Apple iPods now come with viruses

Apple says the virus infected only the video iPod and not the Nano or any of the Apple computers. The iPods were infected by a Windows machine at a contract factory. An official statement and apology was posted to Apple's website and you can view that here.Apple is placing some of the blame on the Windows operating system and said, "As you might imagine, we are upset at Windows for not being more hardy against such viruses, and even more upset with ourselves for not catching it." The RavMonE virus doesn't cause any serious damage or data loss, but it does act as a trojan horse that could allow other, more serious, viruses to infect the computer. The offending computer has been found and dealt with and Apple says it doesn't expect any more infected iPods to be produced.

Mozilla Releases Firefox 2.0 Beta, Invites 3.0 Suggestions

The Mozilla Foundation released the next beta of version 2.0 of its popular Firefox browser Tuesday. Release Candidate 3 is expected to be the final version of Firefox 2.0. Mozilla also launched a wiki inviting the public to help it brainstorm new features for version 3.0.

Element 118 Created, Scientists Report

A U.S.-Russian team is seeking even heavier atoms in a theoretical `island of stability.'

A U.S. and Russian team said Monday that it had created element 118, the heaviest known to date.

It is the fifth ultra-heavy element produced by the team at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, which has come to dominate the creation of short-lived elements.

Although they produced only three atoms of element 118, and each lasted for less than a thousandth of a second, the team said that there is less than one chance in 10,000 of mistaken identity.

A team at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory announced in 1999 that they had created element 118 by a different route, but those results were shown to have been fabricated by physicist Victor Ninov, who was eventually fired by Berkeley.

"We selected a completely different nuclear reaction, performed with completely different people in a different laboratory," said physicist Ken Moody of Livermore, who led the American team, at a Monday news conference. "Everything we do is checked and double-checked."

Their findings will be published today in the journal Physical Review C.

The discovery has no immediate application, but brings researchers closer to discovering what theoretical physicists have described as an "island of stability" — a group of ultra-heavy elements that may survive minutes, or even hours, compared to the fractions of a second now seen with the heaviest creations.

That would allow researchers time to begin to understand the chemistry of the elements, perhaps even to discover some unique new chemical properties.

"I think of this like any other journey to a new place," said physicist Nancy Stoyer, a member of the Livermore team. "Finding it is something new, something interesting. At some point, we will no longer be able to discover new elements. We will reach the end of what we can find."

The team used a cyclotron at Dubna to bombard the man-made element californium-249 with ions of calcium-48.

In two separate experiments, they bombarded the target with 40,000,000,000,000,000,000 ions, producing three atoms of element 118. Each atom had 118 protons and 179 neutrons in its nucleus, giving it an atomic weight of 297.

The element was characterized by observing its radioactive disintegration. Each atom first spit out an alpha particle — composed of two protons and two neutrons — to become the previously known element 116. That element, in turn, spit out another alpha particle to become element 114, and then another to become element 112. Element 112 fissioned into two atoms of roughly equal size.

Element 118 would fall directly below radon in the periodic table of the elements and is thus expected to be a so-called noble gas.

Only 92 elements exist in nature, but physicists have produced 18 more that have been officially recognized and named.

The Livermore-Dubna team has also created elements 113, 114, 115 and 116, but none of those has yet been officially recognized, named and placed in the periodic table because the work has not been replicated by other researchers.

The team will now try to produce element 120 by bombarding a plutonium target with a beam of iron ions.

Heavier elements will require the construction of a new accelerator, the Rare Isotope Accelerator.

But work on that accelerator, which will be built at either Michigan State University or the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois, has been delayed by lack of funding.

Software revises Armstrong's moon quote

That's one small word for astronaut Neil Armstrong, one giant revision for grammar sticklers everywhere.

An Australian computer programmer says he found the missing "a" from Armstrong's famous first words from the moon in 1969, when the world heard the phrase, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."

The story was reported in Saturday's editions of the Houston Chronicle.

Some historians and critics have dogged Armstrong for not saying the more dramatic and grammatically correct, "One small step for a man ..." in the version he transmitted to NASA's Mission Control. Without the missing "a," Armstrong essentially said, "One small step for mankind, one giant leap for mankind."

The famous astronaut has maintained he intended to say it properly and believes he did. Thanks to some high-tech sound-editing software, computer programmer Peter Shann Ford might have proved Armstrong right.

Ford said he downloaded the audio recording of Armstrong's words from a NASA Web site and analyzed the statement with software that allows disabled people to communicate through computers using their nerve impulses.

In a graphical representation of the famous phrase, Ford said he found evidence that the missing "a" was spoken and transmitted to NASA.

"I have reviewed the data and Peter Ford's analysis of it, and I find the technology interesting and useful," Armstrong said in a statement. "I also find his conclusion persuasive. Persuasive is the appropriate word."

SketchUp: Google's Latest Cool Free Download SketchUp, a 3D drawing application which Google released today, is the latest example of a happy, booming software trend: Google or Yahoo buys an innovative small company which makes a for-pay product, and quickly releases a cool free version of its software. In this case, the innovative company was @Last Software, and SketchUp truly is cool, since it makes the notoriously difficult job of drawing 3D architectural models surprisingly easy. In its Google iteration, it's a complement to Google Earth, one which lets that amazing program's community of fans build and share buildings to be incorporated into its virtual world. The application comes with bountiful documentation and tutorials, but the user interface is simple and intuitive. But you can have fun with SketchUp without constructing anything from scratch, because it's easy to grab models from Google's 3D Warehouse, a searchable online repository of objects, including excellent recreations of lots of real-world landmarks. (You can also upload your creations to the Warehouse.) Here's one example of a ready-made model: And here's San Francisco's AT&T Park (nee SBC Park, nee Pacific Bell park) as it looks after being imported into SketchUp: This is not a review of SketchUp. SketchUp is about the least intimidating one ever seen. Which makes Google an entirely appropriate home for it. As with Google Earth, by the way, there's still an industrial-strength version of SketchUp aimed at professionals, at an industrial-strength pricetag: $495. The free version is Windows-only at the moment, but a Mac edition is on the way.

