Gita Technologies presented a new technology call WaterFall, which is a unique solution, based on proprietary hardware and software, which provides a secure , one-way only, channel to transfer data into detached networks.

Organizations in large, prefer not to connect their internal networks to the internet. In some industries - government related, health care, banking and financial - this requirement is mandatory by regulations.

Working in a detached network does not enable receiving email and files. This creates a great liability on the business process of the organization.

The WaterFall solution enables these organization to connect to the external world (directly to the Internet, or to other networks), on-line. Via WaterFall, emails and files can be securely transferred into the internal network, without any possibility of data leakage.

WaterFall integrates with all leading anti-virus and content filtering systems.

Samsung SDI Co, Ltd of Korea has developed a 32-inch cathode ray tube (CRT) only 35cm deep. The new CRT makes it possible to build a CRT TV only 38cm deep (see Fig). The 32-inch CRT TVs available on the market today are normally 50 to 60cm deep. While this new CRT would still be significantly thicker than the 10cm or so of plasma display panel (PDP) and LCD TVs, it would be on a par with the 40cm depth of most rear-projection units using digital micromirror devices (DMD) or similar technologies.

Samsung SDI plans to begin small-scale manufacturing at the end of 2004, shifting to volume production the following year. The technology used in the 32-inch design will also be adopted in other CRT sizes, and the firm’s entire CRT line-up is expected to be updated by 2006.

The trade group that represents Hollywood’s major motion picture studios is expected to announce Thursday that it intends to file as many as 230 lawsuits in coming weeks against individuals who have illegally shared copyrighted movie files over the Internet, according to two people involved in the proceedings.

It would be the first time that the Motion Picture Association of America, which represents the major studios, including Warner Brothers Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Paramount Pictures, has sued individuals for sharing files, one of the people said. Potential targets of the lawsuits have not received warnings, the people said.

Rich Taylor, a spokesman for the MPAA, declined to comment on any action against file sharing that the organization might be considering. But the movie studios have tried to be more proactive recently in discouraging piracy, sponsoring classes in grade schools and running antipiracy messages in movie theaters.

The association has planned a news conference Thursday at which the association’s new chief executive, Dan Glickman, will disclose the movie industry’s plans, according to a news release distributed on Wednesday.

Source: News.com

Mozilla has posted the second Firefox 1.0 release candidate on their FTP servers. This should be the last official release of Firefox before the big 1.0 launch date on November 9th.

The Firefox developers please ask that you look at the following areas:

Please test heavily:

# site authentication (especially over SSL)
# extension installation via update.mozilla.org and other sites.
# the MacOS X builds, a number of theme changes have been made.
# software update - we’re making another attempt at this. We think we’ve got the bugs from RC1, so please test by following these instructions.

Please continue to test:

# the find toolbar
# gecko and website rendering
# migration from other browsers on first run
# opening links in Firefox from external applications
# focus interaction between tabs

Source: Neowin

A US legal firm specialising into corporate law is taking the world’s biggest computer games publishers to task over what it claims is the violation of a 1987 3D graphics patent.

The patent, number 4,734,690 is owned one-time printing and graphics specialist Tektronix and covers the display in 2D of a 3D image. It was filed in April 1987 and granted almost a year later.

The technique described is used by almost every game that uses 3D modelling, from the latest titles right back to the likes of Quake and possibly right back to Doom and even Wolfenstein - all products of the 1990s. It covers the use of a 3D space - the UAC HQ on Mars, say - to encompass one or more 3D objects - half a dozen Cacodeamons, say. The patent details how panning across the scene - sidestepping past a plasma bolt, say - can be realistically depicted on a 2D display, such as a computer monitor.

Given its ubiquity, the firm behind the suit, Dallas, Texas-based McKool Smith, has named all the big guns in the gaming industry, including Electronic Arts, Activision, Take Two, Ubisoft, Atari, THQ, Vivendi Universal, Sega, Square Enix, Tecmo, Lucasarts and Namco. Some smaller firms are also in line for action, apparently.

Prior art may yet come to their rescue. Early 3D games, such as The Colony and Spectre, released in the late 1980s, may just come in ahead of the 1987 filing. Early CAD and 3D graphics apps may also utilise the kind of process outlined in the patent, which doesn’t explicitly focus on games, though that’s clearly where the money is these days.

Source: The Register