Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments
Search

News for nerds, stuff that matters

YRO

Slashdot Login

Log In

[ Create a new account ]

Slashdot Poll

Poll What is your favorite time to read /.
While eating breakfast
On my lunch break
During work, my boss doesn't know
During work, my boss doesn't care
After work
Late at night
Whenever CowboyNeal posts a story
[ Results | Polls ]
Comments:52 | Votes:3616
Recent reviews from Slashdot readers:

Submitting a review for consideration is easy; please first read Slashdot's book review guidelines. Updated: 200746 by samzenpus

Older Stuff


Older Articles
Yesterday's News
Cool Sites:
· AnimeFu (Addicted to Anime?)
· Penny Arcade (The First one is always Free)
· Everything (Blow your Mind)
· Themes.freshmeat.net (Make X Perty)

Support Slashdot:
· ThinkGeek (Clothe Yourself in Slashdot)

You are invited to take a drink from the Firehose

Politics: Safemedia's CEO Tells Congress He Can Stop P2P

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wednesday June 06, @03:12PM
from the also-he-invented-the-question-mark dept.
The Internet
palewook writes "Yesterday, Safwat Fahmy appeared in front of the House Science and Technology Committee. During Fahmy's testimony [PDF], he claimed Safemedia's "P2P Disaggregator" technology uses traffic-shaping systems and network-filtering systems that can destroy contaminated P2P networks. And their Clouseau product will make it impossible to send or receive any illegal P2P transmission on any installed network. However, Clouseau allows tunneling and SSH and never opens packets to determine file legality."

Book Reviews: Pro Drupal Development

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday June 06, @02:29PM
from the read-all-about-it dept.
Michael J. Ross writes "If a Web site needs to be developed as quickly as possible, or it needs to support collaborative content, then usually the best approach is to use a content management system (CMS). There are many CMSs from which a Web developer could choose, including Drupal, which is considered by many to be the most powerful, extensible, and logically organized of them all. Installing Drupal and using it to create a simple site, is fairly straightforward, in part due to its relatively excellent documentation. For much of its existence, there has been far less information available on how to extend a Drupal site with one's own modules, themes, blocks, etc. That need is now met by a new book, Pro Drupal Development." Read on for the rest of Michael's review.

Linux: After Ubuntu, Windows Looks Increasingly Bad

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wednesday June 06, @01:46PM
from the put-up-yer-dukes dept.
Windows
mrcgran writes "Sys-Con has a look at some advantages of using Ubuntu over Windows. 'My recent switch to a single-boot Ubuntu setup on my Thinkpad T60 simply floors me on a regular basis. Most recently it's had to do with the experience of maintaining the software. Fresh from a very long Windows 2000 experience and a four-month Windows XP experience along with a long-time Linux sys admin role puts me in a great position to assess Ubuntu. Three prior attempts over the years at using Linux as my daily desktop OS had me primed for failure. Well, Ubuntu takes Linux where I've long hoped it would go — easy to use, reliable, dependable, great applications too but more on that later. It has some elegance to it — bet you never heard that about a Linux desktop before.'"

Your Rights Online: Vista Trademark Holder Sues Microsoft

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wednesday June 06, @01:01PM
from the free-publicity dept.
The Courts
Liam Cromar writes "Philippe Gildas, a French television presenter is suing Microsoft for 'violation of intellectual property' — in particular the use of the 'Vista' trademark. It appears that Gildas registered the trademark two years prior to Microsoft's application, planning to use the trademark for a new television channel, Télé Vista, which was to be launched later this year. Apparently, Gildas believes that Microsoft's 'hogging of the limelight' presents an 'obstacle to the launch'. Gildas has not, however, registered the Vista trademark in categories of activity 9 and 42, which cover software. With this in mind, his case might be hard to prove."

First Peek at Netscape Navigator 9

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday June 06, @12:07PM
from the check-out-them-peepers dept.
Netscape
lisah writes "Netscape released a beta version of Navigator 9 (Linux.com shares corporate overlordship with Slashdot) today that includes several new components while giving some old ones the boot. This release will no longer ship with mail or composer but does have URL correction, a pre-populated RSS feed menu, and a neat clipboard in the browser's sidebar that will hold links to websites you want to visit again but not necessarily bookmark."

