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Mars, bringer of WAR: Quatermass and the Pit

Quatermass at 60 “When I wrote the Quatermass stories, I couldn’t help drawing on the forces and the fears that affected people in the 1950s,” wrote Quatermass creator Nigel Kneale in 1996.
His inspiration for Professor Bernard Quatermass’ third appearance on television had been the Notting Hill race riots that struck the London suburb during the summer of 1955. The almost tribal conflict that took place back then - and which would flare up time and again throughout the following 40 years - caused the writer to ponder the causes of such unrestrained aggression.

“And men asked,” to quote the opening narration of the 1958 serial Quatermass and the Pit, “why should this be?”
So did Kneale, and why especially in a country considered as civilised and as on the up as late 1950s Britain thought itself to be. The economic shocks of the 1970s were more than a decade and a half away, and Britons back then “never had it so good”, as Prime Minister Harold Macmillan would insist in 1957. It struck Kneale that racial conflict and violence must be a very deep part of the human condition that it could explode through to the surface even in prosperous times.
“The last adventure, which I called Quatermass and the Pit, went way past the concerns of the time and into an ancient and diabolical race memory,” said Kneale in 1996. “It sought to explain man’s savagery and intolerance by way of images that had been throbbing away in the human brain since it first developed. Racial unrest, violence and purges were certainly with us in the 1950s, and I tried to speculate on where they first came from.”

Working in harmony: labourers black and white together discover the secret of their common human ancestry
Source: BBC/2 Entertain

In Kneale’s imagination, the cause of all this conflict went back to the Dawn of Humankind. It was rooted not merely in our evolutionary past but arose through a direct result of the manipulation of our infant species by another race of beings and of the cultural imprimatur they left behind on our genetic heritage.
And this, suggested Kneale, was the source of all human conflict. Britain may have been booming, but the privations arising from World War II had not been forgotten, nor the austerity years that followed it. The Suez Crisis had shamed Britain in 1956, only three years after Britain’s involvement in the Korean War came to an end. Both were fights explicitly associated with the Cold War simmering between the Western nations and the Soviet Bloc.
Indeed, it’s the Cold War stand-off that brings Britain’s best-known rocket scientist, Professor Bernard Quatermass, into the story when he is called upon by the War Office - it wouldn’t become the Ministry of Defence until 1964 - to advise on the siting of nuclear weapons in space and on the Moon.

Boffin and Breen: Quatermass and his military adversary ponder the pit’s portents
Source: BBC/2 Entertain

As the voice of enlightened scientific rationality, Quatermass naturally disapproves. His stance pitches him against Colonel Breen, an exemplar of the new military thinking: deterrent not détente. And, indeed, against the prevailing view of Whitehall, which wants Breen to take over the management of Quatermass’ British Rocket Group and redirect its efforts toward military applications of rocketry.
“The setting up of permanent bases on the Moon and possibly Mars also is a certainty in the next five to seven years. Those bases will be military ones. The present state of world politics leaves no doubt about that,” the Colonel warns.
Furious, the professor goes off in a huff and into the path of Canadian anthropologist Matthew Roney. Roney is keen to tap Quatermass’ ministry connections when his work recovering humanoid fossils discovered under a Knightsbridge building site reveals what is first thought to be an unexploded German bomb buried since World War II.

Apemen found in Knightsbridge - and we don’t mean Harrods customers
Source: BBC/2 Entertain

It’s a bombshell to be sure: but not rusting Nazi ordnance. Instead, it is revealed to be a crashed space capsule in which Quatermass discovers the preserved remains of what he guesses to be a Martian crew. They’re all small, green and have three legs - what else could they be? Quatermass knows his Wells. And Mars is, after all, the “Bringer of War”.

Sony Xperia Tablet Z: Our new top Android ten-incher

Review Not so long ago, Sony declared its aim to be the second most popular tablet vendor after Apple. More recently, that morphed into an ambition to sell the most mobile devices after Apple and Samsung. If both those targets are not to be consigned to the rubbish bin of ill-advised statements, Sony’s phones and tablets need to start getting better fast.
Luckily for Sony they are. I don't rate the the Xperia Z phone quite as highly as many of my colleagues do, but it’s certainly not a bad old Hector and is selling strongly. The new Xperia SP is a device that certainly lit my fire. Now Sony has released a fondleslab counterpart to its latest Xperia phones, the Xperia Tablet Z.

