Find: Google's Android unit reportedly building a smart watch

   
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Google's Android unit reportedly building a smart watch
Samsung_smartwatch1_640_large

According to a recent report from The Financial Times, Google might also be getting into the smart watch game. And unlike Glass, which was developed in the company’s experimental X Lab, the watch (not pictured above) is said to be under development by the Android unit, possibly indicating that Google sees it as a more immediately viable product. According to FT’s source, the Google watch is separate from Samsung’s recently-announced effort.

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Find: Guerilla researcher created epic botnet to scan billions of IP addresses

Very cool, but illegal

The visualizations in the report are interesting. 

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Guerilla researcher created epic botnet to scan billions of IP addresses
Aurich Lawson (after Aliens)

In one of the more audacious and ethically questionable research projects in recent memory, an anonymous hacker built a botnet of more than 420,000 Internet-connected devices and used it to perform one of the most comprehensive surveys ever to measure the insecurity of the global network.

In all, the nine-month scanning project found 420 million IPv4 addresses that responded to probes and 36 million more addresses that had one or more ports open. A large percentage of the unsecured devices bore the hallmarks of broadband modems, network routers, and other devices with embedded operating systems that typically aren't intended to be exposed to the outside world. The researcher found a total of 1.3 billion addresses in use, including 141 million that were behind a firewall and 729 million that returned reverse domain name system records. There were no signs of life from the remaining 2.3 billion IPv4 addresses.

Continually scanning almost 4 billion addresses for nine months is a big job. In true guerilla research fashion, the unknown hacker developed a small scanning program that scoured the Internet for devices that could be logged into using no account credentials at all or the usernames and passwords of either "root" or "admin." When the program encountered unsecured devices, it installed itself on them and used them to conduct additional scans. The viral growth of the botnet allowed it to infect about 100,000 devices within a day of the program's release. The critical mass allowed the hacker to scan the Internet quickly and cheaply. With about 4,000 clients, it could scan one port on all 3.6 billion addresses in a single day. Because the project ran 1,000 unique probes on 742 separate ports, and possibly because the binary was uninstalled each time an infected device was restarted, the hacker commandeered a total of 420,000 devices to perform the survey.

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Find: From smartphone to server room: Nvidia’s “Kayla” shows the future of Tegra

Mobile computing: it isn't just mobile anymore. 

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From smartphone to server room: Nvidia’s “Kayla” shows the future of Tegra
The "Kayla" motherboard is a way for software developers to begin porting their CUDA apps to the ARM architecture before it goes mainstream in 2014.
Andrew Cunningham

SAN JOSE, CA—Tegra 4 phones and tablets aren't quite here yet, but Nvidia is already giving us details about its successor, a chip codenamed "Logan." Due in early 2014, the new processor's primary innovation is that it brings the graphics architecture in Nvidia's mobile processors more or less up to date with the architecture in its GeForce and Quadro graphics products.

This updated GPU will obviously bring performance increases relative to present-day chips, but more important will be the level of API support that it makes possible in mobile devices. Anything supported by current Kepler-based graphics cards—including OpenGL 4.3, Direct3D 11, CUDA, and PhysX—will be possible in phones and tablets, albeit with less raw horsepower behind it than a high-end PC graphics card can provide.

To give developers a chance to start playing with these APIs, many of which aren't yet mainstream in ARM devices, Nvidia (with an Italian company named Seco) is showing off a new small form-factor motherboard called "Kayla" that's meant to provide roughly the same software features as Logan about a year before Logan is actually scheduled to come to market. We got a chance to take a look at the board here at Nvidia's GPU Technology Conference this week.

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Find: NVIDIA Updates Tegra Roadmap Details at GTC - Logan and Parker Detailed

Unified cpu/gpu memory, like on consoles. 

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NVIDIA Updates Tegra Roadmap Details at GTC - Logan and Parker Detailed

We're at NVIDIA's GTC 2013 event where team green just updated their official roadmap and shared some more details about their Tegra portfolio, specifically additional information about Logan and Parker, the codename for the SoCs beyond Tegra 4. First up is Logan, which will be NVIDIA's first SoC with CUDA inside, specifically courtesy a Kepler architecture GPU capable of CUDA 5.0 and OpenGL 4.3. There's no details on the CPU side of things, but we're told to expect Logan demos (and samples) inside 2013 and production inside devices early 2014. 

It’s interesting to note that with the move to a Kepler architecture GPU, Logan will be taking on a vastly increased graphics feature set relative to Tegra 4. With Kepler comes OpenGL 4.3 capabilities, meaning that NVIDIA is not just catching up to OpenGL ES 3.0, but shooting right past it. Tessellation, compute shaders, and geometry shaders among other things are all present in OpenGL 4.3, far exeeding the much more limited and specialized OpenGL ES 3.0 feature set. Given the promotion that NVIDIA is putting into this - they've been making it quite clear t everyone that Logan will be OpenGL 4.3 capable - this may mean that NVIDIA intends to use OpenGL 4.3 as a competitive advantage with Logan, attracting developers and users looking for a more feature-filled SoC than what current OpenGL ES 3.0 SoCs are slated to provide.

