Catch up on stories from the past week (and beyond) at the Slashdot story archive

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror

Comment Re:wearing multiple hats (Score 1) 26

As a tech-startup founder I voted 'other', but agree on checkboxes. Daily work includes HR, AR/AP, production & logistics, IT, QA, hardware and software dev, ops and janitorial, and then back to the spare-time-gig of having two teens and a wife. The only one I'd have to leave unchecked is "retired".

Comment Doesn't have to be that smart. (Score 3, Interesting) 381

I signed up for a Pebble on day 2 of the Kickstarted campaign. When I finally got it, I spend many hours loading watchfaces, apps and exploring all the features. Nothing really klicked for me. Kept it on my arm anyway for a week - just for show and tell - and now I'm totally hooked.
The killer app is the alerts. Not having to pull out the phone 500 times every day is what keeps this ugly thing on my wrist.
Forget all the music control, runkeeper, navigation and whatever they try. Camera - that's just stupid. That's all done better on the phone, but the *alerts* are golden! Several friends went through the same process. Initial disappointment turned to must-have. I never use the buttons - just a quick glance when the thing buzz. Android or iOS in the watch is nonsense. Pebble got the idea right, but could scale down on the features and focus on the looks.
So get me a "moderately clever" watch...

Comment Re:Wireless = less secure (Score 0) 377

Jamming works for sure, and the RF protocols are not very sophisticated so a dedicated geek could surely have some fun decoding and synthesizing the signals and cause some serious confusion.

In the "real world" though, no burglar goes through that effort. Smash the window, find the siren and kill it with a hammer in 15 seconds and get what you want before the alarm company has their truck sent out 20 minutes later.
You don't need a degree to figure that out.

So the only actual downside with a wireless system is the hassle of changing batteries in the sensors every couple of years. Other than that they are really no less secure than a wired system. (We're talking residential here - a jeweler store attracts a different clientele)

But here's the insider secret that the alarm industry don't want you to know:
Alarm systems do not "protect" anything. They give the owner artificial peace of mind. The biggest value of buying a system is the deterring effect of the sign in the front yard.

Portables

Body Heat Could Charge Your Cellphone 94

An anonymous reader writes to mention Nature is reporting that scientists have discovered a much more efficient way to use silicon to convert heat into electricity. This offers the possibility of many different applications including possibly charging your portable electronics just by wearing them close to your skin. "The concept of converting waste heat into electricity isn't exactly new, but it never really materialized due to efficiency hurdles. Now, scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley think they may have found a key [to] increase the conversion efficiency by a factor of 100."

Slashdot Top Deals

The more cordial the buyer's secretary, the greater the odds that the competition already has the order.

Working...