Xbox One Always-Online Rumors Debunked; Google Drops XMPP Support

To view a web version of this message, click here Send this message to a friend Xbox One Always-Online Rumors Debunked Google Drops XMPP Support Do Developers Need Free Perks to Thrive? Charge Your Cellphone in 20 Seconds (Eventually) Working Handgun Printed on a Sub-$2,000 3D Printer Hot Comment: "When everyone kept their mouths shut when the Warrantless Wiretapping was..." From the Vault: Mad as Hell, Switching to Mac Watch It: Automated Beer Brewing: It's Linux Time  Poll Booth: I am fairly prepared for a storm outage of ... Xbox One Always-Online Rumors Debunked Microsoft VP Phil Harrison said Xbox One doesn't need a constant connection in order to play games, but it does require check-ins with Microsoft servers. The company also provided half-answers about how used games and game sharing would work. Sound Off>> Google Drops XMPP Support Google Hangouts, the company's replacement for its aging Talk instant messenger, drops support for the XMPP instant messaging protocol. XMPP delivers IMs to desktop clients and enables communication between users on different IM networks. Sound Off>> Do Developers Need Free Perks to Thrive? Free sodas, candy and energy bars can be surprisingly important to developers, says longtime coder Eric Spiegel. They need the perks, not to mention the caffeine boost. More important, free sodas from management are like the canary in the coal mine. If they get cut, then layoffs might be next. Sound Off>> Charge Your Cellphone in 20 Seconds (Eventually) An international science fair winner created a supercapacitor, an energy storage device that can be fully juiced in 20 to 30 seconds. The student has only used it to charge an LED so far, but as supercapacitors grow more common, near-instant charging of portable electronics could become a reality. Sound Off>> Working Handgun Printed on a Sub-$2,000 3D Printer When Defense Distributed successfully test-fired the world’s first fully 3D-printed firearm a few weeks ago, critics dismissed the demo as expensive and impractical because it could only be done on a high-end industrial 3D printer. But now a couple of Wisconsin hobbyist gunsmiths have proven those critics wrong. Sound Off>> What did you expect? "When everyone kept their mouths shut when the Warrantless Wiretapping was approved, did you expect it to stop there? Benjamin Franklin's quote about temporary safety fell upon deaf ears in the U.S. We are now the police state plutocracy we've always wanted. Good luck getting your privacy back." --by Anonymous Coward Read More>>   Mad as Hell, Switching to Mac Eight years ago, Winn Schwartau posted an article on Network World about switching his company to Macs because he's fed up with the security issues plaguing Windows-based systems. He also offers his view on why Windows is inherently flawed and why it will eventually fail because of those reasons. Read More>>  Automated Beer Brewing: It's Linux Time SlashTV : Linux advocate and LinuxAutomation founder Kurt Forsberg says you can automate just about anything, including home thermostats and sprinklers. But his attention for the past few years has been on beer, specifically, using Linux to control his beer brewing. He explains how it's done.  Watch the Video>> I am fairly prepared for a storm outage of ... Approximately zero (empty fridge) Short duration (chips, soda, candles, laptop) A few hours (flashlight, snacks, UPS) 1-2 days (water, pizza, UPS+spare batteries) A week, tops (storm shelter, charged kindle) A week plus (MREs, shortwave, generator) I could live off the land forever Cast Your Vote>>   Follow Slashdot on Twitter and Facebook. To unsubscribe, click here or send an email to: unsubscribe-213087@elabs10.com To ensure delivery of this newsletter to your inbox and to enable images, please add slashdot@newsletters.slashdot.org to your e-mail address book or safe senders list. Slashdot | 594 Howard Street, Suite 300 | San Francisco, CA 94105 To view our Privacy Policy click here.