The coolest picture of wake turbulance you will see today
URL：http://p.airliners.net/photos/photos/5/0/1/1091105.jpg
2006-08-11
The coolest picture of wake turbulance you will see today
http://p.airliners.net/photos/photos/5/0/1/1091105.jpg
Google announces homepage revisions.
Googler insights into product and technology news and our culture.
Some homepage revisions
You may have noticed the Google homepage feels a little different today. That's because we've reorganized our tabs, or "top links" -- the blue links to Images, News, Maps, etc.). In this iteration, you'll see that Google Video is now featured on the homepage. And we've grouped into a More>> dropdown some other services like Books, Groups, and Froogle.
Search has always been a fundamental paradigm here, so we're constantly working to integrate more services into the main search experience. So while you can go to specific search services directly through the More>> dropdown, you'll also find great results from Books, Groups, and Froogle by just searching Google. As our product line evolves, we're also finding that we have a few destinations that people need to get to directly -- sometimes because the user experience relies heavily on browsing (News, Video) or because there's a different way of searching (Maps).
We'll be making more changes to the organization of our services over the next few months, so let us know what you think and we'll try and incorporate it in our next iteration.
2006-08-10
Google says it won't pull an AOL
Google says it won't pull an AOL
CEO Eric Schmidt says the Net giant's top priority for its search engine is user trust.
Published: August 9, 2006, 3:07 PM PDT
Last modified: August 9, 2006, 3:11 PM PDT
update SAN JOSE, Calif.--Google users should have faith that their Web searches won't end up being public information like they have at AOL, according to Google CEO Eric Schmidt.
"We have systems in place that won't allow it to happen," Schmidt told reporters Wednesday after a keynote discussion at the Search Engine Strategies conference here. "Our No. 1 priority is the trust our users have, and that would be a violation of trust, so the answer is that would not happen."
However, during the keynote discussion, Schmidt had hedged a bit, saying, "We are reasonably satisfied...that this kind of thing could not happen at Google," before adding, "Never say never."
AOL apologized on Monday for releasing search log data on subscribers that had been intended for use with a newly launched research site. While the data was anonymous, it revealed disturbingly sensitive and personal information about users that privacy advocates said could be traced back to specific individuals.
"Maybe it wasn't a good idea to release the data," Schmidt said in the conference session. "There are many things inside our company that we don't share...starting with user queries...I always thought it was fertile ground for the government to snoop."
He noted that Google fought a request from the Department of Justice for similar data, the scope of which a judge limited, giving the search giant a partial victory. "That's an example of how strongly we take this issue," Schmidt said.
The chief executive complained about Web sites that publish sensitive data, such as anti-abortion sites that reveal addresses for clinics and doctors. "Google is simply an aggregator of information, and the people who publish that information better have a good reason for publishing it," he said.
"The good news about these sites is that they're not in the first page (of search results and that) the number of crazy people is small," he said. "We worry a lot about this because we want Google to be used as a positive force in the world. We're convinced that the overwhelming value of having all that information available to you...really does justify what we do."
Asked if Google, which owns a 5 percent stake in AOL , had contacted the Time Warner subsidiary to discuss the privacy breach, Schmidt said he had not personally made any calls because he has been in "deal mode" with other companies. "I don't want to criticize AOL. They're a good partner of ours," he said.
Google has been busy making agreements designed to expand its lucrative online advertising network. On Monday, the search giant announced an advertising and search deal with MySpace.com, the most popular social-networking site. Also this week, Google said it would distribute ad-supported clips from MTV's cable networks over its targeted AdSense advertising network.
"These are big expansions of new content which we believe will be very successful to our advertisers," he said. "It's obvious that much of the world's video will be put onto the Web or repurposed for the Web," and the content owners will want to monetize it.
"We've always wanted to expand our advertising reach and our advertising network and monetize other forms of content," Schmidt added.
"We, in fact, are talking...to many of the online communities, to many of the content companies, as we should," he said. "Their models are also changing, and we're learning from them."
MTV Networks President Michael Wolfe contacted Google even before he joined MTV last year, Schmidt said. "He suggested to us (doing) targeted ads for video online," Schmidt said. "He calls me and says, 'Why don't we try to build this product?'"
In other news:
Radio also is a big opportunity for advertising, particularly targeted advertising from Google, which is testing selling radio ads after its acquisition of radio ad provider dMarc Broadcasting .
"Targetable radio ads are starting now," he said. "Targeted measurable television ads on the Internet are starting now. We're thinking about using our system for every form of ad."
Danny Sullivan, editor of Search Engine Watch, which is hosting the conference, joked that Google was releasing many products that touch on so many different parts of people's lives it could be threatening. "I want to say, 'I surrender. Give me the Google implant,'" he quipped, before asking if Google's reach has limits.
Google has a "master plan" to solve people's online problems, Schmidt said. "The test we apply is not whether we think the product is great or whether we love it or use it, but does it fundamentally impact the way people use the Internet?"
Schmidt said he does a Web search anywhere from 15 to 100 times a day. "It's a different way of living your life because if you always have Google around you can always ask questions," he said.
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Digg this
Wireless LCD in 5 minutes!
Today, I was thinking how dirty and full of stuff my desk was. So I
decided to relocate my graphic LCD to another person's desk but still
have control over it. To do this, I figured I could simply use the
ACODE-300 wireless bluetooth modules.
|
| Required Parts ;
You can get ACODE-300, ACODE interface Board, GHLCD graphic LCD, CUBLOC, and Study Board from cubloc.com. You can probably get LEDs, LM3940, sockets from mouser.com, digikey.com , Radio Shack, or your local electronic shop |
|
You can connect your devices as shown in the above schematic.
(Make sure to use sockets for the ACODE-300 modules, so you can
plug and un-plug the modules for setup)
When you are done making the above, you will ultimately end up with the below:
(Study Board & ACODE300)
(ACODE-300 Proto board for Study Board Close-up)
(front of GHLCD)
(back of GHLCD w/ my ACODE-300 Proto board installed)
(My ACODE-300 Proto board for graphic LCD Close-up)
(Connections to TTL Outputs of GHLCD & Baud rate set to 115200)
The ACODE-300 Bluetooth modules are very easy to use and can be
applied to any serial RS232 interface. You can make a wireless
applications such as this one or any other wired app into a wireless app.
When you are done making your proto-boards and connections,
you are ready for testing.
Insert your ACODE-300 module from your study board as shown
above to the interface board. Also connect a serial cable and
DC power (between 5 and 12V) to the interface board.
Run the PromiWIN4.0_Setup(En).exe installer program and install
Promi software, which we will use to link the two ACODE-300 wireless modules.
PromiWIN4.0_Setup(En).exe Download
The default baud rate for ACODE-300 is set at 9600 bps. So Just
click OK, and you should be able to see the following screen:
Now we are ready to set the device to a faster baud rate.
Change the Operation Mode to MODE3, Baud rate to 115200bps and
set the device name to "device 1" as shown above.
If you get the message "Configuration has been applied," you are ready to go.
Unplug your ACODE-300 module from the interface board and plug it back into your study board.
Power ON your study board and your ACODE-300 should start
blinking the LED like above every 1-2 seconds.
Now take your ACODE-300 module from your GHLCD graphic LCD and
plug it into the interface board and run Promi program again.
Once you are connected, change the Operation Mode to MODE1, Baud
rate to 115200bps and set the device name to "device 1" as shown above.
After applying the above settings, Click on "Connection(out)" and press "Search".
You should be able to find the "device 1", the ACODE-300 module on the study board.
Now, select the "device 1" and click on "Connect".
You should see both LEDs of ACODE-300 turn on continusly once
you get this message:
(LEDs continuously ON)
When LEDs are lit up like above, the ACODE-300 modules are
connected and a straight RS232 serial connection has been
established. It's as if a serial cable has been connected
wirelessly.
Now unplug the ACODE-300 module from the interface board and
plug it back into your GHLCD LCD module.
