Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the full article here by Slashdot
Wednesday 31 August 2016
Google Integrates Cast Into Chrome, No Extension Required
An anonymous reader writes from a report via VentureBeat: On Monday, Google announced Google Cast is now built right into Chrome, allowing anyone using the company's browser to cast content to supported devices without having to install or configure anything. The Google Cast extension for Chrome, which launched in July 2013, is no longer required for casting. The report adds: "Here's how it works. When you browse websites that are integrated with Cast, Chrome will now show you a Cast icon as long as you're on the same network as a Cast device. With a couple of clicks, you can view the website content on your TV, listen to music on your speakers, and so on. In fact, Google today also integrated Hangouts with Google Cast: Signed-in users on Chrome 52 or higher can now use the 'Cast...' menu item from Chrome to share the contents of a browser tab or their entire desktop into a Hangout." The support document details all the ways you you can use Google Cast with Chrome.
Read the full article here by Slashdot
Read the full article here by Slashdot
Monday 29 August 2016
Saturday 27 August 2016
Bored? I'll show you boredom. Play 'Ennuigi'
The taller Mario brother is the picture of dispair in this flash game
Bored? I'll show you boredom. Play 'Ennuigi'
About the only video game buzzword that Ennuigi embodies is "procedurally generated." The rest is the crushing realization that there isn't much to show for 30 years in your brother's shadow, no matter what adventures you had together.
This is Ennuigi, a flash game by Josh Millard that's gotten some attention lately. In it, a depressed Luigi lights up a cigarette and wanders the decaying Mushroom Kingdom landscape, tossing off dour observations from the life he's led and now is too old to change.
"I looked down at Bowser's broken body, and saw in it a map of a broken world," he offers. You press up to get a random thought (such as: "It all tastes of mushroom. Of fungus. Of moulder. Of damp ash." Press down to take a long, pensive drag on the cig. The landscape will randomize from screen to screen, and you can't jump over anything, break bricks, or warp.
Says Millard of his creation:
"This is a shot at a collection of ideas I had a few years ago, about looking critically at the universe of Super Mario Bros. in light of the total lack of explicit narrative in the original game in particular. Who are these strange men? What motivates them? By what right do they wreak the havoc they do on this strange place? What do they feel about where they are and what they're doing?
And so, this is one lens through which to look at all that, with Luigi, the second brother, the also-ran, as a complicit onlooker, wandering now through some fractured, rotting liminal place in this strange world, reflecting on it all in scattered fragments."
Evidently there's a large amount of text — or at least it takes a long time for Luigi to offer it. That brooding chiptune will have you questioning what you've really done with your life, too.
Read the full article here by Polygon
Friday 26 August 2016
Thursday 25 August 2016
Linux Turns 25 Years Old
25 years ago to the day Linus Torvalds announced the creation of his kernel that would become Linux.
"I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons) among other things)." Should you have not read Torvalds' message already many times, you can do so via
this Google archive. Linus announced the project back on 25 August 1991 from Finland.
What's been your favorite Linux moment over the past 25 years? What do you hope will come for Linux over the next year? 5 years? Share via commenting on this article in our forums.Read the full article here by Phoronix
Tuesday 23 August 2016
Hackers are allegedly using Mr. Robot’s fsociety logo for ransomware
The show may be more inspiring to some than others
While Mr. Robot is a fictional show about a group of hackers in New York City dedicated to exposing the evils of a financial conglomerate, it appears that a group of programmers may have taken a little more inspiration from the show than most.
According to Lawrence Abrams, an expert in computer security and forensics, a new EDA2 (the open-source code used to create ransomware) variant was discovered online, hidden behind a giant poster for fsociety, the name of the hacker collective in Mr. Robot. The poster, which features the deranged, Guy Fawkes-inspired face, is used in the show as a way to identify attacks on the conglomerate’s system. Similarly, according to Abrams’ report, the new ransomware that’s being built will operate like the way it’s presented in the series.
The ransomware is being developed as a way to encrypt files, according to Abrams, and is still in very early stages of development. Right now the alleged ransomware only targets a test folder on Windows. If it was in active distribution, Abrams added, there would be a way to get hold of the developer, which there isn’t. All that appears when people come across the film is the test file and the fsociety logo, which has the hacker collective’s name sprawled across the poster, paying homage to the show.
