KSFO's Web Wanderer

The Links for May 31, 2003

Playstation Supercomputer - Taxi Mike

Taxi Mike says: "As perhaps the clearest evidence yet of the computing power of sophisticated but inexpensive video-game consoles, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has assembled a supercomputer from an army of Sony PlayStation 2's."

Taxi Mike continues: "The resulting system, with components purchased at retail prices, cost a little more than $50,000. The center's researchers believe the system may be capable of a half trillion operations a second, well within the definition of supercomputer, although it may not rank among the world's 500 fastest supercomputers."

Taxi Mike continues: "Perhaps the most striking aspect of the project, which uses the open source Linux operating system, is that the only hardware engineering involved was placing 70 of the individual game machines in a rack and plugging them together with a high-speed Hewlett-Packard network switch. The center's scientists bought 100 machines, but are holding 30 in reserve, possibly for high-resolution display application."

Taxi Mike continues: "'It took a lot of time because you have to cut all of these things out of the plastic packaging,' said Craig Steffen, a senior research scientist at the center, who is one of four scientists working part time on the project."

Taxi Mike continues: "The scientists are taking advantage of a standard component of the Sony video-game console that was originally intended to move and transform pixels rapidly on a television screen to produce lifelike graphics. The chip is not the PlayStation 2's MIPS microprocessor, but rather a graphics co-processor known as the Emotion Engine. That custom designed silicon chip is capable of producing up to 6.5 billion mathematical operations a second."

Taxi Mike continues: "The impressive performance of the game machine, which has been on the market for a few years, underscores a radical shift that has taken place in the computing world since the end of the cold war in the late 1980's, according to the researchers."

Taxi Mike continues: "While the most advanced computing technologies have historically been developed first for large corporate users and military contractors, increasingly the fastest computers are being developed for the consumer market and for products meant to be placed under Christmas trees."

Albert Einstein Online - Santa Rosa Steve

Santa Rosa Steve says: "A collaborative effort of the Einstein Papers Project at Caltech and the Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Web site will allow users access to 3,000 digitized images of the Nobel prize winner's writings, Einstein Papers editor Diana Buchwald said."

From the site: "The Einstein Archives Online Website provides the first online access to Albert Einstein’s scientific and non-scientific manuscripts held by the Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and to an extensive Archival Database, constituting the material record of one of the most influential intellects in the modern era.

DIGITIZED MANUSCRIPTS: The site allows viewing and browsing of approx. 3,000 high-quality digitized images of Einstein’s writings, available for viewing in two sizes: a standard resolution image, as well as a high-resolution image for closer inspection. This digitization of more than 900 documents written by Einstein was produced by the Jewish National & University Library’s Digitization Project and was made possible by generous grants of David and Fela Shapell."

The digitized manuscripts cover Scientific writings, Non-scientific writings, and Travel diaries.

Also fron the site: "This Gallery provides you with the unique opportunity to explore some of the highlights from the Digitized Manuscripts housed at the Albert Einstein Archives accessible on this website. Take a tour of some of the major aspects of Albert Einstein's life and work as presented through a selection from his personal papers."

"This Gallery includes a representative sample of manuscripts from the Einstein Archives: scientific manuscripts relating to Einstein's special and general theories of relativity; an example of one of his lecture notebooks; non-scientific manuscripts relating to his interest in Jewish affairs and to his world-wide fame; and a sample from his personal material - one of his travel diaries."

"Some of the manuscripts are accompanied by their corresponding published and annotated version from the Collected Papers of Albert Einstein (CPAE) produced by the Einstein Papers Project and published by Princeton University Press. A few items also display their English translation as published in the CPAE."

Play Jeopardy - Dudley

Dudley says: "If you like to watch Jeopardy, here is a chance to play it. It comes complete with graphics and sound just like the TV show. There's Jeopardy, Double Jeopardy and Final Jeopardy."

On a modem, the download takes a while - the game, graphics, sounds all download, as well as the questions. Once the game starts, it works locally, and moves quickly even with slow internet connections.

The questions were all pretty easy. Still - fun, and worth a try.

Thanks, Dudley!

Day Pop - Andantino

Andantino says: "Daypop seems to index only about 30 days' worth of material and indexes a variety of news sources. Feedster may index news sources but doesn't separate them out the way that Daypop does. If I was doing current events research, I would go to Daypop. If I wanted to extend my search beyond recent happenings, I would refer to Feedster."

