Slashdot Mirror

TwobyTwo writes "Yesterday, Slashdot posted a piece titled Who Really Invented the Internet?. It quoted a Wall Street Journal article with the same title by Gordon Crovitz. Crovitz makes the claim that government research did not play a key role in driving the invention of the Internet, giving credit instead to Xerox PARC. Unfortunately, Crovitz' article is wrong on many specific points, and he's also wrong in his key conclusion about the government's role. In a wonderful piece in the LA Times Michael Hiltzik corrects the record. Hiltzik, who is the author of an excellent book about PARC called Dealers of Lightning, makes clear that government funded research was indeed the foundation for the Internet's success."

decora writes "Ellen Nakashima of the Washington Post reports that the NSA has just declassified one of the 5 documents NSA whistleblower Thomas Andrews Drake was charged under the Espionage Act for retaining in his basement. The document, which Drake previously faced years in prison for possessing, is essentially a cheerleading memo, complimenting the Trailblazer project team for a great presentation and demo. It stands in stark contrast to numerous other reports that described the NSA IT project as an overbudget, ineffective, billion dollar seven year boondoggle."

ananyo writes "Two investigations into the case of alleged plagiarism by Romania's prime minister, Victor Ponta, have reached opposite conclusions, ramping up the tension in a fierce struggle over political power in Bucharest. As Slashdot has noted before, Ponta stands accused of having copied large sections of his 2003 PhD thesis on the International Criminal Court. ... On 29 June, the Romanian National Council for the Attestation of University Titles (CNATDCU), which is in charge of investigating plagiarism charges in PhD theses according to Romanian law, had concluded that Ponta had copied and pasted 85 pages of his thesis from three books without properly marking the copied sections as quotes. But the committee was dissolved during the course of its meeting by acting education minister Liviu Pop. Meanwhile, concerns are rising in the European Union over what political observers say is a lack of respect in Romania for the fundamental principles of democracy."

tsamsoniw writes "With the release of Windows 8 just around the corner, Microsoft is eager to see its Windows Store well stocked with third-party, Metro-friendly apps. Hoping to get developers on board, the company has announced pricing structure, along with guidance and tools to help developers create trial versions of apps and set up lucrative in-app purchases."

Earlier this month you asked Principal Scientist at the BAE Systems Advanced Technology Centre, Dr. Ramsey Faragher, about his NAVSOP navigation system and the future of positioning systems in general. Below you'll find his answers. Automation?
by eldavojohn
How much of this can be done automatically and how much of this must be hand guided? For example you talked about [slashdot.org] fingerprints changing over time and being used only as a guide. Is there a measurement or confidence variable that you can employ to automate when the fingerprint is still valid or has morphed too much? Or is that something that a human overlord must monitor and do research to notice that a new apartment building has just been opened and there are now hundreds of new signals? It feels like you are using an open domain that could have outliers and irregularities that require a human to clean the data before it can be trusted to give you low false positives and true negatives. What statistical methods do you use to overcome these sort of real world problems so that your system can be put anywhere and work?

Dr. Faragher: In the outdoor environment, timing measurements are used. In the indoor environment however RSSI is the primary measurement metric. The inside positioning system exploits low cost inertial measurements to provide the initial push around the environment, with a gradual decrease in positioning accuracy over time if no corrections are applied. By monitoring the radio signal fingerprints and magnetic anomalies (and probably more metrics in the future) the system can recognize when it is back in a location it has been in before, and this provides corrections to the system and increases the accuracy. Over time, the inside environment is mapped out automatically as the user moves around, rather than requiring manual surveying. The system runs in a Bayesian framework, specifically DPSLAM (be careful googling that, DP means things other than “Distributed Particle” out in cyberspace!), and so there is a kernel used to score the fingerprints when comparing current measurements with old ones and a particle filter tracking a large set of hypotheses. For more details, see my ION paper. Fingerprints can indeed change over time – people might move a filing cabinet, or suddenly lots of people might all fill a room for an announcement, or someone might accidentally put their car through a wall. This is accounted for in two ways – the fingerprints naturally age over time, so the longer it has been since you have visited a location, the less confidence that is placed in that fingerprint. Secondly, the system is driven by the smartphone-grade inertial measurement set, so if the fingerprints in a given region have changed, the position estimate can still freewheel through that location and provide an estimate to the user, and the old measurements can be replaced by the new ones.

In standard smartphone-based fingerprinting the current measurement set is compared to a huge database and the user is hurled to whatever location has the best fit. So a sudden change in the real fingerprints means you might not find a match, or suddenly be hurled to the wrong place. This can’t happen with indoor NAVSOP, the core inertial sensing set drives the user around, and the radio and magnetic measurements provide corrections when applicable – the effect of a change to fingerprints in a region results in the system freewheeling through that location and replacing the old fingerprints with the new ones.

Privacy
by girlintraining
It would seem that to use this technology, the client would need to have a much larger datastore than with GPS: Whereas only the positions of the GPS satellites need to be known to make a calculation, the dataset here is in the many thousands to millions. In addition to the data required for map storage, it would seem any implimentation of this would require an internet connection to download the data in a geographically-restricted fashion. This opens the door to privacy issues that standalone GPS clients do not have. How do you plan on addressing the privacy issue with your product?

Dr. Faragher: The idea is that you don’t need to rely on an existing database, or a datalink to access it, the system can build up its own understanding of the environment as it learns. It is possible to encrypt this information to prevent a user from accessing, sharing, or reading the content. The system only uses the publically-accessible downlink synchronization information broadcast by all fixed masts to allow normal devices (DAB radios, DVB-T televisions, etc) to synchronise with them and start using them. No data content is gathered by the system, and there is nothing interesting in the data content for radio positioning anyway as by definition is it unpredictable content. NAVSOP relies on transmitters broadcasting repetitive and known structures in their synchronization fields, equivalent to the PRN sequences from GPS satellites. NAVSOP goes looking for these repetitive structures in the radio bands expected to be the downlink bands for the different signal types. Signal content that doesn’t repeat in a predictable fashion (i.e. the data content) is useless and not captured.

What is the range of frequencies?
by Anonymous Coward
Years ago during world war 2, pilots flying at night used dead reckoning, and followed two other signals, one from the north of England, and one from the south of England. One was called cat, and the other mouse. Cat chased mouse. Hyperbolic curves plotted on maps meant that when the signals were a certain distance apart, you were a certain distance from them (and using loop antennas gave a rough direction to each, given that the signal is strongest when the antenna is orthogonal to the EM radiation). It eventually became LORAN. HF radio direction finding usually involves "ELEPHANTS CAGES" like Pusher HF-DF Wullenweber "BULLSEYE" antennas, etc. These are very large because of the physics involved. To keep your unit small, how do you get around these challenges? Can you use HF frequencies or are you limited to VHF/UHF? I ask because the range of some of these signals (WIFI) is very small, cell phone signals are likewise less than 20 miles, TV is good for about 50 miles. When you are at sea, on the sea, unless you get backscattering, you don't get any of these (and the frequencies are too high to refract on the ionisphere, ie no 'skip'). HF will refract, but then we are talking about physics and size. An aircraft can get signals from much further, but you would still rely on a lot of dead reckoning over much of the worlds oceans.

Dr. Faragher: World War Two did indeed result in a host of radio positioning technologies, any anyone wishing to learn more about them and about the developments in radar and electronic warfare should read R.V. Jones’ excellent book “Most Secret War”. NAVSOP certainly has its roots in these early technologies. We have exploited signals as low as Long Wave, and looked into the use of VLF signals for very longe range radio navigation, although the accuracy drops off considerably at these wavelengths. The old Russian ALPHA positioning system at around 10 kHz also appears to still be functioning and that provides extensive coverage across more than half of the globe. eLoran operates at 100 kHz and there are some quite compact H-field antennas for those receivers. We have used an active E-field whip antenna for LW and MW (just like the antenna on your car that can pick up AM MW radio). There are useable signals from LEO satellites and airliners when in particularly remote locations. It is also possible to determine the time of arrival of signals from a digital transmitter such as a DVB TV transmitter at much greater distances than it is possible to decode data, due to coherent integration of repetitive timing markers. Consider that GPS signals are transmitted at around 50-100W and are 20,200km away. And thanks to coherent integration and correlation gain, they are useable by the time you pick them up (at around a quadrillionth of a Watt). The same principles can be applied to DAB, DVB, and cellular signals, to permit their utilization at very large distances, given line of sight (and so enough altitude).

spoofing
by demonbug
Following the downing of an American drone in Iran the hypothesis was put forward that the Iranians spoofed the GPS signal and convinced the drone that it wasn't where it thought it was in order to get it to land in Iran (I'm not sure if this was ever confirmed). A recent issue of Aviation Week reported on a group I believe in the U.S. working on the same idea, spoofing the GPS signal in a transparent manner to convince an autonomous vehicle that is was somewhere other than its actual location. Would NAVSOP make it more difficult to accomplish this sort of spoofing?

Dr. Faragher: As NAVSOP learns about the opportunistic signals in the environment, and calibrates them for use, it becomes less dependent on GPS. It reaches a point where it treats GPS with an air of suspicion and is capable of flagging up spoofing. If GPS suggests I am going one way, but DAB, DVB, cellular, MW, etc all suggest I’m going a different way (and suddenly there is much more power in the GPS band than there should be) then it is a strong indicator of GPS spoofing.

When technology changes
by Anonymous Coward
Seems like a great alternative to GPS in most casual situations, or as an addition to it for faster position locks while driving. The question I have is, as technology changes, such as the changing of the cell phone signals to differing frequencies as they increase speed.. ie, 4g, LTE,...etc or OTA TV switching to digital.. Will this still work? Or would people have to replace their "non gps navigation unit" when various signals that this relies on for positioning stop, or change frequencies? We've seen a lot of changes already so we know that things can change very rapidly and perhaps in unexpected directions.

Dr. Faragher: Changing frequencies is not a big deal, as there are already a lot of frequencies to search over all the time anyway, but the appearance of a new synchronization marker (e.g. DVB-T changing to T2) or appearance of a brand new network (e.g. LTE) will be important. It is certainly sensible in this day and age to permit a device like this to be upgradeable via software or firmware tweaks. In principle a device could employ a full “blind search” mode where it searches everywhere for new repetitive structures and creates clean templates of new structures for itself, but the cost of the development and deployment of this piece of code would greatly outweigh its usefulness in the commercial sector, since that bit of code may only need to be run once or twice every ten years. An upgrade over the internet is much more sensible!

Galactic GPS using pulsars
by wisebabo
So I seem to remember a proposal to use pulsars to provide a sort of galactic GPS. (Pulsars, spinning neutron stars, are extremely stable periodic emitters of radio waves at interstellar distances). I think this might be what an earlier poster was referring to for spacecraft navigation, I believe they were used on the famous Pioneer 10 plaque (with the naked humans) to show aliens where we live.