On a final note about Logan, it’s interesting to note that Kepler has a fairly strict shader block granularity of 1 SMX, i.e. 192 CUDA cores. While NVIDIA can always redefine Kepler to mean what they say it means, if they do stick to that granularity then it should give us a very narrow range of possible GPU configurations for Logan.

After Logan is Parker, which NVIDIA shared will contain the codename Denver CPU NVIDIA is working on, with 64 bit capabilities and codename Maxwell GPU. Parker will also be built using 3D FinFET transistors, likely from TSMC.

Like Logan, it's clear that Parker will be benefitting from being based on a recent NVIDIA dGPU. While we don't know a great deal about Maxwell since it doesn't launch for roughly another year, NVIDIA has told us that Maxwell will support unified virtual memory. With Logan NVIDIA gains CUDA capabilities due to Kepler, but with Parker they are laying down the groundwork for full-on heterogeneous computing in a vein similar to what AMD and the ARM partners are doing with HSA. NVIDIA has so far not talked about heterogeneous computing in great detail since they only provide GPUs and limited functionality SoCs, but with Denver giving them an in-house CPU to pair with their in-house GPUs, products like Parker will be giving them new options to explore. And perhaps more meaningfully, the means to counter HSA-enabled ARM SoCs from rival firms.

In addition NVIDIA showed off a new product named Kayla which is a small, mITX-like board running a Tegra 3 SoC and unnamed new low power Kepler family GPU. 


Find: NVIDIA’s Kayla: A Dev Platform for CUDA on ARM

General purpose gpu programming finds its way to mobile devices. 

   

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More Details On NVIDIA’s Kayla: A Dev Platform for CUDA on ARM

In this morning’s GTC 2013 keynote, one of the items briefly mentioned by NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang was Kayla, an NVIDIA project combining a Tegra 3 processor and an unnamed GPU on a mini-ITX like board. While NVIDIA is still withholding some of the details of Kayla, we finally have some more details on just what Kayla is for.

The long and short of matters is that Kayla will be an early development platform for running CUDA on ARM. NVIDIA’s first CUDA-capable ARM SoC will not arrive until 2014 with Logan, but NVIDIA wants to get developers started early. By creating a separate development platform this will give interested developers a chance to take an early look at CUDA on ARM in preparation for Logan and other NVIDIA products using ARM CPUs, and start developing their wares now.

As it stands Kayla is a platform whose specifications are set by NVIDIA, with ARM PC providers building the final systems. The CPU is a Tegra 3 processor – picked for its PCI-Express bus needed to attach a dGPU – while the GPU is a Kepler family GPU that NVIDIA is declining to name at this time. Given the goals of the platform and NVIDIA’s refusal to name the GPU, we suspect this is a new ultra low end 1 SMX (192 CUDA core) Kepler GPU, but this is merely speculation on our part. There will be 2GB of RAM for the Tegra 3, while the GPU will come with a further 1GB for itself.

Update: PCGamesHardware has a picture of a slide from a GTC session listing Kayla's GPU as having 2 SMXes. It's definitely not GK107, so perhaps a GK107 refresh?

The Kayla board being displayed today is one configuration, utilizing an MXM slot to attach the dGPU to the platform. Other vendors will be going with PCIe, using mini-ITX boards. The platform on the whole is in the 10s of watts - but of course NVIDIA is quick to point out that Logan itself will be an order of magnitude less, thanks in part to the advantages conferred by being an SoC.

NVIDIA was quick to note that Kayla is a development platform for ARM on CUDA as opposed to calling it a development platform for Logan; though at the same it unquestionably serves as a sneak-peak for Logan. This is in big part due to the fact that the CPU will not match what’s on Logan – Tegra 4 already is beyond Tegra 3 with its A15 CPU cores – and it’s unlikely that the GPU is an exact match either. Hence the focus on early developers, who are going to be more interested in making it work than the specific performance the platform provides.

It’s interesting to note that NVIDIA is not only touting Kayla’s CUDA capabilities, but also the platform’s OpenGL 4.3 capabilities. Because Kayla and Logan are Kepler based, the GPU will be well ahead of OpenGL ES 3.0 with regards to functionality. Tessellation, compute shaders, and geometry shaders are present in OpenGL 4.3, among other things, reflecting the fact that OpenGL ES is a far more limited API than full OpenGL. This means that NVIDIA is shooting right past OpenGL ES 3.0, going from OpenGL ES 2.0 with Tegra 4 to OpenGL 4.3 with Logan/Kayla. This may also mean NVIDIA intends to use OpenGL 4.3 as a competitive advantage with Logan, attracting developers and users looking for a more feature-filled SoC than what current OpenGL ES 3.0 SoCs are slated to provide.

