Gadget Ogling: A Touchless Thermometer, Flashing Audio, and a Mesmerizing Mattress Cover

JoyWing's Wishbone is a fancier thermometer than what you or I will have seen on any trip to the doctor. It's a smartphone attachment that gives temperature readouts within a couple of seconds without even having to touch the person or material it's examining, thanks to an infrared sensor. It's inexpensive, at $26-35 for those pledging to the crowdfunding drive, and I like the capacity to track the temperature changes of an object over a period of time. That feature could come in especially handy for fussy new parents.



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Gamergate Bleeds Into Wikipedia

The Gamergate controversy, which centers on sexism and sexual violence in the video game industry, has made things hot for Wikipedia, whose arbitration committee has taken punitive action against some of the people involved in the debate. The committee decided to impose a complete site-wide ban on one male editor, with the handle "Ryulong," said Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson Juliet Barbara. It also endorsed nearly 150 warnings, sanctions or topic bans affecting other editors on both sides of the issue.



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Google Gives WebView the Cold Shoulder

Google has decided not to fix vulnerabilities in WebView for Android 4.3 and older, sparking heated discussions among developers. Those versions of WebView run on the WebKit browser. Fixing them "required changes to significant portions of the code and was no longer practical to do so safely," explained Adrian Ludwig, lead engineer for Android security. Ludwig recommended steps users and developers can take to mitigate the potential exploitation of WebView vulnerabilities without updating to Lollipop, or Android 5.0.



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SpaceX Video Stirs Excitement for Falcon Heavy

SpaceX on Thursday released a computer-generated animation demonstrating how the three Falcon 9 cores of its Falcon Heavy rocket, scheduled for launch later this year, would return to Earth. The boosters would land vertically at a selected site. The Falcon Heavy will be the most powerful rocket in the world, being able to lift more than 53 metric tons, or 117,000 pounds, into low earth orbit. That's equivalent to a Boeing 737 fully loaded with passengers, crew, luggage and fuel, and it is more than twice the payload of the next closest operational space vehicle, the Delta IV Heavy.



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Canada Levitates Data from File-Sharing Sites

Canada's spy agency, the Communications Security Establishment, has been eavesdropping on 102 free file upload sites, including Sendspace, Rapidshare and Megaupload, which has been shut down. A CSE program called "Levitation" lets analysts access information on 10-15 million uploads and downloads of files from such sites daily, according to documents released by whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Levitation can monitor downloads across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and North America.



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There's a GHOST in Linux's Library

Patches for GHOST, a critical vulnerability in glibc, the Linux GNU C Library, now are available through vendor communities for a variety of Linux server and desktop distributions. Qualys earlier this week reported its discovery of GHOST, a vulnerability that allows attackers to remotely take control of an entire system without having any prior knowledge of system credentials. Qualys security researchers found the GHOST flaw and worked closely with Linux distribution vendors in a coordinated effort to develop a patch for all affected systems.



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Tech-Savvy Cubans Build Their Own Private Internet

Because Cuba's government makes it difficult for all but a handful of Cubans to access the Internet, people in Havana and other parts of the country reportedly have linked thousands of PCs to create an informal network known as "StreetNet," or "SNet" for short. The network was built with commercially available equipment. The PCs are connected by WiFi antennae and Ethernet cables strung across streets and over rooftops. SNet's main uses appear to be sharing gossip and news, accessing popular TV shows and movies, and playing online games.



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POS Terminals Rich Vein for Gold-Digging Hackers

Hackers are like gold miners. Once they find a rich vein for their malware, they mine it until it's dry. Point-of-sale terminals are such a vein. Following the success of the Target breach in 2013, the hacker underground was quick to rush more POS malware to market. "Attackers have recognized that the physical point-of-sale terminal is a new viable soft target," said Christopher Budd, threat communications manager at Trend Micro. "So we saw an increase in interest in malware that targets that."



