Free Republic

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- The creator of the Linux operating system is joining a global development group to focus on further improving the open-source software. Linus Torvalds said Tuesday he is taking a leave from his research job at chip-maker Transmeta Corp. He will become the first fellow at the Beaverton, Ore.-based Open Source Development Lab, which is funded by high-tech companies to, among other things, enhance Linux for corporate data centers. At the lab, he will focus on the next major revision of the Linux core, or kernel. "It feels a bit strange to finally officially work on...

<p>The SCO Group, which is suing IBM for $1 billion, on Monday terminated Big Blue's right to use or distribute its Unix-based AIX operating system.</p> <p>SCO on Monday said it was going to file an amendment to the complaint against IBM with the United States District Court of Utah, where the case is currently pending, for a permanent injunction requiring IBM to cease and desist all use and distribution of AIX and to destroy or return all copies of Unix System V source code.</p>

Another major hardware maker is likely to be added to SCO's legal battle against IBM and others over what it claims is illegally appropriated source code in Linux. In the meantime, Novell backs off copyright claims against SCO. The SCO Group Inc. has found what it says is proof that it owns all copyrights related to the Unix operating system, a claim rival Novell Inc. had contested last month and for which SCO may seek to recoup damages. Also, IBM said that it had no intention of reaching a quick settlement with the SCO Group, a small company based in...

The ability to make atomic-level changes in the functional components of semiconductor switches, demonstrated by a team of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, North Carolina State University and University of Tennessee physicists, could lead to huge changes in the semiconductor industry. The results are reported in the June 13 issue of Science. Semiconductor devices, the building blocks of computing chips that control everything from coffee makers to Mars landings, depend on microscopic solid-state transistors, tiny electronic on-off switches made of layers of metals, oxides and silicon. These switches stop and start the flow of electrons, and work themselves because of the...

EVERETT, June 12, 2003 -- Boeing [NYSE: BA] has decided that the 7E7 will be the first commercial jet ever to have a majority of the primary structure -- including the wing and fuselage -- made of advanced composite materials. Following months of intensive study and analysis, the company has selected a graphite combined with a toughened epoxy resin as the main composite. The wings will also include TiGr composites -- a combination of titanium and graphite. Titanium is a strong metal known for its light weight and durability. Graphite is a stable form of carbon.Over the past year and...

<p>CHICAGO — Cable operators say they may soon be able to offer services that would crush their satellite and phone competitors following introduction this week of a simple device that could free up massive amounts of bandwidth.</p> <p>The inexpensive converter is about the size of two cigarette packs.</p>

Registrar Offers '.la' Web Address June 09, 2003 By: Mickey Alam KhanSenior Editormickey@dmnews.com Los Angeles today officially becomes the world's first city to have its own Internet domain. Approved by the Internet Corporation for Assignment Names and Numbers, the ".la" domain offers the same functionality as .com. It is available to Los Angeles businesses and residents for $50 a year per registered name with the .la suffix. In the month since its soft launch, nearly 10,000 names with the .la address have been pre-registered. Registrants include brands like Yahoo's yahoo.la, Rolex's rolex.la, Madonna's Madonna.la and Arnold Schwarzenegger's arnie.la. LA Names Corp.,...

An anonymous reader writes "According to the Washington Post, Microsoft is not adhering to the terms of its deal with the DOJ. Specifically, there are allegations that it is "trying to license key pieces of its technology at inflated rates" and "thwarting its antitrust settlement with the federal government". They're charging $100,000 just to see technical info about their communication protocols, and you only get $50,000 back if you decide you don't want to license them. Whoda thunk?" Rivals Say Microsoft Flouts Deal Microsoft Corp. is trying to license key pieces of its technology at inflated rates and under onerous...

Wash. school may turn down $43K in free Macs By Peter Cohen pcohen@maccentral.com June 11, 2003 1:15 pm ET Writing for the King County Journal, Nora Doyle reports that Tukwila, Wa.'s cash-strapped Foster High School may have to turn down US$43,000 worth of free Macs because of a PC-only IT policy already in place. According to the report, a teacher at the school applied for a grant offered by a nonprofit organization to outfit the school with 30 new Macs and six new laser printers. The school won the grant, but ran into a snag: A technology plan adopted...

SEATTLE (Reuters) - SCO Group Inc. SCOX.O , which claims International Business Machines Corp. IBM.N illegally used parts of its Unix software in other programs, said on Wednesday that it could revoke its license to the world's largest computer company unless they settled this week. Lindon, Utah-based SCO is suing IBM for more than $1 billion and warned 1,500 other companies last month that they may be violating SCO's intellectual property rights because parts of its Unix software code are being used in Linux. Unix is a widely-used operating system for networked computers that was first developed by AT&T Corp....

