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5th May 2006 Archive

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  • Filipino judge sacked for consulting trio of mystic dwarves

    Ruled incompetent

    A Filipino judge who "claimed he could see into the future and admitted consulting imaginary mystic dwarfs" is asking to be reinstated after getting the boot for incompetence, Reuters reports. Trial judge Florentino Floro, who held court in Manila, was given his marching orders and slapped with a 40,000 pesos ($780) fine last …

    Bootnotes 5 May 2006, 07:02

  • Wanadoo job cuts come despite assurances

    Staff wait to hear whether jobs safe

    Up to 2,000 jobs are to be lost in the UK at France Telecom-owned Orange and Wanadoo despite recent assurances that numbers would not be axed. In February, France Telecom announced that 22,000 jobs would be culled as the giant telco struggles to cut its whopping debt mountain while facing a cut in traditional revenues. However …

    Telecoms 5 May 2006, 08:02

  • BlackBerry MDS Studio

    Plugging a BlackBerry into the world of web services

    The recent 4.1 release of BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) from Research in Motion (RIM) opens the door to a new set of mobile development tools and technologies. BlackBerries aren't just for email – they're also a secure pipe to and from your network. With the latest build of RIM's MDS (Mobile Data Services) platform …

    Mobile 5 May 2006, 08:09

  • C++/CLI: a paradigm too far

    Stob Microsoft's new albino jumbo

    Microsoft has been firing off some big guns in support of something called 'C++/CLI'. The Softies would really like to lure C++ users into the suburban programming world of .NET - the .NETscape if you wish. But their previous attempt in this direction, a system called 'Managed Extensions to C++' that was composed mostly of …

    Verity Stob 5 May 2006, 08:12

  • Sun targets Linux developers with Java

    Monumental change

    Sun Microsystems is changing its Java license to encourage greater adoption of Java among developers on Linux, while announcing that a "monumental" release of the enterprise Java platform has been nailed down. The company said it is hammering out changes to its Java Runtime Environment (JRE) license that will make it easier …

    Hardware 5 May 2006, 08:15

  • Computacenter returns £75m to shareholders

    Steady as she goes

    Computacenter today confirmed that it is returning £75m to shareholders this quarter. The reseller giant had already announced its intention to do this, but added the caveat that this was subject to the resolution of various tax matters. These have now be resolved satisfactorily. Computacenter also provided the City with a …

    Channel Register 5 May 2006, 08:39

  • SOA: The future of IT or pure hype?

    Reg Reader Studies You tell us

    There are those who proclaim Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) as the future of information technology; others say it's all just hype created by the industry to drive the next wave of spending. Well, what do you think? Whether you're an SOA believer or a sceptic, an expert or a novice just trying to figure out what it all …

    Tech Panel 5 May 2006, 08:50

  • Innovative ways to fool people

    Comment 'Your data or your life'

    The greatest president in American history, Abraham Lincoln, is credited with uttering one of the finest sayings about human nature ever expressed: "You may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all the time." Folks in Lincoln's time seemed …

    Channel Register 5 May 2006, 09:22

  • Acorn revived to launch laptop PCs

    Updated UK home computer pioneer returns

    That one-time pioneer of British home computing Acorn is to sprout once again. The creator of the Atom, Electron, Archimedes and BBC Micro machines, of the ARM chip company and of the RISC OS is to be revived next week as a purveyor of notebook PCs. The company's refusing to say anything about the motivation behind the …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 09:32

  • Making sense of spreadsheet madness

    Comment QTier-Rapor

    I have written in the last year or so about a number of vendors offering spreadsheet management and compliance capabilities. However, one that I had not previously come across is QTier, whose QTier-Rapor product combines spreadsheet management with spreadsheet automation. Indeed, the latter was the original focus of the product …

    Developer 5 May 2006, 09:40

  • Intel takes axe to Pentium D prices

    Up to 50 per cent off

    Intel has slashed the prices of its desktop Pentium D processors by up to 50 per cent following the introduction of the 3.6GHz Pentium D 960. The chip giant also cut the prices of its Celeron D products, and tweaked what it charges for Centrino and Centrino Duo bundles. The most recent round of cuts saw the Pentium D 950's …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 09:55

  • Pickled builders find pickled body in barrel of rum

    'Special taste' Jamaican tipple

    A group of Hungarian builders who availed themselves of the contents of a 300-litre barrel of rum left in a house they were renovating eventually found out what gave the tipple its "special taste". Having drained the cask - in the process decanting a few bottles for home consumption - they tried to shift it, but found it " …

    Bootnotes 5 May 2006, 10:06

  • BT, NTL and AOL slammed in broadband survey

    Feathers well and truly ruffled

    Three of the UK's leading broadband providers have been slammed for being pants, according to research carried out by price comparison website uSwitch.com. Its survey of 16,000 grown-ups by pollsters YouGov found that BT, NTL and AOL - who between them account for half of all broadband subscribers in the UK - came bottom in …