Xperia Tablet Z: you can hold it like this all day long

With the Tablet Z Sony thankfully hasn’t tried to reinvent the wheel so there are no strange wedge or clamshell form factors at play as was the case with past Sony slates. What the Tablet Z does offer is a very slim profile, a high definition screen and an impressive lack of weight.
Thanks to the shared design language - called “OmniBalance” by Sony - it looks very much like an Xperia Z that’s been rolled flat. It even carries over the Z’s IP57 resistance to water and dust and its large aluminium power button. Available in 16 and 32GB flavours, the Tablet Z also packs a Micro SD slot which gives it an important edge over the Apple- and Nexus-badged competition, which don’t have one.
Despite being only 7.2mm thick - that’s the official figure; according to my steel rule it’s closer to 6.5mm - and weighing 495g, the Tablet Z is very nearly as robust and solid as the iPad 4. Certainly the screen doesn’t take a mescaline trip when you try to twist it. There are some signs that tolerances are tight, though. Apply some serious torque to the body and sometimes an app or menu will launch, the screen clearly thinking it has been fiddled with.

The back is pleasent to touch but shows up fingerprints badly

I’m not sure the IP57 certificate is strictly necessary. I don’t know about you, but I’d be inclined to take care of a tablet I’d just paid four hundred quid for. So using it in the bath, in the pouring rain or on a building site probably wouldn’t figure in my usage regime. But at least you can take it to the beach without worrying about beer or sand worming its way into its sensitive innards.
The downside of the waterproofing is that all the ports, including the 3.5mm audio jack, have fiddly plug-in covers. Constantly opening and closing them can become a chore so you may want to consider buying the optional charging cradle which connects to the Tablet Z through a couple of contact pins.
Another small annoyance is that the Micro SD and USB ports, and thus their covers, are at the bottom - hardly an ideal place for the charge socket full stop - out of sight and out of mind. I constantly found myself forgetting to close the USB port cover after charging.

Top: Detail of speaker grilles, dock connector, and micro USB slot and cover
Bottom: The power and volume controls, and the (covered) 3.5mm audio jack

When I first saw pictures of the Tablet Z, I was slightly worried that it would have the same rather cold and clammy glass back as the Xperia Z but I needn't have fretted. The matte plastic rear is a much better idea and feels pleasant to the touch though it does show up fingerprints badly. Sony will sell you a handy multi-form carry case to keep your Z looking mint.

'First' 3D-printed rifle's barrel splits after single shot

3D-printed weapons are back in the news, after a rifle billed as the first such device designed to be created on 3D printers was put through its paces with mixed results.
Someone called “Matthew” who writes an instrument making journal and runs a YouTube Channel in which he shows off 3D-printed ukuleles yesterday added a video of what he says is a rifle he designed and printed himself.
As you can see in the video below, the rifle gets off a shot. Later examination found the weapon's barrel split.
The weapon appears to use the same design as the infamous “Liberator” 3D-printed pistol, but adds a longer barrel. Matthew, who posts on YouTube as ThreeD Ukulele, named his creation the “Grizzly”.
As commenters on the video have noted, igniting a bullet's not the hard part of making a cheap gun. Making something that can survive the hot gases that result is, and the Grizzly fails that test.

You can't argue with a dialog box

In related news, Danish 3D printer maker Create It Real has decided to ensure its products can't ever print a gun.
A canned statement (PDF) saying that if users try to load a file for a 3D gun its “... smart software scans the model and tries to match its characteristics with the characteristics of a firearm. If certain features align, the software will not allow the user to view and print the model.” ®

PlayStation 4 is FreeBSD inside

As Sony's PlayStation 4 pre-orders take off (perhaps at the expense of the already-unloved Xbox One), speculation has emerged that the console's underlying operating system is based on the FreeBSD operating system.
The apparent identification of the OS comes not from anything so exotic as a leaked console, but from someone with their hands on the development environment (and, El Reg supposes, willing to ignore what's probably a tied-hands-and-feet NDA).
At VGLeaks, images of the development environment booting up clearly identify the OS as “Orbis OS”. Based on lists of files and libraries, VGLeaks states that Orbis is based on FreeBSD 9.0.