Now when you power ON both study board and the GHLCD graphic
LCD, you should see both LEDs light ON as shown in above picture.
Now open up your CUBLOC Studio and compile and run the tetris
demo program which simply send RS232 LCD commands.
(Open CublocStudio, and download Tetris program)
When you are done downloading to CUBLOC, you should see a tetris
program running wireless!
(wireless LCD finished)
This wireless LCD should work up to around 100 feet flawlessly.
Now, I can have my graphic LCD sitting at another person's desk
and clean some of the clutter off my own desk.
Now I challenge you to make some other wireless app whether you
are using CUBLOC or any other microcontroller.
Real-Time Airport Plane Visualization
Reader Michael sent in this link to some web-based Java airport monitoring app. Just go to the site, pick an airport, and see a real-time display on planes flying in and out of your local hub. So far only major airports like Boston Logan International, LaGuardia, LAX, and my local San Jose International airport have plane tracking up. Pretty sweet app nonetheless.
Govts pose greatest threat to web privacy: Google
Web search leader Google, which stores vast amounts of data on the web-surfing habits of its users, sees government intrusions rather than accidental public disclosures of data as the greatest threat to online privacy, its chief executive has said.
CEO Eric Schmidt told the Search Engine Strategies industry conference that Google had put all necessary safeguards in place to protect its users' personal data from theft or accidental release.
His remarks followed last weekend's discovery by online privacy sleuths that AOL, a key Google search customer, had mistakenly released personally identifiable data on 20 million keyword searches by its users.
Mr Schmidt said a more serious threat to user privacy lay in potential demands on Google by governments to make the company give up data on its customer's surfing habits.
"You can never say never," Mr Schmidt said during an onstage interview with web search industry analyst Danny Sullivan.
"The more interesting question is not an accidental error but something where a government, not just the US Government but maybe a non-US government would try to get in (Google's computer systems)," Mr Schmidt said.
Google won kudos earlier this year from privacy advocates for going to court to block a US Government request for data on Google users. Mr Schmidt warned that such intrusions could occur again.
Google operates one of the world's largest collections of computer databases at its California headquarters. It asks users for permission to store personal data, which it uses to speed web searches to help advertisers target ads.
But Google also operates computer data centres in other countries, including China, where its entry into the market earlier this year stoked controversy over the risks of doing business under China's censorship laws.
Mr Sullivan asked Mr Schmidt why Google does not purge its users' data from its computers every month or two to guard against building up too much history of any web user's search habits.
"We have actually had that debate," Mr Schmidt said, adding that security protections Google has put in place would make it very difficult, if not impossible, to steal customer data. He said keeping users' trust was Google's most essential mission.
AOL, the online unit of media conglomerate Time Warner, apologised on Monday and said it had launched an internal probe into how a research division of the company mistakenly released the data on its website two weeks ago.
The trove of personal data continues to circulate on the web, where it can be downloaded and probed for details on user interests.
Release of the data on searches by about 658,000 anonymous AOL users over a three-month period has provoked a firestorm of criticism over the risks created by collecting vast stores of personal data as many online companies do, including Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Amazon.com.
Even though the users' names are not attached to the data, they can be identified by the personal nature of many web searches.
"It is obviously a terrible thing," Mr Schmidt said of the AOL data breach. "The data that was released was obviously not anonymised enough."
Weighing a Switch to a Mac
By THOMAS J. FITZGERALD
Published: August 10, 2006
Ten years ago, if you were a Windows user, the idea of switching to a Macintosh might not have seemed enticing. An abundance of new Windows software was arriving on store shelves, while the selection available to Mac users seemed to be falling behind, often relegated to a back corner of the same store.
Today the calculation is different. Apple Computer, through a series of transitions, has reinvented itself. With a new operating system, its own chain of retail stores, the iPod and now a new line of computers that run on Intel processors, this new and more mainstream Apple is catching the attention of Windows users, and many are curious about switching.
But is switching a good idea? The answer, as always, depends on the needs and preferences of the user. Apple's move to Intel processors has made it easier to run Windows on Intel-based Macs, and thus any software a switcher may want to continue using. But even with that ability, there are pluses and minuses to consider.
Software
The center of the Macintosh experience is Apple's operating system, Mac OS X. With Unix at its foundation, Mac OS X is more stable, secure and open than previous Mac platforms, and the current version, called Tiger, offers features not included in Windows. More than 12,000 software applications have been developed to run on the Mac OS X platform since it was introduced in 2001, according to Apple, including popular programs like Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, the Firefox Web browser and many from Apple.
But the world of Mac software is still smaller than what is available in the Windows world. A Windows user curious about switching needs to take an inventory of applications and determine what options are available in the Mac world to accomplish the same. Mac software is likely to be available for most mainstream applications; some may be included on a new Mac and others may require a separate purchase.
Other important applications, especially in categories like business software and games, may run only on Windows. This is where the new Intel-based Macs can make a difference: because they use the same hardware architecture as Windows-based PC's, called x86, the experience of running Windows on a Mac is much improved.
Two methods for running Windows on the new Macs have moved to the forefront, and both run considerably faster than Virtual PC, the leading option under the old Mac architecture. The first, a new program called Parallels Desktop for Mac ($80; www.parallels.com), enables you to run Windows and Mac OS X Tiger simultaneously. For example, you can run Windows software like Internet Explorer and Microsoft Outlook in a window that can be minimized just like other Mac programs. Data can be copied between the platforms, you can share files and folders between them and you can choose to run Windows in a full-screen mode.
Parallels can run Windows versions as old as Windows 3.1 and through the current editions of XP. You will need to provide your own Windows installation software. A drawback of Parallels is that it does not support 3-D-accelerated graphics, which means some higher-end 3-D games and other programs run slowly or not well. Other factors to consider are a speed reduction of 5 to 15 percent compared with running Windows natively on Intel-based computers, the company says, and the fact that not all peripheral devices are compatible.
The other option for running Windows on the new Macs is made possible by Boot Camp (www.apple.com/bootcamp), a free utility from Apple now available in beta testing. (Apple announced this week that Boot Camp would be part of its next operating-system release, called Leopard, scheduled for next spring.) Unlike Parallels, which runs Windows within Mac OS X, Boot Camp creates a partition on the computer's hard disk and installs Windows to it. When the computer starts up, you can choose to run either Windows or Mac OS X.
Benefits of Boot Camp include running Windows at full speed; it runs natively on the Mac, as it would on a conventional Windows-based PC, fully using the processor and graphics abilities, and providing compatibility with hardware peripherals and devices designed for PC's.
A drawback of Boot Camp, though, is that you must shut down one operating system before using the other. This means you cannot run Windows and Mac applications simultaneously. Another drawback is that it can run only two versions of Windows: Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2, which costs $200, or Windows XP Professional With Service Pack 2, which is $300.
Security is another aspect of Macs that has Windows users curious. In Windows, antivirus and antispyware programs have become essential for defending against a variety of threats. So far, the Mac OS X operating system has not been infiltrated by viruses, and it remains free from the type of spyware threats that spread in the wild and go after Windows users, according to Symantec, maker of Norton Antivirus.
But when Windows is run on Intel-based Macs, for example through Boot Camp or Parallels, it is vulnerable to the same virus and spyware threats that can affect conventional Windows-based PC's.
The physical designs of Apple's desktop and notebook computers are often innovative. The iMac, for example, is a space-saving desktop unit with an all-in-one enclosure that conceals the computer's components behind the monitor. And the MacBook, a new notebook with a glossy screen, includes a new keyboard layout. This week, the company introduced the Mac Pro, a line of desktops replacing the Power Mac, completing its transition to Intel chips.
But while Apple's selection covers much ground, it is less diverse than what is available from companies like Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Sony and Lenovo. For example, Apple does not offer ultraportable notebooks, a tablet design or as wide a choice in processor types and speeds. And when it comes to pricing, Apple no longer offers notebooks in the sub-$1,000 range, or desktop units in the sub-$500 range, as do other makers.
Consideration should also be given to the compatibility of any devices like printers, external hard drives and cellphones that may be connected to a computer. In some instances, only Windows may be supported.
