Microsoft End User License Agreement

By touching any computer ever made, you agree to the terms of this agreement....

Microsoft shall have the rights to your first born child. This child shal be called Bill or Billina. Said child shall be assigned an activation code, which must be used prior to this child playing outside....

User furthermore agrees to sing praises to Microsoft every morning upon waking and each evening before retiring.... Simply raise your hands in the air and repeat aloud, ''All hail Microsoft!''

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From Wal-Mart for $198

Need a new computer at home and don't want to pay the earth for it? Your next computer could very well be the Everex gPC bought from Wal-Mart for just US$198.



This is a rather modest little number, but has the added feature of a Ubuntu 7.10 (the latest version of the best Linux software) already installed. Great for a kids machine in the family or rumpus room.

The computer features a middle of the road computer as far as capability, and can very well be a good Internet ready machine. It already has installed the Open Office suite of programs, including a word processor, spreadsheet program, diagram editor etc., and has Google Aps, Skype, iPod compatible software and more . . . all free-ware software.

Now isn't the price really coming down on computers!

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Tablet Computers

Would a tablet computer help you in your business?

Tim Berry has a blog entry at Small Business Trends were he talks about what he likes about a tablet computer over a standard laptop.

The biggest advantage tablets have according to Berry is that they are easier to use on airplanes. It allows you to adjust the screen if the person in front of you lowers his seat back. Another versatility offered by the tablet is the ability to do handwriting or use the keyboard.

He also points out several other ideas that benefit from using a tablet.

Is it right for you? Well that depends on your computing needs.

If you are traveling frequently, using it for power points, or have other needs that will benefit from a tablet, then consider a tablet.

Personally, I purchased my first laptop computer last May. So far I have used it on all of my trips and found it handy. Would a tablet computer be more useful for me? It is possible but the laptop is working for now. However, as my consulting increases and I have to be on the road even more the benefits of a tablet may become more apparent.

It all comes down to what is best for you and how you operate your business.

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Roadrunner: A New Age of Super- computing

Roadrunner
Credit: LeRoy N. Sanchez, Records Management/Media Services and Operations

Laboratory officials celebrated Los Alamos's decision to pursue, pending approval by the National Nuclear Security Administration, the final phase of Roadrunner, a high-performance computer (HPC) slated to become the computational cornerstone of Laboratory mission-related work.

"Roadrunner ushers in a new era in high performance computing," said Terry Wallace, principal associate director for science, technology, and engineering (PADSTE). Wallace praised the hard work and dedication of the entire Roadrunner Project Team at the celebration last Thursday.

Roadrunner is designed to achieve a sustained operating speed of 1,000 trillion calculations each second, or a "petaflop/s" in computer jargon-peta signifying the number 10 followed by 15 zeros, and flop/s meaning "floating point operation per second." The fastest current supercomputer is rated at 478 teraflop/s (teraflop/s meaning one trillion floating point operations per second); Roadrunner would be roughly 3 times faster.

The computer will be developed in partnership with IBM and will utilize commercially available hardware, including aspects of commercial gaming and graphics technologies. Because of its off-the-shelf design, the computer costs significantly less than a one-of-a-kind machine. It uses a Linux operating system.........

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Active computer games no substitute

New generation active computer games stimulate greater energy expenditure than sedentary games, but are no substitute for playing real sports, as per a research studyin this weeks Christmas issue of the BMJ.

Young people are currently recommended to take an hour of moderate to vigorous physical exercise each day, which should use at least three times as much energy as is used at rest. But a number of adolescents have mostly sedentary lifestyles.

Time spent in front of television and computer screens has been associated with physical inactivity and obesity.

The new generation of wireless based computer games is meant to stimulate greater interaction and movement during play, so scientists at Liverpool John Moores University compared the energy expenditure of adolescents when playing sedentary and new generation active computer games.

Six boys and five girls aged 13-15 years were included in the study. All were a healthy weight, competent at sport and regularly played sedentary computer games.

Before the study, each participant practiced playing both the active and inactive games.

On the day of the study, participants played four computer games for 15 minutes each while wearing a monitoring device to record energy expenditure.........

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Google's Knol against Wikipedia?

Google loves the content of Wikipedia. Just do some Google searches and you’ll see the Wikipedia articles among the top results. While Google tries to battle Wikipedia and to create their own encyclopaedia ( under the name Knol), I thought I should share my thoughts with you as a Wikipedia administrator. But Larry Sanger, the head and founder of Citizendium, the expert-encyclopaedia, has beat me to it:

There are a few problems.

First, quality. It looks to me as if Knol is a high-level attempt to do what many others have done… Time will tell, but Knol will probably resemble other such websites, and have a huge amount of mediocre content, with a little excellent content mixed in. The concept does not sound like a model that would attract many genuine experts. I say that because the notion that anyone may write a "knol" and be compared and ranked by "the crowd" - not by expert peers - is apt to attract relatively little notice from experts who are very careful about where they publish.

Second, lack of buy-in from the free culture crowd. Many of the sort of people who contribute knowledge to projects like Wikipedia and the Citizendium are likely to be very skeptical of a giant corporation organizing such a project, particularly with Google Ads appearing on the articles. It does not appear to be in the spirit of the free culture movement. Still, it is good that Google has decided to make ads optional.

As an encyclopaedia, Knol has no chance against Wikipedia or Citizendium. As an other place for advertisements where people can promote their products, it seems to be a perfect solution. We’ll see…

I highlighted the features: article rating, Google ads and peer reviews.

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How about a 40-hour laptop battery?

Unbelievable isn''t it? A laptop battery that can keep your laptop going for 40 hours! Yes, research is underway at Stanford Tech to develop a hi-tech lithium ion battery that can juice up your laptop for 40 hours, keeping those charging woes at bay for a longer period.

Apparently, the new battery uses a discarded technology that has been been revamped by Professor Yi Cui and team - silicon anodes in the form of nanowires for charging. This technology was earlier abandoned as the silicon expands up to 400 times when charged, exploding the battery in the process. Using silicon in the form of nanowires eliminates this danger.

So when can you start rejoicing? In a "few years time" is all the information we have at this moment.

Via Newlaunches.

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Mind the (online) gap

Instant messaging, blogs, Facebook, MySpace there are limitless ways your child communicates online with the offline world. And the risks and opportunities are only increasing.

A new Tel Aviv University research study has observed that, despite what parents might believe, there is an enormous gap between what they think their children are doing online and what is really happening.

In her study, Prof. Dafna Lemish from the Department of Communication at Tel Aviv University surveyed parents and their children about the childrens activities on the Internet. The data tell us that parents dont know what their kids are doing, says Prof. Lemish.

Her study was unique in that parents and children from the same family were surveyed.



Strange Encounters

In one part of the study, Prof. Lemish surveyed over 500 Jewish and Arab children from a variety of ages and socio-economic backgrounds, asking them if they gave out personal information online. Seventy-three percent said that they do. The parents of the same children believed that only 4 percent of their children did so.

The same children were also asked if they had been exposed to pornography while surfing, or if they had made face-to-face contact with strangers that they had met online. Thirty-six percent from the high school group admitted to meeting with a stranger they had met online. Nearly 40% of these children admitted to speaking with strangers regularly (within the past week).........

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Copper connections for high-speed computing

Caption: Graduate student Todd Spencer and Regents' professor Paul Kohl have developed an improved signal transmission line, made of an organic substrate, to link high-speed signals between computer chips.

Credit: Georgia Tech Photo: Gary Meek

As computers become more complex, the demand increases for more connections between computer chips and external circuitry such as a motherboard or wireless card. And as the integrated circuits become more advanced, maximizing their performance requires better connections that operate at higher frequencies with less loss.

Improving these two types of connections will increase the amount and speed of information that can be sent throughout a computer, as per Paul Kohl, Thomas L. Gossage chair and Regents professor in Georgia Techs School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. Kohl presented his work in these areas at the Materials Research Society fall meeting.

The vertical connections between chips and boards are currently formed by melting tin solder between the two pieces and adding glue to hold everything together. Kohls research shows that replacing the solder ball connections with copper pillars creates stronger connections and the ability to create more connections.

Circuitry and computer chips are made with copper lines on them, so we thought we should make the correlation between the two with copper also, said Kohl.

Solder and copper can both tolerate misalignment between two pieces being connected, as per Kohl, but copper is more conductive and creates a stronger bond.........

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Attack on computer memory reveals vulnerability

A team of academic, industry and independent scientists has demonstrated a new class of computer attacks that compromise the contents of secure memory systems, especially in laptops.

The attacks overcome a broad set of security measures called disk encryption, which are meant to secure information stored in a computers permanent memory. The scientists cracked several widely used technologies, including Microsofts BitLocker, Apples FileVault and Linuxs dm-crypt, and described the attacks in a paper and video published on the Web Feb. 21.

The team reports that these attacks are likely to be effective at cracking a number of other disk encryption systems because these technologies have architectural features in common.

Weve broken disk encryption products in exactly the case when they seem to be most important these days: laptops that contain sensitive corporate data or personal information about business customers, said Alex Halderman, a Ph.D. candidate in Princetons computer science department. Unlike a number of security problems, this isnt a minor flaw; it is a fundamental limitation in the way these systems were designed.

The attack is especially effective against computers that are turned on but are locked, such as laptops that are in a sleep or hibernation mode. One effective countermeasure is to turn a computer off entirely, though in some cases even this does not provide protection.........

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Ranger Supercomputer For Texas Computing Center

Understanding HIV drug-resistance: A snapshot of the HIV-1 protease (a key protein that is the target for the protease inhibitor drugs) from a computational simulation. Mutations from the "wildtype" can occur within the active site (G48V) and at remote locations along the protein chain (L90M ). The "asp dyad" is at the centre of the active site, where polyprotein changes are snipped by the enzyme; this is the region that any drug must occupy and block.

Credit: Peter Coveney, University College London. Texas Advanced Computing Center.

Ranger, the most powerful supercomputing system in the world for open science research, entered full production on Feb. 4. Open science research makes clear accounts of methodology, along with data and results extracted therefrom, freely available. Ranger, which will enable the leading scientists in the country to advance and accelerate computational research in all scientific disciplines, was dedicated by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) on Feb. 22 at the University of Texas at Austin. NSF's Office of Cyberinfrastructure Director Daniel E. Atkins represented NSF at the ceremony and delivered remarks on this historic occasion.

"Ranger is the first leadership computational resource provided under the National Science Foundation 'Track 2 initiative' and the first machine funded through the newly formed Office of Cyberinfrastructure," he said. The Track 2 initiative is NSF's four-year activity designed to fund the deployment and operation of up to four leading-edge computing systems that will greatly increase the availability of computing resources to U.S. researchers. The Ranger award, the largest NSF grant to the University of Texas at Austin, was made after the evaluation of selection criteria that were "multi-faceted, including not only raw performance of the machine, but also effective education and outreach commitments, institutional competency and commitment for service to the national research community," noted Atkins.........

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Magnetic levitation gives computer users sense of touch

Computers, long used as tools to design and manipulate three-dimensional objects, may soon provide people with a way to sense the texture of those objects or feel how they fit together, thanks to a haptic, or touch-based, interface developed at Carnegie Mellon University.

Unlike most other haptic interfaces that rely on motors and mechanical linkages to provide some sense of touch or force feedback, the device developed by Ralph Hollis, research professor in Carnegie Mellons Robotics Institute, uses magnetic levitation and a single moving part to give users a highly realistic experience. Users can perceive textures, feel hard contacts and notice even slight changes in position while using an interface that responds rapidly to movements.

We believe this device provides the most realistic sense of touch of any haptic interface in the world today, said Hollis, whose research group built a working version of the device in 1997. With the help of a $300,000 National Science Foundation grant, however, he and colleagues have improved its performance, enhanced its ergonomics and lowered its cost. The grant also enabled them to build 10 copies, six of which are being distributed to haptic scientists across the U.S. and Canada.

We have gone from the prototype to a much more advanced system that other scientists can use, Hollis said. Putting the instrument in the hands of other scientists is critical in a young, developing field such as haptic technology, he emphasized. Though haptic interfaces have uses in engineering design, entertainment, assembly, remote operation of robots, and in medical and dental training, their full potential has yet to be explored. Thats especially the case for magnetic levitation haptic interfaces because so few have been available for use by researchers, he added.........

Posted by: Ethan Read more Source

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Locks On Microchips Could Reduce Hardware Piracy

Hardware piracy, or making knock-off microchips based on stolen blueprints, is a burgeoning problem in the electronics industry.

Computer engineers at the University of Michigan and Rice University have devised a comprehensive way to head off this costly infringement: Each chip would have its own unique lock and key. The patent holder would hold the keys. The chip would securely communicate with the patent-holder to unlock itself, and it could operate only after being unlocked.

The technique is called EPIC, short for Ending Piracy of Integrated Circuits. It relies on established cryptography methods and introduces subtle changes into the chip design process. But it does not affect the chips' performance or power consumption.

Michigan computer engineering doctoral student Jarrod Roy will present a paper on EPIC at the Design Automation and Test in Europe conference in Gera number of on March 13.

Integrated circuit piracy has risen in recent years as U.S. companies started outsourcing production of newer chips with ultra-fine features. Transferring chip blueprints to overseas locations opened new doors for bootleggers who have used the chips to make counterfeit MP3 players, cell phones and computers, among other devices.

This is a very new problem, said Igor Markov, associate professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at U-M and a co-author of the paper.........

Posted by: Ethan Read more Source

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Microchip fingerprints used to lock out chip pirates

Pirated microchips -- chips stolen from legitimate factories or made from stolen blueprints -- account for billions of dollars in annual losses to chipmakers.

But a series of novel techniques developed at Rice University over the past year could stop pirates by allowing chip designers to lock and remotely activate chips with a unique ID tag. When a chip is locked with the new technology, only the patent-holder can decipher the key and activate the chip -- meaning knockoffs and stolen chips are worthless.

"Ours is the first remote-activation scheme that protects integrated circuits against piracy by exploiting their inherent, unclonable variability," said the technology's original inventor, Farinaz Koushanfar, assistant professor in electrical and computer engineering at Rice. "We use slight variations that arise in modern manufacturing to create a unique, digital identification that acts like a fingerprint for each chip, and we integrate that into the chip's functionality".

The original work was presented last August at the USENIX Security Symposium in Boston. Since the invention of the method, Koushanfar has collaborated with many scientists to build upon her original scheme. Last October, at the International Conference in Computer Aided Designs, Koushanfar and Rice graduate student Yousra Alkabani, in collaboration with Miodrag Potkonjak from UCLA, showed the first method that could continuously check, control, enable and disable a chip's operation online by integrating the chip's fingerprints into its functionality and actively checking them during operation.........

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Platform As A Service, or PaaS is the latest development in virtualization. Where companies started to offer applications online (Saas, Software As A Service) and the use of virtual servers is becoming mainstream, more and more companies now offer a complete operating system as a service online.
Cloudo is the latest addition to platform providers. There are several others that have existed for a while now in the consumer market, but to be honest I have no idea if there is a consumer market for this technology. Virtualization is huge in the business market - after offering servers with virtual servers on top even SUN Microsystems now considers offering online platforms for businesses.

So what is so interesting about Cloudo? Why would we want a webbased operating system? Well, something that makes a huge difference is the option to sync your files to the operating system. Until now, nobody else offers this.

There currently is a private beta for developers only, so there's nothing for me there right now. But I will keep an eye on it.

Cloudo is here.

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Cisco 11500 Series of Content Services Switches - Cisco

New / Used or Refurbished Cisco 11500 Products

The Cisco CSS 11500 Series Content Services Switch is a high-performance, high-availability modular architecture for Web infrastructures. As the premiere switch for the Cisco Web Network Services Software, the Cisco CSS 11500 Series helps businesses to build global Web networks optimized for content delivery and e-commerce. By activating HTTP headers, the CSS 11500 Series helps to ensure availability, optimize utilization, reduce latency, increase scalability, and enhance security for Websites, server farms, cache clusters, and firewall systems.

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TACACS+ protocol introduced with the IOS AAA architecture had great provisions for customizing the whole login process (user-defined banners, prompts ...). Unfortunately, it never really took off and most AAA solutions deployed today rely on RADIUS servers that cannot control the login process itself (the RADIUS server can only check the username/password pair for validity).

To change the login prompts when using RADIUS servers, use the aaa authentication [bannerfail-messagepassword-promptusername-prompt] text configuration command.

For example, to introduce meaningful prompts when using one-time password solution, you could use something similar to this configuration:

aaa authentication banner #
Access to this router is protected with one-time passwords.

Send an e-mail to admin@nowhere.net if you need access.

#
aaa authentication fail-message #
Login failed. Wait at least 30 seconds and retry
#
aaa authentication password-prompt "Enter your PIN + one-time password:"
aaa authentication username-prompt "Enter your username:"

Note: the texts specified with the password-prompt and username-prompt options are one-line texts delimited with quotes, the parameters of the banner and fail-message options are multi-lined texts delimited with any character.

Consider the network shown above with the configuration on the three
routers as follows -

Router R1

interface Loopback0
ip address 1.1.1.1 255.255.255.255
!
interface Serial2
ip address 12.1.1.1 255.255.255.0
!
router ospf 100
router-id 1.1.1.1
log-adjacency-changes
network 1.1.1.1 0.0.0.0 area 1
network 12.1.1.0 0.0.0.255 area 1

Router R2

interface Loopback0
ip address 2.2.2.2 255.255.255.255
!
interface Serial2
ip address 12.1.1.2 255.255.255.0
!
router ospf 100
router-id 2.2.2.2
log-adjacency-changes
network 2.2.2.2 0.0.0.0 area 0
network 12.1.1.0 0.0.0.255 area 1
network 23.1.1.0 0.0.0.255 area 0

Router R3

interface Loopback0
ip address 3.3.3.3 255.255.255.255
!
interface Serial2
ip address 23.1.1.2 255.255.255.0
!
router ospf 100
router-id 3.3.3.3
log-adjacency-changes
redistribute connected subnets
network 23.1.1.0 0.0.0.255 area 0

Now consider the following output from the show ip ospf database database-summary command taken on router R1. The first command was issued with the configuration shown above and the subsequent outputs were taken after some configuration changes on the routers in the network which are not specified in this problem.

Output #1

R1#sh ip ospf database database-summary

           OSPF Router with ID (1.1.1.1) (Process ID 100)

Area 1 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   2        0        0
 Summary ASBR  1        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
   Prefixes redistributed in Type-7  0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Subtotal      5        0        0

Process 100 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   2        0        0
 Summary ASBR  1        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Type-5 Ext    1        0        0
     Prefixes redistributed in Type-5  0
 Opaque AS     0        0        0
 Total         6        0        0
R1#

Output #2

R1#sh ip ospf database database-summary

           OSPF Router with ID (1.1.1.1) (Process ID 100)

Area 1 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   1        0        0
 Summary ASBR  0        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
   Prefixes redistributed in Type-7  0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Subtotal      3        0        0

Process 100 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   1        0        0
 Summary ASBR  0        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Type-5 Ext    0        0        0
     Prefixes redistributed in Type-5  0
 Opaque AS     0        0        0
 Total         3        0        0
R1#

Output #3

R1#sh ip ospf database database-summary

           OSPF Router with ID (1.1.1.1) (Process ID 100)

Area 1 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   3        0        0
 Summary ASBR  0        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
   Prefixes redistributed in Type-7  0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Subtotal      5        0        0

Process 100 database summary
 LSA Type      Count    Delete   Maxage
 Router        2        0        0
 Network       0        0        0
 Summary Net   3        0        0
 Summary ASBR  0        0        0
 Type-7 Ext    0        0        0
 Opaque Link   0        0        0
 Opaque Area   0        0        0
 Type-5 Ext    0        0        0
     Prefixes redistributed in Type-5  0
 Opaque AS     0        0        0
 Total         5        0        0
R1#

Your task in this problem is to look at the output and reverse engineer what config changes must have been done to cause the changes in the output shown above. Note that you have to specify what happened between output #1 and output #2 and then what happened between output #2 and output #3.

