ACM TechNews - Wednesday, November 12, 2003

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ACM TechNews
Volume 5, Number 570
Date: November 12, 2003

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Top Stories for Wednesday, November 12, 2003:
http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html

"Caught By the Act"
"Yet Another Rendition of Linux"
"System Halts Computer Viruses, Worms, Before End-User Stage"
"It's a Vision Thing"
"Life After Batteries: What's Next for Notebooks"
"Wireless Mesh Networking Gathers Momentum"
"Can Robots Become Conscious?"
"Agenda Lacking as U.N. Info Society Summit Looms"
"Virtual TV Studio Gets Real"
"Scientists Seek to Plug Gaps in Computer Security"
"100,000 Ballots to Be Cast Online"
"Bad Journalism, IPv6, and the BBC"
"Rage Against the (Chess) Machine"
"The Science of 'He Shoots, He Scores!'"
"Awareness of Computer-Security Threats Is Still Inadequate,
 Report Warns"
"FrankenPatch"
"Securing Teleworker Networks"
"Everyone's a Programmer"

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

"Caught By the Act"
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a source of
frustration for companies and individuals targeted by copyright
holders for allegedly breaking the law--specifically, the
provision that bans people from bypassing anti-copying measures ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item1

"Yet Another Rendition of Linux"
Acting executive director of the Desktop Linux Consortium Bruce
Perens told attendees at the organization's first meeting in
Tyngsboro, Mass., that some of the biggest companies in the world
are backing a new version of Linux designed to counter Red Hat's ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item2

"System Halts Computer Viruses, Worms, Before End-User Stage"
Washington University computer scientist John Lockwood led
research on a hardware-based network protection system that
guards against computer viruses and worms by scanning all
incoming traffic.  The Field-programmable Port Extender (FPX) ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item3

"It's a Vision Thing"
Information visualization is being heralded as a solution to data
overload faced by workers and consumers, and many companies are
developing tools such as heat maps, expanding family trees, and
animations that render information in less confusing, more ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item4

"Life After Batteries: What's Next for Notebooks"
Battery limitations have been a sore point for notebook computer
users, who face the catch-22 of settling for bare-bones notebooks
to maximize battery life or contending with shorter battery life
in order to enjoy more notebook features.  Notebook manufacturers ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item5

"Wireless Mesh Networking Gathers Momentum"
Wireless mesh networking was bolstered by two developments this
month, one with the launch of a new startup called PacketHop, and
the other being Intel's new business partnership with Zensys for
wireless home networking automation.  Wireless mesh networking in ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item6

"Can Robots Become Conscious?"
Whether robots can truly become conscious is a matter of debate,
given the profound lack of elemental understanding about
consciousness itself.  The basic measurement of machine
intelligence, the Turing test, has yet to be passed, although ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item7

"Agenda Lacking as U.N. Info Society Summit Looms"
Though more than 50 heads of state are set to take part in the
upcoming WSIS, the issues for discussion are not yet finalized
pending further review at meetings this week.  Interests involved
have indicated that establishing basic governance standards will ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item8

"Virtual TV Studio Gets Real"
German and Italian researchers have spent the past two years
developing the Origami virtual TV studio with the BBC, which has
established such a facility in Surrey, England, and is planning
to debut the system at the First European Conference on Visual ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item9

"Scientists Seek to Plug Gaps in Computer Security"
The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology is setting up a new
computer security center that will focus on developing more
firewalls, detection systems, and cryptography.  Students doing
research at the new Zurich Information Security Center (ZISC) ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item10

"100,000 Ballots to Be Cast Online"
CanVote President Joe Church calls the Internet-based voting in
the Ontario municipal elections by residents in the easternmost
areas of the province a success.  "I believe we're the first to
do a real full Internet election in North America," says Church, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item11

"Bad Journalism, IPv6, and the BBC"
Andrew McLaughlin asserts that as a former Democratic lawyer in
the U.S. House of Representatives he saw that much of the
information published as truth by the press was actually not
accurate.  McLaughlin contends that reporting on the Internet seems ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item12

"Rage Against the (Chess) Machine"
Chess champion Garry Kasparov is set to do battle with the
world's preeminent chess program this month in New York in what
has become an annual test of man versus machine.  The Fritz chess
program has been outfitted this time with a 3D interface so that ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item13

"The Science of 'He Shoots, He Scores!'"
The Acquisition, Querying, and Prediction of Motion Trajectories
is a project at the University of British Columbia to develop a
computer system that can track the movement of National Hockey
League players so that coaches can see how players respond and ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item14

"Awareness of Computer-Security Threats Is Still Inadequate,
 Report Warns"
Education-technology consortium Educause has released a new study
that provides recommendations that colleges could use to secure
their computer networks.  Titled "Information Technology
Security: Governance, Strategy, and Practice in Higher ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item15

"FrankenPatch"
Shoddy patching is often blamed for outbreaks of Slammer and
similar worms, when in fact patching's inherent complexity and
fragility is responsible.  Experts such as Cigital CTO Gary
McGraw say the disclosure of software vulnerabilities is ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item16

"Securing Teleworker Networks"
Teleworking offers convenience for employees and more
productivity and less costs for employers, but it also
constitutes a security risk:  The cost-cutting measures of
getting teleworkers to use personal PCs instead of leased laptops ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item17

"Everyone's a Programmer"
Intentional Software co-founder and billionaire Charles Simonyi
proposes a radical rethinking of software, which has become too
complex to understand--a disadvantage that has led to unfixable
software failures, abandoned projects, and tens of billions of ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1112w.html#item18

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