Let Goofy Track Your Children 291

Posted by samzenpus from the parenting-is-hard dept.
Rio writes "The Walt Disney Company unveiled a new wireless phone service that allows parents to track their children on a map using Global Positioning System technology, according to Local 6 News. The new "family friendly" service, called Disney Mobile, allows parents to decide who their children can call and when, the report said. The phone service will launch in June and has not been priced yet."

Implants Allow the Blind to See 354

Posted by samzenpus from the cyber-eyes dept.
gihan_ripper writes "Neurosurgeon Kenneth Smith has performed a revolutionary operation on St Louis resident Cheri Robertson, connecting a camera directly to her optic nerve. The rig is in principle similar to Geordi La Forge's visor, albeit in very rudimentary form. At present, the 'image' consists of a number of white dots, as on an LED display. There are also governmental restrictions on this research, forcing Kenneth and his team to fly to Portugal to carry out the operation. If this technology takes off, the future will be bright for the sight-impaired."

Overlooked VoIP Security Issues? 42

Posted by Cliff from the missed-vulnerabilities dept.
penciling_in asks: "Voiponder is running an informative article identifying VoIP attacks, which are applicable to current systems but lack public awareness and are, for the most part, misunderstood. The author's primary purpose is to 'discuss two of the most well known attacks that can be carried out in current VoIP deployments. The first attack demonstrates the ability to hijack a user's VoIP Subscription and subsequent communications. The second attack looks at the ability to eavesdrop in to VoIP communications.' This leaves me begging the question: What other not-so-publicized VoIP security issues should companies be watching out for?"

EiffelStudio Goes Open 219

Posted by samzenpus from the born-to-be-free dept.
WeiszNet writes "Bertrand Meyer, the creator of Eiffel the language and CTO of Eiffel Software in Santa Barbara, CA has announced in his Software Architecture course at ETH Zurich that the company's flagship product - EiffelStudio was released under the GPL today. Here is the press release: and the project's page. Eiffel is an object oriented programming language supporting contracts. Last year the international standard (ECMA) for Eiffel was released and now the initiative to go open has been taken."

Should the Computer Science Guy Be CEO? 150

Posted by Cliff from the right-leadership-qualities dept.
compuguy84 asks: "I'm a Computer Science major. A Finance Major friend and I are starting a business based on an innovative idea I had. I came up with the concept and developed the overall model we would use. He loved it, and we've been working on our business plan ever since. We've both donated our respective expertise, covered major ground, and agreed from the start that everything will be split 50-50 (ownership, power, etc). Unfortunately, the time has come to incorporate, and potential investors have advised against assigning Co-CEO's. So who should be the CEO? Should the Finance Major get the job based solely on his Business knowledge, or should the Computer Science guy get the job because it was his idea? We've both have shown ourselves to be savvy business folks, but I don't have the 'schoolin'. All signs so far point to giving him the job, but I can't shake the feeling I'm getting robbed. If it was my idea, shouldn't I call the shots at the end of the day? Has anyone been through this? What did you do?"

Two Legged Robot Sets Speed Record 149

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the see-bot-run-runbot-run dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Researchers in Germany and Scotland have made the fastest two-legged robot yet (for its size) called RunBot. It is controlled by a simple program that mimics the way neurons control reflexes in humans and other animals. From the article: 'We wanted to show that a very simple system with a simple neuronal controller could walk in a natural manner - and fast,' says Florentin Wörgötter, from the University of Göttingen in Germany. The story also features couple of videos of RunBot in action."

MN Bill Would Require Use of Open Data Formats 176

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the enlightenment-is-contagious dept.
Andy Updegrove writes "A bill has been introduced in Minnesota that would require all Executive branch agencies to 'use open standards in situations where the other requirements of a project do not make it technically impossible to do this.' The text of the bill is focused specifically on 'open data formats.' While the amendment does not refer to open source software, the definition of 'open standards' that it contains would be conducive to open source implementations of open standards. The fact that such a bill has been introduced is significant in a number of respects. First, the debate over open formats will now be ongoing in two U.S. states rather than one. Second, if the bill is successful, the Minnesota CIO will be required to enforce a law requiring the use of open formats, rather than be forced to justify his or her authority to do so. Third, the size of the market share that can be won (or lost) depending upon a vendor's compliance with open standards will increase. And finally, if two states successfully adopt and implement open data format policies, other states will be more inclined to follow."

