Stories by: Michael Cooney

It's not all bits and bytes

A round up of interesting algorithms and look at how they impact your community.

Robots set for smack-down in US

A Cisco exec who was shot to death in Detroit last week is being mourned this week as a gentle family man, a "gifted techie" and a voice of reason.

Welcome to the petaflop generation. That was the message as the new most powerful supercomputer in the world IBM's $100,000 million Roadrunner system installed at the US Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory was officially named the most powerful and energy efficient supercomputer in the world.

Looking for a fun, last-minute little something for that special techie someone? Look no further.

An Australian researcher is developing technology that would let you use your eyes - or more specifically your iris - to unlock your PC, access secure buildings or open your front door.

With only a week before the busiest airline travel day of the year the US Government Accounting Office today issued a scathing and chilling report on airline security: Bomb making materials costing less that US$150 were purchased and carried past airport security screening in 19 US airports.

The companies tried to wear each other out in what was then called the midrange server market. The DEC VAX, rolled out in 1976 was a legend but the IBM System /36s and /38s were no slouches. Big Blue morphed those successful servers into its VAX killer, the AS/400 in 1988 and by 1994, 250,000 of them had been sold. DEC eventually tried to counter with its Alpha chip -based line of advanced servers but by the early 1990's Ken Olsen's engineering company was in trouble.

Still basking in the glow of its overly hyped iPhone launch, Apple plans to launch a cheaper version of much-sought after devices in the fourth quarter.

In the pantheon of controversial Microsoft comments CEO Steve Ballmer's recent quote about the Apple iPod: "There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance. It's a US$500 subsidized item," ranks right up there. But Between Ballmer and Chairman Bill Gates that comment would be hard pressed to crack the Top 15 all-time most controversial or even colorful things the two of them have uttered in the past oh, 20 years or so. These are my favorite quotes, there are many like them but these are mine: