Where's My Job?
Sneak Peeks at Tomorrow's
Office
Although new communications tools and mobile devices have
dramatically improved office productivity so much that many
companies do not expect drastic new innovations, but new
office technology is already working in laboratories and
technological advances will make them affordable in the ...
[read more]
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Machine Rage Is Dead...Long
Live Emotional Computing
Emotionless decision-making is not really so effective,
according to British researchers who are building computers
sensitive to human feelings. "The cold, unemotional Mr. Spock
on Star Trek simply could not have evolved," explains Salford
University artificial intelligence expert Ruth ...
[read more]
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Australian Societies Adopt
ACM/IEEE-CS Code of Ethics
Two leading software engineering groups in Australia have
adopted the Software Engineering Code of Ethics and
Professional Practice, an internationally recognized code of
ethics developed by the ACM and IEEE-CS. By embracing the
code, the Australian Computer ...
[read more]
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Concern Grows Over Browser
Security
The Computing Technology Industry Association's second
annual report on IT security and the work force indicates 36.8
percent of respondents experienced one or more browser-based
attacks during the last six months, up from 25 percent the
year before. Browser-based attacks occur when users ...
[read more]
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Gopher: Underground
Technology
Before the Web came along and stole its thunder, the
"gopher" protocol from the University of Minnesota allowed
nontechnical users to view Internet data in a standard format
and through a simple visual interface. Named after the
university's mascot and created in 1992, gopher has a
committed ...
[read more]
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Radio Tags May Give
Consumers More Power
Along with the privacy concerns and benefits to corporate
business, radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology
also promises greater amounts of useful information to
consumers when and where they need it. In the future, people
will be able to use handheld devices to scan product ...
[read more]
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A 'Free' Boost for
Multimedia
A free software project for multimedia production, backed
by the European Commission, is gaining momentum and rivals the
quality of proprietary offerings, according to proponents.
AGNULA is basically GNU/Linux-based audio software for home
musicians and audio enthusiasts. The AGNULA ...
[read more]
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Turning Robots Into a
Well-Oiled Machine
Researchers from three U.S. universities are working to
create autonomous teams of robots that can assist at disaster
sites. Emergency response personnel say controlling robots is
a time-consuming task given the amount of data human operators
have to deal with. If teams of robots could be ...
[read more]
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Robot Guided By Its
Voice
The University of Toronto, which uses a robot to guide
visitors through its Artificial Perception Lab, recently
enhanced the machine with sound source localization. As the
robot makes its prerecorded remarks about different parts of
the facility, microphone arrays embedded in the walls
determine ...
[read more]
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Blind People to 'See'
Color By Touch
Artur Rataj, from the Institute of Theoretical and Applied
Computer Science at the Polish Academy of Sciences, has
created computer software for translating color images into
tactile form, allowing blind people to discern color
information in images. Several techniques are used to ...
[read more]
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The Porous Internet and
How to Defend It
Network researchers say the open TCP/IP Internet protocols
mean criminals have easy access to their targets, and that
there is no simple way to change Internet design. Transmission
Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) was developed to
be as open and transparent as possible. Internet ...
[read more]
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Computers Learn to
Understand Sefrican
Researchers in South Africa are testing a voice-recognition
system that is designed to understand the various languages
and accents spoken by South Africans. Professor Justus Roux,
director of the Research Unit for Experimental Phonology at
the University of Stellenbosch, says the ...
[read more]
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Spaced Out on the
Interplanetary Internet
NASA is working on space networking technologies that could
produce significant benefits for Earth applications. The
Interplanetary Internet was launched in 1998 with funding from
the Defense Department, and signed on Internet pioneer Vincent
Cerf as its research head. Cerf describes the ...
[read more]
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Drive-By-Wire Closer Than
You Think
European researchers are developing drive-by-wire
capabilities that should reduce traffic accidents on the
Continent by half. Researchers working on the PEIT project,
scheduled for completion this summer, have created an
electronic control unit (ECU) that is capable of taking over
driving ...
[read more]
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Internet Congress
Convenes
The first Internet Commons Congress (ICC) was held recently
in Rockville, Md., drawing some 150 participants, including
privacy advocates, free-speech activists, and members of the
free-software community. The aim of the event was to foster
greater communication and solidarity among the ...
[read more]
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Quantum Computing: Bit by
Bit
In the quest to create usable quantum computers, scientists
are tackling basic questions about how to define the boundary
between the quantum and macroscopic worlds. In the mid-1990s,
Researchers at AT&T Bell Laboratories brought quantum
computing from hypothesis into established ...
[read more]
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Defender of U.S.
Cyberspace
InfraGard started as an FBI pilot project, but is now a
national entity that sharing information between the federal
government and private industry, and has some 10,700 volunteer
members and 79 chapters. National chair Phyllis Schneck says
that InfraGard receives analysis information ...
[read more]
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Where's My
Job?
Deborah Wince-Smith, president of the Council on
Competitiveness, says companies in the United States are not
losing their dominance in IT because they are moving jobs
overseas. Wince-Smith says high-tech companies such as IBM are
often outsourcing their back-office operations, such as
customer ...
[read more]
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