Slashdot Mirror

raque writes "Following up on an earlier story, a group of aviation archaeologists will use underwater robots along with submersibles and sonar to search for Amelia Earhart's plane. The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery will search this July for the aircraft, which went down 75 years ago. 'If there's wreckage there that can be recovered, we need to know what it is, how big it is, what it looks like, and what it's made of so we can prepare a recovery expedition that has equipment to raise whatever's there,' said Richard Gillespie, the group's executive director."

New submitter unimacs writes "So Apple has been under fire recently for the conditions at the factories of their Chinese suppliers. I listened to 'This American Life's' recent retraction of the Michael Daisey piece they did a while back. Great radio for those of you who haven't heard it — rarely has dead air been used to such effect. Anyway, while his work has been discredited, Michael Daisey wasn't inaccurate in his claims that working conditions are poor in iPhone and iPad factories. Given that, are there any smart phone manufacturers whose phones are made under better conditions?"

mosb1000 writes "The era of the plastic jumbo jet has finally arrived. Boeing is delivering their first Dreamliner to All Nippon Airways today. From the article: '"Comfort and cost are concerns of the business traveller and the 787 will deliver extreme advancements in fuel efficiency and many traveller features that will improve the journey," said Michael Qualantone, senior vice president & general manager, American Express Global Business Travel. Indeed, this twin-engine, bendy winged, widebody craft has raised the bar for fuel efficiency. Some 50 percent by weight of the 787 airframe is lightweight carbon-fibre composites that could, Boeing says, help reduce fuel costs by 20 percent.' I can't wait for my first chance to fly in one."

nk497 writes "Forget snapping a few components into a motherboard — programming enthusiast Jack Eisenmann has made his own PC from scratch. His Duo Adept, as he's named it, features 64KB of main memory, 256 bytes of RAM and, in total, 263 lines of code for his homemade OS. Sure, it can't run Crysis, but it does run a game he's written himself."

bedouin writes "In April, the Egyptian Centre for Housing Rights filed a lawsuit on behalf of other plaintiffs against the three telecommunications companies (and a number of current and former Egyptian officials) seeking compensation for the damages they suffered due to the shutdown of communications. The case is ongoing. An interesting question is whether any of these companies could also be sued in US courts."

mosb1000 writes "Climate scientist James Lovelock claims it may be necessary to put democracy on hold to prevent a global climate catastrophe. He goes on to say that the best remedies may be adaptation techniques such as building sea defenses." Lovelock is famously the creator of the Gaia hypothesis.

Toe, The writes "Gizmodo details the Long Endurance Multi-intelligence Vehicle (LEMV) (based on the P-791), a spyship from US Army's Space and Missile Defense Command capable of hovering at 20,000 feet. Planned for deployment in Afghanistan, the ship can float for three weeks and carry well over a ton of payload, apparently surveillance equipment. The video on Gizmodo of the P-791 shows that these ships are a hybrid not only of both buoyancy and propulsive lift, but also of both awe and hilarity."

bossanovalithium writes "Gary McKinnon, whose tribulations we have followed for several years now, is the UK hacker trying to escape extradition to the US. It appears he is expected to foot the bill for the US Government patching holes his breaching uncovered — to the tune of $700,000. It's not really the norm for someone to pay for exploits to be patched — damages fixed, yes, but this is a very different thing." The article paraphrases Eugene Spafford as saying that the victim of a cybercrime should not take the blame. "If someone broke a door to rob a store, he said, it was usual to charge them the cost of the door." Isn't the McKinnon case more like charging him to buy the lock that had been missing when he walked in?

An anonymous reader writes "For copyright activists, Christmas comes but once every three years: a chance to ask Santa for a new exemption to the much-hated Digital Millennium Copyright Act's prohibitions against hacking, reverse engineering and evasion of Digital Rights Management (DRM) schemes protecting all kinds of digital works and electronic items. Judging from the list of 20 exemptions requested this year [19 shown], some in the cyber-law community are thinking big. The requests include the right to legally jailbreak iPhones in order to use third party software, university professors wishing to rip clips from DVDs for classroom use, YouTube users wishing to rip DVDs to make video mashups, a request to allow users to hack DRM protecting content from stores that have gone bankrupt or shut down, and a request to allow security researchers to reverse engineer video games with security flaws that put end-users at risk." Reader MistaE provides some more specific links to PDF versions: "Among the exemption proposals is a request from the Harvard Cyberlaw Clinic to allow circumvention of DRM protection when the central authorization server goes down, a request from the EFF to allow circumvention to install third party programs on phones, as well as a request for ripping DVDs for non-commercial purposes. There were also several narrow requests from educational institutions to rip DVDs for classroom practices."

raque writes "Appleinsider is reporting that the new MacBooks/MacBookPros have built-in copy protection. Quote: 'Apple's new MacBook lines include a form of digital copy protection that will prevent protected media, such as DRM-infused iTunes movies, from playing back on devices that aren't compliant with the new priority protection measures.' Ars Technica is also reporting on the issue. Is this the deal they had to make to get NBC back? Is this a deal breaker for Apple or will fans just ignore it to get their hands on the pretty new machines? Is this a new opportunity for Linux? And what happened to Jobs not liking DRM?"

ddelmonte writes "This Washington Post article examines a test conducted at UCLA. The test had two groups, young people who used the Internet, and older people who had never been online. Both groups were asked to do Internet searches and book reading tasks while their brain activity was monitored. 'We found that in reading the book task, the visual cortex — the part of the brain that controls reading and language — was activated,' Small said. 'In doing the Internet search task, there was much greater activity, but only in the Internet-savvy group.' He said it appears that people who are familiar with the Internet can engage in a much deeper level of brain activity. 'There is something about Internet searching where we can gauge it to a level that we find challenging,' Small said. In the aging brain, atrophy and reduced cell activity can take a toll on cognitive function. Activities that keep the brain engaged can preserve brain health and thinking ability. Small thinks learning to do Internet searches may be one of those activities."

katrina writes "Covering the infamous MafiaBoy bank hack, the launch of the first ever online newspaper — MIT's 'The Tech' — and Brewster Kahle developing the Internet Archive back in 1996, five decades of the most significant Internet developments, hacks, legal battles and innovations have been documented in a massive historical article on Cnet UK."