Wrapping things up, Kayla will be made available in the spring of this year. NVIDIA isn’t releasing any further details on the platform, but interested developers can go sign up to receive updates over at NVIDIA’s Developer Zone webpage.

On a lighter note, for anyone playing NVIDIA codename bingo, we’ve figured out why the platform is called Kayla. Jen-Hsun called Kayla “Logan’s girlfriend”, and it turns out he was being literal. So in keeping with their SoC naming this is another superhero-related name.


Announcement: Rescheduling of Critiques on Apr 3

Folks,

We have a guest lecture on Apr 3. We are thus advancing the critiques scheduled on Apr 3 to Apr 1. The following groups are affected by this change:

A personal assistant for sustainable tourism
Help people to get the most out of Winston-Salem’s greenways
Help students log their activity in a field biology class (Life of two wheels)

The post on class website and the class calendar has been updated to reflect this.

Cheers,
Kalpesh

Guest lecture: Michael Capps

Hello folks,


Michael Capps, President Emeritus, Epic Games, will be visiting us for guest lecture on April 3.

The critiques scheduled for April 3 will be advanced to April 1 to accommodate his visit.

Cheers,
Kalpesh

Find: ARM CEO retires, leaves mobile revolution to Simon Segars

Pretty big deal. Seems like a simple passing of the baton though. 

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ARM CEO retires, leaves mobile revolution to Simon Segars
Warren_large_large

ARM is announcing that CEO Warren East is stepping down after nineteen years at the company, making way for new CEO Simon Segars — the company's current president. The succession will happen on July 1st of this year, 12 years after East took charge. Even though ARM doesn’t produce devices (or even chips) of its own, the processor architecture it designs provides the foundation for the vast majority of mobile CPUs on the market, from the likes of Qualcomm, Nvidia, Texas Instruments, Samsung, and others.

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Find: Third of US drivers text while driving

   
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Third of US drivers may have subconscious death wish, text while driving

Nearly a third of American drivers apparently have a death wish, based on data released this week by the Centers for Disease Control. The CDC's study is based on data collected in the US during October 2011, and the organization found that approximately one in three American drivers send or read text messages on their cell phones while driving.

This data, published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report this week, showed more than half of two demographic groups—women from 18 to 24, and men from 25 to 34 years of age—admitted to texting while driving within the 30 days prior to taking the survey.

Percentage of men and women who admit to making cell calls and to texting while driving, by age group.
Centers for Disease Control

The study also included a similar survey of European drivers conducted in June of 2011. By comparison, drivers in most of the countries covered by the study were much less likely to text (or at least, less likely to admit to texting) while driving. Only Portugal matched the US in texting-while-driving behavior.

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Find: More youth use smartphones as route to web ((tags: finds, context, smartphones, indystate((

More youth use smartphones as route to web

A new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project finds that 78 percent of young people, ages 12 to 17, now have cellphones. Nearly half of those are smartphones, a share that's increasing steadily -- and that's having a big effect on how, and where, many young people are accessing the Web.

Find: Samsung's Galaxy S 4: Introduction & Hands On

Nothing earth shattering here: just better in most ways compared to s 3.

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Samsung's Galaxy S 4: Introduction & Hands On


Since 2010 Samsung has grown to become not only the clear leader in the Android smartphone space, but the largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. Its annual iteration of the Galaxy S platform is now arguably one of the most widely anticipated smartphone launches each year.


Like clockwork, tonight Samsung announced the Galaxy S 4: a 5-inch 1080p smartphone, and the new flagship for the Galaxy brand. We just finished learning about the device and spent a short time playing around with it.

Job: SAS JMP summer positions

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Xan Gregg <Xan.Gregg@jmp.com>
Date: Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 1:31 PM
Subject: SAS JMP summer positions


Hi Professors,

 

Your former student and current SAS/JMP employee Justin Mosiman gave me your names; please redirect me as appropriate.

 

I want to spread the word about a couple summer positions in our group in case you have anyone to recommend. JMP have a relatively small technical team within the larger SAS, and we build an interactive desktop product with active users. In addition to programming, the students will likely be involved with graphics and user interaction design.

 

I’m happy to talk or meet with you if it would help understand current or future possibilities.

 

Xan Gregg

R & D Director, JMP Data Visualization

919-531-9357

 

 

https://sas.taleo.net/careersection/10030/jobdetail.ftl?job=13001643

 

 

Summer Student - JMP Visualization Programmer-13001643

Description

You will collaborate with management, developers, and other testers to exercise and improve JMP, an interactive desktop statistical software package.  Your duties will include writing scripts in JSL (JMP Scripting Language) to test and extend JMP with a focus on graphical displays. Your work may result in a JMP add-on that will be published in the JMP File Exchange and an article written by you for the external JMP blog.

Qualifications

Essential
• Currently enrolled in a college or university as an undergraduate student seeking a Bachelor’s degree in a quantitative field
• Programming experience

 

Additional
• Strong verbal and written communication skills
• Working knowledge of statistical concepts
• Working knowledge of data visualization

 

 

Find: Five features iOS should steal from Android

Five features iOS should steal from Android

If you've come anywhere near a tech site in the last year or so, you've heard it all before. "iOS is getting stale compared to Android! It needs some new ideas!" Whether that's actually true is up for (heated) debate, but those with an open mind are usually willing to acknowledge that Apple and Google could afford to swap a few ideas when it comes to their mobile OSes.


So in a fantasy world where we could bring over some of the better Android features to iOS, which features would those be? Among the Ars staff, we sometimes have spirited "conversations" about what aspects would be the best for each company to photocopy. So, we thought we'd pick a few that might go over well with iOS users. Don't worry, we have a companion post of features that Android could afford to steal from iOS. The copying can go both ways.


No one wants iOS to become Android or vice versa. This is about recognizing how to improve iOS with features that would be useful to people depending on their smartphones for more than the occasional text or phone call. We recognize that Apple tries to keep an eye towards elegant implementation, too. So which features are we talking about? Glad you asked.


Visit to hub today @ 230

Folks 

As our earlier email indicated, we have schedule an optional visit to the hub startup incubator for 230p today. Hub hosts our visitors/ collaborators from Spottrot and gematouch among others. 

We'll be able to chat with several mobile developers there in person. 

Hub is located in the brooks bell/junior league building at 711 hillsborough this side of downtown: 

HUB Raleigh
711 Hillsborough St, Raleigh, NC 27603

I'll be driving and can take three. It's not a long walk from main campus. 

Hope to see a lot of you there!

Best, Ben 

Find: Rubin out, Pichai in as Google’s new senior vice president of Android

This is a pretty big deal. 

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Rubin out, Pichai in as Google’s new senior vice president of Android

Google announced that Sundar Pichai has been instated as senior vice president of Android at Google. He'll take over the role from former Senior Vice President of Mobile and Digital Content Andy Rubin.


“The pace of innovation has never been greater, and Android is the most used mobile operating system in the world,” wrote Google CEO Larry Page in an official blog post. “I know [Pichai] will do a tremendous job doubling down on Android as we work to push the ecosystem forward.”


Pichai joined Google in 2004. He led product management for Google Chrome and Chrome OS and also helped develop Google Drive. Pichai will continue working on development for Chrome and other Google App as he takes on his new Android responsibilities.

Find: A look at Samsung’s handset evolution through the ages

A look at Samsung’s handset evolution through the ages

In just a few days, we're hoping to get a glimpse of what's next on the horizon for Samsung in the Android realm—the Galaxy S IV. With rumors cropping up that it will have 3D eye-tracking, a bigger display, and a thinner chassis, it has us pondering how far Samsung mobile phones have come in recent years. Looking back at the company's offerings—from flip phones to touchscreen handsets—Samsung has always followed along with current trends in the mobile phone's evolution. So we've pulled together this walk down memory lane to look back at the devices that have kept Samsung relevant all these years.


While we can't include every single handset that Samsung has ever released—there are far too many to account for and not all were available in the United States—we wanted to look at representative examples that highlight how the company's handsets have changed through the ages. Some were sadly difficult to dig up, so if we happened to miss your favorite Samsung handset, leave some memories in the comments.



In the beginning...


Back in 1983, before cellular phones were considered necessary commodities, Samsung launched its mobile initiative. The hope was that it would be the company's bread and butter. In 1988, after much research and development (plus a failed car phone), the company revealed the SH-100 handset (pictured here), or "hand phone" as it was referred to in Korean.


During this time, Samsung only sold about one or two thousand units of each handset model. Talk about a tough crowd.



https://www.facebook.com/SamsungMobileRomania/posts/424320380915794


15 more images in gallery


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Guest Lecture: Jonathan Stephens


Hello folks,

Jonathan Stephens from Republic Wireless will be visiting us for guest lecture on "Disrupting the Mobile Landscape" on April 10th.

Cheers,
Kalpesh

Guest Visit by Jonathan Stephens and Tim Jones

Folks,

Jonathan Stephens, Manager, Business Development and Tim Jones, VP, Product Development from Republic Wireless will be our guests on Monday 3/18. They will attend the critiques and provide teams with feedback and suggestions.

Cheers,
Kalpesh