Anyway, what's the accuracy for this (the previous poster mentions several hundred meters over hundreds of kilometers but I don't know if it's the same system)? Is it as good as (terrestrial) GPS? Will it be good enough to use for the upcoming GAIA mission which will map the 3D location of a billion stars in our galaxy?* (The positioning requirements of that mission are borderline insane!). Is there any way to use these celestial beacons as (another) GPS backup or are the signals far too weak (or unstable or blocked by our atmosphere or are in already used radio bands). Sorry about the more than one questions but they're all related. :)

*actually since most (all?) of these pulsars are within our galaxy maybe they are not far enough away to have no apparent motion (in which case they would be hard for GAIA to use as a reference). Are there any extra-galactic sources (Quasars?) that could serve a similar function?

Dr. Faragher: Professor Tony Hewish, Nobel-Prize-winning co-discoverer of the pulsar (and coincidentally my old PhD supervisor’s old PhD supervisor!) proposed the use of pulsars for extra terrestrial navigation over three decades ago, so like terrestrial radio positioning, pulsar navigation is certainly not a new idea. The expected accuracy is around the 10km mark. Pulsar navigation could not be exploited on Earth because radio pulsars require very large antenna arrays for detection (Hewish’s and Bell’s array was the size of two football pitches), and the signals from x-ray pulsars (smaller antennas required) do not penetrate the atmosphere. They are going to stick GAIA at one of the Earth-Sun Lagrange points (L2) and from there the stellar map will be generated using parallax as the observatory orbits the sun with us every year. GAIA will probably be tracked from Earth using Delta-DOR or even just traditional radio ranging to provide positioning relative to Earth with much higher accuracy than pulsar positioning could. Delta-DOR exploits quasars rather than pulsars to provide its differential positioning corrections.

On the fly mapping with environmental data
by mattr
You mentioned earlier the domination of signal strength when indoors. Can you also use patterns in observed environmental data for automated mapping and exploration?

For example a robot exploring a cave or a large indoor structure like a power plant might be able to even use information such as ambient temperature / humidity, echoic nature of surroundings, or patterns in ambient air pressure / acoustic input from machinery or the sound of treads against floor.

Also someone was skeptical about using stars to navigate in the day. However radio telescopes can make observations in the daytime, which seems to be the ultimate sensor for your platform. Would your system work to find landmarks underwater too?

Dr. Faragher: Other metrics could indeed be useful if they can be assumed to be relatively stable over time while varying on a fine spatial scale. Stellar cameras can provide positioning estimates accurate to a few hundred metres today, and still operate in the daytime by exploiting infrared sensing, in fact they can even see through thin cloud in this mode (an example of a modern stellar navigator). Radio sensing of stars requires quite big antennas, although of course when you are listening to static on your FM radio, some of what you are hearing is the cosmic microwave background of the universe!

The same learning principles exploited by NAVSOP have already been exploited in the underwater domain – have a google for bathymetric simultaneous localization and mapping.

Sensor fusion
by Arthur B.
In order to combine all the sources of information, are you relying on a messy approach, something based on many signature machine learning algorithms (think boosting, SVNs, random forests etc) or are you writing an explicit generative model for the noise and then applying filtering to it, with a particle filter for instance?

Dr. Faragher: We use a mixture of bespoke Bayesian estimators for multipath mitigation, Error State/Unscented/Extended/Gaussian-Mixture-Model-multiple-hypotheses Kalman filters, particle filters, and batch processing methods, depending on the exact application, set of signals, and hardware.

Regulatory approval?
by k(wi)r(kipedia)
Wouldn't this thing require a whole slew of regulatory approvals since you'd be fishing for different types of signals? Or would this involve mere processing of data already available to, say, the smartphone armed with this technology?

Dr. Faragher: The measurements we make are the same performed by a cellphone during the initial stages of registering on a network, or a DAB/DVB receiver starting up and picking up the beginning of message frames to decode data. These synchronization procedures are all freely accessible within the publicly-available specifications documents defining how a receiver for each signal type works. Your cellphone already makes the same main measurements we do, as do your DAB and DVB tuners, we just make more precise measurements and process them within a positioning engine. We don’t access any of the data content (see related previous question).

your best guess on the GPS successor?
by Sem_D_D
Hi, Dr Ramsey! What is your best estimate as to what is the US DOD’s current GPS backup system?

IIRC Obama cut the budget for LORAN around 2010 and till then the system was financed with the explicit explanation and purpose - GPS backup. But no more... I am currently teaching ECDIS systems to mariners and I always emphasize the weaknesses of GPS under jamming. Ever since Selective Availability has been switched off, the jamming topic pops up more and more as a soft spot of the whole process, so I think we are not fooling ourselves that the US would let down such a gaping hole in its systems uncovered...

Dr. Faragher: I’m afraid I can’t speculate on what anyone else might be using within their multisensor navigation systems. Typical sources that everyone in the navigation game knows about are inertial measurements, non-satellite radio aids, visual aiding (inferring velocity and heading changes by tracking the scenery with cameras as you move), stellar cameras, and map matching. It is certainly critical to have redundancy, and multiple aiding sensors with different failure modes. I think for low-value assets a combination of visual aiding and non-GNSS radio sources could provide good GPS backup in many scenarios. I also think gravitational aiding (see first question) is a really exciting area of research and development in this field and maturing the cold atom technology will be a really important development for GPS-denied navigation.

Most Surprising Correction?
by eldavojohn
I'd imagine a lot of positioning calculations involve accounting for or adjusting for known effects or noise. For example, accounting for general relativity in GPS. What is the most surprising correction you've ever come across (even on an exam or done in theory)? Have you ever found yourself saying "I didn't think that could affect the calculations so much."

Dr. Faragher: I would say the most fascinating aspect I have come across is the modern method of accounting for the Earth’s gravitational field properly. In really long distance navigation, such as for submarines or intercontinental aircraft, if you are relying on just inertial measurements then accounting for the Earth’s gravitational field properly can make a huge difference to the performance of the navigation solution. Basically the effect of gravity must be removed from the measurements by using the gyroscopes to determine your orientation relative to the surface of the Earth, then applying a gravity correction to the accelerometer measurements. There are a few issues resulting from this – your estimate of “up” from the gyros carries an error, and your estimate of the exact magnitude and direction of the local gravitational field will also be erroneous. The result is a significant contribution to the increase in error over time suffered by inertial navigation systems. In the last couple of decades people have looked at using gravitational gradiometers and gravimeters to provide a set of measurements directly to an inertial navigation system to take some of the guesswork out of the process of accounting for gravity, with excellent results (look up the work on gravitational INS aiding on the USS Memphis, e.g. http://www.navy.mil/navydata/cno/n87/usw/winter99/waterfront.htm), including the development of a nearly-unbelievable “gravitational sonar” system, using gravity to sense and image the terrain around the submarine. The initial research was performed in the 1990s but there is currently a big push in developing cold atom interferometer inertial navigation systems to provide a big step forward in inertial navigation based on a combined gyro+accelerometer+gravitational sensing technology.

Earlier this month you asked Principal Scientist at the BAE Systems Advanced Technology Centre, Dr. Ramsey Faragher, about his NAVSOP navigation system and the future of positioning systems in general. Below you'll find his answers. Automation?
by eldavojohn
How much of this can be done automatically and how much of this must be hand guided? For example you talked about [slashdot.org] fingerprints changing over time and being used only as a guide. Is there a measurement or confidence variable that you can employ to automate when the fingerprint is still valid or has morphed too much? Or is that something that a human overlord must monitor and do research to notice that a new apartment building has just been opened and there are now hundreds of new signals? It feels like you are using an open domain that could have outliers and irregularities that require a human to clean the data before it can be trusted to give you low false positives and true negatives. What statistical methods do you use to overcome these sort of real world problems so that your system can be put anywhere and work?

Dr. Faragher: In the outdoor environment, timing measurements are used. In the indoor environment however RSSI is the primary measurement metric. The inside positioning system exploits low cost inertial measurements to provide the initial push around the environment, with a gradual decrease in positioning accuracy over time if no corrections are applied. By monitoring the radio signal fingerprints and magnetic anomalies (and probably more metrics in the future) the system can recognize when it is back in a location it has been in before, and this provides corrections to the system and increases the accuracy. Over time, the inside environment is mapped out automatically as the user moves around, rather than requiring manual surveying. The system runs in a Bayesian framework, specifically DPSLAM (be careful googling that, DP means things other than “Distributed Particle” out in cyberspace!), and so there is a kernel used to score the fingerprints when comparing current measurements with old ones and a particle filter tracking a large set of hypotheses. For more details, see my ION paper. Fingerprints can indeed change over time – people might move a filing cabinet, or suddenly lots of people might all fill a room for an announcement, or someone might accidentally put their car through a wall. This is accounted for in two ways – the fingerprints naturally age over time, so the longer it has been since you have visited a location, the less confidence that is placed in that fingerprint. Secondly, the system is driven by the smartphone-grade inertial measurement set, so if the fingerprints in a given region have changed, the position estimate can still freewheel through that location and provide an estimate to the user, and the old measurements can be replaced by the new ones.

In standard smartphone-based fingerprinting the current measurement set is compared to a huge database and the user is hurled to whatever location has the best fit. So a sudden change in the real fingerprints means you might not find a match, or suddenly be hurled to the wrong place. This can’t happen with indoor NAVSOP, the core inertial sensing set drives the user around, and the radio and magnetic measurements provide corrections when applicable – the effect of a change to fingerprints in a region results in the system freewheeling through that location and replacing the old fingerprints with the new ones.

Privacy
by girlintraining
It would seem that to use this technology, the client would need to have a much larger datastore than with GPS: Whereas only the positions of the GPS satellites need to be known to make a calculation, the dataset here is in the many thousands to millions. In addition to the data required for map storage, it would seem any implimentation of this would require an internet connection to download the data in a geographically-restricted fashion. This opens the door to privacy issues that standalone GPS clients do not have. How do you plan on addressing the privacy issue with your product?

Dr. Faragher: The idea is that you don’t need to rely on an existing database, or a datalink to access it, the system can build up its own understanding of the environment as it learns. It is possible to encrypt this information to prevent a user from accessing, sharing, or reading the content. The system only uses the publically-accessible downlink synchronization information broadcast by all fixed masts to allow normal devices (DAB radios, DVB-T televisions, etc) to synchronise with them and start using them. No data content is gathered by the system, and there is nothing interesting in the data content for radio positioning anyway as by definition is it unpredictable content. NAVSOP relies on transmitters broadcasting repetitive and known structures in their synchronization fields, equivalent to the PRN sequences from GPS satellites. NAVSOP goes looking for these repetitive structures in the radio bands expected to be the downlink bands for the different signal types. Signal content that doesn’t repeat in a predictable fashion (i.e. the data content) is useless and not captured.

What is the range of frequencies?
by Anonymous Coward
Years ago during world war 2, pilots flying at night used dead reckoning, and followed two other signals, one from the north of England, and one from the south of England. One was called cat, and the other mouse. Cat chased mouse. Hyperbolic curves plotted on maps meant that when the signals were a certain distance apart, you were a certain distance from them (and using loop antennas gave a rough direction to each, given that the signal is strongest when the antenna is orthogonal to the EM radiation). It eventually became LORAN. HF radio direction finding usually involves "ELEPHANTS CAGES" like Pusher HF-DF Wullenweber "BULLSEYE" antennas, etc. These are very large because of the physics involved. To keep your unit small, how do you get around these challenges? Can you use HF frequencies or are you limited to VHF/UHF? I ask because the range of some of these signals (WIFI) is very small, cell phone signals are likewise less than 20 miles, TV is good for about 50 miles. When you are at sea, on the sea, unless you get backscattering, you don't get any of these (and the frequencies are too high to refract on the ionisphere, ie no 'skip'). HF will refract, but then we are talking about physics and size. An aircraft can get signals from much further, but you would still rely on a lot of dead reckoning over much of the worlds oceans.

