Comment: Re:Combination of both (Score 0) 203
I bet the same question was asked by buggy whip makers back in the day (and the same solutions were proposed by them as are getting +5Insightful in this story).
+ - Minerva CEO Details His High-Tech Plan to Disrupt Universities->
Submitted
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waderoush
waderoush (1271548) writes "In April 2012, former Snapfish CEO Ben Nelson provoked both praise and skepticism by announcing that he’d raised $25 million from venture firm Benchmark to start the Minerva Project, a new kind of university where students will live together but all class seminars will take place over a Google Hangouts-style video conferencing system. Two years later, there are answers – or the beginnings of answers – to many of the questions observers have raised about the project, on everything from the way the seminars will be organized to how much tuition the San Francisco-based university will charge and how it's gaining accreditation. And in an interview published today, Nelson share more details about how Minerva plans to use technology to improve teaching quality. ‘If a student wants football and Greek life and not doing any work for class, they have every single Ivy League university to choose from,’ Nelson says. ‘That is not what we provide. Similarly, there are faculty who want to do research and get in front of a lecture hall and regurgitate the same lecture they’ve been giving for 20 years. We have a different model,’ based on extensive faculty review of video recordings of the seminars, to make sure students are picking up key concepts. Last month Minerva admitted 45 students to its founding class, and in September it expects to welcome 19 of them to its Nob Hill residence hall."
Link to Original Source
Link to Original Source
+ - Windows Defender update crashes Windows ..->
Submitted
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Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has fixed a snafu with Windows Defender that took down thousands of business PCs and servers running Windows XP and Server 2003 .. The only solution to getting affected machines back up was to uninstall the updated signatures ..."
Link to Original Source
Link to Original Source
+ - One week of OpenSSL cleanup ->
Submitted
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CrAlt
CrAlt (3208) writes "After the news of heartbleed broke early last week, the OpenBSD team dove in and started axing it up into shape. Leading this effort are Ted Unangst (tedu@) and Miod Vallat (miod@), who are head-to-head on a pure commit count basis with both having around 50 commits in this part of the tree in the week since Ted's first commit in this area. They are followed closely by Joel Sing (jsing@) who is systematically going through every nook and cranny and applying some basic KNF. Next in line are Theo de Raadt (deraadt@) and Bob Beck (beck@) who've been both doing a lot of cleanup, ripping out weird layers of abstraction for standard system or library calls.
Then Jonathan Grey (jsg@) and Reyk Flöter (reyk@) come next, followed by a group of late starters. Also, an honorable mention for Christian Weisgerber (naddy@), who has been fixing issues in ports related to this work.
All combined, there've been over 250 commits cleaning up OpenSSL. In one week. Some of these are simple or small changes, while other commits carry more weight. Of course, occasionally mistakes get made but these are also quickly fixed again, but the general direction is clear: move the tree forward towards a better, more readable, less buggy crypto library.
Check them out at http://anoncvs.estpak.ee/cgi-b..."
Link to Original Source
Then Jonathan Grey (jsg@) and Reyk Flöter (reyk@) come next, followed by a group of late starters. Also, an honorable mention for Christian Weisgerber (naddy@), who has been fixing issues in ports related to this work.
All combined, there've been over 250 commits cleaning up OpenSSL. In one week. Some of these are simple or small changes, while other commits carry more weight. Of course, occasionally mistakes get made but these are also quickly fixed again, but the general direction is clear: move the tree forward towards a better, more readable, less buggy crypto library.
Check them out at http://anoncvs.estpak.ee/cgi-b..."
Link to Original Source
+ - Tech Billionaires and the Separate-But-Equal Revival
Submitted
by
theodp
theodp (442580) writes ""As we approach the sixtieth anniversary of the Brown decision," writes the New Yorker's Jelani Cobb in The Failure of Desegregation, "the landmark case seems, in hindsight, like a qualified victory. Racially homogenous schools remain a fact of American life." And the resegregation of schools isn't limited to the Deep South. In the New York City public-school system, Cobb notes, Black and Latino students have become more likely to attend schools with minimal white enrollment, and a majority go to schools defined by concentrated poverty. And, despite the backing of Bill Gates and other like-minded super-wealthy tech "education investors", charter schools are no panacea for integration's failures. "Three-quarters of the city’s charter schools, which were a key component of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's efforts at education reform," writes Cobb, "have fewer than one per cent white enrollment," which UCLA's Civil Rights Project terms "apartheid schools". And at KIPP Schools, a darling of Gates, Netflix's Reed Hastings, and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, "more than 86 percent of our students are from low-income families and eligible for the federal free or reduced-price meals program, and 95 percent are African American or Latino.' So, would Bill send his own kids to a charter school? 'A family like mine should not use up the inner-city capacity of these great schools,' Gates explained, 'but if by some happenstance, my kids had to go to KIPP schools [instead of, say, BillG's alma mater], I wouldn't feel bad at all.' So, while well-intentioned, are tech's billionaire education reformers inadvertently contributing to today's separate-but-equal revival?"
Comment: It's Not Really Oracle (Score 3, Interesting) 154
It's that people think they can drop Oracle on top of a crappy design and that will somehow magically fix it. By the time people get done trying to use brute force, ignorance and massive amounts of IT resources, you may as well have Dbase III on your back end. Oracle might let you get away with a shitty design if your application didn't really need a database, but it's not going to help you that much if what you're trying to do is complicated enough to need one.
+ - Oracle Deflects Blame for Troubled Oregon Health Care Site->
Submitted
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itwbennett
itwbennett (1594911) writes "Oracle is gearing up for a fight with officials in Oregon over its role developing an expensive health insurance exchange website that still isn't fully operational. In a letter obtained by the Oregonian newspaper this week, Oracle co-president Safra Catz said that Oregon officials have provided the public with a 'false narrative' concerning who is to blame for Cover Oregon's woes. In the letter, Catz pointed out that Oregon's decision to act as their own systems integrator on the project, using Oracle consultants on a time-and-materials basis, was 'criticized frequently by many'. And as far as Oracle is concerned, 'Cover Oregon lacked the skills, knowledge or ability to be successful as the systems integrator on an undertaking of this scope and complexity,' she added."
Link to Original Source
Link to Original Source
+ - NASA proposes "water world theory" for origin of life
Submitted
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William Robinson
William Robinson (875390) writes "A new study from researchers at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has proposed the "water world" theory as the answer to our evolution, which describes how electrical energy naturally produced at the sea floor might have given rise to life. While the scientists had already proposed this hypothesis called "submarine alkaline hydrothermal emergence of life" the new report assembles decades of field, laboratory and theoretical research into a grand, unified picture."
+ - MIT Designs Tsunami Proof Floating Nuclear Reactor->
Submitted
by
Amtrak
Amtrak (2430376) writes "MIT has created designs for a nuclear plant that would avoid the downfall of the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The new design calls for the nuclear plant to be placed on a floating platform modeled after the platforms used for offshore oil drilling.
A floating platform several miles offshore, moored in about 100 meters of water, would be unaffected by the motions of a tsunami; earthquakes would have no direct effect at all. Meanwhile, the biggest issue that faces most nuclear plants under emergency conditions — overheating and potential meltdown, as happened at Fukushima, Chernobyl, and Three Mile Island — would be virtually impossible at sea."
Link to Original Source
A floating platform several miles offshore, moored in about 100 meters of water, would be unaffected by the motions of a tsunami; earthquakes would have no direct effect at all. Meanwhile, the biggest issue that faces most nuclear plants under emergency conditions — overheating and potential meltdown, as happened at Fukushima, Chernobyl, and Three Mile Island — would be virtually impossible at sea."
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+ - Click Like? You may have given up the right to sue.->
Submitted
by
sandbagger
sandbagger (654585) writes "The New York Times reports that General Mills, the maker of cereals like Cheerios and Chex as well as brands like Bisquick and Betty Crocker, has quietly added language to its website to alert consumers that they give up their right to sue the company if they download coupons, 'join' it in social media communities. Who'd have imagined that clicking like requires a EULA?"
Link to Original Source
Link to Original Source
+ - For Red Hat, it's RHEL and then? ->
Submitted
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coondoggie
coondoggie (973519) writes "Red Hat is hosting its annual summit this week — this year in San Francisco — where the company is seemingly basking in the glory of making more than a billion dollars off a free open source project. But as successful as Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) has been for Red Hat — the company announced a new beta version of RHEL 7 this week — there’s a question of how long the RHEL gravy train will keep growing, and what’s next for the company after that."
Link to Original Source
Link to Original Source
+ - Americans are scared about the future of drones, robots, and wearables->
Submitted
by
colinneagle
colinneagle (2544914) writes "Findings from a recent Pew study on Americans' opinions on future technology and science: 65% think it would be a change for the worse if lifelike robots become the primary caregivers for the elderly and people in poor health. 63% think it would be a change for the worse if personal and commercial drones are given permission to fly through most U.S. airspace. 53% of Americans think it would be a change for the worse if most people wear implants or other devices that constantly show them information about the world around them.
The drone concern is to be expected, from both a privacy and a safety perspective. Last year, a small Colorado town tried to issue permits for residents to shoot down airborne drones, and came pretty close to making it legal. And just last week, a drone fell out of the air at a triathlon in Australia; an ambulance crew had to pick pieces of the drone's propeller out of her head. Compare this problem with Amazon’s vision of constant drone deliveries and you have a recipe for a country full of concerned parents.
The wearable concern is just another sign of privacy concerns going mainstream. Google Glass has seen some serious backlash lately, with even physical violence and theft against those who wear them in public. The study just illustrates how widespread this contempt goes.
One issue I was surprised not to see was concern over the impact of robots and drones on jobs for humans. A 2013 Oxford study estimated that as many as 47% of human jobs in the U.S. can be automated, taken over by robots or drones that don’t require a wage (let alone a minimum wage) and can work round-the-clock."
Link to Original Source
The drone concern is to be expected, from both a privacy and a safety perspective. Last year, a small Colorado town tried to issue permits for residents to shoot down airborne drones, and came pretty close to making it legal. And just last week, a drone fell out of the air at a triathlon in Australia; an ambulance crew had to pick pieces of the drone's propeller out of her head. Compare this problem with Amazon’s vision of constant drone deliveries and you have a recipe for a country full of concerned parents.
The wearable concern is just another sign of privacy concerns going mainstream. Google Glass has seen some serious backlash lately, with even physical violence and theft against those who wear them in public. The study just illustrates how widespread this contempt goes.
One issue I was surprised not to see was concern over the impact of robots and drones on jobs for humans. A 2013 Oxford study estimated that as many as 47% of human jobs in the U.S. can be automated, taken over by robots or drones that don’t require a wage (let alone a minimum wage) and can work round-the-clock."
Link to Original Source
+ - Apache OpenOffice reaches 100 million downloads. Now what?
Submitted
by
Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes "
The Apache Software Foundation (ASF), the all-volunteer developers, stewards, and incubators of more than 170 Open Source projects and initiatives, announced today that Apache OpenOffice has been downloaded 100 million times.
Over 100 million downloads, over 750 extensions, over 2,800 templates. But what does the community at Apache need to do to get the next 100 million?"
+ - System Administrator vs Change Advisory Board 1
Submitted
by
thundergeek
thundergeek (808819) writes "I am the sole sysadmin for nearly 50 servers (win/linux) across several contracts. Now a Change Advisory Board (CAB) is wanting to manage every patch that will be installed on the OS and approve/disapprove for testing on the development network. Once tested and verified, all changes will then need to be approved for production.
Windows servers aren't always the best for informing admin exactly what is being "patched" on the OS, and the frequency of updates will make my efficiency take a nose dive. Now I'll have to track each KB, RHSA, directives and any other 3rd party updates, submit a lengthy report outlining each patch being applied, and then sit back and wait for approval.
What should I use/do to track what I will be installing? Is there already a product out there that will make my life a little less stressful on the admin side? Does anyone else have to go toe-to-toe with a CAB? How do you handle your patch approval process?"
Windows servers aren't always the best for informing admin exactly what is being "patched" on the OS, and the frequency of updates will make my efficiency take a nose dive. Now I'll have to track each KB, RHSA, directives and any other 3rd party updates, submit a lengthy report outlining each patch being applied, and then sit back and wait for approval.
What should I use/do to track what I will be installing? Is there already a product out there that will make my life a little less stressful on the admin side? Does anyone else have to go toe-to-toe with a CAB? How do you handle your patch approval process?"
Comment: Was the problem fixed by an MSE update? (Score 1) 6
Bruce,
Was the problem fixed by an MSE update? See the discussion on a Microsoft site, System Center Endpoint Protection - error 0x80004005. That discussion indicates that the problem caused severe malfunctions, but was apparently fixed within 22 hours.
You said, "I suspect a very high percentage of people will assume they got a virus, and be forced into an upgrade situation." I think that is true, no matter why the problem occurred.
More about Windows XP: I've written an article, Microsoft Windows XP "end of life": What to do? that I think gives a much more balanced view of Windows XP than anything I've read in the media. The article needs updating with information I've gathered recently.
Was the problem fixed by an MSE update? See the discussion on a Microsoft site, System Center Endpoint Protection - error 0x80004005. That discussion indicates that the problem caused severe malfunctions, but was apparently fixed within 22 hours.
You said, "I suspect a very high percentage of people will assume they got a virus, and be forced into an upgrade situation." I think that is true, no matter why the problem occurred.
More about Windows XP: I've written an article, Microsoft Windows XP "end of life": What to do? that I think gives a much more balanced view of Windows XP than anything I've read in the media. The article needs updating with information I've gathered recently.