The Switching Experience
I spoke with a number of Windows users who had recently switched to Macs. Their reasons varied, but their experiences had some notable similarities. In many cases, since they had mastered Windows long ago, learning the Mac interface, essentially from scratch, took more time than expected. Also, many switchers retained strong links to the Windows world, often through computers at their workplace or older units at home.
Danielle Wang, 26, of Austin, Tex., bought her first Mac six weeks ago. She took the advice of a friend and decided to buy a MacBook to replace her Windows-based laptop, a Sony Vaio, which she said had been stolen.
Early in the transition, Ms. Wang said, it took time to get used to the Mac interface; the menus, the location of buttons and other items were different. "It was difficult," she said. "The first three days, I was constantly thinking about returning it."
Ms. Wang uses the MacBook mainly for applications like e-mail, Web browsing, digital music, games and instant messaging; so far, she has not encountered problems finding Mac software, and she still maintains access to Windows-based computers for other programs she prefers to use at home.
In comparing the MacBook and the Vaio, she said the graphics were clearer on the Sony.
"The Sony Vaio is more lively," she said. But she prefers the look and design of the MacBook.
Over all, Ms. Wang is glad she switched. She likes the Mac interface and says she is likely to remain a Mac owner for the foreseeable future. "It was the right decision," she said. "I really love my Mac right now."
Published: August 10, 2006
Ten years ago, if you were a Windows user, the idea of switching to a Macintosh might not have seemed enticing. An abundance of new Windows software was arriving on store shelves, while the selection available to Mac users seemed to be falling behind, often relegated to a back corner of the same store.
Today the calculation is different. Apple Computer, through a series of transitions, has reinvented itself. With a new operating system, its own chain of retail stores, the iPod and now a new line of computers that run on Intel processors, this new and more mainstream Apple is catching the attention of Windows users, and many are curious about switching.
But is switching a good idea? The answer, as always, depends on the needs and preferences of the user. Apple's move to Intel processors has made it easier to run Windows on Intel-based Macs, and thus any software a switcher may want to continue using. But even with that ability, there are pluses and minuses to consider.
Software
The center of the Macintosh experience is Apple's operating system, Mac OS X. With Unix at its foundation, Mac OS X is more stable, secure and open than previous Mac platforms, and the current version, called Tiger, offers features not included in Windows. More than 12,000 software applications have been developed to run on the Mac OS X platform since it was introduced in 2001, according to Apple, including popular programs like Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, the Firefox Web browser and many from Apple.
But the world of Mac software is still smaller than what is available in the Windows world. A Windows user curious about switching needs to take an inventory of applications and determine what options are available in the Mac world to accomplish the same. Mac software is likely to be available for most mainstream applications; some may be included on a new Mac and others may require a separate purchase.
Other important applications, especially in categories like business software and games, may run only on Windows. This is where the new Intel-based Macs can make a difference: because they use the same hardware architecture as Windows-based PC's, called x86, the experience of running Windows on a Mac is much improved.
Two methods for running Windows on the new Macs have moved to the forefront, and both run considerably faster than Virtual PC, the leading option under the old Mac architecture. The first, a new program called Parallels Desktop for Mac ($80; www.parallels.com), enables you to run Windows and Mac OS X Tiger simultaneously. For example, you can run Windows software like Internet Explorer and Microsoft Outlook in a window that can be minimized just like other Mac programs. Data can be copied between the platforms, you can share files and folders between them and you can choose to run Windows in a full-screen mode.
Parallels can run Windows versions as old as Windows 3.1 and through the current editions of XP. You will need to provide your own Windows installation software. A drawback of Parallels is that it does not support 3-D-accelerated graphics, which means some higher-end 3-D games and other programs run slowly or not well. Other factors to consider are a speed reduction of 5 to 15 percent compared with running Windows natively on Intel-based computers, the company says, and the fact that not all peripheral devices are compatible.
The other option for running Windows on the new Macs is made possible by Boot Camp (www.apple.com/bootcamp), a free utility from Apple now available in beta testing. (Apple announced this week that Boot Camp would be part of its next operating-system release, called Leopard, scheduled for next spring.) Unlike Parallels, which runs Windows within Mac OS X, Boot Camp creates a partition on the computer's hard disk and installs Windows to it. When the computer starts up, you can choose to run either Windows or Mac OS X.
Benefits of Boot Camp include running Windows at full speed; it runs natively on the Mac, as it would on a conventional Windows-based PC, fully using the processor and graphics abilities, and providing compatibility with hardware peripherals and devices designed for PC's.
A drawback of Boot Camp, though, is that you must shut down one operating system before using the other. This means you cannot run Windows and Mac applications simultaneously. Another drawback is that it can run only two versions of Windows: Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2, which costs $200, or Windows XP Professional With Service Pack 2, which is $300.
Security is another aspect of Macs that has Windows users curious. In Windows, antivirus and antispyware programs have become essential for defending against a variety of threats. So far, the Mac OS X operating system has not been infiltrated by viruses, and it remains free from the type of spyware threats that spread in the wild and go after Windows users, according to Symantec, maker of Norton Antivirus.
But when Windows is run on Intel-based Macs, for example through Boot Camp or Parallels, it is vulnerable to the same virus and spyware threats that can affect conventional Windows-based PC's.
The physical designs of Apple's desktop and notebook computers are often innovative. The iMac, for example, is a space-saving desktop unit with an all-in-one enclosure that conceals the computer's components behind the monitor. And the MacBook, a new notebook with a glossy screen, includes a new keyboard layout. This week, the company introduced the Mac Pro, a line of desktops replacing the Power Mac, completing its transition to Intel chips.
But while Apple's selection covers much ground, it is less diverse than what is available from companies like Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Sony and Lenovo. For example, Apple does not offer ultraportable notebooks, a tablet design or as wide a choice in processor types and speeds. And when it comes to pricing, Apple no longer offers notebooks in the sub-$1,000 range, or desktop units in the sub-$500 range, as do other makers.
Consideration should also be given to the compatibility of any devices like printers, external hard drives and cellphones that may be connected to a computer. In some instances, only Windows may be supported.
The Switching Experience
I spoke with a number of Windows users who had recently switched to Macs. Their reasons varied, but their experiences had some notable similarities. In many cases, since they had mastered Windows long ago, learning the Mac interface, essentially from scratch, took more time than expected. Also, many switchers retained strong links to the Windows world, often through computers at their workplace or older units at home.
Danielle Wang, 26, of Austin, Tex., bought her first Mac six weeks ago. She took the advice of a friend and decided to buy a MacBook to replace her Windows-based laptop, a Sony Vaio, which she said had been stolen.
Early in the transition, Ms. Wang said, it took time to get used to the Mac interface; the menus, the location of buttons and other items were different. "It was difficult," she said. "The first three days, I was constantly thinking about returning it."
Ms. Wang uses the MacBook mainly for applications like e-mail, Web browsing, digital music, games and instant messaging; so far, she has not encountered problems finding Mac software, and she still maintains access to Windows-based computers for other programs she prefers to use at home.
In comparing the MacBook and the Vaio, she said the graphics were clearer on the Sony.
"The Sony Vaio is more lively," she said. But she prefers the look and design of the MacBook.
Over all, Ms. Wang is glad she switched. She likes the Mac interface and says she is likely to remain a Mac owner for the foreseeable future. "It was the right decision," she said. "I really love my Mac right now."
Apple thrashes Dell on Mac Pro pricing
Amazing grates
By Dean Pullen: 星期四 10 八月 2006, 05:21
We thought it would be interesting to compare pricing between similarly specced systems from Dell and Apple, and were gobsmacked at the results - this should be very good reading for Apple advocates after our previous commentary, which discussed the poor showing from Apple at this year's WDCC.
