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US courts trash a decade’s worth of online documents, shrug it off

US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta. Kevin / flickr The US Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) has deleted nearly a decade’s worth of documents from four US appeals courts and one bankruptcy court. The deletion is part of an upgrade to a new computer system for the database known as Public Access to Court Electronic Records, or PACER. Court dockets and documents at the US Courts of Appeals for the 2nd, 7th, 11th, and Federal Circuits, as well as the Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California, were maintained with “locally developed legacy case management systems,” said AOC spokesperson Karen Redmond in an e-mailed statement . Those five courts aren’t compatible with the new PACER system. Read 12 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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US courts trash a decade’s worth of online documents, shrug it off

Leaked slides show details for next-gen Intel mini-PCs, new CPUs

According to the slides, there will be three new NUC boards spread across give different boxes, all launching in the first half of 2015. FanlessTech We’re generally fans of Intel’s NUC (“Next Unit of Computing”) mini-PCs, which use Ultrabook parts to create reasonably capable desktop PCs that can fit just about anywhere. When last we heard about new Broadwell-based versions of the boxes, they were due to launch in late 2014, but delays of higher-performance Broadwell parts  has apparently pushed them back. New Intel slides from FanlessTech now show seven new NUC boxes launching in the first half of 2015. The slides also tell us what kind of boxes we can expect, though there are no big surprises here; the Broadwell NUC lineup is broadly similar to that of Haswell. There appear to be three boards: one high-end Core i5 model, one middle-end Core i3 model, and one Core i5 model with Intel’s vPro technology integrated to make it more appealing to enterprises. All appear to come in two types of enclosures, one with extra room for a 2.5-inch SATA III hard drive and one without. This makes for a total of six Broadwell NUC boxes. The revised NUC roadmap. FanlessTech All six boxes will share most of the same ports and features: two display outputs, Ethernet, four USB 3.0 ports, NFC, M.2 slots for SSDs, support for up to 16GB of RAM, and changeable lids (these may just be for customization purposes, though past rumors have suggested that some could be used as wireless charging pads). The vPro models will use two mini DisplayPorts while the standard i5 and i3 boxes will use one mini DisplayPort and one micro HDMI port, and all models appear to come with Intel’s 7265 802.11ac and Bluetooth 4.0 adapter soldered on—with current models, you must supply your own mini-PCI Express Wi-Fi card. Read 6 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Leaked slides show details for next-gen Intel mini-PCs, new CPUs

California DMV says Google’s self-driving car must have a steering wheel

Left: Google’s prototype car. Right: the eventual final design. Google Traditionally, Google’s self-driving car prototypes have taken existing cars from manufacturers like Toyota and Lexus and bolted on the self-driving car components. This is less than ideal, since it limits the design possibilities of the car’s “vision” system and includes (eventually) unnecessary components, like a steering wheel and pedals. However, Google recently built a self-driving car of its own design, which had no human control system other than a “go” button. The California DMV has now thrown a speed bump in Google’s car design, though, in the form of  new rules  that require that all self-driving cars allow a driver to take “immediate physical control” if needed. The new law means Google’s self-designed car will need to have a steering wheel and gas and brake pedals any time it hits the public road. According to  The Wall Street Journal , Google will comply with the law by building a “small, temporary steering wheel and pedal system that drivers can use during testing” into the prototype cars. The report says California officials are working on rules for cars without a steering wheel and pedals, but for now, a human control system is mandatory. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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California DMV says Google’s self-driving car must have a steering wheel

Delaware becomes first state to give executors broad digital assets access

Tim Redpath Delaware has become the first state in the US to enact a law that ensures families’ rights to access the digital assets of loved ones during incapacitation or after death. Last week, Gov. Jack Markell signed House Bill (HB) 345,  “Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets and Digital Accounts Act,” which gives heirs and executors the same authority to take legal control of a digital account or device, just as they would take control of a physical asset or document. Earlier this year, the Uniform Law Commission, a non-profit group that lobbies to enact model legislations across all jurisdictions in the United States, adopted its Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (UFADAA) . Delaware is the first state to take the UFADAA and turn it into a bona fide law. Read 14 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Delaware becomes first state to give executors broad digital assets access

Steve Ballmer leaves Microsoft board

Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has announced that he’s stepping down from the company’s board, effective immediately. With his ownership of the LA Clippers , teaching, and “civic contribution” taking his time, Ballmer wrote  that he’s now “very busy,” and with both a new NBA season and new class of students, it would be “impractical” for him to remain on the board. In announcing his departure, Ballmer expressed confidence in new CEO Satya Nadella’s leadership, noting that although there are challenges ahead, there are also great opportunities, and he said that Microsoft’s mix of software, hardware, and cloud skills is unmatched in the industry. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Steve Ballmer leaves Microsoft board