Your Rights Online: How Private Are Sites' Membership Lists?

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday June 06, @11:19AM
from the private-enough-most-of-the-time dept.
Privacy
Slashdot contributor Bennett Haselton has written an essay on a subtle privacy issue affecting many websites (including Slashdot!) He says "Suppose your girlfriend called up Match.com and said, "I think my boyfriend might be cheating on me. His e-mail address is joeblow - at - aol - dot - com. Can you tell me if he's a member?" And Match.com phone support told her, "Why, yes, he is a member. You'd better have a talk with him." After you had gotten over the guilt of getting caught -- I mean, the guilt of cheating -- would you not feel like Match.com had violated your privacy by telling a third party that you were a member?" Keep reading to see what he's getting at and to decide if and when it's a problem.

Hardware: Computex and Gigabyte's Slick UMPC, Linux SmartPhone

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday June 06, @10:34AM
from the mail-me-three dept.
Handhelds
MojoKid writes "Computex Taipei is brimming with new technologies as usual this year and the first day of the show has proven to be a Tech Geek's nirvana of sorts. Highlights of the show for the handheld crowed include Gigabyte's slick UMPC, FIC's Linux-based Smart Phone, and Asus' sub-$300 Eee notebook PC shown at an Intel keynote address."

Apple: MacBook Pro Gets Santa Rosa Chipset, LED Screen

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday June 06, @09:46AM
from the well-isn't-that-special dept.
Portables (Apple)
frdmfghtr writes "TechNewsWorld is reporting that Apple has updated the MacBook Pro line with the Santa Rosa chipset from Intel. In addition, Apple is also introducing mercury-free displays with some models. 'When Apple presented new editions of its MacBook line last month, the company excluded the latest Intel Centrino chips, dubbed "Santa Rosa," which had been released just days prior. The chips have found their way into Apple's new high-end MacBook Pro notebooks, which the company revealed Tuesday. Certain models use mercury-free displays, falling in line with the company's recent ecological promises.'"

AT&T CEO Attacks Network Neutrality

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wednesday June 06, @08:59AM
from the does-america-even-understand-why-this-matters dept.
The Internet
Verteiron writes "The former CEO of AT&T, Ed Whitacre, had some interesting remarks to make about Net Neutrality during his parting speech. Choice quotes include his plans for getting anti-neutrality legislation through: "Will Congress let us do it?" Whitacre asks his colleagues. "You bet they will — cuz we don't call it cashin' in. We call it 'deregulation.' " More information on AT&T's attitude problem and a video of the speech are available. There's no sign that his replacement is any better."

Linux: NVIDIA's Andy Ritger On Linux Drivers

Posted by kdawson on Wednesday June 06, @08:14AM
from the straight-dope dept.
Graphics
tykev writes "The Director of Unix Software at NVIDIA talks about Linux drivers, planned features, development cycle, and the open source Nouveau driver. (The interview is in English but all the comments are in Czech.) Quoting: 'NVIDIA's stance is to neither help nor hinder Nouveau. We are committed to supporting Linux through a) an open source 2d "nv" X driver which NVIDIA engineers actively maintain and improve, and b) our fully featured proprietary Linux driver which leverages common code with the other platforms that NVIDIA supports.'"

Developers: Memory Checker Tools For C++?

Posted by kdawson on Wednesday June 06, @05:40AM
from the heaps-and-bounds dept.
Programming
An anonymous reader writes "These newfangled memory-managed languages like Java and C# leave an old C++ dev like me feeling like I am missing the love. Are there any good C++ tools out there that do really good memory validation and heap checking? I have used BoundsChecker but I was looking for something a little faster. For my problem I happen to need something that will work on Windows XP 64. It's a legacy app so I can't just use Boosts' uber nifty shared_ptr. Thanks for any ideas."