VGLeaks' capture of the Sony PS4 development bootloader

According to Phoronix, the PS4's eight-core AMD APU and Radeon graphics aren't exactly close friends with FreeBSD: there aren't any suitable open source Catalyst drivers in the BSD world, suggesting a fair degree of cooperation between Sony and AMD.
The FreeBSD licence is seen as friendlier to commercial developers than GNU-licensed Linux distributions, since it allows Sony to sell binaries without being obliged to release the associated source code.
The operating system images have stirred up a frenzy of speculation that Sony will revive the option for PS4 users to access the operating system to run the platform as a FreeBSD computer, except that aside from the presence of the free operating system, there's nothing to suggest this would be the case. ®

Apple KILLER decloaked? Google lovingly unboxes Nexus 7 Android 4.3 slablette

Google has been showing off its new Nexus 7 fondleslab running the latest version of Android, including a 4G LTE version that's the first hardware to allow 4G reception from a variety of competing carriers.
"By the end of the year, consumers are going to buy more tablets than PCs. That's an amazing statistic," said Sundar Pichai, who oversees Android and Chrome for Google. "And by the first half of this year almost one in two tablets sold will be Android."
At the press conference to announce the launch, Pichai said that Android tablet activations have risen from 10 million last year to 70 million today, and in markets like Japan, Android slabs are outselling their Apple rivals.
The latest Nexus 7, built by Asus, is 2mm thinner than Google's first-generation seven-inch fondleslab, with nearly 6mm shaved off the width and the weight reduced by 50 grams. The screen size is the same as the earlier Nexus 7, but the resolution has now been upped to 1920x1200, bringing the pixels per inch from 216 to 323 – the highest ppi of any tablet, Pichai claimed.

The updated Nexus 7 fondleslab, built by Asus

The fondleslab itself uses a quad-core 1.4GHz Snapdragon S4 processor that nearly doubles the computing performance of the old Nexus 7, plus an Adreno 320 400MHz GPU, giving a promised 4x performance boost. RAM has been upped from 1GB to 2GB, and there's now a 5MP camera in the back in addition to a 1.2MP forward-facing camera for videoconferencing.
The Nexus 7 has Wi-Fi models in two sizes (16GB and 32GB) running 802.11 a/b/g/n. There's also an LTE version that works with Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile 4G services via a custom chip that Google has bought in from an unnamed third-party supplier. That hardware means Google can sell the mobile version easily across all US carriers.
"This is the first time you've got a tablet that can handle the different standards used by different mobile companies within a single unit," Hugo Barra, VP of Android at Google told The Register. "We're a bit surprised that so few people have picked up on that."
There are also the usual hardware bells and whistles you'd expect form a fondleslab these days: GPS, near-field communications, Bluetooth 4.0, compass, accelerometer, gyroscope and stereo speakers with "virtual surround sound." The latter is actually pretty good, although if you're holding the Nexus in landscape mode it's easy to block the speakers with your hands.
Battery life is a claimed nine hours for video and ten for web use and browsing, with Qi-compatible wireless charging if you want to buy an extra charger. The unit ships with a USB charger in the box, but it works with any micro-USB power cable.
Consumers will pay $229 and $269 for the 16GB and 32GB Wi-Fi models respectively, and $349 for the LTE-equipped 32GB version. Sales are limited to the US at present, but the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, South Korea, and Australia will be able to buy the Nexus 7 in the next few weeks.
The Chocolate Factory is also making a play for the Nexus 7 as a device for students. It has worked out deals with five academic publishers (including Wiley, Pearson, McGraw-Hill and Macmillan) to allow students to buy textbooks for the device, or rent them for a period of six months with an "up to 80 per cent" discount on the purchase price.
Google has handed out the hardware to the press to play with over the next two weeks and initial impressions are good – overall. It certainly feels noticeably lighter and slimmer than the older version, and the weight savings do make a difference for handheld use.
As for the much-vaunted screen, this hack is less sold. It's good, but not blow-your-socks-off good – possibly down to the seven-inch form factor or the fact that the default settings are very dim.
How well it holds up with extended use and a little customization remains to be seen, but with a price point well below an iPad Mini, the cash-savvy consumer may find the Nexus 7 a tempting buy. ®