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Oculus VR's Story Studio to Create Cinematic Virtual Reality Experiences

Oculus VR on Monday unveiled a new project at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Oculus Story Studio will produce movies in virtual reality. It presented its first example of the genre on Monday evening -- a 4-minute experience called Lost. Oculus, which was founded in 2012 and quickly raised $2.4 million via crowdfunding and venture capital, was acquired last year by Facebook for a reported $2.2 billion. Story Studio currently has about 10 people on its team, including some from Pixar Animation Studios and Lucasfilm.



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Wikileaks Steamed Over Google's Lengthy Silence on FBI Snooping

Google may have contributed to violating the First Amendment rights of three journalists working for WikiLeaks two and a half years ago, when it turned over to the FBI all their email, subscriber information and metadata. Google informed the journalists about its actions last month. "We are astonished and disturbed that Google waited over two and a half years to notify its subscribers that a search warrant was issued for their records," wrote attorneys representing the three in a joint letter to Google.



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Debian Forked: All for Devuan and Devuan for All?

A group of developers made good on their threats to fork Debian Linux late last year, after the community's leadership voted to replace sysvinit with systemd, making systemd the default init boot process. The Debian Technical Committee's decision spurred several key Debian developers and project maintainers to resign. Some of them formed a new community dedicated to developing a forked Debian Linux distro called "Devuan," pronounced "DevOne." The split is largely philosophical.



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Walk Like a Man: The DARPA Robotics Challenge

The humanoid Atlas robot made by Google company Boston Dynamics has gotten an overhaul to be stronger, lighter and more independent, and to be able to function for one hour of mixed-mission operations. Designed by the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, it stands six feet two inches tall. Its weight was trimmed from 330 to 254 pounds through replacing everything but the lower legs and feet and using lighter materials -- despite including an onboard 3.7 kWh Li-Ion battery pack and a variable-pressure pump.



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Microsoft's Windows Reboot Could Be Legendary

I was one of the launch analysts for Windows 95, and the launch of that product is widely held -- including by Bill Gates -- as the company's pinnacle. No launch before or since ever came close to that launch, and I remain amazed that no one, including Apple or Microsoft, has ever really attempted to duplicate that effort. Windows 10 has the potential to be even greater than Windows 95 -- but potential alone won't a legendary product make. It'll come down to execution, not just on the product, but on the launch itself.



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Gadget Ogling: A Microsoft Marvel, an Eensy Keyboard and an Ingenious Desk

Microsoft had a major surprise up its sleeve for those awaiting details about the Windows 10 launch: its holographic headset, HoloLens. Billed as a new way to interact with technology and the world around us at once, it overlays holograms onto what wearers see in front of them. They might, for instance, play a version of Minecraft that's constructed across a kitchen table and chairs, or have a Skype conversation with a screen seemingly hovering in front of them as they stroll across the floor. It is blisteringly impressive.



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Zenwalk Linux - A Walk on the Quirky Side

The developmental path and sketchy developer website may cast an unfavorable impression about Zenwalk's trustworthiness as a serious computing platform. The ho-hum impression when first running the live edition does little to encourage users to take this Linux OS for a stroll. Zenwalk Linux becomes a bit more impressive once you get beyond the awkward first-time experience, but it comes with a number of problems that might be prohibitive for a new user looking for an all-purpose Linux OS.



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The Brave New World of Windows 10

Microsoft on Wednesday unveiled a slew of new features and capabilities coming in Windows 10: the convergence of the desktop and mobile; the advent of the killer universal app; more power and features for personal digital assistant Cortana, which will be on mobile as well as desktops and laptops; improvements to maps; a new browser"; a strong emphasis on gaming; and holographic computing. Windows 10 will be offered as a free upgrade to owners of devices running Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 for one year after it's released.



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Quinn's Crash Override Combats Cyberbullying

Crash Override made its official debut last week, promising a new way to support people who become the targets of online bullying and harassment. Cofounder Zoe Quinn, a video game developer, is one of the better-known people who have been on the receiving end of such abuse. For her, it started when an ex-boyfriend alleged in a blog post that Quinn had traded sex with a journalist for a video game news site in order to get favorable reviews. Readers piled on, many hurling obscene insults.



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Acer Designs Chromebooks for Students' Rough Handling

Acer on Wednesday announced two new ruggedized Chromebooks geared for classroom use. Both will go on sale in February. The Acer Chromebook C910 and C740 have a durable design built around reinforced covers and hinges. The new models support multiple user sign-ons and offline file access. Security features include a Kensington lock to secure the laptop to a wireless cart or lab station. A Web-based management console allows remote management of apps and policies across all Chromebooks in a school network.



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Could Microsoft's Foggy Windows 10 Plan Be Any Smarter?

The most important and daring move that Microsoft made Wednesday is far and away making the upgrade to Windows 10 free. Seems dirt-simple and intuitive on the surface, but it represents a startling and abrupt shift in both how users will relate to Microsoft and how Microsoft innovates with Windows going forward. As long-time readers know, I'm an unabashed Apple fan -- but I can appreciate a smart move when I see one, and no doubt about it, making Windows a free upgrade is a smart move. So what is Microsoft doing, exactly?



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Ubuntu Aims to Make the IoT Snappy

Canonical on Tuesday unveiled Snappy Ubuntu Core, a new rendition of Ubuntu targeting the Internet of Things. Snappy Ubuntu Core offers a minimal server image with the same libraries as "traditional" Ubuntu, if we can call it that, but Snappy apps and Ubuntu Core can be upgraded automatically and rolled back if necessary. This so-called transactional or image-based systems management approach is ideal for deployments that require predictability and reliability, according to Canonical.



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Microsoft Just Handed Us Our Holographic Future

Microsoft on Wednesday announced Windows Holographic, a feature in Windows 10 that will let users create their own holograms and print them out on 3D printers. Every Windows 10 device has holographic APIs enabled, Microsoft's Alex Kipman said. Windows 10 holograms are Windows Universal Apps. Users need the Microsoft HoloLens headset, which Kipman described as "the first fully untethered computer." It has advanced sensors to capture information, high-definition holographic lenses, and spatial sound so users can hear holograms behind them.



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Verizon Offers Connected-Car Service Even Beaters Can Use

Verizon last week unveiled a new connected-vehicle service at the Detroit auto show. Verizon Vehicle, which will go live this spring, will be compatible with nearly every vehicle made since 1996. It will be available directly to consumers regardless of their wireless carrier. Designed to enhance driver safety, Verizon Vehicle will provide diagnostic technology and live assistance with GPS accuracy in times of need. Moreover, it will connect drivers with live A.S.E.-certified mechanics who can diagnose potential problems and offer solutions.



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Businesses Waste Big Bucks Fighting Phantom Cyberattacks

Businesses spend an average of $1.27 million a year chasing cyberthreats that turn out to be dead ends. That is one of the findings in a report released last week on the cost of containing malware. In a typical week, an organization can receive nearly 17,000 malware alerts, although only 19 percent of them are considered reliable, the researchers found. Still, malware fighters have a difficult time keeping up with even the reliable alerts, since only 4 percent are investigated.



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From the Blogosphere With Love: A FOSSy Farewell

The past week has afforded plenty of fodder for conversation here in the Linux blogosphere: the MintBox Mini; the Steam for Linux file-deletion bug; and the latest in the Systemd saga, for example. However, this week seems like a good time to revisit some classic gems from days gone by. As chance would have it, several favorites focus on a theme that's particularly relevant round about this time of year. Can you guess? That's right -- it's the oh, so sweet spot that can be found at the intersection of Linux and Love.



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Sid Meier's Starships on the Horizon

2K Games and Firaxis have announced Sid Meier's Starships, an interstellar strategy game of exploration and conquest. It will arrive later this year for the PC, Mac and iPad. Assuming the role of a fleet commander, players will be tasked with leading their starships across the universe to save plants from eradication, build an empire, and bring peace and order to the galaxy. The game will feature dynamically generated missions and turn-based combat, and offer players the opportunity to create fully customizable starships.



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Keeping Score in the Google vs. Microsoft Zero-Day Games

Google's recent publication of Windows' vulnerabilities -- two within a week -- predictably raised Microsoft's ire. "Risk is significantly increased by publically announcing information that a cybercriminal could use to orchestrate an attack and assumes those that would take action are made aware of the issue," wrote Chris Betz, Microsoft's senior director of trustworthy computing, following the latest revelation earlier this month. Google revealed the information two days before Microsoft released a fix.



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Adobe Opens Lightroom's Door to Android

Adobe last week released an Android mobile app as a companion to its Lightroom desktop application and cloud service. Lightroom is a photo processor and image organizer developed by Adobe Systems for Windows and OS X. It is not available for the Linux desktop. Adobe released a mobile app for iOS last year. The new app will include all of the functionality of the iOS mobile app -- but refined to take advantage of the Android platform, according to Shared Mangalick, senior product manager for photography at Adobe.



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Warning Sony of Coming Storm Wasn't NSA's Department

The United States National Security Agency reportedly knew in advance that North Korea was about to hack into Sony's systems. The NSA apparently penetrated North Korea's network through several vectors, including Chinese networks used to connect with the rest of the world and hacker connections in Malaysia. The NSA was able to burrow in using the networks of South Korea and other allies. The evidence gathered by the NSA reportedly spurred President Obama's accusation that North Korea was behind last year's cyberattacks on Sony.



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Fuel Cells, EVs, Autonomous Driving Shape Auto Industry's Future

The North American International Auto Show, held in Detroit, last week held a preview for industry insiders and the media before opening its doors to the public on the weekend. Automakers from around the world showcased more than 500 cars, ranging from futuristic concepts to vehicles that soon will be hitting the roads. The show allowed automakers to tout the latest technological advances under the hood and on the dash. The first true auto show of the calendar year, it is arguably the biggest event for the American auto industry.



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What If IBM's Rommetty and Apple's Cook Were to Swing for the Fences?

IBM's z13 mainframe launch last week brought back a lot of memories, because I was at IBM when the era of the mainframe collapsed. I also happened to be covering Apple when the era of the Mac collapsed, and I have watched both companies recover -- largely by rediscovering what made them great in the first place. Strangely, even though these firms focus on vastly different customer bases, their core differentiating fundamentals of product control and customer experience are very similar and well differentiated from their competitors.



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Gadget Ogling: A New Galaxy, Awesome Audio, and One Ring That Doesn't Rule

Welcome to Gadget Dreams and Nightmares, the column that takes freshly announced gadgets out for a hypothetical test run, rendering judgement long before they hit the shelves. In the offing this week: Samsung's latest mid-range smartphone, a gesture-based ring, shiny headphones and much more. Samsung has another mid-range smartphone in the Galaxy A7. Sure, it's slimmer, faster, stronger and all the rest -- but that's just it. There's a voice-activated selfie tool, which I suppose is great if you're into selfies.



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Texas May Be Ground Zero for Musk's Hyperloop Dreams

Billionaire high-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk has announced plans to build a test track, most likely in Texas, for his envisioned Hyperloop high-speed transportation system. The goal is to allow experimentation with Hyperloop pods, the equivalent of train carriages. "Entirely funded by Musk's companies and other interested private companies, [the test project is] seen as a giant step to support different teams and universities to help validate and keep the concept alive," said Frost & Sullivan's said Vishwas Shankar.



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Xiaomi Launches Galaxy Note Killers in China

Xiaomi on Wednesday announced two new flagship smartphones in Beijing, the Mi Note and the Mi Note Pro. The Mi Note has a metal frame and is protected on the front and back with 3D curved Gorilla Glass 3, which apparently makes it highly resistant to scratches and shattering. Xiaomi compared the Mi Note to the iPhone 6 Plus. However, "Xiaomi is not eating Apple's lunch -- they are eating Samsung's," said Nick Spencer, a senior practice director at ABI Research.