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Kill browser ads with Cisco router's DNS server

Kill browser ads with Cisco router's DNS server

As you might already know, you can use the /etc/hosts file (or its Windows equivalent) to kill unwanted browser ads - just list all the banner-serving sites in you hosts file and set their IP addresses to 127.0.0.1. In my June IP Corner article, Cisco Router: the Swiss Army Knife of Network Services (section Stop the browser ads and banners), I'm describing how you can do the same thing network-wide with a router acting as a DNS server.

For those of you who would like to automate this approach and convert a hosts file into a router configuration, here's a short PERL script to do it:

#
# hostsToCisco.pl: converts hosts file into router configuration
#
# Stdin: hosts file
# Stdout: IOS configuration
#
our @line,$i;

while (<>) {
 @line = split(/\s+/,$_);
 next unless $line[0] eq "127.0.0.1";
 for ($i = 1; $i < $#line; $i++) {
   last if $line[$i] =~ /\#/;
   print "ip host $line[$i] 127.0.0.1\n"
 }
}

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Cisco Acquires Social Networking Company

Cisco Acquires Social Networking Company

Cisco Systems Technical Marketing Engineer David Lin holds up Cisco's latest wireless 7921 IP phone at Cisco headquarters in San Jose, Calif., Monday, Jan. 5, 2007. Cisco Systems is expected to announce quarterly earnings, Tuesday, Feb. 6, 2007, after the closing bell. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

AP) -- Cisco Systems Inc., whose core business is selling the routers and switches that direct data traffic over computer networks, said it has acquired a small social networking company that allows businesses to create MySpace-like communities on their Web sites.


Cisco said Friday that it was paying an undisclosed amount to acquire privately held Five Across Inc., an 11-person San Francisco company whose software allows companies to add user-interaction and multimedia-sharing capabilities to their Web sites

Five Across' publishing platform allows users to create personal Web pages and post photos, videos and audio clips, much like the proprietary system used by News Corp.'s MySpace. Cisco said the acquisition, its 116th since 1993, is the company's first in the social networking space but likely not the last. The deal is expected to close within the current fiscal quarter. Analysts said the acquisition helps further Cisco's expansion beyond its role as purely a network equipment provider and into helping distribute the media that drives bandwidth consumption and even more network upgrades. Danielle Levitas, a senior analyst at market researcher IDC, said the Five Across acquisition could help Cisco win greater access to a wide range of companies, particularly those in media and entertainment, looking to upgrade their Web sites to connect with customers. "I actually see this as benefiting their core business - if they can promote users using their broadband more, that's huge for them," Levitas said. Cisco has profited mightily in recent quarters from surging sales of its routers and switches as service providers and other companies scramble to upgrade their networks to prepare for the next generation of video and other bandwidth-intensive downloads. Cisco, which was sitting on nearly $21 billion in cash at the end of the second quarter, has been rapidly expanding by acquiring companies that capitalize on the products and services that utilize the network itself. The company's largest recent acquisition was its $6.9 billion purchase last year of Scientific-Atlanta Inc., the world's second-largest cable television box seller. Last month, Cisco also announced it was paying $830 million in cash and stock to acquire IronPort Systems Inc., a maker of anti-spam and antivirus security products. That deal is also expected to close in the current quarter. Investors have cheered the San Jose-based company's robust earnings growth, sending its shares up 45 percent from a year ago and creating more than $51 billion in additional shareholder wealth. Cisco's stock closed up 5 cents to $28.14 on Thursday before the acquisition was announced. By JORDAN ROBERTSON, AP Technology Writer © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO) has announced a definitive agreement to acquire Germantown, MD-based Cognio, Inc., a company involved in wireless spectrum analysis and management for wireless networks.

Cognio's spectrum technology enhances performance, reliability and security of wireless networks by detecting, classifying, locating and mitigating sources of radio frequency interference. The acquisition is said to provide Cisco with complementary and differentiating technology, intellectual property and a core team to expand Cisco's leadership in unified wireless networking.

The Cognio acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of Cisco's 2008 fiscal year, and this looks to be the company's 122nd acquisition. Upon the close of the acquisition, Cisco plans to integrate Cognio into its Wireless Networking Business Unit, under the Ethernet and Wireless Technology Group.

Financial terms were not disclosed as far as what Cisco is paying, nor ant financial backgrounder on Cognio. Cognio was venture-backed with Northbridge Venture partners, ABS Ventures, and Avansis Venture listed as backers.

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• Dell D5561 71Whr Battery for Inspiron 700M/710M - $79.00

• 312-0416 Dell Lithium-Ion Battery - $89.00

• Dell CD-RW/DVD-ROM Drive Module - $129.00

• IBM 73P4485 72W Slim AC/DC Combo Adapter - $95.00

• Dell Latitude 120L Li-ion Battery - $89.00

• Sony VGP-AC19V15 AC Adapter - $85.00

• Dell Inspiron 1300 Li-ion Battery - $79.00

• Dell 9 Cell Y5180 Li-Ion Primary Battery - $106.00

• Dell Inspiron B130 Li-ion Battery - $79.00

• Dell Inspiron B120 Li-ion Battery - $79.00

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Turn your OS X and Linux-based machine into a FON Spot

Not one to dwell too heavily on the past, FON is apparently already moving beyond its newfangled partnership with Time Warner, and has now caved to giving Mac and Linux users the ability to get in on the action. The latest FON Spot software now appears in a beta form for OS X and Linux (preferably Ubuntu) users, allowing Ethernet-connected machines to share excess bandwidth with others via WiFi. Notably, it's even supposed to work if connected via 3G, but we can't imagine your carrier being all too pleased with such a scheme. Per usual, the company warns of its beta nature and insinuates that problems could arise, but if you're still not deterred, be sure to hit the read link and get your respective download on.

