SlowDancing - Slashdot User

Dead At 92, Business Computing Pioneer David Caminer 142

Posted by timothy on Sunday June 29, 2008 @05:36PM from the 92-and-holding dept.

Brooklyn Bob points out this fascinating obituary of David Caminer, the first systems analyst. "The tea company he worked for developed their own hardware and software — in 1951! Quoting New Scientist: 'In today's terms it would be like hearing that Pizza Hut had developed a new generation of microprocessor, or McDonald's had invented the Internet.'"

Netgear Launches Open Source-Friendly Wireless Router 182

Posted by timothy on Saturday June 28, 2008 @08:10PM from the market-linksys-chose-to-mostly-ignore dept.

An anonymous reader submits news of Netgear's release of the "open source Wireless-G Router (model WGR614L), enabling Linux developers and enthusiasts to create firmware for specialized applications, and supported by a dedicated open source community. The router supports the most popular open source firmware; Tomato and DD-WRT are available on WGR614L, making it easier for users to develop a wide variety of applications. The router is targeted at people who want custom firmware on their router without worrying about issues, and enjoy the benefits of having an open source wireless router."

MPAA Scores First P2P Jury Conviction 335

Posted by Soulskill on Friday June 27, 2008 @06:59PM from the connection-reset-by-jury-of-peers dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The MPAA must be celebrating. According to the BitTorrent news site Slyck.com, the Department of Justice is proclaiming their first P2P criminal copyright conviction, against an Elite Torrents administrator. The press release notes, 'The jury was presented with evidence that Dove was an administrator of a small group of Elite Torrents members known as "Uploaders," who were responsible for supplying pirated content to the group. At sentencing, which is scheduled for Sept. 9, 2008, Dove faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.'"

Comment For astronomy (Score 4, Informative) 190

by SlowDancing on Friday April 25, 2008 @09:22PM (#23204668) Attached to: GPL Edutainment Software

Stellarium for star charts and constellations. Windows, Mac, Linux versions. Highly recommended.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Broadband 572

Posted by CowboyNeal on Friday February 17, 2006 @01:25AM from the luddite-and-lovin'-it dept.

Ant writes "eMarketer has an article on The Yankee Group's analysis on why some Americans aren't feeling the broadband love. It was based on Ipsos Public Affairs. 45% of Americans say it's simply too expensive. 30% say that they just don't want it. 14% say they feel dial-up is adequate for their needs. Less than 10% are not able to get broadband access in their area. Five percent insist broadband is "too complicated". Another 5% aren't even sure why they don't have it..."

How Do You Store Your Previously-Written Code? 459

Posted by Cliff on Thursday February 16, 2006 @09:30PM from the a-directory-full-o-files dept.

Asmor asks: "I'm a novice programmer who is largely self-taught. It's never been too much trouble for me to reinvent the wheel constantly before, but now as my ambitions get loftier I'm finding that I could really benefit from maintaining some oft-used code that can easily be reused. The problem is, I really don't have any experience with this and I'm not really sure how I should organize things, how the code should be stored, how it should be implemented, etc. I think this is what people mean when they talk about libraries and/or APIs, but not really sure. I'm specifically curious about PHP and JavaScript, but advice for other programming languages is also helpful! How do you store and maintain your most frequently used code?"

Apple to 'Switch' to Windows? 903

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday February 16, 2006 @03:00PM from the we-all-scoffed-at-an-intel-move-too dept.

JFlex writes "PC Mags writer John C. Dvorak discusses the idea that Apple may dump OS X and 'switch' to running Windows in a recent column: "The idea that Apple would ditch its own OS for Microsoft Windows came to me from Yakov Epstein, a professor of psychology at Rutgers University, who wrote to me convinced that the process had already begun. I was amused, but after mulling over various coincidences, I'm convinced he may be right. This would be the most phenomenal turnabout in the history of desktop computing.""

MS Unveils Office 2007, Multiple Versions 298

Posted by Zonk on Thursday February 16, 2006 @01:06PM from the new-clippy-friends dept.

rfunches writes "MSNBC reports that Microsoft's next version of Office, now known as Office 2007 (previously code-named Office 12), will continue targeting the corporate audience through multiple versions of Office 2007. Versions announced include 'Office Professional Plus 2007' and 'Office Enterprise 2007.' From the article: '[Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007] will integrate capabilities of SharePoint, a collaboration program and Web portal that is designed to run over corporate networks and the Internet...and also incorporate Microsoft Office Communicator, a corporate instant messaging service.'"

Americans Using Internet 'Just for Fun' 158

Posted by Zonk on Thursday February 16, 2006 @12:36PM from the i-live-here-so-i-wouldn't-know dept.

Ant writes "CNET News.com reports that nearly one-third of American Internet users go online just for fun." From the article: "A survey of 1,931 Internet users conducted by Pew Internet & American Life Project in late November and December 2005 found 30 percent of respondents said they went online "for no particular reason" on the previous day. That was up from 21 percent in a November 2004 survey. The survey also showed that 34 percent of online men were surfing for fun on an average day in December, compared with 26 percent of women."

Google Stands Ground on Google.cn 331

Posted by Zonk on Thursday February 16, 2006 @11:19AM from the testify dept.

nmccart writes "Google gave testimony on Friday to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on International Relations. They discussed their decision to build google.cn in China. Elliot Schrage, the vice president for global communications and public affairs at Google describes how these China-based servers fit in to Google's mantra of 'Don't be evil.' Google hopes to use this as an opportunity to help bring global censorship into the spotlight of American politics. Will it work?"

First Mac OS X Virus? 577

Posted by Zonk on Thursday February 16, 2006 @09:41AM from the is-nothing-sacred dept.

bubba451 writes "MacRumors reports on what may be the first virus to affect Mac OS X, disguised as screenshots for the upcoming Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard. From the report: 'The resultant file decompresses into what appears to be a standard JPEG icon in Mac OS X but was actually a compiled Unix executable in disguise. An initial disassembly reveals evidence that the application is a virus or was designed to give that impression.' The virus is said to also spread via Bonjour instant messaging." Update: 02/17 00:09 GMT by P : This is not a virus, it is a simple Trojan Horse: it requires manual user interaction to launch the executable. See Andrew Welch's dissection.

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