Dr. Faragher: World War Two did indeed result in a host of radio positioning technologies, any anyone wishing to learn more about them and about the developments in radar and electronic warfare should read R.V. Jones’ excellent book “Most Secret War”. NAVSOP certainly has its roots in these early technologies. We have exploited signals as low as Long Wave, and looked into the use of VLF signals for very longe range radio navigation, although the accuracy drops off considerably at these wavelengths. The old Russian ALPHA positioning system at around 10 kHz also appears to still be functioning and that provides extensive coverage across more than half of the globe. eLoran operates at 100 kHz and there are some quite compact H-field antennas for those receivers. We have used an active E-field whip antenna for LW and MW (just like the antenna on your car that can pick up AM MW radio). There are useable signals from LEO satellites and airliners when in particularly remote locations. It is also possible to determine the time of arrival of signals from a digital transmitter such as a DVB TV transmitter at much greater distances than it is possible to decode data, due to coherent integration of repetitive timing markers. Consider that GPS signals are transmitted at around 50-100W and are 20,200km away. And thanks to coherent integration and correlation gain, they are useable by the time you pick them up (at around a quadrillionth of a Watt). The same principles can be applied to DAB, DVB, and cellular signals, to permit their utilization at very large distances, given line of sight (and so enough altitude).

spoofing
by demonbug
Following the downing of an American drone in Iran the hypothesis was put forward that the Iranians spoofed the GPS signal and convinced the drone that it wasn't where it thought it was in order to get it to land in Iran (I'm not sure if this was ever confirmed). A recent issue of Aviation Week reported on a group I believe in the U.S. working on the same idea, spoofing the GPS signal in a transparent manner to convince an autonomous vehicle that is was somewhere other than its actual location. Would NAVSOP make it more difficult to accomplish this sort of spoofing?

Dr. Faragher: As NAVSOP learns about the opportunistic signals in the environment, and calibrates them for use, it becomes less dependent on GPS. It reaches a point where it treats GPS with an air of suspicion and is capable of flagging up spoofing. If GPS suggests I am going one way, but DAB, DVB, cellular, MW, etc all suggest I’m going a different way (and suddenly there is much more power in the GPS band than there should be) then it is a strong indicator of GPS spoofing.

When technology changes
by Anonymous Coward
Seems like a great alternative to GPS in most casual situations, or as an addition to it for faster position locks while driving. The question I have is, as technology changes, such as the changing of the cell phone signals to differing frequencies as they increase speed.. ie, 4g, LTE,...etc or OTA TV switching to digital.. Will this still work? Or would people have to replace their "non gps navigation unit" when various signals that this relies on for positioning stop, or change frequencies? We've seen a lot of changes already so we know that things can change very rapidly and perhaps in unexpected directions.

Dr. Faragher: Changing frequencies is not a big deal, as there are already a lot of frequencies to search over all the time anyway, but the appearance of a new synchronization marker (e.g. DVB-T changing to T2) or appearance of a brand new network (e.g. LTE) will be important. It is certainly sensible in this day and age to permit a device like this to be upgradeable via software or firmware tweaks. In principle a device could employ a full “blind search” mode where it searches everywhere for new repetitive structures and creates clean templates of new structures for itself, but the cost of the development and deployment of this piece of code would greatly outweigh its usefulness in the commercial sector, since that bit of code may only need to be run once or twice every ten years. An upgrade over the internet is much more sensible!

Galactic GPS using pulsars
by wisebabo
So I seem to remember a proposal to use pulsars to provide a sort of galactic GPS. (Pulsars, spinning neutron stars, are extremely stable periodic emitters of radio waves at interstellar distances). I think this might be what an earlier poster was referring to for spacecraft navigation, I believe they were used on the famous Pioneer 10 plaque (with the naked humans) to show aliens where we live.

Anyway, what's the accuracy for this (the previous poster mentions several hundred meters over hundreds of kilometers but I don't know if it's the same system)? Is it as good as (terrestrial) GPS? Will it be good enough to use for the upcoming GAIA mission which will map the 3D location of a billion stars in our galaxy?* (The positioning requirements of that mission are borderline insane!). Is there any way to use these celestial beacons as (another) GPS backup or are the signals far too weak (or unstable or blocked by our atmosphere or are in already used radio bands). Sorry about the more than one questions but they're all related. :)

*actually since most (all?) of these pulsars are within our galaxy maybe they are not far enough away to have no apparent motion (in which case they would be hard for GAIA to use as a reference). Are there any extra-galactic sources (Quasars?) that could serve a similar function?

Dr. Faragher: Professor Tony Hewish, Nobel-Prize-winning co-discoverer of the pulsar (and coincidentally my old PhD supervisor’s old PhD supervisor!) proposed the use of pulsars for extra terrestrial navigation over three decades ago, so like terrestrial radio positioning, pulsar navigation is certainly not a new idea. The expected accuracy is around the 10km mark. Pulsar navigation could not be exploited on Earth because radio pulsars require very large antenna arrays for detection (Hewish’s and Bell’s array was the size of two football pitches), and the signals from x-ray pulsars (smaller antennas required) do not penetrate the atmosphere. They are going to stick GAIA at one of the Earth-Sun Lagrange points (L2) and from there the stellar map will be generated using parallax as the observatory orbits the sun with us every year. GAIA will probably be tracked from Earth using Delta-DOR or even just traditional radio ranging to provide positioning relative to Earth with much higher accuracy than pulsar positioning could. Delta-DOR exploits quasars rather than pulsars to provide its differential positioning corrections.

On the fly mapping with environmental data
by mattr
You mentioned earlier the domination of signal strength when indoors. Can you also use patterns in observed environmental data for automated mapping and exploration?

For example a robot exploring a cave or a large indoor structure like a power plant might be able to even use information such as ambient temperature / humidity, echoic nature of surroundings, or patterns in ambient air pressure / acoustic input from machinery or the sound of treads against floor.

Also someone was skeptical about using stars to navigate in the day. However radio telescopes can make observations in the daytime, which seems to be the ultimate sensor for your platform. Would your system work to find landmarks underwater too?

Dr. Faragher: Other metrics could indeed be useful if they can be assumed to be relatively stable over time while varying on a fine spatial scale. Stellar cameras can provide positioning estimates accurate to a few hundred metres today, and still operate in the daytime by exploiting infrared sensing, in fact they can even see through thin cloud in this mode (an example of a modern stellar navigator). Radio sensing of stars requires quite big antennas, although of course when you are listening to static on your FM radio, some of what you are hearing is the cosmic microwave background of the universe!

The same learning principles exploited by NAVSOP have already been exploited in the underwater domain – have a google for bathymetric simultaneous localization and mapping.

Sensor fusion
by Arthur B.
In order to combine all the sources of information, are you relying on a messy approach, something based on many signature machine learning algorithms (think boosting, SVNs, random forests etc) or are you writing an explicit generative model for the noise and then applying filtering to it, with a particle filter for instance?

Dr. Faragher: We use a mixture of bespoke Bayesian estimators for multipath mitigation, Error State/Unscented/Extended/Gaussian-Mixture-Model-multiple-hypotheses Kalman filters, particle filters, and batch processing methods, depending on the exact application, set of signals, and hardware.

Regulatory approval?
by k(wi)r(kipedia)
Wouldn't this thing require a whole slew of regulatory approvals since you'd be fishing for different types of signals? Or would this involve mere processing of data already available to, say, the smartphone armed with this technology?

Dr. Faragher: The measurements we make are the same performed by a cellphone during the initial stages of registering on a network, or a DAB/DVB receiver starting up and picking up the beginning of message frames to decode data. These synchronization procedures are all freely accessible within the publicly-available specifications documents defining how a receiver for each signal type works. Your cellphone already makes the same main measurements we do, as do your DAB and DVB tuners, we just make more precise measurements and process them within a positioning engine. We don’t access any of the data content (see related previous question).

your best guess on the GPS successor?
by Sem_D_D
Hi, Dr Ramsey! What is your best estimate as to what is the US DOD’s current GPS backup system?

IIRC Obama cut the budget for LORAN around 2010 and till then the system was financed with the explicit explanation and purpose - GPS backup. But no more... I am currently teaching ECDIS systems to mariners and I always emphasize the weaknesses of GPS under jamming. Ever since Selective Availability has been switched off, the jamming topic pops up more and more as a soft spot of the whole process, so I think we are not fooling ourselves that the US would let down such a gaping hole in its systems uncovered...

Dr. Faragher: I’m afraid I can’t speculate on what anyone else might be using within their multisensor navigation systems. Typical sources that everyone in the navigation game knows about are inertial measurements, non-satellite radio aids, visual aiding (inferring velocity and heading changes by tracking the scenery with cameras as you move), stellar cameras, and map matching. It is certainly critical to have redundancy, and multiple aiding sensors with different failure modes. I think for low-value assets a combination of visual aiding and non-GNSS radio sources could provide good GPS backup in many scenarios. I also think gravitational aiding (see first question) is a really exciting area of research and development in this field and maturing the cold atom technology will be a really important development for GPS-denied navigation.

Most Surprising Correction?
by eldavojohn
I'd imagine a lot of positioning calculations involve accounting for or adjusting for known effects or noise. For example, accounting for general relativity in GPS. What is the most surprising correction you've ever come across (even on an exam or done in theory)? Have you ever found yourself saying "I didn't think that could affect the calculations so much."

Dr. Faragher: I would say the most fascinating aspect I have come across is the modern method of accounting for the Earth’s gravitational field properly. In really long distance navigation, such as for submarines or intercontinental aircraft, if you are relying on just inertial measurements then accounting for the Earth’s gravitational field properly can make a huge difference to the performance of the navigation solution. Basically the effect of gravity must be removed from the measurements by using the gyroscopes to determine your orientation relative to the surface of the Earth, then applying a gravity correction to the accelerometer measurements. There are a few issues resulting from this – your estimate of “up” from the gyros carries an error, and your estimate of the exact magnitude and direction of the local gravitational field will also be erroneous. The result is a significant contribution to the increase in error over time suffered by inertial navigation systems. In the last couple of decades people have looked at using gravitational gradiometers and gravimeters to provide a set of measurements directly to an inertial navigation system to take some of the guesswork out of the process of accounting for gravity, with excellent results (look up the work on gravitational INS aiding on the USS Memphis, e.g. http://www.navy.mil/navydata/cno/n87/usw/winter99/waterfront.htm), including the development of a nearly-unbelievable “gravitational sonar” system, using gravity to sense and image the terrain around the submarine. The initial research was performed in the 1990s but there is currently a big push in developing cold atom interferometer inertial navigation systems to provide a big step forward in inertial navigation based on a combined gyro+accelerometer+gravitational sensing technology.

theodp writes "In 1999, TIME's cover warned readers to Beware of Pokemon ('For many kids it's now an addiction: cards, video games, toys, a new movie. Is it bad for them?'). But Pokemon wasn't as easily felled as Lehman or Bear Stearns. Thirteen years later, 16-year-old Manoj Sunny has his eye on a Pokemon world title, having earned the chance to travel to The Big Island with 35 fellow Americans for the 2012 Pokemon Video Game World Championships, which will be held Aug. 10-12. Sunny, who also captains his school's chess team, credits his success to a good memory, intuition, daily practice, the use of an online simulator, and a competitive attitude ('I hate losing. Once I lost, I needed to get better.')"

