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I've created a number of software tools which I use and would like to someday make into commercial products. I'm on the verge of getting a new job and would like to protect my rights to my creations...

From the Chinese pirate masters of the non-sea-faring variety comes ... Ylmf OS! Not happy with pirating Windows XP itself, these creative Chinese have gone one step further and hacked Ubuntu to look exactly like Windows XP. Why have they moved to Ubuntu? Because their previous release -- a pirate version of Windows XP itself -- is being cracked down on by Microsoft. If you clicked the link above, you'll notice that the entire site is in Chinese with no sign of any button that'll magically turn it into English, but if you navigate to the download page, there does...

“Save your receipts” may be the rule in the workplace for getting reimbursed for expenses, but those slips of paper are just so much trash to a college student. That’s what Drexel University student Bradley Ericson pondered as he observed transactions at the checkout counter at campus dining halls. Students have a meal plan and tap it electronically by using their student identification card. But the cashier still hands over a printed piece of thermal paper. Soon after, that receipt winds up on the floor or counter. A freshman at Drexel’s LeBow College of Business in the fall of 2008,...

A computer worm that China warned Internet users against is an updated version of the Panda Burning Incense virus, which infected millions of PCs in the country three years ago, according to McAfee. The original Panda worm, also known as Fujacks, caused widespread damage at a time when public knowledge about online security was low, and led to the country's first arrests for virus-writing in 2007. The new worm variant, one of many that have appeared since late 2006, adds a malicious component meant to make infection harder to detect, said Vu Nguyen, a McAfee Labs researcher. "It has gotten...

The U.S. Air Force is modifying the fire control software on its AC-130H gunships so the 105mm howitzer and 40mm autocannon can track and shoot at different targets at the same time. Currently, the two weapons can both be aimed at only one target at a time. The AC-130s are also being tested using missiles, like Hellfire. U.S. Air Force operates 25 of these gunships (eight AC-130H "Spectre", and 17 AC-130U "Spooky"). The AC-130U has an additional 25mm autocannon, and always had the capability to track more than one target at a time. Because of their vulnerability to ground fire,...

Blue Coat Systems (BCSI) this morning said it will cut about 10% of its staff under a new restructuring plan. The company currently has a little under 1,500 employees. The company also said it will acquire S7 Software Solutions, a software R&D firm based in Bangalore, India, for about $5.25 million in cash. Blue Coat said it will shift some engineering positions from Sunnyvale (which is where the company is based) and Austin, Texas to Bangalore and other locations. It is closing offices in Riga, Latvia; South Plainfield, New Jersey; and Zoetermeer, the Netherland.

Cisco boffins infiltrate a botnet to find out about online crime By posing as a rogue programmer, Cisco researchers gained a unique insight into the world of botnets and their owners Poor education, a criminal record and a dislike of authority can all turn programmers bad. That's the finding of Cisco researchers who posed as botmasters to enter the world of online crime. "I wanna do what I wanna do, whenever I want," one botmaster told the researchers. By posing online as a rogue programmer, the researchers got him to reveal how he spams thousands of instant messenger users with...

What is it? Where is it? What's it do? ZoneAlarm Firewall

But Beyonce had one of the best hoaxes of all time Rumours of the death of rapper Kanye West in a car crash became fodder for fake anti-malware scams on Tuesday. Users searching for more info on the fictitious fatality (http://www.sophos.com/blogs/gc/g/2009/10/21/kanye-west-died-car-crash-hackers-exploit-rumour/) are liable to get redirected to sites distributing scareware, security researchers warn. The rumour itself reportedly originated on notorious image board 4chan, the seeding ground for the Anonymous campaign against Scientology. Bogus reports, claiming West met his maker in a crash involving two luxury cars in Los Angeles, subsequently appeared in email as well as appearing on social network...

OCEANSIDE, N.Y. (CBS) ― TD Bank's computer system has been on the fritz for days, causing chaos with balance statements. Customers are furious. On Thursday night, TD Bank was scrambling to fix a computer glitch that has millions of customers angry and confused about their account balances. The bank is now promising to reimburse those affected by the frustrating malfunction. "Very frustrating, very aggravating and scary," said Norma Hernandez, whose account registered zero balance. Online computer glitches with direct deposit created a near run on the bank.

