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11th February 2013 Archive

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  • Competition crowdsources blisteringly-fast software

    TopCoder challenge helps immune system research

    If you want a massive improvement in the software you use, the cheapest way to get it is to host a competition on TopCoder. That seems to be at least one of the discoveries made when a group of research biologists staged a competition on the MIT-operated site. A two-week contest with regular prizes of $US500 ended up costing …

    Developer 11 Feb 00:42

  • FUD flies as Raytheon reveals social media analysis tool

    Privacy crisis in progress as social media tracking again found to be intrusive

    Defence contractor Raytheon has developed a tool that can mine social media to track and predict individuals' behaviour, according to The Guardian. A global “Big Sinister Defence Company Develops 'Google For Spies' That Your Government May Already Have Bought “ story is therefore unfurling as you read this piece. The key “ …

    Security 11 Feb 01:11

  • New Zealand court hands out second peppercorn downloading penalty

    Kiwi freetards have no taste whatever

    New Zealand’s Copyright Tribunal has handed down its second decision under that country’s controversial “SkyNet” anti-downloading legislation. Once again, the tribunal has imposed a fine considerably less than that sought by the country’s music industry lobby, RIANZ (the Recording Industry Association of New Zealand). Asked to …

    Law 11 Feb 01:24

  • Australian Parliament issues summons to Apple, Microsoft, Adobe

    IT Pricing inquiry bares its fangs, prepares to bite Apple over price gouging, tiny tax bill

    The IT Pricing Inquiry being conducted by Australia's House Committee on Infrastructure and Communications has issued summons to Apple, Microsoft and Adobe. The inquiry kicked off in 2012 and is investigating why Australians pay more for hardware and software than those overseas. At current exchange rate one Australian dollar …

    Policy 11 Feb 02:35

  • Bangalore's home state takes aim at tech manufacturing

    State budget talks up exports, education and cyber cafes for 5,600 villages

    Karnataka, the Indian state that includes the IT hub of Bangalore, has announced several new initiatives planned to enhance the state's technology businesses. Outlined last week by Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar, the new initiatives will see a new Indian Institute of Information Technology, a University dedicated to …

    Policy 11 Feb 04:08

  • NABERS ... every server needs good NABERS

    Australian building rating standard comes to data centres

    New South Wales' Office of Environment & Heritage has released a version of its National Australian Built Environment Rating System (NABERS) standard for data centres. The Office oversees NABERS, a standard that “measures the energy efficiency, water usage, waste management and indoor environment quality of a building or …

    Datacenter 11 Feb 05:22

  • AT LEAST two-thirds mobile traffic will be video by 2017 - Cisco report

    Total mobe data shifted doubled during 2012

    Global cellular networks are reeling under remarkable growth rates that look like they will be sustained over the next five years, and this will be driven by video, says a recent report. According to the Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) report, with its quarterly update out this week, video accounted for over 50 per cent of …

    Mobile 11 Feb 06:06

  • Illicit phone rings in Sri Lankan inmate's back crack

    Ill-timed call rumbles rectal ruse

    A Sri Lankan lag at Colombo's Welikada jail was relieved of his illicit mobe after it inconveniently rang during a cell search, alerting officers that he'd concealed it where the sun don't shine. An official at the Colombo hospital where the phone was later extracted from the prisoner's rectum said of the ill-timed call: "The …

    Bootnotes 11 Feb 07:03

  • BYOD is a PITA: Employee devices cost firms £61 a month

    Report: Is making workers pay a false economy?

    Companies are paying £61 a month for every device their workers bring into the office, but less than half of IT departments have any say in mobile strategy these days. The numbers come from biz Wi-Fi flogger iPass, which discovered that only 48 per cent of IT departments are still in control of the spending on mobile devices, …

    Management 11 Feb 07:34

  • Don't be shy, vendors: Let's see those gorgeous figures

    Storagebod None of that five-nines crap... your actual real-life downtime numbers

    One of the frustrations when dealing with vendors is actually getting real availability figures for their kit. You will mostly get generalisations, such as "it is designed to be 99.999 per cent available" or perhaps "99.9999 per cent available". But what do those figures really mean to you and how significant are they? Well, …

    Storage 11 Feb 08:04

  • Review: HP Spectre XT TouchSmart

    The Ultrabook that reckons it's meant for bigger things

    El Reg looked at HP's 13in Spectre XT Ultrabook in October last year and liked it a lot. What you're looking at here, then, is a meatier version with a bigger display, touchscreen support, more ports and the inevitable Windows 8. I like it a lot. It looks absolutely nothing like an Apple MacBook Pro. Not in the slightest. …

    Laptops 11 Feb 09:00

  • Virtual sanity: What if GreenBytes just DUMPED its hardware?

