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c0lo writes:

Gizmag reports:

A quick turn in the weather can bring undone even the most carefully planned loads of washing, so detergent maker Omo is tapping into the Internet of Things (IoT) to offer a helping hand. Peggy is a smart clothes-peg prototype that uses a number of sensors and local weather information to tell you when the washing is dry and ping you when rain's on the way to prevent you drying the same load twice.

Peggy looks something like a regular (oversized) clothes peg, but packed inside are light, temperature and humidity sensors, along with a Wi-Fi chip and lithium-ion battery. By accumulating data through these sensors and connecting to the internet, it keeps an eye on local weather conditions and sends an alert to the user's smartphone when the black clouds start rolling in.

But this is only one part of Omo's vision for how we'll do laundry in the IoT era. The app also taps into its wealth of weather knowledge to tell users the best time to do the washing, pushes a notification to the phone when the cycle is complete and tells you how long it will take to dry on the line in current conditions.
...
The connected clothes peg is currently in testing with those interested in taking part able to register their interest via the source link below. News.com.au reports that the market price for Peggy would be in the tens of dollars and that Omo would work to extend the battery life before a commercial launch of the product, with the current prototypes requiring daily recharging via USB.

Ah... ummm... wouldn't be cheaper with a retractable sail over your cloth lines?

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

The high-powered US investor Warren Buffett has been all over wind energy development in Iowa, and his MidAmerican Energy company has just one-upped itself with a new plan called Wind XI. If approved, the new $3.6 billion wind development initiative would enable MidAmerican to provide its Iowa customers with a grid mix that includes 85 percent wind energy, up from an already impressive current level of 47 percent.
...
The new turbines will generate up to 2,000 megawatts and put Iowa even farther ahead of the other 49 US states when it comes to wind energy generation statewide. Iowa is already the only state in the US to pass the 30 percent threshold, and the new turbines will put it over 40 percent.

To gild the clean power lily, the project will not require state subsidies, and MidAmerican has pledged that its customers' electricity rates will not increase as a result of the new investment.

Opponents argue the new project would chop air particles into bits and cannot be allowed.

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-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

The USA's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports:

BEGINNING ON MAY 11, NOAA'S NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FORECASTS WILL STOP YELLING AT YOU.

New forecast software is allowing the agency to break out of the days when weather reports were sent by "the wire" over teleprinters, which were basically typewriters hooked up to telephone lines. Teleprinters only allowed the use of upper case letters, and while the hardware and software used for weather forecasting has advanced over the last century, this holdover was carried into modern times since some customers still used the old equipment.

Better late than never, but the slow change was not for lack of trying. The National Weather Service has proposed to use mixed-case letters several times since the 1990s, when widespread use of the Internet and email made teletype obsolete. In fact, in web speak, use of capital letters became synonymous with angry shouting. However, it took the next 20 years or so for users of Weather Service products to phase out the last of the old equipment that would only recognize teletype.

Recent software upgrades to the computer system that forecasters use to produce weather predictions, called [AWIPS 2] (The Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System), are allowing for the change to mixed-case letters.

[...] Forecasters will have the option to use all capital letters in weather warnings to emphasize threats during extremely dangerous situations. Certain forecast products with international implications, such as aviation and shipping, will continue to use upper case letters, per international agreements that standardize weather product formats across national borders.

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

The worldwide reliance on burning fossil fuels to create energy could be phased out in a decade, according to an article published by a major energy think tank in the UK.

Professor Benjamin Sovacool, Director of the Sussex Energy Group at the University of Sussex, believes that the next great energy revolution could take place in a fraction of the time of major changes in the past.
...
The study highlights numerous examples of speedier transitions that are often overlooked by analysts. For example, Ontario completed a shift away from coal between 2003 and 2014; a major household energy programme in Indonesia took just three years to move two-thirds of the population from kerosene stoves to LPG stoves; and France's nuclear power programme saw supply rocket from four per cent of the electricity supply market in 1970 to 40 per cent in 1982.

Each of these cases has in common strong government intervention coupled with shifts in consumer behaviour, often driven by incentives and pressure from stakeholders.

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takyon writes:

Warm hand dryers launch more microbes into the air than paper towels, and the futuristic Dyson Airblade jet dryers are one of the worst offenders:

Researchers have long known that warm hand dryers can launch bacteria into the air—compared to dabbing with paper towels, which unleashes virtually none. But new jet air dryers, made by Dyson, are significantly more problematic—they launch far more viruses into the air, which linger for longer periods of time and reach much farther distances, researchers recently reported in the Journal of Applied Microbiology. This is particularly concerning because viruses, unlike many infectious bacteria, can easily maintain their infectiousness in the air and on surfaces, and just a few viral particles can spark an infection.

