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17th November 2010 Archive

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  • Yahoo! preps build-your-own-dynamic-website service

    'The science of web technology' can be yours

    Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz has indicated that her company is developing a service that will allow third-party websites to dynamically optimize their content using Yahoo!'s recently-revamped back-end infrastructure. "[Optimizing and personalizing web content] doesn't scale with most companies," Bartz said during an appearance at …

    Music and Media 17 Nov 2010, 00:12

  • NY youth makes $130k selling real(-ish) white iPhone 4s

    Inevitable legal letter arrives

    Who says the press is useless? Not Fei Lam, a New York teenager who sells conversion kits that transform iPhone 4s from black to white. They are said to be original OEM parts and are not cheap: a full conversion kit costs $279. But as Lam points out on his website Whiteiphone4now: White iPhone 4 Owners: 500 Black iPhone 4 …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 00:34

  • Convey upgrades hybrid core supercomputer

    SC10 Drop-in FPGA upgrade

    Not all of the talk at the SC10 supercomputing extravaganza in New Orleans is about GPU co-processors. Convey Computer – which burst into the HPC scene two years ago with a hybrid supercomputer that employs x64 processors and field programmable gate array (FPGA) accelerators – is upgrading its HC-1 supercomputer with a new …

    HPC 17 Nov 2010, 05:00

  • Zuckerberg admits fallibility over Gmail block

    'But you must understand: I believe in OPENNESS'

    Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg isn't sure that Facebook is "100 per cent right" in preventing Google's Gmail and other third-party apps from automatically importing email addresses from the social-networking service. He says that the company is still weighing the possibilities — and that it believes in openness. "We're …

    ID 17 Nov 2010, 05:42

  • Synology DiskStation DS411+ Nas box

    Review Dual core storehouse

    From the outside, the Synology DiskStation DS411+ appears pretty much identical to the DS410n – a fairly heavy duty home and small business four-bay Nas box, reviewed recently. However, internally, the DS411+ is is quite a different beast, aimed at the small and medium business sector. For business and demanding enthusiasts: …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 07:00

  • British children gorge on Net diet

    Facebook or family time? No contest!

    British children are spending too much time online and admit it - to researchers, if not to their parents. One in five confess to staying up too late, and missing dinners to hang out on the net. And more than half say they spend less time on family, friends or school work because of the internet. These are some of the …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 08:00

  • DiData stares down the recession

    Sales, profits up

    Dimension Data grew revenue by 19.4 per cent in 2010, although this was flattered by moves in its main currencies - especially the South African Rand and the Aussie dollar. Stripping out currency moves, the reseller still grew sales by 9.9 per cent and margins were up from 4.9 per cent to 5 per cent. Revenue for the year ended …

    Channel Register 17 Nov 2010, 09:27

  • We spent how much?

    Project management Budget overruns needn't be normal

    According to the grassroots campaigning group the Taxpayers’ Alliance, overruns in UK government IT projects have run into several billion pounds. If a similar tally were made of private sector overruns, they would most likely be of a similar order of magnitude. It is just that public sector overspends are much better publicised …

    Project Management 17 Nov 2010, 10:04

  • Sony teases with lens-switch camcorder prototype

    E-mount compact shooter for pros

    Sony has told World+Dog that its labs are working on an entry-level pro camcorder with interchangeable lenses. Provisionally dubbed the dubbed the "NXCAM", the HD camcorder will come with a sensor that's equivalent to a Super 35mm frame and Sony's E-Mount lens system as used by its consumer-oriented Nex compact cameras and …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 10:19

  • Google Voice gets going on iPhone

    Everywhere is local, if you're an American

    Google Voice has finally become available for the iPhone after 18 months of bickering and an FCC investigation. It's also offering free calls within America and discounted calls elsewhere. Apple has nothing against Google Voice, but it does upset AT&T who can see the voice revenue that pays for the mobile network tumbling. …

    Mobile 17 Nov 2010, 10:38

  • Easynet network goes titsup

    Updated Customers tweet their fury

    Easynet's core network is down this morning, leaving thousands of businesses and homes without internet access. A message posted to the firm's status page at 8.45am reports a nationwide outage, affecting all connections. Customers have turned to Twitter - presumably via a secondary connection - to complain and compare notes …

    Telecoms 17 Nov 2010, 10:39

  • What's fluffy, shapeless and over our heads?

