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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

There is often pressure inside Software development for Software developers to code outside of work hours. Coding is considered a passion for some, but others don’t think this way. They are more than happy to not code in their spare time. This is OK.

Meetup groups, side-projects, coding quizzes, side-hustles, developing websites for friends and family. Improving your coding skills takes time, effort, discipline and sacrifice. But is it really necessary? That is for you to decide.

There is no doubt that there is importance to setting goals. It helps to see where you are going and to have something you are working towards. Being the best coder isn’t everyone’s goal.

People often feel peer pressure to code outside of hours, to stay competitive and to be the best. If someone is making you feel this way, you can remind yourself that it is perfectly OK to only code at work. Some people might even argue that doing too much can have diminishing returns…

[...] In short, it is perfectly OK to have a life outside of work. Many people hack their schedules according to their own goals and interests, which may or may not include coding. If you think this post could help someone out there, please share it around!

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

It’s no secret that Google tracks a lot of data about you, from the websites you visit to the videos you watch, the things you’ve searched for, and the places you have visited. Scrubbing this data from your Google account has required you to manually dig into your settings each time. That’s changing soon.

In the next few weeks, Google will be rolling out a feature to users around the world that will let them set this information to be deleted automatically every three or 18 months.

"We work to keep your data private and secure, and we’ve heard your feedback that we need to provide simpler ways for you to manage or delete it," Google said in a blog post published Wednesday.

For now, these controls are only coming to your location history and web and app activity, but it’s likely that they’ll come to more of your data history at some point.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

The future of medicine is biological – and scientists hope we will soon be using 3-D-printed biologically functional tissue to replace irreparably damaged tissue in the body. A team of researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology IGB has been working with the University of Stuttgart for a number of years on a project to develop and optimize suitable bioinks for additive manufacturing. By varying the composition of the biomaterial, the researchers have already succeeded in expanding their portfolio to include bone and vascularization inks. That has laid the foundations for manufacturing bone-like tissue structures featuring capillary networks.

3-D printing is not only gaining ground in manufacturing – it is also taking on increasing importance in the realm of regenerative medicine. Scientists are now hoping to use this tissue scaffolds that will replace irreparably damaged tissue. A team of researchers at Fraunhofer IGB in Stuttgart is also working on biobased inks for manufacturing biological implants in the laboratory using 3-D printing techniques. To create a 3-D object in the desired pre-programmed shape, the team utilizes a layer-by-layer approach to print a liquid mixture comprising biopolymers such as gelatin or hyaluronic acid, aqueous medium and living cells. These bio-inks remain in a viscous state during printing and are then exposed to UV light to crosslink them into water-containing polymer networks called hydrogels.

Original Submission

James Orme writes:

For the digital enterprise making use of the best-in-breed applications is non-negotiable, and the number they are relying on is increasing. Workforces on average rely on 162 applications to stay productive, according to cloud identity and access management platform Okta's recent "Businesses @ Work" report. This is a departure from the traditional enterprise approach of stack simplicity; purchasing one integrated system from a big vendor like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP.

[...] To discuss the changing landscape, senior leaders from three of the most successful enterprise applications – communications platform Slack, cloud content management platform Box, and Okta itself – hosted a breakfast roundtable. They cautioned that while increased application volumes are improving enterprise productivity, they are also bringing fresh complexities.

[Source: https://techerati.com/features-hub/opinions/how-can-enterprises-avoid-app-overflow]

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd

Amazon.com Inc dismissed the idea of running a fully automated warehouse in the near future, citing the superior cognitive ability of humans and limitations of current technology.

Scott Anderson, director of Amazon Robotics Fulfillment, said technology is at least 10 years away from fully automating the processing of a single order picked by a worker inside a warehouse.

There is a misperception that Amazon will run fully automated warehouses soon, Anderson said during a tour of Amazon's Baltimore warehouse for reporters on Tuesday.

The technology for a robot to pick a single product from a bin without damaging other products or picking multiple products at the same time in a way that could benefit the e-commerce retailer is years away.

Amazon is exploring a variety of technologies to automate the various steps needed to get a package to shoppers, Anderson said.

