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First time accepted submitter paperclipman writes "I'm on the college student budget and want to make sure that my recent investment in an Acer laptop will last me a good long while. I like to think of myself as a reasonably competent CPU user so I'm no adventurous link-clicker, but I do download some music as a recent SoundCloud devotee. My Kaspersky antivirus will be expiring shortly and I don't particularly care to renew with that steep of a fee — any advice from fellow thrifts?"

benrothke writes "Today's handheld device is the mainframe of years past. An iPhone 5 with 64 GB of storage and the Apple A6 system-on-a-chip processor has more raw computing power entire data centers had some years ago. With billions of handheld devices in use worldwide, it is imperative that digital forensics investigators and others know how to ensure that the information contained in them, can be legally preserved if needed." Read on for the rest of Ben's review. Digital Forensics for Handheld Devices author Dr. Eamon P. Doherty pages 336 publisher CRC Press rating 8/10 reviewer Ben Rothke ISBN 978-1439898772 summary Valuable reference for digital forensics In Digital Forensics for Handheld Devices, author Eamon Doherty provides an invaluable resource on how one can obtain data, examine it and prepare it as evidence for court. One of the reasons many computer crime cases fail to be prosecuted is that the evidence was not properly handled and could therefore not be admitted into court.

Once of the first things a defense attorney will do in a computer crime case is to attack how the digital evidence was obtained and preserved. In far too many cases, it was done incorrectly and the evidence, no matter that it may be a smoking gun, can't be admitted into court. The case then is dismissed, to the chagrin of the victim.

The books 8 chapters of nearly 300 pages are densely packed text, where Doherty brings significant real-world experience to every chapter. As the cybercrime training lab director at Fairleigh Dickinson University, he brings both an academic formality in additional to real-world experience in this highly tactical guide.

Chapter 1 details cell phone forensics. After a brief introduction to the history of the cell phone, it details the entire inner workings of a cell phone. The chapter also details differences in cell phones worldwide. An important fact is that many Asian countries have cell phones available 12-18 months before they appear in the US. With that, American forensic investigators need to be cognizant of this when entering into an investigation.

The chapter includes an overview of the Susteen Secure View application which is an extremely powerful tool for the mobile phone forensic investigator. Besides that tool, in each chapter, Doherty lists many tools that provide specific assistance to the topic at hand. The book is worth it for those listings alone.

Chapter 2 is similar to the previous chapter except this is about digital camera forensics. The chapter provides a detailed overview of how digital cameras operate and how the underlying hardware works. The chapter includes an extremely comprehensive overview of seemingly every tool available to investigate images on a digital camera.

The chapter also includes a number of fascinating case studies on how to effectively perform a forensics analysis of a digital camera. It concludes with an observation that when considering a career in forensics, as fascinating as it is; it may not be for everyone.

Doherty notes that as a forensics investigator, the examiner is often exposed to disturbing material. He quotes a report that studied investigators from over 500 agencies who had been exposed to child pornography during investigation of crime involving child exportation. The report noted an alarming 35% of the participants had problems arising from work exposure to child pornography.

Chapter 5 provides an extremely detailed look at forensics investigation on a corporate network. Throughout the book, Doherty stresses the need for effective chain of custody and other issues to preserve digital evidence. It is imperative to preserve the integrity of the digital evidence obtained from the time it was seized until it is presented in court.

To facilitate this, the book states a best practice to use checklists to ensure nothing is forgotten. The importance of checklists has been detailed in The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right where author Atul Gawande makes a compelling case for the use of checklists.

As to evidence and checklists, Doherty writes that once the evidence is obtained, a chain of custody form should be filled out. Each time the evidence is copied, processed, or transported, it should be documented on the chain of custody form. If others receive a copy of the evidence for prosecution or defense purposes, they too should sign for it. This is an imperative if it expected that the evidence would end up in court or be used for human resources purposes. But at the corporate setting detailed in chapter 5, that same level of diligence is not necessarily required.

Chapter 5 also has overviews of nearly 50 different forensic tools for every imaginable purpose.

While the book has exploratory and technical overviews on many tools and numerous case studies, this is not an introductory text on the subject. It is meant for someone with a technical background that is looking for a technical reference to gain competence on the topic of digital forensics.

The only lacking of the book is that while the author is an expert on the topic and the tools, the writing style is one that screams out for an editor. The text suffers from run on sentences and repetition of defining the same acronym, in addition to other readability issues. The book is pervasive its use of passive voice that can be annoying to many readers. It is hoped that the second edition of this book will be updated with the current tools of the time and a good re-editing of the text to ensure its readability doesn't suffer.

Aside from the grammatical issues, for those looking for a very hands-on guide to gain proficiency on the topic, Digital Forensics for Handheld Devices is a valuable reference. Dr. Eamon Doherty has a unique perspective in that he has academic, law enforcement and very practical experience, which is manifest in every chapter.

The notion of digital forensics is seize it, examine it and then prepare it for evidence in court. In Digital Forensics for Handheld Devices, you found out how to do just that.

Ben Rothke is the author of Computer Security: 20 Things Every Employee Should Know.

You can purchase from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

The Bad Astronomer writes "An extremely bright meteor burned up over Ireland and the northern UK around 22:00 UTC on Friday night, and was apparently witnessed by thousands of people. It traveled east to west, and was moving relatively slowly. It may have been an actual rock, or it may have been some human-made space debris — a satellite or rocket booster — burning up. Space junk tends to move more slowly, so that's a potential suspect, though orbiting debris usually moves in the opposite direction. I'm collecting pictures and images on my Bad Astronomy blog."

mtcups writes "I am a musician/IT guy whose hearing has suffered from VERY LOUD guitar players, (yes I do use earplugs now, but too late), and am faced with the outrageously priced hearing aids $4.5K+/pair and was appalled at their lack of integration with smart phones. It seems obvious to me that I should be able to control the hearing aids via a smart phone interface so I can shape the profile for different environments, and also control features like 'hearing loops' and Bluetooth connections. I have done some research, but my guess is that the hearing aid companies want proprietary systems and don't want a smartphone interface since they would loose control and it would allow for competition for cheaper & better programs. I am not convinced that a combination of good ear-buds, good microphone(s), and a smartphone interface couldn't totally replace these overpriced solutions."