$500 million underwater fiber network to link Asia, America

Unfortunately for most, traversing back and forth to Asia from America on a regular basis isn't exactly in the cards, but thanks to a $500 million project agreed upon by a 17-member telecommunications consortium, visiting via fiber will soon be a whole lot snappier. Telekom Malaysia, along with 16 other firms, have awarded a half billion dollar contract to Alcatel-Lucent and NEC to construct a 12,428-mile link between the west coast of America and Southeast Asia. The aptly-dubbed Asia-America Gateway will connect the western US with Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Guam, and Hawaii, while also offering "seamless interconnection" with Europe, Africa, and Australia. Moreover, the project is being designed to provide a "more secure link for traffic" across the seas, as it avoids the hazardous Pacific Ring in hopes of dodging massive internet outages due to unexpected earthquakes. Best of all, the wait time for the undersea cabling to make an impact is fairly reasonable, as users should see "faster and more reliable service" when it becomes operational in December of next year.

Netgear acquires Infrant to boost storage offerings

Hot on the heels of yet another big time acquisition between Philips and DLO comes news that Netgear will be snapping up the privately-held Infrant Technologies for a cool $60 million in cash. All 34 employees will soon be wearing Netgear badges, and Infrant's CEO will move over and become Netgear's Vice President and General Manager for storage products. Essentially, Netgear is hoping that this move will strengthen the firm's presence in the enterprise and small-business storage realm, as it can now offer up a trusted name in RAID-based NAS products for SMB, SOHO, and the home. More specifically, the ReadyNAS, RAIDiator, and X-RAID portfolios were the targets of Netgear's desire, and while details on branding and the timeframe for the merge weren't noted, it sounds like Netgear's ready to get this party started

Smoking kills Internet2

Say what you want about net neutrality, at least the Internet hasn't been taken out by a hobo. Unlike the regular Internet we all use everyday, which was originally designed to distribute the AACS hex key withstand a nuclear attack, Internet2 is designed primarily for speed -- up to 9.08Gbps in most recent tests. All that juice comes at the price of redundant network links, though -- which means the whole thing got taken offline last night when a homeless man threw a cigarette onto a mattress under Boston's Longfellow Bridge, starting a blaze that eventually melted the fiber-optic link between Boston and New York. While initial estimates called for a service outage of 1-2 days, quick-thinking techs were able to get service going again in just 4 hours. Good thing, too -- if the panic that sets in around here when our DSL goes out is any indication, with the kind of bandwidth these guys were missing out on, there must've been wailing in the street.

Nokia Siemens Networks drops the axe on 9000 jobs

While this doesn't come as a huge surprise -- this layoff was predicted last year -- it still hurts to see such massive cutbacks in an industry held so near and dear to our hearts. Apparently 2,900 jobs in Germany and 1,700 in Finland will be cut on the road to finding savings to the tune of $2 billion by 2010. The final cut will be about 9,000 employees which is roughly 15 percent of the joint venture's workforce of 60,000. The joint venture was founded to help both companies compete with the likes of Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent with 5 major business units focusing on Radio Access, Broadband Access, Service Core and Applications, IP / Transport, and Operations Support Systems. Of course, the verdict is still out on how successful this venture will ultimately be, but Nokia's track record in the mobile space has been strong for as many years as we care to remember.

Every TCP package have 'flag bit’ defining content and intention of each package.
Example:

A package with flag bit contain "SYN or SYNCHRONIZE" will undertake to conduct initiation connection from sender to recipient. A package with flag bit contain "ACK" will undertake to inform receiver about sender information.
While a TCP package with beet flag contain "FIN" or "FINISH" undertaking to stop connection from sender to recipient.

To build a TCP connection, need data transfer package between two host, transfer of this data recognized by the name of "TCP Three-Way Handshake" as below picture.

Computer Network Threat

Threat is very harmful to the entire system and also by application at internal and external network.

The threat as follows:

Remote Login - this matter happened when someone capable to connect to a computer and have ability to control to several things related to resource found on the host or computer.

Application Backdoors - some program have special ability to access with long distance (remote access). Some bug program, exactly contain a backdoor or hidden access providing level control the computer and program.

SMTP session hijacking - SMTP is most commonly method used to deliver E-mail. By getting E-mail mailing-list, someone can deliver undesirable E-mail to thousands of or more users. This matter is called unsolicited junk mail or spam.

Spamming conducted with joining SMTP server which not suspect, then deliver thousands of E-mail called redirecting process, so that complicate to detect who is the real sender of the Mail Spam.

Operating system bugs – In application, some operation system have conducive security gap to be exploited illegally.

E-mail bombs - is an Individual attack, someone send hundreds or thousands of E-mail to one address so the victim E-mail cannot accept E-mail anymore.

Macro - To make simple or facilitate procedure an application, many application program permit us to make command which can be run by the program (script). By exploiting ability of script or macro, attacker can cause damage of data at computer.

Virus – Most known to make trouble at computer. The growth of virus from method, way of, making, effectiveness, damage storey, and also speed of spreading is different each other.

Redirect bombs – Hacker or Cracker can use ICMP to change direction of information and attack to other router.

Source routing - At many case, a data package which work through one or some network determined by router pass to route information by the router, but sometime hacker used the package as the real sender.

Another type of computer attack are from (next posted about this) :

Denial of Service (DoS)
Spoofing
Broadcast Amplification
TCP SYN

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I got a demo of the new Yahoo Messenger for Vista, which has been redesigned to take advantage of Vista-specific features. Since it was the first time I was seeing Vista, I must admit that I was operating at a disadvantage, but what I saw suggests that Yahoo is continuing its Messenger strategy of developing the Messenger client that best takes advantage of the specific operating system, like Vista's transparent windows.

Yahoo has introduced tabbed windows for IM in this version, which means you can drag one independent chat window onto another, and wind up with one chat window with two tabs. Or you can drag a tab off to create a new window.

Yahoo is also trying to integrate other services more closely with Messenger. For example, Fantasy Football is supported by the automatic creation of a group in the Messenger contact list.

The product is not in beta yet, but Yahoo plans to roll that out as soon as possible, and to continuously be rolling out new functionality as more user roll onto Vista.

My sense is that the adoption of Vista will be much slower than Microsoft would have us believe, but Yahoo is being sensible, building a Vista version of Messenger with basic functionality immediately. I just hope that Yahoo continues the push on the Mac client as diligently, since that client is woefully behind the curve relative to the Windows client.

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I'm regularly outspoken about my concerns that Google is going to take over the world and start passing out brain implants - but the fact of the matter is that I love Google services. Today's announcement that more GMail storage is on the way is heartening, but you've got to wonder: why is this mighty giant messing around with anything other than a total storage solution for all my data across all their apps? Where is the GDrive already?

Google told analysts more than a year ago that it wanted to store 100% of our data, a "golden copy." Perhaps its failure to do so yet is a sign of the finite power it truly holds. Or perhaps its just a ruse to lull cynics like me into a false sense of security. That's probably not what's happening.

I should probably pay $50 for super Google, as advocated this morning by Amit Agarwal in reference to the news. See also one estimate of forthcoming free storage capacity over at the blog Googlified.

Finally, I'm sure there are some of you out there that still haven't seen the following video about the future of Google and the web in general. It's not to be missed, it's thought provoking and funny. See you in the "hive mind" if it ever arrives!

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As part of our focus on Yahoo!'s next 100 days this week, I am going to dive into how I would go about fixing the company. Or at least starting along that path. According to comScore, Yahoo! is the 3rd most visited collection of web properties worldwide (trailing only Google and Microsoft), reaching about 61% of the global web audience. In the US, the company's websites are still #1, and actually have a broader ad reach then Google domestically. Yet Yahoo!'s total revenues for the first six months of 2007 were less than Google's revenue for just the last quarter.

Though that serves as a table setter for the problems at Yahoo! I won't get into financials in this article, as that is not my forte. Instead I will focus on what can be done to create a more useful and meaningful Yahoo! for users, one that can keep people on the site and drive them to use their search engine. Remember that Google controls ~50% of the search market share and pay-per-click text ads on search results drive a significant portion of their revenue -- search share is very important to Yahoo!

The Platform is the Killer App

The killer app on the web is the platform. We've talked about this before on this blog in terms of social networks and AJAX start pages, and software like Google Gears, the Adobe Integrated Runtime, and the Dojo Offline Toolkit that let developers take the web out of their web apps and have added credence to the idea that the platform of the future is the Internet.

Social networking darling Facebook has realized the power of the platform, which is part of the reason for all the hype, so have start pages like Pageflakes and Netvibes, who are building sophisticated (and increasingly more social) web platforms for developers. These platforms are beneficial for users because, like a desktop operating system, they allow people to aggregate the applications they use in one, central, organized location for quick access. For developers, platforms are a central location to launch new applications to the greatest number of people. For these reasons, the platform itself becomes the web's killer app.

One need look no further than this year's hottest gadget, the iPhone to see how beneficial a strong platform can be for a service or product. While Apple didn't provide a platform for developers in the true sense of the word, the number of iPhone-specific web apps that have been developed for the phone grows daily. These applications extend the functionality of the device and add value to users at no cost to Apple. Often, it is third party applications on a platform that attract new users or retain existing ones.

Building a Yahoo! Platform

Yahoo! needs to realize that the web platform is getting more and more important. Google already has, and is building a platform around their start page, iGoogle, by encouraging developers to build "gadgets" specifically for it. For Yahoo!, a platform can unify their services -- which right now are scattered -- and add utility to their page that will keep users there long enough to conduct searches. Yahoo! controls some of the hottest and most useful properties on the web, but has not figured out how to tie them together. They've started to bring some of their acquisitions under the single Yahoo! sign-on umbrella, but that still doesn't bring my del.icio.us links, my Flickr photos and my fantasy sports team management to one central location.

The good news for Yahoo! is that they already have a property just waiting to be turned into a full fledged platform: My Yahoo!

