Category: reader

Windows 10 Gets a Package Manager For the Command Line

aojensen writes: ExtremeTech reports that the most recent build of Windows 10 Technical Preview shows that Windows is finally getting a package manager. The package manager is built for the PowerShell command line based on OneGet. OneGet is a command line utility for PowerShell very similar to classic Linux utilities such as apt-get and yum, which enable administrators and power users comfortable with the command line to install software packages without the need for a graphical installer. ExtremeTech emphasizes that “you can open up PowerShell and use OneGet to install thousands of applications with commands such as Find-Package VLC and Install-Package Firefox.” It’s a missing feature Linux advocates have long used to argue against Windows in terms of automation and scale. The package manage is open to any software repository and is based on the Chocolatey format for defining package repositories.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Windows 10 Gets a Package Manager For the Command Line

Apple explains its busted iOS 8.0.1 update

Sure, Apple’s already fixed that buggy iOS 8.0.1 update that disconnected devices from their networks and just pretty much broke iPhones for a while. It’s even been a month since then, but you still can’t let it go until you get an explanation, huh? Well, friends, this is probably the closest thing you’ll ever get: apparently, there was nothing wrong with the update itself, and it was Apple’s distribution methods or how the update was “wrapped” that broke devices. At Recode’s Code/Mobile conference earlier, Apple product marketing executive Greg “Joz” Joswiak said the issue resulted from “the way the software was being sent over servers, ” though he didn’t go into specifics. He also defended his company, claiming that mistakes are inevitable when you’re pushing software and that Apple always tries to fix them quickly. Since Joz dismissed questions on whether he thinks the company has bigger quality control issues, you’ll just have to speculate about that on your own. Filed under: Cellphones , Tablets , Mobile , Apple Comments Source: Recode

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Apple explains its busted iOS 8.0.1 update

The meticulous process of making a Japanese wooden doll is impressive

I’m not exaggerating the tiniest bit when I say I want to fly to Japan right now and park myself right in front of this man’s hand made wooden doll shop in Japan and just watch him work. Imagine the earnest smell of the woodworking, the sound of the lathe spinning and the beauty of his concentration in making art. Read more…

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The meticulous process of making a Japanese wooden doll is impressive

Chinese artists create counterfeit stock images of artists

Stock Photos are glorious things. Yes, they’re an important tool for sites such as our own, but they’re also, perhaps more often than not, unintentionally hilarious. Services like Thinkstock, Shutterstock and Getty Images have birthed fantastic Tumblrs and Twitter accounts like StockFinds , Completely Unusable Stock Photos , and the somewhat-NSFW Porncomnents . They’re solidly embedded in internet culture, and they’re now also the inspiration behind A Contemporary Portrait of the Internet Artist , a collection of hand-painted copies of stock images of artists created by “underpaid Chinese painters.” The artworks are essentially counterfeits of Getty Images, and in an accompanying press release the team behind the project — the IOCOSE collective — explains the methodology by which they were created will be naturally replicated. “The digital images of the portraits will circulate online, be copied, posted and tweeted by journalists and bloggers. The portraits might be bought and become private property, but also continue being exhibited and photographed.” IOCOSE’s copyright-skirting sourcing of these images, and their intent for them to be replicated, is conceived as a subversive commentary on exploitation, outsourcing, and copyright issues surrounding modern creative industries. You can see the collection below, and if you’re intrigued as to what the originals look like, you can follow the link in each image. Comments Source: IOCOSE

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Chinese artists create counterfeit stock images of artists

DARPA’s Chipset Runs an Astonishing 1 Trillion Cycles Per Second

DARPA’s boffins have just set a new world record in computing with a solid-state integrated circuit that packs the power of a supercomputer into a single chip. You thought your six-core, 3.9 Ghz Mac Pro was a computational powerhouse? This single chip is around 250 times as fast. Read more…

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DARPA’s Chipset Runs an Astonishing 1 Trillion Cycles Per Second

