The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

23rd November 2010 Archive

Browse by publication date, or search the site.

  • Google sued for scanning emails of non-Gmail users

    Electronic Communications Privacy Act violation alleged

    A Texas man has fired a legal broadside against Gmail in a federal lawsuit that claims the Google service violates the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986. Keith Dunbar of Bowie County, Texas, claims that emails he sent from a non-Gmail service to Gmail users were scanned by Google algorithms without his consent. The …

    Applications 23 Nov 04:00

  • Facebook homes in on world of Google

    'Let me be your homepage. In so very many ways'

    Facebook is testing a new tool that encourages users to set the social networking site as their browser homepage. It's hardly an unusual move. But at a time when the company is rolling out its own email service and resisting efforts to loosen its grip on user data, the move serves as an apt metaphor for Facebook's sweeping …

    Music and Media 23 Nov 05:00

  • Ubuntu's Shuttleworth lands luxury NY crash pad

    24-hour Natty Narwhal service

    Canonical owner and former cosmonaut Mark Shuttleworth has found a new landing pad. Ubuntu king Mark Shuttleworth has bought a condo in Manhattan's Superior Ink building for a record $31.5m, according to the New York Post. Other residents of Superior Ink – a 68-unit, 17-floor building – include actress Hilary Swank, fashion …

    Odds and Sods 23 Nov 05:34

  • Google plays coy on Chrome OS

    By year end, you'll get...details

    Google is playing coy over the future of Chrome OS, its still-gestating, browser-based operating system. When the project was first revealed in July 2009, Google said that systems based on the OS would arrive in the second half of 2010 — and through this past summer, it continued to make similar promises. But last week at the …

    Operating Systems 23 Nov 06:00

  • Kingston HyperX Max USB 3.0 128GB external drive

    Review SSD on the go

    Kingston Technology's HyperX Max is the company's latest SSD offering that will be hitting the shelves next month. Packaged as an external drive, it's available in capacities from 64GB to 256GB. SuperSpeed storekeeper: Kingston Technology's HyperX Max Entirely bus-powered and measuring in at 74 x 119 x 12mm, the slim …

    reghardware 23 Nov 07:00

  • Guaranteeing service levels? We got what you need

    Live Today Apps, Storage, Cloud

    The nature of networks, internal or external, is that they need to perform or your business suffers and your users will be crawling all over you. This is as true of the in-house email as a cloud solution or even a consolidation project - they all demand effective delivery of data over network connections. But this can be a …

    Tech Panel 23 Nov 08:00

  • Murdoch buys into education

    Digger does schools software

    Rupert Murdoch's News Corp has bought Wireless Generation - a privately-held US schools software provider. News Corp is paying $360m (£226m) for 90 per cent of the company, which is based in Brooklyn. Wireless Generation, founded in 2000, makes assessment software for testing kids' progress in key subjects. It has customers …

    Applications 23 Nov 10:03

  • 'Phantom Ray' robot warjet to ride atop NASA shuttle-carrier 747

    Go west, young autonomous low-observable weapons system

    The "Phantom Ray" robot Stealth combat jet under development by US aerospace mammoth Boeing is ready to begin trials, according to the company. The machine will now be flown to the military test centre, Edwards airforce base in California, mounted atop one of NASA's space-shuttle-carrying jumbo jets. Both of these planes …

    Science 23 Nov 10:15

  • Facebook user locked out of account even with ID

    Your name's not down, you're not coming back in

    A Facebook user shut out of the service due to a glitch last Tuesday was locked out for a further two days even after she proved her identity. The case of Christine C, a US-based marketing executive who asked us to withhold details of the organisation she worked for, raises wider questions about Facebook's handling of the …

    ID 23 Nov 10:28

  • DfE spent £113.8m with Capita last year

    Gov now publishes every item of spending above £25,000 online

    Capita Business Services took 24 per cent of the money spent by the Department for Education in 2009-10 with its 100 largest suppliers. Figures released to Kable under Freedom of Information by the department show that the outsourcing company topped its supplier list, with Capgemini coming second with £33.9m of spending in …

