Genom att använda kolnanorör så kan man sy ihop kompositer bättre än med nål och tråd, och dessutom blir materialet elektriskt ledande, vilket kan var bra i flygplan, då man idag i nya plan måste lägga in metall för att säkra planen mot blixtnedslag, ett problem som diskuterats en del nu i samband med spekulationer om vad som fick Air France-planet att störta utanför Brasilien.

That means aeroplanes built with such materials would be able to disperse lightning strikes rapidly, avoiding electrical damage during storms as well as being better protected against whatever wind and rain can throw at them.

Läs mer: Monitor: A stitch in time | The Economist

I dagens nätupplaga av Svenska Dagbladet kan man läsa följande rubrik: Oppositionen sågar Björklund-förslag | Politik
När man sedan läser texten så visar det sig att det är v som sågar och mp, men inte s. Det är därför felaktigt att säga att "oppositionen" sågar förslaget, då socialdemokraterna är den klart största delen av oppositionen. Man borde istället skrivit "Opposition sågar Björklund-förslag", eller något åt det hållet. F ö, är det bara Björklund som står bakom, det är det väl inte?

Lika kritiska är dock inte Socialdemokraterna. Partiets utbildningspolitiska talesperson Marie Granlund ser inga större förändringar mot dagens skollag.

Läs mer: Oppositionen sågar Björklund-förslag | Politik | SvD

Norska Verdens Gang har gjort en karta i flash där man kan klicka på ett land och se vilka länder detta land historiskt sett har gett mest poäng.

De har ingen sjanse mot hurtige popsanger. Det er fordi danskene har forventninger om at det skal være godt humør og fest når det er Melodi Grand Prix.

Läs mer: Det store danskesviket - VG Nett om Melodi Grand Prix

The sheer volume of these robocalls – tens of millions a week – was staggering. “We think they were just dialing every phone number in the U.S. more or less in order,” says Steve Baker, an attorney for the FTC. They even called Secret Service offices and 911 dispatchers.

Läs mer: ConsumerMan: Big robocall scam shut down - ConsumerMan- msnbc.com

Summary: Install FoxyProxy. Go to Tools->FoxyProxy->Options in the Firefox menus. Add a new Proxy. Call it "NoSSL". Configure it to use the proxy you want.  Edit that proxy under URL patterns to blacklist all URLs that starts with "https://*". Then select Go to Tools->FoxyProxy->Use "NoSSL" for all URLs from the Firefox menus.

I am typing this from a train which has free WiFi included in the ticket price. The networks is unencrypted, so anyone can poetntially spy on my traffic. I therefore tunnel my http requets with SSH (Putty in my case) to a server where I have a simple proxy installed. I simply tell Firefox that the proxy is at localhost:9119 and then tunnel that with putty to my proxy server.

Unfortunately my proxy server is pretty basic and cannot proxy https (SSL) requests, and it does not need to really, because these are already encrypted from my latop and need not make the trip over my server. So how do I tell Firefox to only proxy http requests but not https (SSL)?

I could not figure out how to do it in Firefox standard proxy dialog. I suspect it is not posible. There is however an add-in for Firefox called FoxyProxy. It can do more advanced stuff. It was not that obvious how to do it, but I realized that a FoxyProxy blacklist does not kill those urls, it just does not proxy them; they go out on the network unproxied. So, as per the summary above:

Install FoxyProxy. Go to Tools->FoxyProxy->Options in the Firefox menus. Add a new Proxy. Call it "NoSSL". Configure it to use the proxy you want.  Edit that proxy under URL patterns to blacklist all URLs that starts with "https://*". Then select Go to Tools->FoxyProxy->Use "NoSSL" for all URLs from the Firefox menus.

FoxyProxy is a free, open-source advanced proxy management tool that completely replaces Firefox's limited proxying capabilities. It automatically switches an internet connection across one or more proxy servers based on URL patterns.

