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31st August 2011 Archive

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  • One last production run for TouchPad

    Fondleslab’s final fling

    HP swears this is it: the end, the final, never-to-be-repeated, absolutely the last time: but there will be just one more production run of TouchPads for punters that missed out on cheap-as-chips deals when it killed off the unloved fondleslab. When retailers cut the price to shift the just-launched end-of-life stock, …

    Business 31 Aug 00:01

  • Aus regulator seeks tweaks to Telstra NBN plan

    Separation anxiety

    Australia’s competition regulator has pushed a pawn in the telco regulation chess match, soliciting industry comment on Telstra’s first draft of its structural separation regime. In issuing its 200-page-plus discussion paper ,the Australian Competition and Consumer said its “preliminary view” is that the current undertakings …

    Business 31 Aug 00:30

  • Biofuel boffins pimp panda poo

    Breaking down the tough stuff

    Pandas are famous for a restricted and difficult diet: the bamboo they favour takes a lot of digesting to yield enough energy to keep them going. Naturally enough, then, the tricks that the panda has evolved to survive turn out to be quite potent at breaking down plant material – and according to the American Chemical Society …

    Biology 31 Aug 01:00

  • IBM opens Power8 kimono (a little bit more)

    Wafer baked in 22 nanometers

    Last May El Reg gave you the little information we were able to gather on the impending Power7+ and future Power8 processor designs and their possible announcement dates in Power Systems machines. Data was a little thin, and intentionally so on the part of Big Blue. But with Oracle kicking up a big fuss over Intel's Itanium …

    Servers 31 Aug 04:00

  • Telstra unites and rebrands digital media ad assets

    Aims to get a deep TAN

    Telstra has merged its media advertising assets, Sensis Digital Media, Telstra Classifieds and BigPond Advertising into a newly created group branded the Telstra Advertising Network (TAN). The new entity will be led by Telstra stalwart Michael Padden and sit within Telstra, Innovation Products & Marketing (TIP&M). The merged …

    Servers 31 Aug 04:00

  • Subscribe to our hardware, says Brocade

    Install now, buy by the port later

    Hoping to use its elbows against Cisco’s hold on the data centre market, Brocade has decided on a pitch to the bean-counters: switches that you pay for according to the ports you’re using. The "network subscription" pricing model, unveiled at VMWare’s cloud-fest VMWorld, works like this: Brocade will ship and install the …

    Cloud 31 Aug 05:48

  • Couple can sue service that monitored their net sex

    Laptop tracking firm may have violated wiretap law

    A federal judge is allowing a lawsuit to proceed against a laptop-tracking service that surreptitiously intercepted explicit images from a public school teacher during an investigation of a stolen computer. Susan Clements-Jeffrey filed the suit against Absolute Software after one of its employees captured steamy chats and naked …

    Crime 31 Aug 06:00

  • Renault Scenic Bose Edition 1.6 130dCi

    Review A boombox on wheels?

    Many years ago, a family friend who at the time flew for the United States Air Force gave me a personal tour around a Fairchild A10 Thunderbolt and said: “Y’know, Al, she ain’t a plane she’s more a gun with wings.” Something similar could be said about the Scenic Bose Edition which isn’t so much a car as a stereo system with a …

    reghardware 31 Aug 07:00

  • Samsung outs MacBook Pro lookalike laptop

    Apple legal team rubs hands in anticipation

    Samsung, oh how you must love to tempt Apple lawyers. Launched today: the Series 7 Chronos notebook, a 15.6in machine wrapped in aluminium. With a black caclulator-style keyboard. And a black lid hinge. Yes, the Chronos is less svelte as a MacBook Pro, and not as attractively designed, either. But it's hard not to look at it …

    reghardware 31 Aug 08:07

  • London borough in miracle £250m IT deal

    No cuts, no job losses - yet big savings, apparently

    The London borough of Barking and Dagenham has signed a joint venture agreement with Agilisys to reform the delivery of its back office and support services. The IT services and outsourcing provider will work with the east London borough for seven years in a jointly owned business known as Elevate East London. The council …

    Government 31 Aug 08:26

  • Apple ejects FT app from iTunes

    30 per cent of your subs revenue belong to us

    Apple has formally booted the Financial Times newspaper app out of the iTunes store for the newspaper's refusal to hand over 30 per cent of subscription revenues to the Mac maker. That said, FT devotees with suitable iTunes accounts can still obtain the app from iTunes Slovakia: We suspect it won't be there for long. Not …

    reghardware 31 Aug 08:30

  • Tyneside police website defaced, used to serve phish

    Tunisian conflict spills over into Newcastle

    Northumbria Police Authority woke up to a host of security problems after the August bank holiday weekend. Not only was the UK police regulation authority defaced by a foul-mouthed Tunisian hacker, who made reference to the Anonymous hacking collective, but the law-enforcement authority was placed in the more serious position …