Scientists create artificial insect's eye

Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, said on Thursday that they have created anew mechanical eye, which looks and works like an insect's eye.The eye's many lenses and curved shape give it a wide field of view, as well as super-fast motion detection and image recognition, the researchers reported in the April 28 issue of the journal Science.

Minute cameras and motion sensors with these types of lenses could have medical, industrial and military applications, according to the researchers.

Insects have multiple imaging units called "ommatidia" that are pointed in different directions. The researchers used flexible polymers to build artificial ommatidia, each with a tiny lens connected to a tube-like "waveguide" that directs the light down to an opt electronic imaging device.

Then, they arranged the ommatidia around a dome, projecting outwards in all directions. Of the many different types of insect eyes, a bee's eye is most similar to the new mechanical eye, they said.

Just like pins in a pincushion or a dragonfly's 30,000 ommatidia, the team's artificial ommatidia are each oriented at a slightly different angle. The researchers have shown that the lenses and waveguides of the artificial eyes focus and conduct light in the same way as an insect's eye.

"The lenses and waveguides are the most important part of the system," said Luke Lee, the principal investigator of the study.

"People have said that it would be totally impossible to create them with an angle, but now that we've done it, we're ready to integrate imaging or chemical sensing into the eyes," Lee said.

While conventional micro fabrication techniques are expensive and use high temperatures, Lee and his team borrowed from nature, using a low temperature system, photopolymerization, and self-aligning, self-writing technology.

To create the artificial eye, the team first needed to construct a hemispherical mold of the eye's outer layer, a structure consisting of thousands of microlenses.

Using existing technology, they made a flat array of these tiny,domed lenses arranged in the hexagonal honeycomb pattern. On top of this, they applied a thin slab of an elastic polymer called polydimethylsiloxane, or PDMS, creating a concave pattern of the lenses in the polymer.

By affixing the PDMS membrane over the opening of a vacuum chamber and applying negative air pressure, they pulled it into the dome shapes they needed, controlling its form by using different pressures.
These eyes can eventually be used as cameras or sensory detectors to capture visual or chemical information from a wider field of vision than previously possible, even with the best fish-eye lens, according to Lee.

The researchers speculate that the artificial compound eyes will be put to use within a few years. Their first applications may be in ultra-thin camera phones, and then in camcorders for omnidirectional surveillance imaging and such uses as small, hidden, wearable cameras.

Yahoo! Gives Babel Fish a New Bowl

Good old Babel Fish, the "mascot, star, and proprietor of the oldest free, on-line translation service on the web" has a new home. He has leapt from his original bowl over at Alta Vista over to Yahoo! Go to babelfish.yahoo.com and type most anything you'd like to translate (phrases or passages under 150 words or a Web page), and Babel Fish takes care of the rest. I punched in "I really like to eat fish" in English, scrolled down the dropdown menu to my language of choice, Spanish, and got back "Realmente tengo gusto de comer pescados." Not bad. New enhancements attained over at Yahoo! include a couple of new languages (simplified Chinese into traditional Chinese, and traditional Chinese into simplified Chinese), bringing the site's total to 38 language pairs you can translate between. You'll also find a Babel Fish toolbar button as well as tighter integration between translation and Yahoo! search services, among a few other things.

Green Machine

60mph green machine may be the answer to city traffic jams

This three-wheeled vehicle, part-motorbike and part-car, is being hailed as the future of city driving. Called the Clever, it is half the width of a conventional car, can carry a passenger and, as it runs on gas, would be exempt from the congestion charge in London.
NI_MPU('middle');
It does more than 100 miles (160km) per gallon, three times that of most cars, and emits a third less carbon dioxide. The EU-funded project involved a team from the University of Bath, where it was showcased yesterday. The Clever has a top speed of 60mph and will cost from £5,000 to £10,000 if it makes it into production. The Clever had been successfully crash-tested. Next step is to get EU funding to create a batch of 100 of the vehicles for trial in European cities.

Black holes generate ‘green’ energy

A new study finds that the supermassive black holes at the hearts of some galaxies are the most fuel-efficient engines in the universe. "If you could make a car engine that was as efficient as one of these black holes, you could get about a billion miles out of a gallon of gas," said study team leader Steve Allen of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology at Stanford University. "In anyone's book, that would be pretty green." The finding, made using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and announced in a media teleconference Monday, is giving scientists insights into how supermassive black holes generate energy and how they affect the galaxies where they make their homes.ad_dap(250,300,'&PG=NBCSAT&AP=1089');Black holes are regions of space where gravity is so strong that matter and light can't escape from within the event horizon, a spherical boundary surrounding the black hole.However, inflowing matter that hasn't yet passed this point of no return can — through friction and interaction with the black hole's strong magnetic field — release energy in the form of either diffuse light or focused jets of energy."Once gas comes within a distance about a million times larger than the event horizon of the black hole, it becomes gravitationally captured," Allen explained. "At this point the gas becomes fuel for the black hole engine."The new study looked at nine supermassive black holes at the centers of elliptical galaxies. Each one was about a billion times more massive than our sun. The black holes were relatively old and generated much less energy than the fiercely luminous and rapidly growing supermassive black holes known as quasars.The researchers found that these "quiet" black holes released about 1,000 times more energy as jets than as diffuse light. The reasons for this are still unclear."That's a mystery, how these black holes selectively put that much energy into the jets without producing much light," study team member Christopher Reynolds from the University of Maryland told Space.com.Space bubbles
Most of the energy in the jets is being emitted as radio waves, but in at least one of the black holes studied, the energy was in the form of more energetic X-rays."The energy in these jets is absolutely huge, about a trillion trillion trillion watts," Allen said.

