Comment Re:3.1 (Score 1) 165
personally, I'm holding out for Linux 95. I reckon that'll be when it really starts gaining traction among the general public.
Comment Re:Windows itself seems close to being deprecated (Score 1) 226
a traditional Windows desktop will be available (certainly on x86, perhaps on arm) for those who are determined enough to figure out how to reenable it
You mean to say that clicking on the "desktop" tile that's conveniently located on the welcome 'Metro' screen requires determination and figuring out? It's not even re-enabling it. It hasn't gone anywhere that requires any trickery to get back - unlike the Start Menu.
Comment Re:Google (Score 2, Informative) 354
As I said, the only groups being hurt by this are Google and those dumb enough to rely on Android for their future, anyone else with a brain will take a look at the competition and more open platforms.
Newsflash: Consumers don't care about whether Google's playing nice with the Linux community or not.
Australia Could Finally Get R18+ Games 143
angry tapir writes "Australia may finally get an adults only, R18+ classification for computer games, with the federal government releasing a discussion paper summarizing the key arguments for and against an R18+ classification. Submissions are currently being sought from the community on whether the Australian National Classification Scheme should include an R18+ category for computer and video games. In the past the board responsible for classifying games and movies has banned some titles outright because of the lack of an adults only classification — Aliens Vs. Predator is just the most recent in a long line. The Attorney-General's report on the issue is available online."
Comment Re:Wifi? (Score 2, Insightful) 102
No. You need a valid SIM in your phone to access the market, and as far as I can tell (with my HTC Magic on Virgin), you can only download apps over 3G. You can queue them up over WiFi, but I've never seen an app start downloading until I've disconnected from WiFi.
Comment Re:Proxy? (Score 3, Informative) 102
No. It's a network setting that Optus needs to change. You can get around it by using the "Market Enabler" app that's available on the net, but you need to root your phone* and void your warranty etc to use it.
*and in Australia, this phrase is rather amusing because "rooting" something is usually vernacular for "have sex with"...
*and in Australia, this phrase is rather amusing because "rooting" something is usually vernacular for "have sex with"...
Scientists Create Artificial Meat 820
Hugh Pickens writes "The Telegraph reports that scientists have created the first artificial meat by extracting cells from the muscle of a live pig and putting them in a broth of other animal products where the cells then multiplied to create muscle tissue. Described as soggy pork, researchers believe that it can be turned into something like steak if they can find a way to 'exercise' the muscle and while no one has yet tasted the artificial meat, researchers believe the breakthrough could lead to sausages and other processed products being made from laboratory meat in as little as five years' time. '"What we have at the moment is rather like wasted muscle tissue. We need to find ways of improving it by training it and stretching it, but we will get there," says Mark Post, professor of physiology at Eindhoven University. "You could take the meat from one animal and create the volume of meat previously provided by a million animals." Animal rights group Peta has welcomed the laboratory-grown meat, announcing that "as far as we're concerned, if meat is no longer a piece of a dead animal there's no ethical objection while the Vegetarian Society remained skeptical. "The big question is how could you guarantee you were eating artificial flesh rather than flesh from an animal that had been slaughtered. It would be very difficult to label and identify in a way that people would trust.""
iPhone 3.1 Spotted In Field Testing 136
kai_hiwatari writes "Digitizor reports that the next generation of the iPhone was spotted in the analytics log of an iPhone app called iBart. The device, it seems, was identified as iPhone 3.1 in the log. When iPhone 2.1 was spotted, it was followed by iPhone 3G."
Solar-Powered Plane Makes Runway Debut 120
MikeChino writes "The much-hyped Solar Impulse airplane just completed its first runway test, paving the way for a 20-to-25-day trip around the world next year. Conceived by Bertrand Piccard, the single-pilot plane successfully used its four solar powered motors to taxi around the runway. If all goes according to plan the plane will be able to fly day and night without fuel, signaling a bright future for solar-powered flight."