YouTube subscription plan leaks: offline play, no ads, 20 million songs

A handful of the full set of screenshots obtained by Android Police. Android Police More details have leaked about Google’s upcoming subscription service for YouTube, these in the form of screenshots posted by Android Police on Monday. The service, called YouTube Music Key, will give subscribers ad-free and offline playback of YouTube videos, as well as audio-only material. Per the screenshots, users will be able to play music on their mobile phones “with or without video, in the background, or with your screen off”—all things that the single-tasking YouTube apps could not previously do. Subscribers will also be able to play music via “YouTube Mix,” a recently-added feature that works similarly to radio stations on other streaming services. A YouTube Music Key subscription provides access to a 20-million-song catalog, roughly the same size as that of Spotify and Rdio , as well as a collection of material the app refers to as “concerts, covers, and remixes.” While YouTube is rife with content beyond artists’ official discographies, a lot of it of legally questionable provenance, it’s not clear from the screenshots how Google will decide what goes into YouTube Music Key. Subscribers to the service will also be subscribed to “Google Play Music Key” for free, which is likely a rebranded Google Play Music All Access . Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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YouTube subscription plan leaks: offline play, no ads, 20 million songs

Linux-on-the-desktop pioneer Munich now considering a switch back to Windows

The world is still waiting for the year of Linux on the desktop, but in 2003 it looked as if that goal was within reach. Back then, the city of Munich announced plans to switch from Microsoft technology to Linux on 14,000 PCs belonging to the city’s municipal government. While the scheme suffered delays , it was completed in December 2013. There’s only been one small problem: users aren’t happy with the software, and the government isn’t happy with the price. The switch was motivated by a desire to reduce licensing costs and end the city’s dependence on a single company. City of Munich PCs were running Windows NT 4, and the end of support for that operating system meant that it was going to incur significant licensing costs to upgrade. In response, the plan was to migrate to OpenOffice and Debian Linux. Later, the plan was updated to use LibreOffice and Ubuntu. German media are reporting that the city is now considering a switch back to Microsoft in response to these complaints. The city is putting together an independent expert group to look at the problem, and if that group recommends using Microsoft software, Deputy Mayor Josef Schmid of the CSU party says that a switch back isn’t impossible. Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Linux-on-the-desktop pioneer Munich now considering a switch back to Windows

A brief history of USB, what it replaced, and what has failed to replace it

We’ve all had this first-world problem, but USB is still leagues better than what came before. Like all technology, USB has evolved over time. Despite being a “Universal” Serial Bus, in its 18-or-so years on the market it has spawned multiple versions with different connection speeds and many, many types of cables. The USB Implementers Forum , the group of companies that oversees the standard, is fully cognizant of this problem, which it wants to solve with a new type of cable dubbed Type-C . This plug is designed to replace USB Type-A and Type-B ports of all sizes on phones, tablets, computers, and other peripherals. Type-C will support the new, faster USB 3.1 spec with room to grow beyond that as bandwidth increases. It’s possible that in a few years, USB Type-C will have become the norm, totally replacing the tangled nest of different cables that we all have balled up in our desk drawers. For now, it’s just another excuse to pass around that dog-eared XKCD comic about the proliferation of standards . While we wait to see whether Type-C will save us from cable hell or just contribute to it, let’s take a quick look at where USB has been over the years, what competing standards it has fought against, and what technologies it will continue to grapple with in the future. Read 26 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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A brief history of USB, what it replaced, and what has failed to replace it

Insect that ekes out a living in Antarctica has tiny genome

The larval form of the midge (left) and the adult. Denlinger Lab, Ohio State When the term “extremophiles” gets thrown around, it’s usually in reference to single-celled organisms that thrive in high salt or near-boiling water. But there are a few animals that also manage to make do in rather extreme conditions. Perhaps the top example is a wingless midge that goes by  Belgica antarctica . As its name implies, it’s native to the frozen continent—in fact, it’s the only insect that’s native. (A few others have more recently introduced themselves from South America in recent years, and cockroaches undoubtedly ride in shipments to research bases.) Now, to try to help understand how anything can survive in such inhospitable conditions, researchers sequenced the genome of the midge and discovered it’s gotten rid of a lot of the DNA that’s frequently termed junk. The researchers describe just how difficult the insect’s living conditions are in detail: “The larvae, encased in ice for most of the year, require two years to complete their development and then pupate and emerge as adults at the beginning of their third austral summer. The [wingless] adults crawl over surfaces of rocks and other substrates, mate, lay eggs and die within 7–10 days after emergence.” Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Insect that ekes out a living in Antarctica has tiny genome

Wireless broadband can reach the moon, and maybe Mars

Prescott Pym Aside from air, water and fresh vegetables, what would need to survive on the moon? One thing that would likely of feature high on the list is a decent, reliable wireless internet. And thanks to a group of researches from MIT and Nasa this kind of connectivity could be within the realms of possibility. Between them, the two organizations have demonstrated for the first time that data communication technology is capable of providing those in space with the same kind of connectivity we enjoy on Earth, and can even facilitate large data transfers and high-definition video streaming. To do this it uses four separate telescopes based at a ground terminal in New Mexico to send the uplink signal to the moon. A laser transmitter that can send information as coded pulses of invisible infrared light feeds into each of the telescopes, which results in 40 watts of transmitter power. Read 7 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Wireless broadband can reach the moon, and maybe Mars