 2007, @05:20PM

An anonymous reader writes "British researchers have created artificial snot (nasal mucus) to significantly enhance the performance of electronic noses, ScienceDaily reports. The researchers have coated the sensors used by odor-sensing devices with a mix of polymers that mimics the action of the mucus in the natural nose. This greatly improves the performance of the electronic devices allowing them to pick out a more diverse range of smells."