Earlier this year, Mr. Robot’s chief technical advisor — who was a former hacker and now works in computer security — said that they realized pretty early on that the show had become a hit within the InfoSec (Information and Security) community and had received emails from self-proclaimed hackers about information they were getting wrong, or in some cases, praise for being pretty accurate with the portrayal of how an attack is built.
Mr. Robot has slowly moved away from its main hacker storyline to focus on Elliot (Rami Malek) and his delusions, an aspect of the show that creator Sam Esmail is very interested in portraying. Mr. Robot airs Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. ET on USA.
Read the full article here by Polygon
Monday 22 August 2016
Driverless buses to hit Finnish city's streets
Finland has been testing autonomous EasyMile buses on public roads for a little while now, but away from the hustle and bustle of its big cities. Now the Scandinavian country is ready to try out the adorable, driverless people-movers on the mean streets of Helsinki.
Finland is one of the first countries to try out the minibuses on city roads thanks to its laws allowing cars to roam without a driver. Dubai had signed a deal with the company back in April to test the EasyMile vehicles, while a Japanese mall began using them to shuttle shoppers around this month. But neither of those will likely rival the live-traffic demands of the Helsini experiment.
The buses won't be doing extensive hauls: the EZ10 model is built for short-range travel, say for ferrying folks between a metro station and bus stop, at a max speed of a little over six miles per hour. If all goes well, the vehicles will supplement but not replace existing mass transit networks. The test will run until mid-September.
Via: TechCrunch
Source: YLE
Read the full article here by Engadget
Saturday 20 August 2016
Intel's Euclid is a RealSense PC the size of a candy bar
Intel has just announced Euclid, a unique all-in-one RealSense device that's packed in the size of a candy bar. As CEO Brian Krzanich said on stage, this is essentially an easy way to bring sensors to any robot. The Euclid packs in a camera, an Atom processor, onboard communications, a battery and even a self-contained PC running Ubuntu Linux and Robot OS. Think of it as a robotics platform you can put in your pocket.
An on-stage demonstration at Intel's Developer Forum showed it in action. Simply attach Euclid to a robot, and all of a sudden it can see and sense the world around it. "Intel's Euclid is a developer's dream for RealSense," said Krzanich. Along with Euclid, Intel also announced RealSense 400, which is much thinner and smaller than its predecessor. It also boasts increased accuracy, double the number of 3D points captured per second and improved operating range as well.
Source: Intel
Read the full article here by Engadget
Friday 19 August 2016
Thursday 18 August 2016
Microsoft PowerShell Goes Open Source and Lands On Linux and Mac
Microsoft announced on Thursday that it is open sourcing PowerShell, its system administration, scripting, and configuration management tool that has been a default part of Windows for several years. The company says it will soon release PowerShell on Mac and Linux platforms. PCWorld reports: The company is also releasing alpha versions of PowerShell for Linux (specifically Ubuntu, Centos and Redhat) and Mac OS X. A new PowerShell GitHub page gives people the ability to download binaries of the software, as well as access to the app's source code. PowerShell on Linux and Mac will let people who have already built proficiency with Microsoft's scripting language take those skills and bring them to new platforms. Meanwhile, people who are used to working on those platforms will have access to a new and very powerful tool for getting work done. It's part of Microsoft's ongoing moves to open up products that the company has previously kept locked to platforms that it owned. The company's open sourcing of its .NET programming frameworks in 2014 paved the way for this launch, by making the building blocks of PowerShell available on Linux and OS X. By making PowerShell available on Linux, Microsoft has taken the skills of Windows administrators who are already used to the software, and made them more marketable. It has also made it possible for hardcore Linux users to get access to an additional set of tools that they can use to manage a variety of systems.
Read the full article here by Slashdot
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Read the full article here by Slashdot
Overwatch’s first new map is Eichenwalde, a German castle
A new battleground arrives this September
At Gamescom today, Blizzard revealed the first new map coming to Overwatch. It’s called Eichenwalde and it will be coming to the competitive shooter in September.
Eichenwalde is a hybrid assault/escort map. Players will have to escort a battering ram to Eichenwalde Castle or, if they’re on the opposing team, prevent that battering from reaching its destination.
