Is Solaris 11 good enough to be relevant?
On November 9, Oracle officially launched Solaris 11, the latest generation of the operating system it acquired with Sun Microsystems. Oracle is hyping the latest version of Solaris as the "first Cloud OS" and the "first fully virtualized operating system." Regardless of the marketing, the question remains whether this release of Solaris—over a year after it was first previewed—is enough to boost confidence in the future of the operating system and make it a contender beyond Oracle's Sparc platform.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Why RIM still hasn't found the cause of its world-wide outage
It has been nearly a month since Research In Motion's huge Blackberry service outage ended, and the company hasn't yet revealed why the failure cascaded so widely. While company executives blamed the failure of a core switch and backup systems at a data center in Europe for the initial outage, they've so far been unable to explain why it caused a a backlog of network data to bring services down around the world. RIM has formed a "SWAT team" with Chief Technology Officer David Yach to uncover why the outage spread so far and lasted so long, Bloomberg reports.
Sure, eventually everything fails—anyone who's ever worked in a data center knows that. And the big cloud and managed service companies like RIM Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft have built their infrastructures around the idea that things fail regularly, and have gone to pains to build resiliency into their systems. So why, if they're designed to deal with little failures—like a dying server, a lost drive, or a cut power line—do they seem to fail so often on a huge scale?
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Singing in the brain: wrens cooperate to make better music
Deep in the cloud forests of Ecuador, on the slopes of an active volcano, there lives a chubby, unassuming looking bird known as the plain-tailed wren. As the name implies, it does not look extraordinary, but there is something extraordinary in the way this bird sings. The plain-tailed wren is famous for its unusual duet, where the vocalizations of a male and a female meld so seamlessly that one might think it was a single bird singing.
"What's happening is that the male and female are alternating syllables, thought it often sounds like one bird singing alone, very sharply, shrilly and loudly," explained John Hopkins behavioral neuroscientist Eric Fortune.
In order to examine how sensory information from each wren is used to coordinate singing between individuals for this cooperative behavior, Fortune and his colleagues listened to more than 1,000 wren vocalizations captured in over 150 hours of recordings. They found that wrens commonly sang duets, but both males and females also sang on their own as well. The structure and sequence of syllables sung in duets and solitary singing were identical—with gaps in the individual song where the partner would normally sing. But during a solo, the duration of gaps between sung syllables varied more significantly. This suggests that sensory cues affect the duration and variability of the gaps, and that the birds do not use a fixed pattern to sing.
To learn how cooperative duet singing was encoded in the brain, the researchers captured 6 birds and monitored brain activity in the area that controls singing. They recorded up to 30 hours from each of the three female and three male wrens, and then played back isolated "units" from the recordings. These various pieces included both duets and isolated syllables, and the researchers manipulated some of them, reversing a clip in its entirety or presenting each syllable in reverse order. The researchers expected to find that the brain responded most to the wren's own singing voice, but both females and males responded best to the duet.
"We found that the brain of each individual participant prefers the combined activity over his or her own part," said Fortune. Since the wren's brain responses were stronger for duets than for any other sound, it appears that their brains are wired for cooperation. Because the neurotransmitter systems that control brain activity at the molecular level are nearly identical in all vertebrates and the layout of the brain structures is the same, the brain mechanisms observed in the wrens could hint at the same ones used for cooperative behavior in other vertebrate species.
Science, 2011. DOI: 10.1126/science.1209867 (About DOIs).
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
A faster Web server: ripping out Apache for Nginx
I am, at best, a fly-by-night sysadmin. I grew to adult nerdhood doing tech support and later admin work in a Windows shop with a smattering of *nix, most of which was attended to by bearded elders locked away in cold, white rooms. It wasn't until I started managing enterprise storage gear that I came to appreciate the power of the bash shell, and my cobbled-together home network gradually changed from a Windows 2003 domain supporting some PCs to a mixture of GNU/Linux servers and OS X desktops and laptops.
Like so many others, I eventually decided to put my own website up on the Internets, and I used the Apache HTTP server to host it. Why? I had an Ubuntu server box sitting in front of me, and Apache was the Web server I'd heard about the most. If Apache was good enough for big sites, it should be good enough for my little static personal site. Right?
But it wasn't quite right for me. Here's why—and what I learned when I spent a weekend ripping out my Apache install and replacing it with lightweight speed demon of a Web server called Nginx.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
High-resolution microscopy advance could shrink CPUs beyond current limits
Modern life would be very, very different if it weren't for photolithography, a very simple step in the processes for making an integrated circuit. Essentially, you use a slide projector to project an image of the circuit pattern on a wafer. Exposing the wafer to a light pattern modifies a chemical layer on top of the wafer, creating a mask. The mask allows selected parts of the wafer to be processed to create the circuit.
Despite its relative simplicity, photolithography is the limiting step that governs the rate at which power consumption drops, speed goes up, and the number of transistors increases. As you might imagine, a lot of people have spent a lot of time trying to improve or replace photolithography with a history of success.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Week in Apple: frayed MagSafes, iOS 5.0.1, secret iPhone features, and more
This week in Apple news, we talked to security researcher Charlie Miller about a flaw within iOS that ultimately got him suspended from Apple's developer program. Apple then issued an update to iOS 5 that fixed that bug in addition to a handful of others. We also covered a MagSafe connector settlement, Instagram clients for the desktop, GarageBand for iPhone, Apple's new self-checkout system at its retail stores, and more. Read on for the roundup!
iOS 5.0.1 arrives with purported battery life fixes: Apple has made good on its promise to deliver an iOS 5 software update to address battery life bugs. But does it work?
Proof-of-concept app exploiting iOS security flaw gets researcher in trouble with Apple: Security researcher Charlie Miller has found a crack in iOS's sandboxing foundation that could let any app run unsigned, unvetted code. His proof-of-concept app earned him a one-year suspension from Apple's developer program, too.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Week in gaming: 3D Mario, waiting on games, Steam hacked
This week we played the single-player campaign of Modern Warfare 3, played the first Mario title on the 3DS, and just because not enough stuff has been hacked, we reported on the Steam debacle. There is no place that your data is safe. Make your time.
It was a big week, and the big-name releases are still coming in hot and heavy. Take a look at the stories you may have missed.
Also, if you're wondering what happened with our Skyrim review, we've been working with Bethesda closely since E3 on coverage, and they've been great. Then suddenly our e-mails and phone calls went unanswered when we checked in about a PC review copy. It's funny how that happens.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Week on the Web: Zenbooks, piracy, and Windows Phone jailbreaks
The Asus Zenbook: a steely marvel with an appalling trackpad: The ASUS Zenbook is a beautiful ultrabook, except for one crippling weakness.
Viacom so devastated by piracy that CEO gets $50 million raise: Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman got an impressive $50.5 million raise in 2010. This makes us skeptical of Hollywood's demand that US taxpayers should spend even more money fighting piracy of Viacom content.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Week in IT: DRAM instead of hard drives, ultrabooks, and more
Can DRAM replace hard drives and SSDs? RAMCloud creators say yes: A research group at Stanford has a radical idea that could dramatically speed up storage systems: store all data on DRAM. While speed is guaranteed, it may be several years before the economics and technology align.
Will Ultrabooks rule the Windows notebook market in a few years?: The first ultrabooks have just hit the market, but research firm IHS iSuppli predicts they will account for 43 percent of notebook PC shipments by 2015.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Week in science: climate change and climate confusion
Fox News successfully creates climate confusion, but only among conservatives: Researchers have combined an analysis of cable news coverage, which shows that Fox presents a view of climate change that's inconsistent with reality, and a survey of viewers, which shows that seeing this misinformation had an effect—but only within Fox's core audience.
Gravitational lens lets Hubble zoom in on matter swirling into black hole: A lens within a lens helps us take the temperature of the disk of matter that is spiraling into a black hole in a distant quasar.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Tough Droid Razr teardown reveals user-unfriendly assembly
The Motorola Droid Razr released today has the folks over at iFixit shaking their collective head over its user repairability. The site tore down the phone to find an impressively tight arrangement affording the phone its 0.28-inch thickness, but one that uses a lot of adhesive and requires a tedious, sometimes precarious disassembly.
One of the big offenders to the Droid Razr's repairability is its LCD screen, which is permanently mated to the covering glass. Even if owners manage to break only the glass, they'll have to pay to replace the LCD as well. The rest of the phone is also secured with generous helpings of adhesive, which earned it even more demerits.
The 1750mAh battery powers the phone through contact points, rather than the more common sockets or soldered wires. A Torx T5 screwdriver is required to free the battery, but once the screw is taken care of, users need only pull the "remove battery" tab. Inside the team found 16GB of storage from Toshiba and 4Gb of Samsung RAM, among a bevy of other chips covered by tiny EMI shields.
IFixit notes that the back of the phone, despite being made of Kevlar, was very flexible, but should provide "tough protection" for the internals. The rest of the plastic frames and casing were secured so firmly, the team found them "tedious" to remove, saying that the parts "felt like they would break at any moment."
Due to the mated LCD and glass, difficult disassembly, and injudicious application of adhesive, iFixit awards the Droid Razr a 4 out of 10 for repairability. Those who are not very interested in doing their own repairs, or are very interested in doing difficult repairs, can pick the phone up as of today.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Expert: Regulators "slow to catch up" to Microsoft patent bullying
Google and at least one of its Android partners—Barnes and Noble—have been agitating for a government antitrust investigation of Microsoft's patent licensing practices. Last month, Barnes and Noble submitted a formal request for the Department of Justice to launch a probe.
According to Barnes and Noble, Microsoft claims to have over 60,000 patents. Fewer than 20,000 of those were granted by the patent office; Microsoft presumably purchased the other 40,000 from other firms. The result is one of the world's largest "patent thickets." Microsoft has so many patents that it's difficult to build a software product as complex as a mobile operating system without infringing dozens, maybe even hundreds, of them.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
iOS 5.0.1 update causing contact, WiFi headaches for some users (Updated)
Apple released the first update to iOS 5 on Thursday, fixing a critical security hole and promising better battery life for iPhone 4S users. However, it now looks like Apple may have not sufficiently tested it before release. Users have begun reporting that the update not only fails to address battery life problems, but may in fact introduce a number of new issues.