    Telecoms 5 May 2006, 10:15

  • Eccleston will play Number Six

    Tech Digest The Village revisited slated for 2007

    He may have vanished from your Dr Who screensaver, but Christopher Eccleston isn't done with being a geek hero just yet: Doctor Nine will regenerate as Number Six in Granada's £10m remake of the 60s classic The Prisoner, confirming the El Reg story yesterday linking the in-demand thesp with the role. The six-part remake is …

    Entertainment 5 May 2006, 10:38

  • Intel touts developing-world laptop

    No compromises over software support, apparently

    Intel yesterday unveiled its take on a low-cost laptop for the developing world - the wireless-enabled, handle-equipped, education-oriented 'Eduwise' notebook. It can run Windows or Linux, the chip giant said. As you can see from the pics, it's has a certain retro look - think PowerBook 100 - and the colour scheme's nothing …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 10:48

  • Cassini radar discovers space Arabia

    By the dunes of Titan!

    The European Space Agency's and NASA's Saturn mission has beamed back images of shifting dunes on the surface of the giant moon Titan (see right). Cassini's radar imager found the Earth-like desert landscapes dominating huge swathes of the moon's surface near the equator. The dunes are up to 150m high and can span hundreds of …

    Space 5 May 2006, 10:51

  • Trojan uses smut to filch bank details

    Custom malware

    Hackers have developed a sophisticated Trojan-based attack which uses the lure of pornography to steal bank details from victims' PCs. The Briz-F Trojan has been planted on pornographic websites and takes advantage of software vulnerabilities to launch a complex attack which culminates in the compromise of an infected Windows …

    Malware 5 May 2006, 10:55

  • O2 sniffs around Bulldog, Tiscali - report

    They're all at it

    O2 has become the latest cellco to be linked with the possible acquisition of a broadband operator. According to the Independent, the Telefonica-owned firm is eyeing Bulldog - the LLU operator owned by Cable & Wireless (C&W) and Tiscali UK. It seems O2 - which used to be the mobile arm of BT - is exploring demand for a fixed/ …

    Telecoms 5 May 2006, 11:06

  • Downloads cripple NHS computer system

    Flatlines for two days

    A Kent hospital's computer system flatlined for two days after staff overdosed it with music downloads, videos, photos, and games, UK tabloid The Sun reports. As a result of the collapse - provoked by a main server crash - staff at the Queen Mother Hospital in Margate were obliged to resort to producing X-rays on film and …

    Hardware 5 May 2006, 11:50

  • China moves to enslave Mother Nature

    Weather bows to state hose-down operation

    Chilling news from Beijing, where the meteorological overlords of Orwellian nightmare agency, the "Weather Modification Office" have seized control of clouds. Not content with being set to dominate the world economy and politics, the government has decreed even Cumulonimbus must bow to the will of the People. Or rather, they've …

    Science 5 May 2006, 11:51

  • IPTV/VoD: The open fourth platform

    Industry comment Rome wasn't built in a day...

    Just when you thought the days of the digital TV "walled garden" were over, this week Sky released its new Sky Net platform, which is almost as imaginatively titled as the new service to be released by the start-up Aggregator this year. It seems the world is taking a giant leap backward to the days of web portals and brand …

    Networks 5 May 2006, 12:02

  • Dell unveils latest 'budget' notebook

    D520 more mid-range than low-end

    Dell this week launched its latest low-cost Latitude laptop, pitching the D520 at budget-conscious users. The company also touted the machine's dual-core Intel Core Duo processor, though to make the base price you'll have to put up with a lesser, single-core Celeron M chip. The D520 is available with either a 14.1in, 1024 x …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 12:04

  • Demon does VoIP

    So does Timico

    Demon, the ISP owned by Scottish telco Thus, has unveiled details of a broadband voice service aimed at small businesses. Called "Demon Voice Over Broadband solution for SMEs", Thus reckons its VoIP solution can cut the amount SMEs spend on making voice calls while making better use of their existing broadband connection. As …

    VoIP 5 May 2006, 12:19

  • MySQL patches security vulns

    Less than critical

    MySQL has released patches for three security vulns in its open source database software. The fixes are all contained in the latest versions, so it seems sensible to start downloading now. The flaws, involving disclosure and buffer overflows, are "less than critical", but they could be exploitable by pesky hackers, according to …

    Developer 5 May 2006, 12:37

  • Knife-wielding devil teddy bear rampages through eBay

    Unwanted possession

    Stop us if you've already heard this one: a terrified eBayer is attempting to offload a satanic teddy bear which, well, let's get it from the horse's mouth: When I was a young child, I had a large stuffed toy bear, and named him "Baron". Baron was the one I always blamed for stolen candy and broken dishes, dressed in a button …

    Music and Media 5 May 2006, 13:09

  • HP laptop crypto 'backdoor' lawsuit fails

    Convict broken up over DriveLock

    An attempt by convicted felon Michael Crooker to sue HP for false advertising over the security of its laptop technology has floundered. Crooker, 52, from Agawam, Massachusetts, decided to buy a Compaq laptop in September 2002 largely because of a feature called DriveLock, which prevents a hard drive from working unless users …

