http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/ en Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:03:37 GMT vBulletin 60 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/images/misc/rss.jpg http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/ http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12445&goto=newpost Tue, 09 Mar 2010 03:31:53 GMT Not to worry messed up hands and shoulder will be back posting in a few days Not to worry messed up hands and shoulder will be back posting in a few days ]]> Bulldog http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12445 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12444&goto=newpost Mon, 08 Mar 2010 22:59:50 GMT http://toyotasimulator.com http://toyotasimulator.com ]]> Funnies Wizard http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12444 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12443&goto=newpost Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:52:59 GMT Image: http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//classifications/computing/mobile-computing/Tablets%20and%20touchscreens/2-printing-218-85.jpg Apple has...

Apple has decided to keep the UK pricing of the iPad under lock and key but that hasn't stopped one third-party retailer from possibly blurting out a price for the company's tablet computer.

Play.com has been listed on Google Products as selling the Apple iPad for the UK price of Ł499 for the 16GB version and a whopping Ł699 for the bigger 64GB version.

Dollars and sense

There is no word whether this is official pricing, but even if it is the e-tailer's guess-work (and let's be fair it is only swapping the dollars sign for pounds) we trust its judgement more than most, considering the relationship Play has had with selling Apple goods in the past.

Just last week, the US found out it is to get the Apple iPad 3 April. Since then there has been no word on UK pricing or release date.

It does look like the US and UK will be getting the 3G version of the iPad simultaneously, however, with the press release indicating that both are to receive them at the end of April.

Apple has started the big advertising puch for the iPad this week, with the company choosing the Oscars to show off its iPad - a video which you can watch below:



Via Electric-Pig and T3.com

http://www.techradar.com/news/comput...-price--675490 ]]> Techno News Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12443 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12442&goto=newpost Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:50:16 GMT Image: http://cdn.mos.techradar.com//classifications/computing/images/avatar%20step%20by%20step-218-85.jpg Instead of cracking open your PC to...

Instead of cracking open your PC to add extra memory, how about plugging it into a docking station that also gives you a faster processor so you can run more demanding applications?

Once PCs switch over to internal optical connections based on silicon photonics instead of the copper wires that run around today's motherboards, "we'll have a new way to design that gets rid of the distance limit," says Sean Koehl, a technology evangelist in Intel Labs.

"You can move the memory. Take a very mobile device like a netbook and imagine a docking station that also gives it a connection to faster processing and more memory." That could help with cooling; your notebook could get more powerful without getting hotter.

Memory on your PC is going to get faster as well, he says. "Memory bandwidth is very important and we're working on 3D stacking; the signals are going a shorter distance, the circuits they're driving are much simpler and we get a clean signal compared to the noisy, distorted signal we have to deal with when we're making the connection across the motherboard today."

Koehl also expects stacking one memory call on top of another to need less power as well as improving the connections between memory chips. Put it all together, suggests Koehl, and you get memory that's ten times more efficient than today's DRAMs.

The future of software

Koehl spends his time thinking about what PCs will do in five to ten years' time to work out what Intel needs to design into chips to run them: "we need to understand the future of software so we understand what hardware to build; for example do we need to add more cache memory?"

Several of the projects he's interested in are about model-based computing. Sometimes that's actual models, as in the research Intel Labs in China is doing to create 3D objects from a series of digital photos; think Microsoft Photosynth running on your own PC, making 3D copies of real objects that you can use in virtual world.

It needs 25-30 photographs from a standard digital camera, rather than special equipment and you don't need to position the camera precisely or give the software details of how far away the camera was from the object; the system calculates all that.

Today it takes a trained 3D artist to make a good model; in the future Koehl suggests it's going to be as easy as writing a blog post.



STEP BY STEP: Take the photos and one day your PC will make the 3D model

The same process could make a realistic avatar of your head that can keep changing expression by tracking your actual face through your webcam. The software combines the 3D model it generates from the photos with generic models of faces (automatically derived from scanning thousands of photos, so the system learns, for instance, that mouths move but noses don't).



GO 3D: In the lab Intel can work out where the camera that took a photo was

Models could also help you drive more safely, or even let your PC drive your car: Intel is working with Neustar in China on a Larrabee-based in-car system that could identify pedestrians and other cars on the road.

"In the long term," hopes Koehl, "it could lead to automated cars that drive themselves safely – or at least pull over safely if you fall asleep at the wheel!"


http://www.techradar.com/news/comput...of-2020-675397 ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12442 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12441&goto=newpost Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:44:04 GMT More Info: http://www.spirecoolers.com/main/press_news.asp Spire has just announced the launch of their newest CPU cooler, TherMax Eclipse II... More Info: http://www.spirecoolers.com/main/press_news.asp

Spire has just announced the launch of their newest CPU cooler, TherMax Eclipse II (SP984B1-V2). Compatible with AMD (sockets AM2/AM3/939/940) and Intel (sockets 775/1156/1366) processors, this new cooler features an aluminum heatsink and five 8-mm copper heatpipes that make direct contact with the processor. TherMax Eclipse II CPU cooler is equipped with two 120-mm fans with speed (2,200 rpm max; 29 DBA max) controlled manually thru a external device installed on one of the expansion slots available on PC. This cooler is now available for USD 52.99.







http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/news/ ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12441 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12440&goto=newpost Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:20:05 GMT "Researchers at US-CERT have warned that software accompanying the Energizer DUO USB battery charger contains a Trojan that gives hackers total access to a Windows PC. The product was sold in the US, Latin America, Europe and Asia starting in 2007. Upon installation, the software creates the file 'Arucer.dll,' a Trojan that listens for commands on TCP port 7777. Upon receiving instructions, the Trojan can download and execute files, transmit files stolen from the PC, or tweak the Windows registry. Uninstalling the software disables the automatic execution of the Trojan. Users can also remove Arucer.dll from Windows' system32 directory and reboot the machine to disable the backdoor component."

http://www.computerworld.com.au/arti...e_infects_pcs/

Also reported (and referenced) on /.

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/10/03/08/1531228/Energizer-USB-Battery-Charger-Software-Infects-PCs?from=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed &utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Slashdot%2Fslashdot+%28Slash dot%29 ]]> Off Site News Wizard http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12440 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12439&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:36:07 GMT Image: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/wp-content/uploads/newegg-sells-fake-core-i7-cpus-9-300x225.jpg In an almost surreal tale of events, USA...

In an almost surreal tale of events, USA electronics retailer Newegg has discovered a reported 300 counterfeit Intel Core i7 920 CPU’s in its inventory, some of which were inadvertently shipped out to buyers!



Initial reports of the fakes began yesterday when at least 5 separate incidents totaling 9 fake processors cropped up on Youtube, HardOCP and the Overclockers.com forums. The recipients of the fakes had all purchased the CPU’s from Newegg.com within the past few days.



We contacted Newegg and a representative confirmed that they did in fact receive “incorrect inventory” in the form of fake processors from a vendor and that they were working to rectify the matter as quickly as possible. Unfortunately further questions about how they intended to resolve the matter with the unfortunate purchasers or details about where the counterfeits came from and how they managed to slip by screenings were ignored.



The pictures below, taken by the unwitting buyers tell the story. The heatsink had been swapped with a rather crude epoxy or clay like molding of the stock Intel HSF, with a picture of the fan’s top part attached. The CPU was layers of of metal and PCB with a fake IHS on the top and a sticker attached with typical Core i7 information. The box itself was riddled with spelling errors, and to bypass the security seal, the box was printed with a “Intel Factory Sealed” sticker look alike and a clear sticker attached over top.



Intel does provide “security” windows on its packaging in order to verify that the CPU and fan are in fan in the box, however, it does not show the full components.



It is expected that Newegg will replace the processors very quickly and an investigation into the perpetrators of such a unique crime will likely begin. No others reports of fake CPUs from North American retailers has been heard and a source with retailer NCIX.com confirms that the company has already checked their stock and found no fakes.



If the rumoured HardOCP number of 300 counterfeit units is accurate, it that would represent a street value price of over $85,000 USD.



Update (03/05/2010 4:30PM PST) Newegg has released an official statement regarding the incident, attempting explain the ordeal as a shipment of “demo boxes” by a supplier.



Newegg is aware of a shipping error that occurred with certain recent orders of the Intel Core i7-920 CPU. After investigating the issue internally it appears one of our long term partners mistakenly shipped a small number of demo boxes instead of functional units. Our customer service team has already begun proactively reaching out to the affected… See More customers. In line with our commitment to ensure total customer satisfaction, we are doing everything in our power to resolve the issue as soon as possible and with the least amount of inconvenience to our customers.

Pictures and information from the following sources:

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/news/...e-i7-920-cpus/


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1500534

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/s...51#post6422351

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54tDqM5-6RU

http://www.mixedmartialarts.com/mma....2&page=1&pc=19

http://www.overclock.net/rants-raves...20-retail.html ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12439 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12438&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:32:48 GMT The BBC has tried to draw a line under its decision to bar open source implementations of RTMP (real-time messaging protocol) streaming in the... The BBC has tried to draw a line under its decision to bar open source implementations of RTMP (real-time messaging protocol) streaming in the iPlayer, after The Register revealed (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02..._verification/) the Corporation's quiet switcheroo last week.

BBC online managing editor Ian Hunter claimed in a blog post (http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcintern...rotection.html) today that the term "open source" had been "conflated" by users who had grumbled about third party RTMP plugins being locked out of the catch-up service.

"We know that a number of applications have been making unauthorised use of some media types and we have tightened security accordingly - this was done for several of the formats and content delivery types, not just for Flash," said Hunter. "The result was that some applications that 'deep link' to our content may no longer work."

He was also at pains to insist that the decision had not been made to appease Adobe.

"It's important to note that this has nothing to do with Flash, and it's nothing to do with support for open source. In fact we continue to make our content available as H.264 or SSL, both of them open standards that have nothing to do with Flash or with Adobe," he said.

Hunter said people had drawn the wrong conclusion because the first iPlayer users to be affected by the change were linking to the BBC's Flash streams. Auntie has now added what the BBC online MD described as "similar protection levels" to that which already existed with its open source streams.

At the same time, he reaffirmed that the iPlayer is available in a range of media formats, based on open source and/or proprietary tech.

"The discussion around this issue suggests that two different uses of the term 'open source' are being conflated," said Hunter.

The Beeb hasn't altogether blocked out open source formats, he noted. But he also acknowledged the "unfortunate" demise of the open source XBMC plugin, which "stopped working" after the BBC tightened up its "content protection".

Hunter also reminded UK iPlayer viewers and listeners that the corporation uses Windows Media, Adobe and OMA digital rights management (DRM) systems for downloads, while streaming is subject to (acronym alert!) SSL, RTMP, RTSP and HTTP DRMs.

Returning to his "conflated" claim regarding the use of the term "open source" by critics of the third party RTMP streaming blockade, Hunter had this to say: "The two "open sources" are quite different to each other - we have no particular attachment to Flash over open source formats. In fact most of iPlayer is built on open source products.

"However, we do need to protect our content from applications that threaten to make unauthorised use of it, even if those applications are themselves open source."

Meanwhile, the BBC is working on adding more devices and platforms that are both "legal and supported", said Hunter. However, he didn't reveal further details about development in that area, nor on when support might arrive.

El Reg was first to report last week that the Beeb had quietly applied the update to its online video catch-up service on 18 February.

The tweak meant that free RTMP plugins offered by the likes of the XBMC community - whose code is based on the GNU General Public Licence v2 - were prevented from streaming iPlayer content.

In effect, the Beeb shut the door on "unauthorised" video player applications by applying Adobe's SWF verification, which locked down the iPlayer in Flash, to its system.

Since then the BBC has been inundated with complaints about the unannounced change to its service. However, the BBC Trust, which is the corporation's governing body, later confirmed (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03..._verification/) to the Reg that it had no plans to investigate the gripes.

"The Trust is currently consulting on the BBC's 'on demand' services which covers some iPlayer functions," we were told.

So anyone wishing to grumble (https://consultations.external.bbc.c...n/consult_view) about the Beeb's plugin lockdown has until next Friday (12 March) to do so. ®

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03...nse/print.html ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12438 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12437&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:30:40 GMT March 4, 2010, 09:07 AM — Computerworld —


The North Korean government appears to have developed its own graphical Linux-based "Red Star" operating system, though its people still prefer that symbol of Yankee high-tech imperialism, Microsoft Windows.

That's according to the blog of a Russian college student, 'Mikhail,' studying at a university in North Korea's capital city, Pyongyang.

According to translations of the blog by Russian satellite news channel, Russia Today, as well as Google's Translate tool, installation DVDs of Red Star can be freely purchased in Pyongyang for $5 and come in both client and server versions.

Red Star requires, at minimum, a Pentium III 800 MHz CPU (state-of-the-art in developed countries about ten years ago), 256MB of RAM and 3GB of hard disk space.

Installation takes 15 minutes, and users may only choose to run it in the Korean language. A more serious quirk: The clock on the bottom right shows the year in both the standard international Gregorian calendar, and the North Korean "Juche Idea," in which 2010 is the year 99.

Local North Koreans told Mikhail that Red Star is not stable, and that they still prefer Windows XP, Vista or 7.

Mikhail did not comment on what version of Linux that Red Star may be built upon. Cuba released its own version of Linux last year called Nova that is based on Gentoo, a Linux variant that is run by a foundation based in New Mexico.

Red Star includes applications such as a thinly disguised version of the Mozilla Firefox browser, an OpenOffice.org-like productivity suite, an e-mail client called 'Pigeon,' and a number of other utilities.

Two programs that were apparently developed by North Korea include a firewall program called "Pyongyang Fortress," and an antivirus application called "Woodpecker."

The browser's search engine defaults to the North Korean government's official Web site, Naenara.

Read more about operating systems in Computerworld's Operating Systems
Knowledge Center.

http://www.itworld.com/operating-sys...gui-linux-guts ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12437 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12436&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:28:42 GMT PC-BSD 8.0 was released last week and while we have already delivered FreeBSD 8.0 benchmarks including against Debian GNU/kFreeBSD and Fedora /... PC-BSD 8.0 was released last week and while we have already delivered FreeBSD 8.0 benchmarks including against Debian GNU/kFreeBSD and Fedora / Debian / OpenBSD / OpenSolaris for which PC-BSD is based, we took this opportunity to deliver a fresh set of *BSD benchmarks. In this article we have benchmarks of PC-BSD 8.0 x64 against Kubuntu 9.10 x86_64.



For this PC-BSD vs. Kubuntu benchmarking we used a Lenovo ThinkPad T61 notebook with an Intel Core 2 Duo T9300 processor, 4GB of DDR3 system memory, a 100GB Hitachi HTS72201 SATA HDD, and a NVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M graphics processor. PC-BSD 8.0 is derived from FreeBSD 8.0 and as such it uses the FreeBSD 8.0-RELEASE-p2 (x64) kernel, comes with KDE 4.3.5 installed by default, uses X.Org Server 1.6.5, comes with the NVIDIA 195.22 proprietary driver by default, arrives with GCC 4.2.1, and uses a UFS file-system. Meanwhile, Kubuntu 9.10 has the Linux 2.6.31 (x86_64) kernel, KDE 4.3.2, X.Org Server 1.6.4, GCC 4.4.1, and an EXT4 file-system. Each OS was left in its default configuration.

The Phoronix Test Suite is compatible with Linux, Mac OS X, OpenSolaris, and *BSD systems (and limited Windows support too at this time) and as such we used our open-source automated testing framework for running today's tests.



Starting our PC-BSD vs. Kubuntu benchmarking with LAME MP3 encoding, the Canonical OS came out slightly ahead of PC-BSD, but not by a very sizable margin.



PC-BSD 8.0 actually beat out Kubuntu 9.10 when it came to the 7-Zip compression performance by 14%.



Compressing a 2GB test file was much quicker under Kubuntu 9.10 with the EXT4 file-system than PC-BSD 8.0 with UFS.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...nchmarks&num=1 ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12436 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12435&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:20:14 GMT Kontron is readying an Intel Atom Z530-based box computer designed for rugged railway applications. The MicroSpace MPCX28R Railway Box PC is... Kontron is readying an Intel Atom Z530-based box computer designed for rugged railway applications. The MicroSpace MPCX28R Railway Box PC is protected for railway use with EN50155 certification, TX compliance, extended temperature support, 1.5kV isolated power, and M12 connectors for Fast Ethernet, USB, and power, says the company.

The Linux-compatible MicroSpace MPCX28R is suitable for passenger infotainment, security, and other railway applications, says Kontron. Built around the original 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 CPU and SCH US15W northbridge/southbridge, the MicroSpace MPCX28R supports up to 1GB of DDR2 RAM, the company says.



Kontron MicroSpace MPCX28R Railway Box PC
(Click to enlarge)

The MicroSpace MPCX28R has a front-accessible slot for optional Compact Flash media, an eSATA port, and a bay for an optional 2.5-inch, 80GB SATA hard disk drive or 32GB solid state drive, says Kontron. A PCI/104 expansion slot is provided too, along with dual PCI Express Mini Card slots that are said to offer expansion options including dual-CAN, GPS, GSM/UMTS, and WLAN.

The MicroSpace MPCX28R uses rugged M12 interface connectors for dual fast Ethernet ports, a USB 2.0 port, and a power connector for the 1.5kV isolated power supply, says Kontron. In addition, the front of the Box PC offers two standard USB 2.0 ports, dual 3.5mm jacks, and a SIM slot for mobile communications, says the company.

In the back, there are two additional USB 2.0 ports, adding up to five USB ports in total. Also rear-facing are dual COM ports that use "robust" D-sub connectors, as well as a DVI-I port for analog and digital video signals that is said to support up to 2048 x 1536 resolution.

Housed in a rugged profiled-aluminum case measuring 7.48 x 6.26 x 2.60 inches, the passively cooled system offers both standard, 10-54 VDC voltage, as well as 1.5kV isolated DC voltage (24/36/48/72/110 VDC). Both are said to typically run at 15 Watts.

The standard version offers a wide temperature range of -13 to 131 deg. F (-25 to 55 deg. C), and an extended temperature version boosts that to -13 to 158 deg. F (-25 to 70 deg. C), says Kontron. By ship date, the computer will be certified against violent impacts via compliance with the EN50155 railway standard, and will also offer TX compliance and an optional IP52 enclosure, says the company.

Specifications listed for the MicroSpace MPCX28R include:
Processor -- Intel Atom Z530 @ 1.6GHz with Intel US15W northbridge
Memory -- 1GB DDR2 memory
Storage:
1 x CF slot
1 x eSATA port
1 x bay for optional 2.5-inch 80GB HDD or 32GB SSD
Expansion -- 1 x SIM slot; 1 x PCI/104 slot; 2 x PCIe Mini Card (see expansion options below)
Display -- 1600 x 1200 (UXGA); 2048 x 1536 (via DVI-D port); customer-specific DVI-A interfaces
Networking -- 2 x 10/100 Ethernet (both via M12 connectors and with Wake-on LAN; one with LAN boot)
Standard I/O:
2 x USB 2.0 front
2 x USB 2.0 back
1 x USB 2.0 (M12) back
2 x RS232C/RS422/485 (COM 1/2)
4 x DC-isolated digital I/O
Optional interfaces (via PCIe or SIM slot):
LPT port (in place of digital I/O)
WLAN MiniCard Intel 4965AGN with antenna cable
UMTS/HSDPA 7.2Mbps (Telit UC864-G) with 12-ch GPS and antenna cable
GPS option assembled with antenna cable
MiniCard GSM/UMTS/GPRS assembled, with antenna cable
2 x Peak CAN opto-isolated
Audio -- 2 x stereo audio 3.5mm jacks
Standard DC voltage -- 10-54 VDC; typ. 15 W
1.5kV isolated DC voltage -- 24/36/48/72/110 VDC; typ.15 W
Ruggedization/railway standards-- IP52 enclosure (optional); EN50155; TX
Operating temperature -- -13 to 131 deg. F (-25 to 55 deg. C); ext. temp version -13 to 158 deg. F (-25 to 70 deg. C)
Dimensions -- 7.48 x 6.26 x 2.60 inches (190 x 159 x 66mm)
Weight -- 3.53 lbs (1.6 k)
Operating system -- Linux; Windows XPe/XP/Vista/7
Availability

The MicroSpace MPCX28R Railway Box PC is expected to be available in the first quarter in EMEA and in the fourth quarter in North America and APAC, says Kontron. More information may be found here.

http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/N...ailway-Box-PC/ ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12435 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12434&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:14:00 GMT awn-of-the-data asks: What is a zombie process and how do I get rid of it? DistroWatch answers: UNIX administrators have colourful names and... awn-of-the-data asks: What is a zombie process and how do I get rid of it?

DistroWatch answers: UNIX administrators have colourful names and descriptions for things, especially when it comes to processes. For example, when one program or process starts another process, the original is referred to as the "parent process" and the new process is called the "child process". When a child process is finished its task it "dies". The parent process is notified of its child's death and the child's information is removed from the system.

But sometimes a child process dies and the parent process doesn't stop to collect the information. When that happens, the child process itself is removed from the system, but a marker or "death certificate" is left behind, waiting to be collected. These uncollected death certificates are referred to as "zombie processes". These are rarely problems in themselves as they take up very little memory, but finding zombie processes usually means there's a bug in the parent program.

Let's say you've been monitoring your system and you've found a zombie process, what can you do about it? The first thing to do is find out which process is the parent of the zombie. You can do this by running the command

ps axo stat,ppid,pid,cmd | grep ^Z

The output will show you all zombie processes on the system with the ID number of their parent in the second column. We can then remind the parent that they have zombie children running wild by sending them a signal. Let's say that the parent process ID is 12889, for example. We could remind this process to collect its child's death certificate by running

kill -SIGCHLD 12889

However, if the parent refuses to handle the signal and collect the child's data, then we have to choose between leaving a zombie in the system and killing the parent process. When a parent process dies, any children it has are turned over to the init service. The init service regularly checks the status of its children and collects any death certificates, removing zombies from the system. We can try killing the parent nicely by asking it to terminate using

kill 12889

where 12889 is the parent's process ID. But, if the parent is stubborn and refuses to go quietly, we can force the issue by running

kill -9 12889

At that point, the parent process will be removed from the system, its children (including any zombies) are given to init and the zombies will be removed.

http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20100301#qa ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12434 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12433&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:11:10 GMT In addition to his first e-mail to me, David Gurvich adds more about his experiences with Intel i830m video in Linux and PC-BSD/FreeBSD: I did think... In addition to his first e-mail to me, David Gurvich adds more about his experiences with Intel i830m video in Linux and PC-BSD/FreeBSD:
I did think the problems with FreeBSD were due to using PC-BSD and installing a lightweight desktop on top. After testing with a bare install that turns out to not be the case and the issue is with FreeBSD and has nothing to do with the scripts that PC-BSD uses.
I have not tested OpenBSD but most of the wireless drivers on FreeBSD have been ported from there. I suspect there is a difference between the two that causes these drivers to crash the system on FreeBSD. The primary reason that I was interested in FreeBSD was ZFS support and wanted to setup a file server. The network issue stopped that in it's tracks.
There is a graphical network tool in the FreeBSD ports that seems to work ok but most of my settings were with wpa_supplicant and rc.conf. I believe that PC-BSD has it's own graphical network configuration tool but didn't use that.
Flash does have issues on FreeBSD and I don't recommend installing the linux compatibility to use flash. Instead, use wine with a windows browser. There is a memory leak in the linux flashplugin on FreeBSD that will eventually cause your system to freeze until you kill nspluginwrapper. The same technique may work on OpenBSD.
I have tried Fedora 12 on this laptop and that worked somewhat after tweaking a number of parameters. By somewhat I mean that I had random Xorg crashes and the tweaks simply mitigated the frequency. I gave F12 about 2 months but just could not take the crashes. Fedora 12 is working well on the other systems that I've installed it on but there was a problem with one that had ATI video which required building an xorg module from git.
I am currently using Arch linux on the X30 and, since configuring the boot parameters with 'nomodeset' and locking the xf86-video-intel driver to 2.9.1, have not had any issues with video. The main problem has been with the networking scripts and I am still not sure what the issue is there but installing wicd-1.7 seems to have worked around that. I am impressed with the speed vs Fedora 12. The reason I am impressed is that, prior to Arch, Fedora 12 had been among the fastest distributions on the X30 with a useable firefox in under 2 minutes. The X30 from startup to a working firefox connection takes 45 seconds in Arch.
The main issue I will have with Arch is likely the very reason Arch is so responsive. Rolling releases don't keep old packages around and new versions can cause random failures on working systems. That means that I will need to maintain a list of packages that should not be upraded and be careful on upgrades. Nothing new to anyone who has used Gentoo.
I've currently had Arch installed on the X30 for a month and have had no issues to deal with since the video and networking were fixed. The livecd boots to a text console and I recommend looking at the arch installation guide. Pretty much everything needs to be configured but the wiki makes that simple.
David Gurvich


David, you hit on a number of important points. I will definitely try Fedora 12 to see how it works with i830m, and I agree with you that Arch is an excellent choice. I've written many times about how the Arch community has been a great resource for me in solving my X issues with i830m all the way from Debian Lenny through now.

I neglected to mention ZFS in FreeBSD. That certainly is something to recommend in its favor. There's also a project bringing journaling to soft updates in FreeBSD's UFS filesystem that I heard about in this BSD Talk episode.

I'm not terribly happy about Flash being so problematic in FreeBSD. I forget all the trouble I had with the Opera browser in OpenBSD. That browser and its Flash plugin uses OpenBSD's Linux compatibility layer, and I was eventually able to stop most crashes by changing a parameter in Opera.