Andantino found Daypop on Researchbuzz.

Daypop lets you search either "news" or "weblogs". I liked the mix of results.

Feedster - Andantino

Both Daypop and Feedster search RSS feeds.

From the site: "Feedster is a search engine for what is called an "RSS Feed". An RSS Feed is an XML tagged file which allows a website, news site or blog (actually any site) to provide to the world a list of its current contents. RSS feeds can contain all kinds of information from news to blog / weblog posts to stock quotes and more."

"An RSS feed is generally not read in a web browser like a web page. Instead a special piece of software called a "News Aggregator" like Net News Wire or AmphetaDesk or Newsgator is used. What these products do is enable viewing of multiple RSS feeds in an easy fashion. If you read a lot of information on the web or like to keep up with things, you should definitely look into a News Aggregator."

"Now why don't I just use Google? Good question. This was built for the purpose specifically of searching RSS feeds solely, not web pages. We're clearly oriented towards current information and the way we index is at the Post level not the Page level. Lets say that you have a web page which has three stories on it. The RSS feed for this would have three items and that's how Feedster would index it. What Google does is index those three stories as one page which hurts your search results."

From webreference.com: "Rich Site Summary (RSS) is a lightweight XML format designed for sharing headlines and other Web content. Think of it as a distributable "What's New" for your site. Originated by UserLand in 1997 and subsequently used by Netscape to fill channels for Netcenter, RSS has evolved into a popular means of sharing content between sites (including the BBC, CNET, CNN, Disney, Forbes, Motley Fool, Wired, Red Herring, Salon, Slashdot, ZDNet, and more). RSS solves a myriad of problems webmasters commonly face, such as increasing traffic, and gathering and distributing news. RSS can also be the basis for additional content distribution services."

"RSS defines an XML grammar (a set of HTML-like tags) for sharing news. Each RSS text file contains both static information about your site, plus dynamic information about your new stories, all surrounded by matching start and end tags."

Free For All!

"Free For All" picks are hot, FREE items or services. It can be software, online services, you name it - but it's got to be free, with no strings attached.

43 Free Games - Dudley

Dudley found more online games - all for free. He says: "If you're interested in silly, simple computer games this site has 43 of them."

I checked out a few - they seem fun and addictive. This site is worth a bookmark. Check it out.

Webmaster Password Generator 1.0 - Santa Rosa Steve

Santa Rosa Steve says: "Webmaster Password Generator is a powerful and easy to use tool to generate large lists of random passwords. The passwords can be based on different criteria, including length, upper and lower case letters, numbers, special characters and even custom strings. The generated passwords can be copied to the clipboard or saved in a text file (one password per line). The program is suitable for home users to generate a few passwords, but it can also create lists containing thousands of passwords to be used with ISPs, web sites etc."

Random Password Generator - Santa Rosa Steve

Santa Rosa Steve says: "Random Password Generator v1.0 for Windows 9x/ME/NT4/2000/XP

Generate and Save Passwords to Clipboard or File: Author's description "Random Password Generator allows to generate any quantity of passwords with one mouse click. Using Random Password Generator you do not have to think out new passwords. Random Password Generator will do it instead of you.

The main features of Random Password Generator:

generating passwords 1-24 symbols in length
including special symbols (@, !, #, etc.) into the password
composing password using only symbols you listed in the 'other symbols' field
the ability to save to the text file or to copy to the clipboard one password or a password list

Password Agent Lite - Santa Rosa Steve

OK, you have random passwords generated. Now - how do you use them? Remember them? Frget it. Gator? Naw - filled with spyware. Use Password Agent

Santa Rosa Steve says: "Password Agent Lite v2.2.1 for Windows 9x/Me/NT4/2000/XP

Password Agent (PA) is a password manager program that allows you to store all your passwords in a single, easy to navigate, and secure database. The program supports web site address entries and can launch the associated site with the click of a button. It can copy your user name and password to the clipboard or auto-enter them into the fields. Additional features are the option to lock the program as soon as it is minimized to the tray and more. The Lite version is restricted to 25 entries per file, which should be plenty for the average user. If you need more entries, a Pro version can be purchased. "