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Displays

Why Are We Losing Vertical Pixels? 1140

Posted by CmdrTaco from the for-you-uriah dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Switching from 1600x1200 to wide 1680x1050 to HD 1600x900, we are losing more and more vertical space, thus it is becoming less and less simple to read a full A4 page or a web page or a function call. What's the solution for retaining the screen height we need to be productive?"

Comment Re:Checks and Balances . . . ? (Score 1) 101

by jgirata (#30707386) Attached to: Politicians Worldwide Asking Questions About ACTA
An executive agreement is an agreement with another country that specifies how the Executive Department will handle certain laws/situations/etc. The key is that the executive agreement is limited to what is allowed under current laws. It's sort of along the same lines as Bush banning stem cell research with federal funds, then Obama allowing it. The federal law simply said "you have x dollars to spend on medical research." It is up to the President and the Executive Department to determine how that money will be spent. I don't know very much at all about this law, so I'm not sure what exactly they may be discussing, but it could be how tough the enforcement will be, specifics of international cooperation, etc.
Government

INTERPOL Granted Diplomatic Immunity In the US 450

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the subcontracting-the-dirty-work dept.
ShakaUVM writes "A couple of weeks ago without any fanfare or notice in the media, President Obama granted INTERPOL full diplomatic immunity while conducting investigations on American soil. While INTERPOL has been allowed to operate in the US in the past, under an executive order by President Reagan, they've had to follow the same rules as the FBI, CIA, etc., while on American soil. This means, among other things, the new executive order makes INTERPOL immune to Freedom of Information Act requests and that INTERPOL agents cannot be punished for most any crimes they may commit. Hopefully the worst we'll see from this is INTERPOL agents ignoring their speeding tickets." Update: 01/05 02:57 GMT by KD : Reader davecb pointed out an ABC News blog that comes to pretty much the opposite conclusion as to the import of the executive order.
Earth

Gigantic Spiral of Light Observed Over Norway; Rocket To Blame? 418

Posted by timothy from the they-get-all-the-cool-stuff dept.
Ch_Omega writes "A mysterious light display appearing over Norway last night (more pictures) has left thousands of residents in the north of the country baffled. Witnesses from Trøndelag to Finnmark compared the amazing display to anything from a Russian rocket to a meteor to a shock wave — although no one appears to have mentioned UFOs yet. The phenomenon began when what appeared to be a blue light seemed to soar up from behind a mountain. It stopped mid-air, then began to circulate. Within seconds a giant spiral had covered the entire sky. Then a green-blue beam of light shot out from its center — lasting for ten to twelve minutes before disappearing completely. The Norwegian Meteorological Institute was flooded with telephone calls after the light storm — which astronomers have said did not appear to have been connected to the aurora, or Northern Lights, so common in that area of the world." The Bad Astronomer makes the case that a malfunctioning rocket spewing fuel is a parsimonious explanation, backed up by witnesses to similar events and a cool simulation (on video). An anonymous reader suggests that this Proton-M Carrier Rocket might be responsible for the display.
Security

How To Hire a Hacker 370

Posted by samzenpus from the kid-have-you-rehabilitated-yourself dept.
itwbennett writes "If you want to hire a hacker, you need to take a more psychology-based approach to the entire interview process to determine whether he or she has changed their ways enough to be a trustworthy employee, says Mich Kabay in a recent Network World blog post. But this approach is also 'germane for highly skilled staffers, even those that don't come with arrest records or who have done something questionable in their pasts,' says David Strom. For example, in your next interview, ask a question that will suss out how much of a sense of entitlement a candidate has — or how much you or your company has. 'One time when I interviewed with Microsoft in Redmond I couldn't get over this sense of corporate entitlement — it was one of the biggest turn-offs that I had during my interviewing day there,' says Strom. 'I got the feeling that I wasn't going to fit in, no matter how smart I thought (or they thought) I was.'"
Social Networks

Facebook App Exposes Abject Insecurity 205

Posted by CmdrTaco from the pay-no-attention-to-the-hole-in-my-pants dept.
ewhac writes "Back in June, the American Civil Liberties Union published an article describing Facebook's complete lack of meaningful security on your and your friends' information. The article went virtually unnoticed. Now, a developer has written a Facebook 'Quiz' based on the original article that graphically illustrates all the information a Facebook app can get its grubby little hands on by recursively sweeping through your friends list, pulling all their info and posts, and showing it to you. What's more, apps can get at your information even if you never run the app yourself. Facebook apps run with the access privileges of the user running it, so anything your friend can see, the app they're running can see, too. It is unclear whether the developer of the Facebook app did so 'officially' for the ACLU."
Programming

C# and Java Weekday Languages, Python and Ruby For Weekends? 389

Posted by timothy from the like-a-commercial-for-light-beer dept.
Dan Lorenc writes "Using the StackOverflow.com data dump, I measured the activity of various programming languages throughout the week. The results: Ruby and Python saw a rise in questions asked on the weekend while C# and Java saw a dropoff in activity on the weekend. This means that more programmers are using Python and Ruby on the weekend for their personal projects, showing that these languages are more fun to use. Show this experiment to your boss the next time you are selecting a programming language for a project at work."

Comment Re:Your school is right (Score 1) 537

by jgirata (#28670287) Attached to: Which Language Approach For a Computer Science Degree?
The analogy I use is: In a calculus course, they don't spend a week teaching you how to take derivatives of position functions, then spend a week taking derivatives of velocity functions, then a week taking derivatives of cost functions. They teach you how to take derivatives, then expect you to be able to apply that knowledge in any situation that may require it.
Government

US Dept. of Defense Creates Its Own Sourceforge 131

Posted by Soulskill from the sharing-their-toys dept.
mjasay writes "The US Department of Defense, which has been flirting with open source for years as a way to improve software quality and cut costs, has finally burst the dam on Defense-related open-source adoption with Forge.mil, an open-source code repository based on Sourceforge. Though it currently only holds three projects and is limited to DoD personnel for security reasons, all code is publicly viewable and will almost certainly lead to other agencies participating on the site or creating their own. Open source has clearly come a long way. Years ago studies declared open source a security risk. Now, one of the most security-conscious organizations on the planet is looking to open source to provide better security than proprietary alternatives."

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