As they race outwards from their parent black holes at nearly light speed, the jets carve out enormous cavities, or "bubbles," in the surrounding gas environment; some of these bubbles can be tens of thousands of light years across.Bubbles can also form in the aftermath of stellar explosions called supernovae; our own solar system is enveloped by such a structure, called the "Local Bubble," which was formed during an explosion long ago.The researchers used these bubbles to figure out the fuel efficiency of the black holes. Using Chandra images, they first calculated how much fuel in the form of gas was available to each black hole. They then estimated the power required to produce the bubbles that were observed.Preventing galactic sprawl
The finding could have implications for other types of black holes as well, including much smaller, stellar-mass black holes, the researchers say."We already knew that powerful quasars are very efficient at making light. Now we know that black holes in elliptical galaxies are efficient as well," said Kim Weaver, a researcher at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center who was not involved in the study. "This suggests that being green is a trait that all black holes may have in common."The scientists think the supermassive black holes are green in another way, too. The energy that each black hole emits as jets warms the surrounding environment. This prevents gas from cooling and coalescing into billions of new stars, and places an upper limit on how large a galaxy can grow."In an environmental sense, the black holes are actually preventing galactic sprawl from taking over the neighborhood," Weaver said.

750GB drive

Seagate's 750GB drive

The existence of the 750GB from Seagate, although not yet official, proves that the quest for ever larger storage spaces is never-ending.

Likely to target the desktop drive market, I would think that the problem with such a large single drive is the possibility for failure. 750GB is a lot to lose from a single hardware fault.

As users - home, work and otherwise - we are now storing much more data than ever before. Our music collection, digital photos, even home videos are a prime source of data space in the home, and sometimes at work. For the business desktop it is applications, raw data (photos, spreadsheets and analysis output from databases) and for some more complex types, like virtual machine hard drives and others.

With 750GB you would be tempted to store a lot more, but a hardware failure (and it will happen) could wipe out parts of your entire life and existence. Imagine how upset you would be if you lost the only photos you had of your son, daughter or pet? At work, imagine losing all the work on a large project.

Backups, of course, are part of the answer, but any serious user would also be using a RAID solution - probably RAID 5 - to ensure that a failure didn't cause a blip in operation.

I can't help thinking that with such high drive densities (they are expecting 1GB before the end of 2006) that a better solution would be to look at a new format, perhaps one that combined three slim-line drives of, say, 300GB each and embedded a RAID 5 controller. Each individual drive would be replaceable, but the whole unit would be sold as a kit. You could probably make it about full-height, 3.5" in size, but you'd have a large, and reliable, 'single' drive for storing your data.

Cheap, affordable, easy to build, include and configure RAID for the small business and home market would be a massive boon, and you could still approach the sort of capacities people are looking for, while providing it in a reliable package.

Meanwhile, for those of us who know what we are doing, 750GB will help to reduce power requirements, cooling requirements and physical space. Time, perhaps, to think about replacing the current 6 drive/1.25TB solution, either with something physically smaller and larger capacity, or the same physical size and much larger capacity.

usb battery

how-to: ‘usb battery’ v2

quick improvement

As mentioned by several readers, you’ll want to use a 5 volt regulator ic instead of the resistor/zener-diode combo i discussed previously. you’ll be able to charge your device faster while it is running and it’s much more efficient, which will give your 9 volt a longer battery life.

the best part is that it’s easier and cheaper to do it this way. just grab an lm7805 from your local hacker store and wire it up. connect the positive battery terminal to the 7805 input pin, the positive usb pin to the 7805 output pin, and connect the negative battery terminal and the usb ground pin to the 7805 ground pin.

which is which? if you hold the 7805 with the text facing you and the pins downward, the pins from left to right are: input, ground, output. it looks like this:

for the female usb connector, look down into the end of the connector so that it is oriented like so:

pin 1 is the positive (5v) terminal (which goes to the output of the 7805) and pin 4 is ground (which goes to the 7805 ground pin).

easiest way to test

several people were wondering how to tell if you are going to fry your device. here’s the easiest way to test when you are all done wiring:

1. cut a standard usb cable in half.
2. plug the male end into your usb battery.
3. connect the positive and negative ends of your multimeter to the red and black usb wires respectively.
4. if it reads something very close to 5v then you are wired correctly.

making a case

chose to make my case out of polystyrene plastic. you can find this stuff in sheet form at most hobby stores. it’s the same kind of plastic used in your standard plastic model kit and the sheet form lends itself nicely to making flat sided objects… like a small case for a usb battery!

basically, you can just cut the sheet to the size you want with an x-acto knife. then, just glue them together carefully with standard issue model cement. the cement is a polystyrene solvent and it melts the connected peices of plastic together. when you are finished with the basic assembly, use a sheet of 400 grit sandpaper to smooth the sides down and bevel the edges.