Nej jag har inte valt att resa med mobilbiljett. Jag fyllde bara i alla fält som var markerade med (*) och därmed obligatoriska.

Ok, nu har jag köpt en biljett till, och jag hade kryssat i mobilbiljett på första sidan, så det var väl OK, men nedanstående punkter gäller dock:

Märklig idé det där med att man ska gissa vilka platser som är lediga från en PDF-fil och fylla i ett förslag.

Bekräftelsesidan anger inte

• Vart man reser
• Var man reser från
• När man reser

Det finns en länk till ett kvitto, men man måste upptäcka den inom 12 minuter, annars så går det inte att få ett kvitto. Någon e-postbekräftelse har jag inte fått. Jag har nu med varsam hand kopierat ut beställningsnumret från den i övrigt intesägande bekräftelsesidan. Jag minns var jag ska resa från ,men inte exakt när. Med lite tur får jag reda på det 24 timmar innan avresan...

FreeOTFE and FreeOTFE Explorer both have a the same aim - the secure storage of bulk data, while making it readily accessable to authorised users.

Ett populärt val för att kryptera en hårddisk är TrueCrypt. Ett alternativ med öppen källkod är FreeOTFE. Jag har inte provat det.

Läs mer: FreeOTFE

...if you bear in mind what the difference between mass communication and the new communication landscape is. In the old mass communication landscape, a few people produced for the masses.

In the new landscape, everybody can be a publisher, and everyone expects communication to be two way. This leads to the follwoing pieces of advice for the journalists and editors of the media of the future:

• Your target group will not be hundreds of thousands of people, and certainly not millions. You cannot keep track of that many people, and interact with them or remember something about them,. Your future target group is a couple of hundred people, a couple of thousands tops.
• You need to create value for these people. Value is something that you in this case cannot dig up on your own and just present to your audience, rather it must grow in dialog and in cooperation with these people.
• ...which means you are creating a community. Watch The Guardian, they already have a dating site, sporting people whose lifestyles and values are similar to the Guardian's own. And The Guardian charge for people to be a part of this (somewhat specialized) community.
• You cannot charge for mass communication. Mass communication will be the free by-product of community communication

Read more: Online news: the future's networked | Media | guardian.co.uk

Det här har jag förutspått ett tag: Att ungdomar av idag är mer logiska än tidigare generationer. Jag tror det beror på Internet och dataspel. Den tidigare TV-generationen fick nöja sig med att titta  på TV och leva med, samt att interagera med saker i den verkliga världen. Den nya generationen har spelat dataspel (som är byggda av logik) och har tillgång till mycket mer logiskt strukturerad kiunskap via Internet. Den forskare de intervjuar ser ökad logisk förmåga som något bra. Och det kan det väl ofta vara, men det kan också leda til det som Nicholas Nassim Taleb kallar Ludic Fallacy, och skulle eventuellt kunna ge sämre "people skills" om det tränger ut något annat.

The most recent study, which was reported in the new issue of Journal of Swedish Educational Research, shows that today’s teenagers are achieving demonstrably better results in the logic test than was the case fifty years ago.

Läs mer: Teenagers Are Becoming Increasingly Logical, Swedish Study Finds

Regarding the parliamentary expense claims in Britain: It is interesting that some people, when caught doing something naughty, don't simply recant and say "It is my fault, I did something wrong".

Instead they lament that they were caught and that they have lost career opportunities, reputation, and what not. They do not apologise or feel sorry, and the public for some strange reason accepts that as if it were an apology! Why do we do that? Below are some excerpts from an article in the Guardian about Junior minister Phil Hope, where I have boldfaced some parts

In a statement, the minister said that he was returning the money because of the "massive blow" caused to his reputation by the revelation that he had spent so much furnishing a two-bedroom flat in London.

...

 In his statement Hope said that, although he followed the rules laid down by parliament, he wanted to restore the "trust" and the relationship he had with his constituents. He said the impression given by the revelations about his expenses was "dreadful".

Now as far as I understand the British rules on this, he has not committed outright thievery. But imagine a burglar who gets caught, saying: "I am very sad and sincerely regret the pain and suffering this puts on upon me due the massive blow to my reputation", followed by "It is really dreadful. Well, not the act of burglary per se, but the impression I give by me getting caught".

Now, it would be just as easy for the junior minister to fake remorse and regret, but the strange thing is that apparently he does not need to do that. I suppose there is some transparency in the system :-)

Read more: Junior minister Phil Hope to pay back £42,000 in expenses | Politics | guardian.co.uk

I have tested a number of VNC clients and servers to see which ones handle Alt Gr characters, Copy/Paste and full screen toggle.

With many keyboards it's not possible to type a pipe "|", a backslash "\", curly brackets "{}", square brackets "[]" a commercial at sign "@" or  a tilde "~" without Alt Gr.

The capabilities of the clients vary a lot, also depending on the client/server combination. All clients have been tested with their default settings.

Comparison table

Client Key

GR = Gnome-RDP 0.2.2

XT = xtightvncviewer 1.2.9

TC = Terminal Server Client 0.150

VN = vncviewer 4.1.1

RD = Remote desktop viewer 0.5.1

KD = Krdc 4.0.3

TJ =tightvncviewer (Java applet) 1.3.10 

VW = vncviewer Windows xp 4.1.2

Status

Y = Works

O = Does not work

? = Untested

Servers running on CentOS 5.2, Clients on Ubuntu 8.04

	GR	XT	TC	VN	RD	KD	TJ	vw
Full Screen toggle	O	O	Y	Y	Y	Y	O	Y
vnc server 4.1.2.1 (CentOS Linux 5.2):
View	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Copy/Paste server->client	O	O	Y	Y	Y	Y	O	Y
Copy/Paste client->server	Y	Y	O	O	?	?	?	Y
Control (Edit)	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Alt Gr ([,],{,},@)	Y	Y	Y	Y	O	O	Y	Y
Alt Gr + space (^, ~)	Y	Y	Y	Y	O	O	O	Y
Krfb 3.5.4 server (CentOS Linux 5.2):
View	Y	Y	O	O	Y	Y	?	Y
Copy/Paste server->client	O	O	O	O	Y	Y	?	Y
Copy/Paste client->server	?	?	?	?	?	?	?	Y
Control (Edit)	O	Y	O	O	Y	Y	?	Y
Alt Gr ([,],{,},@)	Y	Y	O	O	O	O	?	Y
Alt Gr + space (^, ~)	Y	Y	O	O	O	O	?	Y
vnc server 4.1.2.(Windows XP):
View	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	?	Y
Copy/Paste server->client	O	O	Y	Y	Y	Y	?	Y
Copy/Paste client->server	?	?	?	?	?	?	?	Y
Control (Edit)	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	?	Y
Alt Gr ([,],{,},@)	Y	Y	Y	Y	O	Y	?	Y
Alt Gr + space (^, ~)	O	O	Y	O	O	O	?	Y

A comparison of VNC Clients on Ubuntu Linux regarding Alt Gr, Copy/Paste and full screen toggle support

I control a CentOS box (vnc-server-4.1.2-14.el5_3.1) with VNC , sometimes from Windows XP and sometimes from Ubuntu 8.04. With Windows there are no problems, but with Ubuntu the VNC clients have a tendency to ignore the Alt Gr key on my Swedish keyboard, which means there is no way among other things to type a pipe "|", a backslash "\", curly brackets "{}", square brackets "[]" a commercial at sign "@" or  a tilde "~". 

For those unfamiliar with the Alt Gr key, the right Alt key is replaced with the Alt Gr key on many keyboard layouts where more characters need to be typable than in English.

