A new Wintel prototype that openly apes Apple Computer’s popular Mac mini is due out this week, sources told Wired News, giving Intel a showcase to prove its chips are a match for anyone when it comes to tiny PC designs.

Read more about it at wired.com

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,67664,00.html?tw=wn_5techhead

Agent-based computing has been hailed as the next significant breakthrough in software development, and the new revolution in software. Currently, software agents are the focus of intense interest on the part of many sub-fields of computer science and artificial intelligence. Software agents hold the potential to shape the next generation of technologies and models for distributed computation. Agent-based systems are capable of independent action in open, unpredictable environments. Agents are currently being applied in domains as diverse as business information systems, computer games and interactive cinema, information retrieval and filtering, user interface design, and industrial process control.

Extremely large, complex software systems stretch the limits of modern design and implementation techniques. Agent-based computing is an approach to design and implementation that facilitates the design and development of sophisticated systems by viewing them as a society of independent communicating agents working together to meet the goals of the system. Java programming language’s rich support for networking, security, and introspection make it well suited to implementing a distributed agent-based computing system.

This article explores the basics of agent-based computing and examines an open source Java toolkit for building distributed agent societies.

The full article is available here

http://java.sys-con.com/read/36191.htm

US Patent Number 6,853,373 B2, titled “Methods, Apparatus and Computer Program Products for Modeling Three-Dimensional Colored Objects,” has been granted to Raindrop Geomagic.

Abstract

Methods, apparatus and computer program products can generate light weight but highly realistic and accurate colored models of three-dimensional colored objects. The colored model may be generated from a second plurality of points that define a coarse digital representation of the surface and at least one texture map containing information derived from a first plurality of colored points that define a fine digital representation of the surface. This derivation is achieved by mapping points within the texture map to the fine digital representation of the three-dimensional surface. Colored scan data may be used to construct the fine digital representation as a triangulated surface (i.e., triangulation) using a wrapping operation. This triangulated surface may be a two-manifold with or without nonzero boundary and the colored scan data may constitute raw point data with each datum comprising three real numbers (x-,y-, z-coordinates) providing geometric information and three integer numbers (r-,g-,b-values) providing color information. Operations are then performed to create the coarse digital representation from the fine digital representation and also preferably create a plurality a texture maps from the fine and coarse digital representations. One map may contain color information and another map may recover geometric detail lost in the simplification process associated with generating the coarse digital representation from the fine digital representation. An additional map may also be generated that corrects for differences in directions of normal vectors associated with the coarse and fine digital representations.

Not sure this is the correct type of application for a 3.5″ screen, but nevertheless here’s another CAD system for the Pocket PC.

Read about it here

http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/index.php?topic_id=39124

MIT Sloan Professor Eric von Hippel recently published a new book, Democratizing Innovation. In his book, Professor von Hippel examines the emerging trend toward user-centered innovation, a system which can offer great advantages over the manufacturer-centric innovation systems that have been in place for hundreds of years.

Professor von Hippel has graciously made a downloadable version of his book available to the public for free. To download the entire book or select chapters, you can visit Professor von Hippel’s website at

http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/democ.htm.

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