    Enterprise Security 31 Aug 08:57

  • CA inks £45m Tesco IT deal

    Taming the heterogeneous infrastructure. Mmm

    Supermarket behemoth Tesco has announced that US-based CA Technologies will take care of its IT network across the whole group. As well as your fruit and veg and the like, the £45m deal will see CA cast its eye over Tesco Group luminaries including Tesco Bank, Tesco Mobile and Tesco.com. The company will manage and monitor " …

    Business 31 Aug 08:58

  • Smartphone net access rockets

    Brits take to mobile internet like never before

    Almost half of the UK's internet users - 45 per cent of them - accessed the net using a mobile phone in the past 12 months, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) said today. That's 6m more people than this time last year, the ONS added. Oldies are less likely to do so than youngsters, of course. Only eight per cent of folk …

    reghardware 31 Aug 09:02

  • Trev's Big Adventure in Virtualisation

    Video Desktop and Server project challenge

    Trevor Pott, our adventurous sysadmin guest, never does things by halves. When a client asked him to virtualize its desktop and server infrastructure all in one go, he jumped at the chance. Danny Bradbury interviews him day by day as he grapples with missing equipment, application issues, and backup woes. Watch Video var …

    Enterprise Tech 31 Aug 09:11

  • Motorola pops Pro+

    A smartphone that won't let you sleep?

    Here's a handset that'll keep you awake: Motorola's new Pro+. Brits - especially those who ever had to stay up late cramming for exams - will know that, over here, ProPlus is a well-known brand of caffeine pill. Motorola's phone runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread and sports a 3.1in, 640 x 480 display. The screen is so relatively …

    reghardware 31 Aug 09:18

  • NHS diabetic gizmo will text for help if wearer is in danger

    hlp Im havN a lo bl%d sugA @ack

    Scientists from Swansea University are collaborating with a consortium of Welsh technology companies to develop a blood glucose-monitoring sensor that can transmit readings to the mobile phones of NHS staff. The university's Centre for Nanohealth and its e-Health Industries Innovation Centre are working on a project to develop …

    Public Sector 31 Aug 09:27

  • Mobee mods Magic Trackpad into virtual keyboard

    Customise your unwanted Apple input device

    So you bought an Apple Magic Trackpad at launch, but you've found you never use it - yes, we're thinking of you, Bob. Now it doesn't have to gather dust. It sounds like an April Fools gag, but Mobee, the guys behind the induction charger system for Apple's Magic Mouse, have launched the Magic Numpad in August. The acme of …

    reghardware 31 Aug 09:35

  • Sid Meier's Civilization

    Antique Code Show Just one more turn?

    I remember 1991 starting on a sombre note, with my sister and I sitting in a bar doing shots under an Apocalypse Now poster waiting for the start of World War III, as we watched US bombers strafe Iraq. The end of civilisation? Well, not quite. Civil engineering? Looking back on events of the time, the emerging Civilization …

    reghardware 31 Aug 10:00

  • Outbound space probe looks back at tiny Earth and Moon

    Pic Space snap puts things in perspective

    NASA's space probe Juno, outward bound for Jupiter, has sent pack a pic of the Earth-Moon system from 6 million miles away. I can see the pub from here According to NASA, Juno was further away than the Moon within a day of being launched on 5 August. Despite its speed, the craft will take another five years to reach its …

    Space 31 Aug 10:14

  • Toshiba launches thick Thrive tablet in Europe

    Skinny Excite set for the States alone?

    Toshiba will not be introducing its third-generation Android tablet at this week's IFA consumer electronics show, confounding reports and the hopes fondleslab fans. In the US, Toshiba may be preparing a skinny new Android-based tablet called the Excite, but Europeans are going to get the current chunky model, the Thrive - here …

    reghardware 31 Aug 10:17

  • Graphene photocells could mean hyper-speed internet

    Not merely broadband but grossly-obese-band now possible

    The latest study of miracle material graphene shows it could be used to provide a much higher speed internet. Yet another application for the boffin collective's research darling could be high-speed optical communications, which hadn't seemed like a practical application up to now because graphene absorbs so little light, just …