"In the current form, the technology is very limited. The technology is very far from the fully automated workstation that we would need," Anderson said.

Your job is safe...for now.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-com-warehouse/amazon-dismisses-idea-automation-will-eliminate-all-its-warehouse-jobs-soon-idUSKCN1S74B9

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Flying can be an excruciating experience these days. The CEO of United Airlines recently admitted that by the time passengers sit down on his planes, they're already "pissed at the world." But plenty of airlines have tried to make things more fun over the years, even if they were incredibly weird. So weird, in fact, that they went out of business.

Source: https://paleofuture.gizmodo.com/failed-airlines-that-were-too-weird-for-this-world-1834047283

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for ErnestTBass

Potato farmers cry foul as PepsiCo sues them

Just days after multi-billion dollar conglomerate PepsiCo sued four Gujarati farmers, asking them to pay ₹1.05 crore each as damages for 'infringing its rights' by growing the potato variety used in its Lays chips, farmers groups have launched a campaign calling for government intervention.

The case is coming up for hearing in an Ahmedabad court on Friday.

Warning that the case could set a precedent for other crops, farmers groups are pointing out that the law allows them to grow and sell any variety of crop or even seed as long as they don't sell branded seed of registered varieties.

The farmers want the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights Authority (PPV&FRA) to make a submission in court on their behalf and fund legal costs through the National Gene Fund.

When asked for a response, a PepsiCo India spokesperson said: "Given the issue is sub judice, it would not be proper to offer detailed comments."

T.K. Nagarathna, the PPV&FRA registrar who has jurisdiction for vegetable crops, said that the case had come to the notice of the Authority and it was looking into it. "We can take action based on the court order," she told The Hindu.

"These farmers are small, holding around 3-4 acres on an average, and had grown a potato crop from farm-saved seed after they accessed the potato seed locally in 2018," according to a letter sent to the PPV&FRA by farmers groups. They alleged that PepsiCo hired a private detective agency to pose as potential buyers and take secret video footage, and collect samples from farmers' fields without disclosing its real intent. PepsiCo then filed suit, the letter said. It added that at least nine farmers in three districts have been charged since 2018.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

HP's Endpoint Security Controller: More Details About A New Chip in HP Notebooks

One of HP's key announcements this spring was its revamped security initiative for PCs that includes hardware, software, and deep learning-based approaches. The software and DL parts of the things were discussed earlier this month, but the hardware-based Endpoint Security Controller remained more or less a mystery. This is why we asked HP to talk about it in more detail.

When it was announced, the company said that the HP Endpoint Security Controller is indeed a separate piece of silicon that sits inside HP's PCs and performs certain security-based tasks. The ESC features a general-purpose processor core, HP's custom hardware IP blocks, and embedded software. What is interesting is that HP has been installing the controller into its laptops since the EliteBook 800 G1 series launched in 2013, but has been very secretive about it until recently.

Initially, HP used the Endpoint Security Controller only for its Sure Start technology that can 'heal'/recover the system BIOS. Fast forward to 2019, and the controller has gained capabilities. HP now uses it to protect Intel's Management Engine, and to enable its Sure Run and Sure Recover capabilities.

Would you rather purchase a Huawei or HP laptop?

[We have covered the Intel Management Engine many times before. --Ed]

Original Submission

Armagadd-on 2.0, Mozilla expired certificate disables add-ons

An Anonymous Coward writes:

No, the culprit you are losing add-ons isn't your computer, or maybe your old FF, or dropping of Webextensions API. Twitter, Reddit, everyone is wondering what is going on. This Armagadd-on 2.0 has a simple explanation: Mozilla forgot to renew certificates, and so add-ons are failing like if they were not properly signed, because technically they are not. Even signing of new add-ons is down (see comment 9). Great weekend at Mozilla HQ!

Some workarounds, until they clean up the mess, include playing with the computer clock (NTP? forget it) or disabling signature checks (not possible in default releases).

All Firefox extensions disabled due to expiration of intermediate signing cert

An Anonymous Coward writes:

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:66.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/66.0

Steps to reproduce:

Wait until it's past midnight on 2019-05-04 UTC.

Actual results:

All addons got disabled due not having valid signature.

