Shuttle Endeavour cleared for June 13 launch

While the shuttle Endeavour's crew reviewed emergency procedures at the launch pad Wednesday, NASA managers held an executive-level flight readiness review and cleared the ship for blastoff June 13 on a complex space station assembly mission.

NASA Launch Director Pete Nickolenko, directing his first shuttle launch campaign, said there is no contingency time left in the schedule to handle unexpected problems. But so far, the shuttle's systems are checking out normally and the team is optimistic about starting the countdown next Wednesday for a launch try one week from Saturday.

"We're running on all cylinders right now," Nickolenko said. "We're hitting our stride."

Over the past month, NASA launched the shuttle Atlantis on a successful mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope, the Russian space agency launched an additional three crew members to the International Space Station, Endeavour was moved from pad 39B to pad 39A for final processing, and Atlantis was returned to Florida from California where it landed May 24.

Endeavour's crew--commander Mark Polansky, pilot Douglas Hurley, flight engineer Julie Payette, David Wolf, Christopher Cassidy, Thomas Marshburn, and space station flight engineer Timothy Kopra--flew to Florida on Tuesday and reviewed emergency procedures at the pad Wednesday. All seven plan to strap in aboard the shuttle Thursday for a dress-rehearsal countdown.

Aboard the space station, meanwhile, commander Gennady Padalka and NASA flight engineer Michael Barratt plan to carry out two spacewalks, one Friday and the other next Wednesday, to rig the Zvezda command module for the eventual attachment of another docking port.

A few hours after the spacewalk ends, NASA will start Endeavour's countdown.

"It's been a really amazing schedule over the last couple of months," Polansky said Wednesday at the launch pad. "It's tight from the standpoint that we're here in Florida to climb in the vehicle tomorrow. We're going to go back home, take a day off, go into quarantine Saturday, come back down here Monday night and launch next Saturday. I mean, that's really tight.

"But I know from a training perspective, we're ready," he said. "It would be great if we could just climb in and go tomorrow, but I think our families would be a little upset because they're not here!"

The shuttle Endeavour's crew chats before answering questions from reporters at launch pad 39A.

(Credit: William Harwood)

The 16-day flight features five spacewalks to install an external experiment platform on the Japanese Kibo research module, to swap out batteries in the station's oldest set of solar arrays, and to deliver critical spare parts. Endeavour also will ferry Kopra to the lab complex for an extended stay and bring Japanese station flier Koichi Wakata back to Earth.

Endeavour was hauled to pad 39B in April to serve as a rescue vehicle for the crew of Atlantis. In the Hubble Space Telescope's orbit, the Atlantis astronauts could not seek safe haven aboard the space station if any major problem developed that might prevent a safe re-entry.

Engineers actually started a countdown for Endeavour late in Atlantis' mission to keep the rescue option open as long as possible. As it turned out, no such flight was needed and after bad weather blocked multiple attempts to bring Atlantis back to Florida, the ship was diverted to Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.

But the wisdom of processing Endeavour in parallel was made clear during a post-landing inspection of Atlantis. Space debris, a greater threat at Hubble's high altitude, apparently hit one of the shuttle's braking rocket nozzles, damaging the inner and outer surfaces.

NASA flight directors and mission managers, at the Kennedy Space Center for shuttle Endeavour's flight readiness review, watch the shuttle Atlantis' arrival after a ferry flight from California atop a 747 jumbo jet.

(Credit: Ben Cooper/Spaceflightnow.com)

The shuttle spent much of the mission flying tail first to shield more sensitive areas from debris impacts and small dings are not unusual. But Mike Moses, director of shuttle integration at the Kennedy Space Center, said this impact appeared to be on the high end of the scale.

As it now stands, NASA will have only three days to get Endeavour off the pad or the flight will be delayed until after the planned June 17 launch of NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. Going into the campaign, Nickolenko said the team would make two back-to-back attempts if necessary, but not three.

If the launch is delayed, and if the lunar orbiter takes off on time, NASA may be able to make additional attempts to launch Endeavour on June 19 and 20. After that, the flight would slip to July 11 because of temperature constraints related to the space station's orbit.

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Intel gets official with new Core i7, mobile chips

Intel has updated its price list with new processors, including new Core i7 chips and a bevy of mobile models.

HP m9600T features the top-of-the-line Core i7 975

(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)

Many gamers have been waiting for the update of the "Nehalem" Core i7, which was first introduced in November of last year. Intel's June 2 update includes the newly minted i7-975 (8M L3 cache, 4 cores, 8 threads, 3.33GHz, 6.4 GT/s QPI). This is priced at $999.

For the uninitiated, threads effectively double the number of tasks a processor can do, GT/s stands for Giga Transfers per second, and QPI is Intel's new Quick Path Interconnect technology.

But there's more. The i7-950 boasts identical specifications except for a lower 3.06GHz clock speed and 4.8 GT/s. It is priced at $562.

Hewlett-Packard's m9600T tower can be configured with the i7-975 and a 1GB Nvidia GeForce GTS 250 graphics card for just over $1,900.

Other vendors such as Falcon Northwest offer decked-out systems at a big price. The Falcon Northwest Mach V is priced at more than $4,000 with 6GB of memory, 1GB Nvidia GeForce GTS 250 graphics card, and a 256GB solid-state drive.

Equally anticipated are the new Intel ULV (ultra-low-voltage) processors. Though some of these were were listed at the end of March (such as the 5-watt, single-core SU3500 and 10-watt, dual-core SU9600), the 10-watt Pentium architecture-based SU2700 (1 core, 2M Cache, 1.30 GHz, 800MHz front-side bus) is new. Intel is not listing this chip, nor is it publishing a price. Though notebooks with this chip are expected to go as low as $499, according to Intel.

Laptops using the ULV chips include the ultra-thin Asus UX30, which will feature the 1.6GHz SU9600, among other chips, and the MSI X340 X-Slim, which sports the SU3500.

Intel also listed new mainstream mobile processors, including the 35-watt T9900 (6M L2 cache, 2 cores, 2 threads, 3.06GHz, 1066MHz FSB). This goes for $530.

Also listed as new is the 28-watt P9700 (6M L2 cache, 2 cores, 2 threads, 2.80GHz, 1066MHz FSB). This lists for $348. The existing T9600 (2.8GHz) fell in price 40 percent to $316 from $530.

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Yahoo sues NFL players group over fantasy stats

Yahoo's StatTracker, a premium service, provides fantasy team owners statistical updates on players moments after they're involved in plays.

(Credit: Yahoo)

Yahoo has filed a lawsuit against the NFL Players Association, contending that it shouldn't be forced to pay royalties for using players' names, statistics, and photos in its online fantasy football game because the information is publicly available.

The complaint (PDF), which was filed Monday in U.S. District Court for Minnesota, alleges that the players group has threatened to sue the Internet giant if it doesn't pay licensing fees for the information. Yahoo had licensing agreements with the players union for previous football seasons, but the last of those deals expired on March 1, according to the complaint.

Yahoo claims it no longer needs the union's permission to use the players' information, citing an April court decision in a similar case between the players group and CBS Interactive (the parent company of CNET). The court in that case found that CBS Interactive didn't have to pay for use of football players' names or statistics because the information was already in the public domain. The players association is currently appealing that decision.

Major League Baseball lost a similar case in 2007 to CBC Distribution and Marketing--a Missouri company that sells fantasy sports products via the Web, e-mail, regular mail, and phone. MLB's Internet media arm, later joined by the pro-baseball players' union, had claimed that CBC was using baseball players' names and statistics without a license, thereby violating the players' rights to publicity under state intellectual property laws.

CBC won at the district court level and again at the appeals court level, which held that the company's "first amendment rights in offering its fantasy baseball products supersede the players' rights of publicity."

The lawsuit asks the court to declare that Yahoo's fantasy game business does not violate any rights of publicity owned or controlled by the players group, and prevent the players group from interfering with or threatening Yahoo's fantasy game business.

As many as 15 million people participate in fantasy football leagues, generating more than $1 billion a year in revenue, according to court documents filed in that case.

Carl Francis, director of communications for the NFL Players Association, declined to comment on the lawsuit.

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Does Opera outperform iPhone's Safari browser?

(Credit: CNET/Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt)

The problem with statistics is that it's too easy to jigger data down to numbers that prove in the end how quickly the exercise can resemble art as much as science. Take the latest stats regarding Opera's mobile performance, for instance. StatCounter's Tuesday graph showed proof of Opera's climb above the iPhone's Safari browser for the month of May.

