Honestly when are these antivirus companies going to learn that this behavior is unacceptable?  You can't go around deleting people's core system files because your 1 day old untested new virus signatures "think" they found something suspicious.  Give me a break! How many times do we have to keep having this discussion?

McAfee pushed out a virus definition update, 5958, at 14:00 PDT that causes false positive identification of the critical Windows system file svchost.exe. Machines running Windows XP Service Pack 3 using the 5958 definitions will delete the file, causing many key Windows services to fail to start. The Windows file is being mistakenly detected as W32/wecorl.a. Failure to start svchost.exe causes Windows to automatically reboot, hindering repair efforts.

http://arstechnica.c...ows-workstations.ars

This is a very quick mini-review of Frederick Brooks new book, The Design of Design (more reviews and opinions at that amazon.com link).

Brooks is the author of "The Mythical Man-Month", a very influential book about the challenges of real-world, large scale computer (software) project management that was originally published in 1975 but was updated as recently as 1995.

I'm just going to give thoughts about his new book to help you decide if it's worth reading.

I guess the bottom line is that from a practical standpoint, "The Design of Design" can't really hold a candle to "The Mythical Man-Month" in terms of value and insight for a software engineer.  It's a much more self-indulgent and less ambitious book.

The first third of "The Design of Design" is actually highly readable, and highly valuable for anyone who doesn't already have a gut-level appreciation of the concepts it touches on.  For example, if you don't already have an immediate appreciation why having constraints (even arbitrary ones) is often helpful for a designer, then you would be well advised to read the first 150 or so pages of the book.  It's enjoyable reading, with some nice anecdotes, and the ideas are sound and well worth reinforcing.

The last two thirds of the book are easily skipped -- many of the chapters are sort of casual case studies in design based on the construction and remodeling of Fred Brook's house.  Even as some one interesting in architecture and remodeling, i found these chapters very thin on substance and entirely skipable.  I got the same feeling reading those chapters as one gets listening to a friend tell you about the fascinating dream they had the night before.  A few later chapters detailing Brooks' involvement in the creation of the legendary 1960's IBM System 360 computer series are mildly interesting for their anecdotes.

So.. thumbs up for the first 150 pages.. thumbs down for the the 250 pages that follow.  But it's an enjoyable and valuable (if not profound) first 150 pages, so if this is the kind of thing you like, it might be worth seeking out.

This review is a comparative look at two cloud synchronizers - SugarSync and DropBox.

With so many things moving to the cloud, and so many having more than one digital device, it becomes an issue to keep everything in sync, and to have access to everything when you need it.  Trying to satisfy these requirements are several cloud-based continuous backup services.

I became aware of Dropbox back when it was in beta, and was able to score an invite.  From the moment I did, I was hooked.  It became very much a part of my computing experience, and I was always looking for new ways to use it.  But for all of that, I never saw a reason to pay for it, figuring that I could keep the documents that I needed within the 2GB limit.  This became a bit harder when I purchased my iPhone, using DropBox as a way to supplement my storage on the device through their iPhone app.

One day I was listening to the AppSlappy podcast, and they reviewed SugarSync as an alternative to MobleMe.  I was intrigued, especially since SugarSync also had a free version.  So I tried it.  During my trial of SugarSync, I began to see DropBox in a new light.  SugarSync had many more features.  But when I started to really implement it, I began to see that it was give and take, so decided to write this comparative review...

A new online film with interviews about the absurdity of software patents, a problem which is getting worse and is way out of control..

Patent Absurdity explores the case of software patents and the history of judicial activism that led to their rise, and the harm being done to software developers and the wider economy. The film is based on a series of interviews conducted during the Supreme Court's review of in re Bilski — a case that could have profound implications for the patenting of software. The Court's decision is due soon...

http://patentabsurdity.com/index.html

Hi guys, after I missed last week, I promised you some good stories this week, so lets take a look what we have on offer.

I'm gonna try stray away from anything iPad related this week, seeing as it seems to have stolen the spotlight on all the other Tech News sources!

Enjoy,
-Stephen

---

Table of Contents:

• The next, big thing for Intel: Sandy Bridge
• U.S. seeks climate ideas after Copenhagen fell short
• Microsoft kills upshirt scene in Kin ad
• Let the Rich Internet App Battle Begin
• Obama on Space Exploration: We've Got to Be Smart
• NSA Chief: Cyberwar Rules of Engagement a Policy Minefield
• The Life Expectancy of Linux
• Astroboffin says 'black holes murder galaxies'
• Google Chrome OS to route print jobs around planet
• School secretly snapped 1000s of students at home

DC member App103 writes:

If you tweet links on Twitter, retweet links from other people, or have a website in which someone might tweet a link to it, you are going to want to read this, because this can potentially affect any or all of us and harm our reputations.

It started with me trying to promote DC a little, to a writer on TechCrunch, which lead to a discovery of how Bit.ly blacklists links shortened by other services, adding an interstitial page that calls the target site harmful, malware, a forgery, spam, and phishing.

When the writer retweeted my link I sent to him, DC was flagged as a bad site, just because I choose to use a competing URL shortener and his twitter client automatically shortens all links with bit.ly (whether they need it or not).

I contacted bit.ly about it, attempting to get the flag removed from the DC link, and their response and attitude were quite alarming.

For the full story, read my blog post about the whole thing;

http://cranialsoup.b...your-reputation.html