I decided to install all vnc clients I could find in the Ubuntu repositories set up on my machine and see which ones did work and which did not with Alt Gr. It's the ones that are checked in this screen shot:

My VNC server also runs the VNC Config program (vncconfig) for Copy/Paste integration:

To see if it is important what kind of VNC server you are running, I also test out the clients with KDEs Desktop sharing server, krfb (KDE 3.5.4):

With Krfb as a server, Terminal Server Client and vncviewer completely fail on my setup. Use xtightvncviewer with the Krfb server if you want Alt Gr functionality.

I also threw in a VNC server on Windows. No client on Ubuntu of the ones tested, can handle all servers with all capabilities intact.

Gnome-RDP 0.2.2

Gnome-RDP does the job although its GUI is a bit barebones with the server dialog turning up near the top left of the screen. It seems to rely on TightVNC as its viewer component. It is called xtightvncviewer. You are supposed to be able to switch on the fly between full screen and windowed mode with F8:

However Full Screen does not work. F8 also brings up copy/paste support. It works client to server, but not server to client, which is the reverse of the vncviewer based clients.

Do note that Gnome-RDP uses the VNC convention for ports, e.g. host:3 means host port 5903.

Test: Gnome-RDP types "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" just fine with my Alt Gr-dependent keyboard.

Notes for the KDE rfb server: Gnome-RDP cannot control the server even when remote user is allowed to control the keyboard and mouse.

xtightvncviewer 1.2.9

xtightvncviewer does the job but needs to be invoked from the command line.  You are supposed to be able to switch on the fly between full screen and windowed mode with F8:

However Full Screen does not work. F8 also brings up copy/paste support. It works client to server, but not server to client, which is the reverse of the vncviewer based clients.

xtightvncviewer uses the VNC convention for ports, e.g. host:3 means host port 5903.

Test: xtightvncviewer types "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" just fine with my Alt Gr-dependent keyboard.

Notes for the KDE rfb server: Same functionality as with the VNC server.

Terminal Server Client 0.150

Terminal Server Client is a Gnome program that can do VNC among other things. With VNC servers, it is actually just a front end to the vncviewer command line program. It can do Alt Gr characters if you go into preferences under "Local resources" and type the language code of your Alt Gr keyboard (in my case "sv").

Incidentally, if you use vncviewer directly from the command line it just works without having to specify a keyboard layout.

You can switch on the fly between full screen and windowed mode with F8:

Do note that Terminal Server Client does not use the VNC convention for ports, e.g. host:5903 means host vnc port 3. Copy/paste does work server to client, but not client to server, which is the reverse of the tightvncviewer based clients.

Test: Terminal Server Client types "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" just fine with my Alt Gr-dependent keyboard.

Notes for the KDE rfb server (desktop sharing): Terminal Server Client crashes when trying to access the server "Rect too big".

vncviewer 4.1.1

vncviewer is a command line program.

You can switch on the fly between full screen and windowed mode with F8:

vncviewer uses the VNC convention for ports, e.g. host:3 means host port 5903. Copy/paste does work server to client, but not client to server, which is the reverse of the tightvncviewer based clients.

Test: vncviewer types "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" just fine with my Alt Gr-dependent keyboard.

Notes for the KDE rfb server (desktop sharing): vncviewer crashes when trying to access the server "Rect too big".

Remote Desktop Viewer

Remote Desktop Viewer is a Gnome program also called Vinaigre in the Ubuntu repository description for it. Remote Desktop Viewer allows you to switch between windowed and fullscreen mode with F11. However it does not work with the Alt Gr key, and there seems to be no way of enabling it.

Test: Remote Desktop Viewer fails to type "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" and instead types the key as if the Alt Gr key was not depressed, which renders "<", "+" and "'" (single quote) respectively on my Swedish Alt Gr-dependent keyboard

Notes for the KDE rfb server (desktop sharing): Same as with the vnc server. Copy/paste works. Alt Gr does not work.

Krdc on Ubuntu 8.04

Krdc is a KDE program that looks very nice and allows you to switch easily between windowed and fullscreen mode with a very nice semi transparent tool bar that comes down when you reach the center of the top edge of the screen with the pointer when in full screen mode.

