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VIA has released 16,434 Lines Of Free & Open Source code that enables Linux to natively use the framebuffer on VIA's graphics chipsets. This comes a month after VIA announced that it will provide Open-Source drivers and documentation on its website so that its hardware will work out of the box with Linux distributions. This gives VIA-powered systems that come pre-installed with Linux, such as the gPC, 15.4" gBook, CloudBook and Zonbu the ability to output graphics through digital connections such as HDMI and possibly making them the best-supported framebuffers Linux has ever had. Look forward to documentation and X.org drivers from VIA as well in the near future.

Sun Microsystems is stepping up efforts to boost Java usage in Linux shops by working to remove some final encumbrances in the open-source Java platform.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/infoworld/20080422/tc_infoworld/98999
http://news.yahoo.com/s/infoworld/20080422/tc_infoworld/98999

Smivs writes "A fish species, which is all female, has survived for 70,000 years without reproducing sexually, experts believe. Scientists from the University of Edinburgh think the Amazon Molly may be employing special genetic survival "tricks" to avoid becoming extinct. The species, found in Texas and Mexico, interacts with males of other species to trigger its reproduction process. The offspring are clones of their mother and do not inherit any of the male's DNA. Dr Laurence Loewe, of the university's School of Biological Sciences, said: "What we have shown now is that this fish really has something special going on and that some special tricks exist to help this fish survive. "Maybe there is still occasional sex with strangers that keeps the species alive. Future research may give us some answers.""

TheKnightShift writes "The federal government has announced that it will soon begin swabbing the mouths of EVERYONE it arrests, in order to collect DNA samples. This will be regardless of whether or not a person is actually charged with a crime. The DNA will then be stored in a central database, and it will be extremely unlikely that anyone cleared of a criminal charge will be able to have their sample removed from it. The Department of Homeland Security is apparently eager to begin using this new power."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080416/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/dna_collection

The Internet Storm Center is reporting that a round of e-mails is being sent out that looks like a subpoena being sent to the CEOs of major US corporations. The e-mail tries to entice the victim to click on a link that gives them "more information" about being subpoena'd to testify in a federal court case. According to ISC Handler John Bambenek:

We've gotten a few reports that some CEOs have received what purports to be a federal subpoena via e-mail ordering their testimony in a case. It then asks them to click a link and download the case history and associated information. One problem, it's total bogus. It's a "click-the-link-for-malware" typical spammer stunt. So, first and foremost, don't click on such links. An interesting component of this scam was that it did properly identify the CEO and send it to his e-mail directly. It's very highly targeted that way.

An interesting problem is that while the courts do send some electronic notices out, they are not PGP or Digitally signed to ensure that they are authentic.
http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid=4289

narramissic writes "A new study by the National Foundation for American Policy (NFAP), a pro-immigration think tank finds that between 2002 and 2005, for every H-1B position requested, tech companies listed on the S&P 500 stock index increased their employment by five workers. For tech firms with fewer than 5,000 employees, each H-1B request corresponded with an average increase of 7.5 workers, the group said."
http://www.itworld.com/Career/1881/h1b-visas-080310/index.html

Apple's iPhone software development kit is already drawing complaints due to the strict terms of service. Voice over IP apps like Skype that attempt to use the cellular data connection will be blocked. Competing web browsers Firefox and Opera are forbidden. Even Sun is now backpedaling on its recent announcement of a java port, noting that there are some legal issues. Critics are already comparing Apple's methods to Comcast's anti-net neutrality filtering, and Microsoft's Netscape-killing antitrust tactics. Could Apple face government regulators? CNET has more.
http://www.cnet.com/8301-13739_1-9889159-46.html

Geoffrey.landis writes "Researchers have been slowly building up a picture of exactly what occurs during a stroke (or, in medical jargon, "brain ischemia," defined as "a pathophysiological state in which cerebral blood flow to the brain is insufficient to meet the metabolic demands"), and the mechanisms by which it damages the brain. For the most part we're talking real science here, which is to say a slow and painstaking accumulation of understanding, and not the headline-making moments of "eureka," right or wrong, which are so beloved by journalists. Nevertheless, there is real progress going on here. Jonathon Sullivan of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Wayne State University has just put up a site summarizing the most recent understanding, including both the technical details that will interest biochemistry nerds, and also a good summary of recent science readable for the rest of us.

One of the hard-won new insights that Sullivan elucidates is the idea that the most devastating events of brain ischemia occur not during the actual oxygen deprivation, but happen when oxygen is reintroduced to the blood-starved brain. (in his words, "Ischemia Cocks the Hammer, Reperfusion Pulls the Trigger.")