Yet the claim that "Opera took 24.6 percent of the worldwide market compared to 22.3 percent for iPhone" is quickly followed by the admission that one only needs to calculate page views from the iPod Touch for mobile Safari to bypass Opera's lead. Web surfing from the Touch alone represents 14.9 percent of May's mobile browsing, according to StatCounter. Add it to iPhone's browser score and Safari's 37.2 percent overall market share quickly outpaces Opera's not-quite-25 percent.

The deeper you dive, the murkier it gets. What StatCounter didn't make clear in this report, and what is absolutely essential to gauging the popularity of one browser solution over another, is which Opera browser StatCounter counted. Was it Opera Mini, the build for Java phones? Or Opera Mobile, which works with Windows Mobile andSymbian platforms? Or was it both? If the final count indeed includes page views from all the browsers powered by Opera Software, then it could also cover white labeled browsing from a number of Archos personal media players and from the Nintendo DSI. If it doesn't, should it?

Even Opera isn't totally certain what StatCounter's methodology sucks in, though a spokesperson did tell CNET that the company puts a lot of faith into StatCounter's figures. A representative at StatCounter was not immediately available for comment.

Opera versus Safari, or iPhone versus everything else?

You might also wonder if this statistical volley between Opera and Safari faithfully compares apples to apples, or if it is in effect one more measure that pits the iPhone and iPod Touch against other handsets. After all, iPhone accounts for 10 percent global smartphone market share while Symbian phones alone hold nearly 50 percent of the rest. By all logic, iPhone's Safari shouldn't come close to generating the greater-than-20 percent of the world's mobile traffic StatCounter says it has.

And yet, since Apple has shut out all browsing competition on the iPhone, I argue that the browser's seeming popularity is more a testament to the hardware's browsing-friendliness than it is to the browsing vehicle itself. In other words, it appears that more people browse more often on the iPhone than they do from other mobile phones. Would we see similar results were Nokia to lock out third-party browsers, too? Or perhaps Apple's minimalisticmonopolistic limited approach to handsets and mobile browsers is one key to Safari's success. The irony, of course, is that Apple isn't ideologically selling its browser the way Opera is. It's selling devices, plus brand confidence and Apple's "cool factor" appeal.

So, does all this add up to a hollow numbers victory for Opera?

Not necessarily. Whether Opera or iPhone's Safari (plus iPod Touch) is truly in the lead, the mobile browser's (or browsers') numbers are up. Following StatCounter's stats, Opera's mobile browser almost fully recovered in May from a steady three percent decline since January to April 2009. In January, StatCounter called Opera out at 24.69 percent of the mobile browsing market, 0.05 percent higher than it is this month. However the usage numbers shake out this month, that turnaround, at least, is something Opera can unquestioningly be proud of.

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Palm Pre reviewed: Does it live up to the hype?

We haven't seen so much buzz over a phone since the iPhone, but for the past six months, all eyes have been on the Palm Pre.

Introduced at CES 2009, the Palm Pre quickly became the most anticipated phone of the year, not only for what it meant for Palm and Sprint--two companies struggling behind their competitors--but also for what the device promised. The multitasking features, the notification system, a physical keyboard, multitouch screen--all these factors combined made it, in our opinion, the most legitimate rival to the iPhone yet.

We all know the six months that followed the Pre's debut were a little tortuous: the long wait for an availability date and pricing; the not being able to touch the Pre without supervision.

Well, now that is all over. While the June 6 release is still a couple of days away, we've been lucky enough to spend the past few days with the final product, poring over every detail of the device. Does it live up to all the hype? Well, you'll have to read our full review to find out. And get comfy: the review is a bit long, but there's a lot to talk about. Also, check out our Palm Pre screenshots gallery to get a more in-depth look at the Palm webOS.

Read CNET full review of the Palm Pre.
Palm Pre unboxing video

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McAfee's new family shiel

On the heels of Symantec's OnlineFamily.Norton released earlier this year, security stalwart McAfee jumps into the family protection game with a new home-oriented protection program. Called McAfee Family Protection, the program offers many familiar tools to parents in the hopes of fostering conversation while protecting children from harm.

McAfee Family Protection protects children based on multiple levels of technology.

(Credit: McAfee)

McAfee Family Protection offers blocking, monitoring, and parental notifications for most computer-based activities. The program allows for up to 10 users on three different machines, utilizing several layers of algorithms to monitor behavior. Parents can outright block or merely monitor Web sites, social-networking behavior, and instant messaging including Facebook IM and multi-protocol chat clients, according to Javed Hasan, vice president of McAfee Product Management.

In addition to blanket blocks for subject matter and specific Web site blocks, parents can customize rules so that they can block all of YouTube, or just YouTube videos that have specific tags. Web sites protected by secure protocol, https, can also be blocked. They can also set up roadblocks that prevent specific applications from opening, such as peer-to-peer clients or media players, and parents can receive brief SMS notifications alongside more detailed e-mail reports.

The program also can restrict computer usage based on cumulative time used or by time of day. It uses a server-based clock, so tampering with the local system-based clock shouldn't affect this feature.

McAfee says that Family Protection uses about 20 MB of RAM when idle and can run on systems with as little as 128 MB of RAM. It's available as a 30-day trial, after which a three-computer license costs $39.99.

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WorldMate's travel service lands on the iPhone

WorldMate, the popular travel planning and organizational service, has expanded its mobile reach onto the iPhone. The two different versions of the app, which were released late Tuesday night (one free, and a premium version that costs a hefty $19.99), give travelers tools to create and track travel itineraries including flights, hotel reservations, rental cars, and any appointments along the way.

The two versions of the app offer identical functionality for core parts of WorldMate's service, like a flight search tool, world clock list, currency conversion, and a heads-up display on what's on your schedule. However, the paid "gold" version comes without any kind of advertising. Feature-wise, it also adds niceties like an automatic flight status checker that, with the soon-to-be-released iPhone OS 3.0, will send you an alert if there's a delay or cancellation of your flight. It also plugs into Google Maps to tack together a rich map with all the places you're visiting on your trip.

Until it gets the live notifications, users of both versions will simply have to use the one-click "check flight status" link. This checks information against WorldMate's delay and cancellation tracker. It also lets you know about any last-minute gate changes.

WorldMate can put your entire travel itinerary in one app, and give you a heads-up if there are any delays or cancellations. It even has mini apps built in, like this currency converter (pictured right)

(Credit: CNET)

The app is quite polished and ran smoothly on my phone. You can get more full-featured versions of the productivity tools that are included in the app by using other, standalone iPhone applications, however WorldMate's strength is that it puts all of those things in one package. This may seem like a trivial matter, but since the iPhone does a lousy job at multitasking, it's nice to have a Swiss army app equivalent.

WorldMate faces competition from TripIt, which has had its own iPhone app since mid-April. It does many of these things in a free package. However, it does not yet have its own notification service. Instead, it takes any delay notifications you get from your carrier and updates its own information. It's also tied into third-party services (via its API) that can alert you to potential changes to your travel plans.

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Digg's new ads put advertisers on the front page

Digg unveiled a new ad platform on Wednesday that will give companies an ad medium that looks and feels like user-submitted stories that have been promoted to Digg's front page. Users will be able to Digg up ads they like and "bury" ones they don't using the same voting mechanism used on regular site links.

Partners for the initial roll-out of ads include Electronic Arts and Intel, the latter of which has provided sponsorship on Digg's labs pages as well as advertising on other parts of the site.

Two things make advertised Digg stories different than naturally submitted story links. One is the lack of an upcoming section for ads. For regular stories, the upcoming section consists of user-submitted links, which are sent to a holding pen. Users then vote them up to the front page. The other is a way for users to completely remove ads that don't do well, which can't be done in this case. Instead of completely removing low-ranked ads from the front page by burying them, they're simply seen less by users.

What isn't clear with this move is whether Digg learned its lesson from the DiggBar debacle. By changing the way users interacted with links from the site, it made a good portion of its heaviest users, along with the publishers it was linking to, quite angry. In this case, the line between advertising and user-submitted content may looks and feel a little too close for some.

It could also spin out of control if Digg ever allows content producers to pay to have certain stories promoted, which would dilute the rewards of user voting, or having stories on the front page.

In a post on Digg's official blog, Digg's chief strategy officer, Mike Maser, said the company will continue to tweak the functionality of the ads based on user feedback. In the past the company has been speedy to change things users have chimed in on, either in its town hall sessions or Digg-related stories that make it to the front page.