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3 Reasons Apple Won't Pull the Rug Out From Under GoPro

Despite having the most popular camera on the planet in the form of the iPhone, the odds of Apple pulling the rug out from under GoPro by building its own action sports camera system -- even with using its forthcoming Apple Watch as a controller -- are so low they stand in stark contrast to the hysterical selloff of GoPro stock this week. What happened? News surfaced that Apple had received a patent for a digital camera system that has a remote control that looks vaguely like an Apple Watch.



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Virtual Traffic Lights Could Revolutionize City Driving

The average American worker spends almost half an hour commuting each day, but virtual traffic lights could cut that almost in half. If traditional traffic lights were replaced with virtual ones, the results could include not only a reduction of up to 40 percent in urban workers' commute times, but also lower carbon emissions, less congestion and fewer accidents, a study from Carnegie Mellon University suggests. "These systems could be made even smarter and more efficient," said tech analyst Roger Kay.



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Cameron Takes Hard Line on Encrypted Communications

UK Prime Minister David Cameron, who is standing for re-election, has vowed to ban personal encrypted communications apps such as WhatsApp if he is voted in. He also will allow UK government security agencies to monitor communications, with warrants signed by the Home Secretary. "The first duty of any government is to keep our country and our people safe," Cameron declared. Cameron's proposal triggered a storm of criticism. "We've seen proposals similar to this before, but never as unbelievably shortsighted," said CDT's Joseph Hall.



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Microsoft's 'Spartan' Browser Will Bulge With Features

Rumors about Microsoft's new browser, code-named "Spartan," have been heating up: It will be an app; no, it will not. It will replace Internet Explorer -- no, it will not. It will use Microsoft's Trident rendering engine and the Chakra JavaScript engine developed for IE 9. Probably. Spartan will be a new browser that will look and work more like lightweight browsers such as Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. No, it won't. "We are talking about IE 12," said Rob Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group. "'Spartan' is just the code name."



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Facebook Adds Amber Alerts for Missing Kids

Facebook on Tuesday announced that it has begun a new effort to help find missing children by incorporating Amber Alerts into the news feeds of its 185 million U.S. users. Through the effort, which is part of a partnership with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the alerts are sent only to users in targeted search areas. They're shown on both desktop and mobile devices and can be shared among users. Photographs and other details about the missing children are included.



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Google Translate App Gets Silver Tongue

Google on Wednesday released a new version of its Translate app for Android and iOS. The app now lets users instantly translate text in foreign languages using their smartphone cameras. Translate app features available on iOS for the first time are camera mode, including Word Lens; and conversational mode, said Google spokesperson Roya Soleimani. The new Translate app also makes conversations between people speaking different languages smoother. The user just has to select the languages spoken and tap the mike icon.



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Google's Project Ara Smartphone Puzzle Is Coming Together

Google has shed fresh light on Project Ara, its modular Android smartphone initiative, including plans to pilot the project in Puerto Rico through food truck-style stores. Project Ara will offer a smartphone endoskeleton; users will be able to add the functionality they want piece by piece, rather than being confined by predetermined hardware configurations. Google showed off its progress on Spiral 2 prototypes and previewed its plans for Spiral 3 -- and for ultimately marketing the devices -- at its DevCon2 developers conference on Wednesday.



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Sony Sortie's Smoking Gun Still Missing

Recent research from security firm Cloudmark has raised doubt about the purported connection between North Korea and last November's intrusion on Sony Pictures Entertainment's computer networks. The FBI last week continued to press its case that North Korea was behind the cyberattack, pointing to an exposed block of IP addresses allocated to North Korea. However, some activity emanating from those North Korean IP addresses suggests that they may have been hacked.