    Analysis In theory, software-only could work just fine, argues Chris Mellor

    Should GreenBytes separate its hardware and software? The storage firm sells an IO Offload Engine which stores deduplicated virty desktop images in its own flash hardware and ships them out to client devices. It's essentially a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) accelerator for storage arrays that runs alongside them and …

    Storage 11 Feb 09:27

  • Michelin critics to football blogger: Salaud! Unhand that URL

    It's the best Michel Platini website we have ever seen

    Michelin restaurant guides have issued a cease-and-desist notice to a blogger who has nabbed the URL michelinguides.com and filled it with photoshopped pictures of European football boss and 1984 European Championship top goalscorer Michel Platini. The blogger bought the domain, retitled it "Michel In Guides" and filled it …

    Hosting 11 Feb 10:04

  • Can BlackBerry survive? Well, the woods are still full of bear poo

    Analysis BES and BBM, QED: Not RIP IMO

    BlackBerry brought its top bosses to Europe this week for its annual Jam developer event on the continent. With the launch of the new BlackBerry OS 10, and its Z10 and Q10 smartphones, now behind it, this is a good time to look at company's realistic prospects. I think the Canadian tech giant still holds a few aces, but before …

    Mobile 11 Feb 10:32

  • Playmobil punts bank-heist set to wide-eyed kiddies

    Should actually be the bank robbing the punter

    El Reg's fave toy manufacturer Playmobil has provoked a miniature rumpus by punting a bank-heist set to children. The "Bank with Safe" ensemble boasts a working cash machine although nippers are encouraged to make over-the-counter withdrawals via a pistol-waving blonde blagger - something hard-pressed parents may appreciate …

    SPB 11 Feb 11:04

  • Barrall, beam me up: 'Private cloud' biz builds Transporter device

    Interplanetary transport doodah - or networked drive?

    Data Robotics (Drobo) and BlueArc founder Geoff Barrall's new small biz Connected Data has revealed itself after gaining $6m in A-round funding and cash from a Kickstarter launch. Connected Data's product is the Transporter, a 2.5-inch disk in a small conical desktop package, which copies files to other Transporters in a …

    Cloud 11 Feb 11:26

  • The Register Guide to Windows Server 2012

    Promo Get your free download here

    Reg stalwarts Trevor Pott and Liam Proven had teamed up to write The Register Guide to Windows Server 2012 - it is fab and it is free,* and it is well worth a read. The authors deliver a great overview of WS2012 and its place in today's IT environment. Windows Server 2012 is the server version's first big update for four-and-a …

    Datacenter 11 Feb 11:30

  • Dead Steve Jobs 'made Tim Cook sue Samsung' from beyond the grave

    Attacking iPhone's chip maker wasn't a bright idea, sources now claim

    Apple co-founder Steve Jobs pressured his lieutenants into suing rival Samsung even though they didn't think it was a very good idea, sources have claimed. Tim Cook, who was promoted from COO to CEO of Apple following the death of Jobs, never wanted to sue Samsung because Apple was snapping up the South Koreans' chips for …

    Business 11 Feb 11:44

  • The data centre of the future, according to Reg readers

    Service driven, virtualised to the hilt and massively fault tolerant

    The wish list for the data centre of the future, according to Register Readers, is heavily focussed on service delivery, with tightly organised pools of resources and massive amounts of virtualisation – and of course, fault-tolerance to the Nth degree. Cloud will play a part in this, naturally. But not in the way some vendors …

    Datacenter 11 Feb 12:04

  • Multi-billion Euro broadband fund OBLITERATED by EU budget cut

    Steelie Neelie sees 2020 digital agenda for speedier networks wiped out

    A €9.2bn fund proposed by Brussels officials to help bring faster broadband to the 27 Member States by 2020 has been obliterated after the European Union agreed to a budget cut that was engineered by Brit Prime Minister David Cameron. It's a disaster for commissioner Neelie Kroes, whose digital agenda has been left in tatters …

    Broadband 11 Feb 12:19

  • Pope resigns months after launching social networking effort

    Cardinals to elect successor to @pontifex handle

    Pope Benedict announced his resignation today, becoming the first pope to relinquish the leadership of the Catholic Church in six centuries - and just months after becoming the first pontiff to join Twitter. The 85-year-old will step down at the end of the month, clearing the way for a conclave to elect his successor. He is …

    Networks 11 Feb 12:45

  • Microsoft Surface Pro launch: It's easy to sell out of sod all stock

    Frustrated fondlers: No desirable 128GB versions and too many 64GB ones

    Microsoft’s Surface Pro went on sale on Saturday, but stockists almost immediately ran into shortages, provoking anger and frustration among potential fondlers. Redmond officially launched the 64GB and 128GB versions of its Intel tablet chunkster online and at selected retail outlets in the US and Canada at the weekend. But …

    Tablets 11 Feb 13:04

  • Curiosity raises mighty robotic fist, punches hole in Mars

    Pic Rover is first bot to drill into the Red Planet

    NASA's nuclear Mars truck Curiosity has punched a hole in the planet for posterity with its robotic arm drill. Curiosity's first sample drilling. The shallow indentation on the right was part of its preparations, NASA says. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS The rover bored into a flat, veiny rock to collect a sample from the …

    Science 11 Feb 13:17

  • Bit9 hacked after it forgot to install ITS OWN security product

    Malware signed by stolen crypto certs then flung at big-cheese clients

    IT security biz Bit9's private digital certificates were copied by hackers and used to cryptographically sign malware to infect the company's customers. The software-whitelisting firm's certificates were swiped when its core systems were hacked last week. The intruders then signed malicious code and distributed it to the …

    Security 11 Feb 13:39

  • Music to investors' ears: Storage upstart Violin to go public?

    Blocks and Files All-flash cash: Is Violin Memory IPO finally happening?

    Violin Memory, the front runner in the shared all-flash array market, has been heading for an IPO for some time. According to reports, the Mountain View storage firm filed to go public last September, but the timing and price of the offering had not yet been determined. The valuation being tossed around back then was a pretty …

    Storage 11 Feb 13:58

  • iOS 6.1 KNACKERED our mobile phone networks, claim Vodafone, Three

    Updated iPhone 4S fans ruin 3G, calls, texts for EVERYONE

    Vodafone has urged iPhone 4S owners to not upgrade to iOS 6.1, the latest available, because it believes the software jams 3G and phone connections. Vodafone claimed that the bug is Apple's fault and that it affects Voda's rivals as well as its own UK network, although it only named Three Austria* as another impacted telco. …

    Mobile 11 Feb 14:36

  • Don't get 2e2'd: How to survive when your IT supplier goes titsup

    Analysis Why you should always see it coming

    I used to know a finance director who had a favourite mantra: “Minimise fixed costs.” The concept's a simple one: by all means use permanent staff to deal with the aspects of your business that don't change much, but where your revenue streams go up and down, think of ways of allowing the cost of servicing those revenue …

    Management 11 Feb 15:04

  • 'Let anyone be administrator' bug in VMware snapped shut

    Party's over, back to be being a normal Windows user for you

    VMware has published a security update for its virtualisation software including its ESX, Workstation, Fusion and View products. A range of applications made by the EMC-owned vendor should therefore be patched to squash a privilege-escalation vulnerability in the VMCI.SYS driver. The flaw affects host machines running …

    Security 11 Feb 15:44

  • Men's rights activists: Symantec branded us a 'hate group'

    'Voice for men' muzzled

    A men's issues website has cried foul after it was apparently classified as a "hate" site by Symantec. Surfers visiting A Voice for Men (AVoiceForMen.com) were confronted by a message stating that it is a "known hate site" blocking from going any further by web-filtering technology in Symantec. A Voice for Men angrily …