    Channel Register 23 Nov 10:30

  • iPAD, KINDLE, all tablets and slablets MADE OBSOLETE

    Boffins produce disposable e-paper, made of actual paper

    Brainboxes in Ohio say they have ended the tablet wars before they've even really begun. No more will harassed consumers need to weigh up the benefits of e-ink versus LCD or LED vid-capable screens. No more will bank accounts be plundered by the need to purchase costly glass-based displays of either type. Instead, no more than …

    Mobile 23 Nov 10:35

  • Google boosts Bletchley's Turing papers bid

    Hands out $100k wad to save the papers for the nation

    Search and ad giant Google has handed $100,000 to Bletchley Park to back the museum's bid for the Alan Turing papers, which go on sale at Christie's later today. The auction, which will also see an Enigma machine and an Apple I go under the hammer, starts at 2pm. Bletchley Park is trying to raise the expected £300,000 to £500 …

    Bootnotes 23 Nov 10:56

  • US man slips into perv scanner-busting undies

    Tungsten fig leaves invite drooling TSA operatives to cop a feel

    US firm Rocky Flats Gear is apparently doing a roaring trade in novel perv scanner-busting underwear - an attractive range of intimate apparel which may protect your naughty bits from radiation and the prying eyes of drooling airport security operatives. According to the blurb, the kit's main aim is "protecting the traveling …

    Bootnotes 23 Nov 10:58

  • O2 outs liars and philanderers with live status feed

    I know you can hear me now

    O2 has launched a live network checker, showing the current network status by post code and updated hourly. The "Live Status Checker" popped up briefly on Wednesday, though it wasn't clear if it was using live data at the time, but now the system is fully operational and reporting that there are currently no network problems …

    Mobile 23 Nov 11:11

  • Most coders have sleep problems, need 'hygiene and care'

    'Special needs', 'poor mental health' in engineer survey

    A study conducted among software engineers indicates that a high proportion of coders suffer from "severe insomnia" and that a majority have sleep problems of some sort, putting their mental health and "hygiene" at risk. According to the study authors, the primary reason for the sleeplessness of software engineers is that "job …

    Developer 23 Nov 11:20

  • Replication for the rest of us

    White paper Expensive and difficult? Not necessarily so

    There's a lot of information you'd want to replicate that wouldn't have been mission critical even two years ago. But you can't, because you have three incompatible storage systems, no budget for an extra data centre and no staff to run it if you did. Many more organisations need replication today than have it: losing even an …

    Storage 23 Nov 11:30

  • Buffy to slay her way back into cinemas

    Another 're-imagining' of cult character

    Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer should brace themselves for a cinematic "re-imagining" of the cult character, which producer Charles Roven describes as a "a completely new reboot". 'Re-imagine this, mate.' Roven's Atlas Entertainment is working with writer Whit Anderson, whose take on Buffy is "pretty compelling and a lot …

    Entertainment 23 Nov 11:53

  • How to... print wirelessly from your iDevice

    Review AirPrint enabler utilities reviewed

    Apple's decision to yank support for its AirPrint technology from Mac OS X 10.6.5 has the noses of no few iDevice owners out of joint. With the arrival yesterday of iOS 4.2 and the wireless printing tech it brings to iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches, the absence of AirPrint on Macs prevents owners of these gadgets printing, …

    reghardware 23 Nov 11:57

  • Martha pushes online government as DirectGov CEO pushes off

    Lane Fox demands 'digital champion with sharp teeth'

    The government’s digital darling Martha Lane Fox has claimed that billions of pounds could be saved if the Coalition agrees to her advice to shift more services online. Fox said that the team running the Directgov website should be a “citizens’ champion with sharp teeth” and at the same time government portals should be …

    Government 23 Nov 12:01

  • Thinking about moving to service delivery?

