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9th March 2011 Archive

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  • Microsoft's pledges mobile open source love

    Android and Apple stores failing compliance?

    Microsoft is clarifying which open source apps are allowed in the Windows Phone Marketplace just as a survey reckons that a number of iPhone and Android open source apps are breaking those platforms' licensing rules. Microsoft says it will update the agreement governing contributions to the Windows Phone Marketplace to make it …

    Developer 9 Mar 2011, 00:11

  • Google to kill Gizmo5 VoIP on April 3

    Pure VoIP Google Voice under test

    Google will shut down the standalone Gizmo5 VoIP service on April 3, 16 months after acquiring Gizmo5 and rolling the startup's engineers into its Google Voice team. On March 4, the company sent an email to Gizmo5 customers, saying that the service would be discontinued and that, on March 11, users will no longer be able to …

    Networks 9 Mar 2011, 05:07

  • Facebook lets users report friends who post suicidal content

    Sign of the times

    Facebook has introduced a service that allows users to report friends who have posted suicidal content on their account pages. The Report Suicidal Content form, asks for the URL where the comments were made, the user's full name and other information. From there, “A Facebook administrator will review your report and take any …

    ID 9 Mar 2011, 06:00

  • Q2 motion-controlled internet radio

    Review It's only rock and roll...

    The Q2 is the simplest Internet radio you’re likely to find. It’s good looking too, with its tidy cube shape, rubberised casing and five colour options: white, black, lime and a couple of flowery pink and blue versions. Hip to be square: Q2's Internet radio The last two colour choices presumably cater for the fashion …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 07:00

  • Govt working on 'browser-based' solution for new cookie law

    Cookies settings may be 'enhanced', says spokesman

    The government is working with browser manufacturers to create new settings that will help businesses comply with a controversial new EU law on cookies that is due to come into force in May. The government has also insisted that the EU Directive will become UK law by the May deadline, despite a warning from the Information …

    Public Sector 9 Mar 2011, 08:00

  • Bury council considers mass outsourcing

    'Increased role for the voluntary sector' too ...

    Bury council is considering a transformation programme that would involve transferring the delivery of most services to private or third sector organisations. It has published a consultation document on it future that includes a number of commitments within the programme. These begin with the key point that it "will start with …

    Government 9 Mar 2011, 08:30

  • Google guilty of copyright wrong

    Big fine to pay in France

    A French court has found Google guilty of copyright infringement and ordered it to pay half a million euros compensation to rights holders. The case was brought by film producer Mondovino along with documentary makers and photographers. The plaintiffs complained that Google had made their work available either on its search …

    Law 9 Mar 2011, 09:28

  • Anobit shipping flash stash

    From Hynix to Apple with love

    Secretive Israeli flash controller start-up Anobit is now shipping its controller with 2-bit (we think) Hynix NAND to "a world-leading provider of mobile computing devices". Well (hint, hint), Hynix supplies Apple, iPad two is shipping ... nuff said. The controller in question is the MSP2020 and it uses Anobit's memory signal …

    Storage 9 Mar 2011, 10:01

  • Org charts on steroids

    Workshop Who's the boss of you?

    Quick, grab the org chart. Today’s org chart can show much more than just who looks after the paperclips; it can also indicate departmental structure, vacancies, reporting lines, accountabilities, even job performance. Sounds handy? But where’s the org chart for your business then? Languishing in the desk of the HR director …

    Data Visualisation 9 Mar 2011, 10:10

  • VMware buys WaveMaker to float casual developers' boats

    I caught my first tube today... Sir

    VMware has bought open-source web apps outfit WaveMaker for an undisclosed sum. The software created by San Francisco-based WaveMaker is aimed at casual developers who aren't expertly trained in the coding field. VMware acquired SpringSource about 18 months ago, and WaveMaker is already part of the Spring ecosystem, so it …

    Virtualization 9 Mar 2011, 10:16

  • EMC blows benchmark away - again

    NFS before, CIFS now

    EMC has blown another file-serving benchmark away with a result more than four times faster than the previous best. A pretty much all-flash VG8 (VNX gateway)/VNX 5700 array scored 661,951 operations per second on the SPECsfs2008 CIFS benchmark. The overall response time was 2.1msecs. SECsfs2008 CIFS benchmark results The …

