March 2016 – Page 22 – news.buyenne.com

Microsoft: Surface Hub wird nach erneuter Verzögerung jetzt geliefert

Eigentlich sollte Microsofts Konferenzsystem Surface Hub nach einer ungeplanten Verzögerung im Januar 2016 ausgeliefert werden. Jetzt, Ende März, ist es soweit. (Surface Hub, Microsoft)

Lost Japanese X-ray satellite was to probe “exotic” areas of the universe

Japanese space agency has lost contact with Hitomi and debris is reported.

An artist's impression of the Hitomi satellite in orbit. Note: That scary, all devouring X-ray source isn't actually that close to Earth. (credit: JAXA)

The Japanese space agency, JAXA, lost communication with its new Hitomi X-ray astronomy satellite on Saturday, spending Sunday trying unsuccessfully to reestablish control over the spacecraft. The prognosis appears to be fairly grim after the US Strategic Command’s Joint Space Operations Center revealed Sunday that it is tracking five pieces of debris associated with the satellite.

It is not clear whether Hitomi struck a piece of space debris in its orbit about 580km above Earth or what else might have precipitated the loss of communication. Either way, scientists lamented the apparent failure of an instrument that would have allowed them to probe much deeper into the relatively unstudied field of X-ray astronomy.

High-energy but very-short-wavelength X-rays are absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere. To observe them, scientists must therefore send instruments into the upper atmosphere or into space itself. Unlike other kinds of observational astronomy, then, X-ray astronomy is a fairly new field.

Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Here’s why the next SpaceX launch isn’t just about the booster landing

Bigelow’s inflatable module may one day revolutionize in-space habitation.

The expandable habitat from Bigelow Aerospace is lifted into Dragon's trunk for a ride to the space station. (credit: SpaceX)

It's a big idea. It's a bold idea. And at first blush, it seems a bit of a daft idea. A company called Bigelow Aerospace wants to build space stations for the government and hotels for private customers that will inflate like balloons once they reach outer space. Bigelow’s inflatables have the potential to revolutionize spaceflight by providing lighter, and much larger, places to live in space. But the big question remains: Does anyone really want to live in a space balloon?

NASA intends to find out and has signed a $17.8 million contract with Bigelow to do so. As early as April 8 a deflated module will launch inside the trunk of a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. The space agency has agreed to attach a test module to the International Space Station, inflate it, and over the course of two years determine if such a contraption can work in space. Crew won’t live in it—inflatables remain too experimental to risk life and limb. But if the module holds up, NASA will invest more money into the technology.

The space agency has said it wants to use the space station as a platform for technologies that will enable, and perhaps lower the cost, of deep space exploration. With the Bigelow module NASA appears to be doing exactly that. “It’s a big step for us, because inflatables can be a big multiplier for us as we move further out into space,” explained Mark Geyer, deputy director of Johnson Space Center, during a recent meeting of NASA’s advisory council.

Read 11 remaining paragraphs | Comments

First Ubuntu tablet to support convergence (desktop or tablet UI) now available for pre-order

The BQ Aquaris M10 Ubuntu Edition is a tablet with a 10.1 inch display, a 64-bit MediaTek quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM, and Ubuntu software. It’s also the first device to ship with support for Ubuntu’s “convergence” feature, allowing you to interact with a phone/tablet-style user interface when using the device as a tablet, and […]

First Ubuntu tablet to support convergence (desktop or tablet UI) now available for pre-order is a post from: Liliputing

Nothing but a number? Meet the new Porsche 718 Boxster

Trading six cylinders for four, Porsche bets that less is more.

Jonathan Gitlin

The 2017 Porsche 718 Boxster looks a lot like the outgoing six-cylinder Boxster but shares very few body panels with that car.

5 more images in gallery

Porsches have long been a living dichotomy. No sports car manufacturer wears its engineering sobriety so blatantly on its sleeve. Yet, the human result is a clear polar opposite. Porsche fans are nearly as rabid as those that feverishly wave the Ferrari flag. After all, this is the company that made the rear-engine 911 not only live, but thrive through multiple generations despite air cooling and a rearward weight bias with the flawed nature of highly polar momentousness. Overcome fundamental deficiencies, find a way to turn them into advantages, then ring the cash register. For Porsche, this has worked for decades. The latest in that thinking are the two 718 Boxsters going on sale this June, in both a $58,000 standard and $64,800 S configuration.

One central argument of the 718 is that less is more. The Boxster convertible (as well as the Cayman coupes) move away from six-cylinder engines to a paltry four cylinders. And though nobody can drive a specifications table and should therefore not judge equipment based solely on stats, many do. So, Porsche purists are concerned. At the most aural level, six cylinders firing every 720 degrees of crank rotation sound better than four. Or so many people think. But no one should judge a book by its cover.

There is some historical precedent for the engine choice, however. Porsche's first cars had four cylinders. Porsche's first racing engine—the Ernst Fuhrmann-designed four-cam boxer—had four cylinders. The latter also had a complex camshaft drive system with multiple shafts and required frequent rebuilds, but that was then and this is now.

Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Kernel: Linux 4.6-rc1 mit neuem Dateisystem OrangeFS

Einen Tag früher als erwartet hat Linus Torvalds das Zeitfenster für Einreichungen zu Kernel 4.6 geschlossen und die erste Testversion freigegeben. Sie bietet neben einem neuen Dateisystem unter anderem Energieeinsparungen für Intel-Chips und Verbesserungen bei den freien Grafiktreibern. (Linus Torvalds, Intel)

9.7-inch iPad Pro review: What makes something “Pro” anyway?

The smaller Pro straddles the line between the 12.9-inch version and the Air 2.

Andrew Cunningham

The 9.7-inch iPad Pro with its Smart Keyboard and Apple Pencil.

9 more images in gallery

If you’re Apple, how do you decide what constitutes a “Pro” device? Is it in the specs? Usually Pro products are faster and offer more storage and RAM than their non-Pro counterparts. Is it something special about the hardware and software? Often, yes, Pro products have specialized features that non-Pro products either get later or don’t get at all. Is it about the kinds of tasks they can perform? Sort of. Most Pro and non-Pro products run the same software, but the Pro can perform actions faster and better thanks to the aforementioned hardware improvements.

Some Pro products are also more “Pro” than others. There’s a huge gap between the lowest-end Mac Pro and the highest-end version of the same machine. The 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro offers all kinds of performance improvements that the 13-inch version doesn't.

Keep all of this in mind as you consider the 9.7-inch iPad Pro. In some ways, it is decidedly more “Pro” than the iPad Air 2 it kind of, sort of replaces—the new iPad Pro is faster, and it supports the Smart Connector and Apple Pencil. Its screen technology is more advanced, and in some ways it’s even better than the 12.9-inch iPad Pro Apple released in the fall. But this new release isn't quite as big and it isn't quite as fast. The 9.7-inch iPad Pro also shares a few areas of overlap with the iPad Air 2, which is still hanging around at lower new and refurbished price points. It’s Pro, in the context of the rest of the iPad lineup, but it's not the most Pro.

Read 44 remaining paragraphs | Comments

Apple: Fehler in iOS 9.3 – Links nicht mehr anklickbar

Das neue iOS 9.3, das seit einer Woche angeboten wird, macht weiter Ärger. Apple-Nutzer beschweren sich über nicht mehr funktionierende Links und Hänger in Safari und anderen Apps, seitdem sie das Update eingespielt haben. (iOS 9, iPad 2)

British Music Copyright Group Wants ‘Take Down, Stay Down’ Google Policy

The BPI, the copyright lobby of the British music industry, wants Google to adopt a “take down, stay down” policy when it comes to removing links from search engine results.The BPI is one of the most active groups in removing piracy links via Goog…

The BPI, the copyright lobby of the British music industry, wants Google to adopt a "take down, stay down" policy when it comes to removing links from search engine results.

The BPI is one of the most active groups in removing piracy links via Google's DMCA take-down process, having already asked for the removal of more than 200 million links. However, the group is rustrated with what seems to be an increasingly futile at removing piracy links, with many removed links simply duplicated in minutes with a different URL.

As such, the BPI now wants Google to adopt a "take down, stay down" policy, which means that instead of submitting a URL to illegal content, rights-holders like the BPI would only need to submit information about a piece of content (such as "7 Year by Lukas Graham"), and then it would be Google's job to hunt and remove all URLs offering an infringing copy of said content. This change would mean Google and other search engines would have to do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to policing the Internet for illegal content.

Explaining the problem in their own words, the BPI says in a statement that, "Illegal results that are taken down by Google are frequently replaced by other illegal links, which means that legal services continue to be overshadowed by infringing sites in the very top search results." Instead, the BPI's solution would mean that "once a piece of content has been notified for removal by the BPI, it isn’t indexed again for the same site and stays removed."

Google says they are already taking action against sites that frequently offer infringing content by demoting them in the search rankings, and that piracy sites do not actually rely on search engine referrals for most of their traffic.

"We've reviewed more than 80 million alleged links to pirated content in the last month alone, and we have refined our algorithm to demote sites that receive high numbers of copyright takedown requests," a spokesperson told the Guardian.

"But search is not the primary problem - all traffic from major search engines accounts for less than 16% of traffic to sites like The Pirate Bay."

Google has previously said that "take down, stay down" may have an "overreaching effect", and that de-listing entire sites could result in the "censorship of lawful material".

RuTracker to Bypass Web Blockade With IM Delivered Torrents

Torrent giant RuTracker is proving that wherever there’s a web blockade, there’s a way to bypass it. In a move already being criticized by record labels, RuTracker is said to be preparing a bot system that will utilize Russian Facebook founder Pavel Durov’s Telegram messaging system to deliver uncensored magnet links to the masses.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

If copyright holders had their way the world’s leading torrent sites would be blocked by Internet service providers in every country of the world. That goal remains in the distance but there can be little doubt that the process is moving forward.

Several countries around Europe are now blocking between dozens and hundreds of ‘pirate’ sites and surprisingly, given the country’s traditional attitude to infringement, Russia is also becoming a blocking front-runner.

But while copyright holders remain enthusiastic about the implementation of bans, millions of Internet users are only interested in circumventing them. VPNs, proxies and mirrors are all playing their part but it now appears that Russian torrent giant RuTracker is about to deploy an alternative system to beat the censors.

In addition to other counter-measures already being deployed, RuTracker is reportedly working on a bot system that will deliver torrents to users via the encrypted instant messaging service Telegram.

Financed by Russian Facebook (vKontakte) founder Pavel Durov, Telegram is a multi-platform messaging system that has grown from 100,000 daily users in 2013 to an impressive 100 million users in February 2016.

“Telegram is a messaging app with a focus on speed and security, it’s super-fast, simple and free. You can use Telegram on all your devices at the same time — your messages sync seamlessly across any number of your phones, tablets or computers,” Telegram explains.

The attractiveness of Telegram for RuTracker lies in its reach. In addition to sending any kind of file (doc, zip, mp3, torrent, etc), it can broadcast such content to an unlimited audience. It’s believed that the site will use Telegram to distribute magnet links, which makes sense after the site added them in recent months.

The big question now is how RuTracker will be received by Telegram’s operators. While the platform is generally anti-censorship and refuses to comply with local government restrictions on freedom of speech, it does have rules about infringing content.

Private chats between groups of users up to 5,000 members are strictly off-limits, so any exchanges there are not subjected to any takedowns. However, something more public could fall foul of the site’s rules.

“Our mission is to provide a secure means of communication that works everywhere on the planet. To do that in the places where it is most needed (and to continue distributing Telegram through the App Store and Google Play), we have to process legitimate requests to take down illegal public content (sticker sets, bots, and channels) within the app,” Telegram’s ToS reads.

While it remains to be seen how the service will view the transmission of magnet links, entertainment industry bosses are already beginning to chime in with their opinions. Alexander Blinov, General Director of Gala Records / EMI, told news outlet Izvestia that if Telegram doesn’t take action against RuTracker, his company will take the fight to Google and Apple.

“The appearance of RuTracker in Telegram is not good and if RuTracker continues to distribute illegal content through this channel, we will have to take the necessary measures, in particular filing complaints with Apple and Google,” Blinov said.

“Working relationships with these companies have already been established. However, response times are unpredictable: sometimes they act quickly, and sometimes they do not pay attention to complaints.”

According to Alexei Byrdin of the Internet Video Association, Telegram is an international project so will need to comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. There are no mentions of that legislation anywhere on the Telegram site but it’s certainly possible that Google and Apple could inflict the terms of the DMCA upon the service.

In any event, the move by RuTracker is certainly an interesting one. The site hasn’t really concerned itself with too much innovation over the years but in recent months has responded aggressively after receiving a lifetime block in Russia. Necessity really is the mother of invention.

Image credit: John Palmer

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.