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Math

First Self-Replicating Creature Spawned In Conway's Game of Life 241

Posted by Soulskill from the emergent-gameplay dept.
Calopteryx writes "New Scientist has a story on a self-replicating entity which inhabits the mathematical universe known as the Game of Life. 'Dubbed Gemini, [Andrew Wade's] creature is made of two sets of identical structures, which sit at either end of the instruction tape. Each is a fraction of the size of the tape's length but, made up of two constructor arms and one "destructor," play a key role. Gemini's initial state contains three of these structures, plus a fourth that is incomplete. As the simulation progresses the incomplete structure begins to grow, while the structure at the start of the tape is demolished. The original Gemini continues to disassemble as the new one emerges, until after nearly 34 million generations, new life is born.'"

Feed 300 First 2007 Blockbuster (wired.com)

From feed by wiredfeed
The ancient battle of Thermopylae stars in 300, which debuts with opening-weekend ticket sales of $70 million. By the Associated Press. Plus: A gallery of photo stills from the film homage to Frank Miller's graphic novel.


Google

Google's Best Perk — Transport 342

Posted by kdawson from the Wi-Fi-included dept.
Reverse Gear writes "The New York Times has an interesting article about how different kinds of fringe benefits are starting to count more in the fight for the best brains in Silicon Valley. The article mainly focuses on Google's high-tech shuttle-bus system, which is quite extensive, covering a majority of the San Fransisco Bay area. The article quotes a transportation expert opining that Google's may be the largest such private system anywhere. One-quarter of the headquarters employees are now using it. A Google software engineer said: 'They could either charge for the food or cut it altogether... If they cut the shuttle, it would be a disaster.'"
Linux Business

Submission + - Why Dell won't offer Linux on its PCs.

Submitted by
derrida
derrida writes: "Jack Schofield explains in his article why Dell won't offer Linux on its PCs. Quoting from there: "The most obvious is deciding which version of Linux to offer. There are more than 100 distros, and everybody seems to want a different one — or the same one with a different desktop, or whatever. It costs Dell a small fortune to offer an operating system (it involves thousands of driver compatibility, peripheral testing, certification, staff training, administration, advertising and support issues) so the lack of a standard is a real killer. The less obvious problem is the very high cost of Linux support, especially when selling cheap PCs to naïve users who don't RTFM (read the friendly manual) and wouldn't understand a Linux manual if they tried. And there's so much of it! Saying "Linux is just a kernel, so that's all we support" isn't going to work, but where in the great sprawling heap of GNU/Linux code do you draw the line?""
The Courts

SCO Says IBM Hurt Profits 174

Posted by kdawson from the and-a-bandaid-for-your-knee dept.
AlanS2002 sends in a link from a local Utah newspaper covering the SCO-IBM trial. The Deseret News chose to emphasize SCO's claim that IBM hurt SCO's relationship with several high-tech powerhouses, causing SCO's market share and revenues to plummet. "[A]n attorney for Lindon-based SCO said IBM 'pressured' companies to cut off their relationships with SCO. And 'the effect on SCO was devastating and it was immediate'..." As usual Groklaw has chapter and verse on all the arguments in the motions for summary judgement.
Unix

Submission + - Debugging the FreeBSD kernal transparently

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: To debug the FreeBSD kernel core dump efficiently, it is best to set up a remote debugging session between the development machine and target machine, and remotely debug the kernel using serial communication. This article shows you how you can debug as many kernel images as you want to debug; it becomes transparent to users once debugging starts and your system's performance is not affected at all.
Space

Submission + - New Mexico secedes, might declare Pluto Planet

Submitted by
pease1
pease1 writes: "Wired and others are reporting for New Mexico, the fight for Pluto is not over. Seven months after a conclave of scientists downgraded the distant heavenly body to a "dwarf planet," a state representative in New Mexico aims to give the snubbed world back some of its respect. State lawmakers will vote Tuesday on a bill that proposes "as Pluto passes overhead through New Mexico's excellent night skies, it be declared a planet." Actual wording of the resolution.

For many of us old timers and those who had the honor of meeting Clyde, this just causes a belly of laughs and is pure fun. Not to mention a bit of poking sticking in the eye."
Power

Journal Journal: Freetricity? Small-scale wind & solar generator 1

Journal by zmef420

OK, so a while back now I was working on a business plan and stumbled across the website of a startup company offering a very intriguing product, a small wind and solar generator system. The product is about the size of a digital satellite dish and the basic unit is claimed to produce 300 watts and includes a 700 watt inverter. Being the impulse buyer that I am, I quickly purchased some of these units but sadly they still haven't arrived. I'm starting to worry that I've been duped. My questio
Education

Journal Journal: New Species Of Dinosaur

Journal by Video Cat
According to http://www.wastedblog.com/viewcontent.php?IdContent=4655 a new species of dinosaur has been discovered. Michael Ryan, curator of vertebrate paleontology for the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, published the discovery in this month's Journal of Paleontology. He dug up the fossil six years ago in southern Alberta, Canada, while a graduate student for the University of Calgary. The new dinosaur has been named

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