"The results of this study suggest that in locations where hygiene and cross-infection considerations are paramount, such as healthcare settings and the food industry, the choice of hand-drying method should be considered carefully," the authors concluded.

Study link (DOI: 10.1111/jam.13014)

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An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/04/researchers-keep-pig-hearts-alive-baboons-more-2-years

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

El Reg reports Job ad promises "Meaningless Repetitive Work on the .NET Stack"

You'll need "numbness to the absence of excellence", will be paid "handsomely for your soul".

"Grease the wheels of capitalism with your tears ...we will pay you handsomely for your soul."

A job ad has appeared offering one lucky worker the chance to perform "Meaningless Repetitive Work on the .NET Stack".

The ad[*] is real. Recruiter Joshua Wulf told The Register he wrote it after a conversation with a candidate "who told me what his job is really like".

[...] The lucky candidate will get to wrestle the following:

• Multiple generations of legacy code that cannot be refactored without destroying the entire house of cards.
• Design anti-patterns as a design pattern.
• Live, mission-critical system where you develop on the production instance.
• Large sections of managed and native COBOL.
• Easily top every development horror story at LAN parties.

To score the gig, you'll need these traits:

• Experience with the following technologies: .NET, ASP.NET, JavaScript, VBScript, COBOL, Managed COBOL.
• An extreme resilience and ability to withstand intense pressure.
• A numbness to the absence of excellence.
• Wily survival instincts and the ability to keep your head down combined with a reckless disregard for type safety.
• A bonus is any political experience, whether as a candidate or as an elected official.

Wulf tells The Register the ad has succeeded. "My phone has been ringing off the hook", he says. "People are telling me they are strangely attracted to the job because other jobs don't sound real."

"I'm surprised by the response: it's blown up!"

Ever seen this kind of honesty in an ad? Did you have the foresight to have archive.is save a copy? Do share.

[*] Ed note: In accordance with the original ad:

Copyright (c) 2016 Joshua J Wulf / Just Digital People. 
License: Creative Commons CC BY-SA 3.0 AU. 

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"exec" writes:

The Register reports Ad slinger Phorm ceases trading on the London Stock Exchange:

Controversial ad targeting firm Phorm has ceased trading.

Phorm's decision follows a failure to secure enough funding to run its business, as explained in a statement to the Stock Market here.

[...] Shares have been cancelled, with the firm moving towards insolvency. Hosting bills have not been paid, so the firm's website has dropped offline.

NoDPI (No Deep Packet Inspection), a campaign for the protection of privacy/security/integrity of telecomms, and a longstanding critic of Phorm, welcomed the firm's apparent demise.

There is a long article on Wikipedia detailing the company's origin, history, and controversies.

-- submitted from IRC

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turgid writes:

Airbus Safrane Launchers are showing off the recently-finalised design of the Ariane 6 launcher which aims to halve launch costs compared with the Ariane 5 rocket which has to date had 81 successful launches.

Ariane 6 will make extensive use of 3D printed parts in its Vulcain 2.1 main engine and will use solid rocket boosters in common with the smaller Vega rocket.

Ariane 6 will be assembled horizontally (Ariane 5 is assembled vertically) at a rate of one per month when fully operational in 2023.

Original Submission

Gaaark writes:

The new Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, is a nerd. Several examples have already arisen:

• http://www.nerdspan.com/the-mind-of-scott-canada-elects-a-nerd-friendly-leader/
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2k057-AmLL4

The latest example is him answering a journalists' flip question with a TL;DR good layman's answer (Could Trump or Clinton answer this question?):
http://globalnews.ca/news/2641108/pm-justin-trudeau-gives-reporter-quick-lesson-on-quantum-computing-during-visit-to-waterloo/

I'm hoping this is a good thing for Canada's scientific realm, after the policing and scientific holocaust that we went through with our last Prime Minister (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkTYF2MGH0E)

Here's hoping that Trudeau is Spock; here's hoping for a bright Canadian scientific future.

DISCLAIMER: I did not vote for him, but was quite willing to if it seemed necessary to get rid of Harper.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

A Russian photographer took photos of strangers on the St. Petersburg metro and used a facial recognition app[*] to match faces with profiles on the VKontakte social network:

A Russian photographer has proved how easy it is to track down people on social media using facial recognition software. Yegor Tsvetkov took photos of strangers on St Petersburg's metro and used a facial recognition app which trawls through profiles on VKontakte, Russia's biggest social network, to track down their online profiles. Named "Your Face is Big Data", the series of photographs shows how powerful facial recognition software has become, to the point that a complete stranger can find you at the click of a button.

