Friday, March 9, 2007

Auto-Parallelizing Compiler From Codeplay. Max Romantschuk writes "Parallelization of code can be a very tricky thing. We've all heard of the challenges with Cell, and with dual and quad core processors this is becoming an ever more important issue to deal with. The Inquirer writes about a new auto-parallelizing compiler called Sieve from Codeplay: 'What Sieve is is a C++ compiler that will take a section of code and parallelize it for you with a minimum hassle. All you really need to do is take the code you want to run across multiple CPUs and put beginning and end tags on the parts you want to run in parallel.' There is more info on Sieve available on Codeplay's site."[Slashdot] 8:19:04 PM      Google It!.

LinuxBIOS Gets GUI. LWATCDR writes "Has a great write up on combining LinuxBios a Linux kernel, busybox, X, a window manager, and rxvt into a two meg flash chip. So what does get you? A six second boot time for one. All sorts of uses come to mind. Terminals to use with the Linux Terminal server. A very fast booting embedded system like a Car computer. With every one pushing for multi-core cpus, mega gigabyte drives and many gigabytes of ram it is interesting to see how small you can go." [Slashdot] 7:21:32 PM      Google It!.

First high-resolution 3D image of a complete cell. Researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory and the University of Colorado have obtained the first 3D visualization of a complete eukaryotic ce... [KurzweilAI.net Accelerating Intelligence News] 7:11:38 PM      Google It!.

Omega-3s may affect mood and behavior. Omega-3 fatty acids are associated with increased gray matter volume in areas of the brain commonly linked to mood and behavior, according to a University of ... [KurzweilAI.net Accelerating Intelligence News] 7:10:37 PM      Google It!.

A conversation with Barry Ribbeck about digital identity in higher education. I met Barry Ribbeck, who[base ']s Director of Systems Architecture and Infrastructure at Rice University, a few years ago at a Dartmouth conference on the deployment of public key infrastructure (PKI) in higher education. I attended that conference several times as an observer, and wrote a couple of InfoWorld columns about it. For today[base ']s podcast I invited Barry to reflect on what[base ']s been happening with token-based authentication, PKI, and identity federation in the realm of higher education. Near the beginning of our conversation I mentioned that people are spooked by the Real ID initiative, and Barry offered a great perspective. We already have a national [~] indeed, international [~] federation of machine-readable identity documents. It[base ']s called the ATM network, and we all use it routinely. For years, people like Barry Ribbeck have been working toward the same kind of ubiquitous deployment of smartcards and digital certificates. It[base ']s been slow going, and still is, but these folks have a long-term vision and the patience and determination to make it real. [Jon Udell] 7:05:26 PM      Google It!.