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Security

Submission + - Microsoft Sounds Alert on Massive Web Bug (computerworld.com)

Submitted by CWmike
CWmike writes: Microsoft has warned users that a critical bug in ASP.Net could be exploited by attackers to hijack encrypted Web sessions and pilfer usernames and passwords from Web sites. The vulnerability went public that same day when a pair of researchers outlined the bug and attack techniques at the Ekoparty Security Conference in Buenos Aires. , the flaw exists in all versions of ASP.Net, the company's Web application framework used to craft millions of sites and applications, according to Microsoft's advisory. It will have to patch every supported version of Windows, from XP Service Pack 3 and Server 2003 to Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2, as well as other products, including its IIS and SharePoint server software.
Music

Submission + - Leonard Skinner, Namesake of Rock Band, Dies (nytimes.com)

Submitted by pickens
pickens writes: The NY Times reports the death at age 77 of the most influential high school gym teacher in American history, whose enforcement of a draconian classroom policy against long hair inspired some of his students to name their Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd. Skinner taught gym at Robert E. Lee High School in Jacksonville in the 1960s, whose students included Ronnie Van Zant. Seeking a new name, the group recalled Skinner, who was said to have sent Van Zant and his bandmates to the principal’s office for wearing their hair too long in his class so in a mocking tribute the fledgling band changed its name to Leonard Skinnerd and then, more memorably, to Lynyrd Skynyrd. Skinner seemed not to be bothered by his association with the band. "They were good, talented, hard-working boys," Skinner said. "They worked hard, lived hard and boozed hard."
Games

Submission + - Top Five Disappointing Sonic The Hedgehog Games (rundlc.com)

Submitted by Buffalo55
Buffalo55 writes: Sonic the Hedgehog’s had a rough career. Originally groomed as the mascot that would topple Mario, Sega grossly mishandled its shining star, casting him in a series of average to downright awful video games that critics would like to forget. And with Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 speeding its way to consoles this winter, all eyes are on the blue blur and his highly anticipated adventure.

So far, it appears that Sega’s moving in the right direction, with a 2-D side scrolling platform game that reminds us of the character’s 16-bit Genesis days, but we’ve been fooled before by over hyped titles that seemed fun, but ultimately proved disappointing. Here now, are those five games.
Operating Systems

Submission + - Looking back at OS X's origins (macworld.com)

Submitted by DJRumpy
DJRumpy writes: Macworld Weekly has an interesting look at the history of OS X from it's early origins in 1985 under NEXT and the Mach Kernel to Rhapsody, to it's current iteration as OS X.

An interesting quick read if anyone is curious about the timeline from Apple's shaky 90's to their current position in the market. There's also an interesting link at the bottom talking about the difference between the original beta and the release product that we see today.

Submission + - Oracle Debuts Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (oracle.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Oracle has announced the availability of the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel for Oracle Linux, a fast, modern, reliable kernel that is optimized for Oracle software and hardware. "Today's hardware innovations are fast and frequent, making it very important that the Linux distributions evolve quickly to leverage the latest hardware," said Wim Coekaerts, senior vice president of Linux and Virtualization Engineering at Oracle.

The new Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel is the result of the combined efforts of Oracle's Linux, database, middleware, and hardware engineering teams, and is:

Fast—More than 75 percent performance gain demonstrated in OLTP performance tests over a Red Hat Compatible Kernel; 200 percent speedup of Infiniband messaging; 137 percent faster solid state disk access

Modern—Provides optimizations for large NUMA servers; improved power management and energy efficiency; fine-grained CPU and memory resource control

Reliable—Supports the Data Integrity Extensions and T10 Protection Information Model, to stop corrupt data from being written to storage; hardware fault management improves application uptime; low overhead performance counters for tracing

Optimized for Oracle—Built and tested to run Oracle hardware, databases, and middleware with the best Linux performance and reliability available
Linux

Submission + - Open source tools for Video Editing (linuxaria.com)

Submitted by linuxaria
linuxaria writes: As seen in a previous article on audio, there are many excellent open source tool to create professional solutions. Today I want to do a roundup on the video editing and show you some of the best open source software available for Linux to do video editing. if you know other software, feel free to drop me a note on the comments.
OpenShot
  Kino
Cinellera
Lives
Kdenlive
Pitivi
VideoLan Movie Creator

Submission + - BBC News - Pi record smashed as team finds two-qua (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by gregg
gregg writes: A researcher has calculated the 2,000,000,000,000,000th digit of pi — and a few digits either side of it. Nicholas Sze, of technology firm Yahoo, determined that the digit — when expressed in binary — is 0.
Robotics

Submission + - NASA Global Hawk over Hurricane Karl now! (suasnews.com)

Submitted by garymortimer
garymortimer writes: A fantastic advert for civil use of UAS, the NASA Global Hawk is on scene and gathering data!

