Channel

• You're fabbing it wrong: Chip shortages due to lack of investment in the right factories, says IDC

  Not enough money going into 40nm+ process nodes
  Dan Robinson Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 21:50 UTC

  Semiconductor shortage issues will continue through the first half of 2022 as the industry attempts to build up inventory to normal levels, according to research firm IDC.

  It cites limited investment in mature process technology as one reason, with many vital components for the automotive industry and other sectors manufactured using these older processes.

  The semiconductor market continues to experience uneven shortages and tight supply, IDC noted, and the research firm highlights that one of the key supply constraints for semiconductors has been in mature process nodes.

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• Microsoft brings Jenny, Aria, and more interface tweaks to new Windows 11 Insider build

  Exorcising the ghost of Windows past
  Richard Speed Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 21:01 UTC

  Microsoft has dropped another Windows 11 Insider build into the hands of unpaid testers, demonstrating it is serious about tidying up the mismatch of user interface cues in its flagship operating system.

  Build 22543 arrived in the Dev Channel last night and while the company was keen to trumpet the arrival of more natural voices for its Narrator ("Jenny" and "Aria") and new keyboard commands, the updated visuals are a welcome bit of polish – particularly in light of the ravaging of Notepad and Task Manager.

  After finally sorting out hardware indicators for the brightness and volume, today's emission brought tweaks to the media controls on the lock screen (for some Insiders) so it looks more like the design in Quick Settings when they are signed in.

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• California's net neutrality law dodges Big Telecom bullet

  Federal appeals court upholds decision not to block connection protection rules
  Thomas Claburn in San Francisco Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 20:06 UTC 2

  The US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday upheld a lower court's refusal to block California's net neutrality law (SB 822), affirming that state laws can regulate internet connectivity where federal law has gone silent.

  The decision is a blow to the large internet service providers that challenged California's regulations, which prohibit network practices that discriminate against lawful applications and online activities. SB 822, for example, forbids "zero-rating" programs that exempt favored services from customer data allotments, paid prioritization, and blocking or degrading service.

  In 2017, under the leadership of then-chairman Ajit Pai, the US Federal Communications Commission tossed out America's net neutrality rules, to the delight of the internet service providers that had to comply. Then in 2018, the FCC issued an order that redefined broadband internet services, treating them as "information services" under Title I of the Communications Act instead of more regulated "telecommunications services" under Title II of the Communications Act.

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• Joe Danger rides to the rescue as ageing title tugs at the heartstrings

  Hobby project sees Hello Games' first baby return at the request of a dedicated dad
  Lindsay Clark Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 19:02 UTC 1

  In these times of political uncertainty, economic upheaval, and an ongoing pandemic, it’s heartening to reveal a human story in software development.

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• Not Azure thing: Using MS's Quantum to schedule chats with spacecraft on the DSN

  Oh boy
  Richard Speed Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 18:13 UTC 1

  While Microsoft's Azure Quantum continues to hover between vapourware and hardware – a state of quantum if you will – NASA boffins have been putting tech inspired by the research to work in spacecraft communications.

  As for those that think the Moon landings never happened, just wait until you hear about scalable quantum computing.

  In this instance, the fabled hardware is not being put to use by engineers and scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Instead, the team is looking for ways of optimising communication with missions via the very finite resource of the Deep Space Network (DSN).

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• Blistering bandwidth: JEDEC pushes out HBM3 memory specs

  All that and improved energy efficiency
  Dan Robinson Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 17:28 UTC

  The JEDEC Solid State Technology Association has published the official standards for HBM3 memory, the latest update to the High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) Standard.

  HBM is a high-performance memory type that uses vertically stacked memory chips that are typically mounted on the same substrate close to a CPU or GPU. There are just a few suppliers of HBM memory: SK hynix, Micron, and Samsung spring to mind.

  The HBM3 standard was designed for greater bandwidth, doubling the per-pin data rate of HBM2 generation components up to 6.4Gbps, equivalent to 819GBps bandwith per device, according to JEDEC, which is in line with the HBM3 DRAM design SK hynix announced last year.

