Techo Karma

Five Best Public BitTorrent Trackers [Hive Five]

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 11:06:00 PST

Five Best Public BitTorrent Trackers [Hive Five]: "

A great BitTorrent client is all well and good, but you need a great tracker to get the actual torrent files and stoke the bandwidth burning fire in your client of choice. Here's a rundown of five of the most popular options.

A bit of clarification is in order before we share the list of the top five contenders with you. In our call for contenders we asked for you to share your favorite BitTorrent trackers, but we didn't explain the difference between a BitTorrent tracker and a BitTorrent indexer. The difference isn't immediately clear to the end user—nor does the difference even matter to many end users—and because we didn't make the difference crystal clear the votes were a mix of both sites that tracked and indexed and just indexed torrent files.

Since the purpose of the Hive Five is to help readers find tools and the ability to find torrents is more important to the majority of users than whether or not the place they find the torrents is also acting as the tracker for those torrents, we've opted to overlook the confusion in an effort to share a list of where Lifehacker readers go to search and download torrent files. The following list contains both true trackers and indexers. If you're curious about the technical details between a tracker and an indexer you can read up on them here and here.

The Pirate Bay

The Pirate Bay is no longer the full-service tracker it once thanks to some rough battles with the law, but it remains in service as an indexer. The Pirate Bay has been and remains one of the most publicly recognizable faces of the torrent phenomenon and is still a popular destination for torrent seekers. It no longer indexes its own tracker but instead organizes torrents indexed to other trackers. The Pirate Bay is known for having, even now, a wide selecttion and a well-organized, easy-to-browse site.

BTJunkie

BTJunkie is one of the largest torrent indexers on the web with over four million torrents and several thousand added daily. BTJunkie amasses such a high number of torrents by employing crawlers that dig through web sites looking for torrent files to index. The quality of torrents is ranked both by an algorithm and by user input which helps filter out low quality or malicious torrents.

isoHunt

Another enormous indexer, isoHunt has nearly two million torrents and a huge user base. In addition to being able to search torrents and sort them by age, number of peers, and other common search factors isoHunt has an additional variable, appropriately called isoHunt Rank, that is a compilation of all the other factors like age, number of comments, user feedback, and more. Sorting by isoHunt Rank allows you to see which torrents are best overall instead of just best in some subcategory like number of seeders or age.

Demonoid

Demonoid is a semi-public tracker. Registration is traditionally closed—it opens a few times a year to let new users in, or you can be invited by an existing member—but the site is still quite functional even without registration. Registration gives you access to the deep archives of Demonoid, but even without it you have access to over a quarter million torrents—the most recently added ones—available for download. Demonoid has built a name for itself by having a low number of bogus torrents and a high level of user participation.

KickAssTorrents

KickAssTorrents is a new kid on the torrent indexing block, but it has quickly built a name for itself by offering a user friendly experience. KickAssTorrents is the only torrent search engine that offers correction of spelling mistakes—search for Unutu for instance and it will ask "Did you mean Ubuntu?"—which is a small thing but highlights the level of detail put into the construction of their search engine. In addition to indexing regular torrents KickAssTorrents also indexes httpTorrents, which allow users who cannot access the BitTorrent cloud due to their location or firewall restrictions to access torrents.

Now that you've had a chance to look over the best places to find new torrents it's time to cast your vote in the poll below:

Which BitTorrent Indexer is Best?(answers)

Have a favorite torrent hangout that didn't make the list? Have a BitTorrent-related tip or trick? Let's hear about it in the comments.

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Evolution by Steve Jobs

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 06:50:00 PST

Evolution by Steve Jobs: "

via

Modern browsers for modern applications

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 06:46:00 PST

Modern browsers for modern applications: "The web has evolved in the last ten years, from simple text pages to rich, interactive applications including video and voice. Unfortunately, very old browsers cannot run many of these new features effectively. So to help ensure your business can use the latest, most advanced web apps, we encourage you to update your browsers as soon as possible. There are many choices:

Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0+

Mozilla Firefox 3.0+

Google Chrome 4.0+

Safari 3.0+

Many other companies have already stopped supporting older browsers like Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as browsers that are not supported by their own manufacturers. We’re also going to begin phasing out our support, starting with Google Docs and Google Sites. As a result you may find that from March 1 key functionality within these products -- as well as new Docs and Sites features -- won’t work properly in older browsers.

2010 is going to be a great year for Google Apps and we want to ensure that everyone can make the most of what we are developing. Please take the time to switch your organization to the most up-to-date browsers available.

Posted by Rajen Sheth, Google Apps Senior Product Manager

China - Google Myth Buster

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 07:01:00 PST

James McCarthy : My Telegraph: "I get the impression that a very great many are in absolute awe of China, believing that it is already a great power to be feared, and anything coming from China is going stomp the competition on the world stage.

�

When talking to friends back home (the last time that happened), the point was frequently made 'But China has 1.3BILLION!!!', �reading any business article it �always says 'China, the worlds largest market'(with the current Google/China issue it's 'China, with over 300 Million Internet users').�

�"

Porn on Billboard

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 02:34:00 PST

A midnight traffic jam near Moscow's Kremlin has been blamed on a pornographic film that suddenly began playing on a giant billboard.

The nine-by-six-metre television screen began showing the two-minute flick in the centre of Russia's capital.

Stunned motorists slammed on their brakes to gawk at the blue movie.

"They couldn't believe their eyes," state media RIA said, citing an unidentified witness.

Some managed to leap out of their vehicles to film the incident - the footage then posted on YouTube.

But not long after Sky News Online stumbled on one censored clip, it had been removed from the video-sharing website "due to terms of use violation".

Mass "overdose" planned in protest of Boots pharmacy sale of "homeopathic remedies" Boing Boing

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 02:23:00 PST

Mass "overdose" planned in protest of Boots pharmacy sale of "homeopathic remedies" Boing Boing: "10:23, a pro-science, anti-homeopathy group, is planning an 'overdose event' for Jan 30 at 10:23 AM UK time: 'more than three hundred homeopathy sceptics nationwide will be taking part in a mass homeopathic 'overdose' in protest at Boots' continued endorsement and sale of homeopathic remedies, and to raise public awareness about the fact that homeopathic remedies have nothing in them. Sceptics and consumer rights activists will publicly swallow an entire bottle of homeopathic 'pillules' to demonstrate that these 'remedies', prepared according to a long-discredited 18th century ritual, are nothing but sugar pills.'"

Do You Have Any Legal Right To Privacy For Information Stored Online? | Techdirt

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 02:18:00 PST

Do You Have Any Legal Right To Privacy For Information Stored Online? | Techdirt: "A year and a half ago, we had an interesting discussion here about whether or not the Fourth Amendment and your right to privacy extended to information you stored online via any sort of 'cloud' service. The arguments basically fell into two camps, with some citing the 'third party doctrine,' which basically says that once you gave up info to a third party, you no longer have any right to expect it to be kept private. This argument came from a lawsuit (Smith v. Maryland) that basically said phone numbers you dialed were not 'secret' because you were supplying them to the phone company. Of course, the other side of that argument is that it's ridiculous to extend this concept to online storage, noting that the Supreme Court had recognized in the Katz case (about wiretapping public pay phones) that the Fourth Amendment applies to 'people, not places.'"

Acer Liquid Android Now in Black

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 02:02:00 PST

Techtree.com India News ; Consumer Electronics ; Acer Liquid Now in Black: "The Liquid sports a 3.5 inch screen with WVGA (800 x 480 pixels) resolution display. The 5 megapixel camera should provide above average imaging abilities as well.

The phone was till now available only in white color - which some people thought was girly and had put off their plans to get one solely because of the color. But, Acer has now released the Black one for the masses in the UK. The well-spec-ed device stacks up quite well against the Google Nexus One - but comes at a higher price tag in the UK. The handset costs $539 (Rs. 25,000 approx.) as against the Nexus One, which costs $529."

Starbucks Locations Information

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 01:22:00 PST

Starbucks Locations Information: "Browse our various site sections to find and share information about the world's most prolific coffee shop."

Microsoft to Remove IP Addresses From Searches After Six Months - BusinessWeek

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 01:21:00 PST

Microsoft to Remove IP Addresses From Searches After Six Months - BusinessWeek: "Jan. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Microsoft Corp., the world’s largest software maker, said it will delete Internet Protocol addresses associated with search queries after six months to comply with European Union privacy regulators.
The changes, incorporated into searches on the company’s Bing search engine, reduce the time data is held from 18 months, John Vassallo, Microsoft’s vice-president of EU affairs, said at a briefing in Brussels today. The new policy will be implemented within the next 12 to 18 months."

TwonkyServer Mobile: media server in your pocket – Android and Me

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 00:25:00 PST

TwonkyServer Mobile: media server in your pocket – Android and Me: "Android phones are some of the most connected devices around, but it is still a hassle to beam your personal media to other home gadgets like a TV, Xbox, or PS3.

PacketVideo, the company that contributed multimedia capabilities to Android as an original member of the Open Handset Alliance, gave us a quick demo of their new TwonkyServer Mobile service. The app is now available in the Andriod Market and turns any Android device into a mobile media sever."

