Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the November 19, 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 573 Date: November 19, 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 Wednesday, November 19, 2003: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "Intel, Clusters on the Rise in Top 500 Supercomputer List" "Hackers Live by Own Code" "Computer Science Is More Than Programming" "The Phone With a Brain" "Analysis: Is U.S. Tech Self-Destructing?" "The End User: EU Leads Spam Fight" "Teaching Computers How We Sing" "Will That Be Cash, Fingerprint, or Cellphone?" "Ever-Present LEDs and the Future of Light" "Virtual Voters Pick Best Teams" "A Lifetime of Memories...In a Nutshell" "Keeping Watch for Interstellar Computer Viruses" "MIT Team Mines for New Materials With a Computer" "IETF's Quest to Be Quicker Moves Slowly" "The Programmer's Future" "Defining the SOA" "Shrink-Wrapping the World" "Trash Your Desktop" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Intel, Clusters on the Rise in Top 500 Supercomputer List" Intel processors and clustered systems made huge headway on the most recent top 500 list announced at ACM's Supercomputing 2003 Conference in Phoenix this week: Intel is inside 189 of the listed machines, up from 119 spots in the June list and 59 spots last year. ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item1 "Hackers Live by Own Code" Hackers follow an ethical code that varies according to each hacker's motivations, and what they consider courteous behavior can seem eccentric--even threatening--to others: One Middle East hacker alerted an Oracle security officer of a software flaw he ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item2 "Computer Science Is More Than Programming" James H. Morris, dean of Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science, argues that prospective computer-science students should know that such a course of study prepares them for a lifetime career by arming them with basic skills beyond ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item3 "The Phone With a Brain" Carnegie Institute of Technology (CIT) researchers have created a prototype context-aware cell phone called SenSay, which combines a global positioning system, sensors, and a personal digital assistant to gather information about the user, his location, and ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item4 "Analysis: Is U.S. Tech Self-Destructing?" There is evidence suggesting that the technology leadership of the United States is on the road to long-term decline with the growth of offshore outsourcing and the rise of "poles" of excellence in overseas regions. The increasing outsourcing of ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item5 "The End User: EU Leads Spam Fight" Victoria Shannon writes that the European Union's recently enacted anti-spam directive will ultimately do little to stem the tide of junk email, for a variety of reasons. Only two EU member countries--England and Italy--have adopted laws that support the ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item6 "Teaching Computers How We Sing" Key to the challenge of effecting smooth human/computer communications on a par with the interplay regularly depicted in science fiction films is teaching computers to distinguish between when someone is speaking and singing, according to ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item7 "Will That Be Cash, Fingerprint, or Cellphone?" Large credit card companies, big IT vendors, and technology startups foresee an imminent change in the way people use bank and credit card accounts. Currently, three technologies are vying to replace the credit cards bulging in people's wallets: ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item8 "Ever-Present LEDs and the Future of Light" Light emitting diodes (LEDs), which offer less heat output and greater electrical efficiency than traditional lighting technology, have made significant headway in the consumer market in recent years--but LEDs' true advancement lies not in the ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item9 "Virtual Voters Pick Best Teams" Researchers at Georgia Tech University in Atlanta have developed a computer program that is designed to select the two best college football teams to play in the national championship game. Peter Mucha and his colleagues view the program as a more ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item10 "A Lifetime of Memories...In a Nutshell" Rapid advancements in hard disk drive technology will pave the way for commercial products that consumers can use to store a lifetime's worth of personal data, such as TV programs they have watched, articles and books they have read, and phone calls they ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item11 "Keeping Watch for Interstellar Computer Viruses" Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory physicist Richard Carrigan, Jr., believes it is within the realm of possibility that signals from extraterrestrial beings could be similar to malware, and he calls for Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item12 "MIT Team Mines for New Materials With a Computer" A team of MIT researchers and engineers is using data mining to set up an online public database that could become an invaluable resource for designers trying to develop novel materials for practically any purpose. The method could be used, for example, ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item13 "IETF's Quest to Be Quicker Moves Slowly" The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) realizes its plight as administrators struggle under a growing load of proposals, and the informal system set up to deal with a research project now has to deal with time-sensitive production issues. IETF Chair ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item14 "The Programmer's Future" The growth of cheap overseas competition and packaged applications are reducing the job opportunities for corporate programmers in the United States, giving rise to a new worker model that stresses productivity and business acumen over pure ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item15 "Defining the SOA" Service-oriented architecture (SOA) has emerged over the past year as perhaps the next distributed computing model, although its definition and distinction from earlier distributed computing implementations are somewhat vague. ZapThink senior analyst ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item16 "Shrink-Wrapping the World" The National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws has abandoned its effort to have states pass the Uniform Computer Information Transaction Act (UCITA), but opponents believe the group's effort still could have an impact on information ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item17 "Trash Your Desktop" An intuitive software interface called Chandler being developed by software designer Mitch Kapor's Open Source Applications Foundation seeks to spare users the headache of laboriously sifting through programs to find related material by placing all ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1119w.html#item18 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review Monday's issue, please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1117m.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