As the vista on Mars gradually gets ever clearer, and the system checks continue to show that the rover is in good stead, the team behind Curiosity will be increasingly eager to stretch its legs wheels. The first trip might be just a cautious few meters, but plans for a more adventurous jaunt have just been revealed. The first location in Curiosity’s sights is an area referred to as Glenelg, which, based on initial pictures, offers three different geological characteristics, as well as potentially being an area where water used to be present. The site is only 1,300 feet (400 meters) from where the rover landed, but it could still take several weeks to get there. This is merely a quick dash compared to the next leg of its journey, which sees Curiosity heading out to an area called Mount Sharp — a large mound of layered rock which is hoped to contain visible geology potentially dating back millions of years. With seven kilometers (4.4 miles) lying between the rover and the mountain’s foothills, it’ll be a much longer journey, but one that could provide the first real evidence of the planet’s ability to host, or have hosted, life
Daily Archives: August 19, 2012
NASA maps out proposed travel plans for Curiosity, decides to head for the hills
Microsoft cures ‘hiccup’ that stopped Windows Phone apps installing
The company called a halt to publishing on Tuesday after discovering the problem, which it blamed on a changeover in the back-end infrastructure for the app store. On Thursday, Marketplace chief Todd Brix said the issue — which he described as a “hiccup” — had now been resolved.
“We fixed the digital certificate problem and last evening resumed publishing new apps and updates,” Brix wrote on the Windows Phone Developer Blog. “It will take a day or two for the repair to fully deploy and newly-published apps to begin appearing in Marketplace again.”
“If your app was in the process of being published, you don’t need to take any action. We have applied the fix and the app will continue through the certification and publishing workflow as normal,” he told developers.
Microsoft estimated the issue affected a “small percentage of the 100,000-plus apps” on the store.
The issue stopped handsets from installing apps or updates published in the last week, according to Microsoft. It affected phones that had been upgraded to Windows Phone 7.5 from an earlier OS, but apparently not those with the later OS pre-installed.
Earlier in August, Microsoft cut the ribbon on the Windows Phone Dev Center, where developers can build, publish and manage apps for Windows Phone 7.5 as well as for the upcoming Windows Phone 8. The company is gearing up for the release of the updated mobile OS, and is looking to build developer backing as it tries to make headway against Android, iOS and even BlackBerry OS.
Sony ericsson the Xperia new Sl smartphone launch
Sony has quietly outed its much-rumoured smartphone – the Xperia SL. The company is now officially lisiting the phone as “coming soon” on The Sony Xperia SL is said to be a slightly refresh version of the Sony Xperia S smartphone.
The Sony Xperia SL has a 4.3-inch scratch-resistant TFT touchscreen with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. The phone runs Google Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) OS. it is powered by a 1.7 GHz Qualcomm MSM8260 dual-core processor.
The phone sports a 12.1 megapixel camera with auto focus and LED flash. The phone will be available in four colors. The Sony Xperia SL will have an internal storage of 27.8GB (up to 25.8GB user-accessible memory), and 1GB RAM.As the company has not issued any official press release yet, details about the availability and pricing of the Sony Xperia SL are not known. We hope to hear from Sony soon.
Apple responds to iPhone SMS security vulnerability
Apple takes security very seriously. When using iMessage instead of SMS, addresses are verified which protects against these kinds of spoofing attacks. One of the limitations of SMS is that it allows messages to be sent with spoofed addresses to any phone, so we urge customers to be extremely careful if they’re directed to an unknown Web site or address over SMS.
I’ve never written a messaging app that works with SMS before, but it would seem to me that completely passing the buck on to the technology as Apple seems to be doing here, is a cop-out. As hacker pod2g explained in his post on the vulnerability, the text header contains both the actual originating number of a text, and the reply-to text. Making both fields a little more visible would certainly be a start, although it’s true that SMS is far from being iron-clad in terms of security.
With that in mind, continue to be vigilant about text messages and careful about how you use them. There are a number of different ways to do your banking these days
Fighting England need to harness ex-factor: Finn’s late wicket may be change of luck required to win Test
England fought hard to show they can find an ex-KP factor against South Africa here as they continued their gut-busting efforts to cling on to their status as the best Test side on earth.
Their trial separation from Kevin Pietersen apparently a day or two closer to becoming a divorce, England approached the final Test of the Investec series to decide the Heavyweight Championship of cricket fully aware of the risks involved in dropping one of the best attacking batsmen in the world.
The wonderful 149 which the 32-year-old scored against the nation of his birth at Headingley two weeks ago highlighted that.
No matter what Pietersen’s advisers may plan next, the England team and management appear determined to face the future without him in all forms of the game.
Yet Andrew Strauss, Andy Flower and their players arrived here knowing what they could really do to persuade everyone such a hard-line approach was justified was to win, pure and simple.
Late in the evening, the game swung a notch or two back in their favour with the controversial dismissal of Jacques Kallis at 131-3, lbw to Steve Finn when Hotspot failed to support the batsman’s assertion that he had hit the ball.
To win, England will need skill, courage and more of the same luck against a South Africa team worthy of challenging for top spot. In truth, they are just a bit better than England right now.
But the fact that, after the trauma, tension and supposed treachery of the past fraughtnight, England will arrive at Lord’s still in with a shout shows they may yet achieve the aim of Strauss and Flower to show it is possible to replace the potential of one outstanding individual to turn a game with the collective strength that means one outstanding individual doesn’t have to.
With Pietersen about to resume his batting for Surrey against Hampshire, how England must crave the breathing space such a victory would allow.