Here's what I'm hoping for:
People smarter than me will figure this out and either make allowances in the kernel and xorg, or will create some other kind of mechanism that doesn't leave users of Intel 830m video chips out in the cold
HTML 5 will sooner than later take hold with an open video codec and return Flash to what it's good at, which is little applications that I can safely ignore, and stop doing what it's bad at, which is delivering video that can better be handled by a plethora of other formats. The easiest way for this to happen would be for Google to open-source the on2 video codec it recently acquired. (Except that Google already converted the entire YouTube library to the loved-by-Apple patent-encumbered H.264.)

I've run BSD before, and if Linux/Xorg throws Intel 830m under the bus, I'll be an enthusiastic user of any system that doesn't follow along.

http://insidesocal.com/click/2010/03...sight-int.html ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12433 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12432&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:09:02 GMT Morgantown, WV, Mar 4, 2010 -- Warren Woodford has released SimplyMEPIS 8.4.99, RC2 of MEPIS 8.5, now available from MEPIS and public mirrors. The... Morgantown, WV, Mar 4, 2010 -- Warren Woodford has released SimplyMEPIS 8.4.99, RC2 of MEPIS 8.5, now available from MEPIS and public mirrors. The ISO files for 32 and 64 bit processors are SimplyMEPIS-CD_8.4.99-rc2_32.iso and SimplyMEPIS-CD_8.4.99-rc2_64.iso respectively. Deltas are also available.

Warren reported: "In the past week, we've fixed some bugs reported by the community and updated the MEPIS Assistants. And we've updated some packages containing bug fixes: digikam 1.1.0, ghostscript 8.71, kdebase-workspace 4.3.4-5 and wl-modules 5.60.48.36. The community is hard at work on translations, updated manual, and a couple of new utilities. I expect RC3 to be ready in a week or so. It should be the last RC before we go final with 8.5."

Progress on SimplyMEPIS development can be followed at http://twitter.com/mepisguy or at http://www.mepis.org OEMs, VARs and SIs interested in MEPIS security, server, workstation or desktop technology should contact sales@mepis.com

ISO images of MEPIS community releases are published to the 'released' subdirectory at the MEPIS Subscriber's Site and at MEPIS public mirrors. To support the ongoing development of MEPIS community editions, users are encouraged to go to become MEPIS Subscribers at the MEPIS store at http://www.mepis.org and/or help out at the MEPIS community sites: http://www.mepislovers.org and http://www.mepiscommunity.org.

About SimplyMEPIS
SimplyMEPIS is a mature and ready to use desktop operating system for PCs and Apple computers that have Intel or AMD 32 or 64 bit processors. It is easier than Vista and it does its best to be intuitive for Windows and OSX users. SimplyMEPIS includes all of the applications that most users need and want. SimplyMEPIS is designed to replace or work side by side with Win7, Vista or XP on PCs and OSX and Windows on Apple computers.

About MEPIS LLC
Founded in 2002, MEPIS LLC develops and maintains MEPIS Linux as a foundation that allows MEPIS business partners to build and deploy virtualized data center, secure server and desktop solutions that integrate and provide a migration path for utilizing hardware virtualization, IPv6, IPsec and DNSsec. MEPIS also offers senior consulting services for product strategy, architecture design, business and systems analysis, and cross-platform software development.

http://www.mepis.org/node/14244 ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12432 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12431&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:54:19 GMT In all the talk about New York financier Paul Singer’s plan to go all Gordon Gecko on Novell, one word has not been mentioned nearly enough. ... In all the talk about New York financier Paul Singer’s plan to go all Gordon Gecko on Novell, one word has not been mentioned nearly enough.

Microsoft.

Microsoft needs a viable Novell, and Novell’s Linux business was on the verge of becoming viable when Singer’s Elliott Associates swooped in with an offer to break up the company, seize its cash, split off the old NetWare business, and auction off Suse Linux.

I doubt Microsoft wants to actually buy that business. Owning a Linux would be a real complication. Suddenly all those patent cross-licenses that claim Microsoft has patent rights to the software take on a different odor, and Microsoft is forced to go down the SCO road to prove its claims.

Microsoft has been doing well against Linux through bluff. What the Elliott move does is threaten to make Microsoft show its hand.

Even the due diligence process could threaten Microsoft. Singer is going to get a look inside that 2006 agreement.

It’s a prime company asset and, even though it’s protected by a non-disclosure agreement, things get out. Stuff leaks. Knowing exactly what Microsoft claims to own in legal documents would tell open source advocates what must be changed to eliminate the threat.

In the Wall Street ocean Novell has become a minnow and Microsoft remains a whale. (Singer’s a shark, and isn’t it gratifying this big GOP contributor now thinks there are greater opportunities here than the Congo.)

Feel free to advise Microsoft in the comments. For now I’ll leave you with Gecko’s greatest hit, from the IMDB database:

The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed, you mark my words, will not only save Teldar Paper, but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA.

Just change Teldar Paper, the fictional firm at the heart of the 1987 movie Wall Street, to Novell. (And here’s a trailer for the sequel.)

http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=5987 ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12431 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12430&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:52:02 GMT One of the big things that Google Chrome introduced is the idea of out of process plugins. It's something that has now (finally!) landed in Mozilla -- albeit in the Alpha 2 release of Firefox 3.7 (officially called Mozilla Developer Preview 3.7 Alpha 2).

When I visited Mozilla Toronto back in January, Mike Beltzner Director of Firefox explained to me what the big deal was with out-process-plugins (read the linked story for full details).