You paid for your antivirus software? Why? Good free options have been available for years, mainly from no-name companies. Nervous consumers figure they’re better off buying major brands, like Norton security software from Symantec Corp. Well, here’s a major brand for you: Microsoft Corp.

A judge Tuesday heard arguments in a dispute over software sales that could potentially have repercussions on the secondhand sale of virtually any copyright material. The suit was filed by Timothy Vernor, a seller on eBay, after Autodesk, citing the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, asked eBay to remove some of its software products that Vernor had listed for sale there, and later to ban him from the site. Vernor had not illegally copied the software but was selling legitimate CDs of the products secondhand. For that reason, he argued, he was not infringing Autodesk's copyright. Autodesk countered that because it...

Locating unidentified homosexual men on Facebook? There's an app for that. It was created by two students at MIT, who discovered that gay men tend to have more male Facebook friends of their own orientation. The students, Carter Jernigan and Behram Mistree, ran the program on 10 men who were gay, but didn't reveal that information on their profiles. The software predicted that all ten were gay. The software apparent does not work for bisexual people or lesbians. No word on when it will be available for the iPhone.

Posted in ubiwar Tagged intelligence, terrorism SNIPPET: "Friends of this blog and others, Palantir Technologies, are profiled in a new article by Siobhan Gorman in the Wall Street Journal, How Team of Geeks Cracked Spy Trade: From a Silicon Valley office strewn with bean-bag chairs, a group of twenty-something software engineers is building an unlikely following of terrorist hunters at US spy agencies."

Question: Is there a cheap software program ... that will take sound from a downloaded file, video, or audio, and transcript it into text, and do a good job? I'm using Windows XP SP2 and Word 97.

HELP! I'm trying to find a good but not expensive application for editing video. What I mostly want to do is just cut out the commercials from recorded shows.Any help would be greatly appreciated. I've tried several apps and haven't had much luck. Thank You

Microsoft late Tuesday warned of "massive disruptions" to sales of Office, as well as to partners such as Best Buy, Dell, and Hewlett-Packard, if the injunction that prevents it from selling Word 2003 and Word 2007 in the U.S. after Oct. 10 is not set aside. In an emergency motion filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals, Microsoft asked that the injunction imposed last week by U.S. District Court Judge Leonard Davis be stayed, or temporarily put on hold, while its appeal is heard.Artwork: Chip TaylorMicrosoft's move was expected, as it had previously said it would appeal the verdict and...

Firms embracing Software as a Service (SaaS) are not protected from government and civil search and seizure actions and may not be informed if their SaaS data is seized from their provider, according to a researcher studying the issue. "In cloud computing, you will not have the ability to fight seizure before it happens," said Alex Stamos, co-founder and partner of security consultancy iSEC Partners Inc.. "You may not even know. There are no legal requirements for [SaaS providers] to notify you, and in fact, they may be gagged from doing so." Black Hat USA 2009 Get the latest news...

Several open-source software companies and many other allies have banded together in a consortium called Open Source for America to try to persuade the U.S. government to use more of the collaboratively developed software, to participate in its development, and help its practitioners work with the government better. The group includes more than 70 companies, academic institutions, organizations, and individuals. Among them are Linux sellers Red Hat, Novell, and Canonical; software sellers Sun Microsystems, its would-be acquirer Oracle, Mozilla, SugarCRM, Alfresco Software, Pentaho, Revolution Computing, Zmanda, EnterpriseDB, and Yahoo's Zimbra; and open-source allies including Advanced Micro Devices and Google. The...

I have a .VOB file, from a DVD, from which I would like to extract 10 minutes. I am using Avidemux, but find the documentation to be virtually nonexistent. I have a really simple objective: extract a continuous 10 minutes from this original .VOB file. IF this were an audio file, and IF I were using Audacity, the process is simple: I would highlight the section of audio. Then I would - "trim" the audio outside the shaded area - save the result as a new file Or, I could - copy the highlighted section - open a new file...