mpbrede - Slashdot User

Submission + - New Android Eyewear Butts Heads with Google Glass (linuxgizmos.com)

Submitted by __aajbyc7391 on Thursday July 18, 2013 @02:28AM

__aajbyc7391 writes: GlassUp, an Italian startup, has started taking pre-orders on Indiegogo for an Android eyewear display system billed as a simpler, lower-cost alternative to Google Glass. The GlassUp device is a receive-only Bluetooth accessory to a nearby mobile device, providing a monochrome, 320 x 240-pixel augmented reality display of incoming messages and notifications. GlassUp was unveiled at CeBit in March, and is now up for crowdfunding on Indiegogo, where pre-sales opened today ranging from $199 to $399, depending on whether it’s a pre-release, pre-production, or full-production version. This is less than a quarter the price of the $1,500 Google Glass Developer Edition. Already almost two years in development, GlassUp is expected to ship to presales customers in Feb. 2014, around the same time Google Glass is expected to ship in commercial production form.

Submission + - Google storing WLAN passwords in the "clear"

Submitted by husemann on Thursday July 18, 2013 @02:10AM

husemann writes: Micah Lee from the EFF filed a bug report (https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=57560) about Google storing all your WLAN passwords on their application settings backup service without allowing you to encrypt them. So far it's not known whether the passwords are stored encrypted at rest, but just the fact that Google can read them (and disclose them if forced by "law") is a bit surprising, too put it nicely. Already one German university is concerned enough about this "feature" that they issued a warning to their users (http://www.rz.uni-passau.de/rzaktuell/meldung/detail/speicherung-von-zugangsdaten-auf-servern-der-fa-google/).

Submission + - RetroArch emulator running on JavaScript

Submitted by genocitizen on Thursday July 18, 2013 @01:45AM

genocitizen writes: RetroArch is a portable multi-system console emulator with an eye for performance, one of the main developers (ToadKing) has made a preliminary JavaScript port that can show the basic menu browsing features. Console emulation purists are already drooling to see the triforce logo composing in their modern browsers.

Comment Wait one second (Score 1) 264

by mpbrede on Saturday July 13, 2013 @11:17PM (#44273369) Attached to: DuckDuckGo: Illusion of Privacy

The source link for the article is a new blog with one (yes, count it, one) post?? I call fowl.

Submission + - Thief swipes iPhones, leaves his own Samsung smartphone at the scene (bgr.com)

Submitted by redkemper on Friday July 12, 2013 @11:13AM

redkemper writes: Clearly, there are better ways to switch smartphone platforms. 25-year-old Travis Montgomery Snyder was arrested this week in Remington, Virginia after a police investigation into a local robbery led them to the man. According to a report, Snyder stands accused of a smash-and-grab robbery where the suspect broke a display case at a Springfield, Virginia wireless store and absconded with several iPhones. Unfortunately for the suspect, he also left his own Samsung smartphone at the scene. Fairfax County police reportedly traced the Galaxy phone’s subscription back to Snyder and then arrested him on Monday...

Submission + - Steve Ballmer: Microsoft Has 1 Million Datacenters, Only Second to Google 1

Submitted by SmartAboutThings on Friday July 12, 2013 @11:11AM

SmartAboutThings writes: Everybody knows by now that Ballmer has announced a major reorganization at Microsoft. And in the memo that he has written, Ballmer has obviously put a big focus on the cloud. During Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference, he also said that Microsoft now has more than 1 million datacenters which makes the company number 2, after Google. Puts things into a perspective, doesn't it?

Submission + - Intel Cherry Picking And Sensationalising Benchmarks; ARM still leads

Submitted by Reynolds953 on Friday July 12, 2013 @10:33AM

Reynolds953 writes: In an EE Times blog http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1318857, the author laments "Unfortunately, we live in a world where sensationalism rules and headlines seldom tell the entire story or even the truth. In any case, the results of one [pro Intel] benchmark, especially one that seems to contradict other benchmarks, seem more suspicious than conclusive." He concludes that "the leading ARM-based processors still have a performance lead over the latest Intel processor (a recent review of the Samsung Galaxy 3 10.1 by GSMArena http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_tab_3_101-review-948.php came to the same conclusion); all benchmarks should be questioned and none used exclusively; and recent headlines were more sensational than truthful.