_0x783czar writes "Filmmaker Brad Canning has released a hi-def video of Curiosity's landing. This video was captured in low res, and then extrapolated and re-rendered by Canning to produce some of the most stunning imagery ever captured on an alien world. It took Canning over a month to complete the process. He used motion tracking to add sound effects which in turn give you the sensation of the ride of your life."

New submitter Covalent writes "I'm a science teacher and have, over the years, accumulated a number of lost graphing calculators (mostly TI-83s). After trying to locate the owners, I have given up and have been loaning them out to students as needed. I want to something more nerd-worthy with them, though. I would feel wrong for selling them. What is the best use for bunch of old calculators?"

First time accepted submitter Boldizar writes "My son turns seven next month and I'd like to buy him a cheap computer. I'm looking for the Slashdot hivemind opinion on what would be the best computer for a child. I'm looking for a computer that will teach him basic computer literacy, and hopefully one wherein the guts are a bit exposed so that he can learn how a computer works rather than just treating it like a magic object (i.e., iPad) – but that would still keep him interested and without leaving him behind in school. For the same reason, I prefer a real keyboard so he can learn to type. I don't know enough about computers to frame the question intelligently. Perhaps something in the $300 range that would be the computer equivalent of an old mechanical car engine? Another way to think about it: I'm looking for the computer equivalent of teaching my son how to survive in the forest should the zombie apocalypse ever come."

redletterdave writes "In response to a recent outbreak of a deadly pulmonary disease commonly carried by mice and other rodents, Yosemite National Park has doubled the scope of those likely infected by hantavirus. Given the rising number of confirmed cases (currently eight) and deaths (three), U.S. officials have effectively sounded a worldwide alert for more than 22,000 local and international visitors that may have been exposed to the deadly virus. Health officials initially believed as many as 10,000 people were at risk to contracting the hantavirus after staying in Yosemite's popular Curry Village lodging area between the months of June and August.; unfortunately, that 10,000 'at risk' estimate was low. Officials expanded the warning this week to an additional 12,000 visitors to Yosemite's High Sierra camps, now that the eighth case of hantavirus was confirmed in a man who stayed in those camp areas. Furthermore, more than 2,500 of those individuals currently live outside the United States."

redletterdave writes "The Yangtze River, the third longest river in the world traditionally known as the 'golden watercourse,' mysteriously blushed for the first time on Sept. 6. Residents in the surrounding area near the city of Chongqing, where the Yangtze connects to the Jialin River, literally stopped in their tracks when they noticed their once golden river had turned a shocking shade of red. Residents have carefully crept down to the riverbanks for the past few days to save some of the red, tomato juice-like river water in bottles. Early predictions from scientists say the red water was likely a result of pollution, but investigators are still investigating the unknown cause."

Curseyoukhan writes "Norton released its annual cybercrime report on Wednesday, and the company put the 'direct costs associated with global consumer cybercrime at US $110 billion over the past twelve months.' Last year's report put the total 'at an annual price of $388 billion globally based on financial losses and time lost.' That's more than the estimated value of the global black market in marijuana, cocaine and heroin combined ($288 billion), the report said. But Norton makes no mention of the vast difference in 2011 and 2012 numbers. That's because last year's number was entirely fictitious." Something tells me that the scare-monger number-wavers aren't as embarrassed by this sort of logical deconstruction as they should be.

redletterdave writes "Valve is reportedly interested in building hardware. The Bellevue, Wash.-based software developer added a job posting to its site on Tuesday morning for an industrial designer. We're frustrated by the lack of innovation in the computer hardware space though, so we're jumping in,' the posting said. 'Even basic input, the keyboard and mouse, haven’t really changed in any meaningful way over the years. There's a real void in the marketplace, and opportunities to create compelling user experiences are being overlooked.'"

Big Hairy Ian writes "An aircraft that resembles a four-point ninja star could go into supersonic mode by simply turning 90 degrees in midair. The unusual 'flying wing' concept has won $100,000 in NASA funding to trying becoming a reality for future passenger jet travel. The supersonic, bidirectional flying wing idea comes from a team headed by Ge-Chen Zha, an aerospace engineer at Florida State University. He said the fuel-efficient aircraft could reach supersonic speeds without the thunderclap sound (PDF) produced by a sonic boom — a major factor that previously limited where the supersonic Concorde passenger jet could fly over populated land masses."

redletterdave writes with news of a drone that's helping weather forecasters this hurricane season. From the article: "Hurricane prediction is not always an exact science — back in 2005, Hurricane Rita was projected to hit Houston, but missed the region entirely — but the NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration) is already on the case. A few weeks ago today, the agency launched an experimental Wave Glider robot named Alex into the ocean, hoping the unmanned drone can forecast the direction of future storms. The Wave Glider, which is completely powered by the waves and the sun thanks to solar panels and a unique thrust engine, contains a GPS unit, satellite communications systems, and sensors for measuring water temperature, wind speed, and various wave characteristics. With its ability to withstand strong winds and thrashing waters — which are typically prohibitive for humans and even aerial vehicles — and its ability to theoretically drift in the ocean endlessly without refueling, a single Wave Glider could be used to monitor not just one storm, but several hurricanes occurring over an entire seasonal period. The NOAA hopes to soon use more Wave Glider robots like Alex to help determine more accurate hurricane watches and warnings."

tetrahedrassface writes "Slashdot carried the story of an-as-yet unverified impact crater in Tennessee a couple of years ago. After a few weeks of fairly hardcore sample taking, digging, obtaining some good images and manipulating them, I'm proud to report the first batch of evidence in favor of it being an impact site. The primary smoking gun is the presentation of an astrobleme, obtained from High Resolution Ornithographic Images taken in 2008. Also of note are the melted/deformed rocks, magnetic crater dust, and the fitment of the crater rim to a circle. A rented plane and a bunch of photographs today and it's pretty obvious that it's a crater, folks. Cheers!"

