2004 April

“Armed with statistics from Environment Canada anticipating there will be more than 67,000 tons of electronic junk or more than 134 million unwanted computers and computer systems in Canada by 2005, Dell Canada Inc. launched a donation program for used computers in an effort to provide technology for schools and non-profit charities across the country.”

“Jonathan Westhues has built a prox card cloner. Without any special hardware and no insider knowledge, he figured out the modulation system that the cards use, built a reader, and then built a ’simulator.’ Now he has a handheld device that can clone your card without your evening knowing it…”

“…Researchers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory have designed an optical quantum device capable of storing photonic qubits.
The researchers’ quantum transponder design calls for encoding pairs of quantum bits in sets of four photons in such a way that the two qubits can be read even if one of the four photons is lost. Qubits would […]

“Imagine being treated for cancer with a couple of visits to your doctor. He simply gives you an injection and then a couple of weeks later runs infrared light over your body to activate cancer-killing agents and excise the tumor. Sound like a Ray Bradbury novel? Don’t tell Naomi Halas that. She is the Stanley […]

“Bob Young is no stranger to open source. In fact, he has one of the most recognizable names in the industry, alongside movement gurus such as Linus Torvalds, Richard Stallman and Jon ‘maddog’ Hall. After all, Young co-founded Red Hat Inc., arguably the most successful Linux vendor in the world. While Young still sits on […]

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“The second of NASA’s twin Mars rovers wrapped up its primary mission Monday, the 90th full day on the Red Planet. Opportunity will probably keep working through at least September.
‘We’re ready, willing and able to carry on with the extended mission,’ said deputy project manager Jim Erickson of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
As of Monday, Opportunity […]

“SYMPTOMS
When you browse through the folders that are in the Open dialog box in Microsoft Word 2000, you may receive an error message that is similar to the following:
Some of the files that meet the search criteria maybe missing from the list. IO error 82
If you click OK in this error message and then try […]

“When you pause or stop video playback in Microsoft Windows Media Player, the time code that is displayed by the player may differ from the time code that is displayed in the video….A supported hotfix is now available from Microsoft…The following file is available for download from the Microsoft Download Center…”

1394 devices (FireWire) don’t enumerate or disappear when others are plugged in
Troubleshooting device conflicts with Device Manager
Access violation error message The instruction at 0×77f41d24 referenced memory at 0×00000000. The memory could not be written

“BFG will give away one BFG GeForce 6800 to one person who creatively gets the BFG Technologies brand in front of as many people as possible without breaking any laws (and prove it with videotape or some other kind of un-doctored method — NO PHOTOSHOP FAKES!).
Some examples: Create a big banner […]

“…One of the mechanisms that can greatly affect a workstation’s efficiency is the file system used by the operating system to save files. If the file system is inefficient, then no matter how fast a CPU or hard drive is, the system will waste time retrieving data. XP’s default file system, NTFS, is more efficient […]

Most people know the story- nVidia itself doesn’t actually make anything but chipsets. Then it’s up to other people to turn out the video cards and motherboards that we’re all familiar with. It’s led to some confusion, because the drivers you download from nVidia aren’t necessarily the best for your video card or motherboard. Why? […]

The following is a direct quote from the iTunes Terms & Conditions. We all expect you to remember it well the next time you find yourself operating a nuclear reactor!

“THE APPLE SOFTWARE IS NOT INTENDED FOR USE IN THE OPERATION OF NUCLEAR FACILITIES, AIRCRAFT NAVIGATION OR COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEMS, LIFE SUPPORT MACHINES […]

“W32.Netsky.AB@mm is a worm that scans for the email addresses on all non-CD-ROM drives on an infected computer. The worm then uses its own SMTP engine to send itself to the email addresses that it finds.
The email’s Subject, Body, and attachment vary. The attachment has a .pif extension.”

A free (after registration) downloadable book. It’s oriented towards servers and Windows 2000, but there’s useful information for workstations and Windows XP. It’s 1.9 MB and is saved as a .cfm file - change .cfm to .pdf to have Acrobat Reader open it.

“You can track pretty much anything online these days, from the Mac Davis CD you sent your Aunt Myrtle (via Amazon), to your uncle’s flight to Newark International (via Atlanta). Now you can add American jobs to the list of ‘trackables.’
Tech labor site TechsUnite.org has launched the ‘Offshore Tracker,’ a Web-based tool that keeps a […]

“…The stereotypical view of teenage whiz kids or disgruntled computer programmers as the source of malicious code such as MiMail is often incorrect. The fact is that many experts now believe that MiMail is the work of skilled programmers operating in Eastern Europe, who launched a well-planned attack….The hackers responsible for many of the recent […]

“There is a serious problem with Macromedia Dreamweaver that can compromise critical databases if certain test scripts were left in the software when it was deployed. Since Dreamweaver is often used in developing e-commerce applications, the back door left in the deployed code needs to be removed so that critical data isn’t compromised.”

In this New York Times article(free registration required), game developers and others in the console gaming industry talk about the superior graphics technology of the Xbox and why Doom 3 (and others) will only be released on that platform.