Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the December 19, 2003 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for IT professionals three times a week.ÿ 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 Remember to check out our hot new online essay and opinion magazine, Ubiquity, at ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ACM TechNews Volume 5, Number 585 Date: December 19, 2003 Top Stories for Friday, December 19, 2003: "Sun Researchers: Computers Do Bad Math" "Web Tools Don't Always Mesh With How People Work" "Linux Gets Heart Transplant With 2.6.0" "With an Urban Scooter, a Humanoid Robot Hits Its Stride" "IBM Research Working Toward a Better In-Box" "From Browser to Platform: Mozilla Rises" "Cyber Threats Risk Net's Future" "Profound Debate Roils Nanotechnology Field" "The Data Center of the Future" "Users Worry About 'Zero-Day' Attacks, Try to Secure Systems" "Taming the Supercomputer" "Making Something Out of Nothing" "AI Think, Therefore I Am" "The End of the Experiment" "Feds Look at the Big Computer Picture" "Instant Manufacturing" "Programming Matter: A Possible Future" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Sun Researchers: Computers Do Bad Math" Unexplained computer crashes--which have at times made the difference between life and death--are sometimes attributable to bad math rather than poor operating system design, according to Sun Microsystems CTO Greg Papadopoulos.ÿ Sun has been granted $50 million from the Defense Advancedÿ ... "Web Tools Don't Always Mesh With How People Work" There are numerous techniques Web users employ to recall the Web pages they visit (sending emails to themselves or writing sticky notes, for example), but most people do not avail themselves of such methods when they decide to revisit pages, say University of Washington's William Jones and Harry Bruceÿ ... "Linux Gets Heart Transplant With 2.6.0" A market dominated by Unix-enabled servers could be disrupted with the introduction of Linux version 2.6.0, an updated kernel of the open-source operating system that was released Dec. 17.ÿ In a note to the kernel mailing list officially announcing the new kernel's release, Linux founderÿ ... "With an Urban Scooter, a Humanoid Robot Hits Its Stride" Segway, the company that develops the Segway Human Transporter, modified the two-wheeled, gyroscopically balanced vehicle for university projects supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under its Mobile Autonomous Robot Software initiative, whose goal is to createÿ ... "IBM Research Working Toward a Better In-Box" IBM Research's Collaborative User Experience Team is trying to improve email systems through its ReMail (Reinventing Email) project, which recently revealed a prototype client boasting features that promise to offer better email organization and management.ÿ "Part of the overload thatÿ ... "From Browser to Platform: Mozilla Rises" Besides providing a steadily improving Web browser, the Mozilla technology is quietly becoming an OS-independent applications platform, writes Nigel McFarlane, who says Mozilla products continue to improve incrementally and have won several awards and outstanding reviews this year.ÿ Mozilla isÿ ... "Cyber Threats Risk Net's Future" A major issue stressed at the recent U.N. summit in Geneva was how to leverage information technology so that developing countries can benefit--and key to this is embedding trustful cybersecurity within these nations.ÿ But this goal is complicated by the fact that such countries areÿ ... "Profound Debate Roils Nanotechnology Field" President Bush's approval of the 21st Century Nanotechnology Research and Development Act on Dec. 3--which allocates $3.7 billion for National Nanotechnology Initiative projects--has split the nanotech community into two camps:ÿ Those supporting Foresight Institute founder Eric Drexler, whoÿ ... "The Data Center of the Future" Companies are looking to several emerging technologies to help them cope with rising data center costs and low utilization rates:ÿ META Group predicts data center budgets will grow by 70 percent over the next decade, with software spending expected to more than double and storage and serverÿ ... "Users Worry About 'Zero-Day' Attacks, Try to Secure Systems" Companies are becoming increasingly concerned about the possibility that their systems will be attacked before software patches are made available.ÿ At the InfoSec 2003 Conference in New York last week, information technology managers indicated that so-called zero-day attacks have theÿ ... "Taming the Supercomputer" Supercomputing is the central driver behind scientific advances, plays an important role in the economy, and is proving useful in national security issues, says IBM systems vice president at the T.J. Watson Research Center, Tilak Agerwala.ÿ IBM collaborates with a number of national and academicÿ ... "Making Something Out of Nothing" A startup firm founded by a 29-year-old MIT graduate student has developed a virtual interactive display that combines converted air particles and a laser-tracking system in an interactive touch screen; the two-dimensional computer images are shown floating in free space and can be manipulated ... "AI Think, Therefore I Am" Virtual agents--autonomous, self-directing computer programs that are social and reactive--are being developed for numerous tasks ranging from the simple to the highly sophisticated, but making them effective requires a delicate balance between psychology and technology.ÿ A virtual agent isÿ ... "The End of the Experiment" A recent paper by John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center at Harvard, critiques ICANN's effort in cultivating worldwide Internet democracy.ÿ Palfrey explains how ICANN has experimented with different types of governance of the domain name system involving recommendationsÿ ... "Feds Look at the Big Computer Picture" Federal policy makers are grappling with future supercomputer development after receiving a wake-up call in the form of Japan's massive Earth Simulator built by NEC.ÿ That system can process complex calculations nearly three times faster than the second-fastest supercomputer, the ASCI Qÿ ... "Instant Manufacturing" Direct manufacturing, in which products are custom-made from digital files, can accelerate production schedules, reduce or do away with excess inventory, and save hours of human labor while delivering products of superior quality and precision.ÿ Such systems essentially print out digitalÿ ... "Programming Matter: A Possible Future" Science writer Wil McCarthy describes the early stages of the development of programmable matter in the book, "Hacking Matter."ÿ Solid-state physicists at IBM, Sun, MIT, and the Defense Department are exploring the technology, which involves manipulating the electrons of an object toÿ ... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Site Sponsored by AutoChoice Advisor ÿÿ Looking for a NEW vehicle?ÿ Discover which ones are ÿÿ right for you from over 250 different makes and models. ÿÿ Your unbiased list of vehicles is based on your preferences ÿÿ and years of consumer input. < > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- To review Wednesday's issue, please visit -- To visit the TechNews home page, point your browser to: -- 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:ÿ technews-request@acm.org - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -