jobs – Page 419

HP To Package Leap Motion Sensor Into — Not Just With — Some Devices

cylonlover writes “It hasn’t even been released yet but the Leap Motion could already be considered something of a success – at least with PC manufacturers. Following in the footsteps of Asus, who announced in January that it would bundle the 3D motion controller with some of its PCs, the world’s biggest PC manufacturer has joined the gesture control party. But HP has gone one step further, promising to build the Leap Motion technology into some future HP devices.” (See this video for scenes of users scrabbling with their hands in empty air, and get ready for more of it.) Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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HP To Package Leap Motion Sensor Into — Not Just With — Some Devices

Harvard Grid Computing Project Discovers 20k Organic Photovoltaic Molecules

Lucas123 writes “In June, Harvard’s Clean Energy Project plans to release to solar power developers a list of the top 20,000 organic compounds, any one of which could be used to make cheap, printable photovoltaic cells (PVCs). The CEP uses the computing resources of IBM’s World Community Grid for the computational chemistry to find the best molecules for organic photovoltaics culled the list from about 7 million. About 6,000 computers are part of the project at any one time. If successful, the crowdsourcing-style project, which has been crunching data for the past two-plus years, could lead to PVCs that cost about as much as paint to cover a one-meter square wall.” The big thing here is that they’ve discovered a lot of organic molecules that have the potential for 10% or better conversion; roughly equivalent to the current best PV material, and twice as efficient as other available organic PV materials. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Harvard Grid Computing Project Discovers 20k Organic Photovoltaic Molecules

U.S. Offshore Wind Farm Receives $2 Billion From Japanese Banks

kkleiner writes “The Bank of Tokyo has invested $2 billion into Cape Wind, the 130-turbine wind farm that is inching closer to becoming a reality. The project is vying to the first offshore wind farm in the U.S. after a decade-long campaign mired by red tape in order to receive approval. Proposed to be installed in Nantucket Sound, the wind farm is estimated to have a capacity of 468 megawatts.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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U.S. Offshore Wind Farm Receives $2 Billion From Japanese Banks

Construction of World’s Largest Optical Telescope Approved

The University of Hawaii at Hilo has been granted a permit by the Hawaii Board of Land and Natural Resources to begin construction of the $1.3 billion Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT). From the article: “The TMT has been in development for over a decade, but the large amount of land needed for its construction raised concerns over the environmental and cultural impact of such a project. Now, however, the land board has rendered a final decision, saying that the university had satisfied the eight criteria necessary under Hawaiian state law to allow the venture to go forward. The giant TMT will be an optical and infrared telescope with enough coverage area and sharpness to observe light from 13 billion years ago, track extrasolar planets, and observe planets and stars in their early formative years.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Hydrogel Process Creates Transparent Brain For Research

First time accepted submitter jds91md writes “Scientists at Stanford have developed a technique to see the structural detail of actual brains with resolution down to the cellular and axonal/dendritic level. The process called CLARITY allows a ‘transparent’ view of the brain without having to slice or section it in any way. From the article: ‘Even more important, experts say, is that unlike earlier methods for making the tissue of brains and other organs transparent, the new process, called Clarity by its inventors, preserves the biochemistry of the brain so well that researchers can test it over and over again with chemicals that highlight specific structures within a brain and provide clues to its past activity. The researchers say this process may help uncover the physical underpinnings of devastating mental disorders like schizophrenia, autism, post-traumatic stress disorder and others.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Hydrogel Process Creates Transparent Brain For Research

Hackers Swipe Unreleased Game From Ubisoft

hypnosec writes with news that a group of Russian hackers has compromised the security of Ubisoft’s digital distribution platform, uPlay, finding a way for users of the service to download any of its games for free. What makes this particularly notable is that the hackers found a copy of Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, an unreleased spin-off of Far Cry 3 that hasn’t even been officially announced (except as part of an April Fool’s joke. The hackers posted a half-hour of gameplay footage to YouTube, and Ubisoft took uPlay down to fix the security vulnerability. They say no user information was compromised. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Hackers Swipe Unreleased Game From Ubisoft

The Search Engine More Dangerous Than Google

mallyn writes “This is an article about a search engine that is designed to look for devices on the net that are not really intended to be viewed and used by the general public. Devices include pool filters, skating rink cooling system, and other goodies. ‘Shodan runs 24/7 and collects information on about 500 million connected devices and services each month. It’s stunning what can be found with a simple search on Shodan. Countless traffic lights, security cameras, home automation devices and heating systems are connected to the Internet and easy to spot. Shodan searchers have found control systems for a water park, a gas station, a hotel wine cooler and a crematorium. Cybersecurity researchers have even located command and control systems for nuclear power plants and a particle-accelerating cyclotron by using Shodan. … A quick search for “default password” reveals countless printers, servers and system control devices that use “admin” as their user name and “1234” as their password. Many more connected systems require no credentials at all — all you need is a Web browser to connect to them.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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The Search Engine More Dangerous Than Google

Microsoft’s Next Xbox Said To Shift To x86 Architecture Courtesy Of AMD System-On-A-Chip

Microsoft’s next Xbox, which could get an initial unveiling as early as next month , will use an AMD system-on-a-chip according to a new Bloomberg report . The new AMD SoC will mean that Microsoft is moving to an x86-based system architecture, which Sony’s upcoming PlayStation 4 is also adopting. The change is great news for AMD, and for gamers, and bad news for AMD’s chief rival Intel. The new Microsoft console will be running a “Jaguar” CPU, which is also what’s going into Sony’s PS4, alongside a Radeon graphics processor from ATI, an AMD subsidiary. The similarity between the two SoCs employed in each next-gen console should go a long way toward silencing complaints from developers that it’s too difficult and resource-intensive to develop for each type of console. A shared x86 architecture means that it’ll be much easier to port titles, both between consoles and from the PC. For AMD, it means gaining access to a much bigger chunk of the console gaming industry, at a crucial juncture: the desktop and notebook PC market is shrinking, facing increasing encroachment from devices like the iPad, meaning there’s less room to vie with Intel for market share in a space where Intel already clearly dominates. The console industry hasn’t exactly been a shining beacon of growth itself, but with a hardware refresh imminent, AMD is in the best position to capitalize should consumer interest once again be caught by fancy new console devices. The problem with Microsoft’s decision to reportedly change over to AMD is that it will likely render games made for the 360 incompatible with the next-generation platform. But long-term, the decision means it’s much easier for developers to work with, which should translate to an alleviation of financial pressures on game studios that are already facing revenue crunches which are forcing cost-cutting measures. The console exclusive might be more of a rarity, but gamers benefit, and we could also see shorter development cycles leading to more frequent game releases. Another party left out of the fun might be the Wii U, which uses a PowerPC based processor under the hood. But overall this is very good news for gamers, since it could both free up resources for developers to spend on innovation and R&D, and suggests both consoles will behave much more like home entertainment PCs based around the TV.

French Intelligence Agency Forces Removal of Wikipedia Entry

saibot834 writes “The French domestic intelligence agency DCRI has forced a Wikipedia administrator to delete an article about a local military base. The administrator, who is also the president of Wikimédia France, has been threatened by the agency with immediate reprisals after his initial refusal to comply. Following a discussion on the administrator’s noticeboard, the article (which is said to violate a law on the secrecy of the national defense) has been reinstated by a foreign user. Prior to pressuring the admin, DCRI contacted the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF), which refused to remove the article. WMF claimed the article only contained publicly available information, in accordance with Wikipedia’s verifiability policy. While the consequences for Wikimedia’s community remain unclear, one thing is certain: The military base article – now available in English – will get more public awareness than ever before.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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French Intelligence Agency Forces Removal of Wikipedia Entry

AMI Firmware Source Code, Private Key Leaked

Trailrunner7 writes “Source code and a private signing key for firmware manufactured by a popular PC hardware maker American Megatrends Inc. (AMI) have been found on an open FTP server hosted in Taiwan. Researcher Brandan Wilson found the company’s data hosted on an unnamed vendor’s FTP server. Among the vendor’s internal emails, system images, high-resolution PCB images and private Excel spreadsheets was the source code for different versions of AMI firmware, code that was current as of February 2012, along with the private signing key for the Ivy Bridge firmware architecture. AMI builds the AMIBIOS BIOS firmware based on the UEFI specification for PC and server motherboards built by AMI and other manufacturers. The company started out as a motherboard maker, and also built storage controllers and remote management cards found in many Dell and HP computers. ‘The worst case is the creation of a persistent, Trojanized update that would allow remote access to the system at the lowest possible level,’ researcher Adam Caudill said. ‘Another possibility would be the creation of an update that would render the system unbootable, requiring replacement of the mainboard.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ken May

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