If you’ve ever messed around with Linux, you’re probably familiar with a little program called ” Wine ,” WINdows Emulator/Wine Is Not an Emulator. With its magic, you can run Windows applications on your Linux box (as well as other operating systems), and soon, Wine could be running them on your Android phone as well . More »
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Full-Fledged Windows Apps Could Be Coming Soon To Your Android Phone
It’s one thing when malware attacks your phone, but it’s another when that same malware hops over to your PC and then uses it to listen in on all your conversations on top of just messing with your phone. A newly discovered Android app—one that’s in the Google Play store— can do just that . Beware. More »
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Terrifying Android Malware Hacks Your PC and then Eavesdrops On You With Its Microphone
An anonymous reader writes in with news of the continuing saga of Java patches and exploits. “If you’re a Mac user who suddenly can’t access websites or run applications that rely on Java, you’re not alone. For the second time in a month, Apple has silently blocked the latest version of Java 7 from running on OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard or higher via its XProtect anti-malware tool. Apple hasn’t issued any official statements advising users of the change or its reasons, but it’s a safe bet that the company has deemed Oracle’s most recent update to Java insecure. That’s why the company stealthily disabled Java on Macs back on Jan. 10, the same day a Java vulnerability was being exploited in the wild.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Apple Angers Mac Users With Silent Shutdown of Java 7
The fastest microchips we have can only pass their data from side to side and front to back, no matter how close their components are squeezed together. A new chip developed by researchers at University of Cambridge, on the other hand, can pass data up and down too, making for the world’s first truly 3D microchip . More »
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Scientists Have Made the First Truly 3D Microchip
ananyo writes “Transistors, the simple switches at the heart of all modern electronics, generally use a tiny voltage to toggle between ‘on’ and ‘off.’ The voltage approach is highly reliable and easy to miniaturize, but has its disadvantages. First, keeping the voltage on requires power, which drives up the energy consumption of the microchip. Second, transistors must be hard-wired into the chips and can’t be reconfigured, which means computers need dedicated circuitry for all their functions. Now, researchers have made a type of transistor that can be switched with magnetism. The device could cut the power consumption of computers, cell phones and other electronics — and allow chips themselves to be ‘reprogrammed” (abstract).” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Magnetic Transistor Could Cut Power Consumption and Make Chips Reprogrammable
gannebraemorr writes “U-T San Diego reports that the city has become ‘the latest in a cadre of California cities turning their backs on red-light cameras — aloof intersection sentries that have prompted $490 tickets to be mailed to 20,000 motorists per year’ there. ‘Mayor Bob Filner announced his decision to take down the city’s 21 cameras at a news conference set at the most prolific intersection for the tickets, North Harbor Drive and West Grape Street, near San Diego International Airport. A crew went to work immediately taking down “photo enforced” signs throughout the city. “Seems to me that such a program can only be justified if there are demonstrable facts that prove that they raise the safety awareness and decrease accidents in our city,” Filner said of the cameras. “The data, in fact, does not really prove it.”‘ I have to say I’m a bit surprised that my city is voluntarily shedding potentially $9.8M in revenue after objectively evaluating a program. I wonder how much a system would cost that could switch my light from green to red if it detected a vehicle approaching from a red-lit direction at dangerous speeds. Can you think of an other alternative uses for these cameras?” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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San Diego Drops Red-Light Cameras
( YouTube link ) A new skit from the Muppets of Sesame Street spoof the TV show Downton Abbey . Steak and kidney pie, anyone? -via Tastefully Offensive
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Upside Downton Abbey
johnsnails writes “Around 60 students at Harvard University have been suspended and others disciplined in a mass cheating scandal at the elite college, the campus newspaper reports. The Harvard Crimson quoted an email from Faculty of Arts and Sciences dean Michael Smith that said more than half of the cases heard by administrators in the scandal, which erupted last year, had resulted in suspension orders. ‘After professor Matthew B. Platt reported suspicious similarities on a handful of take-home exams in his spring course Government 1310: “Introduction to Congress,” the College launched an investigation that eventually expanded to involve almost half of the 279 students enrolled in the course.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Dozens Suspended In Harvard University Cheat Scandal
Oona Räisänen has written a thorough and engrossing article about the noises emitted by dial-up modems while they connect and handshake, and the accompanying graphic (ZOMG HUGE) is nothing short of spectacular. It would make a great full-size poster — maybe a framed art-print. Now the modems must address the problem of echo suppression. When humans talk, only one of them is usually talking while the other one listens. The telephone network exploits this fact and temporarily silences the return channel to suppress any confusing echoes of the talker’s own voice. Modems don’t like this at all, as they can very well talk at the same time (it’s called full-duplex). The answering modem now puts on a special answer tone that will disable any echo suppression circuits on the line. The tone also has periodic “snaps” (180° phase transitions) that aim to disable yet another type of circuit called echo canceller. Now the modems will list their supported modulation modes and try to find one that both know. They also probe the line with test tones to see how it responds to tones of different frequencies, and how much it attenuates the signal. They exchange their test results and decide a speed that is suitable for the line. After this, the modems will go to scrambled data. They put their data through a special scrambling formula before transmission to make its power distribution more even and to make sure there are no patterns that are suboptimal for transfer. They listen to each other sending a series of binary 1’s and adjust their equalizers to optimally shape the incoming signal. The sound of the dialup, pictured ( via JWZ )
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Dial-up handshaking illustrated
These columns are found in Varna, Bulgaria. They’re hollowed out and filled with sand, almost perfectly round, and grouped together. And they’re 100 percent natural formations. Sometimes even prehistory is in on the conspiracy to make us believe that we’ve discovered evidence of alien visitors. More »
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These natural formations look like alien ruins