Jm_aus writes "eBay's plan to force all users to use PayPal only has been rejected by Australia's competition regulator, the ACCC. This followed 650 submissions from eBay users as well as from Australian banks, other payment services, the Australian Reserve Bank, and (anonymously) Google, which aired a lot of dirty laundry about PayPal's unresponsiveness and failure to sign up to the local banking code of conduct. Apparently the public benefits from eBay's 'Bad Buyer Experience' elimination program are likely to be 'minimal.' There is a period for appeals."

number655321 writes "Apple has confirmed the inclusion of ZFS in the forthcoming OS X Server Snow Leopard. From Apple's site: 'For business-critical server deployments, Snow Leopard Server adds read and write support for the high-performance, 128-bit ZFS file system, which includes advanced features such as storage pooling, data redundancy, automatic error correction, dynamic volume expansion, and snapshots.' CTO of Storage Technologies at Sun Microsystems, Jeff Bonwick, is hosting a discussion on his blog. What does this mean for the 'client' version of OS X Snow Leopard?"

redwoodtree writes "An article on the site for the Tri-City Herald sums it up perfectly: 'Contrary to popular belief, not a significant amount of research goes into cockroach radiation.' To test the old saw about 'the cockroaches being the only survivors of a nuclear war' Discovery Channel's Mythbusters are going out to Hanford Site, where plutonium was manufactured for the first nuclear bomb. It's the single most polluted nuclear waste site in the U.S. The Mythbusters are going to take cockroaches and other insects and apply successively higher doses of radiation in a controlled setting."

mjasay writes "At the Web 2.0 Summit, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer admitted that Microsoft 'will do some buying of companies that are built around open-source products,' suggesting that to avoid open-source companies would 'take us out of the acquisition market quite dramatically.' Ballmer has apparently come a long way since dubbing Linux a 'cancer.' The real question, however, is which open-source companies make sense within the Microsoft product portfolio, both from a technology and philosophy perspective. Novell? 37Signals? Jive? SugarCRM? And, equally importantly, which companies could look their communities in the eye after selling to Microsoft?"

jcr writes "Medical researchers in Britain have succeeded in growing a heart valve from adult stem cells taken from bone marrow. The research is being reported in the journal of the Royal Society today. Growing a heart value from your own cells means that tissue rejection isn't an issue."

orgelspieler writes "NPR is running a story on a safe way to reproduce sound from ancient phonographs that would otherwise be unplayable. The system, called IRENE, was installed in the Library of Congress last year. It can be used to replay records that are scratched, worn, broken, or just too fragile to play with a needle. It scans the groves optically and processes them into a sound file at speeds approaching real time. IRENE is great at removing pops and skips, but can add some hiss. Researchers are also working on a 3D model that is better at removing hiss."

Kadin2048 writes "Despite reports last week in major news sources indicating that the One Laptop Per Child project was in negotiations with Microsoft to bring Windows XP to the low-cost platform, Walter Bender, president of Software and Content at OLPC, said in an interview with Ars Technica, 'We are a free and open-source shop. We have no one from OLPC working with Microsoft on developing a Windows platform for the XO.'"

David DelMonte writes "Space.com is reporting on the discovery of seven dark spots near the Equator on Mars. The thinking is that these are cave openings. The openings are the size of football fields, and one of them is thought to extend approximately 400 feet below the surface.'The researchers hope the discovery will lead to more focused spelunking on Mars. "Caves on Mars could become habitats for future explorers or could be the only structures that preserve evidence of past or present microbial life ," said Glenn Cushing of Northern Arizona University, who first spotted the black areas in the photographs.'"

SlashRating^© 10 slashdottit! ^tm ddelmonte writes with a link to a brietbart story on the top ten April Fools Day hoaxes, as determined by the San Diego-based Museum of Hoaxes. Two great British examples: "In 1957, a BBC television show announced that thanks to a mild winter and the virtual elimination of the spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. Footage of Swiss farmers pulling strands of spaghetti from trees prompted a barrage of calls from people wanting to know how to grow their own spaghetti at home. In 1977, British newspaper The Guardian published a seven-page supplement for the 10th anniversary of San Serriffe, a small republic located in the Indian Ocean consisting of several semicolon-shaped islands. A series of articles described the geography and culture of the two main islands, named Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse."

loid_void writes to mention The New York Times is reporting that Biologists are making a bid on the subject of morality. "Last year Marc Hauser, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard, proposed in his book 'Moral Minds' that the brain has a genetically shaped mechanism for acquiring moral rules, a universal moral grammar similar to the neural machinery for learning language. In another recent book, 'Primates and Philosophers,' the primatologist Frans de Waal defends against philosopher critics his view that the roots of morality can be seen in the social behavior of monkeys and apes."

jeckil writes "DarwiinRemote is a tiny piece of software which reads data from and sends data to Nintendo Wii Remote. It detects all 3 axis sensors, all buttons (except power). You can modify which controller LED indicator is on, and send force feedback. Right now it only supports a basic front row control scheme but they should be releasing a better version in a few days. All the source code is available and compatible with latest version of xcode. One can only wonder ... If the latest apple rumor turns out to be true, things could get very interesting for apple. Someone has already released a modified version of this app. It seems there have been some problems detecting the remote so an alternate version that uses the Wiimote's sync button has been released."

jeckil writes "DarwiinRemote is a tiny piece of software which reads data from and sends data to Nintendo Wii Remote. It detects all 3 axis sensors, all buttons (except power). You can modify which controller LED indicator is on, and send force feedback. Right now it only supports a basic front row control scheme but they should be releasing a better version in a few days. All the source code is available and compatible with latest version of xcode. One can only wonder ... If the latest apple rumor turns out to be true, things could get very interesting for apple. Someone has already released a modified version of this app. It seems there have been some problems detecting the remote so an alternate version that uses the Wiimote's sync button has been released."

orgelspieler writes, "According to the New York Times, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine has opened a review of his department's role in the domestic spying program. Democrats (and some Republicans) have been requesting an all-out investigation into the legality of the so-called 'Terrorist Surveillance Program' since it was made public. But this new inquiry stops short of evaluating the constitutional legitimacy of the program." From the article: "The review, Mr. Fine said in his letter, will examine the controls in place at the Justice Department for the eavesdropping, the way information developed from it was used, and the department's 'compliance with legal requirements governing the program'... Several Democrats suggested that the timing of his review might be tied to their takeover of Congress in this month's midterm elections as a way to preempt expected Democratic investigations of the N.S.A. program."

loid_void writes to mention a New York Times article about the discovery that dark energy, or antigravity, was present at the formation of the universe. A team of 'dark energy prospectors' at the Space Telescope Science Institute theorizes that this may have directed the evolution of the cosmos. By observing supernova activity almost 8 billion years in the past, the team was able to study whether or not dark energy has changed over the millennia. From the article: "The data suggest that, in fact, dark energy has changed little, if at all, over the course of cosmic history. Though hardly conclusive, that finding lends more support to what has become the conventional theory, that the source of cosmic antigravity is the cosmological constant, a sort of fudge factor that Einstein inserted into his cosmological equations in 1917 to represent a cosmic repulsion embedded in space. Although Einstein later abandoned the cosmological constant, calling it a blunder, it would not go away. It is the one theorized form of dark energy that does not change with time. Sean Carroll, a cosmologist at the California Institute of Technology who was not on the team, said: 'Had they found the evolution was not constant, that would have been an incredibly earthshaking discovery. They looked where no one had been able to look before.'"

Clodas writes, "smcFanControl 1.1 is a simple GUI that lets you control how fast each fan spins on your MacBook, MacBook Pro, or Mac Mini. The temperature of my MBP when idle averaged around 63 degrees celsius. After running smcFanControl 1.1, my temperature dropped to 43 celsius within 10 minutes of use. This now allows me to sit my MBP on my lap, something I was unable to do previously since the machine got so hot. I have my fans set to spin at a minimum of 3000 RPM and I still don't hear the fans spinning. Apple by default has them set to 1000 RPM. I really recommend smcFanControl 1.1 for any that feel their MB, MBP, or Mini are too hot to handle."

Simon Clement writes "Decided to add to the Apple product line with the iPod Hi-Fi mini. Here's the web page detailing its features, and there's also a link to a Flickr set showing how to build your own."

aceydacey writes ""WxPython in Action" is a new and definitive guide to the popular wxPython GUI framework. WxPython has been growing in popularity by leaps and bounds in recent years but has been hampered by a comparative lack of good, comprehensive documentation, so much so that many people have turned to studying the documentation for the underlying wxWidgets framework, that is written in C++. "WxPython in Action" fills the void by combining a good introduction to the framework with a comprehensive and accessible reference document. At 552 pages, Manning Publications has produced a definitive book." Read the rest of Ron's review. WxPython in Action author Robin Dunn and Noel Rappin pages 552 publisher Manning rating 10 reviewer Ron Stephens ISBN 1-932394-62-1 summary An introduction to the WxPython GUI Framework

WxPython is one of the best cross-platform GUI toolkits for the open source Python programming language. It excels in matching the native look and feel of programs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. It is a mature project, being a well-developed wrapper of the underlying wxWidgets C++ toolkit. Another reason for its growing popularity is its very extensive number of widgets, making it a capable and modern tool for making professional-looking GUIs for applications in almost any field of endeavor. It has endured a reputation for having a steep learning curve, and for sometimes being difficult to install and easy to break during upgrades; both of which downsides should be lessened by the publishing of this book.

Written by Robin Dunn, the creator and moving force behind wxPython, and ably assisted by Noel Rappin, this book is definitive, authoritative and well-written. Part 1 fills the role of a good introduction to the toolkit, and Parts 2 and 3 are a thorough reference to the widgets, behavior and usage of the framework.

in Part 1, we learn the inside story behind the beginnings and the history of wxPython's development. We are walked through the creation of simple examples of the core functionality of the framework illustrating how to create and use the basic controls and event loops. Then, we get a more detailed explanation of the wxPython event loop, an introduction to PyCrust (a useful tool for wxPython programmers, essentially an interactive interpreter session, wrapped as a wx widget) a whole chapter on the Model-View-Controller paradigm, and a discourse on good factoring techniques for GUI programs. This is rather general programming knowledge, not necessarily specific to wxPython, and truly expert programmers will probably skip much of this material, but for many, like me, it is very useful, and for many others, it will be a good review of previously known material. The writing style is excellent but one weakness is that the authors return again and again to wxPython evangelism and boosterism, which is regrettable; but this is the only section of the book to suffer from this flaw.

Part 2 gives detailed coverage of each widget, control, frame, dialog, and menu in the toolkit, and this is the meat of the book and will be used and reused as core reference material by many a programmer. This is good stuff, thorough, well researched, and definitive. Next, the authors give an equally good explanation of how to use sizers and grids to layout and control your GUI application. Part 2 fills the previously missing gap in core wxPython documentation and, to folks who need it, is worth its weight in gold.

Part 3, called Advanced wxPython, gives welcome coverage to advanced layout and control issues. This subject of advanced layout is, in my opinion, where the rubber really hits the road in GUI design, and it is appropriate that this is where the authors spend the most time and effort, and with good result. The final chapter breaks new ground by walking the reader through the creation of a multithreaded wxPython application. This is great stuff, and the advanced readers will be left pining for even more on this timely topic of such growing importance. Fortunately, the authors are available online to communicate with users who truly master the material in the book and want to to pursue more advanced usage.

The book is at its best in documenting the core API for expert programmers who are new to wxPython. It is also a good introduction to wxPython for advanced programmers. For moderately experienced programmers, the book is excellent but will be a tough read; probably not to be mastered in a straight read thorough, the book will adequately reward this kind of reader who is dedicated and persistent. For novice programmers, especially those who have little to no previous experience in GUI programming, I believe the book may be beyond their grasp.

So, if you are a serious programmer who wants or needs to use the wxPython GUI toolkit, "wxPython in Action" is a must-have reference book. It is perfect for this kind of reader and will become a well-worn book that will be useful for at least the next five years. It is unlikely that any other book about wxPython will be published that could do a better job, given the authors' unparalleled understanding of the toolkit and the obvious patience, time and care they took in researching, writing, and editing this book. It is not a casual read, but to a serious student of the subject, that is a positive statement. The book is strong meat, a weighty and substantive technical tome.

The book really shines in the many pages devoted to User Interface design and implementation. This is where many programmers need help, and it is gratifying that this book goes into the most detail on this subject. This is very detailed coverage and one is left with a satisfaction that, while not easy reading, it is well worth while. I feel this is the book's strongest point.

I know that it sometimes seems there has been an inflation in the scoring of books, with reviewers giving so many high ratings that one wonders how meaningful those ratings are. This book is not for everybody, and it is not a work of great literature, but given the obvious need for such a work, and the careful and accurate fulfillment of this need by these authors, I feel justified in giving it a rating of ten stars. For the people who really need this book, it is about as good as it could get, and will be a most welcome addition to their technical library.

More material for those learning and using Python can found at my web site Python Learning Resources.