    Video Cloud hype

    We stuck a bunch of clever chaps, Dale Vile from Freeform Dynamics and Richard George from Intel, in our studio and asked them to give us the low-down on the realities of cloud computing - without the hype. The Register's own Tim Phillips hosts the proceedings with his usual panache. You can watch the pair of them get stuck in …

    Server Management 17 Nov 2010, 10:50

  • iPod accessories incoming

    Add-ons for your Nano and Shuffle

    Folks getting an iPod for Xmas have a couple of interesting accessories to look forward to. The first, a pair of round-the-back-of-the-head earphones into which the iPod Shuffle docks directly, comes from Japan's Elecom. There's no cord to get tangled, and Elecom insisted that the band is comfortable to wear and won't let …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 10:56

  • UK weakens supervision of Data Protection Act

    Opinion Bills could remove Info Commissioner's independence

    I have concluded that proposals published by the government in relation to “the bonfire of the quangos” (the Public Bodies Bill) and in relation to reform of parliament (the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill) can both serve to weaken the effectiveness of the supervision of the Data Protection Act. There is a …

    Government 17 Nov 2010, 11:07

  • Indies walk out on eMusic

    Beggars, Domino desert download service

    Heavyweight independent labels including Beggars Group, Domino and Merge are pulling their catalogues from eMusic at short notice, in a major blow to the download service. Between them they own the rights to many of the most popular independent acts. eMusic subscribers received an email overnight explaining that the cataloguess …

    Music and Media 17 Nov 2010, 11:12

  • Panasonic pitches monster 3D plasma TV at monster price

    Big living room, bigger wallet required

    103in plasma 3D TV, anyone? Yours if you have £75,000 ($120,000) and a Japanese bank account handy, says Panasonic, which introduced the monster set this morning in the Land of the Rising Sun. You don't get much extra for your money - no Blu-ray Disc player, or bundled content. At least Panasonic has the courtesy to chuck in a …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 11:15

  • Blogger faces terror charges for 'naming MPs'

    Don't tell 'em about Hansard or TheyWorkForYou

    A West Midlands blogger has been charged with terrorism offences for allegedly using a blog to list members of parliament who voted in favour of the Iraq war. Bilal Zaheer Ahmad, a 23-year-old man from Wolverhampton, was arrested a week ago by West Midlands Police. He will appear before Westminster Magistrates Court later …

    Law 17 Nov 2010, 11:22

  • Facebook bug sin-bins female users

    Spam abuse system pops a gasket

    Facebook users found themselves challenged to prove their identity on Tuesday as the social network's system for detecting fake accounts went awry. The bug meant a significant number of (seemingly all female) Facebook users were locked out of their accounts. Many lockouts were told that they were using an "inauthentic" name, …

    Applications 17 Nov 2010, 11:25

  • DVD, BD retailers warn punters off non-DVD, BD Xmas gifts

    Remember, a video retail association is not just for Christmas

    Do not buy your loved one a digital photo frame or a digital radio if you want Christmas Day to go off smoothly. Such is the advice offered today by, of all people, the British Video Association (BVA), after polling some 2000-odd customer. Fifty-eight per cent of those asked hoped Santa will bring them electronic goods this …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 11:36

  • Speak geek: The world of made-up language

    Pointy ears, bumpy foreheads and obscure tongues

    The world of invented language is a difficult place to succeed and those who have the patience to create their own tend to have a hard time gathering followers. Klingon and Elvish are notable exceptions, thanks to the huge fan bases for Star Trek and Lord of The Rings. Society tends to regard people who learn these languages …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 11:43

  • Squaring the service delivery circle

    Workshop Marrying what they want with what you can deliver

    In the last article, we considered a number of perspectives on service delivery, top to bottom, left to right. In operational terms however, the relationship that matters the most is the one agreed between coal-face IT staff and the users they support. What’s at the heart of making this work? Things were simpler in the old …

    Service Assurance 17 Nov 2010, 11:47

  • Linux servers for Windows folk: go on, give it a bash

    A piece of cake – even for non open-saucy types

    Despite all the hullabaloo about Ubuntu and other desktop offerings, for most organisations, the main use of Linux is on servers. Ignore all the waffle about flashy desktops and which browser is best, because the truth is, most organisations run on Windows and tons of Windows software – perhaps with a few Macs thrown in – and …

    Operating Systems 17 Nov 2010, 12:00

  • Samsung Galaxy Tab Android tablet

    Review Shrunken slate or fat phone?

