During a recent trip from Sacramento to Salt Lake City, our flight on a Delta (Song) 757-200 was delayed during pushback onto the taxiway. The flight attendants explained that they were trying to get the saftey video to begin playing, but the LCD monitor on the seat in front of me told me differently. The screen flashed a few times, went black, and then started to display a BIOS POST. Intrigued, I watched intently as the boot process continued. To my delight, a Linux kernel was unpacked, and a Red Hat init process, complete with Tux in the upper-left hand corner, was displayed! I smiled, and quickly tried to capture the moment with a few blurry photos from my cell phone.
From what I can gather, the linux system is used on-board to manage the in flight entertainment system. This system feeds music, Dish Network TV, flight information, and games to each screen during the flight. One of the free games even allows you to play a trivia game against the other passengers. It even appears to have a simple transaction processing system for purchasing several items. I am glad to know Linux is alive and well at 30,000 feet!
The work of an entire semester have finally come to fruition. I finished a lengthy research paper this evening for an English class at Utah Valley State College. I case you are interested, I thought I would publish it here for your enjoyment.
ABSTRACT:
The science of cryptography has existed in one form or another for centuries. There are many common implementations of cryptography in use today such as the HTTPS protocol on the Internet. All forms of data encryption and cryptography require a key in some form or another for use in encoding and decoding data. The inherent problem with any form of cryptography is the possibility that the key may be intercepted by an eavesdropper. In a recent breakthrough a technique called quantum cryptography has been shown to possibly guarantee the privacy of an encryption key during distribution using quantum mechanics. As quantum cryptography continues to evolve, it has potential to become the de facto standard for the transportation of confidential information.
Download Full Text
The Mozzilla Foundation announced today a new version and a new website for its two flagship projects, the Firefox browser and Thunderbird email client. Moreover, the new Firefox version 1.5 provides the cutting edge of features for the popular internet browser. Give it a try, it is well worth the download and upgrade.
Download Firefox 1.5
High capacity disk drives are right around the corner. GameDaily reports that a new technology called HVD (Holographic Versatile Disc) will be available sometime in late 2006. The leading company in place to manufacture such equipment, InPhase Technologies, has announced that such discs will start at the 200 gigabyte capacity. This is great news for those who feel that the DVD-R 4.7 GB leaves something to be desired.
After sitting on a domain registration for two years and saying to myself for nearly as long “I need to put up my blog”, I have finally done so! More to follow… and this time I mean it.
~Gary