    Storage 9 Mar 2011, 10:17

  • Irish distie grabs Advent

    Office Supplies R Us

    Irish distributor DCC has bought Advent Data Limited – the Leeds-based office consumables supplier. Advent employs 111 people and made a profit in 2010 of €4.5m on turnover of €150.1m. Advent flogs printer cartridges and other office supplies; it claims to more than £10m in stock at its Elland warehouse. DCC, made up of five …

    Channel Register 9 Mar 2011, 10:28

  • Mole points to April iOS 5.0 outing

    MobileMe too

    Apple may have announced the release of iOS 4.3 will take place this coming Friday, 11 March, but within weeks it will show off iOS 5.0, it has been claimed. Early April will see the Mac maker take the wraps off the new version of the operating system, German-language fansite MacHead says. It cites an unnamed source it …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 10:33

  • Samsung teases with trim tablet snap

    Camera never lies, right?

    Samsung has posted a teaser shot for its upcoming 8.9in Galaxy Tab, which for some reason interweb pundits believe proves the tablet will be a skinny affair. All you can really tell from the shot is that the gadget will have an earphones socket and a textured back. You can make anything look thin if you photograph it from the …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 10:51

  • Building Windows 7 skills - will we need another 10 years?

    Windows 7 The training challenge

    Ten years of Windows XP means that the whole world knows how to use it, from administrators to users. How much training does it take to migrate to Windows 7? The answer is that the training burden falls more on administrators than on end users. One area where Microsoft has a good track record is in application compatibility …

    Enterprise Tech 9 Mar 2011, 10:54

  • Croatian brainboxes deploy calculus-based CAPTCHA

    Head-scratching puzzler

    Boffins at Croatia's Ruđer Bošković Institute are confronting surfers with difficult maths problems as an alternative to conventional CAPTCHA conundrums. Web users signing up for new accounts are typically asked to decipher the text in a jumbled up image and input the results into a dialogue box. The challenge-response test is …

    ID 9 Mar 2011, 11:06

  • iPhone lead in ad revenue generation slipping away

    Europe's Androids turn on to advertising

    Android users are seeing almost as many adverts as iPhone users, in Europe at least, and that is despite Apple customers seeing more than a billion adverts in January from independent ad network InMobi alone. Android is gaining ground fast, with InMobi reporting that it delivered nearly 750 million adverts to European Android …

    Mobile 9 Mar 2011, 11:17

  • Tesco heralds 2011 as YEAR OF ANDROID

    Grocery customers favour 'droid over iPhone

    Tesco is now selling more Android smartphones than iPhones. Before Christmas 2010, iPhones were outselling Google-powered products two to one, the grocer's mobile phone seller said today. But sales of the two platforms reached parity in January. Then, last month, Android took the lead. A problem for Apple? Not entirely. …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 11:27

  • Government needs to bring IT skills in-house

    Easier to identify a problem than achieve change, according to committee...

    A parliamentary committee heard yesterday that government relies too much on outsourcing and needs better in-house IT skills. Parliament's public administration committee was told that the failure of many UK government technology projects is partly due to being tied into large outsourcing deals with a small group of suppliers …

    Cloud Business 9 Mar 2011, 11:35

  • Apple MacBook Pro 13in

    Review Shiny, silver Sandy Bridge system

    Love or loathe Apple, you can't deny it makes gorgeous-looking computers. Are there cheaper machines? Sure. Better spec'd? Maybe not, now that the new MacBook Pros are here, complete with Intel's very latest mobile processors and an interconnect tech no one else has yet. Apple's MacBook Pro 13in: metal-head That's Intel's …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 12:00

  • Virtualising and customising desktops

    Webcast All needs not equal

    Although we've been talking about desktop virtualisation for years, uptake remains modest. Where it has been successful it has been to solve particular pain points, such as centralised management or providing standardised desktops for transaction workers. But broader adoption of desktop virtualisation has been lacking so far, …

    Desktop Virtualisation 9 Mar 2011, 12:00

  • ASA rules BT Wi-Fi service works with invisible routers

    OpenZone does work - it's just a bit shy

    The Advertising Standards Authority has ruled that BT's Wi-Fi network does extend into open spaces, even if the router isn't visible in the adverts. Despite running adverts showing people happily surfing the internet in the open air BT has successfully argued that every one of them was within 25 metres of an OpenZone or BT Fon …

    Wireless 9 Mar 2011, 12:11

  • Logitech circulates surround sound successor

    Similar setup, different design

    Logitech has upped the volume on its surround sound speakers with the release of a new 5.1 set, the official successor to the popular Z-5500 series. The Surround Sound Speakers Z906 boast 500W RMS total power output, with five 67W wall-mountable speakers and a 165W side-firing sub-woofer. The THX-certified system can connect …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 12:49

  • Anti-religious campaigners smack down census Jedis

    'Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper?'