    Channel Register 5 May 2006, 13:23

  • Sony to ship 50GB Blu-ray recordables in June

    They don't come cheap

    Sony will ship blank dual-layer Blu-ray Disc media in June, the consumer electronics giant said today. But anyone hoping the arrival of 50GB discs will prove more economic than the now-shipping 25GB, single-layer discs is going to be disappointed. Sony is now shipping 25GB BD-R and BD-RE media and expects them to cost $20 and …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 13:44

  • Zombies attack Seattle hospital

    Hacker pleads guilty to botnet-fuelled assault

    A California hacker has pleaded guilty to disrupting computer systems - including the network of a hospital - through a malware-fueled attack designed to install adware on infected PCs. Christopher Maxwell, from Vacaville, California, 20, also confessed to disrupting US military systems during the January 2005 attack. As part …

    Malware 5 May 2006, 13:58

  • ATI unwraps $299 Radeon X1900 GT

    Gamer-oriented GPU line extended down-market

    ATI has launched the anticipated Radeon X1900 GT graphics chip. The company's board partners were quick to follow the announcement - which had been expected to take place next week - by releasing products based on the new part. As expected, the GPU, codenamed R580, contains 36 pixel shader units - existing members of the …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 14:05

  • Scientists track weather with mobile masts

    Finally, a use for 3G

    New research suggests mobile 3G masts offer a cheap and accurate weather monitoring network. The data, published today in the journal Science, was collected by an Israeli team headed by University of Tel-Aviv professor Hagit Messer-Yaron. Rain, snow, humidity, and other atmospheric conditions affect the strength of …

    Science 5 May 2006, 14:22

  • Aussie paints John Howard with John Thomas

    NSFW Underwear down Down Under

    An Oz artist is wowing crowds at a Perth porn expo with his portrait of PM John Howard, Ananova reports. What's of particular interest to visitors to Sexpo is not artist Tim Patch's choice of subject, but rather that he eschews the brush in favour of the trouser snake - thereby making him among the world's leading exponents of …

    Bootnotes 5 May 2006, 14:39

  • C++ divided by CLI

    Programmers agitated by Microsoft's approach

    At the ACCU conference recently, one wag in the audience referred to Microsoft’s C++/CLI as “C++ divided by CLI”, which neatly summed up the prevailing mood. The 10,000 classes in .NET can’t work with ISO C++, and you may ask why anyone in their right mind would try to bring out a platform in this day and age that couldn’t talk …

    Developer 5 May 2006, 14:58

  • Crap crim caged for four years

    Dog mess pilferer up sh*t creek

    You can't polish a turd, they say. As mugger David Carlisle has discovered, you can't pinch one either. The blundering Bristolian has been handed down four years hard time after he jumped 52-year-old Marion Budd as she walked her dog last July. Carlisle demanded at knifepoint she hand over the two bags she was carrying. …

    Bootnotes 5 May 2006, 15:13

  • Gowers warned over patent review

    Old boys: 'Watch your step, mister'

    Patent attorneys rarely let their sang-froid slip. But this week the British Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys (CIPA) did just that when it warned the Treasury-commissioned Gowers Review of Intellectual Property to watch its step. The review shook the patent institution's foundations with vague allegations that the …

    Hardware 5 May 2006, 15:16

  • 'Spamford' Wallace fined $4m over spyware biz

    FTC cracks down on rogue operations

    Sanford 'Spamford' Wallace has been fined $4m and ordered to restrict the deceptive spyware practices of his company, Smartbot.Net, after losing a lawsuit brought by the US Federal Trade Commission. The FTC alleged that Wallace's software takes advantage of well-known IE vulnerabilities to infiltrate PC and secretly change user …

    Malware 5 May 2006, 15:24

  • ATI Radeon X1800 GTO vs Nvidia GeForce 7600 GT

    GPU face-off Sub-£150 cards from Gecube and Gigabyte

    Every new generation of high-end graphics cards heralds a speed bump for the mid-range products. In the past, I've been disappointed with many of the mid-range cards - there's just not enough peformance there to justify the £150-200 price point. It's about time we get some decent performance out of the not-stupidly-expensive …

    Reg Hardware 5 May 2006, 15:38

  • How secrecy designs waste and failure into Govt contracts

    Report details the Australian experience

    Government secrecy over the outsourcing deals it does with private firms is self-defeating, and creates a culture of laxity where officials can make mistakes or abuse their power with impunity, says a report. Citing the embarrassing case of the Bruce Stadium in Canberra, Australia, which led to the downfall of a regional …

    Music and Media 5 May 2006, 18:00

  • AOL Europe kicks off strategic review

    Favours partnerships - not sale

    Time Warner has hired bankers Citigroup to conduct a strategic review of its AOL Europe business as part of fresh plans to expand its operation. Contrary to a flurry of recent press reports, the sale of parts of AOL Europe is not top of Time Warner's agenda. Instead, the US media giant is keen to pursue partnerships or third …

    Financial News 5 May 2006, 20:44