Spaceworms To Help Study Astronaut Muscle Loss 73
Hugh Pickens writes "The Telegraph reports that 4,000 microscopic worms were onboard Space Shuttle Atlantis when it launched today. Their mission: to help experts in human physiology understand more about what triggers the body to build and lose muscle. The worms are bound for the Japanese Experiment Module 'Kibo' on the International Space Station, where they will experience the same weightless conditions which can cause dramatic muscle loss, one of the major health concerns for astronauts. 'If we can identify what causes the body to react in certain ways in space we establish new pathways for research back on earth,' says Dr. Nathaniel Szewczyk."
Comment Re:You can't pay a negative amount (Score 2, Funny) 330
The billing system for a contract I was recently on tried to bill a customer for negative 33 pence. That is, it didn't try to credit him with 33p, and it didn't send him a notice saying "you owe us -£0.33" - it put through a request to his bank to deduct negative 33p from his bank account.
Needless to say, when I discovered this, I immediately rang the customer and advised them to check if their bank was still there or not. Then I took two aspirin and lay down for a while.
Needless to say, when I discovered this, I immediately rang the customer and advised them to check if their bank was still there or not. Then I took two aspirin and lay down for a while.
CERN Physicist Warns About Uranium Shortage 581
eldavojohn writes "Uranium mines provide us with 40,000 tons of uranium each year. Sounds like that ought to be enough for anyone, but it comes up about 25,000 tons short of what we consume yearly in our nuclear power plants. The difference is made up by stockpiles, reprocessed fuel and re-enriched uranium — which should be completely used up by 2013. And the problem with just opening more uranium mines is that nobody really knows where to go for the next big uranium lode. Dr. Michael Dittmar has been warning us for some time about the coming shortage (PDF) and has recently uploaded a four-part comprehensive report on the future of nuclear energy and how socioeconomic change is exacerbating the effect this coming shortage will have on our power consumption. Although not quite on par with zombie apocalypse, Dr. Dittmar's final conclusions paint a dire picture, stating that options like large-scale commercial fission breeder reactors are not an option by 2013 and 'no matter how far into the future we may look, nuclear fusion as an energy source is even less probable than large-scale breeder reactors, for the accumulated knowledge on this subject is already sufficient to say that commercial fusion power will never become a reality.'"
Alternate Star Trek TOS Pilot Found 134
Raver32 sends news that the lost second pilot for Star Trek has been found, and will be released next month on Blu-ray. "Star Trek fans know there were two pilots for the original series. The first, 'The Cage,' was rejected by NBC for being 'too cerebral' (ah, some things never change). The second, 'Where No Man Has Gone Before,' replaced the actor who played the captain with William Shatner and was more action driven. That pilot had an alternate version which was largely lost and has never aired. Apparently, a film collector in Germany acquired the print and 'recently brought it to the attention' of CBS/Paramount. CBS is now releasing this version on Blu-ray Dec. 15."
Two Earth-Sized Bodies With Oxygen-Rich Atmospheres 111
tugfoigel writes "Astrophysicists at the University of Warwick and Kiel University have discovered two bodies the size of earth with oxygen-rich atmospheres — however, there is a disappointing snag for anyone looking for a potential home for alien life, or even a future home for ourselves. These are not planets, but are actually two unusual white dwarf stars." The objects, 220 and 400 light-years distant, are believed to be remnants of stars between 7 and 10 solar masses. Such stars, the largest that evolve to white dwarves, have been sought for years. If the stars were a little more massive they would collapse to neutron stars, or so the theory goes. Here is the paper on the arXiv.
Remus Project Brings Transparent High Availability To Xen 137
An anonymous reader writes "The Remus project has just been incorporated into the Xen hypervisor. Developed at the University of British Columbia, Remus provides a thin layer that continuously replicates a running virtual machine onto a second physical host. Remus requires no modifications to the OS or applications within the protected VM: on failure, Remus activates the replica on the second host, and the VM simply picks up where the original system died. Open TCP connections remain intact, and applications continue to run unaware of the failure. It's pretty fun to yank the plug out on your web server and see everything continue to tick along. This sort of HA has traditionally required either really expensive hardware, or very complex and invasive modifications to applications and OSes."