    First signs that the purity of census results may be swayed by internet campaigning emerged this week, as the Twittersphere declared itself opposed to Jediism. Elsewhere, Jewish organisations were urging people to put themselves down as Jewish, in order to increase pressure for more Jewish faith schools. Earlier this week, as …

    Government 9 Mar 2011, 12:50

  • Gwyneth Paltrow rouses Discovery crew

    Singing thesp heralds last hours in space

    The crew of space shuttle Discovery was roused this morning by Gwyneth Paltrow's Coming Home, a choice wake-up ditty selected by the space station flight controllers in Mission Control. The venerable vehicle is on track to land at Kennedy Space Center at 16:57 GMT at the end of its final mission - STS-133 to the International …

    Space 9 Mar 2011, 12:50

  • Dentist cuffed for using lost credit card to pay for pizza

    Millionaire miser cuffed

    A millionaire has been busted after allegedly buying pizza with credit card he found on the street. Richard Lewis Ludwig, 54, a dentist from Okemos, Michigan, faces credit card theft and forgery charges after allegedly using a student's credit card to pay for fast food while on a trip to Florida. The card belonged to Harrun …

    ID 9 Mar 2011, 13:24

  • Murdoch's music dot.com pockets $77m

    Has Beyond Oblivion a hope?

    "Beyond paid downloads, beyond subscriptions, beyond piracy, and Beyond Oblivion is Music Liberation." In true 1999-era dot.com style, that's how Adam Kidron's music startup signs off its corporate communications. The venture does not lack ambition - it has amassed the largest financial war chest ever gathered by a digital …

    Music and Media 9 Mar 2011, 13:26

  • Man jailed after cops uncover 'crack in bum'

    Halfway to a speedball

    A sharp-eyed Reg reader has alerted us to the hardline policing approach taken by coppers investigating drugs crime in North London, as exposed by the Islington Gazette. The individual in question was jailed for two years for possession with intent to supply both smack and crack, the paper reports, which funnily enough are …

    Bootnotes 9 Mar 2011, 13:30

  • Pr0n stars to demo against .xxx

    What do we want? When do we want it...

    Porn stars are set to rally against the proposed .xxx top-level domain name outside the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) public meeting in San Francisco next week. The Free Speech Coalition (FSC), a porn trade group, has called a press conference and rally outside the Westin St Francis Hotel in Union …

    Telecoms 9 Mar 2011, 13:46

  • Boffin demos melon-matching tech

    NSFW-ish App snaps apple, will locate orchard

    With a firm grip on facial recognition tech already, Japanese boffins have turned their attention to food and developed a tool to identify fruit and veg. NEC's latest tech allows punters to point a camera at a product and get back when and where the item was grown. I recognise those melons This is unachievable without …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 14:38

  • Look before you leap into desktop virtualisation

    DV Mapping the road ahead

    Desktop virtualisation is today’s hot topic in IT circles but as with every innovation, rushing headlong into it without proper planning could land you in trouble. How can you go from zero to 60 in measured, sensible steps and avoid a car crash along the way? In an ideal world, you would have all your ducks lined up in a neat …

    Desktop Virtualisation 9 Mar 2011, 14:53

  • HP to put a WebOS in every PC

    Platform shootout extends to the desktop

    HP is planning to put WebOS onto every PC it sells in 2012 in an attempt to attract developers to the platform, not to mention selling HP as a provider of cloud services. The promise came during a presentation to Indian staff by Leo Apotheker, observed by Bloomberg, during which the CEO said that WebOS will be installed on …

    Business 9 Mar 2011, 14:54

  • Cute download Firefox, 'treat a cub' vid downed by IE glitch

    Red hot panda action, live!

