Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the August 26, 2002 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for IT professionals three times a week. For instructions on how to unsubscribe from this service, please see below. ACM's MemberNet is now online. For discussion (and voting) forums on current industry issues and the latest on ACM activities, visit http://www.acm.org/membernet Remember to check out our hot new online essay and opinion magazine, Ubiquity, at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ACM TechNews Volume 4, Number 391 Date: August 26, 2002 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Site Sponsored by Hewlett Packard Company ( ) HP is the premier source for computing services, products and solutions. Responding to customers' requirements for quality and reliability at aggressive prices, HP offers performance-packed products and comprehensive services. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Top Stories for Monday, August 26, 2002: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "UCITA Still Haunts IT" "Fight Continues over H-1B Visa Program" "Israeli Tech Slump Hits Workers Hard" "Q&A: Fred Baker, Chairman of the Internet Society" "Shortage of Tech Personnel Hampers Appalachia, Study Says" "Shortcuts Lighten Wireless Load" "Researchers Turn Scrap to Strength with Nanocrystals" "Primed for a Math Breakthrough" "'Animals' Grown from an Artificial Embryo" "Activists Take on Hollywood Cartel" "PipeRench Gives Leverage on Reconfigurable Computing" "Researchers Develop Software to Combat Terror Attacks" "It Pays to Play With the CIA" "Will Quantum Computing Ever Become a Reality?" "Tablet PCs Will Provide New User Interfaces" "Linking With Light" "Computers Without Clocks" "Europe's New Air War" "Swarm Intelligence: Power in Numbers" ******************* News Stories *********************** "UCITA Still Haunts IT" IT departments in businesses around the country are still warily eyeing the Uniform Computer Information Transaction Act (UCITA), the controversial law set for another push in state legislatures next year. Despite reworking on the part of the National ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item1 "Fight Continues over H-1B Visa Program" Employers claim that the H-1B visa system, which is supposed to shore up the U.S. technology industry by hiring foreign workers, is fulfilling its goal, but opponents say there are still too many foreigners taking jobs away from available Americans. ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item2 "Israeli Tech Slump Hits Workers Hard" The global technology downturn has made a sizable impact in Israel, where formerly high-paid IT workers--at least, those who were able to find employment after being downsized--must accept smaller salaries and fewer, if any, job perks. Israel attracted ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item3 "Q&A: Fred Baker, Chairman of the Internet Society" The Internet Society elected Cisco Systems engineer Fred Baker as its new chairman in early August, and Baker says that if the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) cannot be reformed into a "clear-headed organization," it should ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item4 "Shortage of Tech Personnel Hampers Appalachia, Study Says" The Appalachian region spanning 13 states has a small technology economy that grew only 75 percent as fast the region's general economy between 1989 and 1998, according to a new University of North Carolina report. The region, which covers 200,000 square ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item5 "Shortcuts Lighten Wireless Load" By establishing more remote relationships between nodes in a wireless network, one researcher from the University of Southern California has been able to make wireless networks much more efficient. Existing wireless network technologies use ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item6 "Researchers Turn Scrap to Strength with Nanocrystals" Purdue University researchers have learned that the metal shavings produced from machining processes for automobile and metallic components are also nanocrystals that are strong, wear-resistant, and inexpensive to make. They say the process ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item7 "Primed for a Math Breakthrough" Indian Institute of Technology professor Manindra Agrawal, together with two students, has developed a computer algorithm that can factor large prime numbers without any possibility for error. However, Agrawal himself admits that it has no practical ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item8 "'Animals' Grown from an Artificial Embryo" University of Zurich AI researcher Josh Bongard has developed a computer simulation that grows virtual creatures from artificial embryos that are capable of pushing a simulated box. The genome of each embryo cell is represented by a string of random numbers ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item9 "Activists Take on Hollywood Cartel" Activists are going online to challenge legislation backed by the entertainment industry that would give copyright owners absolute control over the use and distribution of copyrighted works, as well as what related technologies can be marketed. Such a move ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item10 "PipeRench Gives Leverage on Reconfigurable Computing" Computer chip researchers at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh unveiled their reconfigurable computing design, called PipeRench, at the recent Hot Chips conference. By using a virtual machine combined with a data pipeline, the team was able ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item11 "Researchers Develop Software to Combat Terror Attacks" Alok Chaturvedi and Shailendra Raj Mehta of Purdue University's e-Business Research Center have devised a simulation program designed to prevent terrorist attacks, and were recently invited to the White House to demonstrate the program's homeland defense ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item12 "It Pays to Play With the CIA" The CIA-backed venture fund In-Q-Tel is setting a new standard of thinking in how government stays abreast of the latest technology. Originally incorporated as a nonprofit organization, In-Q-Tel doles out $1 million to $2 million grants to small ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item13 "Will Quantum Computing Ever Become a Reality?" Some experts say that the transition to quantum computing is upon us, but others say that its practical applications are still a long time off, given the technology's complexity and the fact that scientists still do not fully comprehend the quantum ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item14 "Tablet PCs Will Provide New User Interfaces" Microsoft and partner companies Hewlett-Packard, Acer, Toshiba, and Motion have unveiled a Windows Tablet PC device that can recognize and transform handwriting into electronic images within documents. Microsoft's Tablet also includes a new version of ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item15 "Linking With Light" Some researchers predict that the electron-driven data flow of copper computer connections will be supplanted by the photonic transmission of optical interconnects. "We're already projecting that for certain system requirements data rates are going to be ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item16 "Computers Without Clocks" Sun Microsystems Laboratories and other research groups are working on asynchronous computing systems in which each component operates at its own speed rather than depends on the rhythm set by a clock, as is typical of synchronous systems. Asynchronous ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item17 "Europe's New Air War" Europe is planning a fleet of 30 satellites that will provide location-based services and enhance the precision of existing Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites, but officials such as U.S. deputy secretary of defense Paul Wolfowitz see sinister ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item18 "Swarm Intelligence: Power in Numbers" Examining the behavior of social insects and the architecture of their collective activities can be applied to heuristics, and used to solve combinatorial optimization problems that plague product design and other systems. Finding optimum solutions for ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0826m.html#item19 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review Friday's issue, please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2002-4/0823f.html -- To visit the TechNews home page, point your browser to: http://www.acm.org/technews/ -- To unsubscribe from the ACM TechNews Early Alert Service: Please send a separate email to listserv@listserv2.acm.org with the line signoff technews in the body of your message. -- Please note that replying directly to this message does not automatically unsubscribe you from the TechNews list. -- To submit feedback about ACM TechNews, contact: technews@hq.acm.org -- ACM may have a different email address on file for you, so if you're unable to "unsubscribe" yourself, please direct your request to: technews-request@acm.org We will remove your name from the TechNews list on your behalf. -- For help with technical problems, including problems with leaving the list, please write to: technews-request@acm.org ---- ACM TechNews is sponsored by Hewlett Packard Company.