Reddit, I got the best present a girl developer could ever want. : programming

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:44:00 PST

Reddit, I got the best present a girl developer could ever want. : programming: "Reddit, I got the best present a girl developer could ever want."

Android usage up 200% over last 3 months - SlashGear

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:18:00 PST

Android usage up 200% over last 3 months - SlashGear: "ndroid hasn’t exactly been the hottest thing around these years – that is, until now.� According to statistics from a ChangeWave research report, usage and overall consumer outlook towards Google’s mobile operating system has soared over the last few months.� As of December 2009, the research firm’s survey shows that 4% of all smartphone owners now use Google’s Android OS. That’s an increase of 200% since the previous survey released in September."

Nexus One is "Good" for Business

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:15:00 PST

Nexus One is "Good" for Business: "The Nexus One and the Droid prove that the Android invasion is fully underway, and the next battlefront will be the enterprise. Consumer gadgets often force their way into the corporate culture, and what is the point of having a smartphone--or a 'superphone' like the Nexus One--if it can't keep you connected with work?"

MySQL utility commands

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:11:00 PST

MySQL utility commands: "This post is a summary of MySQL posts from this blog relating to MySQL utility commands, such as describing table structure, dropping columns from a table, and so on; and server settings."

InfoQ: Evolving the Key/Value Programming Model to a Higher Level

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:08:00 PST

InfoQ: Evolving the Key/Value Programming Model to a Higher Level: "Summary
In this presentation from QCon San Francisco 2009, Billy Newport discusses the ways that developers interact with key/value (KV) stores such as memcached and WebSphere eXtreme Scale, entity vs column-oriented approaches, synchronous and asynchronous operations, large data sets, using a DBMS as a column store, collocating closures and data, and features that could be added to increase scalability.

Bio
Billy Newport is a Distinguished Engineer working on WebSphere eXtreme Scale (ObjectGrid) and on WebSphere high availability, and has worked at IBM since Sept 2001. Besides his current activities, he helped add advanced APIs like the WorkManager APIs (JSR 236/237) and worked on the staff plugin architecture of WPS.

About the conference
QCon is a conference that is organized by the community, for the community.The result is a high quality conference experience where a tremendous amount of attention and investment has gone into having the best content on the most important topics presented by the leaders in our community. QCon is designed with the technical depth and enterprise focus of interest to technical team leads, architects, and project managers."

A tale of two qubits: how quantum computers work

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 21:42:00 PST

A tale of two qubits: how quantum computers work: "A tale of two qubits: how quantum computers work
By Joseph B. Altepeter | Last updated January 18, 2010 11:15 PM

Quantum information is the physics of knowledge. To be more specific, the field of quantum information studies the implications that quantum mechanics has on the fundamental nature of information. By studying this relationship between quantum theory and information, it is possible to design a new type of computer—a quantum computer. A largescale, working quantum computer—the kind of quantum computer some scientists think we might see in 50 years—would be capable of performing some tasks impossibly quickly."

BBC News - Feet hold the key to human hand evolution

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 03:51:00 PST

BBC News - Feet hold the key to human hand evolution: "Scientists may have solved the mystery of how human hands became nimble enough to make and manipulate stone tools.
The team reports in the journal Evolution that changes in our hands and fingers were a side-effect of changes in the shape of our feet.

Scientists simulated the change from an ape-like hand to a human-like hand

This, they say, shows that the capacity to stand and walk on two feet is intrinsically linked to the emergence of stone tool technology.
The scientists used a mathematical model to simulate the changes."

Get ready for the newsstand in your hand - Times Online

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 02:51:00 PST

Get ready for the newsstand in your hand - Times Online: "British buyers may be only just getting their hands on a new range of ebook readers, but already the next generation of hardware has been revealed. At the giant Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas earlier this month, where the gadget industry previewed the next 12 months of innovation, ebook readers were the hottest product category.

Dozens of new devices were unveiled, featuring everything from colour displays and flexible, shatter-proof screens to text-to-speech software and new ways to connect and share books over the internet. And many fulfil the promise of being able to display daily, downloadable newspapers and magazines in the way the publications’ designers intended."

RConversation: Google, China, and the future of freedom on the global Internet

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 01:02:00 PST

A very good post by Rebecca MacKinnon

RConversation: Google, China, and the future of freedom on the global Internet: "Google, China, and the future of freedom on the global Internet
Maybe it's because I was schooled in political science, not computer science. But frankly I've been surprised by the extent to which some respected commentators have focused on trashing Google for lacking purity of motive. As if that were some kind of brilliant revelation. Of course Google's actions are motivated by self-interest.

Self-interest is a complicated thing, and isn't only financial. I personally know quite a number of Googlers working in various locations around the world, some at fairly high levels. I get the sense that the emotional well-being of Google's founders, and many others with decision-making power throughout the company, is quite wrapped up in their belief in Google as a force for good in the world. Whether that belief is completely or only partially delusional is an open question. (Ken Auletta's new book on Google provides some useful insight on that front.) But let's be honest with ourselves. How many people on the planet do anything for 100% selfless reasons?"

How to use Google's URL Shortener Service, goo.gl

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 21:20:00 PST

This post is not about pushing down your throat the importance of URL shorteners in the era of the Twitter. This post is also not about Sarah Palin.

Everyone who used bit.ly know how to easy it is to use. Just bump into bit.ly and shorten your URL. Recently the all mighty Google launched its own URL shortening service called goo.gl. But you can't really go on goo.gl and start using it right away. In fact if you try doing it, it spits something like,

Google URL Shortener is currently available for Google products and not for broader consumer use.

But if you are like me, who would like to use Google and only Google for their online work (may be out of trust, Google brand or simply 'Google' the word sounds cool... choose your options) there is a silver lining. Well since I said I mostly use Google for my online presence, needless to say I use Google Chrome browser too. The Chrome browser recently got a feature it was lacking badly when compared to Mozilla Firefox. Extensions! But not any more. You can have lots of goodies stuffed inside your Chrome browser pretty much like Firefox.

So coming back to URL Shorteners, there is this nice Chrome extension that I found called,

goo.gl url shortener. The screenshot below explains pretty much rest of the stuff.

Motorola takes Android to Korea with MOTOROI

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 21:17:00 PST

Motorola takes Android to Korea with MOTOROI: "

That Korean-language version of the XT701 we saw recently is starting to make more sense now that we know exactly what was up Moto's sleeve: meet MOTOROI. The company's very first Android-powered phone for South Korea takes most (but not all) of its cues from its China Unicom-branded doppelganger, featuring a 3.7-inch WVGA display, 8 megapixel camera with 720p video capture, HDMI-out, and -- like most phones sold in and around Seoul -- support for T-DMB television tuning. Like the Droid, it's available with a home charging dock that'll turn it into a handy alarm clock; unlike the Droid, though, the MOTOROI features multitouch browsing out of the box similar to the Milestone in Europe. The oddly-named phone (is 'ROI' acceptable for short?) launches early next month on SK Telecom.

Motorola takes Android to Korea with MOTOROI originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 17 Jan 2010 23:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Motorola | Email this | Comments"

App to add to road safety

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 20:34:00 PST

Augmented Reality app to avoid accidents and add to road safety.

A Dress Code For Mannequins - The India Uncut Blog - India Uncut

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 11:55:00 PST

A Dress Code For Mannequins - The India Uncut Blog - India Uncut: "The WTF statement of the day is the warning given by Chandra Shekhar, a politician in Bhopal, to local shopkeepers:

Your mannequins should wear sarees, not underwear. From now on, keep all undergarments inside. Show it to the customer when he or she asks for it. Five days from now if undergarments are still hanging outside, we will light a bonfire of the lingerie.

Yes, the culture police is protesting against the public display of lingerie now. In a country in which there are so many serious issues to tackle, this is getting surreal. But why, it must be asked, are they doing this? Is there actually a constituency that approves of this kind of behaviour?"

HP, Dell offer 3G in laptops, so why not Apple? | Nanotech - The Circuits Blog - CNET News

noreply@blogger.com (Harshal) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 11:49:00 PST

HP, Dell offer 3G in laptops, so why not Apple? | Nanotech - The Circuits Blog - CNET News: "Apple aluminum MacBooks are definitely cool--until you want 3G in a laptop. Then they're not.

It's 2010 and still no MacBook Air with 3G.
(Credit: Apple)
I've said this before. But I'll say it again. There are consumers--including those potentially opting for laptops from Hewlett-Packard or Dell--who would like to buy a MacBook with 3G built in. Let's hope Apple sees the light with the expected upgrade to the MacBook Pro line.
Yes, there are ways to bootstrap a MacBook to get 3G. I've done tethering with my BlackBerry Storm. And then there's Verizon's tiny MiFi portable hotspot--which I use now.
But it would be nice if Apple offered one laptop in its MacBook lineup with a built-in 3G option. Like Wi-Fi and Ethernet, 3G should be part of the standard connectivity mix on a laptop."