Supernova May Explain How Planets are Formed 54

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the mega-maid-unavailable-for-comment dept.
ExE122 writes "A young pulsar that formed from a supernova which happened about 100,000 years ago and is sitting 13,000 light years away may solve some questions about the origins of Earth. From the article: 'Scientists think they have solved the mystery of how planets form around a star born in a violent supernova explosion, saying they have detected for the first time a swirling disk of debris from which planets can rise. The discovery is surprising because the dusty disk orbiting the pulsar, or dead star, resembles the cloud of gas and dust from which Earth emerged. Scientists say the latest finding should shed light on how planetary systems form.'"

Redhat and Intel Team Up for Linux Business 66

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the red-rover-red-rover-send-another-company-over dept.
Red Hat and Intel announced today at LinuxWorld Boston that they would be entering a partnership to help customers "plan for, accelerate and optimize their deployments of Linux solutions." From the article: "'We're responding to what customers have told us they really need to support their advanced deployments of Linux and open source,' said Tim Yeaton, executive vice president of Enterprise Solutions at Red Hat. 'The programs Intel and Red Hat have selected are aimed at equipping customers with in-depth domain knowledge and providing hard core data to make complex architectural decisions.'"

Gmail vs Pine 603

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the objectivity-so-rare dept.
Snarfed has an interesting review on Gmail vs Pine. From the article: "I've used Pine as my email client for, well, pretty much forever. I use it because it's fast, powerful, stable, and very keyboardable. (I hate the mouse.) However, since I work at Google, I'm constantly bombarded with people who ask me why I don't use Gmail. After hearing the nth person brag about how much it increased their productivity, I finally broke down and tried it. I didn't expect much, since I've never liked web-based email clients. However, I made myself use it as my only email client, for a month, to give it a fair shot."

New 25x Data Compression? 438

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the make-sure-to-give-it-to-more-than-just-the-corporate-monkies dept.
modapi writes "StorageMojo is reporting that a company at Storage Networking World in San Diego has made a startling claim of 25x data compression for digital data storage. A combination of de-duplication and calculating and storing only the changes between similar byte streams is apparently the key. Imagine storing a terabyte of data on a single disk, and it all runs on Linux." Obviously nothing concrete or released yet so take with the requisite grain of salt.

Health Problems Related to the Geek Lifestyle 495

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the mental-health-beyond-repair dept.
jonasj writes "A doctor and former programmer has written a good article on common geek health problems. From the article: 'If I were to go and try to run a few miles this weekend, I would not be able to easily do so. [...] However, if you take one of the these college basketball athletes, any of them would be able to run miles without even breathing heavy. However, if you made them sit down and try to learn Java for 12 hours a day, most of them would be asleep at their desk before lunch. The typical geek trains their brain to be heavily focused while multitasking day after day. Is it surprising that this same brain does not do well when forced to isolate down to one task?'"

PS3 Prices in Europe Revealed 215

Posted by Zonk from the don't-want-to-buy-another-one dept.
fistfullast33l writes "Ars Technica is reporting that the VP of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe revealed pricing for the Playstation 3 on a French radio show today. From the article: 'Strict currency translation suggests that American pricing may be in the range of US $605 to $726, but currency exchange alone can't tell the story. Case in point: the Xbox 360. In the United States, the Xbox 360 retails for $399, which is only 320 [euros] in exchange. Yet the Xbox 360 is priced at 399 [euros] throughout most of Europe.' The article goes on to speculate that 'the days of multi-console ownership may be coming to an end for many gamers' based on the Xbox 360 and the PS3 prices."

Beginning SQL Server 2005 Express 92

Posted by samzenpus from the book-learning dept.
Graeme Williams writes "Beginning SQL Server 2005 Express Database Applications with Visual Basic Express and Visual Web Developer Express from Novice to Professional is in two parts, "Working with SQL Server Express" and "Working with Visual Basic Express and Visual Web Developer Express". The first part of the book is quite a bit larger (368pp vs. 204pp), so the title, as long as it is, isn't all that accurate. How about, "An introduction to SQL Server 2005 Express, including desktop and web applications in Visual Basic"? The book asks to be judged against a high standard: Can it turn a SQL and Visual Basic novice into a professional? The first part of the book is an excellent introduction to SQL Server in its several manifestations, and essential for anyone who is new to SQL Server 2005 Express. The second part doesn't provide as much help for the complete beginner, but still provides a good introduction to developing database applications." Read the rest of Graeme's review.

Jan Schaumann Talks About NetBSD on the Desktop 29

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the just-depends-on-how-much-work-your-willing-to-do dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Continuing his series of interviews, Emmanuel Dreyfus asks NetBSD's Jan Schaumann about his experience with NetBSD on the desktop. From the article: 'Jan Schaumann has been an important contributor to the NetBSD project for several years. He spent a lot of time working on the NetBSD package system, known as pkgsrc, and he currently uses NetBSD as his desktop system. We will try to learn from his experience during this interview.'"

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