Google Chromecast: Why it's the most important smart TV tech ever

Analysis The more details that emerge about Chromecast, Google's new streaming media dongle, the more it sounds like you get what you pay for – and let's face it, $35 isn't a lot. But don't be fooled. There's more to Chromecast than meets the eye.
When the hardware hackers at iFixit did their teardown of the device, their conclusion was that it was "essentially a luxury item with limited use." And in my own review of Chromecast on Thursday, I was able to stream audio and video from Google Play, Netflix, and YouTube, and little else. In short, it couldn't do much that my existing gear couldn't do already.
But that's today. What about tomorrow – or a year from tomorrow?
A closer look at the inner workings of Chromecast reveals that it's a technology with impressive potential. In fact, if Google succeeds in building an ecosystem around it, it could prove to be one of the most important smart TV technologies to come along so far.
It's essential to understand that when you buy Chromecast, you're not just getting a dongle that can "do YouTube." That's what sets it apart from most of the other smart TVs, set-top boxes, Blu-Ray players, and other devices that can already stream YouTube content.
In fact, unlike a Blu-Ray player that comes with a YouTube app baked into its firmware, Chromecast can't really stream YouTube at all – not on its lonesome. It's really just a receiver. To stream content, it relies on a "sender" app running on an Android or iOS device or in the Chrome browser. Both halves together make the whole.
How important is the sender app? Consider the Google Cast SDK documentation, which explains, "Given the nature of the interaction model, tabs, windows or popups cannot be created, and there should be nothing on the receiver device screen requiring input. All interaction with the application must be done through a sender application."
With Chromecast streaming, you never see any buttons or input boxes or menus on your TV screen. All of that user interaction takes place on the sender device. Thus, the UI you use to find and display content on your TV is the exact same UI you use to find and display that content on your Android or iOS device or in your browser. The only difference is that when you press the Cast button, the content comes up on your TV.
But the Chromecast dongle isn't just mirroring what you see on your sender device's screen. While you're viewing the content on your TV, you're free to use your fondleslab to browse the web, send emails, play games, or even dim the screen and set it aside; the content keeps playing on your TV.
It does so because you're not streaming content from your tablet to your TV. What the sender app sends is just a command that tells Chromecast to grab the content stream and render it itself, via a custom receiver application that's loaded and run on the Chromecast dongle. Netflix content is streamed to a Netflix receiver app running on the dongle, YouTube content streams to a YouTube receiver app, and so on.
The dongle itself is running an embedded version of Chrome OS, and Chromecast receiver apps are all web apps. Therefore, any content that can be rendered in a browser using HTML5 and Google's supported media types and DRM technologies should also be supportable with a Chromecast receiver app. (Despite being based on Chrome, Google's Native Client technology is not supported on Chromecast at this time.)
All of this is significant for a number of reasons. First, it means Chromecast is flexible. The word "platform" is thrown around too lightly these days, but Chromecast is certainly closer to being a media platform than most of the dedicated media player devices on the market today.
Unlike a Blu-Ray player, Chromecast streaming is not limited to the specific set of apps that come preinstalled when you buy the dongle. Instead, it can support a nearly infinite number of streaming sources, and you don't need a firmware upgrade to add new ones: just download the app to your Android or iOS device. When you press the Cast button, Chromecast automatically loads and launches the appropriate receiver app.
Equally important, independent developers don't need to wait around for the Chocolate Factory to support their services. They can add Chromecast support to their apps and media services themselves. In effect, the number of streaming media sources Chromecast can support is limited only by developers' willingness to adopt the technology.