Mar 12 2009

French police: we saved millions of euros by adopting Ubuntu

A recent report has revealed that France’s national police force has saved an estimated 50 million euros since 2004 by migrating a portion of the organization’s workstations to Ubuntu Linux. They plan to roll out the Linux distro to all 90,000 of their workstations by 2015.

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Mar 12 2009

Dealing With Fairness and Balance In Video Games

MarkN writes “Video games are subject to a number of balance issues from which traditional games have largely stayed free. It can be hard finding players of comparable skill-level to create even match-ups, diverse gameplay options can quickly become irrelevant if someone finds a broken feature that beats everything else, and some online games make your ability to play competitively a question of how much time and money you’ve invested in a game, rather than the skill you possess. In this article, I talk about some of the issues relating to fairness and balance in games, in terms of the factors and strategies under the player’s control, the game’s role in potentially handicapping players, and the role a community of gamers plays in setting standards for how games are to be played. What are your thoughts on managing a ‘fair and balanced’ gaming experience?”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Mar 12 2009

Microsoft Executive Tapped For Top DHS Cyber Post

krebsatwpost writes “The Department of Homeland Security has named Microsoft’s “chief trustworthy infrastructure strategist” Phil Reitinger to be its top cyber security official. Many in the security industry praised him as a smart pick, but said he will need to confront a culture of political infighting and leadership failures at DHS. From the story: ‘Reitinger comes to the position with cyber experience in both the public and private sectors. Prior to joining Microsoft in 2003, he was executive director of the Defense Department’s Computer Forensics Lab. Before that, he was deputy chief of the Justice Department’s Computer Crimes and Intellectual Property section, where he worked under Scott Charney, who is currently corporate vice president for trustworthy computing at Microsoft.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Mar 12 2009

Tiny Core Linux Has Just 10 MB In Size

Maybe the smallest desktop-based Linux distribution, which requires only 10 MB free space on an USB drive, CD or an internal hard disk drive, Tiny Core Linux could give you a new experience and maximum Internet speed with a customizable X desktop and by running entirely in RAM. The Tiny Core Linux distribution is powered by Linux 2.6 kernel.

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Mar 12 2009

Linux : The GIMP. Creating an industrial-style wallpaper.

This tutorial shows how to create a good-looking high-contrast industrial wallpaper. You can reproduce the tutorial with other images to bring your own style into it.

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Mar 12 2009

25 Powerful & Useful jQuery Tutorials for Dev & Designers

jQuery is everywhere, its fast and versatile, and is rapidly becoming as common on websites as CSS. The only small problem you may have is keeping up with development, keeping up with new plugins and tutorials. This article will do just that. All of these tuts have been written within the past eight weeks, bringing you up to speed with latest devel

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Mar 12 2009

Analyst: ARM to surpass Atom in 55% of netbooks by 2012

Analyst Robert Castellano from The Information Network believes future netbooks based on the upcoming ARM Cortex-A9 architecture and running Linux could create a market for netbooks at price points Intel and Microsoft simply won’t be able to match.

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Mar 12 2009

Lithium breakthrough could charge batteries in 10 seconds

A new version of lithium battery technology can either provide a higher storage density than current batteries, or can charge and discharge as fast as a supercapacitor, emptying its entire charge in under 10 seconds.

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Mar 12 2009

Robots that Mirror You: Mimicking Non-Verbal Human Cues

Several research teams are exploring ways for robots to both recognize and mimic the subtle, nonverbal side of human communication: eye movements, physical contact, and gestures. Mastering these social subtleties could help machines convey meanings to supplement speech and better respond to human needs and commands.

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Mar 12 2009

7 Prize-Winning Gadgets to Save the Planet, and Lives

LifeBelt CPR beat out a record 1,091 entries to win top honors in the annual Create the Future Design Contest, NASA Tech Briefs announced March 10, 2009. The new tool makes it easier to do the compressions for longer periods and includes a readout to ensure that the motions are done properly.

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