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The Military

Submission + - Radical Overhaul for Pentagon¹s High-Tech

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Defense Secretary Robert Gates just proposed the most sweeping overhaul of America's arsenal in decades. Major weapons programs, from aircraft carriers to next-gen bombers to new school fighting vehicles, will be cut back, or eliminated. Billions more will be put into growing the American fighting force, both human and robotic.
IBM

Submission + - SPAM: IBM, Facebook and the mainframe: Growing Big Iron

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "Pretty sure I would never have expected to see "mainframe" and "Facebook" in the same sentence but there it was. While the page has been up there a while — the zSeries mainframe page has almost 600 Friends — IBM this week acknowledged it had created the page to further develop the mainframe community and of course attract university students to the world of Big Iron. On the subject of attracting new students to the ways of the mainframe world, IBM says its ZNextGen offering continues to grow. zNextGen, a community that IBM and its large user group Share worked together to launch in 2006. IBM says approximately 550 schools worldwide have now joined IBM to offer coursework to some 42,000 students on the IBM System z mainframe. [spam URL stripped]"
Link to Original Source
Power

Submission + - Sony Plans To Unveil Newest Fuel-Cell Prototype (engadget.com)

Submitted by
Nakeot
Nakeot writes: "On Friday, Sony plans to unveil their newest portable fuel-cell technology, aimed at a variety of mobile applications. From the article: "The system contains both a methanol fuel cell and a Li-on battery" and can "intelligently switch between power from the battery, fuel, or even both under high-draw circumstances." Sony intends to show off two models claimed to power your cell for a week or a month, respectively, as well as the latest developments with their sugar-batteries that can now run purely off your favourite cola beverage. This model builds on Sony's 2008 model, their first commercially-demonstratable prototype, and could make waves with Sony's OLED devices, but will Sony be able to avoid another battery recall?"
Businesses

Inside Factory China 135

Posted by kdawson from the making-it dept.
blackbearnh writes "While China is attempting to pull its industry up out of mere manufacturing mode, for now the country is the production workhorse of the consumer electronics industry. Almost anything you pick up at a Best Buy first breathed life across the Pacific Ocean. But what is it like to shepherd a product through the design and production process? Andrew 'bunnie' Huang has done just that with the Chumby, a new Internet appliance. In an interview with O'Reilly Radar, he talks about the logistical and moral issues involved with manufacturing in China, as well as his take on the consumer's right to hack the hardware they purchase."
Microsoft

Microsoft To Open Retail Stores 535

Posted by kdawson from the world-class-shopping-experience dept.
chaz373 writes "CNET reports that Microsoft is going retail. In the 'Beyond Binary' blog Ina Fried reports, 'After years of brushing off the notion, Microsoft said on Thursday that it will open up its own line of retail stores. Without detailing the plans, Microsoft said it has hired David Porter, a 25-year Wal-Mart veteran, to lead the effort. Sources say that Porter's mission will be to develop the company's retail plans and that the effort is likely to start small with just a few locations.'"

Comment 3 out of 5ive (Score 1) 1397

by bridgeco (#26710993) Attached to: Why Do We Name Servers the Way We Do?
Janet is my new shiny fun laptop, and Michael is an old desktop/ server past his prime. Tito is an even older box that hardly saw any use but never seemed to do anything right. I've also got 2 routers, Whitney and Bobby, but don't get me started on those...
Google

Submission + - Why Google Employees Quit (techcrunch.com)

Submitted by
ScottG489
ScottG489 writes: "This article from TechCrunch gives a great insight into why people quit Google. Google HR set up a private Google Group asking ex-employees why they quit the company. The article shows that life working at Google might not be as glamourous as previously thought. From the article: "Those of us who failed to thrive at Google are faced with some pretty serious questions about ourselves. Just seeing that other people ran into the same issues is a huge relief. Google is supposed to be some kind of Nirvana, so if you can't be happy there how will you ever be happy? It's supposed to be the ultimate font of technical resources, so if you can't be productive there how will you ever be productive?" I wonder if this is that good of a source since its from people who mostly ended up not liking the company and could be quite one sided. No doubt still interesting."
The Courts

Submission + - RIAA Files 'Writ' to Stop TV Broadcast of Hearing (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
NewYorkCountryLawyer
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "Well the RIAA really seems to be nervous about the order entered earlier this week allowing next week's hearing in SONY BMG Music v. Tenenbaum to be streamed over publicly accessible internet TV. They've gone and filed a 'Petition for Mandamus or Prohibition' with the Appeals Court, to try and stop it. (For those few of you who may be wondering whether it's a 'Writ of Prohibition' or a 'Writ of Mandamus', I say : 'If the RIAA lawyers don't know, how should I know? I'm just a country lawyer.' But seriously, it's a writ of prohibition, which the RIAA lawyers would have known had they been awake during law school.). Well, let's hope the arguments in the First Circuit will be streamed, too. Meanwhile, one commentator wonders why the tooth and nail opposition to broadcasting, since the professed aim of the litigations was to 'educate' the public?"
Science

CERN Releases Analysis of LHC Incident 149

Posted by timothy from the training-exercise-was-too-trite dept.
sash writes "From the fresh press release: 'Investigations at CERN following a large helium leak into sector 3-4 of the Large Hadron Collider tunnel have confirmed that cause of the incident was a faulty electrical connection between two of the accelerator's magnets. This resulted in mechanical damage and release of helium from the magnet cold mass into the tunnel. Proper safety procedures were in force, the safety systems performed as expected, and no one was put at risk. Sufficient spare components are in hand to ensure that the LHC is able to restart in 2009, and measures to prevent a similar incident in the future are being put in place.'"
Spam

Now Even Photo CAPTCHAs Have Been Cracked 340

Posted by timothy from the given-enough-eyeballs dept.
MoonUnit writes "Technology Review has an interesting article about the way CAPTCHAS are fueling AI research. Following recent news about various textual CAPTCHAs being cracked, the article notes that a researcher at Palo Alto Research Center has now found a way crack photo-based CAPTCHAs too. Most approaches are based on statistical learning, however, so Luis von Ahn (one of the inventors of the CAPTCHA) says it is usually possible to make a CAPTCHA more difficult to break by making a few simple changes."

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