However Krdc does not work with the Alt Gr key, and there seems to be no way of enabling it:

There is a special keys dialog:

But either the Alt Gr keys are too special or not special enough, because it does not type them.

Test: Krdc ignores "|",  backslash "\" and  tilde "~" and instead types nothing with my Swedish Alt Gr-dependent keyboard.

Notes for the KDE rfb server (desktop sharing): Same as with the vnc server.

Krdc on CentOS 5.2

On CentOS Linux 5.2, however Alt Gr keys work and Copy/Paste works in both directions connecting to CentOS 5.2 based server.

Tightvncviewer as Java applet

Tightvncviewer is also available as a Java applet. Copy/paste does not work. There is no F8 menu but a couple of buttons. There is no full screen mode in the Java applet.

Test: Tightvncviewer (Java applet) corectly types "|",  backslash "\" but fails on  tilde "~" and caret "^",  both characters where you need to type a space after, to get the character stand alone.

Vncviewer Windows xp 4.1.2

Everything works across all servers.

Summary

I was going to write that you either get an Alt Gr-compatible VNC client or you get the ability to switch between full screen and windowed mode on the fly. However the underlying components to Terminal Server client (vncviewer) and Gnome-RDP (xtightvncviewer) do have full screen toggle functionality via F8, it just not documented in Terminal Server client or Gnome-RDP. However in the xtightvncviewer and by extension Gnome-RDP the Clipboard and full screen functions in the F8 menu do not work on my setup.

I wondered if the clients would work differently if i used a different vnc server, so I also tried the KDE desktop sharing and a Windows VNC server. The results vary quite a lot. No client handles all servers. I believe changing settings in the clients as to change compression and other quality paramters may give improvements in compatibility, but I tried every client in its default setting. What seems to work is:.

• This post started out as a test of Linux clients, but it turns out that the only client that handles all servers and all capabilities is Vncviewer or Windows... Having said that, on Linux:
• Terminal Server Client, since it has both Alt Gr and copy/paste support, and you can toggle between full screen and windowed mode with F8.
• Or you can just directly use the vncviewer command line program that Terminal Server Client relies upon. You will have no bookmarks (actuall session files) though as you get with Terminal Server Client. However it does not work with some Alt Gr characters against a Windows VNC server.
• Gnome-RDP, or xtightvncviewer directly if you can live without Copy/Paste and Full Screen support since it has  Alt Gr support.
• xtightvncviewer is the only one of the clients that does Alt Gr and works with KDE desktop sharing on my setup

In mice, the treatment helped restore long-term memory and improve learning for new tasks, Nature reports.

Läs mer: BBC NEWS | Health | Trial drugs 'reverse' Alzheimer's

Now Marinee Chuah, Thierry VandenDriessche, Eyayu Belay and colleagues at the Catholic University of Leuven say they've developed a non-viral approach that overcomes some limitations associated with viral vectors. The technique is based on non-viral genetic elements called transposons -- mobile DNA elements -- that the scientists constructed to carry therapeutic genes into the target cell DNA, eliminating the need for viral vectors.

Läs mer: New method of gene therapy is developed - UPI.com

In The Guardian you can read yet a description of what supposedly sets Apple apart from the competition. Now these descriptions have a tendency to talk about Apple's advantage as one of "polish", "design" and stuff like that. This is is not what Apple is about. Any organisation can put "polish" or "design" on their products, these concepts are superficial, polish even so by definition.

The success of Apple is about user interface design principles, among which one is that people prefer to see, recognize and act, than to remember and type, and I believe Apple's succes is also even more about how they view people.

The Apple philosophy is to view human individuals as fundamentally creative people, who want to do creative things. I do not have the books at hand but I believe this view of the individual is explicitly spelled out (or used to be) in their user interface design guidelines.

Competitors can put as much spit and polish on their products as they want, they still don't get the deeper meaning it seems. Apple's philosophy also helps them retain and motivate talented developers.