New submitter Volfied writes with bad news for fans of UK shows that aren't available for purchase anywhere. From the article: "The UKNova website has stopped letting users share links to copies of UK TV shows, apparently after legal threats from the copyright "enforcement body FACT. 'UKNova is being forced to change. We have been issued with a "cease and desist" order by FACT,' the message began. 'Despite our efforts to cooperate with the UK media companies, FACT have stated: "ALL links or access to content provided by UKNova are infringing, unless it can be proven that explicit permission from the copyright holder for that content has been obtained."'"

redletterdave writes "Google Crisis Response, one of Google's thousands of active projects that merges various Google tools like Maps, Docs, Forms and Earth, posted a new webpage on Monday dedicated to Tropical Storm Isaac — soon to be Hurricane Isaac — in an effort to disseminate helpful information about the hurricane's path, its forecasted track, and how local residents can stay safe during this emergency situation. Google's Crisis Map for Hurricane Isaac allows the user to set up and see public alerts from weather.gov, flood gauge forecasts, surge zones, evacuation zones and routes, barrier resources and relevant YouTube videos for each impacted area."

First time accepted submitter ternarybit writes "By 'Linux professional,' I mean anyone in a paid IT position who uses or administers Linux systems on a daily basis. Over the past five years, I've developed an affection for Linux, and use it every day as a freelance IT consultant. I've built a breadth of somewhat intermediate skills, using several distros for everything from everyday desktop use, to building servers from scratch, to performing data recovery. I'm interested in taking my skills to the next level — and making a career out of it — but I'm not sure how best to appeal to prospective employers, or even what to specialize in (I refuse to believe the only option is 'sysadmin,' though I'm certainly not opposed to that). Specifically, I'm interested in what practical steps I can take to build meaningful skills that an employer can verify, and will find valuable. So, what do you do, and how did you get there? How did you conquer the catch-22 of needing experience to get the position that gives you the experience to get the position? Did you get certified, devour books and manpages, apprentice under an expert, some combination of the above, or something else entirely?"

New submitter diacritica writes "This Ask Slashdot is inspired by manhunts à-la-Bourne movies, but taking a more realistic approach to the world we live in. You are native to and live in a big city (> 1M pop) in a G8 country of your choosing. At T = 0h, you accidentally witness a strange event. At T = 1h, you realize you're being followed and you get the feeling that the police/government might be involved. Contextual data: you are able to speak one language apart from good English. You are 25 to 45 years old. You are computer savvy. You are engaged/married, you have family living in the same city. 99% of your money is in a bank account. You prefer to go 'rationally' paranoid. What would you do in order to feel safe after those first 24 hours? Remember, you didn't commit a crime, but there are plenty of real-world resources invested in catching you."

Deathspawner writes "The future of PC gaming is oft-debated, but one thing's for certain: modding has always made it better. With that, wouldn't it make sense for developers to focus more on giving the community the modding tools it needs? Further, couldn't publishers look to modding as a way to increase revenue, by allowing modders to sell their sanctioned creations? Valve already offers robust community options in its Steam platform — and already has payment processing in place. Is this the natural next step for PC gaming?"

New submitter kevmeister writes "Today T-Mobile decided that unlimited data plans are a good thing after all. Over a year after discontinuation, T-Mobile announced that unlimited data is coming back. 'T-Mobile said the new unlimited data plan will cost $20 a month when added to a Value voice and text plan, and $30 a month when added to a Classic voice and text plan. ... Among its top U.S. network counterparts, only Sprint offers a similar deal, and it costs about $110 a month. But Sprint offers the iPhone; T-Mobile does not. One of the new T-Mobile plan's flaws, though, is that it cannot be used for tethering -- that is, connecting multiple devices to the Internet. MetroPCS, considered the fifth-largest carrier in the U.S., made a big announcement of its own Tuesday, saying it would begin offering an unlimited everything promotional plan for $55 a month for a limited time.'"

saiful76 writes "Following mass exodus of people belonging to north-east states India from southern states of India, specially Bangalore, allegedly due to the threatening messages, the government has asked relevant agencies to scan all social media platforms to check for inflammatory and offensive content, following which, the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DIT) has issued an advisory to all intermediaries in terms of provisions of IT Act and Rules to take action for disabling all such content on priority. Cellphone operators have been told to block all bulk SMSs and videos — so nobody can send a message to more than five people at a time."

redletterdave writes "Bill Gates, the man responsible for bringing software to the masses with Microsoft and Windows, has plans to reinvent and popularize another industry: Sanitation. Gates, whose philanthropic efforts have helped bring clean water and resources to developing countries via the foundation created by he and his wife Melinda, said at the 'Reinvent The Toilet Fair' in Seattle on Wednesday that he plans to build a toilet that's better suited to developing countries in an effort to cut down on disease and death in those regions. 'Inventing new toilets is one of the most important things we can do to reduce child deaths and disease and improve people's lives,' Gates said. 'It is also something that can help wealthier countries conserve fresh water for other important purposes besides flushing.'" Science Insider has some information on the winning designs from this year.

redletterdave writes "Malaysian netizens, opposition politicians, well-known bloggers and non-governmental organizations staged an Internet blackout Tuesday to protest and raise awareness about legislation that could threaten free expression on the Web. According to Malaysia's Centre for Independent Journalism (CIJ), the second of two amendments to the Malaysian Evidence Act of 1950, also known as Section 114A, 'enables law enforcement officials to swiftly hold someone accountable (PDF) for publishing seditious, defamatory, or libelous content online.' In addition, those accused of posting this kind of content will be 'assumed to be guilty until proven innocent,' which completely flies in the face of the typical logic of the traditional judicial process, which is 'innocent until proven guilty.' The CIJ warns that 'if allegedly defamatory content is traced back to your username, electronic device, and/or Wi-Fi network, Section 114A presumes you are guilty of publishing illicit content on the Internet.' The CIJ organized Tuesday's blackout, where participating sites blacked out their names and services with messages that read, 'This is what the Web could look like.'"

