Monthly Archives: July 2017

Watch This Heroic Captain Use His Boat's Powerful Jet Stream to Put Out a Massive Fire

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It doesn’t take long for a grass fire to turn into a raging inferno that sweeps through entire forests, so a pair of quick-thinking boaters in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada, used their jet boat to create a massive rooster tail that helped douse the flames before firefighters arrived on scene.

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Source: Gizmodo – Watch This Heroic Captain Use His Boat’s Powerful Jet Stream to Put Out a Massive Fire

Apple's Next iPhone: Facial-Recognition, All-Screen Design

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Apple may have just revealed the features you could expect in the next iPhone. Last week, the company released the firmware of the HomePod, a smart speaker which it will begin selling later this year. In the code, the company has accidentally spilled some features about at least one of the iPhone models. Developer Steve Troughton-Smith looked at the code to find that the next iPhone is going to feature facial recognition and a brand new “bezel-less” design. From a report: The near bezel-less design has long been expected, with leaks and rumours suggesting that Apple was following Samsung’s design moves with the Galaxy S8 and producing a smartphone that resembles Android-creator Andy Rubin’s upcoming Essential phone. Apple is not the first company to use IR-based face recognition as a means of unlocking devices and authenticating users. Microsoft’s Windows Hello IR-based face recognition is found in its Surface line as well as Windows 10 computers from other manufacturers.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



Source: Slashdot – Apple’s Next iPhone: Facial-Recognition, All-Screen Design

The Starbucks Frappajappajooza Is Real If You Want It to Be

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There is not a secret Starbucks drink named the Frappajappajooza. That’s just Twitter user wellmanlaylah putting blue Gatorade in a cup. But in another sense, there is a Frappajappajooza, and it’s made of whatever you want, so long as you choose from existing Starbucks ingredients.

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Source: LifeHacker – The Starbucks Frappajappajooza Is Real If You Want It to Be

This $590,000 iPhone Robbery Sounds Like the Craziest Heist Movie

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A year-long manhunt ended last weekend, when police arrested a gang of five Romanian stunt thieves near a large collection of Van Gogh paintings in the Netherlands. In their hideout, the cops found $590,000 worth of iPhones that the suspects allegedly lifted off the back of a truck—while it was barreling down a…

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Source: Gizmodo – This 0,000 iPhone Robbery Sounds Like the Craziest Heist Movie

Russian official on new US sanctions and NASA: “Nothing lasts forever”

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Enlarge / Expedition 52-53 crewmembers Paolo Nespoli of the European Space Agency (left), Sergey Ryazanskiy of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos, center) and Randy Bresnik of NASA, were all smiles last week before their launch. (credit: NASA)

Last Thursday, the United States overwhelmingly passed a new round of sanctions against Russia, taking the executive actions made by then president Barack Obama in December 2016 and putting them into law. Congress also wrote its legislation such that the White House must get Congressional approval prior to any easing of sanctions against Russia. Despite some concerns about the law, President Donald Trump has said he will sign the bill.

Obama leveled these sanctions, including the dismissal of many Russian diplomats in the United States, following credible reports that the foreign adversary had meddled in the US presidential election. Russian President Vladimir Putin took no action at the time, believing he could work with President Trump to ease the restrictions. But after the Congressional action, Putin acted this weekend to remove hundreds of US diplomats from Russia. The number of US diplomats and Russian nationals employed as staff by the US government must now be 455, the same number Russia has in the United States.

In its most recent round of sanctions, the US government took care to carve out exceptions for key industries, including aerospace. This allows the American rocket company United Launch Alliance to continue to procure RD-180 engines for its Altas V rocket, and for NASA to continue smooth relations with Russia for its partnership with the International Space Station. Three astronauts, from NASA, Italy, and Russia, launched aboard a Russian spacecraft Friday to the station.

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Source: Ars Technica – Russian official on new US sanctions and NASA: “Nothing lasts forever”

AMD Releases Radeon Pro Software for Vega: Crimson ReLive Edition Vega Pro

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Following up last week’s launch of Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition 17.7.2, AMD today is releasing Radeon Pro Software Crimson ReLive Edition for Vega-based Radeon Professional Graphics, earlier known as version 17.8. With the official unveiling of Vega-based products yesterday, this edition of Radeon Pro Software brings support to the Radeon Pro WX 9100, Radeon Pro SSG, and Radeon Vega Frontier Edition.


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Radeon Pro: Crimson ReLive Edition for Vega


ReLive Edition for Vega Pro comes with support for 8K and High Dynamic Range (HDR) displays, something that was included in this past Thursday’s release of Radeon Pro Software Enterprise Driver 17.Q3 for non-Vega Radeon Pro products. Likewise, ReLive enhancements from 17.7.2 will also be present in the Vega Radeon Pro software.



This version also comes with bug fixes and enhanced features for the Radeon ProRender plugins/add-ins such as Autodesk 3DS Max, Autodesk Maya, Solidworks, and Blender. Additionally, AMD notes that Radeon ProRender will be integrated into the upcoming R19 release of MAXON Cinema 4D. 



Security-wise, the Pro WX9100, the new Vega SSG, and Vega Frontier Edition have AMD Secure Processors, a feature recently seen in EPYC and Ryzen Pro CPUs. This hardware root of trust operates during both boot time and shutdown, and works in conjunction with Radeon Pro Software and Microsoft Device Guard.



The rest of ReLive Edition for Vega Pro builds on Radeon Pro Software Crimson ReLive Edition 17.6, which was Radeon Vega Frontier Edition’s inaugural driver. This includes full functionality of Radeon Pro Software “Driver Options,” where the user can ‘swap’ between Radeon Pro Software and select Radeon Software versions without a reboot. Previously in ReLive Edition 17.6, swapping was limited to switching UIs.



ReLive Edition for Vega Pro allows the user to actually load two Radeon Software gaming drivers in addition to the installed professional driver. This will enable the use of gaming software features (except WattMan for adjusting GPU frequency). The swap functionality is intended for both game development workflows and just plain convenient gaming. AMD has clarified that this feature is only available for Vega-based professional products at the moment.



These drivers can be found at the AMD workstation graphics driver download page.



Source: AnandTech – AMD Releases Radeon Pro Software for Vega: Crimson ReLive Edition Vega Pro

OpenGL 4.6 Released With Vulkan/SPIR-V Ingestion, Parallel Shader Compiles & Finally AF

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As we have been anticipating and hinting at for weeks/months, a new formal update to OpenGL has been in the works and it’s officially out today. Meet OpenGL 4.6! This is a pretty significant update and internally they had the debate whether to call it OpenGL 5.0, but here we are with OpenGL 4.6 that features Vulkan/SPIR-V extensions and more. The good news is the open-source Mesa drivers aren’t too far out from OpenGL 4.6 support, at least RadeonSI and Intel.

Source: Phoronix – OpenGL 4.6 Released With Vulkan/SPIR-V Ingestion, Parallel Shader Compiles & Finally AF

A New Game Helps You Navigate Difficult End-of-Life Conversations 

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Call it the new game of Truth. Players go around the table answering questions in their little blue booklets, but these questions aren’t geared to get them talking about that one time they went skinny dipping in Maui. Instead, the questions aim to launch difficult conversations, ones that may be painful, ones they may…

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Source: LifeHacker – A New Game Helps You Navigate Difficult End-of-Life Conversations