Tech News

In its early years, information theory was dominated by research on error-correcting codes: How do you encode information so as to guarantee its faithful transmission, even in the presence of the corrupting influences engineers call "noise"? Recently, one of the most intriguing developments in information theory has been a different kind of coding, called network coding, in which the question is how to encode information in order to maximize the capacity of a network as a whole. For information theorists, it was natural to ask how these two types of coding might be combined: If you want to both minimize error and maximize capacity, which kind of coding do you apply where, and when do you do the decoding?

A fleet of 100 floating robots took a trip down the Sacramento River on May 9, in a field test. The devices, equipped with GPS-enabled smartphones, demonstrated the next generation of water-monitoring technology, promising to transform the way government agencies track one of the state's most precious resources.

Small investors snubbed the Facebook IPO. It's the 'smart money' that's crying.

The situation at HP is putting a nail in the coffin of webOS, effectively killing it off yet again.

Google suffers its first patent defeat since taking over Motorola Mobility in a battle over how Android handles texts.

Scotland Yard has equipped its officers with mobile fingerprint scanners to identify suspects while on the streets.

I do not fear computers. I fear lack of them. - Isaac Asimov

There is a chasm of carbon and silicon the software can't bridge - Rahul Sonnad, 1998