Det har i alla fall den pakistanska kärnvapenteknikens fader, Abdul Qadeer Khan, sagt förra året. Khan är nu fri från husarrest.

If Dr. Khan is allowed to speak of all he knows, or chooses to do so, he could cause considerable embarrassment to Pakistan. In July 2008, he told Pakistani reporters that Pakistan had transported uranium enrichment equipment to North Korea in 2000 with the full knowledge of the country’s army, then headed by Mr. Musharraf.

Läs mer: Pakistan Lifts Restrictions on Nuclear Scientist - NYTimes.com

“A lot of inflammatory diseases — multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis and asthma — are due to the activity of Th 17,” he explained. “If you infect mice with worms, Th 17 drops dramatically, and the activity of regulatory T cells is augmented.”

Läs mer: Babies know: A little dirt is good for you | ajc.com

Testing these nanoparticles in the internal fluid of brain-cancer cells, Kopelman found electric fields as strong as 15 million volts per meter, up to five times stronger than the field found in a lightning bolt. However, this discovery goes beyond being incredibly interesting; the finding will likely change the way researchers look at disease.

Läs mer: Human Cells have Electric Fields as Powerful as Lighting Bolts -A Galaxy Classic

Preliminära data, fungerar bara i tidigt skede. Men stamceller verkar ju vara the shit, alltså.

Researchers from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine said they transplanted early-stage multiple sclerosis patients' own immune stem cells into the patients' bodies, thereby "resetting" their immune systems.

Läs mer: Stem cell transplant reverses early MS - UPI.com

While poverty has rarely been a driving force for revolutionary movements and wars, rising expectations often have.

från denna rapport (pdf)

To meet even the conservative growth rates
posited above, global energy production would need
to rise by 1.3% per year. By the 2030s, demand
would be nearly 50% greater than today. To meet that
demand, even assuming more effective conservation
measures, the world would need to add roughly the
equivalent of Saudi Arabia’s current energy production
every seven years.

...

With the cost of precision weapons
expected to decrease and their availability increasing, joint force commanders could find themselves operating
in environments where even small, energy-rich opponents have military forces with advanced technological
capabilities. These could include advanced cyber, robotic, and even anti-space based systems.

...

Even though
populations today are much larger and more concentrated,
increasing the opportunities for a new pathogen to spread,
the fact that mankind lives in a richer world with greater
knowledge of the world of microbes, the ability to enact
quarantines, a rapid response capability, and medical
treatment, suggests that authorities could control even the
most dangerous of pathogens.

..

Above all, the Chinese are interested in the
strategic and military thinking of the United States. In
the year 2000, the PLA [People's Liberation Army of Chine, blogger's note] had more students in America’s
graduate schools than the U.S. military,

Ur denna rapport (pdf)  från United States Joint Forces Command

A report (pdf)  from United States Joint Forces Command shows just what a dynamic, to not say chaotic world we have been and will be living in with regards to security and international politics.

Take a look at this list from the report, just how the balance of power has changed during the 1900s per decade:

• 1900 If you had been a strategic analyst for the world’s leading power, you would have
  been British, looking warily at Britain’s age old enemy: France.
• 1910 You would now be allied with France, and the enemy would now be Germany
• 1920 Britain and its allies had won World War I, but now the British found themselves
  engaged in a naval race with its former allies the United States and Japan.
• 1930 For the British, naval limitation treaties were in place, the Great Depression had
  started and defense planning for the next five years assumed a “ten year” rule -- no
  war in ten years. British planners posited the main threats to the Empire as the
  Soviet Union and Japan, while Germany and Italy were either friendly or no threat.
• 1936 A British planner would now posit three great threats: Italy, Japan, and the worst, a
  resurgent Germany, while little help could be expected from the United States.
• 1940 The collapse of France in June left Britain alone in a seemingly hopeless war with
  Germany and Italy with a Japanese threat looming in the Pacific. America had
  only recently begun to scramble to rearm its military forces.
• 1950 The United States was now the world’s greatest power, the atomic age had
  dawned, and a “police action” began in June in Korea that was to kill over 36,500
  Americans, 58,000 South Koreans, nearly 3,000 Allied soldiers, 215,000 North
  Koreans, 400,000 Chinese, and 2,000,000 Korean civilians before a cease-fire
  brought an end to the fighting in 1953. The main opponent in the conflict would be
  China, America’s ally in the war against Japan.
• 1960 Politicians in the United States were focusing on a missile gap that did not exist;
  massive retaliation would soon give way to flexible response, while a small
  insurgency in South Vietnam hardly drew American attention.
• 1970 The United States was beginning to withdraw from Vietnam, its military forces in
  shambles. The Soviet Union had just crushed incipient rebellion in the Warsaw
  Pact. Détente between the Soviets and Americans had begun, while the Chinese
  were waiting in the wing to create an informal alliance with the United States.
• 1980 The Soviets had just invaded Afghanistan, while a theocratic revolution in Iran
  had overthrown the Shah’s regime. “Desert One” -- an attempt to free American
  hostages in Iran -- ended in a humiliating failure, another indication of what
  pundits were calling “the hollow force.” America was the greatest creditor nation
  the world had ever seen.
• 1990 The Soviet Union collapses. The supposedly hollow force shreds the vaunted Iraqi
  Army in less than 100 hours. The United States had become the world’s greatest
  debtor nation. No one outside of the Department of Defense has heard of the
  internet.
• 2000 Warsaw is the capital of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nation.
  Terrorism is emerging as America’s greatest threat. Biotechnology, robotics,
  nanotechnology, HD energy, etc. are advancing so fast they are beyond forecasting
• 2010 Take the above and plan accordingly! What will be the disruptions of the next 25
  years?

Denna rapport (pdf)  från United States Joint Forces Command visar hur svårt det är att planera framtiden vad gäller militär och politik. Här har man som exempel bara visat på hur allianser och stormakter skiftat per decennium under nittonhundratalet:

• 1900 If you had been a strategic analyst for the world’s leading power, you would have
  been British, looking warily at Britain’s age old enemy: France.
• 1910 You would now be allied with France, and the enemy would now be Germany
• 1920 Britain and its allies had won World War I, but now the British found themselves
  engaged in a naval race with its former allies the United States and Japan.
• 1930 For the British, naval limitation treaties were in place, the Great Depression had
  started and defense planning for the next five years assumed a “ten year” rule -- no
  war in ten years. British planners posited the main threats to the Empire as the
  Soviet Union and Japan, while Germany and Italy were either friendly or no threat.
• 1936 A British planner would now posit three great threats: Italy, Japan, and the worst, a
  resurgent Germany, while little help could be expected from the United States.
• 1940 The collapse of France in June left Britain alone in a seemingly hopeless war with
  Germany and Italy with a Japanese threat looming in the Pacific. America had
  only recently begun to scramble to rearm its military forces.
• 1950 The United States was now the world’s greatest power, the atomic age had
  dawned, and a “police action” began in June in Korea that was to kill over 36,500
  Americans, 58,000 South Koreans, nearly 3,000 Allied soldiers, 215,000 North
  Koreans, 400,000 Chinese, and 2,000,000 Korean civilians before a cease-fire
  brought an end to the fighting in 1953. The main opponent in the conflict would be
  China, America’s ally in the war against Japan.
• 1960 Politicians in the United States were focusing on a missile gap that did not exist;
  massive retaliation would soon give way to flexible response, while a small
  insurgency in South Vietnam hardly drew American attention.
• 1970 The United States was beginning to withdraw from Vietnam, its military forces in
  shambles. The Soviet Union had just crushed incipient rebellion in the Warsaw
  Pact. Détente between the Soviets and Americans had begun, while the Chinese
  were waiting in the wing to create an informal alliance with the United States.
• 1980 The Soviets had just invaded Afghanistan, while a theocratic revolution in Iran
  had overthrown the Shah’s regime. “Desert One” -- an attempt to free American
  hostages in Iran -- ended in a humiliating failure, another indication of what
  pundits were calling “the hollow force.” America was the greatest creditor nation
  the world had ever seen.
• 1990 The Soviet Union collapses. The supposedly hollow force shreds the vaunted Iraqi
  Army in less than 100 hours. The United States had become the world’s greatest
  debtor nation. No one outside of the Department of Defense has heard of the
  internet.
• 2000 Warsaw is the capital of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nation.
  Terrorism is emerging as America’s greatest threat. Biotechnology, robotics,
  nanotechnology, HD energy, etc. are advancing so fast they are beyond forecasting
• 2010 Take the above and plan accordingly! What will be the disruptions of the next 25
  years?

Hittat via Foreign Policy.

Is this post a cheat sheet? Maybe, but we think of it as a way for you to make your cheat sheet on whatever sector you follow.

Läs mer: How to: Build a Social Media Cheat Sheet for Any Topic - ReadWriteWeb

Google Chrome is Google's new web browser, and I have been using it over the weekend. Here are some things they did not do right from a user interface design perspective, with explanations and violated UI principles. Over a couple of years  I taught desktop user interface design to companies and institutions in the greater Stockholm area. This has helped me not only to spot some of the design errors, but also explain why they are errors. I used Chrome 1.0.154.43, which I downloaded yesterday, so it is a fresh Chrome to the test.

1. Are you talking to me?

When you try to reach https://gmail.com, this is the page that you get:

Now there is something fishy with this page, well actually several things. Google should of course design their e-mail pages in such a way that their browser does not need to warn about their own service, gmail. But there is more:

First, who is talking?

The user interface on the computer is supposed to be an extension of the the user. This is why in Windows it is called "My Computer" and not "Your Computer". If it said "Your Computer", the user interface would be talking to you, and that would not work, because the computer is not a person.

On the web it can be a little more complicated, because web pages made by other people can obviously not be an extension of you all the time. However, in the above page, Google has managed to use "you" and "me" on the same page. Who is talking to who? The principle that has been violated:

On top of that, "Help me" is something you say to a person, or something of similar intelligence, not to a computer.

2. Understand the world

So what more is fishy here? Let's look at the phrase "Help me understand". It feels like the browser is talking down to the user. But let's start with the word "understand". Understand what? There is at least a noun missing. Will they explain the entire history of hacking if the user clicks there ? We just do not know what they want to help the user to "understand". It is too abstract.

3. Feelings of helplessness

Thirdly it does feel like the browser is talking down to the user. The reason for this is that the language is slightly emotional. "Help me" is a phrase used in drama. Now the user interface should not do drama. "Help me", as innocuous as it may sound, has an air of helplessness around it.

Here is a screenshot of the top result, for a google search for the words "help me":

Instead of "Help me", they could have used the phrases "Get help" or "Explain", to get away from the emotional payload.

4. Do not use gray for active elements

Grey means "not editable" or "inactive" or "not selectable".

This is the way it should be:

 This is what the url line looks like in Chrome:

A better choice here would have been to color code the different parts as you do with syntax higlighting in a code editor.

5. Give me menus!

There are no normal menus in Chrome. Menus in a menu bar at the top is important. It makes programs look alike and hence give the same look and feel to different applications on the computer. If you have used one application you'll know how to use the others. Cars work the same: Steering wheel, accelerator and brake pedal are in the same place in all cars and work in the same way. Yes Eleanor, also in French cars. Nowadays.

One of the most frequent violators to this look and feel uniformity are mp3 player applications. I just want to listen to mp3s. If I wanted to play with strange UI controls that do unforeseen things, I'd download an application especially for that purpose. Probably Myst.

Well, Google Chrome does not have menus, at least not in the usual place, in the menu bar. Menus do not only give consistency across applications, they are also quite useful. They give the action space of the application, i.e. the sum of all things you can do in the application.

There are more things to say about menus and muscle memory but I will leave it at that for now.

6. Tweaks - under the hood? More likely than you think.

Once you do find the menus (they are buttons at the upper right) you can get to the options in Chrome.

The Options dialog looks like this:

This sounds like the language of a bad mechanic. The user does not know how the things she wants to change Chrome fits in in this "Basics"-"Minor Tweaks"-"Under the Hood" categorization.  The categorization is thus meaningless to the user. Imagine the doctor using this language when you come in with an ailment. Come to think it, Dr House probably would.

Internet Movie Database used to organise its online help a bit like this, with a freshman course, up to graduation. It does not work. The user does not care what level of difficulty Google (or imdb) thinks these settings should be aggregated under. The user wants meaningful labels, and these aren't. Many programs get away with labelling one tab (or corresponding ui element) with "advanced", but they do not label the other category as "not advanced". The words are abstract and hence have no meaning.

