Posted by on under embassies in japan, german foreign ministry, gnu linux, german engineering, german embassy, compar, maintenance costs, schuster, desktops, ly, rolf, guardian, open source, madrid, korea, linux, germany |

ruphus13 writes "Here's another example of 'German Engineering' — The Foreign Ministry in Germany is migrating all of its 11,000 desktops to GNU/Linux and other open source applications. According to the article, 'this has drastically reduced maintenance costs in comparison with other ministries. "The Foreign Ministry is running desktops in many far away and some very difficult locations. Yet we spend only one thousand euro per desktop per year. That is far lower than other ministries, that on average spend more than 3000 euro per desktop per year ... Open Source desktops are far cheaper to maintain than proprietary desktop configurations," says Rolf Schuster, a diplomat at the German Embassy in Madrid and the former head of IT at the Foreign Ministry ... "The embassies in Japan and Korea have completely switched over, the embassy in Madrid has been exclusively using GNU/Linux since October last year", Schuster added, calling the migration a success.' The Guardian has additional coverage of the move."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.


Tagi: embassies in japan, german foreign ministry, gnu linux, german engineering, german embassy, compar, maintenance costs, schuster, desktops, ly, rolf, guardian, open source, madrid, korea, linux, germany
Posted by on under snow in malibu, th winter, weatherstripping, southern california, weather across, pipes, stranger, globe, temperatures |

Brrr! Snow in Malibu!? In Southern California, we’re getting temperatures in the high 20s. The weather across the globe is getting stranger every season. For those who are suffering from the cold this winter, here are four tips:
1) Prevent pipes from freezing or thaw them if it’s too late.
2) Seal out the cold with weatherstripping. [...]
Tagi: snow in malibu, th winter, weatherstripping, southern california, weather across, pipes, stranger, globe, temperatures
Posted by on under optical lattice, ultracold atoms, neutral atom, classical object, university of glasgow, alternating magnetic field, university of augsburg, spring board, blueprint, blueprints, quantum, colleagues, wheel, germany |

TechReviewAl writes "Alexey Ponomarev from the University of Augsburg in Germany and colleagues have revealed the blueprints for an electric motor built with just two atoms. The motor would have one neutral atom and one charged atom trapped in a ring-shaped optical lattice. The atoms jump from one site in the lattice to the next as they travel around the ring and placing this ring in an alternating magnetic field creates the conditions necessary to keep the charged atom moving round the the ring. A team from the University of Glasgow in the UK in fact built one of these quantum motors back in 2007, which they called an optical ferris wheel for ultracold atoms. 'The next step, say Ponomarev and co, is to attach the motor to a nanoscopic resonator, such as a spring board or nanomushroom, and make it vibrate. If you can do that, they say, you'd be powering a classical object using a quantum motor.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.



Tagi: optical lattice, ultracold atoms, neutral atom, classical object, university of glasgow, alternating magnetic field, university of augsburg, spring board, blueprint, blueprints, quantum, colleagues, wheel, germany
Posted by on under german media, investment vehicle, burda, co founder, shareholder, lars, stake, germany |


BREAKING: German media giant Burda has used its digital arm to purchase a 25.1% share in XING, the business social network that is biggest in Germany and competes with LinkedIn. The 1,323,041 shares were sold to Burda by Cinco Capital, the investment vehicle owned by the former XING co-founder Lars Hinrichs. Priced at €36.50 per share, the deal is therefore worth €48.3 million. This makes Burda Digital the largest shareholder in XING. More details to follow

Tagi: german media, investment vehicle, burda, co founder, shareholder, lars, stake, germany
Posted by on under circulator, two heads, hopeful, prospects, doctors, germany |

Doctors aren't hopeful about their prospects for separating the fledgling fan, which was born recently in Germany and is named Double Circulator, but it seems to be doing pretty well, all things considered:
More »
Tagi: circulator, two heads, hopeful, prospects, doctors, germany