Let's get the base specifications out of the way first, so it's clear the systems are very similarly specified. Considering the recent Apple move towards Intel architecture, the specs are almost indistinguishable:
- Dell base specs
- Dell Precision 490
- Graphics Card - 128MB PCIe nVidia Quadro NVS 285
- Memory - 1GB, DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz, ECC (2x512MB DIMMS)
- HDD - 160GB 7200RPM S-ATA
- Optical - 16X DVD+/-RW drive
- KB/Mouse - USB Entry Quietkey, Dell standard USB 2-Button Optical Mouse
- Sound and Firewire- Onboard AC97 sound and 1394a Controller Card
- No monitor
- Three year onsite economy service & support
- Apple base specs
- Mac Pro
- NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB
- Memory - 1GB, DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz, ECC (2x512MB DIMMS)
- HDD - 160GB 7200RPM S-ATA
- Optical - Superdrive dual-layer DVD+/-RW drive
- KB/Mouse - Apple Keyboard and Apple Mighty Mouse
- Sound and Firewire - FireWire 800/400 and sound with various I/O inc. optical
- No monitor
- One year standard AppleCare
Now let's take a look at different processor configurations and the resulting pricing from the US stores.
Dual Core Intel Xeon 2GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
Dell: $2,086.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
Apple: $2,124.00
Dual Core Intel Xeon 2.66GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
Dell: $2,866.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
Apple: $2,424.00
Dual Core Intel Xeon 3GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
Dell: $3,686.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
Apple: $3,224.00
You can see Dell pips Apple by a tiny $38 for the 2GHz option, but then is whipped into shape by Apple with a $442 saving on the 2.66GHz option and a similarly large margin with the 3ghz processors - $462 per system. It must be noted that the machine from Dell does have a three year on-site warranty whereas the Apple has only the one year, but this is less important to small businesses who have their own IT support, and consumers who wish to get the cheapest deal - something Dell usually wins hands down.
This is quite incredible. Any major OEM has trouble matching pricing with Dell, considering the massive volume discount Dell gets from Intel. But Apple aren't only matching them on the lower specs, they're thrashing them on the higher specced systems - relatively huge margins of pricing difference.
You have to wonder what sort of discounts Apple are getting from Intel, and if this is why Dell is now holding hands with AMD. µ
See Also
Apple lacks lustre
Dell sticks AMD chips in laptops
AMD Dell deal is a big Dell deal indeed
AMD and Dell sign deal for millions of chips
*Update A few readers have pointed out that the Dell comes with a NVidia Quadro graphics card. This model is in fact a very, very cheap entry-level Quadro that retails for only £5-£10 more than then the GeForce 7300 included in the Mac Pro, and isn''t comparable to the £1600 Quadro upgrade that Apple offer!
College Exhibition: Umea Degree Show 2006
College Exhibition: Umea Degree Show 2006
Projects from the Swedish institute's students include a sports car with a joy stick and a "fashionable hybrid"
Students at Sweden's Umea University Institute of Design presented their work in the annual Degree Show in June, which included work from the Masters programmes in Transportation Design, Advanced Product Design, and Interaction Design along with projects from the Bachelor level graduates.
Students were required to collect information about a brand, prepare a strategic plan for it, and to develop a complete concept for a vehicle that is representative ethos of the chosen brand. The students used the concept of the vehicle, its proportions, surface language, details, graphics, functionality, and material choices, to create the identity of the product that captures the spirit of the brand.
The education at Umea Institute of Design is characterised by strong cooperation with industry. In addition to support during the thesis work, the students participate in several sponsored projects during the Masters Programme. Experienced tutors and a strong commitment within the Swedish automotive industry to educate better vehicle designers have helped to boost each years students results. Cooperation partners have included: Volvo Car Corporation, Volvo Trucks, Scania, SAAB, Komatsu Construction Equipment, Toyota Corporation, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, ABB, and Microsoft Corporation.
Projects from the Swedish institute's students include a sports car with a joy stick and a "fashionable hybrid"
Students at Sweden's Umea University Institute of Design presented their work in the annual Degree Show in June, which included work from the Masters programmes in Transportation Design, Advanced Product Design, and Interaction Design along with projects from the Bachelor level graduates.
Students were required to collect information about a brand, prepare a strategic plan for it, and to develop a complete concept for a vehicle that is representative ethos of the chosen brand. The students used the concept of the vehicle, its proportions, surface language, details, graphics, functionality, and material choices, to create the identity of the product that captures the spirit of the brand.
The education at Umea Institute of Design is characterised by strong cooperation with industry. In addition to support during the thesis work, the students participate in several sponsored projects during the Masters Programme. Experienced tutors and a strong commitment within the Swedish automotive industry to educate better vehicle designers have helped to boost each years students results. Cooperation partners have included: Volvo Car Corporation, Volvo Trucks, Scania, SAAB, Komatsu Construction Equipment, Toyota Corporation, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, ABB, and Microsoft Corporation.
Verizon owns 81% of U.S. FTTH subs
Verizon owns 81% of U.S. FTTH subs
By Ed Gubbins
Aug 9, 2006 11:21 AM
Primedia Business - Telephony Online, Click Here!
Verizon Communications owns about 81% of all fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) subscribers in the United States, according to a report released today from Ovum-RHK.
The number of FTTH subscribers in the U.S. grew 34% in the second quarter to 463,000. Verizon laid claim to 375,000 of them. Of the 118,000 new subscribers added throughout the country that quarter, 110,000 were customers of Verizon FiOS service.
Verizon reported having penetrated 15% of the markets where it offers FiOS, with video service penetration of 7% after three months and 10% after six months. If nationwide video franchising becomes reality, Ovum-RHK said, those numbers should rise much higher. Verizon is deploying FTTH in a total of 730 U.S. communities.
The remaining 19% of the domestic FTTH market is divided among other Bell carriers, independent telcos and municipalities.
By Ed Gubbins
Aug 9, 2006 11:21 AM
Primedia Business - Telephony Online, Click Here!
Verizon Communications owns about 81% of all fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) subscribers in the United States, according to a report released today from Ovum-RHK.
The number of FTTH subscribers in the U.S. grew 34% in the second quarter to 463,000. Verizon laid claim to 375,000 of them. Of the 118,000 new subscribers added throughout the country that quarter, 110,000 were customers of Verizon FiOS service.
Verizon reported having penetrated 15% of the markets where it offers FiOS, with video service penetration of 7% after three months and 10% after six months. If nationwide video franchising becomes reality, Ovum-RHK said, those numbers should rise much higher. Verizon is deploying FTTH in a total of 730 U.S. communities.
The remaining 19% of the domestic FTTH market is divided among other Bell carriers, independent telcos and municipalities.
.NET and Java to get better dynamic language support
8/10/2006 8:07:41 AM, by Ryan Paul
With highly expressive syntax that is easy to read, write, and maintain, dynamic programming languages like Python and Ruby are extremely conducive to rapid development. Microsoft and Sun Microsystems have observed growing interest in dynamic programming, and plan to integrate more extensive support for dynamic language features in their respective managed language platforms.
Microsoft developer Jum Hugunin reveals that the Redmond, WA software company is in the process of augmenting its popular .NET platform to simplify development of dynamic programming languages. Hugunin, the developer of a Python implementation for .NET called IronPython, says that the .NET Common Language Runtime will be extended in order to add additional support for dynamic language features. New libraries will be added as well to provide framework components that can be used by language creators. Microsoft hopes that the new features and the availability of the IronPython source code (which will act as a reference implementation) will encourage developers to bring other popular dynamic languages to the .NET platform. Several useful dynamic language features have already been added to .NET 2.0, most notably Lightweight Code Generation and DynamicMethod.
Hugunin is also very enthusiastic about the opportunities created by PowerShell, Microsoft's next-generation command line architecture. Built on .NET technology, PowerShell provides a highly sophisticated dynamic language that includes impressive support for first-class functions and other desirable features. PowerShell also comes with a broad selection of useful libraries and utilities that simplify common computing tasks. Hugunin hopes to expose much of that functionality to Visual Basic and IronPython in order to provide users with a broader selection of options for scripting.