My Yahoo! is one of the oldest and most popular start pages on the Internet (I've used it since 1999), visited by about 50 million people monthly. The path toward a Yahoo! platform begins with My Yahoo!, which has been undergoing a major update via their new beta site. Many of the changes the My Yahoo! beta showcases are good: drag and drop page organization, more customization tools, multiple pages, and the ability to create a module out of any RSS feed are all great features. Yahoo! has also wisely begun to utilize their start page as a way to tie their various services together -- for example, I can add a static module for my del.icio.us bookmarks or my Flickr images. But there is still a lot more they need to do. Below I will outline three things I think they need to do to compete with the other fledgling platforms on the web.

1. An Open API

When it comes to developer APIs, Yahoo! is at the forefront. According to ProgrammableWeb, Yahoo! ties with Google for having the most APIs (25), which is why it boggles my mind that they don't have one for My Yahoo! the way Google does for iGoogle, or Facebook, or Pageflakes, or Netvibes do. Even more amazing, Yahoo! actually already has a widgets API, it's just focused in the wrong direction: on the desktop instead of toward their own web platform.

"The bottom line is, if we expect you to make My Yahoo! your home on the Web, then we need to deliver the content that’s important to your life. Hence we’re working around the clock to add more and more relevant modules to choose from." -- My Yahoo! Team, June 2007

The best way to add more relevant modules is to open the platform to anyone. Why have a team of people adding only "official" modules and working from a limited perspective when you could have thousands of developers doing the work for you for free? Look at the explosion of applications on Facebook's platform as an example of how well this works. Right now there are over 2300 apps on Facebook, created in just the first two full months of the platform, and that is about 500 more than there were 12 days ago.

Sure not all of those apps will be great, and many of them will likely be downright awful. But the chances of adding applications that are useful to your users and will potentially attract new ones greatly increases when you open up your platform. Further, it is now your users, rather than a small team of paid employees, who are deciding which applications are useful to them. Yahoo! could still retain editorial control by approving applications before adding them to the site, or by featuring modules vetted by the editorial staff.

Certainly for a content company like Yahoo!, opening up their platform might seem like giving their competitors a way to leech users away from their own content, but in reality the opposite it a true. It actually means giving users access to competitor content while keeping them on your site, which is a net positive.

2. Richer Applications

Currently most My Yahoo! modules are one-way, meaning that they give you information but you don't really interact with them. I can get my email via a My Yahoo! module, but I can't compose and send or even read a full email without leaving the My Yahoo! page. Some widgets have basic input functions -- like the reference or stock quote widgets -- but query results are still returned on a separate page, rather than inside the widget.

iGoogle's YouTube app can play videos directly in the app.

For My Yahoo! to be taken seriously as a platform and compete with Facebook and iGoogle, they'll need to support richer applications. That means applications that can be interacted with on the page, such as a dictionary app that loads the definition I am after without sending me away from my My Yahoo! page, or a Games application that lets me load a game of Literati right inside my start page, or a Flickr app that lets me upload photos and manage my galleries without actually visiting Flickr.

One of the reasons people get so excited about Facebook and other burgeoning web platforms is that there exists the potential for nearly any sort of application. With the right apps, Facebook could theoretically become a one stop shop for web surfers to consume information and perform tasks. Support for richer applications would put Yahoo! in the mix for creating the web platform that demands the most of your attention.

3. Make the Platform Social

This is probably the last step Yahoo! should take when building their web platform. Richard and I have both talked about turning start pages into social networks (here and here), and this is certainly where I see these companies going. As Richard said, it seems to be almost a natural evolution -- once you have the users, why not allow them to interact? But Yahoo! needs to focus on building out their platform for developers before turning it into a social network.

It's no secret that Yahoo! has long wanted a social network. There was their famous failed attempt to buy Facebook last fall, and they have since been linked with bebo as well. When Yahoo! launched the beta of their new My Yahoo! service last March, they hinted at the prospect of making their start page property more social, so it is possible they already have plans to do so.

I think growing a social network around their platform makes more sense than purchasing one. My Yahoo! already has 50 million users (by December 2006 numbers) -- or a lot more than Facebook. Since we're already using My Yahoo! to tie Yahoo!'s services together and already want it to be the hub for the Yahoo! universe and the web at large, it makes sense to build in a social network, rather than purchase one from the outside an go through the headache of figuring out how to get it integrated.

Conclusion

Certainly the Yahoo! platform won't fix Yahoo! by itself, but I think it should be a major part of their plans going forward. Turning My Yahoo! into an open platform for rich internet applications does two things: 1. it can unify Yahoo!'s services under one umbrella -- something they have long struggled to do, and 2. it adds utility for users and gives them less reason to leave Yahoo!, and the longer people stay on the page, the more likely they are to start using Yahoo! for search.

I think Yahoo! is actually in a better position to create a winning platform than Google is right now. Their start page is already established and has an enormous user base, they have a rich developer culture built around their other APIs and they can seed their platform with some of the best content on the web.

What do you think of my proposed idea to turn My Yahoo! into a platform? Do you use My Yahoo! now? Would you if it was the platform I envision? Would that be a step in the right direction for Yahoo!? Leave your thoughts below.

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