Basically it means less browser crashing and better performance for the browser as plugin processes are isolated. Plugins are things like Flash which can often be the culprit when a browser grinds to a halt.

As part of the testing phase with the new 3.7 alpha 2, crash reports from plugin processes are now submitted automatically. In the limited usage that I've had thus far, I haven't noticed any abnormal plugin behavior at all.

Unlike Chrome, there isn't a specific Task Manager type menu to specifically see how much memory a plugin may be using so it's difficult as a regular end-user to see the actual impact. But so far so good.

The Alpha 2 follows the alpha 1 release by just under a month. While out-of-process plugins are now in the 3.7 build, I'd also expect them to show up in the 3.6.x Lorentz branch soon too for regular users. Mozilla's Lorentz is an effort to put new features (that don't break backwards compatibility) into the current release cycle -- as a way to expedite innovation.

http://blog.internetnews.com/skerner...process-p.html ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12430 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12429&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:49:45 GMT MontaVista Software has always been a leader in embedded-Linux commercialization. The company has developed Linux-development platforms since 1999,... MontaVista Software has always been a leader in embedded-Linux commercialization. The company has developed Linux-development platforms since 1999, when founder Jim Ready pledged to bring "100% pure Linux" to the world under the GNU (GNU's not Unix) GPL (general public license). Since then, MontaVista has specialized in embedded and real-time Linux.

Its approach is not simply an RTOS (real-time operating system) that runs Linux as one of its tasks. The company has changed the Linux kernel to provide determinism and real-time performance in a real Linux operating system. Cavium Networks recently acquired the company, which just announced the release of Version 6 of its operating system.

See also: The Electronics Weekly Open Source Engineering blog

In addition to designing real-time Linux, MontaVista has been working on the development of real-fast Linux, a Linux operating system that boots in less than 1 second. The team who worked on the project includes Alexander Kaliadin, Nikita Youshchenko, and Cedric Hombourger.

Many on the team also worked on the MontaVista real-time Linux. "One of the first things we did years ago was to make the Linux scheduler pre-emptive and deterministic," says Hombourger. These fast-boot developments are not necessarily limited to real-time or an embedded Linux; however, they can get a conventional Linux distribution to boot in 1 second, as well.

"The methods we have developed are independent of whether [you use] a real-time kernel," notes Kaliadin. He says that the team first considered netbooks and mobile Linux fast-boot approaches. It could not adapt them, however, because they needed a fairly heavyweight Linux distribution, and the requirements for a 1-second boot are far more extreme than those of any netbook or notebook application. "We had to devise a set of new techniques in both the kernel and the boot loader," says Kaliadin.

A customer who needed his automotive-dashboard system to come up quickly prompted the development of a fast-booting Linux. Kaliadin remarks that the customer loved the MontaVista OS but had a fixed requirement to show data on the screen in less than a second. "Our first reaction was that it was impossible," says Kaliadin.

The 1-second-boot-time achievement came in three stages. The first stage was optimization in all the obvious places, including the boot loader. The team could eliminate some of the boot time in the boot loader because the hardware is the same for everything the system boots. The team also omitted many drivers the OS didn't need and minimized the OS configuration. "Even [Linux founder] Linus Torvold admits that Linux is getting pretty bloated," says Kaliadin. This first stage got the team members down to a 7-second boot time.

The second stage required an intimate knowledge of the hardware. The Linux boot loader is a serial process. The team's epiphany came when the developers realized that they could use DMA (direct-memory-access) methods to parallel many tasks in the boot process.

The DMA agents can move many boot tasks between flash memory and the processor memory and can accomplish this task in the background without processor overhead. "These days, CPUs have a pretty large cache memory, so they are capable of doing all these things in parallel," says Kaliadin. Using DMA and the processor cache saves 3 more seconds, which further reduces the optimized boot time to 4 seconds from 7.

The next logical place to reduce the boot was in the user's application, but customers fix and determine that variable. The MontaVista team then looked at the loading of the customer's applications.

The developers could use the RAM disk that has been available in the Linux kernel since Revision 2.4, but Linux still cached that memory, and that process slowed things down. Since the development of the 2.6 kernel, Linux has supported loading the file system into this RAM disk. "We ditched the whole buffer scheme and just loaded the customer's application into the Linux page-cache memory," says Kaliadin.

The second part of this innovation was the developers' realization that they didn't have to load the customer's entire application, just the parts that the initial application required to start up. That realization allowed the boot time to near 1 second. "We made some big advances but then had to find 100 milliseconds here and there," he says.

Even though they worked with a customer's automotive dashboard, the developers' work is applicable to any application that needs to have an embedded Linux, complete with a file system, boot in less than a second. Although this application is processor-specific, MontaVista says that it can help you apply the technology to any 32- or 64-bit processor. "We designed the fast-boot process to be architecture-independent," notes Hombourger. He comments that the only hardware-specific features involve the DMA commands that speed the boot loader, but it is a relatively small task to port that function to different hardware.

For those who wonder why a processor doing billions of instructions per second needs to take minutes to boot up, wonder no more; MontaVista has shown that you can boot up a complete modern operating system in less than a second.

http://www.electronicsweekly.com/Art...one-second.htm

Paul Rako, Technical Editor - EDN ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12429 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12428&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:46:12 GMT Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) will stop selling high-end data storage arrays from Hitachi Data Systems at the end of the month, according to a notice from... Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) will stop selling high-end data storage arrays from Hitachi Data Systems at the end of the month, according to a notice from HDS to its channel partners.

