News

Hijacking Chromecast Is Easy   Wednesday 23 July

Chromecast, Google's streaming video USB stick, has a really clever way of allowing users to set it up. The trouble is that it might just be too clever. It turns out that what is easy for users to set up is also easy to hijack.

Wire The Programmer To Prevent Buggy Code   Wednesday 23 July

It's impossible to eliminate all coding errors, but it is certainly worth taking measures to reduce their frequency. A novel approach looks at using psycho-physiological measures.

Microsoft Plans To Merge Windows Systems - Again!   Wednesday 23 July

Microsoft seems to be suffering from a strange case of re-inventing things that it once knew were essential. This time it is the unification of Windows into one operating system.

DotPeek 1.2   Tuesday 22 July

JetBrains has released the next version of dotPeek, its free .NET decompiler and assembly browser.

Cumberbatch As Turing - Trailers Released   Tuesday 22 July

Two official trailers have been released for "The Imitation Game", the biopic in which the role of Alan Turing is depicted by Benedict Cumberbatch.

Oracle Big Data SQL   Monday 21 July

A unified query tool that you can use to ask questions across mixed SQL, Hadoop and NoSQL data sources has been released by Oracle.

Self Assessment For Programmers   Monday 21 July

A useful proficiency matrix has been produced that could be used to track your own progress when learning to program or to advertise your skillset to prospective employers.

The Next Version Of PHP And The Status Of PHPng   Monday 21 July

If the current version of PHP is 5.x, what should the next version be called? Obviously it should be 6.x. Why then is there a proposal that it should be 7.x? And as PHPng gets ever faster, is it PHP 5.7, PHP 6.0 PHP 7.0 or even PHP 8.0?

Smart Cat Feeder Uses Facial Recognition   Sunday 20 July

An Indiegogo campaign for a smart cat feeder that can monitor your cat's health by tracking appetite and weight change has already met its target, demonstrating a new role for AI in the home.

Finding Beautiful Walking Routes   Saturday 19 July

Yahoo researchers are working on an alternative approach to providing directions to pedestrians. Instead of simply the shortest route, they  want to suggest routes that are both short and pleasant.

Jibo The Friendly Robot Could Be Your Next Platform   Friday 18 July

We keep waiting for the robot revolution - no not that robot revolution, the one where robots help around the home. Now an MIT Media Lab roboticist has gone to the crowd for some funds to build Jibo, the friendly and hopefully helpful robot. 

Chrome 36 Out Chrome 37 In Beta   Friday 18 July

Chrome 36 has security fixes, a few improvements for all users and a couple of developer features. Chrome 37 is now in beta. What does it have to offer?

Microsoft Discontinues Android, Asha and S40   Friday 18 July

As well as the sad news of large scale layoffs at Microsoft, there are also some phone casualties. 

Mozjpeg 2 Makes Pictures Smaller   Thursday 17 July

Do we need a new image format? Mozilla thinks not and getting better performance is all a matter of using what we have better. 

Kinect SDK 2 Dumps Kinect V1   Thursday 17 July

It is both a sad and a happy day. The new Kinect V2 is being shipped to eager programmers and SDK 2 is available for download. But the lack of any backward compatibility in SDK 2 is the end of the line for the original Kinect V1.

Professional Programmer

Keeping Track of Computer Science Courses   Thursday 17 July

In the last three years we've witnessed an explosion. From an initial three free online computer science courses there are now over a hundred to choose from and keeping up with them all is an increasingly difficult juggling task. Luckily there are websites to help.

History

Clive Sinclair And The Small Home Computer Revolution   Tuesday 22 July

Not every computer innovation originated in the United States. Clive Sinclair was a designer who could make one transistor do the work of two or more. He built low cost and futuristic electronics by doing things different.