An anonymous reader writes "Last week Russian developer Alexey Borodin hacked Apple's In-App Purchase program for all devices running iOS 3.0 or later, allowing iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch users to circumvent the payment process and essentially steal in-app content. Apple [Friday] announced a temporary fix and that it would patch the holes with the release of iOS 6. While Cupertino was distracted, Borodin came in and pulled off the same scheme on the Mac."

Nerval's Lobster writes with news that U.S. federal agencies are falling behind in their efforts to consolidate government data centers. Current plans call for a savings of $2.4 billion and the closing of over a thousand data centers, but 17 of 24 agencies still haven't provided details on their IT infrastructure and usage. A new report from the Government Accountability Office highlights the problems with this consolidation effort. "Data centers represent a significant cost to the federal government. Electricity to operate federal servers and data centers costs around $450 million a year, according to an EPA estimate cited in the report. Moreover, federal agencies reported limited reuse of data centers, along with server utilization rates dipping as low as 5 percent. The GAO report features agencies claiming several challenges on the way to data-center consolidation. These included accepting cultural change as part of the consolidation; funding the consolidation and identifying the resulting cost savings; operational challenges including procurement and resource constraints; and difficulties in planning a migration strategy."

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.

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.

An anonymous reader writes "It looks like Valve's Linux team that's still growing has found much interest in open-source graphics drivers. Intel Linux graphics driver developers and Valve's Linux team were meeting for the past week to look at each other's code, work out performance goals, and collaborate on new features. Ian Romanick of Intel blogs, 'The funny thing is Valve guys say the same thing about drivers. There were a couple times where we felt like they were trying to convince us that open source drivers are a good idea. We had to remind them that they were preaching to the choir. :) Their problem with closed drivers (on all platforms) is that it's such a blackbox that they have to play guess-and-check games. There's no way for them to know how changing a particular setting will affect the performance. If performance gets worse, they have no way to know why. If they can see where time is going in the driver, they can make much more educated guesses.' Perhaps the companies are paying attention to Linus Torvalds' memo to NVIDIA?"

An anonymous reader writes "It looks like Valve's Linux team that's still growing has found much interest in open-source graphics drivers. Intel Linux graphics driver developers and Valve's Linux team were meeting for the past week to look at each other's code, work out performance goals, and collaborate on new features. Ian Romanick of Intel blogs, 'The funny thing is Valve guys say the same thing about drivers. There were a couple times where we felt like they were trying to convince us that open source drivers are a good idea. We had to remind them that they were preaching to the choir. :) Their problem with closed drivers (on all platforms) is that it's such a blackbox that they have to play guess-and-check games. There's no way for them to know how changing a particular setting will affect the performance. If performance gets worse, they have no way to know why. If they can see where time is going in the driver, they can make much more educated guesses.' Perhaps the companies are paying attention to Linus Torvalds' memo to NVIDIA?"

An anonymous reader writes "It looks like Valve's Linux team that's still growing has found much interest in open-source graphics drivers. Intel Linux graphics driver developers and Valve's Linux team were meeting for the past week to look at each other's code, work out performance goals, and collaborate on new features. Ian Romanick of Intel blogs, 'The funny thing is Valve guys say the same thing about drivers. There were a couple times where we felt like they were trying to convince us that open source drivers are a good idea. We had to remind them that they were preaching to the choir. :) Their problem with closed drivers (on all platforms) is that it's such a blackbox that they have to play guess-and-check games. There's no way for them to know how changing a particular setting will affect the performance. If performance gets worse, they have no way to know why. If they can see where time is going in the driver, they can make much more educated guesses.' Perhaps the companies are paying attention to Linus Torvalds' memo to NVIDIA?"

An anonymous reader writes "About 10 days after Viacom pulled 26 channels from DirecTV over a contract dispute, the two companies have finally come to an agreement that should have DirecTV fans in need of their MTV rejoicing. While precise details of the newly agreed upon contract weren't made public, Bloomberg is reporting that the new contract is for 7 years with Viacom set to receive more than $600 million a year from DirecTV. That represents a 20% payment increase from the previous contract and is slightly below the 30% increase, or $1 billion, Viacom was initially pushing for." The disturbing part of this dispute, to me, was how Viacom pulled its shows from the internet in addition to DirecTV. Advertising your side of the story is one thing, but going out of your way to directly frustrate viewers who are interested in your shows seems like bad business.

sunbird writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in San Francisco on behalf of an anonymous petitioner seeking to challenge a National Security Letter (NSL) the petitioner had received. NSLs are issued by law enforcement with neither judicial oversight nor probable cause, and have been discussed on Slashdot before. In response to the lawsuit, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a separate lawsuit against the individual who had received the NSL, requesting that the court order the recipient to comply with the NSL and asking the court to find that the 'failure to comply with a lawfully issued National Security Letter interferes with the United States' vindication of its sovereign interests in law enforcement, counterintelligence, and protecting national security.' Both cases are filed under seal, but heavily-redacted filings are available. The cases remain pending."

sunbird writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in San Francisco on behalf of an anonymous petitioner seeking to challenge a National Security Letter (NSL) the petitioner had received. NSLs are issued by law enforcement with neither judicial oversight nor probable cause, and have been discussed on Slashdot before. In response to the lawsuit, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a separate lawsuit against the individual who had received the NSL, requesting that the court order the recipient to comply with the NSL and asking the court to find that the 'failure to comply with a lawfully issued National Security Letter interferes with the United States' vindication of its sovereign interests in law enforcement, counterintelligence, and protecting national security.' Both cases are filed under seal, but heavily-redacted filings are available. The cases remain pending."

Jeremiah Cornelius writes "Wal-Mart — the retail king of Big Data analytics — will be meeting Mark Zuckerberg for two days in Bentonville, to 'deepen' their relationship with Facebook. The CEO-level strategy summit is intended to bolster the relationship between the world's No. 1 social network and the world's largest retailer. Wal-Mart has been left in the dust online by the behemoth Amazon. An alliance may be poised to challenge this dominance, particularly in light of Amazon's planned foray into same-day delivery nationwide. The companies share James Breyer, who sits on the boards of both Facebook and Wal-Mart. Adding another angle to this, Yahoo's new CEO, Marissa Mayer, was elected to Wal-Mart's board in early June, while she was still at Google. Earlier this month, Facebook and Yahoo settled a patent dispute and announced plans to form another 'strategic alliance' involving advertising and distribution. The implications for online privacy in this series of relationships are uncertain."

Jeremiah Cornelius writes "Wal-Mart — the retail king of Big Data analytics — will be meeting Mark Zuckerberg for two days in Bentonville, to 'deepen' their relationship with Facebook. The CEO-level strategy summit is intended to bolster the relationship between the world's No. 1 social network and the world's largest retailer. Wal-Mart has been left in the dust online by the behemoth Amazon. An alliance may be poised to challenge this dominance, particularly in light of Amazon's planned foray into same-day delivery nationwide. The companies share James Breyer, who sits on the boards of both Facebook and Wal-Mart. Adding another angle to this, Yahoo's new CEO, Marissa Mayer, was elected to Wal-Mart's board in early June, while she was still at Google. Earlier this month, Facebook and Yahoo settled a patent dispute and announced plans to form another 'strategic alliance' involving advertising and distribution. The implications for online privacy in this series of relationships are uncertain."

ananyo writes "In the search for methods of geoengineering to limit global warming, it seems that stimulating the growth of algae in the oceans might be an efficient way of removing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere after all. Despite attracting controversy and a UN moratorium, as well as previous studies suggesting that this approach was ineffective, a recent analysis of an ocean-fertilization experiment eight years ago in the Southern Ocean indicates that encouraging algal blooms to grow can soak up carbon that is then deposited in the deep ocean as the algae die. Each atom of added iron pulled at least 13,000 atoms of carbon out of the atmosphere by encouraging algal growth which, through photosynthesis, captures carbon. The team reports that much of the captured carbon was transported to the deep ocean, where it will remain sequestered for centuries — a 'carbon sink' (abstract)."

scibri writes "So now that we've pretty much found the Higgs Boson, what's next? Well: 'There's going to be a huge massacre of theoretical ideas in the next couple of years,' predicts Joe Lykken, a theoretical physicist at Fermilab. The data has shored up the standard model, but technicolor is dead and supersymmetry is starting to look pretty ropey now. Theorists are now poking at the mathematical chinks in the standard theory in the hopes of being the first to find a deeper truth about how the Universe works."

scibri writes "So now that we've pretty much found the Higgs Boson, what's next? Well: 'There's going to be a huge massacre of theoretical ideas in the next couple of years,' predicts Joe Lykken, a theoretical physicist at Fermilab. The data has shored up the standard model, but technicolor is dead and supersymmetry is starting to look pretty ropey now. Theorists are now poking at the mathematical chinks in the standard theory in the hopes of being the first to find a deeper truth about how the Universe works."

HangingChad writes "Microsoft's announcement of a late October release date for Windows 8 was eclipsed by its earnings report, in which the computer giant posted its first-ever quarterly loss since going public in 1986. The loss stems from Microsoft's continued struggles with the online services division."

AbrasiveCat writes "In an update to an earlier Slashdot story, the Portland Oregon man who was arrested after stripping naked at a TSA checkpoint at Portland Airport was acquitted of indecent exposure charges. He successfully argued that he was protesting TSA actions, and his actions were protected speech under the Oregon Constitution."

dstates writes "An industry has grown up around patents guaranteeing exclusive access to testing of mutations in specific genes, but recently the Supreme Court rejected a biotechnology patent saying laws of nature cannot be patented, and threw the issue of patents on genes back to the lower courts. The Court of Appeals is now preparing to hear arguments on whether genes can be patented. The results will have major implications. On the one hand, restricting access to whole regions of the human genome will stifle scientific progress. On the other, companies like Myriad Genetics and Optimal Medicine use the patents to protect years of work invested in research, but this also means preventing other companies from offering diagnostics based on competing faster and lower cost technologies to analyze mutations in these genes."

Last week you asked Joseph Palaia, Chief Operating Officer & Director of research laboratory Earthrise Space, Inc. about living on Mars one day and building moon machines with students. Below you'll find his answers to your inquiries. Can Mars ever hope to be self-sustaining?
by crazyjj
With low air pressure, little in the way of concentrated water/oxygen, no arable soil, cold weather, weak sunlight, and limited natural ores and minerals--can any Martian colony ever be anything other than a constant resource sink for its earth-bound sponsor?

