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Feed Engadget: GSM cellphone technology celebrates 20 years, aims for 20 more (engadget.com)

From feed by engfeed

Filed under: Cellphones

Just this summer we saw text messaging party down after turning 15, and now its time to get your weekend started right by celebrating 20 whole years of GSM. Reportedly, "15 phone firms signed an agreement to build mobile networks based on the Global System for Mobile (GSM) Communications" on this day in 1987, and while it took "12 years for the first billion mobile connections to be made," things have pretty much taken off since then. So here's to 20 incredibly fruitful years, GSM, you've earned it.

[Thanks James; image courtesy of RetroBrick]

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

Mindbridge Saves "Bunches of Money" In Switch To Linux 177

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the yet-another-success-story dept.
While Mindbridge didn't start out as an open source company, it has since managed to save what they can only describe as "bunches of money" by switching to Linux. "Today, Mindbridge has repurposed itself as an open-source-friendly company, and revamped its infrastructure to run completely on Linux and other open source software. 'Having deployed [Linux servers] to our customers, we turned around and said, we can do the same thing internally and save bunches of money. We began a systematic but slow flipping of servers from the Microsoft world over to predominantly Linux — although there are a few BSD boxes around as well,' Christian says. 'It's to the point that today I only have two production Windows servers left, out of 15 or so.'"

Feed Science Daily: Polar Bear Population Predicted To Dwindle WIth Retreating Ice (sciencedaily.com)

From feed by sdfeed
Future reduction of sea ice in the Arctic could result in a loss of 2/3 of the world's polar bear population within 50 years according to a series of studies just released by the U.S. Geological Survey. Polar bears depend on sea ice as a platform to hunt seals, their primary food. But sea ice is decreasing throughout their Arctic range due to climate change. Models used by the USGS team project a 42 percent loss of optimal polar bear habitat from the Polar Basin during summer, a vital hunting and breeding period, by mid-century.
Intel

Intel to Take Online Suggestions for New Chips 152

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the horses-mouth dept.
hhavensteincw writes "Intel has quietly launched a new online community that it plans to use to take feedback and suggestions from OEMs and end users for new features in its vPro chips and management software. Intel envisions that the community will grow to allow users to get answers from other community members faster than Intel's support group can answer questions."
Toys

Spider-Like Catamaran Travels 5,000 Miles On One Tank 196

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the doing-whatever-a-spider-boat-does dept.
Lucas123 writes "Proteus, a Wave Adaptive Modular Vessel that looks like a spider, is so fuel efficient that it can travel 5,000 miles on one load of diesel fuel. The 100-foot-long, 50-foot-wide boat rides on metal and fabric pontoons that have hinges and shock absorbers to flex with the motion of the waves, which helps it to skim over the water at a max speed of 30 knots. It made its debut yesterday in New York harbor."
Power

Radiation Absorbing Mineral Found In the Arctic 351

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the the-power-of-suck dept.
An anonymous reader writes "A mineral has recently been found that exhibits the astounding property of being able to remove radiation from water-based solutions. 'After coming into contact with the mineral, radioactive water becomes completely safe. Had this mineral been available to physicists after the Chernobyl or Three Mile Island disasters, the consequences might have been very different, as both accidents resulted in contamination from radioactive water.' Also, the article notes that although only grams of the material have been found, tons of it are needed; they are confident they could artificially reproduce it."
Software

Open Letter to ISO Calls For Standardization of Process 108

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the corruption-arms-race dept.
In a recent open letter to the ISO FreeCode CEO Geir Isene calls for standardization in the processes used by the ISO to help prevent future OOXML blunders. "It seems ISO is not prepared for a politicized process where a big and influential commercial enterprise will use any means possible to push its own standard through to certification. Committees are flooded by the vendor in support of the standard. Votes are bought and results are hijacked. Several national bodies have flawed and skewed procedures open for corruption."
Databases

Are Relational Databases Obsolete? 417

Posted by kdawson from the long-in-the-tooth dept.
jpkunst sends us to Computerworld for a look at Michael Stonebraker's opinion that RDBMSs "should be considered legacy technology." Computerworld adds some background and analysis to Stonebraker's comments, which appear in a new blog, The Database Column. Stonebraker co-created the Ingres and Postgres technology while a researcher at UC Berkeley in the early 1970s. He predicts that "column stores will take over the [data] warehouse market over time, completely displacing row stores."

Comment Seymour (Score 1) 279

by Meditating_Guru (#4751030) Attached to: Coolest Cluster Ever
Yeah really snappy....only 400 grandish from a supercomputer. These things are a bargain.

I'm reminded of Seymore Crays thoughts on clusters.

quote.
"If you were plowing a field, which would you rather use? Two strong oxen or 1024 chickens?"

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