    The buzz surrounding Apple’s iPad has prompted a rush of me-too tablets hoping to combine its up-to-the-minute spec, with practicality and usability. Unlike the iPad, Samsung’s much-anticipated Galaxy Tab also has the advantage of being a phone, and a 3G Android smartphone at that, with huge potential for add-on functionality. …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 12:00

  • Hackers hop onto royal engagement search results

    Malwarey Middleton meddling by miscreants

    Knaves, scoundrels and traitors to the crown took only minutes to leap onto yesterday's news of the royal engagement in a bid to expose sentimentally patriotic surfers to malware. Links to malicious sites appeared prominently in Google searches for Kate Middleton. Malicious downloads are offered to surfers under the guise of a …

    Malware 17 Nov 2010, 12:04

  • A Linux server OS that's had 11 years to improve

    Review: Is SME Server ready to roll?

    SME Server is pretty much the original ready-rolled server distribution. Although it has changed hands – and names – a few times, it's been around since 1999, when it was known as e-Smith, a name you'll still see in a few places. Name: SME Server 7.5.1 Supplier: Free download Price: Free, no subscriptions or registration …

    Operating Systems 17 Nov 2010, 12:30

  • Isis joins battle for control of your wallet

    Operators vs banks in NFC cash-snatch death match

    AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon have teamed up to create Isis - a pay-by-NFC architecture that places the network operators at its centre, though it may already be too late. Isis has a logo, and is backed by Barclaycard, but will have to pit itself against Visa, which has already teamed up with Bank Of America, Wells Fargo and US …

    Mobile 17 Nov 2010, 12:32

  • Virgin opens kimono, flashes box

    Glimpse of stocking filler

    There are no more details to add to what Virgin Media announced earlier this month, but the cableco this week posted a tease snap of its upcoming 1TB Tivo-designed DVR. Here it is: Virgin and TiVo announced a year ago that they were going to bring the DVR pioneer's technology to the UK. When it arrives - and Virgin is saying …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 12:51

  • Ballmer, Gates won't slice up Microsoft

    Steve's 'genetic makeup' doesn't like the 'dis-synergy'

    Microsoft held its annual shareholders' meeting in Redmond yesterday, where the company’s boss Steve Ballmer once again rejected the idea – first touted by Goldman Sachs – to split the software vendor up. "I obviously don’t think it is time,” he told shareholders, according to Todd Bishop at TechFlash. “I don’t think it would …

    Channel Register 17 Nov 2010, 12:53

  • How von Neumann still controls the desktop

    Workshop Putting the business first

    When John Von Neumann first wrote up his notes about the logical design of the EDVAC computer on a train journey to Los Alamos in 1946, it is unlikely that he fully appreciated the impact they would have. For all their complexity, cores and threads, their caches and bus architectures, modern computers still follow which is …

    Desktop Management 17 Nov 2010, 13:07

  • i365 needles VAR channel

    Giving VARs a way into cloud backup

    Giving the VAR channel a "poke with a hot needle" is i365's idea of an attractive offer giving small and medium enterprise resellers a way into the cloud backup service business. The company, fully owned by Seagate, sells the EVault – software running in an X86 appliance – to back up data to its data vaults in the cloud: which …

    Storage 17 Nov 2010, 13:22

  • What will Google do with NFC?

    Wave it at Cupertino, or take on Visa...