Tsvetkov told the Guardian the project aimed to show technology can affect privacy, particularly if you don't activate the relevant settings on your social media profiles. "Nobody noticed that I photographed them, but I used a simple camera and I didn't try to hide it," he said. "One girl in the project texted me after the publication and said that it was a bad feeling when she saw herself ... but she fully understood my idea." He added that the project had highlighted the difference between the persona people present online and in real life.

A Global Voices Advocacy Director complained about the ethics of the project:

[Continues...]

takyon writes:

Just days after Russian fighter jets flew within 10 meters of a U.S. warship in the Baltic Sea, a similar incident has occurred, involving a U.S. reconnaissance plane:

A United States Air Force reconnaissance plane was barrel-rolled by a Russian jet over the Baltic Sea during a routine flight in international airspace, U.S. European Command said Saturday. The incident on Thursday occurred when a Russian jet "performed erratic and aggressive maneuvers" as it flew within 50 feet of the U.S. aircraft's wing tip, Danny Hernandez, a spokesman for European Command, said in a response to a question from CNN.

The Russian SU-27 began the barrel roll from the left side of the U.S. RC-135 and went over the top of it to end on the right side of the aircraft, European Command said. The U.S. RC-135 aircraft was "intercepted by a Russian SU-27 in an unsafe and unprofessional manner," Hernandez said, adding that the U.S. plane never entered Russian territory.

Secretary of State John Kerry said that under the rules of engagement the U.S. could have shot down the jets buzzing the USS Donald Cook.

[The craft involved: Boeing RC-135 and Sukhoi SU-27. -Ed.]

Original Submission

c0lo writes:

Southern Poverty Law Centre reports:

Every four years, teachers in the United States use the presidential election to impart valuable lessons to students about the electoral process, democracy, government and the responsibilities of citizenship.

But, for students and teachers alike, this year’s primary season is starkly different from any in recent memory. The results of an online survey conducted by Teaching Tolerance suggest that the campaign is having a profoundly negative effect on children and classrooms.

It’s producing an alarming level of fear and anxiety among children of color and inflaming racial and ethnic tensions in the classroom. Many students worry about being deported.

Other students have been emboldened by the divisive, often juvenile rhetoric in the campaign. Teachers have noted an increase in bullying, harassment and intimidation of students whose races, religions or nationalities have been the verbal targets of candidates on the campaign trail.

Many other news outlets covering the report cite Richard Cohen, president of the southern Poverty Law Center, which said: “We’ve seen Donald Trump behave like a 12-year-old, and now we’re seeing 12-year-olds behave like Donald Trump.”

[Continues...]

turgid writes:

The BBC has a story about how a secondary school Physics experiment in 1966 revealed the existence of a secret Soviet rocket launching site.

Physics teacher Geoff Perry of Kettering Grammar School in Northamptonshire was explaining the Doppler effect, most commonly experienced as the change in frequency of sound from a moving vehicle, to his pupils and realised that he could demonstrate the effect on radio waves transmitted from satellites.

Using a second-hand WWII vintage radio receiver and a home-made antenna, the pupils recorded the signals from several Soviet satellites. As the quantity and quality of their data improved, they were able to deduce that one of the satellites had a slightly different orbit from the others and therefore must have been launched from a different site.

Using their data, they were able to determine the location of the second site, Plesetsk in Russia, which was a secret. Officially, at that time the only Soviet launch site was at Baikonur in Kazakhstan.

Original Submission

Phoenix666 writes:

Chemists at ETH Zurich and the Paul Scherrer Institute have found a new, direct way to convert gaseous methane into liquid methanol. This offers industry the interesting prospect of using the gas, rather than simply burning it off, as is currently the case.

Methane is an abundant and inexpensive gas. Although it would be a suitable energy source and base material for the chemical industry, huge quantities of it are simply burnt off around the world - above all at oil fields and refineries. "On satellite images of Earth at night, the Middle East is brightly illuminated. This is not because the region has an especially high number of large, brightly lit settlements, but rather because of methane flaring at the oil fields," says Jeroen van Bokhoven, Professor for Heterogeneous Catalysis at ETH Zurich and Head of the Laboratory for Catalysis and Sustainable Chemistry at the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI).

Another reason for this wasteful approach to methane is that, at present, it is not sufficiently profitable to convert the gas into methanol in liquid form, which is easier to transport and more reactive. On the industrial scale, this conversion is currently performed using an indirect, elaborate and energy-intensive method that involves the production of syngas as an intermediate step.

The key change here is that instead of needing to repeatedly vary the temperature during the conversion (up to 450 °C and then back down to 200 °C), researchers discovered that the reaction can be made to occur at a constant temperature of 200 °C if the process performed at high pressure: 36 bar.

An abstract is available (full article paywalled) — DOI: 10.1002/anie.201511065.

Bah! Real men get their methane from pigs.

Original Submission