    On Demand Here's how

    If you're looking to move your IT operations to more of a service delivery model then we may have just the fillip here. Last Friday we had The Register's Tim Phillips in a studio with Patrick Ancipink, a service management guru from CA, and Tony Lock, an analyst from our old friends Freeform Dynamics. The three of them set off …

    Service Assurance 23 Nov 12:16

  • Network card rootkit offers extra stealth

    Sneaky reverse engineering

    Security researchers have demonstrated how it might be possible to place backdoor rootkit software on a network card. Guillaume Delugré, a reverse engineer at French security firm Sogeti ESEC, was able to develop proof-of-concept code after studying the firmware from Broadcom Ethernet NetExtreme PCI Ethernet cards. He used …

    Malware 23 Nov 12:19

  • China-inspired charity aims to sex-down society

    This will solve all our problems

    A new charity, SaferMedia, has been launched to combat the menace of the sexualisation of society. Its demands for cleaning up the internet are likely to be fed into an official government review of sexualisation in childhood later this year. Around 70 delegates from a range of concerned organisations met in the Grand …

    Government 23 Nov 12:33

  • Apple MacBook Air 11.6in sub-notebook

    Review The beauty and the boast

    I took a look at the 11.6in MacBook Air for Reg Hardware almost a day after the new line-up of skinny Macs was announced. I've now had a chance to use one in earnest - and benchmark it - to see if my initial thoughts are born out by longer term usage. Apple's MacBook Air 11.6in: smaller and lighter than a netbook, but much …

    reghardware 23 Nov 13:00

  • Appro talks super-dense servers

    4 GPU + 2 CPU in 1U

    At this point, every server vendor+dog has some sort of integrated CPU-GPU system that they’re offering to their high performance computing (HPC) and other number-crunching customers. The recently introduced Tetra from Appro has upped the ante by offering more GPUs than any other manufacturer in a small 1U package. This …

    HPC Blog 23 Nov 13:01

  • Scottish botnet master jailed for 18 months

    Controlling the net from mum's front room

    A Scottish botnet master was this morning jailed for 18 months and ordered to pay £5,000 costs for hijacking many thousands of computers from his mum's front room. Matthew Anderson, 33, from Drummuir, used the global network of compromised machines to send tens of millions of spam emails. The father of five, whose own home was …

    Crime 23 Nov 13:03

  • Symbian, The Secret History: Dark Star

    Part One How it almost never set sail

    This is a story about politics and intrigue in business. It’s about the formation and early years of Symbian – a company created by the industry's giants to create future mobile devices - and it reveals stories and plans that have never previously come to light. The issues raised here are alive today as ever. This piece looks at …

    Mobile 23 Nov 13:04

  • Storage biggies lining up to buy Seagate?

    Comment New York Post gets excited

    It's either on the button or way over the top; a possible buyer for Seagate could be one of rivals Western Digital, Toshiba or Samsung. That's reported by the New York Post, and the report follows on from Wall Street speculation that Bain Capital has withdrawn from the private equity bid consortium being put together by TGP …

    Storage 23 Nov 13:09

  • What could possibly go wrong?

    Project management Risk assessment: prepare for the worst, don't frighten the horses

    Who says there isn’t much government transparency on the riskiness of recent projects? David Pitchford, executive  director of major projects, efficiency and reform group at the Cabinet Office, recently said: “We in the UK have a propensity to try to do things that have never been done before. Innovation is a good thing, but …

    Project Management 23 Nov 13:19

  • The alternatives to password protection

    Workshop Securing the desktop

    In a world where it is possible to create credential-stealing malware and where users are supposed happy to trade passwords for a bar of chocolate in a railway station survey, we ask the question: is the era of password authentication coming to a close? From the first time systems administrators looked to restrict access to …