Digg's new ads look a lot like user-submitted content, and function much the same way too.

(Credit: Digg)

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Snort Webinar: Installing Snort 2.8.4 on Fedora Core 10

In this edition of the Snort Users Webinar Series Nick Moore a Security Engineer with Sourcefire will discuss installing Snort 2.8.4 on Fedora Core 10. Nick's presentation will cover a basic Snort/Base installation on a VMWare install of FC 10 with:

• MySQL 5.0.77
• Libnet 1.0.2a
• Libpcap 1.0.0
• BASE 1.4.2
• Apache 2.2.11
  

Date: Friday, June 12, 2009

Time: 12:00 PM US Eastern Daylight Time (GMT -4:00)

Registration: https://sourcefireevents.webex.com/sourcefireevents/onstage/g.php?d=663567514&t=a

As always, this session will be recorded and posted on Snort.org for future use.

I hope you can join us.

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Apple confirms North Carolina facility

After weeks of speculation, Apple on Wednesday confirmed its plans to build a server farm facility in North Carolina. Gov. Bev Perdue officially welcomed Apple to North Carolina after signing a bill giving the company a state tax credit worth $46 million.

"We're looking forward to building a new data center in North Carolina, and we appreciate the efforts of Gov. Perdue and state lawmakers who helped make it possible," Apple representative Susan Lundgren told CNET. "Our teams are getting started right away to acquire a site for the data center, and we plan to begin construction soon."

Changes in the tax laws were not without opponents. Last week when the House voted in favor of the tax credit by a vote of 80-34, House Minority Leader Rep. Paul Stam was clearly upset with the incentives.

"They're playing us," Stam said. "And they're going to keep playing us as long as you agree to be played. They'll either come or they won't come, but whether they come I can virtually assure you it will not depend upon whether you pass this bill."

North Carolina said the Apple server farm will have about 50 full-time employees. One of the regulations that Apple has to follow is that the average wage in the facility exceed the wage standard in the county where it's located.

Overall, when all job types (like maintenance) are factored in, the state expects the Apple facility to create up to 250 jobs. The Department of Commerce estimates that with a $1 billion investment, more than 3,000 jobs could be created in the regional economy.

"North Carolina continues to be a prime location for growing and expanding global technology companies," said Perdue in a prepared release. "We welcome Apple to North Carolina and look forward to working with the company as it begins providing a significant economic boost to local communities and the state."

The site has not been finalized yet, but Catawba and Cleveland counties are said to be potential sites for the facility.

Jim Dalrymple has followed Apple and the Mac industry for the last 15 years, first as part of MacCentral and then in various positions at Macworld. A guitar player for 20 years, Jim also writes about the professional audio market, examining the best ways to write and record songs on a Macintosh with Logic Pro and Pro Tools. Jim is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET.

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Second Life to host first college graduation

A slide from a Bryant & Stratton College gallery of the upcoming graduation ceremony at its virtual campus in Second Life.

(Credit: Bryant & Stratton College)

It's the time of year for college graduations--students don caps and gowns, degrees are conferred and commencement speakers stir graduating seniors' emotions--even in the virtual world.

Second Life on Wednesday is hosting the commencement ceremony for online students graduating from Bryant & Stratton College, and appropriately, Second Life founder Philip Rosedale will be the guest speaker.

"These graduates are pioneers, overcoming life's obstacles to pursue their educational goals through online education and start a new life," says Scott Traylor, director of admissions of the 150-year-old college. "It is particularly fitting and gratifying that they celebrate their achievement with Philip Rosedale, the man who pioneered a whole new virtual world through Second Life."

Bryant & Stratton College has chosen to offer its online curriculum through Second Life's education community. There, students can go to virtual campuses, attend conferences, and register for online classes. Hundreds of schools use Second Life, from K-12 to universities, including Harvard, Texas State, and Stanford. Study abroad is even possible, where students can virtually study in Asia, the Middle East or Africa.

The college will bestow diplomas on Wednesday to about 40 graduates who have earned online degrees. Besides Rosedale's speech, the event will include a virtual procession for students dressed in their digital regalia.

Bryant & Stratton was initially a business institute and is now is an accredited proprietary college with campuses in Ohio, Virginia, Wisconsin, and New York, according to its Web site. It offers both two-year and four-year degrees.

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