Joseph: Yes a Mars settlement can be self-sustaining. Mars possesses all of the natural resources needed to support agriculture and industry. Mars has also been subjected to the same geological and volcanic processes which have been experienced here on Earth, and these processes concentrate resources. The location for the first Mars settlement will be selected to be in relative proximity to concentrations of a variety of key mineral resources. Early infrastructure sent from Earth will focus heavily on mining, refining and manufacturing tools and equipment which can be used to extract raw resources from the local environment and process these materials into useful products (such a structural materials, air to breath and water to drink). The CO2 Martian atmosphere itself is a resource which can be concentrated and used to support industrial processes, and to produce fuel and oxygen. As for water, there are regions near the Martian equator which contain greater than 50% water ice or hydrated minerals (minerals which contain water bound into their structure). Soil on Mars can be conditioned to be quite good for plants, with the main issue being a lack of organics. Initial agriculture will be hydroponic, but suitable soils can be built up over time through composting of inedible bio matter. Cold temperatures don’t stop humans from living in the far north or south here on Earth, so why would this stop us on Mars? And as for weak sunlight, there is still enough sunlight at the Martian surface to allow for the use of photovoltaics, and nuclear power will supply the rest of what is needed.

The Martian settlement will work over time to first become material self-sufficient (food, water, air, at first low-tech building materials and later higher tech materials) and then eventually will shift focus to working on energy self-sufficiency. But there will be time for this, as the initial nuclear reactors sent from Earth can be designed to last for at least 10 years before requiring refueling.

Other Science Missions
by RapidEye
Knowing that much of the early science experiments and resources on either the Moon or Mars will be dedicated to finding ways to survive the harsh conditions of either location, what do you see being the second tier science being performed from either location (other than the obvious search for life on Mars)?

Joseph: I feel that you are correct, in that a lot of the early science investigations conducted will focus on how to locate and extract indigenous resources. However there are a lot of different science investigations which will be enabled by the fact that you will have astronauts and their tools on-site in these locations. Certainly there is the search for life as you point out, but there is also a wealth of knowledge to be gained regarding comparative planetology. In learning more about how Mars formed and the processes which alter it, we will learn more about the evolution of the solar system in general and may learn lessons which can be applied to improve our understanding of the Earth and its formation.

My personal focus has always been on understanding how we can create infrastructure and grow a settlement on Mars. I am not a scientist per se, and while I appreciate and encourage science investigations, for me personally that is not the reason that we will go to Mars. We will go to Mars for the challenge. We will go to Mars to become the builders of a new world, and through that challenge we will learn and grow as a society just as society has learned and grown from the challenges we have faced and overcome in the past.

Build Subterranean Base
by na1led
Will there be subterranean facilities built, or will the base be all above ground? Seems more logical to use the Moons natural resources to protect the astronauts.

Joseph: For both the moon and for Mars, building underground or building above ground and then covering the facility with regolith (rock and soil) makes a lot of sense. Both Mars and certainly the moon have much higher radiation environments on the surface than Earth. By burying the habitats and other structures you can provide some protection from this radiation. You can also place shielding materials between the structures and the rest of the environment (water or plastics for instance anything which contains a lot of hydrogen).

Re:Build Subterranean Base
by rraylion
Hello, related to this question, and the following question for that matter: With Mars' lack of a magnetosphere and the MARIE experiment failing due to high radiation levels coupled with no ozone layer to absorb UV light, what hope do humans have of using the surface of the planet or introducing flora?

Would it not be more practical to send robots to the Moon and set up infrastructure in an experimental effort to identify problems. Granted the two are VERY different environments, atmosphere, and gravity, but surely the money saved on fuel and communication time would give the Moon a a very strong case to be first settled. I have heard the arguments that rocket fuel can be easily made with late 1800's techniques from the CO2 rich atmosphere. Do those arguments hold any water?

Joseph: You asked a number of questions here. Let me address them one by one.

Your first question seems to concern how do we get plants and people out of the well shielded habitats and onto the surface. Radiation effects can be mitigated sufficiently using shielding technologies built into spacesuits and surface vehicles to permit humans to travel across, explore, and be productive on both the surface of the moon and on Mars. This will especially be true if the time durations spent there are limited. To improve productivity, we can also make use of telerobotics. This would be robots operated in real-time by astronauts working in safety and comfort from within the habitat. One might ask why such robots couldn’t be operated by remote control from Earth well they certainly could be, but remember that there are significant time delays involved, especially between the Earth and Mars. This makes teleoperation very difficult. Operators on the moon or on Mars would not have to deal with this time delay. Regarding how to get plants to survive and thrive on the Martian surface, there have been some recent studies which have shown that there are radiation and lower pressure resistant life which would fare well on Mars. With advancements being made in genetic engineering every day, I have no doubt that this is a solvable problem.

There are certainly a lot of good reasons that we might want to send people to the moon, but unfortunately it would make a poor place for a permanent settlement. While true it is much closer to Earth, thus reducing transportation times as well as time delay to send and receive signals, the moon is lacking in three key resources. These resources, which are absolutely critical for agriculture and industry, and carbon, nitrogen and hydrogen. So any settlement on the moon would be focused on trying to find very very efficient recycling systems to conserve and reuse these resources, and would need to import these materials in order to expand and grow the settlement.

Regarding making rocket fuel with 1800’s technology and the CO2 atmosphere on Mars, that’s absolutely correct. I would encourage you to read The Case For Mars by Robert Zubrin which outlines the technology needed in detail. Dr. Zubrin actually built a working demonstration unit several decades ago when he was working for Martin Marietta.

Protection from space-based radiation
by cje
One of the biggest impediments to long-term settlement of Mars is the fact that it lacks an Earth-like magnetosphere to protect surface dwellers from solar flares/CMEs and other forms of energetic particle radiation. Similarly, the very thin Martian atmosphere provides little of the protection that the Earth has from photon-based radiation (e.g., UV/X-rays, etc.)

How much of a problem is space-based radiation for future Martian settlers, and what would be the best way to deal with it?

Joseph: I’ve already addressed some of this question in my previous responses. In short, we bury or shield the habitats, provide “solar storm” shelters (essentially hollow water tanks) which the settlers can take refuge in for the relatively short duration solar flares / CMEs, incorporate shielding technology into space suits and surface vehicles, and make use of telerobotics where possible.

As for UV, there are numerous UV protectant / blocking coatings which are used here on Earth so this shouldn’t be a problem at all.

Sustainability of the Project?
by NeverVotedBush
In comparing 4Frontiers and Mars One, it looks like there are two competing companies working to establish outposts on Mars and both have similar plans for funding - virtual tourism and monitoring of the participants.

The Apollo program was an ambitious program to land humans on the moon. If you consider that it started with Kennedy's speech in 1962 and ended with Apollo 17 in 1972, it only lasted 10 years but the astronauts could all be brought back to Earth to live out their lives.

Even though civil unrest and budget issues led to the demise of the Apollo program, and no humans have visited the moon since, underneath it all was a very quick loss of interest by the public. The world stopped to watch Neil Armstrong take the first steps on the moon, but by Apollo 17, the US broadcasters had stopped live broadcasts and had resorted to very short updates during the evening news.

Sending humans to mars is for all practical purposes a one-way trip and those humans will need to be supported for the rest of their natural lives. They simply won't be able to create manufacturing facilities essential to be entirely self-sufficient. With the loss of interest in the Apollo program and the presumed inability to bring humans back to earth if either 4Frontiers or Mars One programs/companies cease operations before all of the astronauts have died, what happens to the astronauts or what will be done so that they can live out a full, and to whatever extent possible, enjoyable life on mars?

Joseph: I won’t debate you point for point, because there is simply too much here that I disagree with. I’ll answer you with some general comments:

• 1. 4Frontiers started essentially as a series of research studies where we examined the feasibility of creating a Mars settlement. While our personal ambitions are to pursue this until it happens, I am under no illusion that we have answers to all of the issues which people raise or that we even understand all of the challenges we will face! This is a tremendously large and complex undertaking. We will need to work on this over time.
• 2. One of the biggest challenges, as with many projects, is funding. I encourage the Mars One program to continue its efforts, as I believe we need more people exploring the issues related to creating infrastructure to support humans on Mars but I have not yet examined their information in detail so I don’t know how feasible or well thought out it is. Regarding their funding plan, one thing that I have become convinced of over the past several years is that no single funding strategy will work for creating a Mars settlement. The Mars One approach (reality TV / media coverage) is certainly one possible funding element to consider, but I am not sure how significant it will be compared to other funding pathways. I feel it is just one element of what will need to be a much broader and complex funding strategy.
• 3. I agree that it will not be possible without a great many years of effort for a Mars settlement to become completely self-sufficient. But where I disagree with you is with regards to how much self-sufficiency is necessary. I think you will find that many of the most massive items which will be needed for the settlement (building materials, consumables such as water and gases, etc) are relatively low-tech items to produce. Many high-tech items (computer chips, sensors, etc) are relatively low mass (and so can be imported with only minimal impact on program cost). Another thing to think about here is how many cities here on Earth are completely self-sufficient? Are any? Trade is a necessary part of life here on Earth and I think it will also be a big part of life on Mars (trade between different settlements) and in space (trade between Earth, Mars, the moon, asteroids, and other locations where humans will conduct work and live).

Re:Sustainability of the Project?
by NeverVotedBush
Along these lines, since there are two competing companies with similar funding/support plans, both planning to build and populate outposts on mars, how do you plan to work with the other company in the event either of you run short of funding/support? Would you allow the other colony to take up residence in your colony? What if it would overrun resources available to sustain your colony?

What about the other side of that coin? How would you work with the other colony if 4Frontiers was to see the end of funding and then be unable to support your own colonists?

With two colonies on mars, won't that then become a ratings war as each tries to be more interesting to viewers and not be canceled (or at least keep revenue coming in) by whatever media outlet is supporting your colony/company? How far would colonists be expected to go in order to maintain interest and viewership?

Why not work with the other colony/company from the outset instead of competing? It would seem that competing on such a venture is going to doom one of the colonies. Funding for one is questionable enough. Funding for two and competing for public interest could ultimately doom both, couldn't it?

Joseph: Who said we were competing?

How do we get the energy we need to mars.
by Anonymous Coward
Any human base seems to depend on a long term high energy source, in the case of mars the only viable option is a nuclear reactor. Is there any approximate energy requirement basic mining and extraction will need to consume ?

Are any of the current nuclear powerplant designs able to operate in Mar's gravity, atmosphere, and temperature range. Is this something that should be actively pursued ? Are there any powerplant designs that can be shipped to mar's as a whole piece or will they all have to be shipped in parts ?

Joseph: Thank you so much for asking this question. You are dead-on. A Mars settlement will need an energy rich environment to support a human population, including agriculture and industry. 4Frontiers has completed an initial analysis looking at energy requirements for mining, refining and manufacturing. Let me refer you to the following book chapter which was authored by 4Frontiers personnel which includes that information: Palaia J, Homnick M, Crossman F, Stimpson A, Truett J. (2009) Economics of Energy on Mars. In: Badescu V. Mars: Prospective Energy and Material Resources. New York: Springer. Ch 13 p369-400.