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• Despite growth, questions remain over whether SAP can get customers off-prem fast enough to appease investors

  €500m cloud investments drag on profit
  Lindsay Clark Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 16:47 UTC 3

  SAP's operating profit has fallen 45 per cent year-on-year in the fourth calendar quarter pf 2021 to €1.47bn as cloud investments drag on profitability.

  Despite boasting 17 per cent growth in cloud revenue to £9.4bn, the full-year results also show the pain involved as one of the world's largest software vendors attempts to transition to a new business model.

  On a call with investors, CEO Christian Klein said: "These are very strong results during a challenging time for most businesses. They demonstrate the confidence our customers have in SAP and in the unique value we offer in helping them address an unprecedented set of challenges. We are optimistic about the year ahead and we are well on track to achieving our 2025 ambitions."

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• New tools to simplify wrapping your head around Kubernetes

  Where to begin when you're ready to get your K8s on
  Liam Proven in Prague Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 15:15 UTC

  Engineer Nelson Elhage offers several reasons Kubernetes is so complex but this does at least mean that multiple companies offer tools to try to help you master it.

  The Google-backed container-management system is famously difficult, even to spell or pronounce. (It's often called "k8s" for short: since "kubernetes" is 10 letters long, "k8s" signifies "k" + eight letters + "s", and is pronounced "kates".) The Mountain View mammoth even commissioned a comic to explain what it is. (It's long, but quite good.)

  K8s is a set of tools for managing clusters – but not everyone has a spare cluster lying around that they can play with.

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• ISO.org outage hits day 3: Still in the dark as the important matter of bunk bed standards enters discussion

  Time to get out ISO 22300:2021, Security and resilience – Vocabulary
  Richard Speed Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 14:16 UTC 9

  The great International Organization for Standardization outage is entering its third day as consultants find themselves bereft of technical documents with which to beat engineers.

  Problems first appeared as 26 January drew to a close and the organisation noted: "We are currently facing a technical outage impacting our application's availability and performance. This outage is under investigation."

  The following day brought good news. At 0822 CET on 27 January the group announced it had identified the issue (something to do with IT infrastructure) and a couple of hours later reported that some applications were being brought back up.

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• Capita offloads Microsoft licensing biz Trustmarque to private equity for £110m

  Remainder of Capita's Portfolio of unwanted businesses to be expunged by year end, says CEO
  Paul Kunert Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 13:45 UTC 1

  Capita is again clearing out another of the previous CEO’s past conquests with confirmation this morning that it is offloading software licensing and hardware reseller Trustmarque to One Equity Partners for £111m.

  Readers will no doubt be delighted to hear that the sale represents a good earner for Capita, everyone's fave outsourcing badass, which paid £57m for Trustmarque in 2016. Not all of Capita's other past divestments have proved as financially nourishing.

  "We are pleased to have agreed the sale of Trustmarque to One Equity Partners following a competitive sales process," said Jon Lewis, who grabbed the controls of what appeared to be a slowly sinking ship in December 2017.

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• Internet Society condemns UK's Online Safety Bill for demonising encryption using 'think of the children' tactic

  Plus: Cops' surveillance is used against drug gangs and not child abusers, says Tutanota
  Gareth Corfield Fri 28 Jan 2022 // 12:56 UTC 41

  Britain's controversial Online Safety Bill will leave Britons more exposed to internet harms than ever before, the Internet Society has said, while data from other countries suggests surveillance mostly isn't used to target child abusers online, despite this being a key cited rationale of linked measures.

  Government efforts to depict end-to-end encryption as a harm that needs to be designed out of the internet as it exists today will result in "fraud and online harm" increasing, the Internet Society said this week.

  Founded by Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn, the Internet Society is one of the oldest and most well-respected institutions guiding the path of the public internet today. Its cry against the draconian Online Safety Bill (aka Online Harms Bill) should cause policymakers to sit up and pay attention.

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