Bruce Perens - Slashdot User

Open Hardware Journal-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Monday October 31 2011, @04:55PM

Bruce Perens writes "Open Hardware Journal is a new technical journal on designs for physical or electronic objects that are shared as if they were Open Source software. It's an open journal under a Creative Commons license. This issue contains articles on Producing Lenses With 3D Printers, Teaching with Open Hardware Submarines, An Open Hardware Platform for USB Firmware Updates and General USB Development, and more."
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The Covenant - A New Open Source Strategy-> 1

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Monday September 12 2011, @08:15AM

Bruce Perens writes "Lexis Nexis has Open Sourced HPCC, the parallel software that they use for handling extremely large data. Databases that, for example, hold records for every consumer in the U.S. can be processed with this software and its task-specific language. As Strategic Consultant for the company while they decided to participate in Open Source, Open Source co-founder Bruce Perens designed a new Covenant between Lexis Nexis and the Open Source community that makes dual-licensing more fair to the Open Source developer."
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Red Hat's Secret Patent Deal-> 0

Submitted by Bruce Perens on Friday November 12 2010, @12:39PM

Bruce Perens writes "When patent troll Acacia sued Red Hat in 2007, it ended with a bang: Acacia's patents were invalidated by the court, and all software developers, open-source or not, had one less legal risk to cope with. So, why is the outcome of Red Hat's next tangle with Acacia being kept secret, and how is a Texas court helping to keep it that way? Could the outcome have placed Red Hat in violation of the open-source licenses on its own product?"
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Codec2: An Open Source Low-Bandwidth Voice Codec-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Monday September 20 2010, @09:37PM

Bruce Perens writes "Codec2 is an Open Source digital voice codec for low-bandwidth applications, in its first Alpha release. Currently it can encode 3.75 seconds of clear speech in 1050 bytes, and there are opportunities to code in additional compression that will further reduce its bandwidth. The main developer is David Rowe, who also worked on Speex.

Originally designed for Amateur Radio, both via sound-card software modems on HF radio and as an alternative to the proprietary voice codec presently used in D-STAR, the codec is probably also useful for telephony at a fraction of current bandwidths.

The algorithm is based on papers from the 1980's, and is intended to be unencumbered by valid unexpired patent claims. The license is LGPL2. The project is seeking developers for testing in applications, algorithmic improvement, conversion to fixed-point, and coding to be more suitable for embedded systems."
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Oracle Sues Google for Infringing Java Patents-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Thursday August 12 2010, @08:48PM

Bruce Perens writes "Oracle has brought a lawsuit against Google claiming that Google has infringed patents on the Java Language, presumably in Android. We don't have the text of the lawsuit yet. But there's a patent grant that should allow Google to use Java royalty-free. Has Google failed to meet the terms of the grant?"
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Mark Hurd is Irrelevant - The Challenge HP Faces-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Tuesday August 10 2010, @05:16AM

Bruce Perens writes "Mark Hurd's silly exit has little to do with HP's real problems. As an executive there about a decade ago, I saw a company that was giving up its differentiating value in the name of operational savings, not realizing that a decade later the Golden Goose of creativity would have found greener pastures. But surprisingly, the classic HP tradition of building a great place to do engineering that results in a flood of excellent creative products is being followed..."
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LCD "engine" for spacecraft attitude control!-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Wednesday July 28 2010, @11:08PM

Bruce Perens writes "Japan's IKAROS satellite, which earlier performed the first successful demonstration of a solar sail, has broken more new territory. Liquid-crystal displays, yes — like in your video monitor — were fabricated into strips on the edges of the solar sail. By energizing some of the LCDs and changing the reflective characteristics of parts of the sail from specular to diffuse, JAXA scientists successfully generated attitude control torque in the sail, changing the spacecraft's orientation."
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Geostationary GPS Satellite Out of Control-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Sunday May 09 2010, @06:19PM

Bruce Perens writes "The Galaxy 15 commercial satellite has not responded to commands since solar flares fried its CPU in April, and it won't turn off. Intelsat controllers moved all commercial payloads to other birds except for WAAS, a system that adds accuracy to GPS for landing aircraft and finding wayward geocaches. Since the satellite runs in "bent pipe" mode, amplifying wide bands of RF that are beamed up to it, it is likely to interfere with other satellites as it crosses their orbital slots on its way to an earth-sun Lagrange point, the natural final destination of a geostationary satellite without maneuvering power.

The only payload that is still deliberately active on the satellite is its WAAS repeater. An attempt to overload the satellite and shut it down on May 3 caused a Notice to Airmen regarding the unavailability of WAAS for an hour. Unsaid is what will happen to WAAS, and for how long, when the satellite eventually loses its sun-pointing capability, expected later this year, and stops repeating the GPS correction signal. Other satellites can be moved into Galaxy 15's orbital slot, but it is yet unannounced whether the candidates bear the WAAS payload."
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Inside Open Source's Historic Victory-> 1

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Monday February 22 2010, @12:07PM

Bruce Perens writes "Bruce Perens was an expert witness in the Jacobsen v. Katzer court case. He tells the story of the legal wrangling that produced a historic victory for Open Source"
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Open Hardware Radio Manufacturer Acquired-> 0

Submitted by

Bruce Perens

on Friday February 05 2010, @02:36PM

Bruce Perens writes "Ettus Research produces the USRP or Universal Software Radio Peripheral. When used with the GNU Radio software, this device allows the construction of radio receivers and transmitters that are primarily software. It's been used for everything from medical imaging to espionage. USRP is Open Hardware, the design and other data needed to implement it have been published. Matt Ettus today announced that his company has been acquired by National Instruments. Operation will remain separate from NI and Matt says that little will change."
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