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

Phillip Ryu writes "As someone in the Macintosh shareware business, as part of my job, I make the daily crawl through MacUpdate to look for the latest and greatest in Mac software. One thing I've been noticing recently is a renaissance of extremely polished and beautiful Mac apps, so I thought I'd share some of these finds with you guys. Without further ado, presenting the top ten most beautiful OS X apps. Hopefully you'll find some new gems in there, even I found a few surprises while compiling this list. Enjoy!"

Benjamin Horst writes "The volunteer effort raising $10,000 to place at least two backpage ads in New York City's free daily paper Metro is now entering its second full week. We've collected over 10% of our goal already and continue to find new pledge donors at a healthy pace. Our project's purpose is to help 'cross the chasm' and bring awareness of OpenOffice.org 2.0 to the large number of computer users who stand to benefit from its broad feature set and range of useful capabilities. This is not the first time an open source project has sought a high-profile newspaper ad buy. In fact, our effort was directly inspired by the Firefox New York Times ad. Firefox's famous effort announcing its arrival on the world stage helped push it from about 10 million downloads to its current tally of over 185 million!"

dhollist writes "A story just released by the Inquirer shows that 80% of incoming search requests from Microsoft's domain arrived via Google's search engine. In contrast, 64% of Yahoo! staff and 100% of Google staff use their own company's search engine. How's that for a product endorsement? I'd guess that Microsoft may soon add google.com to the list of blocked URL's on their intranet."

rbannon asks: "Computer literacy is becoming an increasingly used term in education, and more and more schools are being asked to set computer literacy goals for their students. Unfortunately for too many, it means being able to use Microsoft products, and that's all. However, I see it much differently, and I cannot help but think that computer literacy is all about using computers to be able to communicate more effectively. With that in mind does anyone have any recommendations for computer literacy goals, and how to measure them?"

QuatermassX writes "Forget increased sales of Mac computers, think media players. The iPod 'halo effect' shows its true power in recently compiled statistics from Nielsen/NetRatings and Apple. From the report on WebSiteOptimization.com: 'Podcasting is taking off and iPods are seemingly ubiquitous. Unique users of Apple's iTunes player should pass RealPlayer by mid-2006 with nearly 30 million users in the US alone. People are tuning in over twice as long with iTunes than with RealPlayer or Windows Media Player. As broadband penetration increases we are spending more time on our computers.'"

QuatermassX writes "In a lengthy piece in today's New York Times, Ken Belson equates Sony's troubles in bringing Blu-Ray to market with their classic fumble of Betamax technology in the early 1980's. He also discusses the influence of Microsoft in the recent advances in the adoption of the perceived underdog in this fight, HD-DVD. The article also summarises the various twists and turns in the development of the format along with some scary numbers (that we're familiar with) on the estimated cost of Playstation 3 From TFA: "There are other industry analysts who contend that Microsoft is simply propping up Toshiba to further its own aims, like countering the PlayStation and combating the spread of Sun's Java software. Nonetheless, Toshiba is happy for the backing, given that the format was written off for dead just a few months ago. '"There's no doubt that everyone has various agendas," said Mark Knox, an adviser to the Toshiba promotion group. "But whatever their agenda, Microsoft's support has been a huge boon to HD-DVD.'""

hammersuit writes "GameDaily Biz is reporting that Atari has put up five studios for sale in an effort to stave off bankruptcy once again. These include Shiny Studios (thought to be working on next-gen Earthworm Jim games) and Reflections (working on yet another sequel to the Driver series)."

Kadin2048 writes "According to an recent Ars Technica article, the US is headed on a 'collision course' with the WTO over off-shore Internet gambling, if a bill currently in the House of Representatives passes. The 'Internet Gambling Prohibition Act,' (PDF) which updates the 'Wire Act' to prohibit Internet gambling regardless of whether the servers are located in the US or outside of it, is in direct contravention of a WTO ruling. Proponents of the bill claim that it was narrowly defeated in previous incarnations due to the influence of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. However it seems as though some of Abramoff's biggest clients -- brick and mortar casinos -- are really the big winners from passage of this bill, since it does not prohibit gambling in person, only online."

azav wrote to mention the New Scientist story detailing the computer virus that brought down the Russian Stock Exchange. From the article: "As the world waited for one computer virus to strike on Friday, another wriggled its way into the Russian stock exchange and knocked it offline. Computer experts had warned that 3 February could bring gloom for many as a computer virus called Nyxem was scheduled to start deleting files on machines it had infected."

cyberbian asks: "My six year old daughter has recently expressed an interest in chess. We have been playing a few games, but I fear that I'm not the best teacher for such a venerable game. Is there any software that the Slashdot community would recommend for learning the mechanics and structures of good chess?"

QuatermassX writes "The New York Times editorial page comments on the responsibilities of American technology companies doing business in China. From the article: 'Such obvious disregard for users' privacy and ethical standards may make it easier to do business in China, but it also aids a repressive regime. Some in the American Congress are talking about holding hearings. Microsoft has responded to criticism by saying, 'We think it's better to be there with our services than not be there.' This is a false choice. China needs Internet companies as much as they need China.'"

Boccaccio writes "James Lovelock, the planetary scientist famous for his Gaia Theory, writes in today's Independent of his belief that it is already too late to divert an environmental catastrophe which will see much of human civilisation destroyed. Fearing it too late to be green, he instead suggests communities plan for survival in a Mad Max type world with limited resources ruled by violent warlords. "We have to keep in mind the awesome pace of change and realise how little time is left to act, and then each community and nation must find the best use of the resources they have to sustain civilisation for as long as they can." He suggests we should be writing a practical guidebook printed on long lasting paper containing "the basic accumulated scientific knowledge of humanity.""

norburym writes "Peter Morville is an information architect, an advocate of expanding the boundaries of librarianship in an Internet age and the voice of ambient findability. In this new book from O'Reilly, Morville expands on a theme he's been discussing for several years: we live in an age where computers and the Internet are changing how we access information. Digital networks are available everywhere. As users, we have computers, PDAs, GPS units, smartphones, software and other network technologies that enable constant and mobile connectivity. As Morville writes, ambient findability is "a realm in which we can find anyone or anything from anywhere at anytime" and his book is a thought provoking chronicle of the advent of that goal." Read the rest of Mary's review. Ambient Findability author Peter Morville pages 204 publisher O'Reilly Media rating 9 reviewer Mary Norbury-Glaser ISBN 0596007655 summary Information retrieval in an age of ubiquitous computing.

Ambient Findability is divided into seven sections that track the journey from simply defining what the author means by findability through a history of man's search for location awareness in both the physical environment and in the cyber world; how we interact with information through documents, language, and systems of retrieval; intertwingularity and findable objects; the balance between push (advertising) and pull (information retrieval); being a Web designer and a user advocate; metadata and physical data in the context of findability; and the ability to make informed decisions based on open source and emerging technology.

A core definition offered by the author in Chapter 1 is for findability: "the quality of being locatable or navigable; the degree to which a particular object is easy to discover or locate; the degree to which a system or environment supports navigation and retrieval." Morville discusses how well various websites perform in providing information desired by the user and how successful sites cater to mass customization. Businesses and non-profits that aim to reduce search time and improve findability of their site contents will gain marketplace advantage.

Chapter 2 is an interesting and informative introduction to the history of wayfinding through lessons learned from various animal species (exocentric and egocentric navigation, echolocation, etc.) to how humans have adapted landmarks or created tools to aid in navigation and exploration (lighthouses, compasses, sextants, maps, etc.) and further how architects and urban planners can effectively design built environments. The logical extension of this discussion is how the wayfinding techniques developed in the physical world have translated to the digital realm. In this discussion, we see how we have translated our spatial metaphors to the web.

This leads directly to the next chapter, on how people interact with information. Morville tackles the difficult task of defining information and considers the concept of relevance in relationship to the information we seek to retrieve from the Internet and how the inherent ambiguity of language negatively impacts any system of information retrieval. To top this off, the author reminds us that users themselves introduce added complexity and complication to how people seek information. He cites several research studies and literature on the subject and suggests that there is value in integrating both push and pull in how we interact with information systems.

Chapter 4 deals with the topic of intertwingularity (a combination of "intertwined" and "mingled") or the idea that things are connected together in a complex and nonlinear way. In terms of the Internet and ubiquitous computing, this translates into our ability to connect to disparate bits of data not only from computers but also from mobile devices and other ambient devices (GPS, EZPass, pagers, RFIDs) that are truly pervasive throughout society. Morville takes us through part two of wayfinding with descriptions of GPS technology, interactive mapping and photographic confluence sites, tracking using GPS and cellular communication, RFID, webcams, and of course the convergence of technology as wearable computing (sunglasses that can be used with cell phones and MP3 devices, Bluetooth enabled garments, cameras embedded in glasses, etc.) becomes more common and affordable.

Morville then leads us neatly back to the idea of push and pull. In chapter 5, he discusses the necessary flow toward balance and uses the example of Google, which successfully intertwingles unobtrusive targeted ads with search results. Design and marketing, as the author notes, are not enemies. Yet finding the balance is tricky and not a simple task. Morville describes his "user experience honeycomb" model which combines the key issues that designers should consider when creating a website that optimizes findability and therefore enhances user experience: useful, usable, desirable, findable, accessible, credible, and valuable. He concludes the chapter with hacks that improve web findability: adopting search engine optimization techniques (avoid drop down menus, image maps, frames, etc.; use RSS feeds with backlinks; embrace web standards; determine and include keywords and phrases in visible body text, links, headers, tags, etc.), and personalization (examples include Yahoo! using individual profiles to customize sports scores and stock information, the Weather Channel using zip codes for local weather, and Google Alerts letting users track keywords in news and web sites).

In chapter 6, "The Sociosemantic Web," Morville outlines the controversy surrounding an article, "The Semantic Web," that appeared in May 2001 in the Scientific American. The authors of the article propose an ambitious "road map for future Web design" that subsequently fueled a debate between W3C Semantic Web members and social software supporters. The debate leads to a discussion about how well metadata can be normalized in an environment such as the Web. Morville uses this debate as an introduction to a history and structural description of metadata. He describes the formulation of taxonomies and the use of controlled vocabularies to enable findability. Of course, web sites are not simply hierarchical; they are complexly grouped which brings us to the idea of folksonomies where users tag objects with one or more keywords that become shared. Folksonomies are obviously not great for findability since they fail at semantic relationships and hierarchy. However, all forms of structure (folksonomies, ontologies, and taxonomies) can co-exist on the Web to describe metadata and the differences between data and metadata are becoming less distinct. Amazon is a perfect example of this: traditional publication and topic details and concordance are documented along with customer reviews and rankings. Amazon also has the option to "search inside this book" which makes the pages and even the text itself become metadata.

The final chapter of the book delves into how we are ultimately capable of making informed decisions through the power of the Internet: the sheer volume and variety of sources available to us and the ease of access enable us to take charge of decisions we would normally trust to those professionals outside of our narrow realm of expertise. We decide which information to believe in. Morville considers information literacy and digital librarianship and proffers the idea that libraries and the Internet have common principles of maintaining free expression, privacy, free and equal access, and intellectual freedom.

Tim O'Reilly is well known for expanding the boundaries of technology in print and through conferences like the Emerging Technology Conference, the Web 2.0 Conference, and the Open Source Convention held in both the US and in Europe. His agenda has never been to fill convention halls with attendees who fit a lowest common denominator; his aim has been to bring together people who not only think smart but who also have the ability to think outside the normal boundaries of their particular field of interest (Robert J. Lang, Freeman Dyson, James Gosling, among others) and who therefore inspire innovation. With the publication of Ambient Findability, O'Reilly Media continues this tradition of giving readers an opportunity to experience the visionary writing of people like Peter Morville.

Read Ambient Findability if: you are interested in expanding your business or nonprofit through its presence on the Internet; you are a librarian and want to grow into the nontraditional environment of the Web; you are a Web designer and want to optimize the findability of your sites on the Internet; you are a user and want to enhance your searching experience. Read this book if you are a teacher, a student, a writer, a parent...in short, if you use a computer or a handheld or a GPS or a smartphone or any type of technology that connects you to the world, then you should read this book. Peter Morville's Ambient Findability will amaze and delight you. It will give you new insight into how ubiquitous computing is affecting how we find and use information and how we, as users, can and will shape the future of how data is stored and retrieved.

Mary Norbury-Glaser is IT Director at the Barbara Davis Center, an affiliate center at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver."