During a livestream, Blizzard described Eichenwalde as the birthplace of the robot Bastion. Blizzard’s fly-through video of the new map shows a handful of destroyed Bastion robots littered throughout the map. Eichenwalde was also described as having a "very vertical" portion of the map.
Here’s the map’s official description:
The site of one of the most famous battles during the Omnic Crisis, it was here that the leader of the Crusaders, Balderich von Alder, and a handful of his best soldiers made a last stand against an advancing automaton army. Outnumbered and outgunned, they were ultimately slain during the resulting combat. However, thanks to their valiant efforts, the German military was able to push back the omnic offensive and win the fight.
Later this week, Blizzard will release Overwatch’s next animated short, "The Last Bastion," at Gamescom.
For a closer look at Eichenwalde, check out the gallery of screenshots from Blizzard.
Read the full article here by Polygon
Intel "Aero" drone board runs Yocto on Cherry Trail
hackerboards: Intel has launched a Linux-on-Atom powered "Aero Compute Board" and quadcopter, promising improved obstacle navigation based on Intel RealSense.
Read the full article here by Linux Today
Intel Releases The Tiny Joule Compute Module
At the keynote for the Intel Developers Forum, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich introduced the Intel Joule compute module, a ‘maker board’ targeted at Internet of Things developers. The high-end board in the lineup features a quad-core Intel Atom running at 2.4 GHz, 4GB of LPDDR4 RAM, 16GB of eMMC, 802.11ac, Bluetooth 4.1, USB 3.1, CSI and DSI interfaces, and multiple GPIO, I2C, and UART interfaces. According to the keynote, the Joule module will be useful for drones, robotics, and with support for Intel’s RealSense technology, it may find a use in VR and AR applications. The relevant specs can be found on the Intel News Fact Sheet (PDF).
This is not Intel’s first offering to the Internet of Things. A few years ago, Intel partnered up with Arduino (the Massimo one) to produce the Intel Galileo. This board featured the Intel Quark SoC, a 400MHz, 32-bit Intel Pentium ISA processor. It was x86 in an Arduino format. This was quickly followed by the Intel Edison based on the same Quark SoC, which was followed by the Intel Curie, found in the Arduino 101 and this year’s DEF CON badge.
We’ve seen plenty of Intel’s ‘maker’ and Internet of Things offerings, but we haven’t seen these platforms succeed. You could spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in market research to determine why these platforms haven’t seen much success, but the Hackaday comments will tell you the same thing for free: the documentation for these platforms is sparse, and nobody knows how to make these boards work.
Perhaps because of the failures of Intel’s IoT market, the Joule differs significantly from previous offerings. Although it can be easily compared to the Raspberry Pi, Beaglebone, and a hundred other tiny single board computers, the official literature for the Joule makes a comparison between it and the Nvidia Jetson easy. The Nvidia Jetson is a high-power, credit card-sized ‘supercomputer’ meant to be a building block for high-performance applications, such as drones and anything that requires video or a very fast processor. The Joule fits into this market splendidly, with demonstrated applications including augmented reality safety glasses for Airbus employees and highway patrol motorcycle helmet displays. Here, the Joule might just find a market. This might even be the main focus of the Joule – it can be integrated onto Gumstix carrier boards, providing a custom single board computer with configurable displays, connectors, and sensors.
The Intel Joule lineup consists of the Joule 570x and 550x, with the 550x being a bit slower, a Gig less RAM, and half as much storage. They will be available in Q4 2016 from Mouser, Newegg, and other Intel reseller partners.
Filed under: computer hacks, news
Read the full article here by Hack a Day
Universal Serial Abuse
It’s probable that most Hackaday readers are aware of their own computer security even if they are not specialists. You’ll have some idea of which ports your machines expose to the world, what services they run, and you’ll know of a heap of possible attack vectors even if you may not know about every last one.
So as part of that awareness, it’s likely you’ll be wary of strange USB devices. If someone drops a Flash drive in the parking lot the chances of one of you blithely plugging it into your laptop is not high at all. USB ports are trusted by your computer and its operating system, and to have access to one is to be given the keys to the kingdom.