Expected results:

If the signature was due to expire, it should have been renewed weeks ago. Not all extensions were disabled. Fakespot and Google Scholar Button were left in their disabled state.

Some reports on reddit says that they had their clocks a day forward, but they may be just early canaries for the actual widespread issue.

Going backwards in time allows installation from AMO (Mozilla Add-ons) but do not remove the unsupported mark from the add-ons already installed.

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1548973

Workaround: Go to about:config and set xpinstall.signatures.required to false

Original Submission #1  Original Submission #2 

janrinok writes:

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Bacteria across our planet contain nanometer-sized factories that do many different things. Some make nutrients, others isolate toxic materials that could harm the bacteria. We have barely scratched the surface of their functional diversity.

But all share a common exterior, a shell made of protein tiles, that Michigan State University researchers are learning how to manipulate in the lab. This will allow them to build factories of their own design, using the natural building blocks. Indeed, scientists see the structures as a source of new technologies. They are trying to repurpose them to do things they don't in nature.

In a new study, the lab of Cheryl Kerfeld reports a new genetically engineered shell, based on natural structures and the principles of protein evolution. The new shell is simpler, made of only a single designed protein. It will be easier to work with and, perhaps, even evolve in the lab. The study is published in ACS Synthetic Biology.

Original Submission

https://lwn.net/Articles/786593/

An April Fools joke that went sour seems to be at least the proximate cause for a rather large upheaval in the Devuan community. For much of April 1 (or March 31 depending on time zone), the Devuan web site looked like it had been taken over by attackers, which was worrisome to many, but it was all a prank. The joke was clever, way over the top, unprofessional, or some combination of those, depending on who is describing it, but the incident and the threads on the devuan-dev mailing list have led to rancor, resignations, calls for resignations, and more.

Quick summary:

- Nicosia (a core dev) posted to the mailing list saying Devuan was compromised.
- Nicosia kept up the joke for some time.
- Nicosia admitted it was a prank later.
- Mike Bird suggested legal action against Nicosia and auditing/rebuilding the affected servers.
- Nicosia stepped down on April 11.
- Roio (a core dev) accused CenturionDan (a core dev) of causing Nicosia to step down.
- Reurich (a core dev) commented on the divide between people who want to use Devuan professionally and people who use Devuan for fun.
- Roio objected to Reurich.
- Reurich considered stepping down.

Some facts (?) gathered from the comments:

- Many core devs were unaware of the joke. They thought the compromise was real, as everyone but Nicosia was blocked from logging in to the affected server. They worked to shut down their infrastructure and isolate it from the supposedly compromised machine.
- The Devuan continuous integration server is apparently still down.

Related: Devuan Site Possibly Hacked

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for AzumaHazuki

Lenovo Readies New ThinkBook Family of Laptops

Lenovo is gearing up to launch a new series of notebooks aimed at mainstream users. The new ThinkBook laptops were recently showcased at a trade show in China and are currently listed by at least two European retailers. Meanwhile, based on model numbers, it looks like that when they launch in the coming weeks, the new ThinkBooks will succeed certain IdeaPad models within Lenovo's laptop product stack.

[...] The flagship Lenovo ThinkBook S models are based on Intel’s Core i7-8565U (Whiskey Lake) processors and are paired with 16 GB of RAM as well as a 512 GB M.2 NVMe SSD. Select models will also come with a discrete AMD Radeon 540X GPU, but expect this one to be available only inside premium SKUs. In fact, based on Lenovo’s usual approach, expect to see the Lenovo to release the ThinkBook S in a wide variety of configurations in order to cover several market segments.

Both demonstrated ThinkBook S models will also be outfitted with Lenovo’s Accutype keyboard, a rather large touchpad, a 720p webcam with IR sensors for Windows Hello, stereo speakers with Harman badge, a microphone array, three USB Type-A ports, a USB Type-C port, an HDMI output, and a 3.5-mm audio jack for headsets. As for dimensions and weight, the 13.3 and 14.1-inch machines feature 15.9 and 16.5-mm z-heights and weigh 1.34 and 1.5 kilograms respectively.

from the ideapads-but-with-higher-margins dept.