    Yesterday Google's CEO, Eric Schmidt, demonstrated an Android handset with integrated NFC. And while conventional wisdom says that's not enough to kick-start proximity payments, Google has never followed convention before. Gingerbread, the next incarnation of the Android OS, will have a standard API for interaction with Near …

    Mobile 17 Nov 2010, 13:23

  • UK.gov ignores 'net neutrality' campaigners

    Fast lanes coming

    ISPs will be allowed to charge content providers to prioritise their traffic, the government indicated today. A speech by the communications minister Ed Vaizey confirmed that the concept of "net neutrality" remains irrelevant in the UK under the coalition. As long as providers are open about their policies, he said, the …

    Telecoms 17 Nov 2010, 13:28

  • Royal Wedding: Prince Charles is a ZX81, Wills is an iPad

    One ruined young lives, the other is shiny on top

    Back in 1981, two major events occurred in the UK. An awkward, troublesome, difficult-to-get-on-with contender captured the heart of an inexperienced young virgin: and in the same year, Prince Charles married Lady Di in the last major royal wedding to hit the UK. The frankly irritating yet inevitably famous (given the position …

    PCs & Chips 17 Nov 2010, 13:38

  • Chinese ISP hijacked US military, gov web traffic

    BGP wakeup call still not sounded

    Eight months after traffic to as much as 15 percent of the world's internet destinations was mysteriously diverted through China, investigators for a US Congressional committee remain wary of the Asian superpower, even as they're quick to say they have no evidence it's the work of the Chinese government. “Several incidents in …

    Enterprise Security 17 Nov 2010, 14:18

  • Google chucks personal ratings to the Hotpot

    Yelp, only more creepy

    Google has launched Hotpot, a surprisingly Yelp-like service for collecting ratings of places, which will then use those ratings to personalise your search results. Google Maps already provides reviews culled from around the web, and submitted by other Google users, but Hotpot goes a little deeper by tailoring its …

    Applications 17 Nov 2010, 14:20

  • Adobe update tackles PDF peril

    Quick patch to stop hack smack attacks

    Adobe released an unscheduled update to Reader and Acrobat on Tuesday that addresses a variety of security bugs in its PDF software, including an unpatched flaw that has become the subject of hacking attacks over recent weeks. Updates of Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9.4 for Windows, Macintosh and Unix address a critical flaw in …

    Developer 17 Nov 2010, 14:28

  • Hey kids, wanna build your own Vulture 1?

    Click here for hot plans of famous space plane

    Well, you lovely people, it's time to wrap the Paper Aircraft Released Into Space project following our astounding Vulture 1 triumph. In case you missed it, we had a bit of a result with our beloved PARIS. No sooner had the news broken in Oz, than the international media were all over us like a rash. Poor old John Oates was …

    SPB 17 Nov 2010, 15:19

  • HMV offers 80-quid colour e-book reader

    'Rubber style finish'

    HMV has followed John Lewis to pitch what is essentially a 5in media tablet as a colour e-book reader. His Master's Voice is now offering the View Quest BookBox for £80 online, or £99 in store. Said tablet's colour screen has a resolution of 480 x 800, but no touch capability, it seems. There's 2Gb of on-board storage, but …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 15:45

  • Police-baiting website Fitwatch returns

    Back and fitter than ever - not that it ever really went away

    The British website briefly removed from the sight of some web surfers by the Met Police's e-crime unit is back in full effect. Of course Fitwatch never really disappeared; the site's hosting provider JustHost suspended the account after a stroppy email from the Met, but hardly had the plug been pulled than the site sprouted …

    Policing 17 Nov 2010, 15:53

  • Microsoft spooks software customers about dangerous pirates

    Warning: They look just like the rest of us!

    One in four people surveyed by Microsoft think that pirated versions of software are as “safe” to use as the legit copy. Of course, Microsoft didn’t shape its latest opportunistic “piracy is bad” press release in quite such a negative (for Redmond, at least) way. Instead it preferred to say that – of the 38,000 peeps in 20 …

    Channel Register 17 Nov 2010, 16:17

  • Adaptive Computing speaks better GPU with Moab 6

    SC10 Torque is cheap

    Supercomputer clusters are getting larger every year, and now they are getting math help from adjunct devices such as GPU co-processors. Cluster provisioning and management tools therefore have to scale from tens of thousands of cores to hundreds of thousands – without choking on their own communication with cluster nodes. …

    HPC 17 Nov 2010, 16:40

  • PopDrive and Bantam have a pop at RDX

    Potshot at industry leader ProStor

    Two upstarts - Idealstore's Bantam and DHK's PopDrive - want to challenge ProStor, the king of removable hard drive storage with its RDX technology. The RDX is a shock-proofed 2.5-inch hard drive which fits into a dock and has various capacity levels topping out at 1TB. Docks and drives are made by Tandberg Data and Imation, …

    Storage 17 Nov 2010, 16:49

  • Apple adds ex-Northrop exec to board

    Sugar to sweeten Jobsian investment portfolio?

