Carl Zimmer published a fascinating article in Discover Magazine about scientists at Michigan State University that have re-created the evolutionary process using computer software. They've created digital organisms that replicate themselves like viruses, but include the remote chance of random mutation to their code during that replication, simulating the random mutations that happen in the DNA of living organisms. DNA is, after all, just a set of instructions, just like software. The creatures were able to evolve a complex operation, the equals operation, negating Intelligent Design's "complexity" argument (complex things can't evolve because they are of no use without all their parts). The digital organisms have even started to show signs of ... intelligence, playing dead for their programmers. Pretty fascinating.

ItWorks has come up with an interesting idea with the complete server on a USB plug they've been selling on ebay. "HTML, PERL, CGI, PHP, SSI, MySQL, FTP, HTTP, POP3, SMTP, IP security, Port security, Aliasing, Logging, MIME, User authentication, custom errors, multi threading, and even Remote Administration via web browser." Their server software is proprietary and only works with Windows machines. I wonder what it would take to set up a more cross-platform, open source version with cools stuff like Ruby, lighttpd, SQLite, and of course Rails.