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Stories · 615
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Note Taking Devices for Students?
Gavin Scott asks: "I'm looking for solutions for a college student who needs an inexpensive mechanism for note taking in class. She suffers from a condition that makes writing notes out by hand slow and painful. One of the small sexy sub-notebook computers would be ideal, but at $1,500-$2,500 these are completely out of reach budget-wise. She has a perfectly good desktop system at home, so something that simply allowed typing in notes that could then be transferred to the PC would be ideal. I've considered things like a Palm-type device with an external keyboard, but I'm interested in knowing what other options people might suggest. Or any opinions on what kind of lightweight almost-laptop devices are good in, say, the sub-$500 range?"
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Alien Hominid Breaks New Grounds In Console 2D
Thanks to GameSpot for its first look at GameCube/PS2 side-scrolling 2D shooter Alien Hominid, an interesting-looking title that had its genesis after "a rough prototype for the game was uploaded in 2002" to the Newgrounds Flash movie/game website. The article notes: "The core [game] mechanics are clearly inspired by classic 2D shooters such as Contra and Metal Slug. However, while Alien Hominid has obviously been influenced by those games, it doesn't end up being derivative", and concludes of the The Behemoth-developed, American-created title, due out this October: "The straightforward, accessible gameplay found in the various game modes is rock solid and a blast to play. The multiplayer modes are an awesome addition to the mix, and the level editor in the PDA [sub-game] is icing on the cake."
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World War II Online Reloaded - Can MMOs Be Rehabilitated?
Thanks to FiringSquad for its article revisiting the state of PC MMO World War II Online, as the writer asks: "Three years ago I uninstalled World War II Online and lamented a good idea gone bad. Now I can barely force myself to write this article for fear of losing Maastricht to a British counter-offensive." With FiringSquad's original review stating "the vast majority of you will simply feel cheated", things seem to have changed, from the same reviewer's perspective: "Somewhere along the way, World War II Online got good. The game isn't so much better than it used to be because the graphics got some sprucing up or because of new weapons. It happened in the community." Can a keen, well-organized community and post-launch patching rehabilitate an MMO, or will a sub-optimal launch doom it?
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SpaceshipOne's Control Problem Fixed
Baldrson writes "Wired News reports that Rutan's team says they have gotten to the bottom of the June 21 flight anomalies that affected the first SpaceShipOne sub-orbital flight: 1) A control surface actuator had run against a stop limiting its movement, and 2) Wind shear caused the 90-degree roll shortly after rocket ignition. Rutan also said with the problems now identified, the next time SpaceShipOne flies, it will be to win the prize."
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Are IT Certifications Meaningless?
superflippy writes "In his article Hiding Behind Certification, MIT's Michael Schrage argues that CIOs who rely too heavily on certifications as a measure of an employee or sub-contractor's abilities are wasting their companies' money."
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Orac^3 -- Not Your Everyday Casemod
jmke writes "G-nome has finished his amazing Orac case mod, which looks absolutely stunning." An excerpt from the site: "Ever since I saw the first series of Blakes 7 I have wanted my own Orac. For those that don't know, Blakes 7 was a late 70s/early 80s British Science Fiction series and Orac was this intellectually snobbish, difficult and incredibly brilliant computer, hand built by an eccentric scientist. The special effects were straight out of 60's Star Trek and a lot of the props were converted from (or later converted to) props from other classic BBC series such as Doctor Who and The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (where the Bambleweeny 57 sub-meson brain looks like it was made by the same bloke!)."
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Tribes 1 And Tribes 2 Free Downloads Available
James Cho writes "Starsiege: TRIBES (typically known as "Tribes 1") and Tribes 2 for the PC have been released for free download via FilePlanet by Vivendi Universal Games [also try the Tribes 2 BitTorrent link]. The two games stand as pioneers of the outdoor combat sub-genre of first person shooters and of all multiplayer games, influencing Halo and UT2004 among other games. Tribes 1 was the first multiplayer-only shooter, whereas Tribes 2 extended the core unique elements of its predecessor to a greater scale and depth. With this [previously mentioned on Slashdot] free release, VUG is stirring up anticipation for the release of the third Tribes game, Tribes: Vengeance." You'll need to enter a form to get a CD key to play Tribes 2 online.
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XCor Receives Sub-Orbital Launch Permit
Marc Newman writes "MSNBC is reporting that XCor has received the second FAA suborbital launch permit. Xcor Aerospace is not competing in the X-Prize but rather is 'in it to make money'. They are still awaiting a launch permit for their Mojave desert launch site. It'd be interesting if XCor beat Scaled Composites with the first sub-orbital flight but couldn't claim the $10 million prize."
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FAA Grants Sub-Orbital License to SpaceShipOne
abucior writes "The FAA announced today that Scaled Composites has been granted a launch licence for a series of sub-orbital flights over a one-year period for Burt Rutan's SpaceShipOne. Is X Prize finally entering the end-game? Space.com has more information on the move."
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Giant Sub-Woofer
PuceBaboon sent us linkage to an amusing story about building a gigantic custom sub woofer. I was about to yawn until I looked at the pictures of them excavating a 60 cubic meter hole, and laying bricks. This one might be a little outside the realm of reasonable, but it's damn impressive.
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Sub-atomic Particles Used To Map Pyramid
firegate writes "Yahoo News is reporting on a pyramid-mapping project focusing on an ancient Aztec site in Teotihuacan, Mexico. Scientists are attempting to map an ancient pyramid by detecting muons - sub-atomic particles which are left as remnants of ancient cosmic rays. A similar method was used to scan Egypt's Khephren Pyramid in the 1960's."