In December 2007, two Global Hawks were transferred from the U.S. Air Force to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base. Initial research activities beginning in the second quarter of 2009 will support NASA's high-altitude, long-duration Earth science missions.The two Global Hawks were the first and sixth aircraft built under the original DARPA Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration program, and were made available to NASA when the Air Force had no further need for them. Northrop Grumman is an operational partner with NASA and will use the aircraft to demonstrate new technologies and to develop new markets for the aircraft, including possible civilian uses.
According to an article in the March 2010 issue of Scientific American (p. 25-27), the Global Hawk aircraft belonging to NASA were in use for testing purposes as of October 2009, with science missions expected to start in March 2010. Initial science applications included measurements of the ozone layer and cross-Pacific transport of air pollutants and aerosols. The author of the Scientific American piece speculates that the aircraft could be used for Antarctic exploration while based in and operated from Chile.
In August and September of 2010 one of the two Global Hawks was loaned for NASA's GRIP Mission (Genesis and Rapid Intensification Program), with its long-term on station capabilities and long range it was the best aircraft for the mission to monitor the development of Atlantic basin Hurricanes. It was modified to equip weather sensors including Ku-Band Radar, Lightning sensors and Dropsondes. It successfully flew into Hurricane Earl off the United States East Coast on September 2nd.

Submission + - Sprint Prviews 4G in NYC (nyconvergence.com)

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward writes: "Sprint previewed its 4G technology in NYC today, displaying several new gadgets running on the Sprint 4G network, including the HTC Evo and the Samsung Epic. Connections were very fast with seamless video streaming from both YouTube and ESPN live television; up to10Mbps for download speed, with an average of 3 to 6Mbps, and a maximum upload speed of 3Mbps with 4G."

Submission + - Sikorsky beats helicopter speed record, again.

Submitted by gilgsn
gilgsn writes: 250 knots might not seem a whole lot compared to any jet, but for a helicopter, it is truly incredible. Sikorsky today successfully achieved a speed of 250 knots true air speed in level flight with their X2 Technology demonstrator, and even pushed it to 260Kts in a shallow dive. Most commercial helicopters fly at half that speed.

Submission + - A portable, laser backpack for 3D mapping (spacemart.com)

Submitted by
wooferhound
wooferhound writes: "A portable, laser backpack for 3D mapping has been developed at the University of California, Berkeley, where it is being hailed as a breakthrough technology capable of producing fast, automatic and realistic 3D mapping of difficult interior environments.
The backpack is the first of a series of similar systems to work without being strapped to a robot or attached to a cart. At the same time, its data acquisition speed is very fast, as it collects the data while the human operator is walking; this is in contrast with existing systems in which the data is painstakingly collected in a stop and go fashion, resulting in days and weeks of data acquisition time.
Utilizing novel sensor fusion algorithms that use cameras, lasers range finders and inertial measurement units to generate a textured, photo-realistic, 3D model that can operate without GPS input and that is a big challenge.

http://www.spacemart.com/reports/Portable_Laser_Backpack_Revolutionizes_Interior_3D_Mapping_999.html"

Submission + - The 110MPG X-prize Car Was Built In Rural Virginia (pbs.org)

Submitted by tcd004
tcd004 writes: Instead of using Detroit engineers or Silicon Valley bitheads, Virginia-based Edison2 relied on retired Formula 1 and Nascar engineers to build its entry for the X-prize. Relying on composite materials and titanium, the team assembled an ultra-lightweight car that provides all the comforts of a standard 4-passenger vehicle, but gets more than 100 mpg. The custom engineering goes all the way down to the car's lug nuts, which weigh less than 11 grams each. Amazingly, they expect a production version of the car should cost less than $20,000.
PlayStation (Games)

Submission + - PSP2 Is Real, 'Pretty Powerful' And In Developers' (industrygamers.com)

Submitted by donniebaseball23
donniebaseball23 writes: IndustryGamers has learned from a producer on the new Mortal Kombat that the team has a PSP2 and it's a "pretty powerful machine." While Sony has yet to acknowledge the existence of the new PSP, it's clear that developers are gearing up for the new portable. Sony is feeling pressure from Apple, whose iPhone continues to gain steam in gaming and even has Unreal support now, and Nintendo whose 3DS is "magical" and will sell like hotcakes, according to EA.
Science

Submission + - China creates first solar powered air conditioner (tekgoblin.com)

Submitted by tekgoblin
tekgoblin writes: In Dezhou, China, Shandong Vicot Air Conditioning Co., Ltd unveiled the worlds first directly solar powered air conditioner. The unit was revealed at the World Solar-Powered Air Conditioning Development Forum which was hosted in Dezhou.

This new air conditioner is a leap towards energy independence with predictions that the worlds traditional energy resources will be depleted by 2060. With the implementation of China's Renewable Energy Law which supports the usage of renewable energy China has quickly become the worlds largest user and creator of solar energy.
Security

Submission + - Polish hacker hits US Defence site (techeye.net)

Submitted by bossanovalithium
bossanovalithium writes: There is one movie every Polish person knows. It's a cult comedy from the 80s called "Mi" — meaning "Teddy Bear". Now, thanks to a hacker going by a name "Porkythepig", everyone can see it — but not on YouTube where you would expect it, but on the USA military Defence Logistics Agency website.

If you go the site and just type "porkythepig", a fragment of a movie begins to play. It's in Polish, of course — for those not fluent in Polish the man with a guitar sings: "I'm a Happy Romek..." * It's funny but the story is much more serious.

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It's a naive, domestic operating system without any breeding, but I think you'll be amused by its presumption.

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