There are existing nuclear reactor designs which would be appropriate for use on Mars, but they are not optimal. This is an area which deserves a lot of attention. This is one of the reasons I studied nuclear engineering at MIT in order to get an understanding of this exact question. We have team members with the appropriate skill sets and experience lined up to work on the challenge of creating an optimized nuclear reactor design, and building and testing that design. What we lack currently is the funding to actively pursue this. But we know this is a high priority item and will pursue it aggressively as funding becomes available.

Why Humans?
by pyzondar
Considering the advances we are making in robotics, what is the justification for having humans in the settlement already in "Phase 1"? It adds a huge overhead to the project; not only in the obvious forms such as food, water, air, radiation protection, space suits, which are all heavy and extremely costly to ship to Mars. But also in the form of safety standards (equipment failure on Mars will likely mean the death of the person operating it). And it also leads to the problem of biosphere contamination.

I think it is very obvious that the scientific ROI is vastly higher for an installation that is strictly electricity driven. Achieving ore extraction and flexible equipment manufacturing so that the base can both replenish itself and expand seems both more economically rational and technologically feasible. And once that is in place, we can get a nice little settlement ready and pre-built for when the first humans arrive.

Joseph: We will certainly send equipment and materials ahead of time, to ensure key assets, equipment, tools and supplies are safely on-site before we commit a human crew. But in terms of setup of equipment or actual operations, it’s largely impossible to do this even taking into account recent advancements in robotics technology. Robots cannot adapt to new situations rapidly the way that humans can. They cannot improvise or innovate on site to overcome challenges which are faced. And robots cannot accomplish nearly as much in a given amount of time as a human on the scene can. For example, all of the geological investigations and exploration conducted by the Mars Exploration Rovers in their several years of operations on the surface of Mars could have been accomplished in one or two days of effort by one or two human field geologists.

I also disagree with you regarding the link between equipment failure and death on Mars. Equipment will be designed to facilitate human troubleshooting and repair. Redundant and backup systems will eliminate single point failures and allow a crew on-site time to evaluate the failure and come up with workable solutions. Certainly humans will be more dependent upon their technology for their very survival than they ever have been before in human history but they will be there to solve problems as they occur, and they will be armed with the knowledge, experience, tools and materials to allow them to tackle whatever challenges they face. Will there be danger and hardships? Yes. But this is no different from how things have been on every frontier in human history.

biome
by girlintraining
To date, all attempts to create a sealed and self-sustaining biome have failed; Maintaining the air quality over long periods of time is presently an unsolved problem. At present, there's no way for your settlement to completely untether from Earth: You will need regular shipments of supplies, if only to maintain the air quality. Supplies which can only be replenished through industrial processes available here. How do you plan on addressing this major problem?

Joseph: Closed-loop life support experiments (such as Biosphere 2 and some work by NASA) have focused on 100% or nearly 100% closure. This is where absolutely everything is recycled and reused. We’re not even going to attempt anything approaching this. It’s not necessary (although obviously the more we trend in this direction, the more efficient our operations become). The needed raw materials are on Mars, we just need to send the equipment, tools, and trained personnel to make use of them. If you run low on oxygen, split some carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and generate some more. If you run into a problem with carbon dioxide buildup in the habitat’s atmosphere (like they did in Biosphere 2) then just vent the entire habitat (or one section at a time) and start fresh. Better yet, build a regenerating scrubber. Need more water? Go mine more. As long as you have people on the scene with tools and equipment, and enough energy (provided by nuclear reactors brought from Earth and backed up by solar and wind), the settlers will survive, and likely thrive, for as long as they care to stay there.

On creating living areas...
by SternisheFan
Concerning building living areas, I remember reading in an old Popular Science an idea of building low cost 'moon-homes', and even space stations, via a machine that would scoop up lunar soil, compact it into cubes which are somehow sealed. Then, taking advantage of the moon's low gravity, the cubes can be 'catapulted' precisely to anywhere on the moon, or space, to be caught and stored until later use and assembly. Have you and your students given this idea any consideration, or would spraying sealant on pre-existing cave floors/walls be more feasible for living quarters?

Joseph: There are a lot of different ideas out there regarding how to build habitats on the moon or on Mars. I’m more familiar with habitat construction on Mars, so that’s what I’ll address here.

As you may realize, due to the low air pressure (about 1% of Earth sea level) any structure constructed on Mars will need to be a pressure vessel of some kind. You need to balance the outward forces exerted by the atmosphere contained within the structure (at a comfortable pressure approaching Earth’s sea level) with equal and opposite forces. If you don’t, your structure will explode. At the same time, it would be nice to have a structure with some inherent structural strength to it, so that should you have to open the structure up to the outside atmosphere (low pressure) it won’t collapse.

A number of studies have looked into masonry structures with some type of soil overburden (soil piled on top to push down and counter the outward forces of the internal air pressure). This will work, but the problem with masonry (brick or block) structures is that they are very labor intensive to build. Construction by robots may allow you to somewhat overcome this limitation.

Some individuals have looked at using natural caves on Mars and applying some type of spray sealant to the inner surface. This may be possible but as I mentioned in a previous answer, we will want to locate the settlement where there are concentrations of resources. Imposing the additional constraint of finding a suitable cave, and verifying the structural integrity of this cave, may be untenable.

The construction techniques looked at most closely by 4Frontiers are welded steel pressure vessels, reinforced concrete poured structures (where pre-stressed steel rebar provides the inward force to keep the structure together against the internal air pressure), and spun fiberglass vessels.

The North Carolina data center that Apple has touted as especially earth-friendly (for having biogas-fueled generators, for one thing) will soon have a smaller companion; Apple is expanding its presence, according to filings reported over at Slash DataCenter, with another 21,000-plus square foot facility at the same site. "Apple also plans to build a hydrogen fuel-cell facility in the area, at least based on other filed permits. That would complement the solar-array installations under construction. Apple has claimed that some 60 percent of the data center facility’s power will be generated onsite. As it stands now, the Maiden facility already incorporates energy-efficient design elements, including real-time energy monitoring and analytics."

The North Carolina data center that Apple has touted as especially earth-friendly (for having biogas-fueled generators, for one thing) will soon have a smaller companion; Apple is expanding its presence, according to filings reported over at Slash DataCenter, with another 21,000-plus square foot facility at the same site. "Apple also plans to build a hydrogen fuel-cell facility in the area, at least based on other filed permits. That would complement the solar-array installations under construction. Apple has claimed that some 60 percent of the data center facility’s power will be generated onsite. As it stands now, the Maiden facility already incorporates energy-efficient design elements, including real-time energy monitoring and analytics."

It seems like less than an hour since Slashdot ran a Report From HOPE: The State of Community Fabrication. Now we have a video about a Massachusetts mother and son team we met at HOPE that had so much trouble with commercial RepRap machines that they designed their own and started marketing it under the name Robison Industries, a company they seem to be starting on the fly that uses their local hackerspace as its manufacturing location. Interested in RepRap? Maybe not yet, but as devotees of the concept point out, nobody outside a small circle of geeks was interested in personal computers at first, but they're ubiquitous today. Will we all have 3D printers on our desks in a few years? Good question. round us up in 2020 or 2025 at our local hackerspace and we may have an answer for you.

For those interesting in further reading, a selection of links mentioned in the video:

• Wildseyes Simple hot end.
• A project to add dual extruders to the RepRap (another attempt, and some general chatter about the idea).
• Automated circuitry manufacturing with the RepRap.
• An inkjet head for the RepRap, made by the RepRap.

Four years ago, there were around ten hackerspaces across America; today, Hackerspaces (Techshops, Makerspaces) are within driving distance of a good chunk of the population. The RepRap can be assembled for a moderate price, and those with a bit more cash to burn can get one preassembled from multiple sources. Makerfaires are held in most major cities, sites like Instructables and Hackaday are thriving, and all things "Maker" are cool. Far McKon was at HOPE 9 giving an update on how far community fabrication has come since his 2008 presentation at the The Last HOPE (mp3 of the talk), what threats lie on the horizon, and where we might find ourselves in another four years.

Update: 09/20 21:02 GMT by U L : There's an audio recording of the talk available.

Much has improved in the last four years. 3D printers for one have gone from being rare and expensive items to something you can build with a reasonable effort, or purchase for a mere arm & leg instead of your first born. The copyleft nature of the 3D printer community and active competition between folks selling them is certainly reminiscent of the early days of commercial Free Software (making things quite exciting).

Hackerspaces have spread like wildfire, encouraging cooperation and granting access to DIY manufacturing tools to the masses without forcing everyone to shell out lots of money.

McKon admits that electronics kits are only a bit more accessible than they were in 2008 — Arduino, Beagleboard, Raspberry Pi, et al are certainly welcome — but we're nowhere near the "building hardware being as easy as software" dream McKon predicted in 2008. He predicts that four years from now will see about as much incremental change; hardware is hard.

On the other hand, Laser cutters haven't really budged in cost (they were around $8000 then, and ... surprise, $8000 now). But, hey, what's your local Hackerspace for? McKon speculated that laser cutters have been produced by entrenched proprietary vendors which have no profit-motive to decrease prices. Entering the market is far more challenging than jumping into a market with open hardware participants, something echoed later in the talk when McKon noted that Open Source ideals more easily infiltrated upcoming industries than entrenched ones generally (where's my Open Source fridge?).

Software for 3D printing still sucks. OpenSCAD is workable but difficult, Blender isn't really suited for the task, and in any case the bar to generating a model that can actually be printed is way too high. During the Q&A someone mentioned that Autodesk was adding features aimed at 3D printing; McKon noted that Open Source design tools were encroaching on Autodesk et al's turf. Proprietary software packages are going to have to improve (great for their users), but Open Source development has distinct advantages that, at least in this area, are leading to ever-accelerating development. Still, he emphasized that the only way Open Source tools would win is if people contributed. So go and contribute, or else.

The Hackerspace community has spread the ideals of Free Culture into device manufacturing. McKon sees two business models: Seed and Feed. In the Feed model, you are a consumer and the device is closed. You can see this in proprietary additive printers where the extrusion material often comes in closed cartridges ala inkjet printers and the manufacturer doesn't release information on controlling the device. The Feed model prevails in the world today.

The Seed model is a mixture of DIY and peer to peer sharing of knowledge. Makerbot Industries might sell you an additive printer, but what you do with it is produce, and everything is out in the open so you can make your own repairs, source your own supplies, etc.

The Internet had the promise of expanding P2P and Seed culture, but has become more about consumption (a theme that proved prevalent at HOPE9). Home manufacturing similarly pushes us toward a producer culture; the change this may bring is not all so rosy.

Four years ago "You wouldn't pirate a car would you?" was an absurd parody of itself; now replicating an army of RPG miniatures isn't really stretching the imagination. This poses a possible threat to the revenue models of some rather profitable businesses; and thus the threat that we may see lobbying from those entities similar to what the RIAA/MPAA have done for the last decade.

