MichaelSmith - Slashdot User

Google buys Motorola mobile business-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Monday August 15 2011, @07:56AM

MichaelSmith writes "One interesting point here: The acquisition will also net Google a significant patent portfolio."
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Reviews of Osama's hideout on google maps-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Tuesday May 03 2011, @06:46AM

MichaelSmith writes "Google maps has a handy feature where people can write reviews of businesses. So find out all there is to know about Osama Bin Laden's Hideout"
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Android web browser can not upload files-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Tuesday March 15 2011, @08:07AM

MichaelSmith writes "I have an android phone and wrote a photo blogging application so that I could upload pictures directly from the phone. When I finally got around to testing from the browser on android the <input type=file> tag turned into a message Uploads Disabled. So I googled around and found this hilarious bug report which unfortunately confirms that Android can not upload files."
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Aus internet filter delayed for election-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Friday July 09 2010, @12:04AM

MichaelSmith writes "Australian communications minister Stephen Conroy has delayed the planned implementation of internet filtering until 2011. The likely reason for this is to neutralize it as an issue in the 2010 election, which is expected to happen before October. Interestingly Optus, Telstra and iPrimus have pledged to block child-abuse websites voluntarily but the article doesn't say how they plan to do that."
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New comet impact on Jupiter-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Thursday June 03 2010, @08:55PM

MichaelSmith writes "Amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley has apparently observed another impact on Jupiter. The impact was observed at 20:30 UT on June 3."
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Transport ticketing system as job creation-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Friday May 21 2010, @07:26PM

MichaelSmith writes "Screw ups in the new Melbourne ticketing system are so common they aren't really funny any more but this one almost had me ROFLing.
Staff at the firm making myki have had to manually add one cent to 87,261 cards so that they can be used on Sundays, when seniors are entitled to free travel. The myki system requires all users — even those getting a free ride — to have a positive balance on their card. 'This exercise took several weeks and was carried out by existing myki customer service staff...."

Geez guys write a loop. Learn some perl. Or fix the original requirement."
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The Wifi AP names people use-> 1

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Saturday March 20 2010, @07:16PM

MichaelSmith writes "I code on the tram, going to and from work and I noticed that there are a lot of wifi access points along the way. So one week I made it my job to write an automatic scanner which runs from a cron job every minute during commuting times. My backup script pushes the new AP names to my web server and you can read it on line.
It is a mixture of the straightforward, naive and funny, with a few pop culture references along the way. The first column in the file is the number of access points with that name. The second column is the AP name, in brackets to pick up white space."
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Could the Mono Lake arsenic prove there is a shado-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Friday March 05 2010, @05:00AM

MichaelSmith writes "Scientists think that there might be arsenic based life in Mono Lake, California. If it shown to exist such life could have evolved independently from our own, or it could have forked from ours at a very early stage."
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Look out for paragliding terrorists-> 1

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Saturday January 23 2010, @05:14AM

MichaelSmith writes "Intelligence sources are reporting that south Asian terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba has purchased 50 para gliders from suppliers in Europe. This article in the Indian Express discusses possible attacks in India using this novel vector, but other targets can't be ruled out.

One possibility would be to use a high building or terrain to fly right over perimeter security at a public event. Para gliders can use convective lift as well, but the pilot needs to be experienced. The article discusses suicide attacks so this may put a limit on the sophistication of the flying involved."
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MP horrified by altered bin Laden pic-> 0

Submitted by MichaelSmith on Saturday January 16 2010, @07:00PM

MichaelSmith writes "The FBI has apparently used elements from a photograph of Spanish member of parliament Gaspar Llamazare to help compose an age advanced image of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The FBI says:

"FBI special agent Jason Pack said a forensic artist had been unable to find suitable features from the FBI's database of photographs and used a picture from the internet instead.
"The forensic artist was not aware of the identity of the individual depicted in the photograph," Mr Pack said, adding that the image would be taken off the FBI website."

Mr Llamazare is not happy about his face being used in this way and has complained to the US Embassy in Spain."
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