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

norburym writes "The Bruce Perens Open Source Series of books published by Prentice Hall PTR is a strong collection of nearly 20 volumes focusing on Linux and open source technology. Edited by Linux guru and former Debian GNU/Linux Project Leader, Bruce Perens, the books are aimed toward developers, sysadmins and power users. Several months following the release of a new print volume, a free electronic version is made available on Prentice Hall PTR's web site. The series includes some excellent editions including Official Samba-3 HOWTO and Reference Guide (2nd ed.), Linux Quick Fix Notebook and PHP 5 Power Programming. The newest book by Mark Wilding and Dan Behman, Self-Service Linux: Determining Problems and Finding Solutions, is another well-written and worthy companion to this series." Read the rest of Mary's review. Self-Service Linux: Determining Problems and Finding Solutions author Mark Wilding and Dan Behman pages 456 publisher Prentice Hall, PTR rating 8 reviewer Mary Norbury-Glaser ISBN 013147751X summary Linux Troubleshooting

This is not a basic Linux HOW TO book: authors Wilding and Behman take the reader to a level past the introductory Linux OS installation instructions and KDE/GNOME window dressing changes. In all real life scenarios and at some critical point, a Linux user or admin will need to troubleshoot some aspect of the system they use at home or the systems they manage on the job. This book is for that power user, systems administrator or developer who will, out of base necessity, require a proper bag of tools and practical guidance in establishing an effective set of skills for troubleshooting one or more Linux systems.

A quick scan of the table of contents gives a very abbreviated summary of the book and actually belies the depth of the contents. The authors break the chapters into very self-contained topics including best practices and initial investigations, strace and system call tracing explained, the /proc filesystem, compiling, GDB (GNU Debugger), Linux system crashes and hangs, and kernel debugging, among others. These chapters are filled with detailed examples that perfectly illustrate real world scenarios that any Linux user will be familiar with.

Chapter 1 is an overview of the complex process of problem determination and resolution and begins with steps to configure your Linux system(s) for optimal troubleshooting. The authors outline a selection of tools they recommend the reader/user install on their Linux system(s) in anticipation of future problems: strace, ltrace, lsof, top, traceroute/tcptraceroute, ping, hexdump, tcpdump/ethereal, GDB and readelf. These and many others are categorized by type (process information and debugging, network, system information, files and object files, kernel and miscellaneous) in Appendix A, "The Toolbox." Wilding and Behman stress the importance of balancing the need to solve issues immediately vs. building troubleshooting skills. They outline four phases of problem investigation (using your own knowledge and skills to investigate, using the Internet, conducting a deeper investigation, and getting help) and discuss where the various tools fit into different scenarios, how to collect information about system changes, what resources are available on the Internet (Google, USENET, Bugzilla, etc.), how to handle more difficult problems and where and how to get outside help, if necessary.

Chapter 2 explains system call tracing, introduces the strace tool (traces system calls between a process and the kernel) and how to use it to diagnose errors related to the operating system. This is a very well organized chapter with plenty of depth. Wilding and Behman offer an extensive discussion of this first tool, progressing from simple examples that illustrate how to read the strace output, how/when to use strace options, timing system call activity, tracing an existing running process, to many practical debugging examples.

Chapter 3, "The /proc Filesystem," looks at user process information (/proc/self, /proc/<pid>, /proc/<pid>/environ, /proc/<pid>/mem), kernel information and manipulation (/proc/cpufreq, /proc/cpuinfo, /proc/devices, /proc/meminfo, /proc/partitions), and system information and manipulation (/proc/sys/fs, /proc/sys/kernel, /proc/sys/vm). The authors run through files and directories relative to /proc and describe how to view information about the kernel and currently running processes. This chapter gives a good example of how to use the "kernel magic sysrq key" feature (using the ALT-SysRq hotkeys to get kernel information) when a system hangs. Output from the commands showPC, showMem and showTasks are given as examples.

The next chapter details the GCC (GNU Compiler Collection) and compiling. The authors don't attempt to walk the reader through basic kernel source compiling but rather they concentrate on how to decipher errors that arise from compiling source. They give a basic outline of some basic compile failures (environment/setup errors, compiler version differences, user error, code error, etc.) then show a common error involving both incorrect code and different allowances made between compiler versions. Wilding and Behman show the reader how to decipher the kernel error and how to use both existing documentation and bugs posted on the Internet to correct the errors and rerun the compilation successfully. This is a very practical demonstration of how compile errors can be worked out and solved quickly.

Chapter 5 begins with a definition of "stacks" and a description of stack structure, local variables, and stack frames. Also shown is how to display the raw stack in a debugger like DDD (Data Display Debugger) or GDB (The Gnu Debugger) in order to perform a detailed stack analysis. The authors use the backtrace command to look at stack traceback output from GDB, "walking the stack" (manually walk the raw stack frame by frame using the dladdr function), common causes of stack corruption, and SIGILL signals.

Debugging applications is the subject of the next chapter with the majority of the chapter dedicated to The GNU Debugger. This is a logical place for a discussion on debuggers as the authors point out that they are particularly useful when problems can't be solved through log files, error messages, etc., when a problem is of an immediate nature (i.e. doesn't extend over a long period of time) and when source is available. GDB command line editing is covered along with how to control a live process by running the process directly through the debugger, how to attach to a running process and how to use a core file (or a process image) to perform debugging. The authors also examine viewing the memory map and variables, looking at the contents of register dumps, working with C++ (inline functions and exceptions), and problems with threaded applications. A brief description of the Data Display Debugger (DDD) GUI front-end to GDB is included at the conclusion of the chapter.

Chapter 7 deals with "System Crashes and Hangs" and how to assemble the appropriate information necessary to troubleshoot a system problem using various tools and techniques: using the syslog, setting up and using a serial console, using the SysRq kernel magic hotkey, examining the oops report generated by a manual kernel trap, considering hardware failure issues, and setting up cscope to index kernel sources. This chapter prepares the reader for documenting proper and extensive details about errors and problems not only for rapid diagnosis but also in the event he or she needs to call in an expert.

Kernel Debugging with KDB is a brief chapter that instructs the reader on how to enable and activate KDB, basic commands associated with its use, and some examples on how to use it. Several good illustrations of where KDB proves useful over other tools are included.

The final chapter explores the ELF file format (executable and linking format) for shared libraries and executables. The authors provide a comprehensive look at the ELF standard on Linux. They start with basic definitions and concepts (symbols names and C versus C++, linking with static libraries and run time linking, and run time linker) and prep the reader with some source code that is used in later chapter examples. They examine the ELF file structure (the header using hexdump, segments/sections with readelf, the program header table, and the section header table). This is probably the strongest chapter in the book. There is enough information and instruction in this chapter to arm a Linux system troubleshooter to follow the practical examples with little effort.