Submission + - Fighting fire with napalm: How Google's Moto X will battle the iPhone 5S (bgr.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 12, 2013 @09:56AM

An anonymous reader writes: Fighting fire with fire is only a safe bet when the odds are somewhat balanced. Google knows this, so to battle Apple’s next-generation iPhone 5S this fall, it’s planning to fight with napalm. A recent report revealed that Google will spend half a billion dollars or possibly even more to market its Moto X smartphone following its launch in the late summer or early fall. That means Google will spend half of Apple’s ENTIRE fiscal 2012 advertising budget to promote a single phone...

Submission + - Playstation 4 Fans Petition Microsoft to Restore Xbox DRM

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 12, 2013 @09:55AM

An anonymous reader writes: After Microsoft rescinded the DRM policies for the upcoming Xbox One console it had announced earlier at E3, you'd think gamers would be at least mollified, if not ecstatic. But some apparently thought that Microsoft had gotten it right the first time, such as the ability to share a game with up to 10 friends, and so a petition to 'Give us back the Xbox One we were promised at E3' was launched on change.org. The petition was quickly co-opted by Playstation 4 fans (assuming that the original author was playing straight, and maybe he wasn't) seizing an opportunity to haze Microsoft and the Xbox. As of today the petition has 17,500 signees, many accompanied by open forum satire posts reminiscent of the surge in attention given to humble looseleaf binders following an October Presidential debate.

Submission + - Kremlin security agency to buy typewriters 'to avoid leaks

Submitted by Presto Vivace on Friday July 12, 2013 @08:04AM

Presto Vivace writes: Russia's agency responsible for the Kremlin security is buying typewriters — a move reportedly prompted by recent leaks by WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden.
"After scandals with the distribution of secret documents by WikiLeaks, the exposes by Edward Snowden, reports about Dmitry Medvedev being bugged during his visit to the G20 London summit (in 2009), it has been decided to expand the practice of creating paper documents," the source said.

Snowden's service consists of informing Americans what is being done in our name. If he has panicked the Russians into abandoning their computers that is so much extra goodness.

Comment Sometimes two heads are better than one (Score 1) 217

by mpbrede on Wednesday July 03, 2013 @12:07AM (#44172855) Attached to: AOC's 21:9 Format, 29" IPS Display Put To the Test At 2560x1080

I like playing my games in fullscreen and having another monitor showing other"stuff" on the side. With this monitor, that would not be possible.

Comment An advert, not even thinly veiled (Score 1) 276

by mpbrede on Tuesday June 25, 2013 @01:57PM (#44102887) Attached to: Join COBOL's Next Generation

Come on. Why is this even allowed on /.? The RFA has the email address of the recruiter and is really just a solicitation. The piece on /. is hardly any better.

Comment Content-free article (Score 1) 235

by mpbrede on Saturday March 16, 2013 @12:44PM (#43191265) Attached to: Smartest Light Bulbs Ever, Dumbest Idea Ever?

Do we now have hacks that post thinly disguised PR releases or vague descriptive picture stories? What a waste of /. bandwidth.

Comment It seems arrogant (Score 5, Insightful) 134

by mpbrede on Monday January 28, 2013 @10:45AM (#42714945) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Best Free and Open Source Apps For Android?

To imply that you can predict (or ask others to predict) which applications will become abandonware. Free, open-source program repositories are littered with abandonware. That is one of the real hurdles for open-source adoption in enterprises. Android will be no different. Besides, some programs will work fine even if they never get updated again.

Submission + - Unity3D Technology revises EULA, pushes developers into a ditch (unity3d.com)

Submitted by mpbrede on Monday December 10, 2012 @03:31PM

mpbrede writes: Unity3D Technologies(http://unity3d.com/), the up-and coming cross-platform game developer has revised its EULA for Version 4 of the product.

Among the new restrictions imposed, and that has developers up in arms(http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/161689-Unity-4-New-EULA-Restrictions), are the following:
1) Unity3D can't be used in a gambling application, 2) Unity3D may not be used as the UI in embedded applications without a per-device license if the number of devices may exceed 50, and 3) Developers are prohibited from developing Streaming and Cloud Gaming applications.

Says the Unity CEO (David Helgason) in the forum(http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/161689-Unity-4-New-EULA-Restrictions?p=1107170&viewfull=1#post1107170): "Please remember that there's a difference between "not allowed by the EULA" and "not allowed at all". Of course we allow people to submit their games to OnLive, we just want to talk to them first and learn more about this area – so far we've not actually seen this happen at all."

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