In my overview of PowerShell (then called the Microsoft Command Shell), I pointed out that lack of support for defining classes in scripts represents one of the most significant limitations of the language. By enabling users to leverage the power and functionality of the PowerShell libraries and classes in an elegant and sophisticated dynamic language like Python, Microsoft can provide developers with the best of both worlds.
Python isn't the only dynamic language making its way to .NET. Canadian developer John Lam is currently developing RubyCLR, a bridge that will make it possible for developers to create .NET applications with Ruby. Other dynamic languages ported to .NET include Lisp (Rob Blackwell's L#), and Smalltalk (SmallScript Corp's S#).
Sun Microsystems plans to expand its own Java platform to provide stronger support for dynamic languages. In an uncharacteristically perceptive statement from Sun, Sun Computational Theologist Gilad Bracha admits, "It has come to our attention that some people want to program in things other than Java."
Sun has been steadily laboring to improve dynamic language support, and plans to include a JavaScript implementation in version six of Java Standard Edition. In order to simplify development of dynamic languages for the Java Virtual Machine, Sun has issued a Java Specification Request describing a new bytecode operation called invokedynamic, which Bracha describes as "a loosely-typed invokevirtual." Sun also plans to add support for dynamic metaprogramming facilities (runtime code generation mechanisms analogous to macros in Lisp and metaclasses in Python). Although several dynamic languages are already available for the Java Virtual Machine, including JRuby and Jython, the new features are important because they will simplify the language development process and expand the scope of functionality accessible to those dynamic languages. Dynamic metaprogramming is a particularly exciting feature that has a lot to offer in the field of domain-specific language design.
Many dynamic language enthusiasts are also interested in Parrot, an open source virtual machine designed specifically for dynamic languages. Initially conceived as the foundation for Perl 6, Parrot provides some extremely impressive features including a built-in grammar engine that vastly simplifies the process of language development. Although Parrot is far from complete, a number of languages built on top of it are at various stages of completion, including ports of Python, Ruby, Tcl, Lisp, and basic. Perl 6 developers claim that Parrot will eventually provide better performance than the JVM or .NET for dynamic scripting languages, but performance claims are currently debatable since Parrot is still in early stages of development. There are several significant architectural differences between Parrot and other prominent virtual machines, particularly the fact that Parrot is register-based, whereas Java's bytecode and .NET's Common Intermediate Language are stack-based.
Released yesterday, Parrot 0.4.6 includes new partial Ruby and Javascript implementations, improvements for the grammar engine and abstract syntax tree generator, and new opcodes for accessing globals, as well as numerous bug fixes and improvements.
Managed language platforms have a lot to offer modern dynamic languages, particularly performance (IronPython is one and a half times faster than the standard Python implementation in some contexts), interoperability, and broader library support. As dynamic languages continue to grow in popularity, widely used development platforms like .NET and Java will expand to meet that demand, and Microsoft and Sun will continue to strengthen their commitments to the dynamic language community. Parrot will also eventually catch up and provide a robust, open source alternative.
Eric LaForest: Next Generation Stack Computing
Eric LaForest delivers a crash-course on modern stack computing, the Forth programming language, and some projects of his own. Stack systems have faster procedure calls and reduced complexity (shorter pipeline, simpler compilation) relative to their conventional counterparts, as well as more consistent performance, which is very important for real-time systems. Many consider stack-based architecture's crowning feature, however, to be the unrivalled price-to-performance ratio.
Note: the slides are hard to make out in the video, so make sure to download the slides as well.
Download Eric LaForest: Next Generation Stack Computing in a number of formats via
- bittorrent ,DiVX(357M) ,XViD(309M) ,Quick Time(298M) ,Mpeg(307M) ,Real 9(391M) ,Windows Media(220M) ,slides [pdf](1M) ,slides [Power Point](1M) ,slides [Open Office](1M)
- via dijjer (a mostly seemless bittorrent alternative): ,DiVX(357M) ,XViD(309M) ,Quick Time(298M) ,Mpeg(307M) ,Real 9(391M) ,Windows Media(220M) ,slides [pdf](1M) ,slides [Power Point](1M) ,slides [Open Office](1M)
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The Decline and Fall of the General-Purpose CPU
The Decline and Fall of the General-Purpose CPU
Michael Asher - August 9, 2006 7:09 PM
Is the general purpose processor here to stay? Or is it just a blip on the future architectural landscape?
Back in 2001, I raised a few eyebrows with the prediction that, by the year 2020, desktop processors would contain a hundred or more cores, many of them specialized to certain tasks. Today, with both Intel and AMD striving towards that goal, this prediction seems rather...mundane. So lets look a little further into the future.
Is there any effective limit on the number of individual processors one can put on a chip? 1,000? 10,000? Certainly a thousand cores by 2030 seems likely. Right now, software developers seem to be having a hard time writing code that uses more than one effectively, but this will change. Those programmers will die out, if need be, to make way for the new breed.
Specialized cores are inevitable for one simple reason. If you design a chip for a specific task, the same number of transistors can perform that task 10-100 times faster. Sometimes more. These kind of performance gains can't be ignored.
If a 100-core chip has room for a few speciailized cores, what will our thousand-core monster look like? Certainly some just for physics, for media operations, and one or more graphics processors-- why have a separate 3D accelerator card when you have transistors to burn?
But what else? Why not include some cores designed specifically to run certain applications? Include a core for rendering HTML and running Javascript...and you have a hardware-accelerated web browser. Why not one for word processing? In the future, will Intel and AMD be bowing to pressure from Microsoft to include "Office 2030" cores in their chips? Certainly a few designed just for the Windows kernel seem inevitable. Throw in a few hundred cores, each specialized to a different set of algorithms (sorting, string searching, etc) and one has to ask-- will we need any generalized processing? Just bounce a thread around from core to core, depending on its current needs.
Does this mean the general-purpose processor will eventually go the way of the dinosaur? One can argue that, while the cores themselves are specialized, the chip as a whole still isn't...and you'd be at least half-right. But it seems clear that on an architectural level, we are eventually going to have to rethink the concept of "general purpose" processing.
Michael Asher - August 9, 2006 7:09 PM
Is the general purpose processor here to stay? Or is it just a blip on the future architectural landscape?
Back in 2001, I raised a few eyebrows with the prediction that, by the year 2020, desktop processors would contain a hundred or more cores, many of them specialized to certain tasks. Today, with both Intel and AMD striving towards that goal, this prediction seems rather...mundane. So lets look a little further into the future.
Is there any effective limit on the number of individual processors one can put on a chip? 1,000? 10,000? Certainly a thousand cores by 2030 seems likely. Right now, software developers seem to be having a hard time writing code that uses more than one effectively, but this will change. Those programmers will die out, if need be, to make way for the new breed.
Specialized cores are inevitable for one simple reason. If you design a chip for a specific task, the same number of transistors can perform that task 10-100 times faster. Sometimes more. These kind of performance gains can't be ignored.
If a 100-core chip has room for a few speciailized cores, what will our thousand-core monster look like? Certainly some just for physics, for media operations, and one or more graphics processors-- why have a separate 3D accelerator card when you have transistors to burn?
But what else? Why not include some cores designed specifically to run certain applications? Include a core for rendering HTML and running Javascript...and you have a hardware-accelerated web browser. Why not one for word processing? In the future, will Intel and AMD be bowing to pressure from Microsoft to include "Office 2030" cores in their chips? Certainly a few designed just for the Windows kernel seem inevitable. Throw in a few hundred cores, each specialized to a different set of algorithms (sorting, string searching, etc) and one has to ask-- will we need any generalized processing? Just bounce a thread around from core to core, depending on its current needs.
Does this mean the general-purpose processor will eventually go the way of the dinosaur? One can argue that, while the cores themselves are specialized, the chip as a whole still isn't...and you'd be at least half-right. But it seems clear that on an architectural level, we are eventually going to have to rethink the concept of "general purpose" processing.