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Appleseed World Preview Minireview
darrellberry writes "We went to see the World Sneak Preview of Masamune Shirow's Appleseed at the ICA tonight. Complimentary sake and sushi, a loving but silly flipchart presentation from the producer about the politics of the world in which it is set, then the film. The animation is amazing the rendering of the city of Olympus is beautiful, the battle set-pieces are fluid and very well choreographed, and the fine line betwen genre conventions and attempts at hyper-realism is treated with respect. Although the first few minutes owe too much to The Matrix-meets-Avalon, and in parts (to my eye) the human characters suffer somewhat from traditional anime styling, Appleseed is something genuinely new in animation. Detail everywhere, lovingly rendered. Way too much exposition, in the style of some Russian epic from the 60s, and music supervision that was entirely wrong: it was nice to see Basement Jaxx turning up for the premiere, but their music and that of Oakenfold and the rest on the soundtrack made no sense thematically or emotionally. I can see that they are going for a big international release with Appleseed, but the music is just wrong. On the plus side, the motion capture-based character animation is very convincing, and the Mobile Fortresses out-scale any other city-stomping weapons platform I can remember. And lovely to see anime at a high frame-rate, not jumping in triples. Go see it at a big cinema with decent Dolby when it's on release next month, or get it on DVD (evidently on release in July) and turn up the sub-woofer." I don't know if we linked to the official site in our last story.
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Carbon From Outer Space Older Than Our Sun
Roland Piquepaille writes "While looking at interplanetary dust particles (IDPs) found in the Earth's stratosphere, researchers from the Washington University in St. Louis have found carbon older than the Solar System. They identified the organic material by its carbon isotopic composition, different from the one of carbon found on Earth. "Our findings are proof that there is presolar organic material coming into the Solar System yet today," said Christine Floss, the leading scientist. "This material has been preserved for more than 4.5 billion years, which is the age of the Solar System. It's amazing that it has survived for so long." This overview contains more details and references. It also contains pictures including the one of a sample's isotopic structure at a sub-micrometer scale."
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New EU IP Law Deemed Harmful
JPMH writes "The Register is reporting on this alert from FFII about a new EU Directive on IP enforcement due to go to the Parliament legal affairs sub-committee on Monday, and full Plenary in two weeks time. The detailed text of the measure was only published on Tuesday. FFII says that without better defined safeguards the Directive will lead to a far more agressive, lawyer-driven legal environment for creative businesses. Having seen how similar legislation is used in the United States, FFII fears that it will provide the perfect means for agressive litigators holding dubious intellectual property rights to "pull a SCO" and use the powers of the Directive to seriously harass and damage small open-source projects and innovative businesses. FFII has a list of MEPs to contact here." The law has been described as a DMCA on steroids. We've reported on this before, but it bears repeating...
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Why Hasn't the DVI Interface Replaced D-Sub?
nic1m asks: "When DVI connectors started appearing on video cards I thought they were a smart replacement for the old D-Sub analog connector because DVI can support both digital and analog displays. With LCDs rapidly gaining market share I would have expected DVI to replace D-Sub by now. Almost the opposite seems to be happening, however. Many video cards still lack DVI, most LCDs still have only an analog input, and motherboard-based graphics never have DVI. Why has DVI been a relative failure in the market?"
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Registering a Locality Based .US Domain?
waffle zero asks: "I've been looking for a simple domain to host personal photos and journals. I gave up on getting a .COM or .NET TLD and started looking into one like firstnamelastname.ny.us. NeuStar manages the .US TLD and sub-domains like los-angeles.ca.us are run by third parties (mostly regional ISPs and universities). My local municipality is a small city so there is no 'delegated zone'. The only ones I have seen frequently are of the form k12.ny.us used by primary schools. I would like to hear users experiences working with locality based domains and what it would take to run one for my area."
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Sub-Zero Squirrels
DesertFalcon writes "There's a Wired article about squirrels in the Arctic whose body temperatures drop below freezing when they hibernate. Scientists have the goal of applying this to humans in the long run. Could this be the answer to problems with long-distance space travel?" We had a previous story on this.
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L.A. County Bans Use Of "Master/Slave" Term
SlashChick writes "In an interesting twist on political correctness, L.A. County has banned the use of the terms 'Master/Slave' (commonly used to denote hard drive arrangements.) According to Snopes.com, 'someone within the County bureaucracy... had taken offense at "master/slave" references and complained to the board.' L.A. County now requires that vendors working with the county remove all 'master/slave' references. Incredible. Read the full story."
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New 'Mystery Meson' Sub-Atomic Particle Discovered
securitas writes "The BBC reports that scientists in Japan have discovered a new sub-atomic particle that defies current theories of matter and energy. The 'mystery meson' X(3872) was revealed while studying beauty quarks at the KEK High Energy Accelerator Research Organization Tsukuba meson factory. 'It weighs about the same as a single atom of helium and exists for only about one billionth of a trillionth of a second before it decays into other longer-lived, more familiar particles.' Scientists say the lifespan 'is nearly an eternity for a sub-atomic particle this heavy' and may require a change in current theory. Possible explanations for this include the particle being comprised of two quarks and two antiquarks, instead of the usual one-one pairing. More explanation and illustrations at KEK."
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Free/Open Cross-Platform SPEC Substitutes?
ErnstKompressor asks: "In light of the endless debate regarding top-dog performance between all flavors of OS/Hardware, the failings inherent in the various methods of testing such diverse systems, and the cost of existing software solutions, I was wondering what the Slashdot community recommends in the way of free, open-source, cross-platform, performance evaluation software. Additionally, how should one go about testing systems to obtain the fairest results? What compilers are evenly matched amongst different hardware? What balance should one strive for regarding optimizations and platform specific enhancements versus results that represent real-world performance? Finally, should such tests take into account the sub-systems available, such as 3D performance and the various Quake-FPS metrics?"