    Mozilla is trying to encourage more people to download the final beta of its soon-to-be-released Firefox 4 browser by streaming various web cams capturing red panda cubs in captivity at Knoxville Zoo in Tennessee. The only trouble being that one of the live feeds from the zoo has "encountered" an unfortunate Internet Explorer …

    Applications 9 Mar 2011, 14:56

  • Canonical pares Ubuntu down to 2 editions

    Simplify, simplify

    Canonical, the commercial entity behind the Ubuntu distribution of Debian Linux, is going to make it easier for people to consume its operating system. Gerry Carr, director of platform marketing at Canonical, says in a blog post that beginning with the "Natty Narwhal" release in April, the company is going back to the way it …

    Operating Systems 9 Mar 2011, 15:19

  • How do you quantify service performance

    Datacentre ...and how does the customer pay for it?

    Service availability and performance are key to running businesses efficiently, given today’s massive reliance on computing systems. How do you determine how a system should perform, and how do you measure that performance? The measurement aspect is relatively simple. All modern operating systems come with basic in-built …

    Data Centre 9 Mar 2011, 15:45

  • Police expert caught with abuse images

    Techie gets 14 months

    A technology expert given special clearance to examine police computers has been caught with child sex abuse images. Joseph McCabe, a 52-year-old man from Perthshire, Scotland, was jailed for 14 months following a hearing in Perth. The court heard McCabe, who was an IT consultant in human resources for the Metropolitan Police …

    Crime 9 Mar 2011, 15:50

  • Honey I shrunk the chip ... now what?

    Lumpy atoms

    Bigger is better in pastries, paychecks and bank accounts, but not in electronics. A recent story in HPCwire caught my interest and got me thinking about what the end of the shrink road might portend – and the potential alternatives. The ability to steadily shrink the size of the processor brains that drive computers – and …

    HPC Blog 9 Mar 2011, 16:00

  • Fusion-io files for IPO

    Cashing in on the flash boom

    Privately-owned solid state storage vendor Fusion-io has filed for an initial public offering (IPO), hoping to cash in on the booming flash market. There are no details at all at the moment, other than that a filing with the SEC has been made with a notional $150m target. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are acting as lead …

    Storage 9 Mar 2011, 16:02

  • DDoS botnet attacks gold miners and wine makers

    Malware with posh taste

    Security researchers have discovered a strain of DDoS botnet agent that launches an attack against large corporate investment groups and mining-related interests. The technically unremarkable JKDDOS botnet launches packet-flooding attacks on targeted websites from malware-infected zombie PCs. Targets over the months have …

    Enterprise Security 9 Mar 2011, 16:06

  • Tree-keen Toyota plans major e-car roll outs

    Sylvan dream machine

    Toyota is banking on a big jump in the price of oil: it said today that it plans to launch rather a lot of new e-cars by 2015. The strategy will see the Japanese car giant "expand [its] line of hybrid models, launching about ten more by 2015". "About ten", eh? Nice to see Toyota likes to be precise. In addition to the …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 16:08

  • Angry Birds flies to Facebook

    Social nestworking

    Rovio's Angry Birds is officially in-flight toward Facebook, with a version planned to hit the social network site this May. The news was announced last week on Rovio's Facebook page, which claimed the new edition would be created if fans continue to hit the 'like' button. However, it seems probable the version was already …

    reghardware 9 Mar 2011, 16:13

  • The public cloud ... why bother?

    Money isn't everything

    Given the amount of noise around cloud computing at the moment, the signal can be difficult to discern. One question that tends to be forgotten in the debate is – why should you bother? Is it just about the money, as some pundits would have you believe? Given that the public cloud is not going to be right for everything, when …

    Cloud Business 9 Mar 2011, 16:32

  • Internet Explorer 9 pulls on best pants for 14 March release

    'We want to make the interwebs a more beautiful place', say two grey MS men

    Microsoft is to release its forthcoming browser Internet Explorer 9 on 14 March. The company said in a blog post that the final HTML5-heavy IE 9 software code – which comes loaded with hardware-accelerated graphics as well as a new fast JavaScript engine, codenamed Chakra – will be pushed out to all comers next Monday. …

    Applications 9 Mar 2011, 17:07

  • Republicans believe in 'climate change' but not 'global warming'

    Democrats believe in it no matter what it's called

    The likelihood of an average American agreeing that world temperatures are rising is strongly affected by the name used for the phenomenon. Americans believe strongly in "climate change", but acceptance that "global warming" is taking place is much less common. In a recent study carried out by psychologists in Michigan, 2,267 …

    Energy 9 Mar 2011, 17:09

  • Discovery glides into history

    Veteran shuttle lands at end of final mission

    Space shuttle Discovery ended its 39-mission career this afternoon at 16:57 GMT, when it landed at Kennedy Space Center. The shuttle's swansong was a 13-day trip to the International Space Station to deliver spares and the Permanent Multipurpose Module. It first launched on 30 August 1984, carrying three communications …