The book concludes with two valuable appendices that detail the authors' selected tools for Linux problem determination and include a data collector script intended to capture basic critical system information in the event of a problem. As discussed above, the "Toolbox" appendix is a summary of the authors' selection of best Linux tools for diagnosing problems. Each tool has a brief description, where to get it, level of usefulness, when to use the tool and additional notes. Appendix B, "Data Collection Script," offers the reader a sample bash script tool that gathers a broad range of system information. The authors provide several optional switches to increase the amount of data collected with the caveat that time to collect that information also increases.

Wilding and Behman assume some familiarity with the Linux system: their advice and instruction are intended for those users who are not afraid of the CLI and who understand basic Linux operating and file system structure. That said, Self-Service Linux: Mastering the Art of Problem Determination is a valuable resource for advanced users and system administrators. In short, this book is for anyone who uses Linux on a daily basis on one or multiple systems. The examples are fully detailed: the reader gets commands, options, output, sample code, and a variety of possible outcome scenarios. Wilding and Behman set out a realistic and practical approach to problem solving; they satisfy the troubleshooter in all of us. Self-Service Linux is a welcome addition to the Bruce Perens Open Source series of Prentice Hall PTR professional reference books."

You can purchase Self-Service Linux: Determining Problems and Finding Solutions from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Toothpick writes "Apple Insider reports that a new security update is available for download from Apple. This addresses issues identified in sudo, Safari, and OpenSSL among others. The gory details are, predictably, available on the Apple Info site." Commentary from ZDNet is also available.

brjndr writes "A MacInTouch poster has found that certain Sony CD's also contain a smaller extra partition for 'enhanced' content. Running one of the applications found within this partition installs kernel extensions containing DRM software by SunnComm. In Sony's defense you're told what is being installed within a EULA which pops up when the program is loaded. Thankfully we all read our EULAs completely."

Wysz writes "Mike Evangelist, former Director of Product Marketing for Apple's "Pro" applications, has blogged his thoughts about DRM. Like many of us, he is offended by the fact that the record labels and movie studios treat their customers like criminals. While he notes in the comments section that iTunes is the best of the worst, he admits to using third-party tools to remove the DRM from iTunes tracks."

atani writes "PostgreSQL 8.1 has been posted, though not officially announced as of this moment. This release includes two-phased commits, improved SMP and overall performance, a new role system replaces the older user/group, autovacuum is now within the backend rather than a separate contrib module, and various improvements, performance enhancements, and bugfixes. " You can also read the developer notes for the popular database. One thing is clear- with the newest Postresql and MySql, you have much to choose from.

norburym writes "Mark G. Sobell is well known for several comprehensive and well-written volumes: A Practical Guide to Solaris; A Practical Guide to Red Hat Linux: Fedora Core and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (2nd ed.); and A Practical Guide to the Unix System (3rd ed.). It seems only natural for the author to follow these exceptional examples with yet another excellent book entitled A Practical Guide to Linux Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming . Read on for Norburyms' review. A Practical Guide to Linux Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming author Mark G. Sobell pages 1008 publisher Prentice Hall PTR rating 9 reviewer Mary Norbury-Glaser ISBN 0131478230 summary Linux Commands, Editors, & Shell Programming

While the author has covered some aspects of this material in A Practical Guide to Red Hat Linux: Fedora Core and Red Hat Enterprise Linux, there is more than enough here (in-depth coverage of the vim and emacs editors; tcsh; sed and gawk; and the command reference section that comprises Part V) to make this a new and exhaustive volume that should take top dog in anyone's Linux library.

Sobell splits the book into six parts with Chapter 1 acting as a preface to the rest of the book. It gives a history and an overview of Linux and discusses distinctive aspects of the operating system that make it different from others. We've all heard and read the arguments before: Linux is superior to Windows, TCO is lower with Linux, Linux is not proprietary, etc. but Sobell avoids this display of arrogance and superiority by treating the origins and features of Linux as an evolution of best practices and common sense. As such, we're not left with a suspicion that the author has blinders on. To the contrary, the reader can proceed with an open mind to learning the intricacies of Linux and the command line.

Part I isn't geared for experienced users of Unix or Linux but it does serve as a good skimming point for those sysadmins who may need to brush up. For the beginner or the novice, however, these four chapters give a compact and succinct introduction to using Linux and set the stage for the sections to follow. Chapter 2 begins with logging in from a Terminal, including emulation, ssh and telnet. The author explains how to tell which shell the user is running; how to work with the shell; and how to use help, man and info. Chapter 3 is a catalog of basic utilities with all the usual suspects: ls, cat, rm, cp, mv, grep, hostname, head, tail, sort, echo, date, etc.; compressing and archiving tools: bzip2, bunzip2, gzip, tar; locating commands: which, whereis, apropos, slocate; commands used to get user and system information: who, finger, w; and commands used for communication: write, mesg. Sobell gives each utility a brief but thorough description of its function, appropriate syntax and practical uses. Chapter 4 is a complete treatment of the Linux hierarchical filesystem: directory and ordinary files; absolute and relative pathnames; how to work with directories; hard and symbolic links; and access permissions. Chapter 5 is where the reader gets a closer look at the shell. Sobell covers command line syntax (command name, arguments and options), processing and executing the command line, standard input and output (including pipes and a really nice explanation of device files), redirecting standard input and output, running a program in the background and aborting it using kill, generating filenames and expanding pathnames using wildcards/special characters, and utilities built into the shell like echo (and how to list bash and tcsh builtins).

Part I is a comfortable read. It moves along quickly and with quite a bit of information but not so much to overwhelm. By the conclusion of Chapter 5, the beginner or novice can feel pretty competent with the CLI.

Part II is dedicated to the vim editor and the emacs editor, both enjoying a chapter to themselves. Sobell happily avoids adding fuel to the already flaming fire of which editor is "the best." Chapter 6, "The vim Editor," and Chapter 7, "The emacs Editor," both use a tutorial approach to demonstrate the use of each text editor. The author includes a brief history of the development of the editor before giving a fairly complete lesson on creating and editing files within that particular editor. Some highlights of Chapter 6 include: vi clones; details of vim commands like join, yank and put; and advanced editing techniques like using markers and creating macros. Chapter 7 features: an explanation of emacs key notation and key sequences; incremental and nonincremental searches; advanced editing techniques like using the buffer to undo changes; using Mark and establishing a Region; yanking killed text; and manipulating windows (splitting and adjusting, for example).