room with a view

here you can see the case during construction. i want it to be small, so i sized it just large enough to accommodate the battery and usb connector.

regarding the usb connector. metal can be notoriosly hard to secure to plastic. model cement works best for styrene on styrene, but 2 part epoxy or super glue seem to do the best job for syrene on metal. try to affix the largest possible surface area. i glued small pieces of styrene to each of the 4 faces of the usb connector. you can then cement on more styrene to build up a larger surface area which can then be securely affixed to the front of the case.

sliding door

to close off the battery compartment, i made a pretty simple sliding door. it’s just two pieces of styrene with a third smaller piece sandwiched in between. this slides on rails which were made by cementing thin strips of styrene to the case.

where to go from here

Hackers load Linux onto Intel Mac

Hackers load Linux onto Intel Mac

Hackers who came up with a way of dual-booting Mac OS X and Windows XP on an Intel-based Mac before Apple introduced Boot Camp have now made it possible to add Linux to the mix.
The OnMac.net project has published instructions on how to triple-boot Mac OS X, Windows XP and Linux using Apple's Boot Camp utility.The procedure has been successfully used to set up a MacBook Pro, but is as yet untested on the iMac and Mac mini models.The actual process itself is pretty tricky, as it is not possible to boot Linux from Boot Camp. The open source OS would have to be 'chain loaded' from an installed copy of XP using the LILO bootloader.Although OnMac.net was created earlier this year with the intention of finding a way to boot Windows on an Intel Mac, a quest that was superseded soon after it was completed by Apple's launch of Boot Camp, the site founders are maintaining the site for new projects such as the triple-boot idea.Full instructions for triple-booting can be found at Triple Boot via BootCamp

Opera 9 Beta released

Opera 9 Beta released - includes widgets and BitTorrent


Today Opera Software announced the first public Beta of Opera 9. According to the company, this version includes Widgets ("small Web programs running in their own windows that are fun, easy-to-use and live on users' desktops"), support for file downloading technology BitTorrent, plus other features such as a content blocker and thumbnail previews of tabbed sites.
CEO Jon S. von Tetzchner says Opera is targeting the "Internet ecosystem" with this release. According to the press release, the full list of features is:
"- Widgets - Small Web applications (multimedia, newsfeeds, games and more) that make your desktop experience more fun. Any Web developer can create their own Widgets and share them, regardless of operating system. Try the Widgets in Opera 9 by pressing F6. Look for further development of Opera Widgets in future releases.- BitTorrent - Instead of having to use a separate BitTorrent application for downloading large files, users can now simply click a torrent file and start the download- Content blocker - Choose the content you want to view. Remove ads or images - it is up to you. Right-click on the Web page and choose "Block content"- Improved rich text editing - Take advantage of rich text editing capabilities when using the latest Web mail or blogging services- Customize your search engines – Use your favorite search engine in the search box. Right-click on the site's search field and select "Create search" from the menu- Thumbnail preview – It's easy to have many tabs open at once in Opera. But exactly which tab had that video you wanted? Hover any tab to see a thumbnail preview- Site-specific preferences - Do you need to view a site in a different way or deny certain cookies? Want to block pop-ups on certain sites only? Site specific preferences hold the key."

Has anyone played with the new Opera 9 beta yet? I'm keen to know what you think.

Supercomputer simulates black hole collision

Supercomputer simulates black hole

Supercomputer simulates black hole collision

When two black holes collide, space shivers like Jell-O. With the help of a supercomputer to simulate this event, NASA seeks to prove Albert Einstein's theories and unveil universe's secrets.

The NASA supercomputer Columbia just performed its largest astrophysical calculation ever; a 3D simulation of two black holes merging. "This merger is a cataclysmic event, second only to the Big Bang in the amount of energy it produces," Joan Centrella, chief of the NASA Gravitational Astrophysics Laboratory in Greenbelt, Md., said Tuesday in a press teleconference.

NASA called the successful simulation a breakthrough in the observation of black holes, as well as the understanding of the entire universe. In fact, NASA claims that it might even provide the ultimate proof for Einstein's theory of general relativity.

Black holes occur when large stars burn up all their energy and collapse into bodies of enormous density. Their gravity is so strong that it absorbs everything around them--even light.

When two of these bodies collide, they emit more energy than the light of all the stars in the universe combined. Space shivers like a bowl of Jell-O around them, when gravitational waves spread at light speed. It is the pattern of these waves that NASA has now managed to simulate.

"Gravitational waves are going to give us an entirely new window on the universe," said Peter Saulson, a physics professor at Syracuse University involved in the project. He compared the results with the discovery of radio waves, infrared light and x-rays.

"Each time astronomers were able to open a new window, the universe showed a new face," he said. "Now that we are about to open up the gravitational wave window, we should again see a whole new different view of the universe."

Obstacle overcame
Einstein explored the forces of gravity in his general relativity theory, predicting phenomena like black holes and gravitational radiation long before they could be proved. It is not until now, more than 90 years later, that scientists have managed to test these, back then inconceivable, predictions, Centrella said. "This has been a holy grail quest for the last 30 years."

Earlier trials failed since the equations based on Einstein's general relativity theory were so complicated that they made supercomputers crash; the enormous gravity of black holes cause disturbances in time and space, making time stop and space shrink and expand.

NASA researchers have managed to transform the theory into mathematical algorithms and run through it through Columbia, thefourth most powerful supercomputer in the world. Its 2,032 interconnected 512 Intel Itanium 2 processors ran for 80 hours, in an operation that would have taken 18 years for a single processor to perform.