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for AndyTheAbsurd

Late last year, Republican FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr got an "earful" from remote Alaskan residents who were concerned with how poor their access to the internet is — and they weren't wrong. Alaska has, on average, some of the slowest internet connections in the country, primarily due to its distance from the rest of the continental United States.

But remote Alaskans may see faster speeds soon. MTA Fiber Holdings announced today that it would build the "first and only all-terrestrial" fiber optic network running from Alaska and into the Lower 48. The line will begin in North Pole, Alaska and will travel through Canada, connecting with Canadian carriers, where it will finally connect with "any major hub" in the US. A vast majority of Alaska's current connections to the global internet either run through a handful of submarine cables, satellites, or wireless connections.

"This is a major step for Alaska that will ensure future capacity requirements for MTA members and can support the continuing growth of broadband across the state of Alaska," MTA CEO Michael Burke said in a statement.

According to the press release, only internet traffic that both originates and terminates in the US will be carried over the network.

Source: https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/1/18525866/alaska-fiber-optic-network-cable-continental-us-100-terabit

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Two proteins central to the pathology of Alzheimer’s disease act as prions — misshapen proteins that spread through tissue like an infection by forcing normal proteins to adopt the same misfolded shape — according to new UC San Francisco research. 

Using novel laboratory tests, the researchers were able to detect and measure specific, self-propagating prion forms of the proteins amyloid beta (Aß) and tau in postmortem brain tissue of 75 Alzheimer’s patients. In a striking finding, higher levels of these prions in human brain samples were strongly associated with early-onset forms of the disease and younger age at death. 

Alzheimer’s disease is currently defined based on the presence of toxic protein aggregations in the brain known as amyloid plaques and tau tangles, accompanied by cognitive decline and dementia. But attempts to treat the disease by clearing out these inert proteins have been unsuccessful. The new evidence that active Aß and tau prions could be driving the disease – published May 1, 2019 in Science Translational Medicine — could lead researchers to explore new therapies that focus on prions directly. 

“I believe this shows beyond a shadow of a doubt that amyloid beta and tau are both prions, and that Alzheimer’s disease is a double-prion disorder in which these two rogue proteins together destroy the brain,” said Stanley Prusiner, MD, the study’s senior author and director of the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases, part of the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences. “The fact that prion levels also appear linked to patient longevity should change how we think about the way forward for developing treatments for the disease. We need a sea change in Alzheimer’s disease research, and that is what this paper does. This paper might catalyze a major change in AD research.” 

Original Submission

martyb writes:

Qualcomm Will Pocket Almost $5 Billion from Apple Settlement this Quarter:

Qualcomm will make nearly $5 billion in the current quarter from the settlement of its licensing dispute with Apple.

During its quarterly earnings report on Wednesday, the mobile chipmaker said it will record revenue of about $4.5 billion to $4.7 billion from Apple in its third fiscal quarter, which ends in June. That includes a cash payment from Apple and the release of money it had to reserve to pay or refund Apple and the contract manufacturers for certain customer-related liabilities.

Overall, Qualcomm's third-quarter revenue should total $9.2 billion to $10.2 billion, a 65% to 83% jump from the previous year when Apple wasn't paying Qualcomm's licensing fees.

"We believe the settlement is a win for both companies, and we are pleased with the result and pleased to have it behind us," Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf said during a call with analysts. "We are committed to a strong partnership with Apple."

Apple and Qualcomm last month settled their patent licensing battle, ending a two-year dispute the day after their trial kicked off in San Diego. The two sides announced the surprise agreement through a joint press release at the same time lawyers were presenting their opening arguments in a courthouse in Southern California. Apple and its contract manufacturers had given their statements, and Qualcomm's head lawyer had nearly finished his remarks when the courtroom buzzed with the unexpected news.

Excluding that benefit from Apple, though, Qualcomm expects its third-quarter revenue to slide from the previous year's $5.6 billion by as much as 16%. It cited a slowdown in the handset market, especially China. Qualcomm expects third-quarter revenue, excluding the Apple payment, to total $4.7 billion to $5.5 billion. Analysts polled by Yahoo Finance expected sales of $5.08 billion.

Know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em.

Original Submission