    Security 11 Feb 15:57

  • Cat cuffing: Japanese cops collar suspect for mass murder e-threat

    Arrested man: 'That's not true at all'

    Japanese cops have cuffed a suspect in a high-profile cyber threat and computer hacking case that had police examining a cat for clues at one stage of the investigation. Police said a memory stick found on a cat's collar led them to make the arrest. However, a whopping four innocent people, including an anime director, have …

    Security 11 Feb 16:44

  • UK financial watchdog bends Autonomy over for fresh probe

    Financial Reporting Council sniffs allegations surrounding Brit software biz

    HP-owned software house Autonomy faces more probing, this time by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC). The British corporate governance watchdog announced today it will investigate allegations that the Brit biz overinflated its value by $5bn just before Hewlett-Packard bought it in 2011. HP's buy-up of Autonomy for $10.7bn …

    Small Biz 11 Feb 17:29

  • Mellanox shoots higher and lower with long-haul switches

    Adding MetroDX for campus and a MetroX that spans 100km

    InfiniBand and Ethernet switch maker Mellanox Technologies, recently hammered because it missed its latest quarterly results big-time and gave a weak forecast for the first quarter, is sticking to its switched-fabric knitting and expanding its product portfolio, making good on its promise to flesh out a series of long-haul …

    Data Networking 11 Feb 18:06

  • Samsung laptops can be NUKED by ANY OS – even Windows: new claim

    'Guys, that's not what we meant by interoperability'

    New Samsung laptops that destroyed themselves when booting Ubuntu Linux can be bricked by ANY operating system – including Windows – according to a top embedded developer. Nebula programmer Matthew Garrett has shed new light on a baffling bug that renders shiny Sammy computers completely unusable by accident, and blamed the …

    Operating Systems 11 Feb 18:24

  • Microsoft's Azure SQL Reporting FAIL

    Updated Cloud component fails to report for duty after price-cut

    Microsoft's Azure cloud is grappling with an "unexpected outage" in its SQL Reporting component. The failure in the US East data-center hub began on Sunday night and meant the SQL Reporting Service suffered "service degradation" – a softie-euphemism for anything from intermittent connectivity to outright failure. "We are …

    Cloud 11 Feb 18:45

  • Zombie CISPA cybersecurity bill rises from Congressional grave

    Obama put on the spot over veto threat

    The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), which President Obama threatened to veto for its lack of privacy protection, has been resurrected by its sponsors and will be reintroduced to the US House of Representatives this week. CISPA sets up a framework to allow government agencies to share information on new …

    Policy 11 Feb 19:18

  • Linux Foundation ships UEFI Secure Boot workaround

    Should work with any distro, but not without hassle

    The Linux Foundation's open source workaround for Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) Secure Boot has shipped, and while it's not necessarily the easiest way to boot Linux on UEFI-enabled PCs, its authors claim it should now work with any bootloader and any distribution. The Linux community was first alerted to …

    Operating Systems 11 Feb 20:39

  • Apple said to develop curved glass iWatch with Foxconn

    Or is Cupertino simply juicing the rumor mill?

    A weekend flurry of speculative articles stoked the Apple "iWatch" rumor mill, perhaps indicating that Cupertino is secreting some well-placed leaks to pump up interest in what it hopes might be its Next Big Thing™. The Wall Street Journal, for one, reports (paid subscription required) that "people briefed on the effort" tell …

    Hardware 11 Feb 21:57

  • Chrome OS code suggests Chromebook Pixel could be real

    Support for hi-res screens, LTE, fast CPUs in the works

    The video that leaked last week purportedly showing a new, high-resolution Google Chrome OS device called the Chromebook Pixel prompted lots of debate, with many skeptics decrying it as a hoax. But Reg reader Jan-Willem Aldershoff claims there's strong evidence that such a device may indeed be in the works, based on analysis of …

    Laptops 11 Feb 22:08

  • Public told to go to hell, name Pluto's two new moons

    Measures will be taken to avoid silliness

    A poll has been opened to decide the names for two newly discovered moons of Pluto, and so far the response has been phenomenal, the SETI Institute told El Reg. The two moons, the fourth and fifth found to be orbiting Pluto, have been provisionally named P4 and P5, but now the SETI Institute has teamed up with the …

    Science 11 Feb 22:26