IT Trends :: Thursday, September 21, 2006

Opinion

Power, Power, and Power

By Terry Calhoun

How many power cords are enough? I’m beginning to think that a typical working professional who needs to reliably use info tech at work, at home, and while traveling needs at least four power cords for their laptop. (1.) One to stay plugged in at home; (2.) one to stay plugged in at work; (3.) one to carry in their computer bag, and (4.) one to plug into a power source in a car or truck.

I would add in how nice it would be to have one with an attachment to fit into an airliner’s power receptacle, except that in the decade I have been flying with laptop computers, I have never actually located such a power receptacle. In my own system of belief, those things are more fantasy than reality.

In a recent article announcing that Virgin Airlines was joining Qantas in disallowing Dell and Apple computers to be taken on board planes with batteries in them, it is mentioned that Virgin would provide adapters for those “lucky enough to sit in seats with power supplies.” Yet another purveyor of the myth...

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IT News

Athletes Learn to Be Careful with MySpace, Facebook Web Sites

Some college athletics administrators monitor athletes' profiles on sites like Facebook...

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Virgin Atlantic Adds Laptop Restrictions

Plan to fly Virgin Atlantic with your Dell or Apple computer?...

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Some Dorms Receive Wireless at Brown University

Somehow, it seems like a time warp when we read headlines like this in late 2006...

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IBM PC Turns 25

This article actually has to describe what a floppy disc is for its readers!...

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Deals, Contracts, Awards

Minneapolis City Council Votes to Go Wireless

Minneapolis is joining other cities and realizing that wireless is a basic infrastructure, just like electricity, gas, and water...

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UIS Officials: Global Campus Shouldn't Harm Online Programs

The University of Illinois at Springfield serves up a number of online courses already…

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New Technology

Microsoft Zune to Share the Music

One feature of Microsoft’s so-called "iPod killer" is a peer-to-peer sharing system that will allow users to...

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University Dumps Cisco VoIP for Open-Source Asterisk

Sam Houston State University is moving 6,000 of its students, faculty, and staff off a Cisco VoIP platform...

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Computing at Speed of Light: Intel, UC Santa Barbara Use Lasers in Computer Chips

Intel and UC Santa Barbara are seeing spots at their success in replacing copper wire with lasers...

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Ohio University Struggles with Slow, Unreliable E-mail

There are only so many IT staff, and this summer at Ohio University they focused on security...

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UPCOMING EVENTS

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October 9-13, 2006 in Las Vegas, NV

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Featured

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    California Governor Signs AI Content Safeguards into Law

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    NIST's U.S. AI Safety Institute Announces Research Collaboration with Anthropic and OpenAI

    The U.S. AI Safety Institute, part of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), has formalized agreements with AI companies Anthropic and OpenAI to collaborate on AI safety research, testing, and evaluation.

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    Report: Use of Game Engines Expands Beyond Gaming

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    Cloud Security Alliance: Best Practices for Securing AI Systems

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