To Iraq and back: Soldier uses Linux in war and peace
Thursday August 10, 2006 (05:00 PM GMT) By: Tina Gasperson
In 2003 and 2004, Jeff Schroeder served in the Iraq war, flying a tiny remote control spy plane and servicing Unix and Linux systems on the battlefield. Schroeder learned a lot of technology in the desert, and now that his time in the Army is over, he's busy working as a Web administrator for Comair Airlines, and writing utility scripts for Ubuntu, his favorite distribution. He believes Linux is going to "take over the world." 
In 2003 and 2004, Jeff Schroeder served in the Iraq war, flying a tiny remote control spy plane and servicing Unix and Linux systems on the battlefield. Schroeder learned a lot of technology in the desert, and now that his time in the Army is over, he's busy working as a Web administrator for Comair Airlines, and writing utility scripts for Ubuntu, his favorite distribution. He believes Linux is going to "take over the world."
A high school teacher introduced Shroeder to Linux in 1999. "It was in networking class," he says. "I had a guy who was a big Linux zealot, and he was like, 'This is the next big thing.' I deeply respected this guy." Schroeder took him seriously and started playing around with Red Hat at home.
In 2001 he enlisted in the Army as an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Operator, a.k.a. 96U. "I flew a remote control spy plane called the Shadow 200," Schroeder says. When he was deployed to Iraq in 2003, he was happy to find that, even in the desert, Linux would still be a big part of his life.
The Shadow is a Tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (TUAV) that performs surveillance using a liquid nitrogen-cooled camera. Operators run the plane from a ground control station that is a retrofitted Humvee loaded with a bank of computers running the Solaris operating system and "locked-down" Java apps. The Shadow sends pictures and video back to a ruggedized laptop video terminal that runs a custom version of Red Hat 9 Linux. "The laptop connects to a little directional antenna that tracks the plane," Schroeder says. "There were always problems with [the laptops]," and since Schroeder knew Linux, he was called on to detect and fix those problems. "The contractors the military hired weren't very Unix-savvy," he says.
Schroeder says that the military effort in Iraq is laced with technology that makes use of open source software. One example is the Army's Land Warrior program, in which soldiers will be "wired" with special embedded Linux computers that allow them to communicate with each other and track enemy locations.
Now that Schroeder is a civilian again, he says he is glad to have had the opportunity to serve his country and pick up some great skills at the same time, using his Army training as a stepping stone in his career as a Web administrator for Comair, a regional airline based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Schroeder oversees the operation of about two dozen application servers and a cluster of Apache servers, and he also performs day-to-day Unix and Linux systems administration.
In his spare time, Schroeder helps people install Linux on their computers. He's a big fan of Ubuntu. "I used Fedora before," he says, "and still use it for servers. But all of my desktops are running Ubuntu." To make Ubuntu even better, Schroeder's written several utility scripts, including a popular snippet he calls Faster Dapper. "I like things to be a little faster," he says. "I wrote the script for myself." Faster Dapper enables certain features of Ubuntu, such as preload, a daemon that analyzes file usage patterns and preloads the apps you use the most, and Faster Dapper disables lots of services that are enabled by default. "Bluetooth stuff," he says. "I don't use that on my laptop. It takes two seconds to load that daemon. If there are, say, 14 services loading that you don't need..."
Schroeder also created a script called Pretty Dapper that automatically sets up his preferred theme and desktop icons, and Secure Dapper, which results in "basic system hardening." He says that he plans soon to port Faster Dapper to Fedora and openSUSE. Examples of Schroeder's work are available at his Web site, digitalprognosis.com.
Managing users in Ubuntu
A short, practical guide to user management in Ubuntu and GNU/Linux
By Mark Rais
Online on: 09/08/2006
Digg it!
As you notice from day to day use of Ubuntu, most tasks are easily accomplished. But what happens when you're ready to expand your use of Ubuntu to include new applications, or connect to a home network and add new users? This brief guide shares the key steps necessary to create and manage other users, helps clarify some essential differences with other flavors, and provides tips regarding "root" user. Perhaps most importantly, these steps help empower the use of your Ubuntu system to become far more than just another desktop PC.
Understanding users in Ubuntu
The security and usefulness of your Ubuntu system depends a good deal on what you do to enable users and their privileges. Without falling into the minutia and the mundane, it is important to at least understand how users are handled in the Ubuntu GNU/Linux environment.
When you first install Ubuntu, you are required to create a user account. This initial user account, and for that matter all subsequent users, have their independent user files stored under the Home folder. But there is something unique about the first user account you create.
In my case, when installing Ubuntu, I created the user account: "mark". Not only is mark my first Ubuntu user, but mark has automatically been given unique and powerful privileges that other users do not receive. My mark account can create users, change files and folders, and do a lot of administrative functions on Ubuntu that are normally performed by another important user account named "root".
Therefore, in Ubuntu, you should understand the three key users:
* Initial user, in my case called mark, created when installing Ubuntu
* Root user, known as the administrator that usually has maximum privileges
* All other users, which I term basic users, are added following installation
Each of these three key users have their own folders, their own unique privileges, and most importantly their own role to play on your Ubuntu system. In the following sections, I will share how to enable and utilize each. Let's begin with the basic user.
NOTE: I assume that you are logged in to your Ubuntu system as the initial user, thereby having the rights and privileges necessary to perform the tasks below.
Creating and managing basic users
Inevitably, once you setup Ubuntu in your home or office, others will come to you begging to get access. Some may want a chance to try out one of the multitude of cool applications that come preloaded with your system, while others desire to see GNU/Linux power! In other words, you need a good way to give them access without giving them the keys to the system.
Step 1. Accessing the users and groups tool
Creating basic user accounts is easily accomplished through the Users and Groups tool. From your main menu, choose System, then Administration. To start your tool select the Users and Groups menu item.
Notice the message that appears (figure 1).
By Mark Rais
Online on: 09/08/2006
Digg it!
As you notice from day to day use of Ubuntu, most tasks are easily accomplished. But what happens when you're ready to expand your use of Ubuntu to include new applications, or connect to a home network and add new users? This brief guide shares the key steps necessary to create and manage other users, helps clarify some essential differences with other flavors, and provides tips regarding "root" user. Perhaps most importantly, these steps help empower the use of your Ubuntu system to become far more than just another desktop PC.
Understanding users in Ubuntu
The security and usefulness of your Ubuntu system depends a good deal on what you do to enable users and their privileges. Without falling into the minutia and the mundane, it is important to at least understand how users are handled in the Ubuntu GNU/Linux environment.
When you first install Ubuntu, you are required to create a user account. This initial user account, and for that matter all subsequent users, have their independent user files stored under the Home folder. But there is something unique about the first user account you create.
In my case, when installing Ubuntu, I created the user account: "mark". Not only is mark my first Ubuntu user, but mark has automatically been given unique and powerful privileges that other users do not receive. My mark account can create users, change files and folders, and do a lot of administrative functions on Ubuntu that are normally performed by another important user account named "root".
Therefore, in Ubuntu, you should understand the three key users:
* Initial user, in my case called mark, created when installing Ubuntu
* Root user, known as the administrator that usually has maximum privileges
* All other users, which I term basic users, are added following installation
Each of these three key users have their own folders, their own unique privileges, and most importantly their own role to play on your Ubuntu system. In the following sections, I will share how to enable and utilize each. Let's begin with the basic user.
NOTE: I assume that you are logged in to your Ubuntu system as the initial user, thereby having the rights and privileges necessary to perform the tasks below.
Creating and managing basic users
Inevitably, once you setup Ubuntu in your home or office, others will come to you begging to get access. Some may want a chance to try out one of the multitude of cool applications that come preloaded with your system, while others desire to see GNU/Linux power! In other words, you need a good way to give them access without giving them the keys to the system.
Step 1. Accessing the users and groups tool
Creating basic user accounts is easily accomplished through the Users and Groups tool. From your main menu, choose System, then Administration. To start your tool select the Users and Groups menu item.
Notice the message that appears (figure 1).
2006-08-09
Cell-phone Sized Device Cuts Power Use
| The Shanghai Academy of Science and Technology has invented a cell-phone sized device that can reduce the amount of power an air-conditioner used by more than 8 percent, it announced yesterday.