Learning at least one editor to a level of competency is an absolute must. Sobell provides excellent instruction on both vim and emacs and along with the tutorials and the exercises at the conclusion of each chapter the reader will be sufficiently proficient in both to choose a favorite.

Part III, "The Shells," discusses the Bourne Again Shell (bash) and the TC (tcsh) shell with careful detail to each interpreter/language. The author stresses that bash, rather than tcsh, should be the shell of choice for programming and this is reflected in the instruction set forth in each of these two chapters.

Chapter 8 concentrates on bash: shell basics (startup files, redirecting standard error, simple shell scripts, separating and grouping commands, job control, directory stacks); parameters and variables (shell and user-created variables, variable attributes, keyword variables, special characters); processes (structure, identification); history mechanisms (reexecuting and editing commands, referencing events using !, use of the Readline Library); using aliases; shell functions; controlling bash features and options (using command line options and the set and shopt builtins); and a description of how bash processes the command line (command line expansion).

The TC Shell (tcsh) gets equal attention in Chapter 9. The author aims to show how tcsh differs from bash while providing a broad overview of the shell: shell scripts; entering and leaving tcsh; tcsh startup files; features common to bash and tcsh (and how tcsh implements them in a different manner) including command line expansion (tcsh calls it "substitution"), history, aliases, job control, filename and command substitution, and directory stack manipulation; redirecting standard error using >&; command line (word completion, command line editing, spell correction); variables (substitution, string variables, arrays, numeric variables, using braces, shell variables); control structures (if and goto, interrupt handling using onintr, if...then...else, foreach, while, break and continue, switch); and tcsh builtins.

Part IV, "Programming Tools," is the logical progression from the previous discussions of editors and shell basics. Sobell splits this part over four topics: programming tools, programming bash, gawk and sed.

The focus of Chapter 10 is programming tools. In particular, attention is given to writing and compiling C programs. Sobell shows how to check for your GNU gcc compiler and then gives a C programming example with a simple C program that converts tabs to spaces while maintaining columns. He takes this a step further by compiling his example C program to create an executable file. He also addresses shared libraries, fixing broken binaries, using GNU make to resolve dependencies, debugging techniques, threads, and system calls for filesystem operations and for processes control. I especially like the inclusion of the make utility. Sobell provides a nice graph that shows dependency relationships and uses an example makefile to illustrate dependency lines and construction commands. The rest of the chapter deals with source code management and using the CVS (concurrent versions system) utility and TkCVS (a Tcl/Tk-based GUI to CVS).

The next chapter is a return to bash with more detail to shell programming. The author uses this section to cover control flow contructs (if...then, if...then...else, etc.); file descriptors; more detail on parameters and variables (array variables, locality of variables, special parameters like $$ and $?, positional parameters like $#, $0 and $1-$n); expanding null and unset variables; bash builtin commands (type, read, exec, kill, etc.); and expressions (including a table of bash operators). The chapter concludes with the creation of two example shell programs: a recursive shell script that illustrates recursive operations and a "quiz" shell script which presents questions with multiple choice answers. The author walks through both of these step-by-step and points out potential pitfalls as he creates and executes a working design. Sobell should be congratulated for putting together a well-balanced and complete chapter. The exercises are thoughtfully constructed.

The Gnu awk (gawk) utility and the sed (stream editor) utility complete the final two chapters of the book. Both chapters include syntax, arguments, options and a fair number of examples.

Part V is the command reference section and this constitutes a volume in itself. This is, essentially, a printed version of man pages of utilities and shell builtins. Sobell gives us a bonus above Linux man pages, though: he includes extremely useful and pithy examples with each entry along with interesting discussion and notes sections. I would love to see the "Command Reference" as an electronic, searchable version! Perhaps as a CD included with the book in future, instead of in print.

The Appendixes make up Part VI. Regular expressions used by gawk, sed, vim, emacs, etc. are described in Appendix A. Help options, including Web sites for documentation on Linux systems (GNOME, GNU, KDE, etc.), Linux newsgroups and mailing lists, software packages (CVS, Freshmeat, Sourceforge, Tucows-Linux, etc.), Office suites (AbiWord, KOffice, OpenOffice, etc.), and how to specify a Terminal make up Appendix B. The last appendix shouldn't be ignored or overlooked: Keeping the System Up-To-Date. This section describes yum, Apt and BitTorrent. Kudos to the author for reminding readers to maintain their systems and providing good instructions on how to do so.

A Glossary of terms and the Index conclude the book.

The layout of the book is well designed: the typography is comfortable to read and, although physically hefty, the dimensions of the book give the reader a nicely balanced paperback. Nothing fancy but excellent quality and eminently readable with delineated examples and good font choices.

Every chapter begins with a brief introduction and ends with a chapter summary, exercises, and advanced exercises where appropriate. The exercises are a highlight of the book: Sobell has obviously given these a lot of thought and they are exemplary of the chapter topics that they reference. Answers to even numbered problems can be found at the author's Web site.

Overall, it's hard to find anything to complain about here that wouldn't sound inconsequential and trifling. No mistake, this is a big book: Part V alone (command reference) is a volume in itself. But I can't see anything extraneous or non-essential here. The author combines all the important features and tools together with the appropriate and necessary references.

Sobell has compiled an extensive volume that both newcomers to Linux and experienced users will find extremely useful. Once in hand, A Practical Guide to Linux Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming becomes not only a complete tutorial but also an invaluable resource that will be referenced time and again. This is as close to a textbook as you can get without being tormented by dry sterile language; Mark G. Sobell clearly has a command of his subject and he exudes a passion that infuses his writing and clearly elevates this book above any mere manual. This will become a standard and as such, a "must have" for anyone serious about learning command line scripting.

You can purchase A Practical Guide to Linux Commands, Editors, and Shell Programming from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

WeebMac writes "IGN has a new career-themed section and one of their first stories is about the earning potential available to those who make their careers in the gaming industry. From TFA, 'Beginning programmers, whether you're working on tools, gameplay, networking, audio, AI, or animation, you can expect to start off with a salary in the area of $60K with the potential for more in the way of sales-based royalties or bonuses or stock options depending on the particular company you've been hired by."

breadiu writes " Satellite imagery of New Orleans taken on Wednesday, August 31st is now available on Google Maps. Enter 'New Orleans' in the search field at the top of the page, or drag and zoom the map to the area. A red 'Katrina' button will appear at the top right of the map, next to the existing map buttons. Older images for the area are still available too - click the "Satellite" button to switch to those."