US Post Office Increases Secret Tracking of Mail

HughPickens.com writes: Ron Nixon reports in the NY Times that the United States Postal Service says it approved nearly 50, 000 requests last year from law enforcement agencies and its own internal inspection unit to secretly monitor the mail of Americans for use in criminal and national security investigations, in many cases without adequately describing the reason or having proper written authorization. In addition to raising privacy concerns, the audit questioned the efficiency and accuracy of the Postal Service in handling the requests. The surveillance program, officially called mail covers, is more than a century old, but is still considered a powerful investigative tool. The Postal Service said that from 2001 through 2012, local, state and federal law enforcement agencies made more than 100, 000 requests to monitor the mail of Americans. That would amount to an average of some 8, 000 requests a year — far fewer than the nearly 50, 000 requests in 2013 that the Postal Service reported in the audit (PDF). In Arizona in 2011, Mary Rose Wilcox, a Maricopa County supervisor, discovered that her mail was being monitored by the county’s sheriff, Joe Arpaio. Wilcox had been a frequent critic of Arpaio, objecting to what she considered the targeting of Hispanics in his immigration sweeps. Wilcox sued the county, was awarded nearly $1 million in a settlement in 2011 and received the money this June when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the ruling. Andrew Thomas, the former county attorney, was disbarred for his role in investigations into the business dealings of Ms. Wilcox and other officials and for other unprofessional conduct. “I don’t blame the Postal Service, ” says Wilcox, “but you shouldn’t be able to just use these mail covers to go on a fishing expedition. There needs to be more control.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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US Post Office Increases Secret Tracking of Mail

Thousands of Americans got sub-broadband ISP service, thanks to telcoms shenanigans

Measurement Lab, an open, independent analysis organization devoted to measuring the quality of Internet connections and detecting censorship, technical faults and network neutrality violations, has released a major new report on how ISPs connect to one another, and it’s not pretty. Read the rest

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Thousands of Americans got sub-broadband ISP service, thanks to telcoms shenanigans

MPS-YouTube Is a Terminal-Based Youtube Player and Downloader

Windows/Mac/Linux: YouTube is a bloated site with a lot going on. If you really want to simplify using it, MPS-YouTube is a YouTube player that works entirely in Terminal. Read more…

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MPS-YouTube Is a Terminal-Based Youtube Player and Downloader

Mobile pushes Facebook to even greater heights

…And Facebook’s march towards utter market dominance continues unabated. While Twitter enjoys plenty of success, and we’re sure someone out there still uses Google+ , there’s no denying that the king of the social networking hill is Facebook. And during the third quarter of 2014 the company did nothing but extend that lead . In particular the number of mobile users continued to explode at an impressive rate. The average number of monthly mobile users in September was 1.12 billion. (To put that in perspective: Twitter announced just 284 million monthly users across all platforms.) That’s 29 percent more than last year. Most impressively many of those users check in every day . The average daily number of mobile users during the quarter was 703 million. And when you take the desktop into account, usage balloons to 864 million per day — or about 64 percent of its users. Its no surprise with its continued growth that ad revenue has soared for the company. And that mobile ad dollars made up a majority of its income. A full 64 percent of the money coming into Facebook is from ads, and 66 percent of that ad revenue is from mobile. (You know, just in case you needed any more evidence that the future is on mobile.) While Mark Zuckerberg spoke at length about how important WhatsApp and Oculus are to the future of the company, he declined to go into to much detail during his prepared statements. He did however provide an update on Instagram which has seen its audience grow by as much as 100 percent in certain markets over the last year as it continues its international expansion. The mobile photo-sharing network also has an impressive grip on the attention span of its users. The average member apparently spends 21 minutes per-day browsing the service. The move to bring ads to the platform hasn’t seemed to hurt usage yet. Filed under: Internet , Facebook Comments

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Mobile pushes Facebook to even greater heights

Newspaper outraged after FBI creates fake Seattle Times page to nab suspect

YoungToymaker In 2007, the FBI wrote a fake news story about bomb threats in Thurston County, Washington, and then sent out e-mail links “in the style of the Seattle Times .” The details have now been published by that very same newspaper , which today carries a story including outraged quotes from a Seattle Times editor. The FBI put an Associated Press byline on the fake news story, which was about the bomb threats in Thurston County that they were investigating. “We are outraged that the FBI, with the apparent assistance of the US Attorney’s Office, misappropriated the name of The Seattle Times to secretly install spyware on the computer of a crime suspect,” said Seattle Times  editor Kathy Best. “Not only does that cross a line, it erases it.” Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Newspaper outraged after FBI creates fake Seattle Times page to nab suspect