Google is a triumph of high technology, supreme usability, and hacker chic. But you can make it work better by investing a little time to learn a few Google tricks. Surprisingly, I’ve found it difficult to get many people to learn these tricks. Most computer users aren’t interested in the details, options, and preferences available to them when they use a piece of software—they just want to get their job done. These are the people who are determined to work harder, not smarter, when faced with a daunting task. If you are one of these people, stop reading now. Otherwise,...

Icy claim that water has memory 19:00 11 June 03 Claims do not come much more controversial than the idea that water might retain a memory of substances once dissolved in it. The notion is central to homeopathy, which treats patients with samples so dilute they are unlikely to contain a single molecule of the active compound, but it is generally ridiculed by scientists. Holding such a heretical view famously cost one of France's top allergy researchers, Jacques Benveniste, his funding, labs and reputation after his findings were discredited in 1988. Yet a paper is about to be published in...

KYOTO, Japan — IBM researchers have integrated a 10-Gbps silicon photodetector using a 130-nm 1.5V CMOS process, opening the way to chip-to-chip and board-to-board optical interconnects. Eventually, optical photodetectors may be used for chip-level interconnects as well. By 2010, when processors exceed clock frequencies of 11.5 GHz, optical interconnects may be needed to avoid chip-to-chip and on-chip bottlenecks. In a presentation here Wednesday (June 11th) at the 2003 Symposium on VLSI Technology, Min Yang, a research staff member at the IBM Watson Research Center at Yorktown Heights, N.Y., described a monolithically integrated photodetector that achieves a much higher data detection...

Intel says that its Tri-Gate transistor, a futuristic transistor that will let electricity flow more freely inside chips, is moving closer to reality. The Tri-Gate transistor, one of the tools that may let Intel continue to follow Moore's Law in the second half of the decade, has been placed on the "pathfinder" development path at Intel, said Ken David, co-director of components research in the Technology Manufacturing Group at Intel. That means that it is one of a select few design alternatives that will get incorporated into chips by 2007. "We've moved beyond the research stage and are in the...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Sun Microsystems Inc. said Dell Computer Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. have agreed to ship Sun's Java software technology on personal computers, a boost to Sun's efforts to popularize the technology. Sun has been struggling to ensure widespread access among PC users to Java since late 2001, when rival Microsoft Corp. decided to stop shipping Java when it introduced its Windows XP operating system. The issue has figured prominently in an antitrust suit filed by Sun against Microsoft, which was prompted by Microsoft's actions against Java during the late 1990s. Java includes a programming language and a...

I am actually a big fan of AMD. It is not only the best processor for the money, but the best period, IMHO. But one thing I'll have to hand to Intel. I'm upgrading an Intel system for a friend and I ordered a retail Celeron 1.7ghz. This is the first Pentium type processor I've looked at up close since the old Socket 7 days [I think that's the one that Intel and AMD both could use a few years ago.] Anyway, the heat sink and fan assembly on the Intel chip is massive compared to the dinky heat sink...

<p>Based on Norman Shorr's way of thinking, the best way to stop armor-piercing bullets and rocket-propelled grenades isn't with clad-metal armor. Using engineering chutzpah, Shorr is proving that crime and terrorism can be repelled better with plastic, glass and marbles.</p>

<p>Some members of the open-source community are claiming that the SCO Group may have violated the terms of the GNU GPL (General Public License) by incorporating source code from the Linux kernel into the Linux Kernel Personality feature found in SCO Unix without giving the changes back to the community or displaying copyright notices attributing the code to Linux.</p>

Sun Microsystems will tell anyone in earshot that the "network is the computer," but reporters at the JavaOne show are having trouble believing the company lives by its motto. Stepping into the JavaOne press room was like a journey back in time. Dial-up cords crisscrossed over tables surrounded by an army of ancient phones. Even the grizzled tech veterans used to 56Kbps in the days of yore were uncomfortable with the lack of network speed here. "What's that slogan?" asked one reporter. "The network is the computer, right?" That's right and you can add that to "the company that put...

LATEST NEWS 2:11 PM PDT Monday Intel ships billionth chipRemember the 8086? That was Intel Corp.'s first microprocessor for personal computers in 1978, back when a "hand-held" was a transistor radio, computers were immobile mainframes, and the Internet was a project by a handful of research scientists. A quarter-century later, Intel has shipped its 1 billionth computer chip, according to figures compiled by semiconductor industry analyst firm Mercury Research and verified by Intel. "From the 8086 to today's Intel Pentium 4 processor, Intel Xeon and Intel Centrino mobile technology, the Intel architecture has brought the benefits of digital intelligence...