    Space 9 Mar 2011, 17:12

  • Google juices VP8 open source video codec

    Swimming poultry breed does faster encodes

    Google has released a new SDK for its open source and royalty-free VP8 video codec, promising faster encoding and improved video quality. Mountain View has not changed the VP8 format, merely the software around the format. The new SDK is known as "Bali", and it's the second major update to the platform. According to a Google …

    Developer 9 Mar 2011, 18:14

  • Gmail auto sorts bulk mail, notifications, forum messages

    Google claims high IQ for robot labelers

    Google has introduced a new Gmail tool designed to automatically identify and sort certain types of messages, including "bulk" mail, group mailing list "forum" messages, and notifications such as online account statements and receipts. This past August, in an effort to battle the dreaded "information overload", Mountain View …

    Applications 9 Mar 2011, 19:26

  • Microsoft to Apple: 'Oh, yeah? Well, your font is too small'

    Size matters in trademark smackdown

    Microsoft has filed another legal salvo at Apple in the ongoing dust-up over whether the term "App Store" is worthy of being trademarked. Microsoft's latest argument? That the font Apple used in its response to Redmond's opposition to the trademark application was too small. Seriously. We can't make this stuff up. Microsoft …

    Music and Media 9 Mar 2011, 19:29

  • VMware lets Apple fondleslabs tickle Windows VDI

    You know you want it

    Hot on the heels of a new 4.6 release of its View virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), launched last week, VMware is allowing a new client to reach back across the internet or internal corporate networks to use server-based Windows desktops: Apple's iPad and impending iPad 2 fondleslabs. Like the Windows, Linux, MacOS, and …

    Virtualization 9 Mar 2011, 20:05

  • Trujillo embraces his inner amigo

    Leads Latino exec movement

    Australia's favourite Ex-Telstra CEO, Sol Trujillo, may have left the country with an extra $30m in his pocket after a four-year stint taunting the government and shareholders, but that didn’t stop him from branding the experience as marred by racist "amigo-heavy" slurs. These days, it seems Sol is focusing on his Hispanic …

    Business 9 Mar 2011, 21:27

  • DDoS malware comes with self-destruct payload

    How to kill a zombie

    Attacks that have wreaked havoc on dozens of South Korean government websites over the past week have included another nasty surprise: a malicious payload the causes the infected machines recruited to carry out the assaults to spontaneously self-destruct. The DDoS, or distributed denial-of-service, attacks were first spotted on …

    Malware 9 Mar 2011, 21:29

  • Smartphones now half of Aussie browsing, says Nielsen

    Kiddies will drive new tablet buys

    Smartphones are now the engine-room of digital content consumption, according to the Nielsen Australian Online Consumer Report. For the first time, mobile internet penetration has hit 50 per cent with smartphones in the hands of over a third of online Australians. "Following in the footprint of the smartphones evolution, …

    Bootnotes 9 Mar 2011, 21:31

  • HP lays cuckoo egg in Microsoft nest

    Analysis webOS among the Windows

    Microsoft's biggest partner has laid a cuckoo's egg in the nest. Next year, every Hewlett-Packard Windows PC will ship with the Linux-based webOS as well. Recently recruited chief executive Leo Apotheker told Businessweek that putting webOS on all HP's PC would encourage software developers to create "a wider range of …

    Operating Systems 9 Mar 2011, 22:09

  • Oz governments find new use for censorship

    Kill off naughty stuff? There’s an app for that…

    Australia’s government has once again exhibited its enthusiasm for censorship, with the Minister for Home Affairs Brendan O'Connor reportedly considering setting the country’s content classifiers onto Apple's App Store and Google's Android Marketplace. Apparently unaware that Apple works hard to sanitise its walled garden, O' …

    Policing 9 Mar 2011, 22:39

  • Ingenious NetApp buys Engenio

    Boss gets sweet revenge on ex-employer

    NetApp is buying LSI's Engenio storage business. In other words, NetApp CEO Tom Georgens is buying the business he used to run. Georgens must feel particularly good. With Engenio, he was going to lead the company into independence from LSI, but the deal was pulled, Georgens quit and went to NetApp, reporting to then-CEO Dan …

    Storage 9 Mar 2011, 22:52