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Loving Linux in a Touchscreen World

Well it was a fairly quiet week here in the Linux blogosphere, as much of the mainstream tech world staggered directly out of their New Year's revelries and into the halls of CES. Not that Linux didn't have a presence at the gargantuan show, mind you. It was there, all right -- not just in phones but in TVs, smartwatches and cars, to name just a few examples. Still, there was no denying that the mega-event left things a little more peaceful than usual for those of us who chose to stay put in the Linux blogosphere.



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The Convoluted Trail Linking North Korea to Sony

FBI Director James Comey has "very high confidence" that North Korea was behind last November's cyberattack on Sony, he said at a cybersecurity forum held last week at Fordham University. The attack resulted in large amounts of intellectual property, confidential communications and employee data being posted on the Internet for public view. New evidence of the link includes documentation of the hackers' failure to cover their tracks with proxy servers on several occasions, Comey said.



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LG's WebOS: 3rd Time's the Charm?

LG turned up at last week's CES with a smartwatch that apparently runs webOS. LG used the watch to unlock an Audi at the show. "LG has never officially confirmed that we were planning a webOS smartwatch," said company spokesperson Ken Hong. "I think that is speculation based on the watch that Audi announced here at CES, which we developed but have not finalized the OS for." LG makes no mention of the wearable on its site, but the smartwatch reportedly has a dialer, a messages app, music functionality, a calendar, email and a health app.



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Google Translate to Convert Talk to Text

Google soon will update its Translate mobile app to render words spoken in popular languages into written text, according to reports. This feature is already available for some major languages in the Google Chrome browser. In essence, the update will let two people converse in their own native tongues by listening to both and automatically translating their words into each other's language. Google likely will incorporate the Word Lens app, which translates text and signs from other languages when a smartphone's camera is trained on them.



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Volkswagen, Ford Win Vehicle of the Year Laurels

Volkswagen's Golf has been named the 2015 North American Car of the Year, and Ford Motor's F-150 is the 2015 North American Truck/Utility of the Year. For the 22nd year running, a panel of jurors from newspapers, television and radio stations, magazines and websites voted to determine which vehicles were truly best of the year, and the honors were bestowed Monday at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. The 57 jurors considered all vehicles introduced to the market in the last calendar year, then voted at the end of December.



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The Secret Stories of CES

By this time, you likely are getting a bit sick out of folks talking about wild new products that won't be on the market for weeks or months while you are paying your Christmas bills. So rather than tell you about a slew of new products, I'll focus on the back stories that didn't seem to get much coverage at CES -- what now is the largest technology show in the U.S. OK, so right off the bat I'm showcasing a product -- but remember, this is the consumer electronics show not a car show.



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Gadget Ogling: A Swank Walkman, a Brainy Grill, and Oh, So Much More From CES

Welcome to the year's first edition of Gadget Dreams and Nightmares, the column that offers infallible opinions on the latest gadget announcements. The mammoth CES trade show took place this week, and though it offered far too many new items to conceivably cram into a single column, we'll look at some of the most notable and notorious. On our show floor this time are Sony's latest Walkman, a smart grill, a speaker-beer cooler hybrid, a fitness-tracking belt, and much more.



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Researchers Turn Computer Into Poker Shark

A computer program dubbed "Cepheus" has solved the game of poker, researchers at the University of Alberta announced. The Computer Poker Research Group, which created Cepheus, claims it not only can play heads-up limit Texas hold 'em poker, but also beat human opponents. Games such as poker and chess have been used as test beds by researchers developing new concepts in AI. Past successes include IBM's Deep Blue, which defeated world champion Garry Kasparov in chess, and IBM's Watson, which beat top-ranking Jeopardy! champions.



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Google Joins Charlie Hebdo Solidarity Movement

Google has donated nearly $300,000 to help French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo make its largest print run ever, following the massacre at the magazine's Paris office. Its normal production run numbers about 60,000 copies, but the surviving staff plan to print a million issues next week. Le Monde, France Télévisions and Radio France also have pledged to help keep the publication alive, according to Luc Bronner, assistant managing editor with Le Monde. The UK's Guardian Media Group has pledged roughly $150,000.



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