benrothke writes "In the documentary Scared Straight! a group of inmates terrify young offenders in an attempt to 'scare them straight'" (hence the show's title) so that those teenagers will avoid prison life. A 2002 meta-analysis of the results of a number of scared straight and similar intervention programs found that they actively increased crime rates, leading to higher re-offense rates than in control groups that did not receive the intervention. For those considering the use of social media in their business, it is quite easy to read Navigating Social Media Legal Risks: Safeguarding Your Business as a scared straight type of reference. Author Robert McHale provides so many legal horror stories, that most people would simply be too afraid of the legal and regulatory risks to every consider using social media." Keep reading for the rest of Ben's review. Navigating Social Media Legal Risks: Safeguarding Your Business author Robert McHale and Eric Garulay pages 320 publisher Que rating 10/10 reviewer Ben Rothke ISBN 978-0789749536 summary Definitive guide to social media law for the layman But the reality is that social media is becoming required for nearly every business. With that, Navigating Social Media Legal Risks, author and attorney Robert McHale, with Eric Garulay, provide a fascinating and invaluable reference to any organization that wants to use social media, and not violate any of the myriad state, federal and international laws and regulations.

Social media makes it relatively easy for organizations to find and retain customers and increase sales, amongst many other benefits. At the same time, it can expose an organization to significant and highly-expensive legal risks and issues, and find themselves at the receiving end of a subpoena.

The books 12 chapters take a look at various aspects of social media and details how to use them in a legal and judicious manner.

In chapter 1, the book details social media promotions law around contests and sweepstakes. People often use the terms contest and sweepstake interchangeably, but the words have very different meanings. There are various contests and sweepstakes laws that must be dealt with before these promotions can commence. Often web sites will combines elements of contests and sweepstakes, include prizes, chances and considerations, which in turn make it a lottery. The issue is that it is illegal for most entities to create a lottery. So if not done correctly, a simple contest can turn into a costly legal mess.

Chapter 2 deals with online endorsements and testimonials. Any company that will use online endorsements and testimonials in their advertising must ensure that they are following all truth in advertising laws. The book details numerous areas where regulators have launched investigations and taken enforcement actions against violators. The book notes that one rogue blogger will not likely trigger a law enforcement action if your company has a reasonable training and monitoring program in place.

Chapter 5 shows how to manage the legal risks of UGC (user-generated content). UGC can drive significant amounts of traffic to a web site, but also creates legal risks.

Organizations can find protection from UGC via the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and the Communications Decency Act of 1996 (CDA). But those firms that want to enjoy the protections of the DMCA and CDA are required to fully comply with a very detailed set of legal requirements, leaving them very little room for error. The chapter details how to avoid those errors.

The book has scores of examples of things many readers may not have thought about. For example, chapter 8 writes of the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA). The purpose of the ACPA is to protect consumers and American businesses and provide clarity in the law for trademark owners by prohibiting the bad-faith and abusive registration of distinctive marks as Internet domain names with the intent to profit from the goodwill associated with such marks-a practice commonly referred to as cybersquatting.

Yet what about the post-domain path of a URL, which is everything after the domain name. Of which question is, are post-domain path names protected under the ACPA? For example, is the post-domain path of twitter.com/Boeing owned by Boeing or simply the person who registered it first? The courts are grappling with that and similar questions.

In chapter 9, the authors detail the need for designing a geolocation data security plan. This is particularly important for firms that handle consumer's geolocation data. Such a plan is particularly important given that the tracking, storage and sharing of precise geolocation information is becoming increasingly subject to legal and regulatory requirements..

The book concludes with 10 social media lessons that details some noteworthy social media business entanglements and the lessons that businesses must learn from them. A few of these include: your Twitter hashtag can be used against your, do not pay for or use false endorsements and other invaluable lessons. The advice in these 10 tips alone are worth the price of the book.

Each chapter ends with detailed tactical lists of dos and donts around the specific topic.

The book should be required reading for every organization. Even those firms that have completely rejected any form of corporate social media interaction can still be held liable for actions of their employees. So such firms can't simply bury their head in the sand.

At $30, Navigating Social Media Legal Risks: Safeguarding Your Business is the cheapest legal advice you can get, and is worth every penny. If you are looking for crystal clear and detailed advice on social media law, you won't find a better book.

The world of social media is fraught with legal danger which can be quite expensive and embarrassing to recover from. It lives up to its title, and provides an outstanding path to navigate the dangerous waters of social media.

Ben Rothke is the author of Computer Security: 20 Things Every Employee Should Know.

You can purchase Navigating Social Media Legal Risks: Safeguarding Your Business from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

redletterdave writes "For about a year, Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble were almost completely alone in the 7-inch tablet market. It was nice while it lasted. The past few months have seen Google and Microsoft unveil their 7-inch tablet offerings — the Nexus 7 and Microsoft Surface, respectively — and it looks like Apple is about ready to get into the mini tablet game, too. If Apple releases its first 'iPad Mini' next month, what can Amazon and Barnes & Noble do to keep the Cupertino colossus at bay, as well as the other new competitors in the 7-inch tablet game?"

New submitter damitr asks: "What is the most ergonomic position if you are working with a laptop or a desktop (with or without wireless keyboard and mouse) for long hours at stretch? Is bean bag for sitting with a laptop a good option? What is the best way to use a desktop without causing tennis elbow and backache/neck problems?"

redletterdave writes with this snippet from the IB Times: "Five days after NASA's Curiosity rover successfully landed on Mars, the one-ton robot sent another postcard back to Earth, this one a 360-degree doozy. Curiosity's first panorama, albeit black-and-white, gives Earthlings a great high-quality glimpse at the surface on Mars, specifically within the 96-mile Gale Crater."

