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New features, new fixes: OS X Server’s six-month checkup

It has now been roughly half a year since the release of Mountain Lion . If Apple sticks to its new yearly release cadence for new OS X versions, that means we’re probably about halfway to OS X 10.9. That doesn’t mean the OS has stood still, though—two point updates have since tweaked the operating system’s functionality and stability, and this is even more true of OS X’s buttoned-up cousin, OS X Server . While Windows Server rarely picks up major new features outside of service packs, OS X Server is like the client version of OS X in that it sometimes takes a couple of point updates for its features to stabilize. Since July, we’ve received two point updates for OS X Server, and they’ve changed things around enough that it merits revisiting our original guide and pointing out what has changed. We’ll be focusing on the major user-facing changes here, but for a complete list of everything that has been changed and fixed you may also want to look at the complete release notes for OS X Server 2.1.1 and 2.2 . Read 14 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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New features, new fixes: OS X Server’s six-month checkup

Cheesecake Factory has 3,120 calorie dish

The Center for Science in the Public Interest’s annual list of “food porn”–items that have more calories in them than one might expect–identifies Cheesecake Factory’s Bistro Shrimp Pasta as a particularly bad offender. “It’s like eating three orders of Olive Garden’s Lasagna Classico plus an order of tiramisu for dinner,” CSPI said. Some in the food and beverage industries have dubbed the Washington-based group the “food police”. More than one-third of Americans are obese. One of my first memorable experiences in the U.S. was visiting a Cheesecake Factory, ordering a salad, and receiving 8lb of shredded lettuce suspended in a curiously solid hillock of oil and ranch dressing. Cheesecake Factory pasta on annual list of caloric “food porn” [Reuters]

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Cheesecake Factory has 3,120 calorie dish

Researchers Develop Solid But Flexible Electrolyte For Bendable Batteries

hypnosec writes “Korean scientists have developed a ‘fluid-like’ polymer electrolyte used in lithium-ion batteries that would pave way for flexible batteries and flexible smartphones. The discovery was made by a joint team of researchers that was led by Professor Lee Sang-young of Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology. The new electrolyte, though flexible, is made of solid materials hence making the batteries more stable than the lithium-ion batteries used today.” Paper, but full text is paywalled. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Researchers Develop Solid But Flexible Electrolyte For Bendable Batteries

New York Passes Landmark Gun Law

New submitter mallyn points out that the state of New York has become the first state to pass a new gun control law since the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary last month. “Called the New York Safe Act, the law includes a tougher assault weapons ban that broadens the definition of what constitutes an assault weapon, and limits the capacity of magazines to seven bullets, down from 10. The law also requires background checks of ammunition and gun buyers, even in private sales, imposes tougher penalties for illegal gun use, a one-state check on all firearms purchases, and programs to cut gun violence in high-crime neighborhoods. … New York’s law also aims to keep guns out of the hands of those will mental illness. The law gives judges the power to require those who pose a threat to themselves or others get outpatient care. The law also requires that when a mental health professional determines a gun owner is likely to do harm, the risk must be reported and the gun removed by law enforcement.” Meanwhile, the Obama Administration is expected to propose a new federal assault weapons ban later today. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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New York Passes Landmark Gun Law

Employee Outsourced Programming Job To China, Spent Days Websurfing

New submitter kju writes “The security blog of Verizon has the story of an investigation into unauthorized VPN access from China which led to unexpected findings. Investigators found invoices from a Chinese contractor who had actually done the work of the employee, who spent the day watching cat videos and visiting eBay and Facebook. The man had Fedexed his RSA token to the contractor and paid only about 1/5th of his income for the contracting service. Because he provided clean code on time, he was noted in his performance reviews to be the best programmer in the building. According to the article, the man had similar scams running with other companies.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Employee Outsourced Programming Job To China, Spent Days Websurfing

Is Dell looking to kill PCs with “Project Ophelia”?

Dell’s Project Ophelia: an Android-based thin client that you can put in your pocket for around $50, eventually. Dell Dell is reportedly investigating a move to take the company private in a leveraged buy-out to clear the decks for a radical repositioning of the company. And according to a report from Atlantic Media’s Quartz , that includes relaunching Dell’s desktop and mobile business around a brand-new product: a computing device the size of a thumb-drive that will sell for about $50. Dell announced its pocket client PC, called ” project Ophelia ,” on January 8, and demonstrated it at CES. Developed by Dell’s Wyse unit, Ophelia uses a Mobile High-Definition Link (MHL) to draw power to boot from an HDTV display, or it can be powered off a USB port. It has integrated Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capability for connecting to a keyboard, a mouse, and the network, and it runs the Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean) operating system with all of the functionality of a tablet. It can also be used to power virtual instances of other desktop operating systems on a remote server or in the cloud. In other words, it’s a fusion of Wyse’s thin client technology modeled after the capabilities of a Google Chromebook—except it can be carried in a pocket. The main drawbacks are that few HDTVs currently support MHL—though such support can be found in a number of Dell flat-panel displays. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Is Dell looking to kill PCs with “Project Ophelia”?

New report shows Congress’ favorite BitTorrent downloads

Congress has become gun-shy about putting together Internet-related legislation after the attempt to pass SOPA generated unprecedented public outrage, but Internet piracy is still on its radar. Still, it turns out that digital copies of pirated movies and TV shows aren’t just the subject of committee debates on Capitol Hill—they’re also being downloaded onto Capitol Hill computers. A post today in US News & World Report’s tech blog published new information from anti-piracy forensics company ScanEye , a company that offers BitTorrent monitoring services in the name of fighting piracy. The ScanEye report [ PDF ] shows apparently pirated movie files being downloaded via IP addresses associated with the US House of Representatives. Congressional employees downloaded episodes of Glee , CSI , Dexter , and Home and Away in October and early November. There are more TV episodes downloaded than movies, but the report also shows downloads of films, such as Iron Sky , which was downloaded by a Congress-owned computer on Oct. 4; Life of Pi , downloaded on Oct. 27; and the Dark Knight Rises , downloaded on Oct. 25. Another download listed is Bad Santa 2 , a movie which has not been released yet. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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New report shows Congress’ favorite BitTorrent downloads

Why You’re Totally Justified in Hating Data Caps

Going over your mobile data cap limit costs more than a long distance phone call from a hotel room and for what? Crossing some invisible line in the sand drawn by your carrier? That’s some bullsh*t. Brian Boyko explains exactly why data caps don’t so much protect network infrastructure as generate revenue. [ Blogphilo ] More »

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Why You’re Totally Justified in Hating Data Caps