    Apple announced on Wednesday that a new director has been added to its governing board: Ronald Sugar, recently retired chairman and CEO of defense contractor Northrop Grumman and former CFO of TRW. "Ron is an engineer at heart, who then became a very successful business leader," said Apple CEO Steve Jobs in a prepared …

    Financial News 17 Nov 2010, 18:46

  • Oracle Java submission hastens Apache showdown

    Two weeks and counting

    Oracle is not altering course on its Java roadmap, hastening a final showdown with open sourcers at Apache. On Tuesday, the database giant submitted four Java Specification Requests (JSRs) for Java Standard Edition 7 and 8 for approval to the Executive Committee of Java's governing body, Java Community Process (JCP). The JSRs …

    Developer 17 Nov 2010, 19:14

  • Microsoft has a BLAST with Azure clouds

    SC10 Petaflops barrier also broken

    Microsoft is a wannabe in the supercomputing arena, but the software giant is making steady progress among quants and life sciences techies with its Windows HPC Server 2008 R2 and now its Azure cloud services. At the SC10 supercomputing trade show in New Orleans, Microsoft announced that it has a version of the BLAST, which is …

    HPC 17 Nov 2010, 19:23

  • FBI brass ask Google, Facebook to expand wiretaps

    Mr. Mueller goes to Silicon Valley

    Top officials from the FBI traveled to Silicon Valley on Tuesday to persuade Facebook and Google executives to support a proposal that would make it easier for law enforcement to wiretap the companies' users. FBI Director Robert Mueller III and General Counsel Valerie Caproni were scheduled to meet with “managers of several …

    ID 17 Nov 2010, 19:57

  • Na'vi on your sat-navatar

    Plug in your tail and off you go

    Na'vi – the constructed language, or conlang, of those big blue dudes with the tails in Avatar – has tipped up on Garmin satnavs, or sat-Na'vis, as we must now call them. Amazingly, Garmin is citing public demand for this feature, which incorporates turn-by-turn instructions in a conlang that maybe 10 or 20 people in the world …

    reghardware 17 Nov 2010, 20:12

  • Virtualization: the challenges and opportunities for SMBs

    On Demand Webcast How to get started

    Small and medium-sized businesses are virtualizing servers, but at a much slower rate than larger enterprises. Some are put off by high licensing costs, some can't spare the time to make the move, and some just don't know how to get started. If you're in one of these categories, tune in to this event where our studio experts …

    Tech Panel 17 Nov 2010, 20:33

  • Will Facebook target ads across the interwebs?

    Zuckerberg on Eric Schmidt's ad nightmare

    Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is downplaying the possibility of the social networking giant rolling out a web-wide advertising network that targets ads based on your behavior and the behavior of your Facebook friends. On Wednesday evening, during an appearance at the Web 2.0 Summit in downtown San Francisco, Zuckerberg was …

    Music and Media 17 Nov 2010, 20:45

  • Oracle sues partner after multiple break-ins

    Third time's the charm for hapless remanufacturer

    Oracle has sued a remanufacturing partner for contract violations and losses after a warehouse operated by that unfortunate company was robbed of Oracle equipment not once, not twice, but three times. There are limits, it would appear, to Oracle's patience and forbearance. The target of Oracle's wrath is Multis, Limited, of …

    Channel Register 17 Nov 2010, 22:27

  • US may disable all in-car mobile phones

    Transportation boss: 'It will be done'

    The US government may require cars to include scrambling tech that would disable mobile-phone use by drivers, and perhaps passengers. "I think it will be done," US Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood said on Wednesday morning, according to The Daily Caller. "I think the technology is there and I think you're going to see …

    Mobile 17 Nov 2010, 22:46

  • Oracle ships Solaris 11 Express

    Solaris 11 for the impatient

    If you can't wait to get your hands on Solaris 11 when Oracle makes it available next year — like Oracle itself can't wait in its Exadata and Exalogic clustered systems — then you'll be happy to know that Oracle has started shipping Solaris 11 Express. The company may have let the OpenSolaris project die of neglect, but Oracle …

    Servers 17 Nov 2010, 22:51