ACM TechNews - Friday, November 21, 2003

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ACM TechNews
Volume 5, Number 574
Date: November 21, 2003

Top Stories for Friday, November 21, 2003:
http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html

"Smaller Computer Chips Built Using DNA as Template"
"Senate Approves $3.7B Nanotech Bill"
"SCO to Expand Its Lawsuit Beyond Linux"
"Republicans Back E-Vote Bill"
"Group Pushing E-Voting Security to Launch"
"Computing Power Tries to Keep Up With Information Flood"
"Open Source's Threat to Microsoft Is Growing"
"Study Warns of Lack of Scientists as Visa Applications Drop"
"IBM Donates Code to Open-Source Project"
"InterVal--Internet and Value Chains: Berlin Research Center on
 Internet Economics"
"Next-Generation Tech: Individuals First"
"Sandia Labs Studies Phony Computer Network for Hackers"
"UF 'Smart Home' Demonstrates Concept of Automated Elderly Help
 and Care"
"Web Regulator Too American, UN to Hear"
"Breaking the Glass Firewall"
"The Next Chapter: Predictions About Storage"
"From Artificial Intelligence to Artificial Biology?"
"The Best New Technologies of 2003"

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

"Smaller Computer Chips Built Using DNA as Template"
Scientists at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology have
used DNA strands to create minute, self-assembling transistors
through recombination, which is typically used to fix damaged DNA
and swap genes.  The process involves placing a single DNA strand ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item1

"Senate Approves $3.7B Nanotech Bill"
Congress has passed legislation that authorizes a four-year
commitment of $3.7 billion to support nanotechnology research and
development; the bill supplies a framework for coordination of
research across agencies and stresses interdisciplinary research, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item2

"SCO to Expand Its Lawsuit Beyond Linux"
SCO Group CEO Darl McBride announced at the Enterprise IT Week
cdXpo Conference in Las Vegas this week that his company is
analyzing source code awarded in a nine-year old settlement
between AT&T's Unix Systems Laboratories and Berkeley Software ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item3

"Republicans Back E-Vote Bill"
The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003 has
picked up its first Republican co-sponsors.  Reps. Tom Davis
(R-Va.), Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), and Charles Bass (R-N.H),
have indicated that they will sign on as co-sponsors of the bill ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item4

"Group Pushing E-Voting Security to Launch"
The National Committee on Voter Integrity (NCVI) will hold its
first press conference today in Washington, D.C., to promote "the
integrity and reliability of electronic voting systems,"
according to the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).  ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item5

"Computing Power Tries to Keep Up With Information Flood"
The University of California-Berkeley report, "How Much
Information 2003," estimates that five exabytes of
data--equivalent to all words spoken by human beings--was created
last year, and reckons that the volume of information worldwide ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item6

"Open Source's Threat to Microsoft Is Growing"
Traditional software companies see open-source software as a
growing threat to their business, which is based on proprietary
products:  Microsoft is so concerned that it has launched a
wide-ranging campaign to show the public that its Windows OS ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item7

"Study Warns of Lack of Scientists as Visa Applications Drop"
Increasing American dependence on foreign-born scientists and
engineers puts the nation's technology-driven economy at risk as
heightened security fears since Sept. 11 has made it more
difficult for foreigners to obtain working visas for the United ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item8

"IBM Donates Code to Open Source Project"
IBM has contributed source code that will act as a cornerstone of
the Visual Editor Project, an effort by the Eclipse software
consortium to advance the technology used to build Java-based
graphical user interfaces (GUIs).  IBM's Visual Editor for Java, ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item9

"InterVal--Internet and Value Chains: Berlin Research Center on
 Internet Economics"
Berlin's Humboldt-Universitat is hosting a new research center
intended to study the long-term and macroeconomic effects of the
advanced networked economy--specifically how XML, Web services,
and the semantic Web affect industry supply chains.  The Internet ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item10

"Next-Generation Tech: Individuals First"
Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems director Radu
Popescu-Zeletin foresees the emergence of an individual-centric
model for mobile and wireless communications technology in the
next decade, one that is "intelligent enough to adapt to the ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item11

"Sandia Labs Studies Phony Computer Network for Hackers"
Network-security experts at the Livermore, Calif., campus of
Sandia National Laboratories are protecting a supercomputer
conference this week in Phoenix without the use of a main
firewall.  Instead, federal researchers have decided to use a ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item12

"UF 'Smart Home' Demonstrates Concept of Automated Elderly Help
 and Care"
University of Florida researchers have designed and built a
500-square-foot "smart house" that employs state-of-the-art
computer and sensor technology to automatically provide
assistive-living services to elderly residents.  The many devices ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item13

"Web Regulator Too American, UN to Hear"
Though ICANN's board of directors encompasses members from all
over the globe, a number of developing countries still believe
the United States has inappropriate power over the Internet and
they advocate oversight by a more intergovernmental group.  Not ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item14

"Breaking the Glass Firewall"
Alta Associates CEO Joyce Brocaglia thinks women are excellent
candidates for information security management because "They're
good at communication, relationship management, team-building and
multitasking--all of which are essential traits for ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item15

"The Next Chapter: Predictions About Storage"
Academics and top technology business executives predict many
significant advances in the field of digital storage by the end
of the decade.  M-Systems Flash Disk Pioneers' Dana Gross
forecasts that continued progress in multilevel cell technology ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item16

"From Artificial Intelligence to Artificial Biology?"
A fundamental shift in the perception of computing, from
artificial intelligence to artificial biology, is a topic of
interest among a growing cadre of scientists.  Rather than
pursuing bug-free software, the researchers argue that bugs ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item17

"The Best New Technologies of 2003"
A number of broadly applicable technologies with the potential to
change the home and workplace have been selected by Business 2.0
as the best new technologies of the year.  Canon, Cornice,
Hitachi, and Rio are marketing or developing micro hard drives ...
http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1121f.html#item18


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