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Software

The Finns Who Invented the Graphical Browser 148

Posted by kdawson from the something-in-the-water dept.
waderoush writes "If you thought Mosaic was the first graphical Web browser, think again. In their first major interview, three of the four Finnish software engineers behind Erwise — a point-and-click graphical Web browser for the X Window system — describe the creation of their program in 1991-1992, a full year before Marc Andreessen's Mosaic (which, of course, evolved into Netscape). Kim Nyberg, Kari Sydänmaanlakka, and Teemu Rantanen, with their fellow Helsinki University of Technology student Kati Borgers (nee Suominen), gave Erwise features such as text searching and the ability to load multiple Web pages that wouldn't be seen in other browsers until much later. The three engineers, who today work for the architectural software firm Tekla, say they never commercialized the project because there was no financing — Finland was in a deep recession at the time and lacked a strong venture capital or angel investing market. Otherwise, the Web revolution might have begun a year earlier."

Comment Instead of pure open source... (Score 2, Interesting) 555

by lejflo (#26731055) Attached to: Why Windows Must (and Will) Go Open Source

What if Microsoft offered their OS at a much cheaper price and modeled their revenue after, say, console makers? While the consoles are still expensive, the corporations sell them at a loss and instead plan on gaining a profit from selling video games.

In Microsoft's case, they would sell their software products like units at a profit, and they could concentrate on producing new types of software in house (like Apple does). Plus, if they went this route, they wouldn't necessarily have to pursue something stupid like new their software subscription services strategy.
Media

New Ads That Watch You 238

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the watching-the-watchers dept.
Pandanapper writes to tell us Yahoo is reporting that if you find yourself watching an ad on a video screen in a public venue, the ad may be watching you as well. "Small cameras can now be embedded in the screen or hidden around it, tracking who looks at the screen and for how long. The makers of the tracking systems say the software can determine the viewer's gender, approximate age range and, in some cases, ethnicity -- and can change the ads accordingly. That could mean razor ads for men, cosmetics ads for women and video-game ads for teens."

Comment Re:Malwarebytes (Score 1, Informative) 353

by lejflo (#26285389) Attached to: 400,000 PCs Infected With Fake "Antivirus 2009"

For the general malware infection, finding out what reg entries and what files to delete require:

  1. Doing a Google search for symptoms
  2. Reading through a LOT of forums/pages to figure out what you have.
  3. Manually scouring your filesystem and registry for the culprits/doing many other steps that you found from the aforementioned search.
  4. Crossing your fingers and hoping that you followed the appropriate instructions.

Contrast to Malwarebytes:

  1. Start up the program.
  2. Run the update (as needed).
  3. Start the scan.
  4. Go do something more fun (like, e.g., posting on /.).

I LOVE Malwarebytes. It saves me so much time, and it has, on occasion, found stuff I had no idea was even on my computer.

Comment Re:What a load of crap (Score 1) 414

by lejflo (#26228599) Attached to: Universal Broadband Plan Calls For $44 Billion

The free market works great, we just wouldn't know, we don't have one. We're regulated to death....

Actually, "federal officials are on pace this year to bring the fewest prosecutions for securities fraud since at least 1991": http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/25/business/25fraud.html?hp. One can't help but wonder if this freer market contributed to the economic crisis that exists right now and how something like Madoff's scheme went unnoticed until he decided to spill the beans.

Hell, even Greenspan, once one of the greatest cheerleaders for deregulation, admitted that he "put too much faith" in the free market: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/business/economy/24panel.html.

Federal regulation can suck at times, but when the core of the country's economy is based on abstract constructs that are intangible (like, say, toxic mortgage assets), I think at least some oversight is needed.
Programming

Web Browser Programming Blurring the Lines of MVC 303

Posted by kdawson from the extremely-thick-client dept.
lkcl tips his in-depth article up at Advogato on the difficulties for the MVC programming model that are introduced by Javascript and AJAX, and solutions for them. He writes: "This article outlines how the MVC concept is made incredibly awkward by the gradual but necessary introduction of Javascript and AJAX. A solution is found in the form of Javascript Compiler Technology such as GWT or Pyjamas (PyPy's JS backend or Rb2Js could be used, with some additional work). The article outlines how and why the traditional MVC patterns are fragmented by Javascript and AJAX, advocating that if a site is programmed purely in a high-level language that is then compiled to Javascript for the Web Browser sections, the same high-level source code can be executed either client-side on the browser, or server-side, or even both, depending on the requirements. The implications of this approach are discussed in depth."
Games

Fallout 3 Gets Leaked, Goes Gold 249

Posted by Soulskill from the sorry-about-your-luck dept.
Fallout 3 is due to be released in a few weeks, and Bethesda recently announced that all versions of the game have gone gold. They provided the systems specs for the PC release as well. Unfortunately for them, the Xbox 360 version was leaked onto torrent sites almost three weeks early. Bethesda is "looking into" how the game was distributed. In preparation for the launch, game director Todd Howard spoke at length with Gamasutra about the scope of the project, and the differences from their previous games, such as Oblivion. CrispyGamer recently ran a three-part series detailing their four hours of hands-on time with the game. We've previously looked at some gameplay videos for Fallout 3, and discussed the fact that no mod tools will ship with the game.

New MacBook Case Leak Rumors 243

Posted by CmdrTaco from the dear-god-i-need-a-new-machine dept.
Someone noted that there are more macbook case leaks which look to all but confirm a new MacBook and possibly a MacBook Pro expected to be announced for later this week. There seem to be fewer ports, and no leaks of a 17" aircraft carrier laptop.

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