The Myth of the Best Practices Silver Bullet
"Lawmaker Doesn't Rule Out Cybersecurity Regulation"
The U.S. government and the private sector have not given cybersecurity adequate emphasis, said Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Calif.), speaking at a Sept. 26 cybersecurity policy forum hosted by Nortel Networks. Although his preference is for companies to voluntarily patch vulnerabilities, Lungren, ...
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"VoIP Wants to Cut the Computer Cord"
The advent of softphone technology has made voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephony an even more appealing option, as users can easily download software that enables any laptop to serve as a telephone. Backers of the technology are betting that as softphones become available to a ...
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"EE Schools: Where Are the Girls?"
Girls are being discouraged from pursuing degrees in engineering by a variety of factors, including a negative image of the engineering profession, a lack of role models, little support from peers or parents, sexist attitudes, and classes and workplaces that are predominantly male. ...
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"Networking Researchers Show Their Stuff at iGrid"
California Institute of Technology and Information Technology director Larry Smarr proclaimed yesterday's ultra-high-resolution teleconference between Keio University President Yuichiro Anzai and UC San Diego Chancellor Marye Anne Fox at iGrid 2005 to be "a window to the future." ...
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"Gaming Makes the Grade"
Some universities are attempting to reverse the decline in computer science undergraduate enrollments by re-energizing interest in the field with a focus on games and gaming. Academics and industry representatives say classes that use games as programming teaching aids or that let students ...
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"Hi-Tech DIY to Solve Local Problems"
MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms has the ambitious goal of producing a machine that can fabricate any material or object on a molecular level. In the four years since its launch, the center has made some of its tools and software available to people of all ages via "Fab Labs;" adults and ...
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"NASA to Show Intelligent Space Robots in Action at Ames "Marscape""
NASA will demonstrate a pair of intelligent robots as well as "mobile agent" software on Oct. 3 at the NASA Ames Research Center's "Marscape" environment in Silicon Valley. The research for the technologies is funded under the auspices of the Software, Intelligent Systems, and Modeling ...
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"Purdue Method Will Help Industry Design Parts-Search Systems"
Purdue University researchers who developed shape-search engines have created a "benchmarking database and process" that enables engineers to assess the performance of such systems, according to mechanical engineering professor Karthik Ramani of the Purdue Research and Education Center for ...
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"New Security Proposed for Do-it-All Phones"
The increasing consolidation of functions into mobile phones has placed a premium on safeguarding their security. The Trusted Computing Group (TCG) has developed a hardware-based standard for securing mobile phones that has been backed by industry heavyweights such as Nokia, Motorola, Intel, and ...
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"Computer Users Move Themselves With the Mind"
A new brain-computer interface developed by Gert Pfurtscheller of Austria's Graz University of Technology provides a non-invasive way to detect neuronal signals associated with movement and translate those signals into movement within a virtual environment. The interface consists of an ...
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"KDE 4 Promises Radical Changes to the Free Desktop"
KDE version 3.5 has yet to be released, but developers are already at work on KDE version 4. The release of 3.5 promises a mature and stable desktop platform capable of performing a broad array of applications; KDE 4 is largely a conceptual opportunity, with developers looking to test out major ...
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"When Technology Wastes Time"
American companies lose $588 billion per year because of unnecessary distractions caused primarily by technology tools such as email and instant messaging, according to a new Basex report. The IT analysis firm estimates that 28 billion man-hours are lost annually to interruptions from spam, the ...
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"In Chess, Qualified Respect for Computers"
The skill of chess-playing computers has long been a yardstick by which the progress of artificial intelligence is measured, and has developed in parallel with most hardware advances. IBM's Deep Blue chess computer trounced world champion Garry Kasparov eight years ago, but experts are ...
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"Searching for a Better World"
As the information available on the Web proliferates and takes on new forms, search engines are struggling to keep pace: They already have trouble ascertaining the meaning of a query when there are multiple definitions for a search term, and the addition of new file formats has ...
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"What Makes a Great IT Pro"
Australian IT managers predict that skills requirements for professionals in their field will be more business- and people-oriented five years from now. Sydney Harbor Foreshore Authority IT manager Virginia Orr says there was a greater concentration on operational and technical skills five years ...
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"Death to Folders!"
The graphical user interface has begun to show its limitations as the vehicle for desktop navigation: Under the current file and folder system, content must be placed in a given location, and users must adhere to the filing system they created in order to effectively retrieve information ...
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"The Avatars of Research"
Massively multiplayer online games such as Second Life have aroused the interest of scholars as a testbed for entrepreneurial skills as well as a tool for studying social interaction. Second Life is especially attractive to researchers since almost any kind of activity can be performed in the ...
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"Human 2.0"
Author and inventor Ray Kurzweil bases his predictions on how technology will transform humanity on the fact that technological progress unfolds exponentially rather than linearly. Advancements in information technology, combined with the conversion of practically all technologies ...
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"The Myth of the Best Practices Silver Bullet"
An organization's management must realize that there is no best practices panacea so as to avoid assuming the automatic success of the practices they deploy; true success stems from management's understanding of how the practices they use will function within their individual organization. ...
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