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Education

Submission + - Open source in academia

Submitted by
An anonymous reader writes: Having recently been approached to help come up with some guidelines to introduce the open source software model to graduate level computer science students, I decided this is something that could best be answered by the Slashdot community as a whole, as while I am currently myself a student, I'm sure there is a wealth of insight out there that I am missing.

Unfortunately the subject of open source software would not have its own course, and would be part of one that serves as an overview of different 'real world' coding applications, the idea being to give students a feel for things beyond your typical computer science assignments, with open source being covered for four to six weeks.

Are there any suggestions for good open source projects that students could rather quickly get acclimated with and contribute to? How do you go about grading something like open source code contributions? What level of community interaction should be expected of students with no previous open source experience?

For you other students out there, do any of your universities currently offer courses covering open source software, and if so, how is it handled there?
Programming

Submission + - JUnit and GWTTestCase makes Ajax unit testing easy

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Anyone who has developed an Ajax application can testify, testing Ajax isn't exactly easy. In fact, the emergence of Ajax has essentially invalidated a host of test frameworks and tools that weren't designed to test asynchronous Web applications! This article shows you how the Google Web Toolkit actually leverages its Java compatibility to make Ajax applications every bit as testable as their synchronous counterparts.
Privacy

Submission + - Letter casts doubts on Yahoo! China testimony (duihua.org)

Submitted by
Saint Aardvark
Saint Aardvark writes: "A hand-written letter, believed to be from Chinese police, has surfaced that sheds new light on the case of Chinese reporter Shi Tao. The letter "is essentially a standardized search warrant making clear that Chinese law enforcement agencies have the legal authority to collect evidence in criminal cases. This contradicts Yahoo's testimony to Congress in 2006 that they "had no information about the nature of the investigation." "One does not have to be an expert in Chinese law to know that 'state secrets' charges have often been used to punish political dissent in China," says Joshua Rosenzweig, manager of research and publications for The Dui Hua Foundation. Shi Tao was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his reporting on the Tianamen Square massacre."
Wireless Networking

802.11n Draft 2.0 Approved by Working Group 105

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the stamp-of-approval dept.
[Geeks Are Sexy] writes "Yes folks, the 802.11 Working Group has finally approved Draft 2.0 of the 802.11n spec, bringing us a step closer to its final form. 'With the positive vote from the 802.11n Working Group, the Wi-Fi Alliance will now begin officially certifying equipment as being compliant with Draft 2.0. That's an important step, as official Draft 2.0-compliant gear is guaranteed to be fully compatible with the final 802.11n standard.'"
Google

Google Updates AdSense Rules, Still Working on Radio 66

Posted by Zonk from the your-love-won't-pay-my-bills dept.
Photocritic writes "The practice of placing images above or next to adsense banners has been around for a while — the idea is to trick visitors into thinking that the Googe Ads are clickable image captions. Unsuspecting visitors click on the ads, and the webmasters make money. Now, Google has officially announced that the practice is no longer allowed. Meanwhile, the Marketwatch site is reporting that the company's previously discussed move into radio advertising is getting a mediocre reaction. Google, as yet, does not have enough access to airtime for the project to be profitable. The company plans on purchasing more airtime to expand the program, and is reportedly also looking to begin selling television ads as well." From the article: "Until Google can strike a deal with CBS, or some other radio giant, 'there will be no significant impact until mid-2007' on Google's bottom line, or the radio industry in general, [analyst Jordan] Rohan said in his research note. 'We believe a critical mass of advertisers is interested in testing the platform,' Rohan said, based on his interviews with his own sources. 'However, there is simply not enough radio inventory in the Google Audio system (yet) to enable buyers to run campaigns.'"
Google

Submission + - Google axes Search API

Submitted by
webbod
webbod writes: "The Google Search API is no more, released in a blaze of publicity in 2002, the API has been unceremoniously dumped, with not so much as a whimper from Google.

Google has quietly axed the web services API to its eponymous search engine. The stealth move was made without any announcement, but visitors to the page now receive a blunt message, backdated to 5 December, advising them that the SOAP API is no longer supported.
...<snip!>...
Google now points developers to the more restrictive AJAX API instead.

"The AJAX Search API is better suited for search-based web applications and supports additional features like Video, News, Maps, and Blog search results," Google said.
Register Article"
Security

Submission + - Exploit for Word also works with OpenOffice

Submitted by
mikrorechner
mikrorechner writes: "It seems you can be too compatible: According to this heise Security aticle, an exploit for one of the recent MS Word vulnerabilities also works with OpenOffice. Both Windows and Linux versions of OOo Writer crash if a prepared document is opened. As of now, it is uncertain if the crash can be used to inject code, but it seems possible."
PHP

Journal Journal: Update from Apache 1.3 to Apache 2.0?

Journal by ZaiPower

Hello:

I write this letter for asking you (and share knowledge about) your experiences at the time of migrating from Apache 1.3 to Apache 2.0 in production environments.

In my enterprise we have a few projets (most in PHP and a very little number in Perl) running in Apache 1.3. Now we are thinking in upgrading the web server (only the web server, the PHP version would be the same, PHP 4).
Software

Submission + - Citadel 7 Groupware Targets Enterprise

Submitted by IO ERROR
IO ERROR writes: Version 7 of Citadel, the world's first open source groupware platform, was released Monday. From the announcement: 'This is a major upgrade that includes an elaborate set of options for per-user sorting and filtering of incoming mail. Each user can build a custom set of rules using an easy point-and-click rules editing screen. Advanced users can bypass the rules editor completely and build scripts using the Sieve language.' Also new for version 7 are Sarbanes-Oxley mail journaling support, improved integration for KDE, Debian, FreeBSD and Mac OS X, Webcal and GroupDAV support for your favorite calendar/PIM application, a complete AJAX and graphic facelift for the Web interface, translations for eight languages, and much more. Citadel was featured in the December 2006 issue of Linux Magazine.
PlayStation (Games)

Submission + - Turn Your PS3 into a Linux PC for $49.95

Submitted by
Julie
Julie writes: "Game hackers, rejoice! Yellow Dog Linux v5.0 can turn a Playstation 3 into a powerful Linux machine. Now shipping from Terra Soft ("My yellow dog ate your red hat"), the $49.95 package features a desktop platform called Enlightenment E17 that apparently surpasses the typical KDE and Gnome environment for "an integrated end-user experience," according to the company. The PS3 was never content to be just another gaming machine. Now Yellow Dog Linux v5.0 can turn it into a full-blown PC, incorporating the state-of-the-art Cell microprocessor. Could hackers be far behind?"

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