The pace of innovation in open hardware might be threatened by patents in the way they have affected software: as the twenty year term seems infinite in the software world, the pace of development in the hardware world seems to have caught up. McKon especially feared a patent arms-race like we've seen with Smartphone companies leading to crippling lawsuits for everyone. Luckily, McKon reports that this certainly has not begun, but notes that a few "hey, we've got these patents and you might be violating them, thought you might want to know" letters have been received by some.

Right now Makerspaces and Maker culture are the hot thing; McKon believes that Maker culture is well on its way to the peak of inflated expectations, and that a crash is inevitable. Some funded hackerspaces may lose funding, some will disappear, device manufacturers will consolidate, etc. But, eventually things will level out to a sustainable Hackerspace population. What that level is remains to be seen, but what is known is that something is brewing.

Four years ago, there were around ten hackerspaces across America; today, Hackerspaces (Techshops, Makerspaces) are within driving distance of a good chunk of the population. The RepRap can be assembled for a moderate price, and those with a bit more cash to burn can get one preassembled from multiple sources. Makerfaires are held in most major cities, sites like Instructables and Hackaday are thriving, and all things "Maker" are cool. Far McKon was at HOPE 9 giving an update on how far community fabrication has come since his 2008 presentation at the The Last HOPE (mp3 of the talk), what threats lie on the horizon, and where we might find ourselves in another four years.

Update: 09/20 21:02 GMT by U L : There's an audio recording of the talk available.

Much has improved in the last four years. 3D printers for one have gone from being rare and expensive items to something you can build with a reasonable effort, or purchase for a mere arm & leg instead of your first born. The copyleft nature of the 3D printer community and active competition between folks selling them is certainly reminiscent of the early days of commercial Free Software (making things quite exciting).

Hackerspaces have spread like wildfire, encouraging cooperation and granting access to DIY manufacturing tools to the masses without forcing everyone to shell out lots of money.

McKon admits that electronics kits are only a bit more accessible than they were in 2008 — Arduino, Beagleboard, Raspberry Pi, et al are certainly welcome — but we're nowhere near the "building hardware being as easy as software" dream McKon predicted in 2008. He predicts that four years from now will see about as much incremental change; hardware is hard.

On the other hand, Laser cutters haven't really budged in cost (they were around $8000 then, and ... surprise, $8000 now). But, hey, what's your local Hackerspace for? McKon speculated that laser cutters have been produced by entrenched proprietary vendors which have no profit-motive to decrease prices. Entering the market is far more challenging than jumping into a market with open hardware participants, something echoed later in the talk when McKon noted that Open Source ideals more easily infiltrated upcoming industries than entrenched ones generally (where's my Open Source fridge?).

Software for 3D printing still sucks. OpenSCAD is workable but difficult, Blender isn't really suited for the task, and in any case the bar to generating a model that can actually be printed is way too high. During the Q&A someone mentioned that Autodesk was adding features aimed at 3D printing; McKon noted that Open Source design tools were encroaching on Autodesk et al's turf. Proprietary software packages are going to have to improve (great for their users), but Open Source development has distinct advantages that, at least in this area, are leading to ever-accelerating development. Still, he emphasized that the only way Open Source tools would win is if people contributed. So go and contribute, or else.

The Hackerspace community has spread the ideals of Free Culture into device manufacturing. McKon sees two business models: Seed and Feed. In the Feed model, you are a consumer and the device is closed. You can see this in proprietary additive printers where the extrusion material often comes in closed cartridges ala inkjet printers and the manufacturer doesn't release information on controlling the device. The Feed model prevails in the world today.

The Seed model is a mixture of DIY and peer to peer sharing of knowledge. Makerbot Industries might sell you an additive printer, but what you do with it is produce, and everything is out in the open so you can make your own repairs, source your own supplies, etc.

The Internet had the promise of expanding P2P and Seed culture, but has become more about consumption (a theme that proved prevalent at HOPE9). Home manufacturing similarly pushes us toward a producer culture; the change this may bring is not all so rosy.

Four years ago "You wouldn't pirate a car would you?" was an absurd parody of itself; now replicating an army of RPG miniatures isn't really stretching the imagination. This poses a possible threat to the revenue models of some rather profitable businesses; and thus the threat that we may see lobbying from those entities similar to what the RIAA/MPAA have done for the last decade.

The pace of innovation in open hardware might be threatened by patents in the way they have affected software: as the twenty year term seems infinite in the software world, the pace of development in the hardware world seems to have caught up. McKon especially feared a patent arms-race like we've seen with Smartphone companies leading to crippling lawsuits for everyone. Luckily, McKon reports that this certainly has not begun, but notes that a few "hey, we've got these patents and you might be violating them, thought you might want to know" letters have been received by some.

Right now Makerspaces and Maker culture are the hot thing; McKon believes that Maker culture is well on its way to the peak of inflated expectations, and that a crash is inevitable. Some funded hackerspaces may lose funding, some will disappear, device manufacturers will consolidate, etc. But, eventually things will level out to a sustainable Hackerspace population. What that level is remains to be seen, but what is known is that something is brewing.

OverTheGeicoE writes "The Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a motion in court yesterday regarding the court's ignored year-old ruling on EPIC vs. DHS. EPIC is asking the court to require DHS to start taking public comment within 60 days or, as an alternative, forbid DHS from using body scanners in primary airport screening altogether. If the court orders the latter, that would give EPIC what it originally sought in its lawsuit. Meanwhile, for what it's worth, the related petition on whitehouse.gov has a little more than half the signatures it needs to get an official 'response.' The signing period ends on August 9."

Hugh Pickens writes "Rebecca Greenfield writes that Google's Nexus tablet with its taped sides and fussy plastic takes effort to open, eliciting what some would call 'wrap rage,' the linguist-approved word for the anger associated with opening a factory sealed product, and as a montage of frustrated Google Nexus 7 owners struggling to open their new tablets' packaging proves there is at least one thing Apple gets that Google does not: boxes. In comparison to the minutes-long process that it takes to get to Google's well-reviewed tablet, opening an iPad takes a simple slide of a cover — a lid that 'comes off easily, but not too easily,' as Random Tech's Anthony Kay puts it. Apple boxes aren't beloved by accident. The company thinks about the way a box informs a product and takes boxing seriously for a reason. 'Not only does the box give people warm and fuzzy associations with the product from the get-go, but also, people form emotional attachments to the actual pieces of cardboard. Instead of tossing them like the trash that they are, people have been known to keep their iBoxes,' writes Greenfield. 'Instead of forgotten in a dump or recycling facility, the boxes sit on shelves serving as a constant reminder of the beauty within.'"

judgecorp writes "The Grum botnet has been finally put out of action by a co-ordinated international effort. After Dutch servers were taken out, the remaining C&C servers in Russia and Panama were removed, with help from ISPs and their upstream providers."

hypnosec writes "The newly unveiled productivity suite from Microsoft, Office 2013, won't be running on older operating systems like Windows XP and Vista it has been revealed. Office 2013 is said to be only compatible with PCs, laptops or tablets that are running on the latest version of Windows i.e. either Windows 7 or not yet released Windows 8. According to a systems requirements page for Microsoft for Office 2013 customer preview, the Office 2010 successor is only compatible with Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows Server 2012. This was confirmed by a Microsoft spokesperson. Further the minimum requirements states that systems need to be equipped with at least a 1 GHz processor and should have 1 GB of RAM for 32-bit systems or 2 GB for 64-bit hardware. The minimum storage space that should be available is 3 GB along with a DirectX 10-compatible graphics card for users wanting hardware acceleration."

An anonymous reader writes "As you probably remember, the Space Shuttle Enterprise was flown on the back of a 747 to New York City where it was then delivered to the USS Intrepid. As sad as it was to see a space shuttle retired (and NASA take a major step down in the space flight abilities) this was one of the most amazingly geektastic events in recent memory. Now the shuttle is on top of the aircraft carrier's flight deck, living in its very own pavilion. As of tomorrow it will go on display as part of the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, but today we got a sneak peek at the shuttle."

Sparrowvsrevolution writes "In an update to a story posted on Slashdot earlier this week, McDonald's has responded to the claims of Steve Mann, a University of Toronto professor and augmented reality pioneer who says McDonald's staff in Paris assaulted him tried to pull off a computer eyepiece he's worn for decades, then threw him out of the restaurant. McDonald's confirms that Mann was ejected from the premises, but denies that there was a 'physical altercation' with staff or that they destroyed any of his property. That last claim is especially dubious, since Mann has posted photos taken from his eyepiece that show McDonald's staff ripping up a doctor's note that he showed them to explain his need to wear the device. The company still hasn't explained why Mann was removed from the restaurant, but Mann has speculated that it has a policy against recording."

hypnosec writes "Apple launched the iOS 6 Beta 3 just a couple of days back, and the redsn0w team has given out a jailbreak for the latest version of iOS 6 already. The only downside is that this is a tethered jailbreak, which means you will have to make sure your phone is connected to the computer whenever you need to reboot it."

Nerval's Lobster writes "In keeping with Microsoft's 'all-in' strategy with regard to the cloud, Office 2013 incorporates a good deal of cloud functionality: SkyDrive is now the default storage selection for documents, for example, and users' work is synced between devices connected to the Web. In conjunction with that, Microsoft is now offering a 'Cloud App Model' that incorporates Web standards, meant for developers interested in building apps that bring functionality into Office and SharePoint. The toolset for building within this 'Cloud App Model' is codenamed 'Napa.' Among the potential uses: developers can build mail apps for Office, which add content and functionality to Outlook items based on activation rules, content apps for Excel, which add content and functionality to Excel documents, and task pane apps for Office, which add functionality to Excel and Word documents in a task pane adjacent to the document."

CowboyNeal writes: "Last week I wrote about the fluid nature of modern game development and how that often impacts both game reviews and purchases. Given the recent announcement of the release of Alien Arena: Reloaded, I decided it warranted a fresh look, to see how the free shooter has aged. Read on for the rest of my review of Alien Arena: Reloaded."

What is Alien Arena?

First released in 2005, Alien Arena is a multiplayer sequel to two older single-player first-person shooters. Since then Alien Arena has had yearly releases which have kept the game updated with new features. The original game was based on the id Tech 2 engine from Quake 2, with many new features added that kept it looking modern. Alien Arena: Reloaded uses the CRX engine, which while still based on id Tech 2, has had several things from id Tech 3 folded into it, as well as other features. On the surface, it's pretty standard arena shooter fare. There's no single-player campaign here, instead the single-player mode has one square off against bots on the same maps one would play in multiplayer, as sort of a practice mode before going online.

Given its Quake ancestry, game play is fast and frenetic. Alien Arena: Reloaded very much feels like a Quake mod when playing it, but looks more like a modern game thanks to its use of improved textures, and added features like rain and water dripping on surfaces.

There's a healthy amount of Alien Arena servers up at any given moment, however there's not very much in the way of a competitive scene. There are still clan tournaments, but there's no tourneys on the scale of Warsow or even QuakeWorld.

Given the free nature of the Alien Arena's code and assets, it's available for most major modern operating systems. There's a handy Windows installer, and it's available for most Unix-like systems through the usual channels, such as MacPorts, various Linux packages, and the FreeBSD ports system.