The result was a model of the gravitational wave pattern of the black hole collision, which turned out to be the same disregarding the bodies' starting positions. Knowing the pattern, scientists can look for and interpret it in space, Centrella said.

"This is not something made up, like in a science-fiction movie," Centrella said. "We have confidence that these results are the real deal, that we have the true gravitational fingerprint predicted by Einstein for the black hole merger."

In fact, scientists are already out there looking. The National Science Foundation's Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) in Hanford, Wash., is scanning space for the waves. Now they know what to look for, said Paul Hertz, chief scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

"Today we're throwing down the gauntlet for Einstein's theory of general relativity," Hertz said. "When LIGO detects gravitational waves from merging black holes, we will know whether Einstein's theory is right, or whether Einstein's theory is wrong."

Origami Project

Origami concepts and GPS at Averatec

During the launching of its last portables today, presented 3 projects to come these next months.

An apparatus based on the project Origami de Microsoft, it acts of the AHI at Averatec. It is planned for this autumn from 499 Euros including all taxes up to 899 Euros including all taxes according to versions'. It will be equipped with Windows XP, camera, keyboard, touch screen, Wifi, GPS, GSM, 3G. Its endurance estimated will be 6 Hours. The version BASIC will be provided with a simple craddle, the higher version will be delivered with a craddle integrating a drive DVD.

The second project is a GPS planned for the month May in the USA. It uses the operating system Windows NET. Its date of marketing in France is not stopped but, it will be provided with the chart of Europe on SD 1Gb. Its price of marketing will be 399 Euros including all taxes.

Another project which for the moment is only one concept, if it receives a cordial reception on behalf of the customers and market, Averatec will launch its manufacture for a possible beginning of marketing in January 2007. They are a portable computer with rotary screen 20 inches and removable keyboard wireless telegraphy, the price would border the 1,700 Euros including all taxes.

Google Voice Search

Google look to voice search

Search engine giant, Google, has prompted speculation about the future of voice-based search following its acquisition of patent 7,027,987, Voice interface for a search engine. While Google has not offered an official comment on the technology yet, the patent's abstract on the US Patent Office database indicates that voice recognition technology would be utilised to perform a search query in much the same way as the text based service works at the moment. The abstract describes how: 'The system receives a voice search query from a user, derives one or more recognition hypotheses, each being associated with a weight, from the voice search query, and constructs a weighted boolean query using the recognition hypotheses.' The Boolean search allows users to create a refined search by constructing logical relationships between terms to widen or delimit the results, typical Boolean terms are or, and or not.

MS answer to Google

Microsoft Launches Competitor To Google Scholar

The beta version of Windows Live Academic Search lets users search the Web for journal articles, academic papers, and notes and slides from scholarly conferences.

Microsoft Corp. introduced a new search engine for academic journals late Tuesday.

The beta version of Windows Live Academic Search lets users search the Web for journal articles, academic papers, and notes and slides from scholarly conferences in computer science, electrical engineering and physics.

The search effort between Academic Search, industry association CrossRef and more than 10 publishers connect users to primary research material. CrossRef, a nonprofit group, operates a citation-linking platform allowing researchers to legally access millions of articles and other content from several hundred scholarly and professional publishers.

Academic Search will source journals from the Association for Computing Machinery, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Reed Elsevier and Wiley & Sons. Reading more than the abstract, however, requires a subscription. The initial beta for the service is available in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Spain, Japan and Australia.

The tool for researchers, students, librarians, and journalists narrows searches to specific interests. There are plans to add journals from medicine, psychology, history and art in phases following the initial launch.

Academic Search supports OpenURL, the library standard used for linking to subscription-based content via the Web, and Open Architecture Initiative (OAI) protocol to index OAI-compliant repositories. For example, Microsoft has indexed the content in ArXiv.org. Microsoft also provides a list of the journals and source indexes. Functions also include the OpenURL standard to allow users to click on the link in their library Open URL to determine their access to the full text.

The site competes with Goolge Scholar and SciFinder Scholar, which cover a broad subject range.

Google Pins Hopes on Calendar

For all of the hoopla surrounding Google's products, the company sure has struggled to generate smash hits outside of Web search. Sure, Google's maps, with their eye-catching satellite imagery, have been a scorching success. But many other ventures, from shopping site Froogle to social networking hub Orkut to Google Talk instant-messaging client, have generated little enthusiasm.

The company hopes to better the record on Apr. 13 when it launches Google Calendar -- a free, Internet-based calendar that helps users keep track of important dates, events, and information.

Early indications are promising. Several analysts who have tried the product believe Google may be on to something. Google Calendar differs from most other online calendar services because it lets users publish and share the information, as well as overlay events from other calendars.

SYNCED SCHEDULES. Google Calendar users, for example, could sync their own calendars with those of a spouse and children to more efficiently plan a summer vacation. "Our goal is to reduce the burden of running a calendar," says Google Product Manager Carl Sjogreen.

That may be just the start. Google's goal is to make this not just an end product, but rather a platform for organizing events and sharing information, analysts say. "Google has rethought the entire role of a calendar," says Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li. "It recognizes you have several calendars to manage and that you have to interact between them."

Calendar could thrust Google into other new areas, including territory occupied by the likes of Evite, owned by Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp . Google Calendar lets users plan events, including sending out invitations and reminders, keeping track of RSVPs, and interacting with potential guests.

ADS FOR EVENTS. Although Google has not announced how it plans to make money from the calendar offering, event planning could provide prime real estate for advertisers. A local costume store could advertise in conjunction with an invitation for a Halloween party, for instance. "Events are highly monetizable," says Li.

