X17 Solar Flare Sends 2B Tons of Plasma at Earth 473

Posted by michael from the spf-5000 dept.
Dr. Zowie writes "This morning a very large solar flare erupted from a large sunspot group that is crossing the face of the Sun. The explosion sent over 2 billion tons of material hurtling across the solar system toward Earth. Movies from the SOHO spacecraft show the flare in UV and the associated coronal mass ejection in visible light as they happened, and the impact of high energy protons that the flare launched at about half the speed of light. NOAA's Space Environment Center shows that the Sun's X-ray brightness went up 100x during the flare. Expect more aurora and geomagnetic effects in the next day or two!"
The Internet

Is it Copyrighted or a Trade Secret When Using DRM? 51

Posted by Cliff from the tough-questions dept.
rcpitt writes "In a discussion on the Digital Copyright (Canadian, but relevant world wide) list I subscribe to, we were discussing the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) treaty. In thinking about an article that I subsequently wrote I came up with this thought: If 'publishing' (in the context of when the copyright act takes effect for a work) were taken (by the courts for instance) to be defined only as that done without any rights management or extra contractual ties, then all works not so published would then become trade secrets (or something to that effect), and would lose (or never gain) the protection of the government via the copyright act and have to go after civil damages for individual transgressors. I'm interested in others' thoughts on this concept in light of Digital Rights Management, distribution of binary/source code (software), or music/video (multi-media) with an EULA that is restrictive might be construed as 'not publishing' in the context of whether the (insert your country) Copyright Act can be applied."
Operating Systems

Syncing Options for Computer Lab Machines? 60

Posted by Cliff from the keeping-control-over-the-hardware dept.
sirfunk asks: "I'm going to begin helping out maintaining the computer labs around my university campus. I was wondering what solutions the Slashdot community had hints and tips for maintaining computer lab networks. We need a solution where we can keep a remote image on a server, and the computers will update to that on bootup. We also need them to be able to update, even if Windows is severely messed up (so if Windows dies, just reboot it). I know there's commercial solutions like Deep Freeze, but I was hoping someone knew of a creative Open Source alternative. I'd love if we could run these as dumb terminals with *nix, however that won't be an option for the general public. One Idea I had was to make the machines boot into a Linux partition that would rsync a FAT filesystem (the update) and then reboot to that FAT filesystem. The whole thing about getting it to boot into Linux first and then Windows next might be tricky. I would love to hear everyone's ideas on this topic. If you have any ideas that would run cross-platform (Mac/Windows) that would be great, too."
Linux

Linux in Movies? 210

Posted by Cliff from the penguins-in-the-media dept.
chicagoan asks: "Last weekend I, like many other people across the US, saw Scary Movie 3. During the movie an actress gets on the web to help her in her quest. Looking closer I noticed that the Desktop environment she was using was GNOME and the Web Browser was Mozilla's Firebird. Where have you spotted actor's using Linux in movies or on TV shows?"
The Internet

Online Fire Tracking? 61

Posted by Cliff from the finding-the-hot-spots dept.
goatbar asks: "Being in San Diego, it is really frustrating to see the lack of information to the public about where the fires are. It seems such a simple thing to have an application where people can add info as to when and where there are fires. We would love to know when it's safe to go home, but with 3 TV stations out, it's hard to know. Seems like basic disaster service, right?"
The Almighty Buck

ISPs for the Little Guy? 118

Posted by Cliff from the getting-the-service-you-want dept.
jjshoe asks: "While access to the Internet varies greatly, depending on where you are in the USA, I recently went on the hunt for an ISP that provided me the ability to have a 'broadband' link to the Internet. I am looking for would be the ability to lease/rent static IP's, so I could host my own DNS/WWW/E-mail server. I was wondering what ISP fellow Slashdot readers use for themselves, as well as what they pay. I have gotten quotes for $50 a month for a single static IP on top of my monthly DSL fee. This seems slightly outrageous to me. Colocation is not an option as it generally runs $150 a month and does not provide me Internet access. I am open to any other ideas the community might have."
Programming

Web Performance and QA Tools? 25

Posted by Cliff from the verifying-your-web-code dept.
perf_monkey asks: "I'm part of a large Web Infrastructure Quality Assurance (QA) team at a large financial institution. Currently, we use Mercury Interactive's LoadRunner like a bunch of trained monkeys. We also use QA Load and SilkPerformer, but for smaller (non-J2EE) projects. As one of the technical folks, I've been trying to expand our horizons and our budget. I can no longer believe that large companies are willing to pay a QUARTER OF A MILLION dollars for the privilege of an additional 2000 Mercury VUsers. I'm looking at both commercial and open source alternatives. I've been tinkering with The Grinder and have had pleasing results. While not a full-blown QA tool, it is an excellent 'programmer's' load test tool. I was hoping that there are other tools like this and was hoping for the community's opinion. What web performance tools do you use and what do you think of them?"
Businesses

Employee Patent Compensations? 89

Posted by Cliff from the if-you-invent-do-it-on-your-own-time dept.
Anonymous Coward asks: "My employer has recently filed a patent application for something I invented. As compensation I am being given the statutory $1 for the assignment and a shiny brass plaque if the patent(s) is awarded. Is this typical for North American companies? I did sign a no compensation and automatic assignment type employment contract and while I was willing to accept that technically, I'm owed nothing, this strikes me as cheap, greedy, and backward thinking on my employers part. I've Google'd and read and this action seems archaic, am I wrong and just full of myself? Your thoughts please!"
Privacy

Which Adware and Spyware are the Most Insidious? 840

Posted by Cliff from the sneaking-on-to-a-machine-near-you dept.
the_dreadnought asks: "I was just asked today which adware and spyware are the most insidious by an acquaintance. He asked me if this stuff was really legal, or was it just not important enough for law enforcement to deal with? I know the porn stuff (not from experience,,,ok, from experience) that dials out to foreign countries is one of the more extreme examples, and Gator is well known, but if Slashdot readers could describe what adware and spyware they think is the sneakiest I would appreciate it. Also, any thoughts on whether some of this stuff is even legal, as it is almost certainly not ethical."
GNU is Not Unix

Can Watermarking Help Find GPL Violations? 265

Posted by timothy from the why-couldn't-it dept.
bitkid writes "I recently run across techniques that can be used to watermark program code. While I yet have to see some source code for this to play with, the authors claim that the watermarks can be introduced into the source code and can be found in the compiled executable. My question for the slashdot-crowd is: Do you think free software (GPL or other viral licenses) should be watermarked? This could help to find GPL violations (think Everybuddy or Linksys) or can be used in court someday against the next SCO to prove authorship. What might be the ramifications of this?"
Hardware

Obtaining a USB Vendor/Product ID? 37

Posted by Cliff from the proper-identification dept.
Qeygh asks: "I am interested in developing some hardware devices for my own use and, since RS-232 is dying, would like to use USB to communicate with them. If they work out well I may offer kits for sale. To do this right I should get a USB Vendor ID so that the devices can be uniquely identified by the host; but, being cheap, I don't want to drop the $1500 that USB.org charges for one. Does anyone know of any alternatives -- perhaps someone who bought a Vendor ID and re-sells small blocks of Product IDs? If no-one out there is doing this yet, is it a service that anyone else would use?"
Unix

Can WINE Compromise Unix? 87

Posted by Cliff from the a-valid-security-concern? dept.
gbulmash asks: "As API's like WINE and Crossover Office gradually make it easier to run Windows binaries on Unix, will the system inherit some of Windows' vulnerabilities? For example, has anyone tried to get Outlook up and running under Wine, then deliberately tried to infect themselves with a Windows virus to see if it could raid the Outlook address book and start mailing itself out? It just seems to stand to reason that the better these systems get at running Windows binaries, the easier it will become to infect them with Windows viruses. Or am I just totally off base here?"
Graphics

Digital 35mm SLRs? 386

Posted by Cliff from the please-your-inner-shutterbug dept.
pipingguy asks: "Canon has released the first(?) 'low-priced' digital 35mm SLR with interchangeable lenses with the Digital Rebel. I've owned a few digital and non-digital cameras over the years (and am by no means a photography expert), and most annoying was the lack of manual zoom and focus, not to mention the barely-noticeable millisecond delay between button click and shutter closure. Can any owners of this and other digitals provide some opinions on how this new model compares to the more expensive digital 35mm's and typical $300 SLRs? Is it time to buy?"
Printer

PDF Writers? 94

Posted by Cliff from the reports-are-a-PHBs-best-friend dept.
Saqib Ali asks: "I am looking for for some OpenSource PDF Writers/Creator. I found one, here. It can basically create PDFs out of common software Like OfficeSuite, Visio, Project or any other Windows Application that uses the Windows Printers. I know OpenOffice can also export to PDF. I am working on a project (fat client) where I need to dynamically create PDF reports from data stored in MySQL DB. I know I can use PHP to create PDFs, and also Apache's Cocoon (you can find an example document, here). Of course, I would like to investigate other OpenSource PDF writers as well. Do you know of any other PDF writers, that I can utilize or learn from by looking at the source-code?"
Privacy

How Do You Fool Spam Bots? 87

Posted by Cliff from the email-armor dept.
ThisIsAnExampleAccou asks: "I am currently researching Spam Bots, and the various methods by which they collect addresses. While doing my research, I have started to notice the various ways that people post their email addresses to fool spam filters (i.e. bob@hottroutmail.com - go fishing to mail me) What clever ways have you seen/done to fool spambots while still letting people know how to get in contact with you?"

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