Category Archives: Technology

Anatomy of a Blast: Researchers Develop Sensor System to Assess the Effects of Explosions on Soldiers

Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are becoming a global problem for the U.S. armed forces. To prevent injuries to soldiers and provide better care to those who are injured, the U.S. military is striving to better understand how blasts impact the human body. (more…)

Read More

Twitter can give power to the people

Twitter can easily teach people about social movements such as Occupy Wall Street and even entice them to participate, according to a new study by a Michigan State University education researcher.

The social networking site – which lets users read, send and group together 140-character messages known as tweets – can actually be a better source of information than traditional news sources and online search engines, Benjamin Gleason reports in the journal American Behavioral Scientist. (more…)

Read More

Older Is Wiser: Study Shows Software Developers’ Skills Improve Over Time

There is a perception in some tech circles that older programmers aren’t able to keep pace with rapidly changing technology, and that they are discriminated against in the software field. But a new study from North Carolina State University indicates that the knowledge and skills of programmers actually improve over time – and that older programmers know as much (or more) than their younger peers when it comes to recent software platforms.

“We wanted to explore these perceptions of veteran programmers as being out of step with emerging technologies and see if we could determine whether older programmers are actually keeping up with changes in the field,” says Dr. Emerson Murphy-Hill, an assistant professor of computer science at NC State and co-author of a paper on the research. “And we found that, in some cases, veteran programmers even have a slight edge.” (more…)

Read More

Building the intelligent car of the future

Microsoft: Working with automotive industry to design an updateable car that’s easier to use and responds to the driver’s needs.

Microsoft’s Pranish Kumar and his team work to develop reliable in-car experiences, not by sitting at a desk but by working behind the wheel of a fleet of test vehicles. (more…)

Read More

IBM Research Makes World’s Smallest Movie Using Atoms

Future storage systems based on atomic-scale memory would be capable of storing massive amounts of Big Data
GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS® certifies movie as World’s Smallest Stop-Motion Film

SAN JOSE, Calif. – 01 May 2013: Scientists from IBM today unveiled the world’s smallest movie, made with one of the tiniest elements in the universe: atoms. Named “A Boy and His Atom,” the GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS -verified movie used thousands of precisely placed atoms to create nearly 250 frames of stop-motion action. (more…)

Read More

IBM Unveils New Technology to Connect a Smarter Planet

New Appliance, Software and Services Extend the IBM MobileFirst Strategy

LAS VEGAS – 29 Apr 2013: IBM’s Smarter Planet strategy took a major technological step forward today with the introduction of IBM MessageSight, a new appliance designed to help organizations manage and communicate with the billions of mobile devices and sensors found in systems such as automobiles, traffic management systems, smart buildings and household appliances.

Over the next 15 years, the number of machines and sensors connected to the Internet will explode. According to IMS Research, there will be more than 22 billion web-connected devices by 2020[i].These new devices will generate more than 2.5 quintillion bytes of new data every day[ii], while every hour enough information is consumed by Internet traffic to fill seven million DVDs.[iii]  (more…)

Read More

A techie with a dream sparks a new generation of computer scientists

Read the improbable story of a Microsoft employee who twice turned down a traditional tech sector job so he could teach high school students, and then landed his dream job.

REDMOND, Wash. — Kevin Wang could have followed his career.

Instead, he chose to follow his calling.

It was the early 2000s, and Wang had just graduated from Berkeley with a degree in computer science and electrical engineering. He was trying to decide which tech company he should offer his services to, when a high school came calling. (more…)

Read More

elicit Helps Improve Your Website’s Searchability

Microsoft BizSpark startup uses Windows Azure to put keyword search control into the hands of humans rather than algorithms.

REDMOND, Wash. — April 3, 2013 — One of the biggest fears for website developers is that their visitors click an internal search button on the site, can’t find what they’re looking for and leave frustrated. Because every failed search can mean a lost opportunity for business owners, elicit was founded to help people find what they are looking for within a website.

The founders of elicit are all serial entrepreneurs who met when working together at various startups. Brothers Eric and Adam Heneghan are the co-founders of Giant Step, a digital marketing firm; Jeff Froom is an application and interaction developer; and Chip Aubry is a software architecture expert. While working at an interactive marketing agency, they formed the idea for elicit based on feedback from customers. (more…)

Read More