NASA is offering a prize to coders who can help speed up the supercomputer software used to improve aircraft performance. You’ll need to be a US citizen and able to work with Modern Fortran. While many people think of NASA as being a space organization, it also works on aeronautics closer to home. This includes […]
Elon Musk wants a network of subterranean city tunnels carrying cars around at 130 miles per hour. But the project is moving ahead about as quickly as a pet snail he cited. Late last year he tweeted “Traffic is driving me nuts. Am going to build a tunnel boring machine and just start digging…” For […]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4izQnNE2S2o The robot might not be as complex as Bishop from Alien, but fortunately for the man lending his hand for the experiment, he’s just as agile. Five finger fillet with Staubli TX40 robot speeding up for the second pass. A demonstration of confidence in Staubli speed and precision (and my programming!) by my next […]
Verizon is to offer a Gigabit internet service for the first time, albeit in a limited range of places and not quite at the implied speed. The service is an upgrade to the existing Verizon Fios ‘Instant Internet’ offering of 750 Mbps for both uploads and downloads. The new deal will be available to the […]
A man who played a key role in the development of the Internet has died. Robert Taylor, who arguably conceived ARPANET, was 85. Taylor brought together two sets of existing work and ideas at ARPANET, a network at the US Defense Department’s Advanced Research Projects Agency. The idea of a computer network joining together multiple […]
A Finnish museum plans to display an animated GIF for the next thousand years. Its title, As Long As Possible, acknowledges that may be a stretch. The GIF at Kiasma’s Museum of Contemporary Art is the work of artist Juha van Ingen and is designed to celebrate both the 100th anniversary of Finnish independence and […]
The boss of a planned space tourism service says there’ll be no toilets or sick bags on the flight. But Jeff Bezos says neither should be needed. Bezos, who made his fortune from Amazon, now runs Blue Origin. It plans to run flights for six passengers that cross the Karman line that lies around 62 […]
The FCC looks set to continue a ban on voice calls by cellphone users on planes. The commission had previously considered dropping the ban on the grounds it was outdated and increased costs for passengers. Chairman Ajit Pai has formerly proposed ditching a 2013 plan to eventually allow cellphone calls. That proposal will need a […]
A consumer group says many laptops it tested had battery lives around half those advertised by manufacturers. The difference may well come down to “real world” use vs generous lab testing conditions. Which?, a UK group similar to the US’s Consumer Reports, gathered together data from its tests of 67 models over the past year. […]
Elon Musk is working on a program to wirelessly connect human brains and computers. Potential purposes include boosting brains with artificial intelligence and tackling neurodegenerative conditions. Musk plans to detail his new company, Neuralink, some time next week. What’s already known is that it will be based around neural lace, the concept of implanting electrodes […]