Day: April 3, 2015

There was the Dominoes robot:

Then CERN Confirmed the Force Exists:

“Researchers at the Large Hadron Collider just recently started testing the accelerator for running at the higher energy of 13 TeV, and already they have found new insights into the fundamental structure of the universe. Though four fundamental forces – the strong force, the weak force, the electromagnetic force and gravity – have been well documented and confirmed in experiments over the years, CERN announced today the first unequivocal evidence for the Force. “Very impressive, this result is,” said a diminutive green spokesperson for the laboratory.

‘The Force is what gives a particle physicist his powers,’ said CERN theorist Ben Kenobi of the University of Mos Eisley, Tatooine. ‘It’s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us; and penetrates us; it binds the galaxy together.’

Though researchers are as yet unsure what exactly causes the Force, students and professors at the laboratory have already started to harness its power. Practical applications so far include long-distance communication, influencing minds, and lifting heavy things out of swamps.

Kenobi says he first started teaching the ways of the Force to a young lady who was having trouble revising for her particle-physics exams. ‘She said that I was her only hope,’ says Kenobi. ‘So I just kinda took it from there. I designed an experiment to detect the Force, and passed on my knowledge.’

Kenobi’s seminal paper “May the Force be with EU” – a strong argument that his experiment should be built in Europe – persuaded the CERN Council to finance the installation of dozens of new R2 units for the CERN data centre*. These plucky little droids are helping physicists to cope with the flood of data from the laboratory’s latest experiment, the Thermodynamic Injection Energy (TIE) detector, recently installed at the LHC.

‘We’re very pleased with this new addition to CERN’s accelerator complex,’ said data analyst Luke Daniels of human-cyborg relations. ‘The TIE detector has provided us with plenty of action, and what’s more it makes a really cool sound when the beams shoot out of it.’

But the research community is divided over the discovery. Dark-matter researcher Dave Vader was unimpressed, breathing heavily in disgust throughout the press conference announcing the results, and dismissing the cosmological implications of the Force with the quip ‘Asteroids do not concern me’.

Rumours are growing that this rogue researcher hopes to delve into the Dark Side of the Standard Model, and could even build his own research station some day. With the academic community split, many are tempted by Vader’s invitations to study the Dark Side, especially researchers working with red lasers, and anyone really with an evil streak who looks good in dark robes.”

Then, there was “SmartBox by InBox”:

Then, there was the “Hailo Piggy Back”

Not to mention Google allowing you to play Pacman on Google Maps!

Could the impossible happen? Will Microsoft EVER release Windows to Open Source? I gotta say, I don’t think so.

Open-source Windows? The unthinkable is already happening, says Microsoft

PC World – By: Mark Hachman – “However unlikely a future in which Microsoft makes Windows open source may sound, Microsoft has already taken considerable strides in that direction.

But instead of allowing developers to make changes to Windows and other products, it’s Microsoft’s fingers at the keyboard.

According to Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich, a future that includes an open-source Windows could happen. ‘It’s definitely possible,’ Russinovich reportedly told an audience at the ChefCon conference in Santa Clara this week. ‘It’s a new Microsoft.’

‘Every conversation you can imagine about what should we do with our software—open versus not-open versus services—has happened,’ Russinovich added.

Why this matters: Saturday marks Microsoft’s 40th anniversary. Just a few years ago, such a statement by Russinovich would have been anathema to Microsoft—and if Bill Gates were still at the CEO’s desk, it might have resulted in a letter of termination. But this is the new Microsoft, forced into a spirit of cooperation and collaboration by increasing pressure on the PC and on its business model. This is still pie-in-the-sky stuff—but science fiction can become reality. Just ask Dick Tracy’s watch.

You can’t just toss away $4 billion per quarter

An open-source Windows would be unlikely in the near term, however. That would require Microsoft to expose its reams of code to public view, theoretically allowing developers to create their own proprietary, incompatible forks of Windows. That’s an absolute example, of course—Microsoft could decide to open the code to certain components within the OS—perhaps what will turn into the ‘legacy’ browser, Internet Explorer. But open-sourcing Windows—and perhaps make it free to use—would also require Microsoft to give up a large chunk of the $4 billion or so a quarter it collectively receives from Windows, Windows Phone, and Office licenses.

As Wired points out, Microsoft has agreed to provide OEMs a free copy of Windows for devices with displays under 8 inches. And it’s far more open to running open-source products on top of its Azure cloud services than it was.”