Equipment failure grounds flights within 250 miles of Memphis 

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Communications equipment failed Tuesday at a regional air-traffic control center, shutting down all airline traffic within 250 miles of Memphis and causing a ripple effect across the country ... that grounded dozens of passenger and cargo flights. The problem started when a major telephone line to the Memphis center went out at 12:35 p.m. EDT. The Federal Aviation Administration said air-traffic control operations were back to normal about three hours later. Air-traffic control centers in adjacent regions handled flights that were already in the air when the problem was discovered. "The airspace was completely cleared by 1:30 (p.m.) Eastern time," FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said. High-altitude flights through the region — which includes parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee — were discontinued while the equipment was being fixed. "What we did is put a ground stop in place for any flight that would transition through th   [More...] [Less...]

Agilent | United States Home 

Products & Services Capillary Electrophoresis Liquid Chromatography Consumables & Parts Mass Spectrometry DNA Microarrays Gas Chromatography Informatics & Software ICP-MS UV-Vis Lab-on-a-Chip Oscilloscopes ... Spectrum and Signal Analyzers Network Analyzers Logic Analyzers Power Meters & Power Sensors Frequency Counters LCR & Resistance Meters Impedance Analyzers DC Power Analyzers Generators, Sources, Supplies Signal Generators Pulse Pattern Generators Data Generators & Analyzers DC Power Supplies DC Electronic Loads Test Systems and Software assureME Assurance Solutions Photonic Test & Measurement Parametric Test Flat Panel Display Test Used Agilent T&M Equipment Services Check Warranty Status more...   [More...] [Less...]

BBC NEWS | Technology | Ofcom ponders future of fast net 

Super-fast broadband could be delivered via the underground pipes of the UK's water and electricity companies, regulator Ofcom has said. It is conducting a survey of the UK's ducting network to see its ... suitability for carrying fibre networks. Some companies in the UK and France already offer fast broadband via the sewers. Ofcom also wants to see the three million homes earmarked to be built in the UK by 2020, fibre-enabled. Change perception It has opened a consultation - which will run until June 25 - to see how best to regulate next-generation networks. Critics have warned that the regulator is not doing enough and that the UK is in real danger of falling behind with the rollout of superfast broadband access. "The fact that this is just a consultation is another indication that the UK is lagging behind," said Ian Fogg, an analyst with Jupiter Research. In France, for example, there are already three operators providing superfast broadband to homes at speeds of between 50 and 100 mega   [More...] [Less...]

Japan Leads U.S. in Fast and Cheap Internet Connections - New York Times 

Yukari Haruzono, a computer game enthusiast in Tokyo, waited Sunday for an upgrade while her daughter, Yuho, 6, played. She pays $55 a month to be able to download data at high speeds. TOKYO The United ... States may be the world s largest economy, but when it comes to Internet connections at home, many Americans still live in the slow lane. By contrast, Japan is a broadband paradise with the fastest and cheapest Internet connections in the world. Nearly eight million Japanese have a fiber optic line at home that is as much as 30 times speedier than a typical DSL line. But while that speed is a boon for Japanese users, industry analysts and some companies question whether the push to install fiber is worth the effort, given the high cost of installation, affordable alternatives and lack of services that take advantage of the fast connections. Indeed, the stock price of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone , which has two-thirds of the fiber-to-the-home market, has sunk because of concerns about   [More...] [Less...]

Novel Semiconductor Structure Bends Light Wrong Way - The Right Direction For Many Apps 

An easy-to-produce material made from the stuff of computer chips has the rare ability to bend light in the opposite direction from all naturally occurring materials. The semiconductors that constitute ... the Princeton invention are grown from crystals using common manufacturing techniques, making it less complex, more reliable and easier to produce than other metamaterials. Credit: Keith Drake by Staff Writers Princeton NJ (SPX) Oct 16, 2007 A Princeton-led research team has created an easy-to-produce material from the stuff of computer chips that has the rare ability to bend light in the opposite direction from all naturally occurring materials. This startling property may contribute to significant advances in many areas, including high-speed communications, medical diagnostics and detection of terrorist threats. The new substance is in a relatively new class of materials called "metamaterials," which are made out of traditional substances, such as metals or semiconductors, arranged in   [More...] [Less...]

Boston Underground Railway Gets Cellphone Coverage 

Travelers on Boston's public transport train service can now use their mobile phone in selected areas of the underground network. Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) General Manager Daniel ... A. Grabauskas announced that wireless services are available, for the first time ever, in the train tunnels connecting the four downtown Boston stations that comprise the core of the nation's first subway. Customers can also use their mobile phones from the eight train platforms at Park Street, Downtown Crossing, Government Center, and State Street Stations. The service is currently limited to customers of T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon Wireless. Additional stations and tunnels are expected to be added to the underground wireless network in 2008 and 2009. The MBTA contracted with InSite Wireless to design, build and operate a wireless infrastructure solution that allows multiple licensed cellular providers to deliver wireless voice and data services to T riders. The system is designed to de   [More...] [Less...]

eLearn: Feature Article 

Top 100 Tools for Learning, 2007 By Jane Hart, Head of the Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies Have you ever wanted to know what tools other learning professionals use and which are the most ... popular? Here at the we wanted to find out too. So in July and August 2007 I posed a simple question on our website and blog: "What are your 10 favorite tools for your personal learning/working, or for creating learning for others?" We received lists of Top 10 Tools from 109 learning professionals. I had personally invited 30 of these respondents and the other 79 replied to the open invitation. While many of the respondents are well known names in the e-learning field, including Jay Cross, Clive Shepherd, Clark Quinn, Brent Schlenker, Stephen Downes, Seb Schmoller, James Farmer, Jane Bozarth, Harold Jarche, Karl Kapp, Charles Jennings, and George Siemens. Other contributors are practitioners working in corporate training or education, so there was a wide range of contributions. Over 400   [More...] [Less...]

M.T.A. Makes Deal for Cellphones in Stations 

The bill looms for Broadband Britain 

Richard Wray, communications editor The Guardian Tuesday September 25 2007 Two years ago BT agreed to separate the millions of phone lines in the nation's skirting boards from the rest of its business ... to create a standalone company that would deal equally with any operator that wanted to get into the digital home of the future. Since then Openreach, as that new business became known, has handed over control of more than 3m of the UK's near 30m phone lines to rivals such as Carphone Warehouse's TalkTalk and Tiscali, so they can provide services from home telephony and broadband internet access to TV. A further 5m BT lines are being rented by rivals, using BT's wholesale product, for broadband services. As a result, the UK residential telephony market is fast becoming one of the most competitive in the world. But the set-up may soon change again since Ofcom is preparing a fundamental rethink of the UK broadband market. The regulator is asking the entire industry what is needed to pre   [More...] [Less...]

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