What sets Alien Arena apart?

Alien Arena has a unique selection of weapons, including the newly-added Mind Eraser, that are designed around its retro sci-fi theme that showcases giant-headed aliens in space suits, robots and other '60s B movie favorites. There's a rocket launcher too, because that's required in the sacred laws of shooters. While movement still felt like Quake 3 to me when I first loaded it up, that was a good thing, as it made me feel at home, and is likely to do the same for long-time shooter players. Alien Arena also adds a dodge functionality, which the id Tech engines didn't have. It's also possible to chain dodges together to enable a "strafejump" sort of movement. While it takes a little practice to get this technique down, it's easily picked up for players who are used to double-jumping in other shooters.

Alien Arena has the standard capture-the-flag and deathmatch modes, including team deathmatch. There's also a Team Core Assault mode which is a control point scenario where a team must disable all of the other team's power nodes before destroying a central spider power node. Alien Arena also adds some new modes that are unique, which are Deathball and Cattle Prod. In Deathball, one scores points by killing opponents as well as finding a ball and shooting it into the goal. In Cattle Prod mode, teams try to guide the cows found in the middle of the map into goals which are located inside the enemy base.

Gameplay

Overall gameplay is a lot like any other Quake-based shooter, and as I mentioned before, it didn't take long for me to feel right at home. The single-player option, while not a full campaign, is designed to let the player jump into action immediately and face off against bots. Lower levels of the bot AI aren't very challenging to allow new players to get acclimated, and higher levels provide a much tougher challenge. It's worth mentioning that Alien Arena: Reloaded has improved the bot AI for capture-the-flag mode, which makes it both easier to practice or to have a bot or two fill in for lopsided teams.

Multiplayer offers more of the same, except with facing off against human opponents. Alien Arena comes with the Galaxy server browser that allows one to create or join servers, and uses an IRC-based chat system to set up games and chat with fellow players.

Conclusions

Alien Arena is a fun game, and its developers should be proud of having crafted such a unique shooter that draws on the best parts of its ancestors. In these days of tactical team-based shooters, it's refreshing to see a run-and-gun style shooter still deliver. However, the community is smaller than other free shooters, and the competitive scene is nearly non-existent. For a game based around online multiplayer, that doesn't really help. Still, I'd say it warrants a play if you enjoyed Quake 3 Arena, or if you like Warsow and are looking for a break with something a little different.

CowboyNeal writes: "Last week I wrote about the fluid nature of modern game development and how that often impacts both game reviews and purchases. Given the recent announcement of the release of Alien Arena: Reloaded, I decided it warranted a fresh look, to see how the free shooter has aged. Read on for the rest of my review of Alien Arena: Reloaded."

What is Alien Arena?

First released in 2005, Alien Arena is a multiplayer sequel to two older single-player first-person shooters. Since then Alien Arena has had yearly releases which have kept the game updated with new features. The original game was based on the id Tech 2 engine from Quake 2, with many new features added that kept it looking modern. Alien Arena: Reloaded uses the CRX engine, which while still based on id Tech 2, has had several things from id Tech 3 folded into it, as well as other features. On the surface, it's pretty standard arena shooter fare. There's no single-player campaign here, instead the single-player mode has one square off against bots on the same maps one would play in multiplayer, as sort of a practice mode before going online.

Given its Quake ancestry, game play is fast and frenetic. Alien Arena: Reloaded very much feels like a Quake mod when playing it, but looks more like a modern game thanks to its use of improved textures, and added features like rain and water dripping on surfaces.

There's a healthy amount of Alien Arena servers up at any given moment, however there's not very much in the way of a competitive scene. There are still clan tournaments, but there's no tourneys on the scale of Warsow or even QuakeWorld.

Given the free nature of the Alien Arena's code and assets, it's available for most major modern operating systems. There's a handy Windows installer, and it's available for most Unix-like systems through the usual channels, such as MacPorts, various Linux packages, and the FreeBSD ports system.

What sets Alien Arena apart?

Alien Arena has a unique selection of weapons, including the newly-added Mind Eraser, that are designed around its retro sci-fi theme that showcases giant-headed aliens in space suits, robots and other '60s B movie favorites. There's a rocket launcher too, because that's required in the sacred laws of shooters. While movement still felt like Quake 3 to me when I first loaded it up, that was a good thing, as it made me feel at home, and is likely to do the same for long-time shooter players. Alien Arena also adds a dodge functionality, which the id Tech engines didn't have. It's also possible to chain dodges together to enable a "strafejump" sort of movement. While it takes a little practice to get this technique down, it's easily picked up for players who are used to double-jumping in other shooters.

Alien Arena has the standard capture-the-flag and deathmatch modes, including team deathmatch. There's also a Team Core Assault mode which is a control point scenario where a team must disable all of the other team's power nodes before destroying a central spider power node. Alien Arena also adds some new modes that are unique, which are Deathball and Cattle Prod. In Deathball, one scores points by killing opponents as well as finding a ball and shooting it into the goal. In Cattle Prod mode, teams try to guide the cows found in the middle of the map into goals which are located inside the enemy base.

Gameplay

Overall gameplay is a lot like any other Quake-based shooter, and as I mentioned before, it didn't take long for me to feel right at home. The single-player option, while not a full campaign, is designed to let the player jump into action immediately and face off against bots. Lower levels of the bot AI aren't very challenging to allow new players to get acclimated, and higher levels provide a much tougher challenge. It's worth mentioning that Alien Arena: Reloaded has improved the bot AI for capture-the-flag mode, which makes it both easier to practice or to have a bot or two fill in for lopsided teams.

Multiplayer offers more of the same, except with facing off against human opponents. Alien Arena comes with the Galaxy server browser that allows one to create or join servers, and uses an IRC-based chat system to set up games and chat with fellow players.

Conclusions

Alien Arena is a fun game, and its developers should be proud of having crafted such a unique shooter that draws on the best parts of its ancestors. In these days of tactical team-based shooters, it's refreshing to see a run-and-gun style shooter still deliver. However, the community is smaller than other free shooters, and the competitive scene is nearly non-existent. For a game based around online multiplayer, that doesn't really help. Still, I'd say it warrants a play if you enjoyed Quake 3 Arena, or if you like Warsow and are looking for a break with something a little different.

ananyo writes "The Norfolk Constabulary has closed its investigation into the November 2009 release of private emails between researchers at the Climatic Research Centre at the University of East Anglia in Norwich after failing to identify those responsible. Despite not being able to prosecute any offenders, the police have confirmed that the data breach 'was the result of a sophisticated and carefully orchestrated attack on the CRU's data files, carried out remotely via the internet.' The investigation has also cleared anyone working at or associated with UEA from involvement in the crime. The hacking resulted in the release of more than 1,000 emails and shook the public's trust in climate science, though independent investigations after the breach cleared the scientists of wrongdoing."

ananyo writes "The Norfolk Constabulary has closed its investigation into the November 2009 release of private emails between researchers at the Climatic Research Centre at the University of East Anglia in Norwich after failing to identify those responsible. Despite not being able to prosecute any offenders, the police have confirmed that the data breach 'was the result of a sophisticated and carefully orchestrated attack on the CRU's data files, carried out remotely via the internet.' The investigation has also cleared anyone working at or associated with UEA from involvement in the crime. The hacking resulted in the release of more than 1,000 emails and shook the public's trust in climate science, though independent investigations after the breach cleared the scientists of wrongdoing."

An anonymous reader writes "TechCrunch reports that Dell will be officially re-entering the Linux laptop market. Beginning this fall, it will sell a 'developer edition' of one of its Ultrabooks that comes pre-loaded with Ubuntu 12.04. Dell first started offering computers with Linux installed in 2007, but they dropped the products in 2010. This spring, a skunkworks effort called Project Sputnik was announced, and now, after the completion of a short beta test, the Ubuntu laptops have been given a green light for commercial sale. Canonical has been working alongside Dell to help make this happen."

An anonymous reader writes "TechCrunch reports that Dell will be officially re-entering the Linux laptop market. Beginning this fall, it will sell a 'developer edition' of one of its Ultrabooks that comes pre-loaded with Ubuntu 12.04. Dell first started offering computers with Linux installed in 2007, but they dropped the products in 2010. This spring, a skunkworks effort called Project Sputnik was announced, and now, after the completion of a short beta test, the Ubuntu laptops have been given a green light for commercial sale. Canonical has been working alongside Dell to help make this happen."

DavidGilbert99 writes "Jolla Mobile's MD, Jussi Hurmola has confirmed that its first smartphone will be backed up by an app store at launch later this year — pointing out that a version of Angry Birds is already available on MeeGo. And really, all you need to make an app store successful is Angry Birds, right?" The interview from which the article is sourced has more information on Jolla's general strategy, including their plans to become "a major player."

zacharye writes with news of some exciting rate changes for folks on ATTWS. From the article: "AT&T on Wednesday announced the upcoming availability of new shared data plans. Following Verizon's lead, AT&T's new plans will allow subscribers to share data between family members and also between devices. Dubbed 'AT&T Mobile Share' plans, the new offerings start at $40 per month plus $45 per device for unlimited voice minutes and messaging and 1GB of data, and top out at $200 plus $30 per device for unlimited voice and texts plus 200GB of data..." My favorite part is where you pay per-device and get nothing in return.

First time accepted submitter Kalriath writes "After calling the United States 'the enemy' at the NetHui conference last week (reported on Slashdot), Judge David Harvey has stepped down from the Dotcom case citing beliefs that the comments could reflect on his impartiality. From the New Zealand Herald: 'An Internet law expert, Judge Harvey had been considered the perfect choice to hear arguments on whether Dotcom and his Megaupload colleagues should be extradited by the United States to face charges of criminal copyright violation. The district court's chief judge Jan-Marie Doogue said Judge Harvey had made the decision to step down from hearing the case. "He recognizes that remarks made in the context of a paper he delivered on copyright law at a recent Internet conference could reflect on his impartiality and that the appropriate response is for him to step down from the case."'"

An anonymous reader writes "Despite weaknesses in the Linux-hostile 'secure boot' mechanism, both Fedora and Ubuntu decided to facilitate it, by essentially adopting two different approaches. Richard Stallman has finally spoken out on this subject. He notes that 'if the user doesn't control the keys, then it's a kind of shackle, and that would be true no matter what system it is.' He says, 'Microsoft demands that ARM computers sold for Windows 8 be set up so that the user cannot change the keys; in other words, turn it into restricted boot.' Stallman adds that 'this is not a security feature. This is abuse of the users. I think it ought to be illegal.'"

An anonymous reader writes "Despite weaknesses in the Linux-hostile 'secure boot' mechanism, both Fedora and Ubuntu decided to facilitate it, by essentially adopting two different approaches. Richard Stallman has finally spoken out on this subject. He notes that 'if the user doesn't control the keys, then it's a kind of shackle, and that would be true no matter what system it is.' He says, 'Microsoft demands that ARM computers sold for Windows 8 be set up so that the user cannot change the keys; in other words, turn it into restricted boot.' Stallman adds that 'this is not a security feature. This is abuse of the users. I think it ought to be illegal.'"