Nerval's Lobster writes "Between 4:52 and 5:12 on August 3, attackers used Wired writer Mat Honan's Apple ID to wipe his MacBook, before seizing control of his Gmail and other online identities ('My accounts were daisy-chained together,' he wrote in an Aug. 6 postmortem on Wired), and posting a message on Twitter for all to see: 'Clan Vv3 and Phobia hacked this twitter.' In the wake of Honan's high-profile hack, there are some key takeaways. Even if a typical user can't prevent a social-engineering attack on the company hosting their cloud account, they can armor their online life in ways that make attacks more difficult. First, two-factor authentication can prevent an attacker from seizing control of those vital 'hub' accounts (such as Gmail) where users tend to store much of their most vital information. Google offers two-step verification for signing in, as does Facebook. The truly security-conscious can also uncouple their cloud accounts; for example, making sure that iCloud and iTunes use two different sets of credentials. That might rob daily life in the cloud of some of its convenience, but it could also make you a harder target." Update: 08/08 01:17 GMT by S : This high-profile security breach has had an impact already: Apple has suspended password resets through customer support, and Amazon no longer lets users call in to change account settings.

redletterdave writes "Siri can send texts and emails, set alarms and reminders, surf the Web, ask questions, place calls, play music, and get directions. But would you trust Siri, or any of her similar rivals out there for Android, to pay your bank bill? Or report a lost card? Or set up an auto-payments for your bills? Even if you wanted to do these things, how does Siri even know you are who you say you are? Nuance has clearly thought about what's missing from the voice recognition department, and unveiled its own solution on Monday, called 'Nina.' The Nuance Interactive Natural Assistant, or NINA, is a cloud-based AI that can be enabled in most business and enterprise applications thanks to a set of APIs and an open SDK for iOS and Android. Nuance calls Nina 'a watershed of firsts for virtual assistants,' mainly because she is the 'first [VA] to understand what is said and who said it' using voice-ID authentication software. Unlike Siri, Nina can help users manage their bank accounts, book flights and hotels, oversee and manage their investments, and more."

First time accepted submitter christurkel writes "CDE, the Common Desktop Project, has been open sourced by the Open Group. CDE was created by a collaboration of Sun, HP, IBM, DEC, SCO, Fujitsu and Hitachi. You can find the source here. It has been tested on Debian Squeeze and Ubuntu. Testers are encouraged to join the project. Motif will follow in a few months once some legal issues are sorted out."

First time accepted submitter erdos-bacon sandwich writes "Gender tests may be the most controversial obstacle the athletes face. The London Games tries a new approach based on testosterone. Of all the obstacles athletes have had to overcome to compete in the Olympics, perhaps the most controversial has been the gender test. Originally designed to prevent men from competing in women's events, it is based on the premise that competitors can be sorted into two categories via established scientific rules. But the biological boundaries of gender aren't always clear."

schleprock63 writes "The FCC ruled today that Verizon cannot charge extra for users for 4G Wi-Fi tethering. The FCC used the original agreement in the auction of the C block spectrum which said 'licensees offering service on C Block spectrum "shall not deny, limit, or restrict the ability of their customers to use the devices and applications of their choice on the licensee's C Block network, subject to narrow exceptions."' So Verizon cannot charge for tethering on 4G service, this raises the question of whether they can continue to charge for tethering on 3G or 1x?"

The Bad Astronomer writes "The White House budget for NASA in 2013 is bleak, with big cuts in many areas. None is worse hit than planetary exploration, which got slammed with a 20% reduction. Several top-notch space scientists have taken matters into their own hands, looking to create a privately-funded alternative for space exploration. Called Uwingu — Swahili for 'sky' — they're hoping to get seed money to create a program which can generate millions in donations to explore our solar system. Astronomer Pamela Gay has more info at her blog, Star Stryder."

redletterdave writes "In 2008, then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama decided to announce his running mate, then-Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, over a text message, which was sent out to Obama's legions of followers. Four years later, Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the likely presidential nominee from the Republican Party, has decided to make his VP announcement over a smartphone app. On Tuesday, Mitt Romney's campaign team launched a smartphone app called 'Mitt's VP,' which promises app users will be the first to know the official news of Romney's running mate for the November election. Once Romney makes his decision, he will announce the news over the app, which will alert smartphone owners with a text notification."

thatpythonguy writes "Core Python Application Programming is the latest addition to a growing corpus of literature serving a growing number of Python programmers and engineers. This Prentice Hall book of 800+ pages covers some traditional areas and touches upon some new ones. I typically do not spend much time speaking about the author of the books that I review; however, this occasion warrants an exception. And it is not because Wesley Chun used Python over a decade ago to build the address book and spell-checker for Yahoo! Mail nor is it because he holds a minor degree in music from UC Berkeley in classical piano. Rather, it is because he is both an engineer and an instructor. In other words, he was not pulled from his geek duties and asked to become a pseudo-writer; he already does that for his consulting practice, authoring (or co-authoring) several books and articles on Python (including "Python Web Development with Django") as well as starring in his own training video (entitled "Python Fundamentals"). The result of that experience is a writing style that is technically sound, yet accessible." Keep reading for the rest of Ahmed's review. Core Python Applications Programming author Wesley J. Chun pages 888 publisher Prentice Hall rating 8/10 reviewer Ahmed Al-Saadi ISBN 978-0132678209 summary Python application programming for intermediate python engineers The book followed the normal evolutionary path of other books in its class. It started out as the second part of "Core Python Programming" and ended up being split into its own volume in its third edition. The first part became "Core Python Language Fundamentals" which covers the core language. This volume covers the natural successor topics of "now what?" that the first raises: the use of Python in various applications. It is for this reason that the book recommends that the reader be an intermediate Python programmer. I think "intermediate" here refers to anyone who has read an introductory book or followed a tutorial on the core language.

The book covers the two main lines of python development: 2.x and 3.x. Despite the slow adoption of the 3.x line due to its backward incompatibility, there are already popular third-party libraries that have been ported to that line and that occurrence will only increase moving forward. Chun does a very good job balancing the two by providing concurrent examples (i.e., code snippets) in both flavours. He also has numerous references and side notes indicating that certain features/libraries are only available for certain versions of the language.

There are three parts to the book: General Application Topics, Web Development, Supplemental/Experimental. The first includes the usual dosage of general chapters including regular expressions (regex), network programming (including an intro to the Twisted framework), Internet client programming, threading and multi-processing, GUI, and databases (including a taste of NoSQL). It is peculiar that it also includes chapters on Microsoft Office programming and writing Python extensions which are not general in my opinion. It is probably because these two chapters do not fit anywhere else! The second part is probably the core of Chun's own experience as he is a self-described "web guy". He certainly goes into details in that domain covering web clients/servers (yes, he writes a small web server!), general web programming (i.e., CGI and WSGI), the Django framework, cloud computing (mostly Google App Engine; GAE), and web services. Finally, the last part has two chapters on text processing and miscellaneous topics (basically, Jython and Google+). I find the naming of the text processing chapter rather poor given that it is about processing comma-separated values (CSV), JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), and Extensible Markup Language (XML). Arguably, "text processing" is more descriptive of regex, transcoding, and Unicode! Two appendices at the end of the book provide some background and a guide to Python 3.x migration.

Chun spends some time delving into a problem domain in addition to providing the Python solution. For example, he describes the regular expression syntax in detail and spends time explaining the client-server architecture using real-life analogies to drive his points home. His code examples are well-structured, object-oriented solutions that range from the demonstrative to the practical. For example, in the Django chapter, he builds a practical Twitter application that uses third-party libraries and some advanced features. However, do not expect a cookbook-style coverage nor production-ready code from a book of this nature. Do expect many exercises with partial solutions at the end of the book.

I find Chun's approach to be pedagogically sound. His ideas flow logically from one to the next, incrementally building a story-like chain of problems and Python solutions. He highlights architectural patterns that are shared by disparate problem domains (e.g., the event-driven nature of SocketServer and Tkinter), leading to a better understanding of both. However, he does leave out many topics from his coverage for applications in compression, cryptography, and date handling (among others). Maybe he considers these to be ancillary or simple enough to be looked up in Python's own standard library documentation. Also, as a Developer Advocate for Google, it is not surprising to see him cover the GAE in depth. Specifically, I think for anyone who is interested in running Django on the GAE, he can be an excellent (and accessible, by his own admission) resource. Google him (no pun intended!) to see his presentation on "porting" Django applications to the GAE.

Finally, the book is aesthetically type-set and is well-structured. I think that it has a wealth of well-written information that cover key areas of Python application development that will be useful to a broad spectrum of readers.

Ahmed Al-Saadi is a software consultant based in Montreal, Canada. He mainly speaks Python, Erlang, and Objective-C these days.

You can purchase Core Python Applications Programming, 3rd ed from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Rambo Tribble writes "Reuters is reporting that Taiwan's National Cheng Kung University has filed a suit against Apple claiming patent infringement by the Siri voice-recognition software. At issue are two patents dating to 2007 and 2010. From the article: 'The suit was filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Marshall Division, on Friday, it said. "We filed that lawsuit in the Texas court because it processes faster and its rulings are usually in favor of patent owners and the compensations are usually higher," said Yama Chen, legal manager of National Cheng Kung, in the southern Taiwan city of Tainan.'"

New submitter AaronLS writes "There has been a debate about whether HP has or has not developed a memristor. Since it's something fairly different from existing technologies, and similar in many ways to a memristor, I think they felt comfortable using the term. However, the company has been criticized for using that labeling by former U.S. patent officer Blaise Moutett. On the other hand, had HP created a new, unique label, they would have probably gotten flack for pretending it's something new when it's not. Will anything positive come from this debate? Electrical engineering analyst Martin Reynolds sums it up nicely: 'Is Stan Williams being sloppy by calling it a "memristor"? Yeah, he is. Is Blaise Moutett being pedantic in saying it is not a "memristor"? Yeah, he is. [...] At the end of day, it doesn't matter how it works as long as it gives us the ability to build devices with really high density storage.'"

New submitter accet87 writes "We are celebrating the Silver Jubilee of our graduation next month and have come up with an idea where we will build an air-tight chest in which each of us will deposit something and will open the chest only on our Golden Jubilee, i.e. after another 25 years. I want to understand what kind of items can be safely stored for 25 years and what kind of precautions are required to be taken. I am sure things like paper, non-ferrous metallic objects, wood, etc., will hold up well. What about data storage electronically? I don't think CD/DVDs, etc., will be usable. Even if the data is retained, reading it in 2037 may be a challenge."

Aryden writes with news of a recent court decision in which a judge ruled it was acceptable for police to impersonate the owner of a cell phone they had seized, in order to extract information from the owner's friends. The ruling stems from an incident in 2009 when police officers seized the iPhone of a suspected drug dealer, then used text messages to set up a meeting with another person seeking drugs. "'There is no long history and tradition of strict legislative protection of a text message sent to, displayed, and received from its intended destination, another person's iPhone,' Penoyar wrote in his decision. He pointed to a 1990 case in which the police seized a suspected drug dealer's pager as an example. The officers observed which phone numbers appeared on the pager, called those numbers back, and arranged fake drug purchases with the people on the other end of the line. A federal appeals court held that the pager owner's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure were not violated because the pager is 'nothing more than a contemporary receptacle for telephone numbers,' akin to an address book. The court also held that someone who sends his phone number to a pager has no reasonable expectation of privacy because he can't be sure that the pager will be in the hands of its owner. Judge Penoyar said that the same reasoning applies to text messages sent to an iPhone. While text messages may be legally protected in transit, he argued that they lose privacy protections once they have been delivered to a target device in the hands of the police."

ndogg writes "Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing has decided to give his $3,000,000USD bonus to his workers instead of keeping it. Those 10,000 employees include receptionists, production line workers, and assistants. That works out to about 2,000 yuan or $300 per employee, which is about a month's worth of salary."

