Comment False security (Score 1) 147
And this is why the only reason you would use it is to keep the young kids from being able to play with the phone.
Comment Re:Curing Greed. (Score 1) 468
What most of the people that subscribe to the "greed is good" philosophy is that they are not describing greed. Greed is one of the seven cardinal sins, it creates strife. What is really being described is ambition. Ambition created the middle class. Ambition has done more for the poor person. We should be rewarding ambition not greed.
Comment Why not decentralized? (Score 1) 147
I can't help but to think why there isn't a decentralized social network yet; possibly built on top of peer-to-peer infrastructure. That way, people would not need to rely upon Facebook/Twitter/etc... being gracious enough to allow you to express your opinions.
Federal Government Inadvertently Deleted Ca.Gov 195
An anonymous reader writes "A Network World reader whose brother works for a California state agency forwarded me an e-mail alert that his brother received: "The Department of Technology Services (DTS) has notified us that the Federal Government inadvertently deleted the CA.GOV domain. As the evening progresses you may experience an impact in your ability to access some Web sites and exchange e-mail. DTS is working with their federal counterparts to restore service as quickly as possible but service may not be restored until tomorrow morning.""
Microsoft Should Abandon Vista? 1119
mr_mischief writes "An editorial written by Don Reisinger over at CNet's News.com takes Microsoft to task for the outright failure of Vista. He suggests that Vista may be the downfall of the company as, despite years in development, Vista was delivered to market too early. His suggestion? Support those who are running it, but otherwise ditch Vista and move on. 'Never before have I seen such an abysmal start to an operating system release. For almost a year, people have been adopting Vista and becoming incensed by how poorly it operates. Not only does it cost too much, it requires more to run than XP, there is still poor driver support ... With Mac OS X hot on its tail, Vista is simply not capable of competing at an OS level with some of the best software around. If Microsoft continues down this path, it will be Vista that will bring the software giant to its knees--not Bill Gates' departure.'"
Why Do Commercial Offerings Use Linux, But Not Support Linux Users? 414
Michele Alessandrini writes "Having bought several TomTom One navigation systems at work, I was browsing their web site to find information about maps.
There are several pages of documentation about their devices.
In one of them, they proudly inform you that their devices use Linux, as a warranty of power and stability. They even prominently display their GPL compatibility. But, when you come to the software (the one used to manage updates, set locations, etc), they only support Windows and Mac OS. Not that surprising, and not a real necessity. Just the same, they probably saved millions of dollars using a free kernel and didn't think to support Linux users. As Linux gains ground in commercial applications like this, how often are we going to see actual users of the OS left out in the cold? Why don't more Linux-using shops reach out to the Linux-using community?"
MIT Student Arrested For Wearing 'Tech Art' Shirt At Airport 1547
SuperBanana writes "According to a report by the Boston Globe, MIT Student Star Simpson was nearly shot by Logan Airport police who thought she was armed with a bomb. She approached an airline employee wearing a prototyping board with electronic components, crudely attached to the front of her sweatshirt and holding 'putty' in her hand. She asked about an incoming flight, and did not respond when asked about the device. Armed police responded. 'Simpson was charged with possessing a hoax device and was arraigned today East Boston Municipal Court. She was held on $750 cash bail and ordered to return to court Oct. 29. "Thankfully because she followed our instructions, she ended up in our cell instead of a morgue," Pare said. "Again, this is a serious offense ... I'm shocked and appalled that somebody would wear this type of device to an airport."'"
MIT Media Lab Making Programming Fun For Kids 318
An anonymous reader passed us a link to an article on the Boston Globe's website, talking up efforts by MIT to make programming a non-threatening part of grade-school education. MIT has developed a new programming language designed to encourage experimentation and play. Called Scratch, the project eschews manuals and high-level concepts in favour of approachability. "Efforts to make computer programming accessible to young people began in the late 1970s with the advent of the personal PC, when another programming language with roots at MIT — Logo — allowed young people to draw shapes by steering a turtle around a screen by typing out commands. But the path to mastering most programming languages has been strewn with obstacles, since students needed to figure out not only the underlying logic but also master a brand new syntax, observe strict rules about semicolons and bracket use, and figure out what was causing error messages even as they learned the program."
Microsoft Worried OEM 'Craplets' Will Harm Vista 527
elsilver writes "An article at the CBC indicates that Microsoft is worried that the assorted crap most OEM companies load onto a new machine may affect users' opinion of Vista. An unnamed executive is concerned that the user will conclude the instability of the non-MS-certified applications is Vista's fault. Is this a serious concern, or is MS trying to bully OEMs into only including Vista-certified apps? As for the OEMs, one "removed older DVD-writing software they found was incompatible and replaced it with Vista's own software." — do they get points for realizing it was both buggy AND redundant?"
Journal Journal: Apple's new iphone
Apple's new iphone has recently been displayed on their website seen here:
http://www.apple.com/iphone/
I have been using HP iPaqs for a couple of years, both ones that are simply handhelds and ones that have integrated cell phone systems.
The Apple iphone is by far the best looking, and hosts the best opperating system as of yet. Some of the main features I have noticed are the excellent integration between the phone and the handheld, which is somet
Vendor AMD-ATI combo to shake up consumer electronics mkt
AMD is looking to change the rules
of the semiconductor chip maker game. It started with their acquisition of ATI, making them the second-largest maker of computing processors. They are now working to "create a new class of x86 processor that integrates the CPU and the GPU at the silicon level with a broad set of design i
Microsoft Squeezes Win2000 Users 404
darkonc writes "InformationWeek has a story on how Microsoft is squeezing Windows 2000 users as Vista and Office 2007 are being released. While some new software is legitimately unable to run on Windows 2000, other software (like MS's anti-spyware product) will install and run flawlessly — but only if you remove an explicit check for Windows 2000 in the installer." The article notes that other vendors, for example Sun, have more liberal and flexible support policies for legacy products.
Google Web Toolkit Now 100% Open Source 173
chrisd writes "When we first released the Google Web Toolkit (GWT) we were focused on building a great tool for people to build AJAX apps with. Now, we're happy to announce that all of the GWT source code is available, including the Java to JavaScript compiler and the debugging browser, under the Apache 2.0 license. If you'd like to see how we pulled off letting you avoid dealing with nasty browser quirks, you should take a look. More importantly, we're running this like a true open source project now: we'll be developing GWT completely in the open, as per our project charter. More info on the GWT blog."
Microsoft Looking to Run Windows on OLPC 392
pete314 writes "Microsoft has been provided with a number of test models of Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop per Child computers and is trying to get Windows installed on them. The current design runs a custom version of Red Hat's Fedora Linux. Running Windows will take quite a bit of additional memory: the OLPC has 512Mb of Flash, where XP requires a minimum of 1.5Gb storage."
Novell "Forking" OpenOffice.org 370
l2718 writes to mention that In the wake of their recent deal with Microsoft, Novell has announced a new version of OpenOffice.org which will support Microsoft's planned Office formal, Open XML. From the article: "The translators will be made available as plug-ins to Novell's OpenOffice.org product. Novell will release the code to integrate the Open XML format into its product as open source and submit it for inclusion in the OpenOffice.org project. As a result, end users will be able to more easily share files between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org, as documents will better maintain consistent formats, formulas and style templates across the two office productivity suites."
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It was pity stayed his hand. "Pity I don't have any more bullets," thought Frito. -- _Bored_of_the_Rings_, a Harvard Lampoon parody of Tolkein