 "It is not as though Apple invented a totally new technology," says Adam Leach, principal analyst at consultancy Ovum. "What they did was re-think the whole mobile experience and produce a very polished experience compared with what people were used to."

Den årliga pressfrihetsrapporten från Freedom House har anlänt och de nordiska länderna placerar sig i topp. Israel(!), Italien(!) och Hong Kong klassas inte längre som att de har full pressfrihet. Överhuvudtaget har utvecklingen gått lite bakåt i världen.

There are particularly worrisome trends in East Asia, the former Soviet Union and the Middle East and North Africa

Läs mer: freedomhouse.org: Freedom of the Press 2009 Survey Release

Ja. det här är ju bara en experts preliminära utlåtande, men Ralp Tripp på University of Georgia tror att H1N1-viruset liknar influensa-viruset som gick runt jorden 1957. Det skulle innebära att äldre människor har en viss immunitet. I så fall kan det faktum att yngre drabbas hårdare ha att göra med brist på immunitet snarare än på en s k cytokin-storm i ett starkt immunförsvar. Och det vore ju goda nyheter.

I samma artikel nämns också att viruset tycks sakna vissa aminosyror som ger en "viruschock" i lungorna.

Ralph Tripp, an influenza expert at the University of Georgia, said that his early analysis of the virus' protein-making instructions suggested that people exposed to the 1957 flu pandemic -- which killed up to 2 million people worldwide -- may have some immunity to the new strain

(Hittat via DN faktiskt, tack för att ni börjat direktlänka till externa källor!)

We're also actively monitoring travelers at our land, sea, and air ports. We're watching them for signs of illness, and we have appropriate protocols in place to deal with those who are sick. Precautions are being taken to protect travelers and border personnel. Anyone exhibiting symptoms is being referred to an isolation room where they can be evaluated by a public health official before proceeding to their destruction.

Från Department of Homeland Security i USA:s webbsida.

Läs mer: DHS: Remarks by Secretary Napolitano at Today’s Media Briefing on the H1N1 Flu Outbreak and the U.S. Government’s Response

Hittat via:

Department of Homeland Security to destroy swine flu victims • The Register

Telekomjätten Ericsson överraskade marknaden på torsdagen med en rappport som var bättre än väntat. Resultatet slutade på 2,6 miljarder kronor. Aktien faller brant.

(min fetstil)

Läs mer: Ericsson klår prognosen - Ny Teknik

Auto-tune är en teknik för att sångare att sjunga rent på inspelningar, men den kan också användas för att "tonsätta" talspråk. Här är det gjort med Winston Churchill.

Churchill gives a dazzling rendition of his 1941 proclamation, aided by wayward time travelers. New facebook page, with sound files and goodies:

Läs mer: YouTube - Winston Churchill backed by band from the future

Överhuvudtaget så tror jag att Internet intellektualiserar samhället, genom att ge möjlighet att använda datorer och nätverk som kognitiva hjälpmedel för att fokusera på och analysera saker som bara ett fåtal tidigare hade sinne, tid och läggning för att göra. De texter som är bra, även gamla, återupptäcks och används. Alla älskar en utmaning, om den är på lagom nivå, och Internet kan ge det och samtidigt riva ned elfenbenstorn som tidigare gjort en del ämnen svårtillgängliga.

Den mannen tänker bra den där John Hawks:

I think the right model is the premium satellite channel model. What does it take to be the HBO of genomics? It takes compelling content -- new, fascinating content that people are willing to subscribe to. There ought to be a lot more video. It ought to connect people to subjects they already know are deep and important, like (if I could be so bold to suggest) our evolutionary history. The content is the hook -- it gets people thinking about how interesting the data are, how they connect them to other people, how much they'd like to know more. A multi-hundred dollar purchase is a very high barrier to entry. Where's the $25 service that someone can buy to get involved at a lower level? Where's GENOME the magazine?

Läs mer: Turning ACGT into poetry | john hawks weblog