Expect a new Swift upgrade this spring

Swift 3.1, a limited-focus upgrade to Apple's general purpose systems language, is due next spring, with a few enhancements to the language itself as well as to the Swift Package Manager and Swift on Linux. Source compatibility with Swift 3.0 also is a key goal.Apple detailed goals for the language in a recent bulletin, but the company already is looking past this upgrade to Swift 4, which is planned for late 2017, according to Apple's Ted Kremenek, release manager for Swift 3.1.[ InfoWorld's quick guide: Digital Transformation and the Agile Enterprise. | Download InfoWorld’s essential guide to microservices and learn how to create modern web and mobile applications that scale. ] "To meet this goal, Swift 3.1 will include changes in mainline development, i.e. the master branch, only until January 16," Kremenek said. "After that date, there will be a 'bake' period in which only select, critical fixes will go into the swift-3.1-branch and move master on to Swift 4 development."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

8 ways companies can manage risks brought on by the SaaS Tsunami

Shadow ITImage by ThinkstockEvery employee is on a mission to find the next SaaS application that will make their job easier. With nothing more than a credit card and an expense report, anyone within the organization can sign-up for a new application in minutes.The problem is that employees are signing-up for SaaS apps without the knowledge or permission of their IT administrator. According to Gartner and Cisco, IT pros only know about 7% of the apps in use. Meaning, within any given organization, there are hundreds of unsecured SaaS apps, each a potential entry point for hackers to access your corporate data.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Nearly half of all websites pose security risks

According to a new study of the top one million domains, 46 percent are running vulnerable software, are known phishing sites, or have had a security breach in the past twelve months.The big problem is that even when a website is managed by a careful company, it will often load content from other sites, said Kowsik Guruswamy, CTO at Menlo Park, Calif.-based Menlo Security, which sponsored the report, which was released this morning.For example, news sites -- 50 percent of which were risky -- typically run ads from third-party advertising networks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Nearly half of all websites pose security risks

According to a new study of the top one million domains, 46 percent are running vulnerable software, are known phishing sites, or have had a security breach in the past twelve months.The big problem is that even when a website is managed by a careful company, it will often load content from other sites, said Kowsik Guruswamy, CTO at Menlo Park, Calif.-based Menlo Security, which sponsored the report, which was released this morning.For example, news sites -- 50 percent of which were risky -- typically run ads from third-party advertising networks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The latest ransomware is pure evil genius

Ransomware is always nasty business, but the latest variant discovered by the MalwareHunterTeam takes the nastiness to a whole ‘nother level.Turning victims into criminals Apparently, the latest Popcorn Time ransomware adds a new twist to the standard M.O. of demanding payment from their victims or permanently lose access to their files. In what seems like a brilliant if seriously messed up maneuver, if victims don’t want to pay the Bitcoin ransom “the fast and easy way,” the program gives victims the option of paying up “the nasty way”—by sending the ransomware link on to others. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The latest ransomware is pure evil genius

Ransomware is always nasty business, but the latest variant discovered by the MalwareHunterTeam takes the nastiness to a whole ‘nother level.Turning victims into criminals Apparently, the latest Popcorn Time ransomware adds a new twist to the standard M.O. of demanding payment from their victims or permanently lose access to their files. In what seems like a brilliant if seriously messed up maneuver, if victims don’t want to pay the Bitcoin ransom “the fast and easy way,” the program gives victims the option of paying up “the nasty way”—by sending the ransomware link on to others. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Synaptics has a new fingerprint sensor that will mean smoother phone screens

A Silicon Valley biometrics company says it has developed a fingerprint sensor that can sit under glass so smartphone screens don't need a cutout or extra button to accommodate the sensor.The Synaptics FS9100 sensor can sit under a millimeter of glass and still provide accurate fingerprint readings, so it should be easier to integrate one under a display.At present, most fingerprint sensors have to sit above the glass, necessitating a cutout in the face of the phone or a dedicated button that houses the sensor. That's the case on market-leading handsets like the iPhone 7 and Samsung Galaxy S7.And while there are some fingerprint sensors that work under glass, that glass needs to be thinner than 1mm, so the glass needs to be shaved in the area of the sensor.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

8 Ways The Network Will Change In 2017

We Were Acquired by Cloudflare, Here’s What’s Next

Like most of you, I first heard of Cloudflare via this blog. I read about HTTP/2, Railgun, the Hundredth Data Center, and Keyless SSL — but I never thought I would work here. I, along with my co-founder Adam, and our friends and coworkers were hard at work building something very different. We were working on a tool which spent most of its life in the web browser, not on servers all around the world: an app store for your website. Using our tool a website owner could find and install any of over a hundred apps which could help them collect feedback from their visitors, sell products on their site, or even make their site faster.

Our goal was to create a way for every website owner to find and install all of the open-source and SaaS tools technical experts use everyday. As developers ourselves, we wanted to make it possible for a developer in her basement to build the next great tool and get it on a million websites (and make a million dollars) the next day. We didn’t want her to succeed because she had the biggest sales or marketing team, or the most Continue reading

Response: Arista Victory Seen by Street in Cisco Patent Win – Tech Trader Daily – Barrons.com

Analysts take the view that Arista is winning the legal battle with Cisco

The post Response: Arista Victory Seen by Street in Cisco Patent Win – Tech Trader Daily – Barrons.com appeared first on EtherealMind.

