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Comment: Community did this already in 2010... (Score 3, Insightful) 88

by Freshly Exhumed (#40043323) Attached to: Mandriva SA Cedes Control To Mandriva Community

The community already took control of Mandriva's distro by forking it to Mageia in 2010. Mandriva, as a distro, has seemed almost pointless since then despite some inherent design changes. So, what Mandriva is now proposing seems to be an anachronism.

The nice Mageia distro was born from all the Mandriva uncertainty of the past several years and is about to launch version 2 any day now. Again, Mandriva seems almost pointless, but all the power in the world to people who take them up on their offer.

Shark

Finally, a Shark With a Laser Attached To Its Head->

Submitted by Freshly Exhumed
Freshly Exhumed writes "Marine biologist-cum-TV personality Luke Tipple attached a 50-milliwatt green laser to a lemon shark off the coast of the Bahamas in late April. The escapade was sponsored by Wicked Lasers, a consumer-focused laser manufacturer based in Hong Kong that produces some of the most brilliant — and potentially dangerous — handheld lasers in the world.

“This was definitely a world first,” Tipple told Wired. “Initially, I told them no. I thought it was a frivolous stunt. But then I considered that it would give us an opportunity to test our clips and attachments, and whatever is attached to that clip, I really don’t care. It was a low-powered laser that couldn’t be dangerous to anyone, and there’s actually useful applications in having a laser attached to the animal.”"
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Only Firefox 3.6 is fully compatible with our site, says eBay-> 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "This is truly astonishing, one of the biggest online brands on the planet tells a customer that it should only be used with Firefox and warns them off of using IE, Chrome or Safari. A support chap is recorded as stating: "I suggest that you kindly use Firefox 3.6 (not IE 9.0, Safari or Google Chrome as they aren't compatible) and certainly you won't face any issues.""
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Iphone

Triggertrap Mobile app turns an iPhone into a smart DSLR trigger->

Submitted by cylonlover
cylonlover writes "One of the keys to great photography is knowing when to hit the shutter button, but sometimes that's easier said than done. Triggertrap Mobile is an iOS app which aims to help you capture that elusive shot by turning your iPhone or iPad (2 or new) into a smart camera trigger capable of making your camera take a photo at exactly the right moment. The app requires a dongle and cable to connect your iOS5 device to a DSLR (more than 270 cameras are supported thanks to a range of connection cables) and enables you to take photos using 12 different triggering modes, many of which are activated by sensors in your iPhone or iPad. If you don't want to control an external camera, the app can also be used to trigger the internal camera."
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Space

Brown Dwarf Radio Emissions and the Hunt for Aliens-> 1

Submitted by
astroengine
astroengine writes "Penn State University researchers have detected flaring emissions from a very cool brown dwarf 33.6 light-years away called "J1047+21." The emissions detected were of radio wavelengths, suggesting some kind of interaction between a magnetic field and charged particles. This is a noteworthy discovery for two reasons: 1) It's the coolest radio-star detected to date and, 2) the method by which this brown dwarf was detected can be applied to large exoplanets that possess magnetospheres. Should the radio emissions from an exoplanet be discovered, this may indicate that an alien biosphere may be protected by a global magnetic field."
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Science

The Science of Falling Cats

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes "Cats' bodies have evolved to survive high falls. The question that has puzzled scientists is how they do it. In one study of the "high-rise syndrome" of 132 cats brought to a New York City emergency veterinary clinic after falls from high-rise buildings, 90% of treated cats survived and only 37% needed emergency treatment to keep them alive. In fact, one cat that fell 32 stories onto concrete suffered only a chipped tooth and a collapsed lung and was released after 48 hours. "Being able to survive falls is a critical thing for animals that live in trees, and cats are one of them," says Dr Jake Socha, a biomechanist at Virginia Tech university. "The domestic cat still contains whatever suite of adaptations they have that have enable cats to be good up in trees (the falling cat problem)." For one thing, cats have a relatively large surface area in proportion to their weight, thus reducing the force at which they hit the pavement and cats also spread their legs out to create a sort of parachute effect. An average-sized cat with its limbs extended achieves a terminal velocity of about 60 mph, while an average-sized man reaches a terminal velocity of about 120 mph. Another factor is that cats' muscular legs — made for climbing trees — act as shock absorbers. "Cats have long, compliant legs," says Jim Usherwood of the structure and motion lab at the Royal Veterinary College. Finally after the maximum velocity has been achieved, the vestibular system is no longer stimulated and a falling cat orients its limbs horizontally explaining "the decreased number of limb fractures, since the impact is more evenly distributed throughout the body.""
Google

Data Engineer in Google Case Is Identified 1

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes "Meet Engineer Doe. A NY Times report has identified Marius Milner as the software engineer at the center of the uproar over a Google project that used wi-fi sniffing Google Street View cars to collect e-mail and other personal data from potentially millions of unsuspecting people. Milner, creator of the wardriving software NetStumbler, referred questions to his lawyer. Google declined to comment. A patent search shows the USPTO awarded Google and Milner a patent in June 2011 for protecting Internet users from 'hackers and other ne'er-do-wells [who] may seek to tap into communications on a network.'"
Graphics

Microsoft Releases DirectX 11.1 Specification->

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "Direct3D 11.1 lets you use shader tracing to ensure that your code is performing as intended and if it isn't you can discover and remedy the problem. The SDK for Windows 8 Consumer Preview contains HLSL compiler enhancements. Shader tracing and the HLSL compiler are implemented in D3dcompiler_nn.dll."
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Censorship

Tor Researchers' Tool Aims To Map Out Internet Censorship-> 1

Submitted by Sparrowvsrevolution
Sparrowvsrevolution writes "Tor developers Arturo Filasto and Jacob Appelbaum have released OONI-probe, an open-source software tool designed to be installed on any PC and run to collect data about local meddling with the computer’s network connections, whether it be website blocking, surveillance or selective bandwidth slowdowns. Unlike other censorship tracking projects like HerdictWeb or the Open Net Initiative, OONI will allow anyone to run the testing application and share their results publicly. The tool has already been used to expose censorship by T-Mobile of its prepaid phones' browser and also by the Palestinian Authority, which was found to be blocking opposition websites. The minister responsible for the Palestinian censorship was forced to resign last week."
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So I'm ugly. So what? I never saw anyone hit with his face. -- Yogi Berra