    Desktop Management 23 Nov 13:40

  • Overland back on the NASDAQ ropes

    Delisting threat comes back

    Disk storage, tape and virtual tape data protection vendor Overland Storage is facing being booted off the Nasdaq index once again due to its declining share price and company value. It is compiling a Nasdaq compliance report and intends to regain NASDAQ compliance and so preserve its ability to raise money at competitive …

    Storage 23 Nov 13:50

  • Mature mechanoid meanders into museum

    Recognition for UK robotics pioneer

    Mention robots and most people envisage the future, but some have been around longer than us. George the Robot is one such android and has found a new home in the National Museum of Computing after 60 years of hibernation in a galaxy far, far away his maker's shed. George is the creation of Tony Sale, a former RAF officer and …

    reghardware 23 Nov 13:59

  • Ovi discovers the price of popularity

    Signing process goes titsup due to traffic snarliness

    Nokia isn't coping well with the new-found popularity of its Ovi store, with delays to the signing process driving some developers elsewhere despite public apologies. Nokia reckons it is the popularity of the Ovi store that's causing the delays, which are running into weeks... and upsetting developers who based their schedules …

    Mobile 23 Nov 14:13

  • Latest military-research boon: Game interface to rule them all

    May possibly involve becoming disembodied head in jar

    Sometimes, people suggest that military boffins are a waste of the taxpayers' money. They either develop hideous weaponry calculated to increase the amount of misery in the world, or fool about inventing pointless gadgetry which wastes our soldiers' time. Not today, though - today is one of those days when the brainboxes of …

    Science 23 Nov 14:16

  • Asus sidesteps tablets, debuts e-reader-cum-jotter

    Take note

    Asus has outed its Linux-based wireless-enabled e-book reader and digital notepad. Actually, there's rather a lot of media tablet about the Eee Note EA800, only the lack of a colour LCD limiting its ability to show video. It doesn't do Adobe Flash, either. What it does do is present a range of e-book, document, picture and …

    reghardware 23 Nov 14:27

  • Apple MacBook Air: the 2010 revamp

    Review The new line-up reviewed and rated

    Check out Reg Hardware's reviews of Apple's new Air line-up. MacBook Air 13.3in Boots in a flash, but you'll need a lot of cash MacBook Air 11.6in The beauty and the boast

    reghardware

  • How I invented Desktop Publishing

    Well, OK. Me, and a thousand others

    Today's Desktop Publishing systems like the Macintosh with PostScript are taken for granted, but it wasn't so long ago that these technologies were impossible. Early "homebrew" computer hackers recognized the demand for computer publishing and paved the way for the professional systems we use today. Some of those inventions …

    Applications 23 Nov 14:48

  • Sony readies Reader e-book app for iPhone

    Coming to Android too

    Sony has taken a leaf out of Amazon's e-book and is preparing e-book reader apps for both the iPhone and Android. The app, simply called Reader, will be out next month. It presents a similar UI to that employed by Sony's Reader line of e-book readers, and also presents the Reader Store, Sony's own online bookshop. The …

    reghardware 23 Nov 15:08

  • Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood

    Review Taking the hit

    It seems odd to complain of a sense of déjà vu when playing a sequel, especially when the game in question is the third in a highly successful series. But when that déjà vu pervades through twenty hours of gameplay, as it does in Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, it's difficult to ignore an overriding sensation that comes to define …

    reghardware 23 Nov 15:09

  • German zoo separates gay vulture couple

    Enforced reorientation provokes 'right carrion'

    German gay groups have protested the enforced separation of a couple of homosexual vultures who'd happily set up nest in Münster's Allwetterzoo. Griffon vultures Guido and Detlef had been together since March, gaily "grooming one another with tender sweeps of their savage beaks between rearranging the sticks that made up their …

    Bootnotes 23 Nov 15:25

  • Ford secrets thief caught red handed with stolen blueprints

    Was moving to China, now he faces 5 to 6 years in US jail

    A veteran auto-plant worker faces an extended spell behind bars after pleading guilty last week to stealing industrial secrets, including design blueprints, from car maker Ford and passing them on to a Chinese rival. Xiang Dong ("Mike") Yu, 49, a product engineer at Ford for 10 years between 1997 and 2007, admitted copying …

    Crime 23 Nov 15:28

  • Tools and technologies for service delivery

    Workshop What’s the cut-off point?