    Networks 31 Aug 10:27

  • New UK 'leccy meters remotely run via Voda 2G

    Also have ZigBee for total control of your home

    British Gas is to deploy meters with embedded mobile phones, and Zigbee networking, to ensure we know how much electricity we're using, and they do too. The smart meters use Vodafone's 2G network to send back readings and allow British Gas to see exact levels of 'leccy consumption at any time, while the Zigbee connectivity …

    Mobile 31 Aug 10:43

  • Father of Java abandons Google for floating robot cloud

    Fun times ahoy, cries newly nautical Gosling

    Father of Java James Gosling has quit Google and turned his back on tier-one tech companies altogether by joining a California start-up which makes unmanned ocean-going robots. Gosling is becoming chief software architect for Liquid Robotics, whose Wave Gliders cruise hundreds of miles offshore scooping up oceanic data – and …

    Cloud 31 Aug 10:57

  • Finding the black-spots in service delivery

    On Demand And what to do when you clock them

    Earlier this month we ran live Regcast called ‘Watermelon metrics...'’. Reg broadcast editor Tim Phillips was joined by Freeform Dynamics analyst Andy Buss and CA Technologies' Patrick Ancipink. Show Notes IT nowadays is so complex that even the best systems, operated by the best people in the game, can have black-spots when …

    Site News 31 Aug 10:58

  • Sony to ship VR-style 3D headset in November

    Japan first

    The 3D headset Sony showed off at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this past January will finally go on sale in November - though only in Japan. Each pair sticks a tiny 1280 x 730 OLED before each eye, and they also incorporate a set headphones linked to on-board decoding to simulate 5.1 surround sound through …

    reghardware 31 Aug 11:10

  • Quarter of NHS data collection to go in red-tape slash plan

    They make a desert, and call it rationalised

    The UK's Department of Health hopes to save millions by cutting data collection and red tape across the NHS. A 12-week consultation, launched on Tuesday and due to run until 22 November, aims to pool ideas for plans to slash data collection across the NHS by a quarter (25 per cent), saving an estimated £10m in the process. The …

    Public Sector 31 Aug 11:19

  • Firefox offers glimpse of new tablet version

    Slab-size Fennec looking worthy of a good fondle

    The chaps at Mozilla are showing off how well Firefox will work on a tablet computer, with new interface elements aping Honeycomb – but still no launch schedule. Firefox already has an Android version, and very nice it is too, but the emphasis of Firefox Mobile (which was known as Fennec during development) was always on …

    Applications 31 Aug 11:57

  • Don't buy your iPad in a McDonald's car park

    South Carolina fangirl finds herself fondling wood

    A young woman in South Carolina has had her dream of buying a brand-new shiny iPad in the car park of a McDonald's crushed by two swindlers, who left her with a wooden dud. The 22-year-old saw nothing suspicious in being approached by two men in the aforementioned car park nor in being offered an iPad for $300. Claiming they …

    Bootnotes 31 Aug 12:24

  • DARPA software to trawl Bin Laden laptops, thumb drives

    Mil-spook gear to deal with haul from Special Ops raids

    Famous Pentagon mad-scientist bureau DARPA says it would like some miracle software to help hard-pressed US spooks and military intelligence officers trawl through the massive troves of imagery retrieved from gadgetry seized in the ongoing massive campaign of special-forces raids across southwest Asia. The new project has been …

    Software 31 Aug 12:44

  • MySociety marshals griping commuters to fix UK transport

    'We'd have done climate change, but even Obama can't sort that'

    Commuters who like to complain have a new outlet with the launch of FixMyTransport.com, a website that gets your grievance to the right person. The new site, from charitable democracy project MySociety.org, allows the transport-weary masses to report broken ticket machines, locked gates or stations without stair-free access to …

    Odds and Sods 31 Aug 12:58

  • Last ever batch of TouchPads isn't coming to Blighty

    No cheap slabs to fondle for Limeys, Yur'peens

    Brits hoping for a cheap fondle won't get one from HP, as the final production run of the TouchPad will be bound for North America only. We knew one more production run was planned, but mobot.net managed to get official word out of HP that the slabs coming off the production line won't make it to this side of the pond, so …

    Business 31 Aug 13:19

  • Microsoft brings Hadoop option to SQL Server

    Open-source crunchware SQOOPs to conquer

    Microsoft customers running SQL Server are getting a taste of really big data processing through an injection of Hadoop. The company has released early code that will let Microsoft customers plug the open-source Java architecture from Doug Cutting into SQL Server 2008 R2, SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse for huge data …

    Infrastructure 31 Aug 13:35

  • WikiLeaks weathers DDoS assault

    Continues to spaff secret diplo cables, beg for Bitcoin

    WikiLeaks' website slowed to a crawl on Tuesday night following an apparent denial of service attack. The assault follows days after the accelerated publication of thousands of the remaining US diplomatic cables which the whistleblowing website first began publishing last autumn. The initial publication of the controversial …

    Enterprise Security 31 Aug 14:34

  • Nokia's Ovi wunderkind is off ... to Nokia-backed Vision+

    Ojanperä brings unbeatable track record - of disasters

    One of Nokia's high flyers is leaving the company – but will still be spending Nokia's money. Tero Ojanperä, an executive vice president, member of the core Leadership Team (and, don't forget, UN Young Global Leader) will head up a Nokia-backed investment fund called Vision+. The new investment fund "seeks to help communities …

    Business 31 Aug 15:20

  • Oracle's Africa dealings under FBI, SEC, DoJ investigation

    Ellison's firm up to its neck in the alphabet soup

    Oracle is reported to be under investigation by the US authorities for breaking federal anti-bribery laws in Africa. The FBI field office in Washington, fraud prosecutors in the Justice Department's criminal division, and attorneys for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are reported to be looking into sales of Oracle …

    Business 31 Aug 15:52

  • Google rolls out offline Gmail (for Chrome only)

    Offline Docs and Calendar imminent

    Google has released a new version of Gmail that operates without an internet connection, and it plans to offer similar offline versions of Google Docs and Google Calendar over the coming week. But these tools will only work in tandem with Google's own Chrome browser. The company had promised offline versions of its Google Apps …

    Applications 31 Aug 18:25

  • Mozilla addons site targeted in same attack that hit Google

    Counterfeiters mint SSL cert for addons.mozilla.org

    The secure webpage hosting addons for Mozilla Firefox was targeted in the same attack that minted a fraudulent authentication credential for Google websites, the maker of the open-source browser said. "DigiNotar informed us that they issued fraudulent certs for addons.mozilla.org in July, and revoked them within a few days of …

    Enterprise Security 31 Aug 18:34

  • DoJ files antitrust suit to block AT&T's T-Mobile buy

    Deal will 'substantially lessen competition'

    The US Department of Justice has filed an antitrust lawsuit to block AT&T's proposed acquisition of fellow wireless carrier T-Mobile USA. In a press release that hit the wires on Wednesday, the DoJ said that the $39bn deal would "substantially lessen competition" for wireless services in the US. AT&T runs what is likely the …

    Telecoms 31 Aug 19:32

  • Sydney NFC newbie gets tapped by investors

    Tapit gets VC interest in record time

    Sydney based NFC start-up Tapit Media has secured its first round of seed funding from VC group Sydney Angels. While the terms of Tapit’s seed investment were not disclosed, the Sydney Angels Sidecar Fund generally invests between $AU100,000 – $AU500,000 in its portfolio companies. The mobile start-up was founded in March and …

    Business 31 Aug 21:35

  • IBM borgs UK 'big data' outfit

    Big Blue echoes HP (The New Big Blue)

    IBM is to acquire the Cambridge, UK-based "big data" analytics outfit i2, echoing HP's $11bn purchase of Autonomy Corp. earlier this month. This is Big Blue's twenty-fifth analytics acquisition in the last five years. It spent about $14bn on the previous 24, but terms of the i2 deal were not disclosed. According to The FT, the …

    Applications 31 Aug 21:47

  • Wikileaked cable: AFACT was MPAA’s cat’s-paw

    Pope turns out to be Catholic

    A second cable discussing the “world+dog vs. iiNet” court case has emerged on Wikileaks, confirming the widespread suspicion in Australia that Hollywood was behind both the action and the choice of target. Running just slightly ahead of the last one, this cable was actually classified (“Confidential”, the lowest tier in US …

    Music and Media 31 Aug 22:11

  • Kernel.org Linux repository rooted in hack attack

    Updated Rootkit not detected for 17 days

    Multiple servers used to maintain and distribute the Linux operating system were infected with malware that gained root access, modified system software, and logged passwords and transactions of the people who used them, the official Linux Kernel Organization has confirmed. The infection occurred no later than August 12 and …

    Enterprise Security 31 Aug 22:35

  • Google+ is an identity service, Schmidt says

    Weed out evil

    Hoping, perhaps, to bring the curtain down on the so-called ‘nym wars’, Google chairman Eric Schmidt has discussed the advertising giant’s identity policies in a Q&A at the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International TV Festival. Google+, which the outside world thinks of as another social networking service, is in fact something …

    Business 31 Aug 23:00