benrothke writes "Anyone who has worked in information technology knows of Gartner. They are one of the leading information technology research and advisory firms. Most of their clients are CIOs and senior IT leaders in corporations and government agencies, high-tech and telecom enterprises. Gartner is huge with over 5,000 associates, over 1, 200 research analysts and consultants and clients in 85 countries. Their revenue in 2011 was nearly $1.5 billion. While Gartner is the world's largest, there are over 650 independent analyst firms worldwide. Barbara French's Directory of Analysts provides a comprehensive list. With all that, very few people understand how Gartner works and what makes them tick. In UP and to the RIGHT: Strategy and Tactics of Analyst Influence: A complete guide to analyst influence, ex-Gartner analyst Richard Stiennon takes the mystery out of Gartner. In particular, a good part of the book deals with Gartner's vaunted Magic Quadrant." Read below for the rest of Ben's review. UP and to the RIGHT: Strategy and Tactics of Analyst Influence: A complete guide to analyst influence author Richard Stiennon pages 186 publisher IT-Harvest Press rating 9/10 reviewer Ben Rothke ISBN 0985460709 summary Definitive guide on Gartner and their Magic Quadrant The Magic Quadrant (MQ) is Gartner's proprietary research tool that according to them provide a qualitative analysis into a market and its direction, maturity and participants, thus possibly enabling a company to be a stronger competitor for that market. Every, and I mean every tech vendor strives to be recognized by Gartner be on a prominent post on the MQ.

Today there are hundreds of different MQ's for sectors from firewalls, cloud services to web hosting and everything in between.

For those not Gartner clients, buying a specific MQ can be expensive. But vendors often use the MQ to tout their product and pay to make them publicly available. Some examples of the freely-available are the MQ for:Secure Web Gateways, Security Information and Event Management and Web Fraud Detection. A Google search of the term with the PDF format will also reveal numerous free versions.

The book derives its name based on the best place for a company to be on the MQ. Up and to the right is where Gartner places market leaders which is nirvana for a tech firm. The other locations on the quadrant are: niche player, visionary and challenger. But for a tech firm, there is only one location, and that is up and to the right.

The MQ itself has two markers; completeness of vision, which defines features and innovative enhancements. The other is ability to execute, which is determined by revenue, number and quality of resellers and distributors, number of employees and their distribution between engineering, sales, and support and other business issues.

If up and to the right is the desired location, how does one get there? For many tech firms, they often are clueless. In the book, Stiennon provides clear direction on how to get there. For those looking to make the expedition to the land of Gartner; this book is a veritable Berlitz Guide on how to safely make the journey.

A Gartner myth that will never go away and that Stiennon deals with on page 2 is the notion that getting on the MQ is simply a matter of paying for the privilege. He calls the notion of MQ pay to play completely false.

Chapter 2 is The Magic of Magic Quadrants and Stiennon details what it is and why vendors aspire for placement. Irrespective of its value, he notes that every time a new MQ comes out, the vendor has an opportunity to issue a self-congratulatory press release about it.

In chapter 6, Stiennon makes the somewhat depressing observation that the senior analysts at Gartner have not had hands-on experience with products for many years. Yet these same analysts often have huge influence on the very products they often don't understand in minutia.

In some ways, the book is akin to How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. The only difference is that one is attempting to influence a Gartner analyst in the vendor's favor. In chapter 7, the book details how to find the influencers. Stiennon is a big fan of social media and gives a number of valuable methods to find the Gartner analysts in your sector.

One approach I think Stiennon is mistaken is with the use of Klout. He writes that Klout is a great tool for measuring relative influence, at least on social media of an analyst. That may be somewhat true, but for a large part is irrelevant. As I wrote in Some Observations on Klout Scores, Klout can and should be applauded for trying to measure this monstrosity called social influence; but their results of influence should in truth, carry very little influence.

I based this on the fact that Klout scores Funny One Liners and the legendary Tim O'Reilly as being equal; which is utterly absurd. You can do your own Klout analysis for similar irrelevant and meaningless Klout scores.

The MQ is not the only service Gartner offers. In chapter 8, Stiennon writes of SAS Day. SAS is the Gartner Strategic Advisory Service, where a vendor buys the services of an analyst for a day. He notes that the pay to play myth may arise from SAS; but observes that you are not buying the analyst's opinion, rather their time. Vendors can get a lot out of a SAS day, as it is a day-long bottoms-up analysis of their products, markets, sales strategies and more with an analyst who has a deep awareness of that sector.

Stiennon also provides a lot of pragmatic direction on SAS on how to prepare for the SAS day. Given the expense of the analyst and the need to have all of the key staffers there, he notes that getting an agenda planned, good conference rooms, nutritious meals and much more are key to getting the most out of the day.

Back to the MQ; Stiennon writes that every organization of size needs a dedicated analyst relations (AR) staff member. The AR person will be the conduit between the vendor and the analyst firm. While the AR person is critical, he writes that a firm should never pin the responsibility for missing a target of MQ placement on the AR person. Executing on the MQ strategy is the responsibility of the entire organization.

The book provides more pragmatic advice in chapter 12 where it details the use of Gartner conferences. Stiennon writes that firms invest huge sums to attend and sponsor Gartner conferences in the hope to get in front of and sell to leading CIO's. In many cases a single sale to a CIO that arises from a Gartner event will justify the huge expenses.

But even with that, many firms make the mistake of manning their booths at the conference with junior staffers and marketing people that can't speak to the CIO, while the CEO of the vendor firm is in the back of the booth on their cell phone. That is just one of a few major faux pas the chapter details and how then can be obviated.

The chapter also details a common sales mistake in staffing the booths with booth babes. He notes that the concept is gross and misogynistic.

Towards the end, the book closes with what not to do when dealing with Gartner. He gives two examples of firms that were on their negative side. After Oracle Under Fire was written, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison went on a tirade against Gartner.

In another case, ZL Technologies, an email archiving firm sued Gartner for over $1 billion in damages (even though it was worth a fraction of that) when an analyst said their products was not up to par.

The book closes with the observation that buyers need industry analysts, as the analysts see that changes that are coming in the industry and are able to forewarn their clients.

The book is an easy read, yet highly informative and insightful. Every chapter has Stiennon's real-world experience at Gartner and post-Gartner.

While Stiennon is ex-Gartner, never in the book does his disparage his former employer or denigrate their MQ methodology. Rather he shows ways in which the vendor can maximize the potential Gartner relationship and exposure.

Any technology executive, investor and everyone in their PR and marketing departments who are looking to be on the MQ, deal with Gartner or any advisory service, should make certain that UP and to the RIGHT: Strategy and Tactics of Analyst Influence: A complete guide to analyst influence is on their absolutely required reading list. The book provides myriad superb advice on everything you need to know about dealing with and being successful with Gartner.

Given the extraordinary costs involved with analysts and the preparation for analyst meetings, the books $22 price tag is an absolutely bargain combined with its indispensable content. Whether you are a niche player or leader, it is a book well worth reading.

Ben Rothke is the author of Computer Security: 20 Things Every Employee Should Know.

You can purchase UP and to the RIGHT: Strategy and Tactics of Analyst Influence: A complete guide to analyst influence from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

New submitter oakgrove writes "Valve Software confirmed today in a new blog devoted specifically to Steam on Linux (called Steam'd Penguins) that for more than a year, a Steam client has been in the works for Ubuntu Linux 12.04. 'We've made good progress this year and now have the Steam client running on Ubuntu with all major features available. We're still giving attention and effort to minor features but it's a good experience at the moment. In the near future, we will be setting up an internal beta focusing on the auto-update experience and compatibility testing.' The blog post also says that a working port of Left 4 Dead 2 is currently playable, and that their goal is to bring performance in line with the Windows version."

First time accepted submitter Flere Imsaho writes "During the NetHui Internet conference last week, the NZ judge to hear the Dotcom extradition case was speaking on the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement and how the U.S. entertainment industry is pushing to make region code hacking illegal, when he said 'Under TPP and the American Digital Millennium copyright provisions you will not be able to do that, that will be prohibited ... if you do you will be a criminal — that's what will happen. Even before the 2008 amendments it wasn't criminalized. There are all sorts of ways this whole thing is being ramped up and if I could use Russell [Brown's] tweet from earlier on: we have met the enemy and he is [the] U.S.'"

First time accepted submitter rosy rohangi writes "Biologists at UC San Diego have discovered a chemical that provides a completely new direction and promise for the development of drugs to treat metabolic disorders such as type 2 diabetes – a key concern of public health in the U.S. due to the current obesity epidemic. From the article: '...Scientists have long suspected that diabetes and obesity could be related to problems of the biological clock. Laboratory mice with altered biological clocks, for example, often become obese and develop diabetes. Two years ago, a team led by Steve Kay, dean of the Division of Biological Sciences at UC San Diego, discovered the first biochemical link between the biological clock and diabetes. He found that a key protein, cryptochrome, which regulates the biological clocks of plants, insects and mammals also regulates glucose production in the liver and that changes in levels of this protein could improve the health of diabetic mice.'"

Phoghat writes "A top defense and cybersecurity expert says the U.S. should stop trying to take aim at expert hackers and start doing a better job of recruiting them. 'Let's just say that in some places you find guys with body piercings and nonregulation haircuts,' says U.S. Naval Postgraduate School professor John Arquilla . 'But most of these sorts of guys can't be vetted in the traditional way. We need a new institutional culture that allows us to reach out to them.'"

New submitter MyFirstNameIsPaul writes "The once popular social news website Digg.com, which received $45 million in funding, is being sold to to Betaworks for $500,000. From the article: 'Betaworks is acquiring the Digg brand, website, and technology, but not its employees. Digg will be folded into News.me, Betaworks' social news aggregator. This is not the outcome people expected for Digg. In 2008, Google was reportedly set to buy it for $200 million.'" Update: 07/13 12:26 GMT by S : Looks like real number is about $16 million.

AZA43 writes "After releasing some very ugly financial numbers in late June, BlackBerry-maker RIM went on a media blitz to downplay the significance of its latest earnings and counter increasingly negative media attention. ... But a new Q&A with BlackBerry chief Thorsten Heins offers a unique take on what exactly went wrong at RIM — Heins blames the company's downfall [partly] on LTE in the U.S. — and he actually seems genuine in his answers." A peek into the mind of RIM's upper management.

redletterdave writes "It appears that Google is no longer alone in exploring the realm of wearable tech solutions. Apple was granted a patent on Thursday in relation to 'peripheral treatment for head-mounted displays.' While Google Glass places a piece of smartglass right above the user's eye, Apple's solution uses two peripheral lights to show two different images to each eye 'to create an enhanced viewing experience for the user.' Apple's patent also attempts to address the biggest problems with head-mounted displays (HMDs), particularly tunnel vision and motion sickness."

redletterdave writes "Research In Motion is in trouble. The BlackBerry maker has been suffering from an identity crisis for the last six months, which has resulted in mass layoffs, lots of job shuffling, dramatic drop-offs in market share and a quickly decaying portfolio for investors. But not according to Thorsten Heins! The newly-appointed CEO published an op-ed in the Toronto Globe and Mail on Tuesday, and also appeared on a radio program the same morning, to deliver one message: 'There's nothing wrong with the company as it exists right now.'"

redletterdave writes "Facebook already knows what you 'Like.' Soon, it may ask you what you 'Want'. Tom Waddington, a Web developer for the craft website Cut Out + Keep, discovered that Facebook has included code for a disabled 'Want' button within the Javascript of its list of social plug-ins. The code was released to the Facebook Javascript SDK last Wednesday, but Waddington discovered the disabled button among other embedded tags, including 'degrees,' 'social context' and 'page events.' Waddington says the 'Want' button would work with Open Graph projects that use the tag 'products.'"