The academy, which has applied for patents for the invention on the Chinese mainland and in Hong Kong, said the device can also stop air-conditioners from dripping on pedestrians.
Two air-conditioner manufacturers -- TCL and Jiangsu Province-based Shinco - yesterday signed agreement with the academy to install the device on their products.
"Our invention is simple but useful to save energy," said Li Jianjun, director of the academy's energy and environmental development research center, which created the device.
The device is attached to an air-conditioner by a series of tubes, which collect condensation drops. The water is pumped to the device, which turns it into a fine mist that is sprayed on the back of the air-conditioner, cooling it down significantly. The device is expected to cost about 100 yuan (US$12.50), researchers said.
"The more quickly a machine cools down, the more efficiently it works and the less energy it needs," Li said.
Tests on several air-conditioners show the device can reduce power consumption by at least 8 percent. "The invention is very exciting because it uses the simplest and cheapest approach to saving energy," said Zhao Guotong, an energy expert.
During the hottest part of the summer, air-conditioners account for up to one-third of all power use in the city, researchers said.
(Shanghai Daily August 9, 2006) |
Auto inline MP3 player Greasemonkey script
A handy music player Greasemonkey script inserts a play button next to any MP3 file you happen upon on the web so you can listen before you download.
The one-click listening is courtesy of a Flash-based music player, similar to the one built into del.icio.us audio bookmarks and MetaFilter Music. After the user script is installed (you need the Greasemonkey extension first), check out this directory listing of Kleptones MP3's to give it a go. Thanks, Daniel!
Read more: Firefox, Greasemonkey, Mp3, Music, Top, User scripts
AT&T spying lawsuit delayed
AT&T spying lawsuit delayed
Judge temporarily halts further review of suit that charges AT&T with illegally letting U.S. monitor phone calls, e-mails.
A federal judge has temporarily halted further review of a lawsuit charging that AT&T illegally allowed the U.S. government to monitor phone and e-mail communications.
Earlier this year, privacy rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation sued the telecom giant , saying the U.S. program eavesdrops on phone calls and reads e-mails of millions of Americans without warrants.
Last month, U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker rejected a request from the head of U.S. intelligence and other officials to dismiss the suit.
But on Tuesday Walker said he would stay the case pending an appeal of his earlier decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. He said he was also awaiting another court decision that could bundle similar lawsuits across the nation before his or another court.
"The issues here are serious indeed," he said. "Prudence requires a stay of some duration…I'm thinking about a stay until some time in late September or October."
Walker also said if the case proceeded he was considering asking former CIA director James Woolsey to serve as an expert assisting the court review issues in the case.
Mac OS X v10.5 "Leopard" Developer Improvements
Apple Computer's recently previewed Mac OS X v10.5 "Leopard" has made quite a stir, not because of what was shown at the World Wide Developer Conference but of what was excluded from show, cited "Top Secret". However, the build released to attendees at the conference includes a huge number of ground-breaking changes to the underlying technology in Mac OS X and the APIs exposed to developers.
As a world wide exclusive, AeroXP has received information detailing several of the API improvements to Leopard, detailed below:
Screenshots: Xray, Interface Builder, Dashcode
As a world wide exclusive, AeroXP has received information detailing several of the API improvements to Leopard, detailed below:
- Complete 64-Bit support for Intel and PowerPC through all frameworks excluding QuickTime C, QuickDraw, Sound Manager, Code Fragment Manager, Language Analysis Manager and QuickTime Musical Instruments. These modules are deprecated and one should use the modern equivalents instead.
- Leopard will feature resolution-independent user interface and there are several functions to get the current scaling factor and apply it to pixel measurements. It is a good idea to use vector controls and buttons (PDF will work fine) or to have multiple sized resources, similar to Mac OS X icon design, so you can scale to the nearest size for the required resolution.
- Address Book adds support for sharing accounts, allowing an application to restrict content according to user.
- Automator includes a new user interface and allows things such as action recording, workflow variables and embedding workflows in other applications.
- Time Machine has an API that allows developers to exclude unimportant files from a backup set which improves backup performance and reduces space needed for a backup.
- A new Calendar Store framework allows developers access to calendar, event and task information from iCal to use in their applications or to add new events or tasks.
- Carbon, the set of APIs built upon Classic MacOS and used by most 3rd party high-profile Mac OS X applications, now allows Cocoa views to be embedded into the application. This could provide applications like Photoshop and Microsoft Office access to advanced functions previously only available to Cocoa applications.
- A new control for creating matrices of views is available, NSGridView. This allows a grid to be created from any view in the system, including OpenGL or Web Views.
- Core Animation allows layers to be used as backing stores for a view, windows to use explicit animations when resizing (can be three dimensional, akin to the Time Machine view). Any view can now be put into fullscreen mode and a CoreImage transition effect can be used. Using Core Animation you can create anything including GPU-accelerated Front Row-style user interfaces without having to write OpenGL code. A Core Animation layer can include OpenGL content, Core Image and Core Video filter effects and Quartz/Cocoa drawing content, like views and windows.
- Text engine improvements include a systemwide grammar checking facility, smart quote support, automatic link detection and support for copying and pasting multiple selections.
- Core Image has been upgraded to allow access to RAW images directly.
- Apache 2.0, Ruby on Rails and Subversion are included, and support for script-to-framework programming is available, allowing Python and Ruby scripting to access Mac OS X specific APIs.
- The iChat framework allows a developer to add shared content to an active iChat session, for example a video, an image slideshow or even an online multiplayer game.
- "Sharing accounts" are possible, with users being restricted via an access control list (ACL) to certain applications or files. Developers can integrate with this by restricting access to a specific piece of content by connecting it to a sharing account. Sharing accounts have no home folder.
- An Image Kit is included, to allow a developer to easily create an application that can browse, view, crop, rotate and pick images, then apply Core Image filter effects through an interface. A slideshow interface is also open to developers, allowing any application to display a fullscreen slideshow of images.
- Leopard also gives developers access to a "Latent Semantic Mapping" framework, which is the basis for spam protection in Mail. It allows you to analyze text and train the engine to restrict items with specific content (like spam e-mail for example).
- Mail stationery is open to developers, allowing any web designer to create fantastic-looking Mail templates, with defined areas for custom user content.
- A new framework is included for publishing and subscribing to RSS and Atom feeds, including complete RSS parsing and generation. Local feeds can be shared over Bonjour zero-configuration sharing and discovery.
- Quicktime 7.1 is included, and the underlying QTKit framework is greatly improved. There is improved correction for nonsquare pixels, use of the clean aperture which is the "user-displayable region of video that does not contain transition artifacts caused by the encoding process", support for aperture mode dimensions, improved pitch and rate control for audio and a number of developer improvements, like QuickTime capture from sources like cameras and microphones, full screen recording or QuickTime stream recording. Live content from a capture can be broadcast as a stream over the network.
Screenshots: Xray, Interface Builder, Dashcode
AOL gives out free .com domains to anyone who asks
AOL gives out free .com domains to anyone who asks
August 8, 2006 10:59 PM PDT
AOL has just announced that it will give a free domain name to anyone who asks for one.
There's a catch. You don't own the domain name; AOL does. What you can do is use is use that domain as your e-mail address and your home page starting in September. So can your friends, family, and members of the same club, organization, sports team, and so on.
It's an intriguing idea, and one that's likely to gain some attention from folks who always thought of buying a domain name and never quite got around to it. It also solves the problem of what to do with a domain name once you purchase it: instead of paying a hosting company a few dollars a month, AOL takes care of everything at no additional cost.
The service, by the way, is called AOL My eAddress. AOL says it supports .com or .net domains, up to 100 e-mail identities per domain, 2 GB of storage, spam filtering, and open mail clients such as Outlook and Thunderbird through the IMAP protocol.