    Certain things in life are true, such as exercise is good for you, common sense is not so common, and budget for IT management and operations tools is hard to come by. Browse around the websites of any number of software companies and you will find technologies to make IT operations more productive, reduce costs and risks, and …

    Service Assurance 23 Nov 15:30

  • Casualty of Web 2.0: Directgov CEO job in doubt

    'Sharp teeth' claim first victim

    The government’s plan to bring management of its online services under the roof of the Cabinet Office has left the future of the Directgov CEO job, which was surprisingly vacated by Jayne Nickalls just last week, in doubt. A Cabinet Office spokesman told The Register this afternoon that once the government has a new “executive …

    Government 23 Nov 15:36

  • Turing papers could be saved after auction fail

    Reserve not met...

    The Turing papers - the almost complete collection of the great codebreaker's writings - failed to reach their reserve price at auction today. Bidders at Christie's pushed the price up to £240,000, but that was lower than the minimum price set by the seller. Google had offered $100,000 towards any purchase, and Bletchley Park …

    Bootnotes 23 Nov 15:40

  • Scareware scammers booby-trap worried Koreans

    Mean black-hatters poison Korean language search terms for border clash

    Korean language search terms for the cross-border clash between North and South Korea are already been poisoned so that scareware portals appear prominently in results. The use of black hat search engine optimisation techniques is designed to expose surfers to fake anti-virus scans that warn on non-existent threats in a bid to …

    Malware 23 Nov 15:42

  • ZT Systems boots eight-node Ubuntu ARM server

    Can't wait for the Cortex-A15

    A growing number of companies are spoiling for a fight between the ARM and x64 architectures in the data centre. The latest one to enter the ring is ZT Systems, a maker of low-powered servers that has just launched its first ARM-based server. If you ask Intel, the company will emphatically deny that there is a market for …

    Servers 23 Nov 16:01

  • UK.gov insists e-petitions won't be ditched

    Dave says one thing, Cabinet Office another

    The future of Number 10’s online petitions website is still under consideration by government despite its absence from Martha Lane Fox’s strategic review about Directgov, released today. A Cabinet Office spokesman told The Register that it was never the intention of Fox’s report to make direct reference to Number 10’s e- …

    Government 23 Nov 16:04

  • Facebook royal rant bishop suspended

    Out on his republican ear 'until further notice'

    The Bishop of Willesden has been suspended over Facebook comments regarding the forthcoming wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. The Rt Rev Pete Broadbent laid into the "nauseating tosh" generated by the royal event of the century, and suggested he and fellow republicans would do well to dodge the hysteria by pushing …

    Bootnotes 23 Nov 16:11

  • Motorola drags Microsoft to ITC, says Xbox infringes its patents

    Redmond: 'You can't, we dragged you there first'

    Motorola has complained to the ITC that Microsoft is importing kit, specifically the X-Box, which infringes Motorola's patents and should thus be banned from US shores. The infringements are already part of an ongoing legal action by Motorola, itself in response to Microsoft's actions. But bringing in the International Trade …

    Business 23 Nov 16:30

  • Elon Musk's SpaceX gets unique commercial re-entry licence

    Feds issue permit chit for Pacific Dragon splashdown

    SpaceX, the upstart startup rocket company bankrolled by famous PayPal nerdwealth hecamillionaire Elon Musk, has received the first ever commercial licence permitting the re-entry of spacecraft into Earth's atmosphere from orbit. The chit will permit the firm to carry out an imminent test of its new "Dragon" capsule. The feds …