We revisit:

And:

7. Chrome refuses to show my site

This is not a user interface problem. iI don't know what it is. Is this a pre emptive measure from Google? I cannot get Chrome to load this blog you are reading. This page you are reading loads fine though in Chrome.

Opera on Windows loads the front page fine:

IE on Windows no problem:

Konqueror on Linux no problem:

(And Konq uses more or less the same rendering engine as Chrome)

But Chrome fails:

"Unknown error". To boldly err were no one erred before?

Thanks for your attention.

Read more: Google Chrome - Download a new browser

This is what happens when an engineer needs to ..

Läs mer: YouTube - An Engineer's Dog

I alla fall en del av dem

Vienna, December 24 – The Transcarpathian Rusins (Ruthenians), who are estimated to number more than a million, are calling on Moscow to recognize the independence of Subcarpathian Rus because Kyiv has ignored their demands for autonomy within Ukraine, an appeal that could create yet another “unrecognized” republic in the former Soviet space.

Enda gången jag stött på den etniska gruppen rutenare är i Istvan Szabos fil "Överste Redl" där huvudpersonen är rutenare, men om jag minns rätt försökte dölja det.

Enligt Wikipedia är begreppet rutenare omstritt.

Läs mer: WindowonEurasia: Window on Eurasia: Another ‘Unrecognized Republic’ is Born – This Time in Ukraine

För du är väl inte oaustralisk?

This site is part of The Inspiration Room™, a global effort designed to influence, affect and involve creative communities in the development of a world standard for inspiration. Become a member of The Inspiration Room™.

Läs mer: The Inspiration Room™ | Daily

Björn von Sydow sätter fokus på att USA är uppbundet militärt nu i andra delar av världen än Europa. Då ställer ju jag mig frågan: Vad händer om europeiska länder måste lita på varandra för sitt försvar? Och det gör mig lite orolig. Som jag skrivit om tidigare så är möjligen Tyskland, Italien och Spanien inte beredda försvara Baltikum  (från FT.com).

Det kan mycket väl bli så att en del länder i Europa hellre låter Ryssland karva av lite fria stater från Europa, än att stå upp och riskera egna medborgares liv. Och då är processen igång, och vi kan hamna i en mycket farlig situation.

Indirekt kan denna frånvaro av konventionella militära styrkor från USA och Nato i Europa göra att rysk politisk och militär försvarsplanering utgår från att man har handlingsfrihet - åtminstone i form av överraskande, begränsade infall och angrepp på grannstater inom före detta Sovjetunionen

Läs mer: Dags för Sverige att rusta upp mot Ryssland

Grötzinger and his team also determined the 3-D shape of hydramacin-1, which revealed that it most closely resembled a superfamily of proteins found in scorpion venom; within this large group, they propose that hydramacin and the two leech proteins are members of a newly designated family called the macins.

Läs mer: New Family Of Antibacterial Agents Uncovered

Proud2B_American Quote 2009-01-17 03:04:16 PM

And not to cross-thread jack, but The Government of Seoul, South Korea just issued a newly updated forecast...Temperatures expected to rise dramatically from a nice 65 degrees to a toasty 12,000 degrees, with winds going from light winds to winds in excess for 500MPH....

Läs mer: FARK.com: (4150968) Hawaii shut down government on Friday because it was "windy." Totally not because it creates a five-day weekend with MLK on Monday and the Inauguration on Tuesday

Designers love freebies that make life easier and help them create higher-quality work. Free vectors are useful, free vector packs even more so. Fortunately, there are plenty of talented graphic designers who are willing to give away their work (or samples of it) to benefit the rest of us. In this post, we feature 60 of the best and most useful free vector packs.

Läs mer: The Ultimate Collection Of Free Vector Packs | Developer's Toolbox | Smashing Magazine

In this article, you’ll find 15 free tools to help you facilitate remote/web-based collaboration. Whether you need basic whiteboarding/brainstorming tools or fully-featured project management applications – you should be able to find a tool or two that’s worth checking out.

Läs mer: 15 Free Tools for Web-based Collaboration - Six Revisions

Dabbleboard is an online collaboration application that’s centered around the whiteboard. With a new type of drawing interface that's actually easy and fun to use, Dabbleboard gets out of your way and just lets you draw.

Läs mer: Dabbleboard - Online whiteboard for drawing & team collaboration