It's part of the company's recent strategy to stem the flood of defections (nearly 1 million in the second quarter) from dialup users who are switching to broadband and leaving AOL far behind. AOL already has lost more than a third of its subscribers since its peak in 2002.
From a financial perspective, the My eAddress service seems to make sense for AOL. The current wholesale price of .com domains is around $6 each, and because AOL is an accredited registrar it gets the best deal possible. That means AOL needs to generate at least $6 a year in advertising revenue (or upselling some users to premium services) per domain to make it worthwhile.
There's also a second way that AOL benefits. Good domain names are hard to find nowadays. AOL is enlisting its vast member base in a quest to locate the good ones, which it henceforth owns. If some fall into disuse, AOL should be able to sell them at a tidy profit.
Posted by Declan McCullagh
AMD talks about ATI
AMD's recent acquisition raises a lot of questions, and AMD's Hal Speed has answers
By Tom Yager
August 02, 2006
From the moment I got the call, I knew there was much more to AMD's acquisition of ATI than was being reported. My mind immediately leaped to the ramifications the acquisition would have on ATI's relationship with Intel OEMs. Intel couldn't be jazzed about having AMD inside systems that bear Intel's imprint. Then I wondered whether AMD's acquisition might result in the opening up of ATI's graphics drivers, which are now distributed only in binary form. Is ATI rival NVidia going to keep working with AMD? And how does this figure into LIVE!, AMD's push into consumer electronics and media centers?
Many of the questions I posed overlapped with open issues on the table at AMD. When I asked about Intel and its OEMs, executive Hal Speed asserted that Intel is working as hard as ever to blunt AMD's progress in the market -- servers have broken through, but AMD still faces low buy-in from desktop, notebook, and embedded OEMs. "I have no way of knowing," he said, "but I think Intel's on the phone [with OEMs] right now."
Interestingly, AMD shot me a note today that an OEM invited to show a Core 2 Duo system at Intel's launch event was un-invited because the demo machine had an ATI graphics card. It's a cinch that Intel won't be doing any more co-marketing with ATI, and I fully expect Intel to pressure OEMs not to put ATI GPUs inside systems with Intel's sticker outside. ATI stands to lose even more in chipsets, where it makes products for Intel as well as AMD CPUs. An Intel motherboard with what amounts to an AMD chipset is Intel CEO Paul Otellini's nightmare, and if I were he, I might work (within the law) to see that doesn't become a popular configuration.
Because that's the case, what's the point of keeping ATI's name? AMD's wrestling with that right now. I offered that, in my opinion, because Intel's likely to interfere with newly acquired ATI anyway, AMD should meld the two companies' images and reputations under AMD's name to strengthen both for a run at the blockade. No one is going to turn up his nose at a killer aftermarket graphics card just because it's got AMD's logo. And ATI's sales and marketing chops would bring luster (and lust) to AMD's pitch to customers.
Ah, yes. Customers. ATI is a supplier to major players in practically every technology market. AMD's lack of presence outside the desktop and server PC markets put a crimp in AMD LIVE!, the erstwhile competitor to Intel's Viiv brand for media centers, digital TVs, and consumer electronics. AMD is so far behind Intel in that mission that everyone saw its efforts there as doomed. Well, ATI is already a supplier to many of the manufacturers AMD wants to woo. And ATI's customers would benefit from solutions that integrate AMD's low-power (lower than Core 2 Duo) Athlon 64 and super duper low-power Geode CPUs. Speed says that this integration won't be done in silicon; AMD is not taking over ATI's manufacturing. But reference designs combining AMD and ATI technology, which is one of AMD's key plans, will close deals.
Lastly, and remember you heard it here, AMD is strongly considering open-sourcing at least a functional subset of ATI's graphics drivers. It's time for X Window System, OpenGL, and client virtualization for which ATI binary drivers aren't available to escape the ghetto of the 1980s-era framebuffer. And what a boon for PR. If AMD's graphics cards were the only ones with open device drivers, it might affect a buying decision or two.
By Tom Yager
August 02, 2006
From the moment I got the call, I knew there was much more to AMD's acquisition of ATI than was being reported. My mind immediately leaped to the ramifications the acquisition would have on ATI's relationship with Intel OEMs. Intel couldn't be jazzed about having AMD inside systems that bear Intel's imprint. Then I wondered whether AMD's acquisition might result in the opening up of ATI's graphics drivers, which are now distributed only in binary form. Is ATI rival NVidia going to keep working with AMD? And how does this figure into LIVE!, AMD's push into consumer electronics and media centers?
Many of the questions I posed overlapped with open issues on the table at AMD. When I asked about Intel and its OEMs, executive Hal Speed asserted that Intel is working as hard as ever to blunt AMD's progress in the market -- servers have broken through, but AMD still faces low buy-in from desktop, notebook, and embedded OEMs. "I have no way of knowing," he said, "but I think Intel's on the phone [with OEMs] right now."
Interestingly, AMD shot me a note today that an OEM invited to show a Core 2 Duo system at Intel's launch event was un-invited because the demo machine had an ATI graphics card. It's a cinch that Intel won't be doing any more co-marketing with ATI, and I fully expect Intel to pressure OEMs not to put ATI GPUs inside systems with Intel's sticker outside. ATI stands to lose even more in chipsets, where it makes products for Intel as well as AMD CPUs. An Intel motherboard with what amounts to an AMD chipset is Intel CEO Paul Otellini's nightmare, and if I were he, I might work (within the law) to see that doesn't become a popular configuration.
Because that's the case, what's the point of keeping ATI's name? AMD's wrestling with that right now. I offered that, in my opinion, because Intel's likely to interfere with newly acquired ATI anyway, AMD should meld the two companies' images and reputations under AMD's name to strengthen both for a run at the blockade. No one is going to turn up his nose at a killer aftermarket graphics card just because it's got AMD's logo. And ATI's sales and marketing chops would bring luster (and lust) to AMD's pitch to customers.
Ah, yes. Customers. ATI is a supplier to major players in practically every technology market. AMD's lack of presence outside the desktop and server PC markets put a crimp in AMD LIVE!, the erstwhile competitor to Intel's Viiv brand for media centers, digital TVs, and consumer electronics. AMD is so far behind Intel in that mission that everyone saw its efforts there as doomed. Well, ATI is already a supplier to many of the manufacturers AMD wants to woo. And ATI's customers would benefit from solutions that integrate AMD's low-power (lower than Core 2 Duo) Athlon 64 and super duper low-power Geode CPUs. Speed says that this integration won't be done in silicon; AMD is not taking over ATI's manufacturing. But reference designs combining AMD and ATI technology, which is one of AMD's key plans, will close deals.
Lastly, and remember you heard it here, AMD is strongly considering open-sourcing at least a functional subset of ATI's graphics drivers. It's time for X Window System, OpenGL, and client virtualization for which ATI binary drivers aren't available to escape the ghetto of the 1980s-era framebuffer. And what a boon for PR. If AMD's graphics cards were the only ones with open device drivers, it might affect a buying decision or two.
Intel Releases Next Generation Open Source Graphics Driver
Intel Releases Next Generation Open Source Graphics Driver
The Intel Open Source Technology Center graphics team is pleased to announce the immediate availability of free software drivers for the Intel® 965 Express Chipset family graphics controller. These drivers include support for 2D and 3D graphics features for the newest generation Intel graphics architecture.As with any free software project, this release represents only the beginning of an ongoing commitment by Intel to work with the X.org and Mesa communities to continuously improve and enhance the drivers. While these drivers represent significant work at both Tungsten Graphics and Intel—as our first release of this code—they're still in need of significant testing, tuning, and bug fixing before they will be ready for production use. We're releasing them now to demonstrate our ongoing commitment to providing free software drivers for Intel hardware.
"...in terms of open source support for 3D graphics,
Intel provides by far the best support..."
Dave Airlie, Ottawa Linux Symposium 2006
We would like to especially thank our engineering team.
Following the release of this driver, future work will continue in the public X.org and Mesa project source code repositories and with this project Web site serving as the central site for users of Intel graphics hardware in open source operating systems.
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