Hardware: Inkjet Photo Print Longevity Lacking

Posted by kdawson on Wednesday June 06, @02:42AM
from the ghosts-of-digital-photos-past dept.
Printers
Yet another Anonymous Coward writes to tell us about a piece up at the NYTimes on the (lack of) longevity of photos printed on inkjet printers. As the article's title says, somewhat alarmingly, "It isn't that images fade, it's that they can vanish." The problem is actually more nuanced than this; it's that no-one has a reliable and standardized way of testing inkjet prints for longevity. From the article: "The life of color inkjet prints has also been hindered by the origins of the technology, which was mainly intended for printing things like pie charts, said Nils Miller, a scientist at Hewlett-Packard. 'The initial emphasis was, how do we get bright colors on plain paper," Dr. Miller said. "Permanence was not really on the radar screen yet.'"

Your Rights Online: Microsoft Slaps Its Most Valuable Professional

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 05, @11:47PM
from the schizophrenic-is-one-word-for-it dept.
Microsoft
Violent Offender writes with a touching story in The Register about Microsoft's awarding of its Most Valuable Professional credential to a British hobbyist, Jamie Cansdale, then turning around and threatening him with a lawsuit for the very software that won him the award. The article links to the amazing correspondence from Microsoft on Cansdale's site.

Apple: The Apple II At 30

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 05, @10:23PM
from the hacker's-dream-and-appliance dept.
Technology (Apple)
turnitover sends us to eWEEK for an appreciation of the Apple II on the 30th anniversary of its shipping. An overview of the history of the Apple II puts it in context. A nice tidbit: how important the floppy drive was to sales. The article quotes Sellam Ismail, the proprietor of VintageTech, which maintains archives of computers, documents, and software: "You could think of the Apple II's importance on two levels — the Woz level and the Steve Jobs level." The former refers to its allure to hackers, and the latter to its appliance-like polish, a first for its time, There is also an interview with Woz, who says, "[A]t the start there were no computers in the home — we had to make the word computer compatible with homes."

IT: Red Hat Boosts SELinux With RHEL 5

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 05, @09:01PM
from the reducing-false-alarms dept.
Security
E. Stride writes "Many IT managers find Security Enhanced Linux, or SELinux, to be wildly complex. The mandatory access controls originally developed by the NSA have developed a reputation for being too complicated to deal with, and many IT shops simply turn the feature off. However, Red Hat's Dan Walsh says it's the only way to ensure 100% protection in the data center."

Your Rights Online: RIAA Accused of Extortion & Conspiracy

Posted by Zonk on Tuesday June 05, @07:31PM
from the this-is-new-oh-in-court dept.
The Courts
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "The defendant in a Tampa, Florida, case, UMG v. Del Cid, has filed counterclaims accusing the RIAA record labels of conspiracy and extortion. The counterclaims (pdf) are for Trespass, Computer Fraud and Abuse (18 USC 1030), Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices (Fla. Stat. 501.201), Civil Extortion (CA Penal Code 519 & 523), and Civil Conspiracy involving (a) use of private investigators without license in violation of Fla. Stat. Chapter 493; (b) unauthorized access to a protected computer system, in interstate commerce, for the purpose of obtaining information in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1030 (a)(2)(C); (c) extortion in violation of Ca. Penal Code 519 and 523; and (d) knowingly collecting an unlawful consumer debt, and using abus[ive] means to do so, in violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, 15 U.S.C. 1692a et seq. and Fla. Stat. 559.72 et seq."

Watching My Neighbors Watch On-Demand TV

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 05, @06:11PM
from the video-voyeurs dept.
Television
Josh Levin, Slate Magazine writes "I have a magical box that allows me to watch other people watch TV — their movies, their sports, their cartoons, and their hour-long procedural dramas. And sometimes, usually around 11:30 on Friday nights, their soft-core pornography... I solved the mystery by consulting online message boards. At techie sites like AVS Forum, other voyeurs described their adventures in freeloading. I was intercepting video-on-demand channels through the power of my Samsung's QAM tuner."

Apple: iPhone To Allow 3rd-Party Development

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday June 05, @05:23PM
from the let-us-at-it dept.
Communications
Anarchysoft writes "In an exciting shift from previous statements, Apple CEO Steve Jobs revealed at the D Conference that 3rd-party development will be supported on the iPhone. Questions remain as to whether the opening of the platform, slated for later this year, will be through Dashboard-like widgets or a separate SDK."
<  Yesterday's News  >

All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-2007 SourceForge, Inc.