    Space 23 Nov 16:45

  • Acer takes on iPad with Android, Flash, own UI

    Tablet trio introduced

    Acer has taken the wraps off a family of Android tablets running from a 4.8-incher through to a 10.1in model. And there's a Windows 7 model coming too. All due in April 2011 - Acer is awaiting the next major Android release, Honeycomb, presumably - they'll actually sporty an Acer-made UI rather than the Android standard. The …

    reghardware 23 Nov 17:03

  • Acer replaces laptop keyboard with multi-touch LCD

    Dual-screen... er... 'touchbook' debuts

    Tablets out of the way, we now come to Acer's other big launch: a 14in laptop with a virtual keyboard. Yes, the Iconia - as the new machine is dubbed - sports a second LCD where the keyboard usually goes, giving the laptop the look of a scaled up Nintendo DS or Microsoft's ill-fated Courier two-screen tablet. Still, the spec …

    reghardware 23 Nov 17:27

  • Opera 11 goes beta with extensions, stacked tabs

    Anything Firefox can do...

    Opera has released a beta version of Opera 11, its latest desktop browser, that offers Firefox-like extensions and a new interface meant to better organize tabs. The Norwegian browser maker released an alpha version of Opera 11 in late October, and according to the company, testers have already download more than 500,000 …

    Applications 23 Nov 18:36

  • Attachmate: Novell's openSUSE project is 'safe'

    Hawn is no Ellison

    Attachmate says that Novell's openSUSE project will continue to operate as it always has. With Attachmate shelling out $2.2bn acquire Novell, SUSE Linux customers and contributors to the openSUSE project are understandably nervous about what Attachmate is planning for the community development that underpins SUSE Linux. In …

    Operating Systems 23 Nov 19:11

  • Lawsuit says Facebook plunders user names, photos

    Seeks $1m for (alleged) Friend Finder sins

    A federal lawsuit filed on Monday claims Facebook's Friend Finder service uses user names and photos without permission and makes false claims about it usefulness. The feature encourages users to upload their entire body of email contacts so they can be reunited on the social networking site. Facebook often promotes the service …

    ID 23 Nov 19:23

  • Jumpin' Meerkats! Ubuntu moving to daily downloads?

    Updated Six months is for your dad

    Ubuntu is moving away from its established six-month-cycle and potentially to a future where software updates land on a daily basis. Ubuntu founder Mark Shuttleworth said during an Ubuntu 10.10 conference call last month that a move to daily updates would help the popular Linux distro keep pace with an increasingly complex …

    Operating Systems 23 Nov 20:26

  • Google advertisers howl over 'sudden quality score drop'

    Second howl in four weeks

    For the second time in a month, Google advertisers are complaining of a sudden drop in "quality scores" on the company's AdWords platform, and some say this is forcing them to pay more for the same ad placements. In an email to The Register, a Google spokesman said that at this point, the company "believes" that current …

    Music and Media 23 Nov 20:31

  • Browser add-on updated to slaughter Firesheep

    HTTPS Everywhere: the missing protection

    The Electronic Frontier Foundation has updated its popular web browser security tool to guard against attacks waged by the Firesheep script-kiddie snoop kit. HTTPS Everywhere 0.9.0 has been updated to force websites such as Facebook and Twitter to activate a secure flag in cookies used to authenticate users on those websites, …

    ID 23 Nov 21:25

  • Google 'sacked Apple pioneer over leaked Schmidt memo'

    Woz pal booted, says report

    Google has sacked Randy Wigginton — a software engineer who was employee number six at Apple — for leaking Eric Schmidt's memo announcing a company-wide pay raise and bonus, according to a report citing a "well-placed source close to Google." Gawker reports that Wigginton is "widely believed within the company to be the fired …

    Music and Media 23 Nov 22:17