The announcement threatens to end a nine-year partnership between HDS and Sun Microsystems, which was acquired by Oracle in January, but Hitachi said the two will continue to work together in other ways.

"Hitachi Data Systems and Oracle agree that the time is right to evolve this relationship into one reflecting the priorities of both our companies," HDS said in a statement. "Hitachi Data Systems and Oracle are in active discussions to broaden its current relationship in many areas — application integration and optimization is one example with many benefits to our customers. Our main priority is to ensure that we are working together to ensure that our customers are being fully supported during this time of transition, and we are both committed to providing the exceptional service both our companies are known for in the marketplace. We look forward to sharing more details on our expanded relationship in the coming months."

Oracle said in late January that it is focused on the Sun 7000 Open Storage systems and the ZFS file system, along with Sun's tape storage business, leaving unanswered questions about some Sun partnerships and products.

Sun's strategy of combining open source software with commodity hardware revitalized its data storage business, a turnaround acknowledged by Oracle in its embrace of the 7000 series and ZFS.

Analyst Brian Marshall of Broadpoint AmTech wrote in a research note today that he thinks Oracle may need to find a high-end replacement for Hitachi's USP-V systems — and he cited EMC (NYSE: EMC) and 3Par (NYSE: PAR) as possible partners.

"[W]e think the chances are high they look to partner down the road, as the [Sun] storage assets don't provide for a high-end SAN solution. ... It is our view, if ORCL selects another enterprise storage partner (specifically for the now missing high-end SAN slot) as opposed to trying to develop it internally, EMC and PAR are the likely vendors of choice considering IBM is public enemy #1 for ORCL."

Another Sun-Oracle storage partnership that is rumored to be under scrutiny is the company's relationship with LSI (NYSE: LSI), which provides a small percentage of LSI's revenues compared to the outsized contributions from IBM (NYSE: IBM) and Seagate (NASDAQ: STX). When asked about the future of its relationship with Oracle, an LSI spokesperson said the company "does not comment on rumors or speculation."

Another Sun storage technology that could face scrutiny is the open source QFS file system, which was already taking a back seat to ZFS at Sun before the merger.

Asked about its plans for QFS, an Oracle spokesperson referred a reporter to a video of Sun Storage vice president Mike Shapiro that emphasizes Oracle's plans for ZFS, but the accompanying slides also mention QFS and the Lustre clustered file system as technologies that remain under development. Interestingly, Shapiro also mentions the LSI-OEMed Sun Storage 6780, so LSI may fit into Oracle's plans after all.

http://www.enterprisestorageforum.co...le.php/3868696 ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12428 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12427&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:41:21 GMT March 5 (Reuters) - Two former executives who helped develop the "Call of Duty" video game have filed a lawsuit against Activision Blizzard Inc for wrongful dismissal and breach of contract, LA Times said.

Jason West and Vince Zampella, who were sacked by Activision on Monday, have filed a $36 million lawsuit with the Los Angeles County Superior Court, the paper said.

The complaint alleges that the company fired the executives to avoid paying them royalties on the military game Modern Warfare 2, which was released in November and has generated more than $1 billion in retail sales, LA Times said.

West was the president and Zampella the chief executive of Infinity Ward studio, acquired by Activision in 2003, and developed the original "Call of Duty" game and several others in the franchise.

Activision released a statement calling the lawsuit "meritless" and claiming that the pair did not "honor their obligations" to the publisher, though it failed to specify what actions led to their dismissal, LA Times said.

Activision could not be reached for comment by Reuters outside regular U.S. business hours. (Reporting by Amulya Nagaraj in Bangalore, editing by Will Waterman)

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...2361021,00.asp ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12427 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12426&goto=newpost Sun, 07 Mar 2010 16:39:06 GMT Owners of Nvidia-based video cards may be putting those cards, as well as the rest of their PCs, at risk if they're using the latest version of Nvidia's graphics drivers. First reported by beta testers playing Starcraft II, the problem with the recently released driver update 196.75 may affect you, even if you're not a gamer.

Starcraft II's publisher, Blizzard Entertainment, issued an official statement in the game's Battle.net forums advising users to roll back to the previous driver version, 196.21, to avoid any issues. The company has diagnosed the problem as related to fan control, which is causing overheating. According to a story at IncGamers.com, in some extreme cases this is causing physical damage to not only the video card but the processor and motherboard as well.

Blizzard also advises that the problem could affect Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft. But any current Windows version (32- and 64-bit XP, Vista, and Windows 7) running the driver is susceptible, which means that using any 3D application with the new drivers could put your system at risk.

Nvidia responded to our request for comments with the following statement: "We are aware that some customers have reported fan speed issues with the latest 196.75 WHQL drivers on NVIDIA.com. Until we can verify and root cause this issue, we recommend that customers stay with, or return to 196.21 WHQL drivers. Release 196.75 drivers have been temporarily removed
from our Web site in the meantime."

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...2360987,00.asp ]]> News In Short (Tech) Guy00 http://forum.meetthegeeks.org/forum/showthread.php?t=12426