What to expect from Cisco’s competitors in 2017

In my previous post, I previewed what we should expect to see from Cisco in 2017. While I think Cisco is in a strong position next year, I don’t expect Cisco’s competitors to sit around and let it take share. Below are the market segments where I think we’ll see the most activity and which vendors are likely to be the most disruptive.Collaboration Hard-charging Microsoft has turned its unified communications (UC) focus to the cloud with its Skype For Business Voice available as part of the Office 365 suite. One can argue who has better voice or video, but Microsoft’s real strength is in how easy it is to purchase and start using voice, including PSTN calling. Microsoft also announced its Team product, which directly competes with Cisco’s Spark product, so the collaboration battle will be drawn on many fronts. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What to expect from Cisco’s competitors in 2017

In my previous post, I previewed what we should expect to see from Cisco in 2017. While I think Cisco is in a strong position next year, I don’t expect Cisco’s competitors to sit around and let it take share. Below are the market segments where I think we’ll see the most activity and which vendors are likely to be the most disruptive.Collaboration Hard-charging Microsoft has turned its unified communications (UC) focus to the cloud with its Skype For Business Voice available as part of the Office 365 suite. One can argue who has better voice or video, but Microsoft’s real strength is in how easy it is to purchase and start using voice, including PSTN calling. Microsoft also announced its Team product, which directly competes with Cisco’s Spark product, so the collaboration battle will be drawn on many fronts. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Apple faced a challenging 2016

Apple had a tough 2016. Early in the year, the tech giant became entangled in a legal battle with the FBI over the company's refusal to help the agency unlock the phone of San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook. Apple argued that doing so would open a back door that would put other iPhone users at risk of privacy breaches. Apple also had a somewhat disappointing financial year with annual sales dropping for the first time since 2001, when the company released the iPod.  On the hardware side, Apple did release a refreshed version of the iPhone and the MacBook Pro, but both received mixed reviews. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump’s margin up after Wisconsin recount over voting machine security

President-elect Donald Trump added 131 votes to his winning margin in a recount in Wisconsin of ballots cast in the state for the recent U.S. presidential elections, but a significant part of the recount was not by hand.The recount was asked for by Green Party candidate Jill Stein after doubts were raised that the voting systems can be hacked. Wisconsin uses both the optical scan and direct-recording electronic types of voting machines, which are both susceptible to compromise, Stein said in a petition to the Wisconsin Elections Commission.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump’s margin up after Wisconsin recount over voting machine security

President-elect Donald Trump added 131 votes to his winning margin in a recount in Wisconsin of ballots cast in the state for the recent U.S. presidential elections, but a significant part of the recount was not by hand.The recount was asked for by Green Party candidate Jill Stein after doubts were raised that the voting systems can be hacked. Wisconsin uses both the optical scan and direct-recording electronic types of voting machines, which are both susceptible to compromise, Stein said in a petition to the Wisconsin Elections Commission.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

67% off Sabrent 4-Port USB 3.0 Hub with Individual Power Switches – Deal Alert

The thin, lightweight design makes this hub a great travel companion to expand one USB 3.0 port into four. Each port has its own power switch so you can control each port independently. It currently averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 4,300 people (read recent reviews). Its typical list price of $30 had been reduced 67% to just $10. See it on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

67% off Sabrent 4-Port USB 3.0 Hub with Individual Power Switches – Deal Alert

The thin, lightweight design makes this hub a great travel companion to expand one USB 3.0 port into four. Each port has its own power switch so you can control each port independently. It currently averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 4,300 people (read recent reviews). Its typical list price of $30 had been reduced 67% to just $10. See it on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: Load Balancing at Fastly

High-speed scale-out load balancing is a Mission Impossible. You can get the correct abstraction at the wrong cost or another layer of indirection (to paraphrase the authors of Fastly load balancing solution).

However, once every third blue moon you might get a team of smart engineers focused on optimal solutions to real-life problems. The result: a layer of misdirection, a combination of hardware ECMP and server-level traffic redirection. Enjoy!

LSA issue @ December 13, 2016 at 10:24AM

Here is your fresh IPv6 fix: Tenth iNOG, namely iNOG::A, is all about IPv6 experience.
Technical talks are:
1) Orla McGann (HEAnet) An Irish IPv6 Fairytale
2) Nathalie Trenaman (RIPE) The Sad Tale of 462 Operators Who Switched Off IPv6* (*with a happy ending)
3) Ed Horley (Groupware Technology) IPv6 Operating Challenges

Particulary interesting talk was given by Nathalie from RIPE who was talking about IPv6 global perception seen from RIPE point-of-view.

#Video #iNOG #IPv6

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSH6jxmqrag
By: via LSA

29% off Plantronics Explorer 50 Bluetooth Headset – Deal Alert

The Explorer 50 Bluetooth Headset from Plantronics averages 4 out of 5 stars from over 2,000 people (read reviews) on Amazon, where its typical list price of $25.48 has been reduced 29% to just $17.99. The Plantronics Explorer 50 Bluetooth headset reduces background noise, connects to two smartphones, streams your music and GPS directions, and has a power-saving DeepSleep mode. Up to 11 hours of talk time. It's designed to fit either ear, the earloop swivels and rotates for a stable fit. See the discounted Explorer 50 now on Amazon. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here