Sullivan blames the problem on the peroxynitrite radical, O=NOO-. (Which can be pronounced "O Noo!" if you like). Quoting the text: "You are looking at a truly evil molecule. If we didn't have it caged in this little white box right now, it would jump right out of the screen and nitrosylate your face." (although that's not the only molecule Sullivan doesn't like. About the calpain molecule, he says, "calpain is like one of those white supremacy biker dudes on an overdose of meth. He goes insane and starts tweaking on all kinds of molecules.")

Bottom line is that while he says that there's no silver bullet, he notes that there are many promising strategies that work better than "take a lot of aspirin and hope for the best." Two approaches that look promising for the future include hypothermia and insulin injection, separately or in combination."
http://sullydog.com/sullysites/qm/brainischemia101syllabus/syllabus/index.html

Sun has moved OpenOffice.org to the LGPLv3 license. They cite worry over software patents as being one of their main reasons for this move, saying 'Upgrading to the LGPLv3 brings important new protections to the OpenOffice.org community, most notably through the new language concerning software patents. You may know that I am personally an opponent of software patents, and that Sun has already taken steps in this area with a patent non-assert covenant for ODF. But the most important protection for developers comes from creating mutual patent grants between developers. LGPLv3 does this.'
http://blogs.sun.com/webmink/entry/openoffice_org_goes_to_lgplv3

Novell Vice President and GNOME architect Miguel de Icaza sounded off at a MIX 08 panel on a number of topics. First, he claimed that he was 'not happy' with Novell's cross-patent licensing agreement with Microsoft, saying that if he had his way, the company would have stayed with the open-source community. He also said that neither Windows nor Linux are relevant in the long term, thanks to Web 2.0 business models:

'They might be fantastic products ... but Google has shown itself to be a cash cow. There is a feature beyond selling corporate [software] and patents ... it's going to be owning end users."

He also tangled with Mike Schroepfer, a Mozilla engineering executive, about extending patent protection for Moonlight to third parties. However, de Icaza did say that Novell has done the best it could to balance open-source interests with patent indemnification.
http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/03/06/mix-novells-de-icaza-criticizes-microsoft-patent-deal

It looks like Trent Reznor's new Nine Inch Nails album experiment is a success. Among the various options he gave fans, the most expensive was the $300 Limited Edition Ultra Deluxe Package. It took just over a day for that package to completely sell out, earning Reznor $750,000 in revenue from just that option alone.

anthroguy writes "I've been reading Slashdot for years and enjoy it as a cross-reference for nerdy news, but I'm wondering something: what are the best blogs on programming — or otherwise — on the internet at the moment that we should all be reading (to submit to Slashdot, if worthy, of course)?"

The combination of AMD's ATI graphics division and AMD's CPU division means that AMD often fights a two-front war, directly competing against Intel in the CPU business as well as Nvidia in graphics. AMD's Hybrid Graphics technology allows them to fight against both companies at the same time, offering customers their 780G chipset that allows integrated graphics to work more efficiently with the CPU. In addition, inserting an additional card works the same as CrossFire, which, like Nvidia's SLI, was only capable by having two discrete graphics cards installed on a motherboard. ExtremeTech has put the 780G chipset through a series of gaming and synthetic benchmarks to see just how beneficial this technology is. The results indicate that Hybrid Graphics isn't yet ideal for the power-hungry gamer, as driver revisions need to be ironed out at this early stage, but performance looks promising.
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2272623,00.asp

Spetiam writes "The Associated Press clamps down on fair use: "We have been informed that the Associated Press takes issue with our use of their images on this website, and until I'm able to resolve this matter with them amicably, I'm going to have to take the site offline...I'm somewhat befuddled on this point, and hope that some of you can help clarify this for me. How in the world can one provide analysis, commentary, and criticism on news photographs, if they are forbidden from actually showing said photograph? Did the Associated Press crack down on people who clipped newspapers out and shared them with their co-workers? Did they crack down on the thousands of fax-lists that powered New York through the 80's? And is this even relevant? I'd love to hear what you think." The take-down letter from the AP lawyer is scanned and posted for your perusal."
http://www.snappedshot.com/

The Washington Post reports that the initial pilot of the Virtual Border Fence planned by the DHS and subcontracted to Boeing has been a miserable failure. A lot of things sound like death march software development projects. Some choice quotes include "did not work as planned or meet the needs of the U.S. Border Patrol", "DHS officials do not yet know the type of terrain where the fencing is to be constructed", and "the design will not be used as the basis for future . . . development".