LCD Window Case

It used to be that the true measure of a computer geek was what they had done to mod their system. One of the more challenging mods was the infamous (more than famous) window kit. Using some Lexan and aquarium striping, the window kit was born. Well, some corporate marketing executive caught wind of this trend and decided it would be a good idea to mass market it. Nowa days its nearly impossible to get a case with out a ............................

Air Cooled Mouse Pad

The idea for this project evolved out of necessity. Dan and I are both avid gamers. After a few hours of gaming with our normal high-end mouse pads you get a build up of sweat. The mouse and mouse pad becomes slippery and you start to loose your competitive advantage due to the loss of precision. While there are a couple mice on the market that have small fans in them to dry out your palm, they all have major failings in precision and accuracy. So after some thought and discussion we chose to build out our own custom mouse pad with a blower in it to suck the air down through the pad and away from the gamer’s hand. The result is astonishing!

Surf the web without logging on to Internet

Ever thought of surfing the web when you are not connected? Well, that is the latest offering from Rakesh Mathur. Mathur, who co-founded Junglee — that was later taken over by Amazon — has developed a software ‘Webaroo’ that will make this possible.

Like the Kangaroo — that is an inherent part of the company’s logo — it promises to leapfrog the net to a new era. The company on Monday launched a new free software service that enables consumers to instantly search web pages and view web sites without an Internet connection, on their handhelds and laptop computers.

Already the company has support from Acer, which also announced its intention to bundle Webaroo software in its laptop.

Webaroo, which launched its services today, issued a statement quoting Campbell Kan, head of Mobile Computing Business Unit, Acer Inc, as saying that they plan to incorporate Webaroo’s software into Acer’s mobile PCs.

Webaroo servers scour the web, analyse web pages and automatically select the subset of pages with the most content value in the least storage size. These pages are then assembled into topic specified ‘web packs’.

These webpacks can be downloaded on a laptop or a mobile phone. Once downloaded, the webpacks or web sites can be accessed anytime.

Zdnet, a premier technology portal, termed it as a new permutation in web search’’ with the general idea being to take a one million gigabyte index and compress it to 40 gigabytes.

MIT Builds Batteries with Viruses

Normally, one would associate the word virus with something negative, whether it is a malfunctioning desktop computer or a sickness. However, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have "trained" viruses in a lab to create a miniature battery.

By manipulating a few genes within the virus, researchers were able to get the organism to grow and then assemble itself into a functional electronic device. They hope to be able to build a battery that could be as small as a grain of rice.

Two opposite electrodes -- or conductors -- form the structure of a battery, called an anode and a cathode. These are separated by something called an electrolyte, a liquid of gel-like substance that contains ions and can conduct electricity.

In the process created by MIT researchers, the viruses were engineered to create the anode by collecting cobalt oxide and gold. Since these viruses have a negative charge, they are then layered between oppositely charged synthetic polymers to create thin sheets.

Batteries made with this process could store two to three times the energy of traditional batteries that size, meaning a longer-lasting charge. While the researchers did not specify any early applications of the technology, it would likely first appear in Defense Department work. The project was funded by the Army Research Office, MIT said.

AMD schedules first 65nm processor shipments for H2 2006

AMD today said that it is on track to ship its first 65 nm processors in the second half of this year. The company claims that it already has been producing a significant number of 65nm development test chips to lay the foundation for a volume conversion of its manufacturing process by mid-2007.

AMD's first substantial 65 nm announcement was made at a press conference at the Semicon Europa 2006 event, which is currently held in Munich, Germany. Other than rumors in past days have indicated, the company did not actually demonstrate a 65 nm processor, but decided to rather reassure Semicon visitors that its silicon is stable and on schedule.

According to Dirk Meyer, AMD's president and chief operating officer, 65 nm chips have been sampling for quite a while in AMD's Fab 36 in Dresden and have been manufactured parallel to 90 nm CPUs on 300 mm wafers. While details were scarce, the company apparently is running the CPUs through its validation track, collecting and analyzing data to eliminate errors and improve production efficiency.

AMD did not announce specific processors, however there appears to be little change to previous statements that the firm's first 65 nm processors may be introduced late this year or early in 2007. The company is expected to quickly transition to 65 nm once the first wave of commercial products will have shipped. Production will be "substantially" converted to 65nm production by mid-2007, AMD said. "Our manufacturing strategy execution continues to be flawless," said Meyer in a prepared statement. "The increased capacity provided by Fab 36 will contribute to our goal of doubling total production output from 2005 through 2008."

AMD's Fab 36 is located on the same site as the 200 mm 90 nm Fab 30. The company claims that it has increased total production output at Fab 30 by approximately 80% from the first quarter of 2004 through the fourth quarter of 2005. The fab, which was originally designed to produce a maximum of 20,000 wafers per month, now produces approximately 30,000 wafers per month. Fab 36 was recently brought online and began first revenue shipments of AMD64 processors in March of this year

Top 20 Strangest Gadgets and Accessories

20. The Talking Lips:

Not your ordinary speakers, these “Talking Lips” actually have moving lips that synchronize with your mobile phone or online chat conversations (Skype, etc.). They come in three different colors (silver/black/red) and connect to your phone or computer via USB. Fortunatley, there’s an on/off switch on the bottom that will come in handy after the few seconds of entertainment are up.

19. Portable Cardboard Speakers

MUJI, best known in for their innovative yet simple products, has come out with speakers made of cardboard and a few electronic components They ship unfolded in a clear plastic pouch — fold them up and they’re ready to use. Now that’s what I call portability. MoMAstore has them available for puchase now at $42 USD.

18. Talking Japanese Watches

Now available from FredFlare is this innovative new watch that not only tells time but teaches you Japanese as well. By pressing a button, you can activate the speaker which responds with the time in Japanese. It also features a stylish retro design and comes in five different colors - priced at just $20 USD each.

17. The Baller Cheating Pen

Did you always dream of a pen like this? The Baller Pen features a retractable 6.5″ sheet which can be written on. On the UV coated front side, you are able to use fine tip markers/sticks while the back side is erasable which makes it perfect for writing on with pencils.

16. Cup Noodle Stove

The “Cup Noodle Stove” is the best thing that could happen to ramen lovers short of going to Japan. Forget the microwave, place your favorite Cup Noodle flavor on the stove and power it up. In just a few minutes, your ramen will be piping hot and ready to eat.

“The heat temperature can get pretty high for a little thing like this. So don’t try to make any damn omelets.”

15. Gas Powered Blender

Tailgating parties aren’t complete without the “Daiquiri Whacker Gas Powered Blender”. It comes with an unbreakable Oster blender jar and a Mountain Safety Research aluminum fuel bottle (for gas mixing/fuel storage). This powerful blender will start any party off with a bang, get yours now for just $275.00 from TheBigChill.

Powerful enough to whip up a batch of your favorite blended drink faster than you can say” Dos Margaritas por favor!”

14. The Mini Desk

Made by MiniStatements, the “Mini Desk” looks good enough to drive. The entire desk is constructed from what looks like a real Mini with its top chopped off, interior gutted, and left door panel removed. It supposedly retails at a whopping $4,400, email the company for additional information.

13. Wood LED Clock

When turned off, this clock looks just like a regular block of wood. Once powered up, the LED lights display the time on this still regular looking block of wood. Time adjustment knobs and a “power adapter” jack can be found on the back. These wooden clocks are made by Japanese company Takumi and are available now from Dynamism at the price of $379.00 USD.

12. Headlight LCD Combo

Now you can sit in front of your headlight and watch your favorite DVD movies. Someone decide to cut you off? Show them so love by putting on a movie.

Screenlights have come up with a piece of technological wizardry — “a fully functional headlight that has an embedded LCD screen within. This mod comes in 3″, 4″, 5″, and 7″ flavors. The 3″ screen will peg you back by $900.

11. Rat Race Clock

Amsuing yourself at work just got a little bit easier with this “Rat Race Clock”. Watch the mechanical rat run on a treadmill, whilst moving “gears that advance the hour and minute hands”. Powered by 4D and 2AA batteries, this clock can be had for just $24.99 from ComputerGear.

10. Radio Toaster

With “The Only Radio Toaster” you can not only prepare toast but also listen to FM radio at the same time. The toaster is housed in a slick silver brushed-metal case and features an electronic sensor which automatically adjusts the toasting time based on its internal temperature (this will come in handy since i’m not a morning person). Also included are multiple toasting settings, easy-to-read radio controls, and built-in cord storage to keep your kitchen “clutter-free”.

9. The Sauce Dispensing Chopsticks

With these sauce dispensing chopsticks you’ll never have to dip your sushi in soy sauce again. For $21 you can own two pairs of these chopsticks, which are made from polypropylene and ABS, meaning they will break before you know it. Additional info on this Japanese invention can be found here.

8. The Head Bath Cap

If you’ve been waiting for a cap that gives your head/hair a good bath than the solution is here. Presenting the “Head Bath” cap, just place it over your head and let water start running into it. This thing not only looks funny but supposedly “helps your hair grow faster and fuller” by penetrating the pores in your scalp with the trapped water.

7. SatuGO - Bouncing Digital Camera

This nifty little bouncy ball type gadget is actually a digital camera that snaps 3.0 Megapixel images when bounced. The SatuGO is notable in that it includes 1GB NAND memory and sports a timer/flash so it can also be used as a webcam. Just plug it into your computer’s USB port for quick and easy recharging. No word yet on pricing or availability.

6. Touch Rubik’s Cube

The Touch Rubik’s Cube puts a new twist on the classic puzzle game. It uses six different materials: metal, wood, textile, stone, rubber, and plastic, engaging users to use their senses. This also enables blind persons to enjoy the wonders of a Rubik’s cube.

5. RSStroom Reader

Introducing the RSStroom reader by Yi Tien Electronics, with this gadget you’ll be able to print the latest RSS headlines directly on to rolls of toilet paper. It also features Wi-Fi Connectivity, USB 2.0, and RSS 2.0/Atom compatibility. This reader interacts with your toilet bowl “biometrically” which basically means when you sit down this thing will weigh you. Depending on your weight, it’ll deliver you a customized news feed.

4. BriefSafe

The problem with most safes is that experienced burglers know how to crack them. “Brief Safe” offers the next best thing which is basically stained underwear that securely stores valuables in a 4″ x 10″ secret compartment with velcro closure. Available now for $9 from Shomer.

“Leave the “Brief Safe” in plain view in your laundry basket or washing machine at home, or in your suitcase in a hotel room - even the most hardened burgler or most curious snoop will “skid” to a screeching halt as soon as they see them.”

3. Knife Block Shaped Like Human Head

Put simply, this solid lime-wood knife block shaped like a human head would be a refreshing addition to any boring kitchen. This piece was hand carved by Irene van Gestel.

“This is a lovely design-student project: a hand-carved knife-block shaped like a man’s head, the knives sticking out of it in gruesome humor.”

2. Shower Belt

While not on the cutting edge of technology or gadgetry, this shower belt did provide me with a few minutes of laughter. The “Shower Belt” designed by Carl Hagerling can easily attach to any faucet with the buckle acting as a fully functional nozzle. Get off work late and want to freshen up before heading out on that big date? Just whip out your trusty shower belt for a quick wash in the bathroom.

1. Synthetic Human Skin Laptop Bags

This expensive ($601 USD), but striking laptop bag is made from synthetic human skin. The “Skinbag” is shock absorbant, has 1 cm padding (fabric lining), and 1 side pocket for all your accessories. It measures approx. 39 x 29 cm or 14 x 11 in. and doubles as a regular carrying bag.

“The bags dedicated to electronic machines are waterproof and proctective jackets and become autonomous organisms. They anticipate the fusion between the digital and the organic.”

Honorable Mention - Bottle Cap Tripod

If all you want is a basic digital camera tripod, Yodoboshi offers the “Bottle Cap Tripod”. This device fits 28.5 to 30.5mm mouths and comes in six different colors. Its available now from Semsons for just $19.99.

“The world’s first bottle cap tripod by Yodobashi. It magically turns a bottle into a tripod, ideal for night shot and self protrait.”

Honorable Mention - Backside Watch

The “Backside Watch” is an amusing piece designed by Open Concepts, its a watch that’s meant to be worn upside down.

“From one point of view this watch is not so comfortable for precise time measuring. If you put the watch on your hand and that brought you in good mood it means the life turned bright side to you!”

Keyboard Shoes

These keyboard shoes are currently on display at the “14th China International Clothing and Accessories Fair” in Beijing.

HOWTO: Homemade Reversing Variable-Length Extension Tube Macro

Here I will explain super cheap homemade variable length (like a bellows, sorta) reversing extension tube.

First, the technologies involved:

Reverse Lens

Lens reversing has been used as a technique for macro photography for quite a while. Decen’t close ups can be achieved by mounting the lens reverse directly on the camera, and really high magnification can be achieved by mounting the lens reverse on another (front mounted) lens. A reversed 50mm lens is basically a +10 diopter. The reason this works (I’m not a physicist, so this is a stupid explanation) is, while a lens is designed to take a large image and make it small (on your sensor), reversing it will take a small image and make it bigger.

Extension

Moving the lens farther away from the film plane increases magnification. Obviously. There are two commercial implementations of this. Extension tubes, some of which preserve the electronic connection to the lens, and bellows, which are variable length (you can contract or expand the bellows to focus and increase magnification). These are both often used with a reverse lens for added effect.

So I decided I would just make my own extension tube, and it just so happened that it ended up variable-length. I had some old diopters that were really bad so I never used them, and I had a dremel. I decided that it was possible to design a reversing extension tube with a drilled out body cap and a bunch of busted-out filters as spacers.

So what you need is:

A body cap

Some old filters that you don’t want (stackable). How much magnification you get depends on how many you use. I used 7 total, but find that 4 is the best to get good shots with. Should all be the same size and should fit the lens that you want to use.
Lens. It would probably be best to use a prime, and it can’t have an electronic aperture. You must be able to change the aperture with the ring on the lens, without it being connected to the camera. I use Nikkor 50mm/1.8D. Your lens will just attach to this mount, so you’ll still be able to use it for normal purposes after this project.

I thought of this project looking at the clearance table at Wolf, and bought 2 circular polarizers, 2 UV filters, and a body cap for a total of $12. I had a set of diopters that I never used too.

First thing to do is break all the glass out of the filters.

Do this inside a ziplock bag and one quick whack with the hammer should do it. Once the lens is fully busted shake all the broken glass down into the bottom of the ziplock bag. Dispose of the broken glass properly, make sure you don’t leave broken glass shards laying around. Do this to all the filters that you want to use. Afterwards, run water over them and clean them thoroughly with a rag. There are little tiny pieces of glass dust all in them (especially two-part rings like polarizers) and your sensor will be exposed to this if you do not clean them. This is going directly on your camera with no lens between it and the sensor, so be careful.

For turning filters, like polarizers, you don’t want to have your extension tube body turning all the time, so a dab of superglue where the two parts connect (in three or four places around the circle) should stop that problem.

Now get the lens cap and dremel out the center of it. Be sure to keep the mount in tact:

The dremel will likely melt the plastic, a bit that’s ok! makes it smoother. Sand it down. Wash all the little bits of plastic off.
Now onto the front of the body cap (that faces away from the camera), glue a filter ring, with the male side facing out. This is the side that’s going to interface with your lens. Mine wouldn’t fit on the no-name body cap that I was using so what I did was glued one male side in, and then glued another one female-female (giggidy giggidy) on top of that. So it ended up with the male side out, just using two filters. This is ok!

Now, you can either reverse mount your lens directly on the body adapter, or you can add your extra spaces to extend. This will increase magnification.

Here’s my finished extension tube and my first subject:

And here’s my first shot with it:

This picture is taken with 4 rings worth of extension.

Full manual mode only. The lens is not electronically attached so there is no metering. It’s pretty easy to get good shots with flash and the power dialed way down on it. You won’t be able to see through the viewfinder with the aperture stopped down, so what I do is open the aperture to compose, then stop it down and shoot.
Total investment: $12 + a bit of super glue. Oh and somewhere in the process I got my sensor dirty and had to clean it. So I used a little bit of compressed air too.