Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the March 31, 2003 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 the latest on ACM activities, member benefits, and industry issues, 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 5, Number 476 Date: March 31, 2003 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 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, March 31, 2003: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "Freedom, Technology and the Net" "Ubiquitous Computing: Slow Going" "What Hyperthreading Can (and Can't) Do for You" "Out of the Shadows" "Battling 'Surveillance Society'" "An Engineer by Any Other Name" "Software Bug May Cause Missile Errors" "IEEE USA Presses Congress on Visa Curbs" "University of Minnesota Researchers Develop Surveillance Software" "Flash Forward" "Email Traffic Patterns Can Reveal Ringleaders" "HP Thinks in 3D for Web Browsing" "Wave Propagation" "Are We Vulnerable to Cyber-Attacks?" "ICANN Ready to Chart a New Course?" "Computing at the Atomic Scale--and Below" "Cybersecurity Downgraded?" "Snags Remain as Grid-Lock Eases" "Right Game, Wrong Team" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Freedom, Technology and the Net" Amid the dragging war against Iraq, the rollback of civil liberties through legislation, and copyright holders' push to expand the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, one of the few bright spots is this week's Computers, Freedom, and Privacy ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item1 "Ubiquitous Computing: Slow Going" Computer and network engineers continue to envision rooms and buildings of ubiquitous computing environments as they did 15 years ago, but moving this theoretical design to commercial reality has taken longer than expected. Intel senior researcher ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item2 "What Hyperthreading Can (and Can't) Do for You" Although many may view hyperthreading (simultaneous multithreading) as a marketing ploy for Intel, it does offer performance benefits to users, and is expected to become a standard feature of software applications, according to Aberdeen ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item3 "Out of the Shadows" Open-source software is now being perceived as more useful and of higher quality than in the past, and companies are making a profit by offering services to those who use open-source software, or by packaging the software with their own commercial ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item4 "Battling 'Surveillance Society'" Barry Steinhardt of the ACLU has long championed the fight against a "surveillance society" in which the government is constantly privy to the movements, opinions, and thoughts of all citizens, a trend that could endanger people's right to free ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item5 "An Engineer by Any Other Name" Texas' narrow legal definition of what constitutes an engineer could hamper the growth of the state's high-tech industry because it shuts out a large portion of the workforce, according to Steven Kester of the American Electronics Association. Current ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item6 "Software Bug May Cause Missile Errors" Glitchy software may be the reason why Persian Gulf-based Patriot missiles targeted friendly aircraft twice in the past week, in one case with fatal results. A Patriot battery fired and destroyed a British Royal Air Force Tornado GR-4 on Sunday, while ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item7 "IEEE USA Presses Congress on Visa Curbs" Cheap foreign labor continues to have a huge impact on the prospects of U.S. workers for gaining high-tech jobs, says IEEE-USA President-Elect John Steadman. The industry group has called on Congress to investigate abuses in the H-1B and L-1 visa ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item8 "University of Minnesota Researchers Develop Surveillance Software" A new layer of security could be added to military computer systems thanks to the work of researchers at the University of Minnesota. The Minnesota Intrusion Detection System, which was developed by University computer scientists in collaboration with ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item9 "Flash Forward" With flash memory chips expected to reach their physical limits within two years, Intel, Motorola, and other manufacturers are exploring alternative materials and designs, although their projected market impact is a matter of debate. Flash memory's ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item10 "Email Traffic Patterns Can Reveal Ringleaders" Hewlett-Packard researchers have devised a new method of analyzing the flow of email traffic for patterns that could reveal online communities and their leaders, and HP's Joshua Tyler says law enforcement officials could employ the technique ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item11 "HP Thinks in 3D for Web Browsing" Hewlett-Packard has introduced a new tool for creating three-dimensional views of online stores, similar to Doom and other video games. Called the VEDA (virtual environment design automation) project, the application is used as a visualization ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item12 "Wave Propagation" Innovations around the Wi-Fi standard 802.11 are still picking up pace, and World Wide Web Consortium founding member and IBM veteran John Patrick says Wi-Fi will emerge as a leading Internet access tool and leading mobile phone technology. In fact, ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item13 "Are We Vulnerable to Cyber-Attacks?" The current conflict with Iraq might spur more hacking and cyber-terrorism, forecasts David Kirkpatrick. U.K. consulting firm mi2g says that so far in 2003, confirmed digital attacks have caused $16 billion in losses, nearly double that of a year ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item14 "ICANN Ready to Chart a New Course?" Incoming ICANN CEO Paul Twomey sees ICANN's primary mission as reaching out to all Internet stakeholders in order to involve them in the ICANN process, especially stakeholders from less-developed countries. ICANN will move forward with ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item15 "Computing at the Atomic Scale--and Below" In about 10 years it may not be possible for today's semiconductor components to continue to follow Moore's Law, but new computing techniques likely will allow engineers to keep improving performance dramatically. Spintronics researchers have ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item16 "Cybersecurity Downgraded?" The information technology industry has gone from having a cybersecurity czar in the White House to perhaps not having a cybersecurity representative in the Bush administration. After cybersecurity czar Richard Clarke left his post Feb. 21, ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item17 "Snags Remain as Grid-Lock Eases" Grid computing could gain acceptance this year as new software makes the technology easier to use and implement and helps companies take advantage of excess computing power. WorldCom, for example, is investigating grid computing services as a way to ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item18 "Right Game, Wrong Team" The test-driven approach followed by extreme programming (XP) teams can be applied to management, which often overlooks the important process of articulating financial and organizational objectives to the teams, resulting in software that misses these ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0331m.html#item19 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review Friday's issue, please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0328f.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.