The update was Apple's first public over-the-air "delta" update, downloading directly to a device over WiFi instead of requiring a full iOS download and update via iTunes. Several Ars readers reported the update downloading and installing without a hitch. Numerous other users, however, have chimed in on Apple's support forums to say they have noticed no improvement in battery life on the iPhone 4S after applying the update.
Furthermore, users are also reporting a rash of new problems that were apparently introduced by the 5.0.1 update. The Next Web reported that some users aren't getting a proper contact name displayed when receiving a call, despite the name and number appearing in a user's contact list. Meanwhile, GigaOm reported that users are complaining of microphone problems, WiFi signal issues, and difficulty connecting to cell networks.
These new issues so far appear to be scattered and inconsistent, so it's unclear what the causes might be. Thankfully—knock on wood—we haven't experienced any of these issues here in the Orbiting HQ just yet, but the day is still young. Have you applied the 5.0.1 update? Has it helped your battery life? Did it cause any new problems for you? Let us know in the comments.
Update: Apple has once again given a statement to All Things D about continuing battery life issues: "The recent iOS software update addressed many of the battery issues that some customers experienced on their iOS 5 devices. We continue to investigate a few remaining issues."
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Mac OS X has its own sandbox security hole
Move over, iOS: CoreLabs Research has posted a public notification of a potential security vulnerability in Mac OS X's sandboxing mechanisms. According to CoreLabs, it's possible for sandboxed apps to trigger external processes that aren't sandboxed and possibly gain privileges not granted by a particular sandboxing profile. The revelation comes shortly after Apple announced it would force apps distributed via its Mac App Store to use sandboxing, ostensibly to increase security for Mac OS X users.
Apps that conform to Apple's sandbox design use a set of "entitlement" profiles defined by Apple; those profiles determine which system resources it can use and which are off limits. CoreLabs discovered that some of the limits in the default profiles can actually be circumvented by triggering certain Apple Events. In particular, Apple Events can cause
launchd to launch a separate process without sandbox restrictions.Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
What's the best age to win a Nobel Prize?
When you think of a prize-winning scientist, do you picture a young genius bursting with creativity and new ideas, or an older, more seasoned researcher that has been slaving away at the bench for decades? It turns out both images are pretty accurate. According to a recent paper in PNAS, the average age at which scientists complete Nobel Prize-winning work has varied greatly over the history of the prize, depending on the era and the scientific field.
Curious about the relationship between age, creativity, and scientific achievement, a group of researchers analyzed data regarding the Nobel Prizes won in physics, chemistry, and medicine between 1900 and 2008. They determined how old each winner was when they completed their prize-winning research, creating a dataset of 525 Nobel Prize winners (182 in physics, 153 in chemistry, and 190 in medicine).
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Logitech dropping Google TV, says Revue was an expensive mistake
Google aimed to gain a foothold in the living room with its ambitious Google TV platform, but the software failed to provide a compelling user experience. Logitech, one of the biggest Google TV launch partners, has given up on the platform and has no plans to make a follow-up to its unsuccessful Google TV-based Revue set-top box.
According to a report by The Verge, Logitech CEO Guerrino De Luca told analysts yesterday that the company’s misadventure with Google TV was a costly failure. He described Google’s television software platform as “incomplete” and said that it simply wasn’t ready for consumers at launch.
He also said that Logitech overestimated demand for the Revue and didn’t anticipate its lack of appeal to consumers. The Revue boondoggle and “operational miscues in EMEA” reportedly cost the company a collective $100 million in operating profits.
Google TV fell flat at launch due to a poor user experience and limited content availability. Google failed to court the content companies ahead of releasing the platform. Viacom, Fox, ABC, CBS, and NBC all blocked Google TV users from accessing their Web-based content shortly after the first products reached consumers. The move significantly undermined the viability of the product, especially compared to alternatives like the Boxee Box.
Despite the initial failure, Google hasn’t been sitting still. The search giant has been working on a major overhaul of Google TV that rebases the set-top platform on Honeycomb, the company’s tablet software environment. The move will enable third-party Android applications to run on Google TV products. We saw some compelling demonstrations at Google I/O earlier this year.
Logitech’s withering criticism of the platform won’t help Google make its case for Google TV, but new hardware partners are still coming to the platform. Samsung and Vizio have committed to shipping hardware with the latest iteration of the software.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Upcoming documentary shows world's greatest Tetris players
I write about video games for a living, and I've heard everything there is to say about how something may or may not be a giant waste of time. On the other hand, there is nothing I find more fascinating than tiny things in life that most people don't care about, but obsess others. Take, for instance, Tetris. It's a very popular game that almost all of us have played at some point or another, but an upcoming documentary shows just how serious some take the game.
Take a look at the trailer.
Read the comments on this post
Read More ...
Available Tags:iOS , iPhone , 3D , Steam , Windows Phone , Windows , Microsoft , Mac , security , Google TV , Logitech , Google ,
No comments:
Post a Comment