Our subject today is a DEF CON talk courtesy of [Dominic White] and [Rogan Dawes] entitled “Universal Serial aBUSe“, and it details a USB attack in which they create an innocuous USB stick that emulates a keyboard and mouse which is shared across a WiFi network via a VNC server. This gives an attacker (who can gain momentary physical access to a USB port to install the device) a way into the machine that completely bypasses all network and other security measures.
Their hardware features an AVR and an ESP8266, the former for USB and HID work and the latter to do the heavy lifting and provide WiFi. They started with a Cactus Micro Rev2, but graduated to their own compatible board to make the device more suitable to pose as a USB stick. Both hardware and software files can be found on their GitHub repository, with the software being a fork of esp-link. They go into significant detail of their development and debugging process, and their write-up should be an interesting read for anyone.
Below the break you can find a video description of the attack. It’s not a shock to know that USB ports have such little defense, but it is a sobering moment to realize how far attacks like this one have come into the realm of what is possible.
USB security is something we’ve covered before here at Hackaday, with an earlier talk on the subject from Shmoocon and the DEF CON talk about BadUSB exploits using device microcontrollers. Our favorite solution though is the USB killer, a device that fries the ports of people who plug in those parking lot thumb drives.
Read the full article here by Hack a Day
Wednesday 17 August 2016
Google’s New OS Will Run on Your Raspberry Pi
According to reports from Android Police and ZDNet, you may soon have a new operating system from Google to run on your Raspberry Pi. Details are still extremely sparse, the only description on the GitHub page is “Pink + Purple == Fuchsia (a new Operating System)”. But, here’s what we do know:
The new OS, called Fuchsia, will be based on Magenta, which is in turn built on LittleKernel. That means that, surprisingly, Google will not be using a Linux kernel for the new OS but something more like an embedded RTOS. Although Google is targeting embedded systems, the possibility of being able to run it on a desktop has been mentioned, so it may not be too minimalistic.
Google’s Travis Geiselbrecht has named the Raspberry Pi 3 specifically as one system it will run on, and said that it’ll be available soon. But, it seems Google is aiming to make it run on a variety of ARM devices (both 32 bit and 64 bit), as well as 64 bit PCs. This is a direct effort to compete against other commercial embedded operating systems that are currently available, and especially on IoT devices.
If you’re eager to see what this is all about, you can follow Google’s quick start recipes and see what you can come up with, although details are still sketchy enough that we’re just going to wait a bit.
Filed under: news, Raspberry Pi
Read the full article here by Hack a Day
Tuesday 16 August 2016
Audi's active suspension converts road jolts into electricity
Regenerative brakes capture a lot of wasted energy in hybrid and electric cars, but there's another energy source automakers could exploit: potholes. To harness those tailbone scourges, Audi developed an active suspension called eROT that replaces hydraulic shocks with electromechanical ones. "Every pothole, every bump, every curve induces kinetic energy in the car," says Audi's Dr. Stefan Knirsch. "With the new electromechanical damper system in the 48-volt electrical system, we put this energy to use.
To convert kinetic to electrical energy, the shocks use a lever arm that captures up-and-down wheel motion and transmits it to a 48 volt alternator. It's then converted into electricity, with an average recuperation output of 100 to 150 watts -- as little as 3 watts on a freeway, and up to 613 watts on a rough county road. That's not enough for your AC, but it could power other accessories and reduce fuel consumption a bit.
As with any active suspension, it'll also smooth out the ride by adapting to road surface defects and the driver's style. "With eROT, Audi configures the compression stroke to be comfortably soft without compromising the taut damping of the rebound stroke," the article explains. It also saves space in a vehicle's luggage area by eliminating the telescopic shock absorbers.
These aren't the first regenerative shocks we've seen, but Audi says that "initial test results for the eROT technology are promising, thus its use in future Audi production models is certainly plausible." Before it can be commercialized, however, Audi says the vehicle needs a 48-volt electrical system -- luckily, it's is planning on releasing a hybrid vehicle in 2017 equipped with one.
Source: Audi
Read the full article here by Engadget
Monday 15 August 2016
'PaRappa the Rapper' comes back as an anime series
You sadly aren't about to see another PaRappa the Rapper game any time soon, but you will get some kind of fix the near future. Fuji TV has announced that it's airing the pilot episode for a PaRappa anime series, PJ Berri no Mogu-Mogu Munya-Munya, during the variety show Hi Poul on August 18th. More episodes will surface in October. As the name implies, it'll focus primarily on the DJ bear PJ Berri (at left) instead of the game series' namesake rapping dog.
Don't expect a magnum opus: each episode will last just 96 seconds. You won't hear PaRappa singing about how you "gotta believe," then. Look at it this way, though: the PaRappa universe hasn't had much attention since the original game reached the PSP in late 2006. You may have to bend over backwards to see PJ Berri if you're outside of Japan, but this beats letting a classic game fade into obscurity.
Via: MoCa News (translated), Polygon
Source: Fuji TV (translated)
Read the full article here by Engadget
Google Fuschia To Run On Magenta Kernel Instead Of Linux
Fuschia, the brand new operating system of Goggle, is currently in the works with a promising Magenta Kernel. While rumors spread that this latest OS from Google might combine Android and Chrome OS into one, we dig deeper on Fuschia’s potential benefits and drawbacks.
Advertisement
Google Source reveals the latest information and GitHub leaks it as "Pink+Purple=Fuchsia (a new Operating System)." The code repository does not discuss further details, though.
Also: Google waves goodbye to Linux for new IoT OS Fuchsia - coming soon to Raspberry Pi
Read the full article here by tuxmachines.org
Friday 12 August 2016
A and B smell the flowers. image / twitter / facebook /...
A and B smell the flowers.
image / twitter / facebook / patreon
Read the full article here by http://owlturd.com/
Wednesday 10 August 2016
Tactical Denialimage / twitter / facebook / patreon
Tactical Denial
image / twitter / facebook / patreon
Read the full article here by http://owlturd.com/
Adblock Plus responds angrily to Facebook's plan to circumvent ad blockers
Facebook's plans to show adverts to everyone regardless of whether they are using an ad blocker was always going to prove controversial. The decision to bypass the privacy and security tools that many people have put in place has riled one company in particular -- Adblock Plus Describing the social network's latest move as being 'all anti-user', Adblock Plus's Ben Williams says that it is an 'unfortunate move' that 'takes a dark path against user choice'. He goes on to pooh-pooh the idea that Facebook made the decision based on what users want. He points out that Facebook recognises the… [Continue Reading]
Read the full article here by Betanews
Read the full article here by Betanews
Google partners with Dashlane for an open-source login API
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Google partners with Dashlane for an open-source login API
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Google Connects with Dashlane to Improve Login Security Standards
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Google Pushes Machine Learning Forward With Open-Source Code, Simple APIs
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Dashlane and Google team up for 'OpenYOLO' security project
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Google and Dashlane unveil Open YOLO: Android API for password managers
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HPE Mobile Center 2.0, Dashlane and Google’s new API, and .NET Framework improvements—SD Times news digest: Aug. 4, 2016
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Dashlane & Google Develop New API for Better Login Security
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OpenYOLO API project set to enhance user security and make login easier
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Dashlane, Google launch 'OpenYOLO', an API-based password project for Android apps
Read the full article here by tuxmachines.org
Tuesday 9 August 2016
Intelligent Speed Bump In Sweden
British comedian and host of HBO's Last Week Tonight, John Oliver, takes a look at how the...
Read the full article here by Likecool
Netflix explains how and why it's switching to HTTPS streaming
Netflix has always used DRM to keep studios happy and make an effort to stop people from copying its video streams, but now it's added a new layer of protection. Last year the video streaming giant announced it would roll out HTTPS encryption for streams, and a new post on its tech blog explains how you do that for 80+ million customers at once. It developed a scheme to add encryption on its Open Connect servers -- the boxes hosted by or near ISPs to bring Netflix's library closer to the homes of viewers -- without impacting efficiency.
We won't spoil the magic here, but according to a paper written by Netflix (PDF), it expects that by the end of 2016, most streams will be using TLS encryption. The company uses it for the same reason many sites (including Engadget) have switched to HTTPS by default: so that prying eyes on insecure connections might not be able to see what content you're viewing. Still, your workplace IT department may have its own MitM method so it's not necessarily foolproof, but it's a start, especially as governments and others may have interest in the data. The move also benefits Netflix, as it tries to keep third-party analytics from easily collecting detailed viewer data.
Source: Netflix Tech Blog
Read the full article here by Engadget
Monday 8 August 2016
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