ACM TechNews - Friday, September 26, 2003

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ACM TechNews
Volume 5, Number 550
Date: September 26, 2003

Top Stories for Friday, September 26, 2003:
http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html


"European Parliament Votes to Limit Scope of Software Patents"
"Maryland: E-Voting Passes Muster"
"The Grand Challenges for Computer Science"
"Patent Politics"
"Davis to Sign E-Waste Bill"
"Congress Questions Database Protection Proposal"
"Want PC Security? Diversify"
"Pentagon Spy Office to Close"
"Evolving Web Could Turn Into the Everynet"
"An Open Invitation to Election Fraud"
"'Smart Sofa' Aimed at Couch Potatoes"
"Researchers Develop a 'Smart' Payment Card That Can Easily
Be Programmed to Restrict Spending"
"An Open-Source Search Engine Takes Shape"
"Revenge of the Coders"
"Ultra-Wideband: Multimedia Unplugged"
"5 Technologies That Will Change the World"


******************* News Stories ***********************

"European Parliament Votes to Limit Scope of Software Patents"
Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) on Sept. 24 voted
overwhelmingly in favor of amendments to the European
Commission's software patent directive.  Changes that were
approved include prohibitions on the patenting of algorithms and ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item1

"Maryland: E-Voting Passes Muster"
A Sept. 24 report from Maryland election officials concluded that
despite a "high risk of compromise," the state has enough
confidence in Diebold Election Systems' touch-screen voting
machines to go ahead with a deal to purchase the machines.  The ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item2

"The Grand Challenges for Computer Science"
The U.K. Computing Research Committee, in conjunction with the
Council of Professors and Heads of Computing, has embarked on
seven new projects in the hope that one or more will become
15-year, international Grand Challenges that significantly ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item3

"Patent Politics"
Microsoft and its industry rivals are siding together against
Eolas, a single-man firm that won a patent claim against
Microsoft for its ActiveX technology, which allows application
plug-ins to run in Internet Explorer.  The 1999 patent claim, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item4

"Davis to Sign E-Waste Bill"
California Gov. Gray Davis will sign a bill on Sept. 25 requiring
consumers to pay an additional $6 to $10 for every new computer
monitor or television they purchase to fund the recycling of
electronic waste.  Californians Against Waste executive director ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item5

"Congress Questions Database Protection Proposal"
A draft bill designed to boost protection for the content of
commercial databases has sparked debate in Congress as both
supporters and opponents expressed their views at a Sept. 23
hearing.  Proponents such as Keith Kupferschmid of the Software ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item6

"Want PC Security? Diversify"
Seven computer security company executives, writers, and
academics presented a report at a Computer & Communications
Industry Association (CCIA) meeting on Sept. 24 arguing that
network instability has been worsened by Microsoft's ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item7

"Pentagon Spy Office to Close"
A joint congressional panel has elected to shutter the
Information Awareness Office of the Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency (DARPA), which was developing the controversial
Terrorism Information Awareness (TIA) program.  TIA was a ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item8

"Evolving Web Could Turn Into the Everynet"
The adoption of the Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) standard
promises to ease networking by allowing any object to be set up
as an online service, according to Wind River Systems' Joerg
Bertholdt.  This is just one of several developments that should ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item9

"An Open Invitation to Election Fraud"
Bev Harris, author of "Black Box Voting," has made it a priority
to uncover the flaws of electronic voting systems, and she
recently published several critical vulnerabilities in Diebold
touch-screen machines that were verified by internal Diebold ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item10

"'Smart Sofa' Aimed at Couch Potatoes"
Researchers at Dublin's Trinity College are working on a "smart
sofa" that can so far only deliver personalized greetings to
users via microchip sensors that identify whoever sits down by
weight; however, scientist Mads Haahr believes the device will ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item11

"Researchers Develop a 'Smart' Payment Card That Can Easily Be
Programmed to Restrict Spending"
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed
technology that would turn credit cards into "smart" payment
cards.  The technology makes use of microchips built into credit
cards, an on-card verification system, open application ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item12

"An Open-Source Search Engine Takes Shape"
The Nutch open-source search engine uses a nonproprietary ranking
formula to give users clear, unbiased query results, according to
Nutch Organization President Doug Cutting, who believes that a
transparent offering such as Nutch could benefit commercial ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item13

"Revenge of the Coders"
There is a movement among programmers away from sluggish,
feature-heavy IDEs and toward flexible code editors as
enterprises focus intensely on productivity.  The rationale
behind this transition is developers' desire to not be locked ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item14

"Ultra-Wideband: Multimedia Unplugged"
Ultrawideband (UWB) technology has the potential to transform
home media networking and facilitate the seamless interlinking of
numerous devices, even though the FCC placed frequency
limitations on UWB to quell concerns that it would interfere with ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item15

"5 Technologies That Will Change the World"
The Internet meltdown has not halted technological development,
and five technologies--radio frequency identification (RFID)
tags, 3D printing, biosimulation, self-aware computers, and
distributed power generation--have the potential to dramatically ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0926f.html#item16


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