Secure shell (SSH) client for the Android platform

ConnectBot is a Secure Shell client for the Android platform. Its ultimate goal is to create a secure connection through which you can use a shell on a remote machine and transfer files back and forth to your phone.

via connectbot – Secure shell (SSH) client for the Android platform – Google Project Hosting.

Putty is also available for Android but it’s nice there are two options for doing this.

Syncing an Android Tablet to a PC

Android tablets don’t have an automatic method or desktop management software to sync your files from the device to a personal computer. However, there is a way to do it manually, a process which requires mounting the device so the computer recognizes its file system, then moving pictures, videos and other data to the computer’s local hard drive.

via Syncing an Android Tablet to a PC | Chron.com.

This entire site seems like a good reference on many topics relaing to  using tablets based on android.

WindowsAndroid goes above and beyond Bluestacks, lets you run Android 4.0 natively on your PC

To get an early release of WindowsAndroid, you first have to fill out the download form (make sure to provide a valid email address) and grab the hefty 64.8MB installer via the download link you receive in your inbox. WindowsAndroid takes up about 300MB and comes with a cute Android robot icon. Firing it up presents you with a command prompt that loads all the components and then this familiar screen:

via WindowsAndroid goes above and beyond Bluestacks, lets you run Android 4.0 natively on your PC – The Next Web.

BitTorrent Launches Private and Secure Dropbox Alternative

Just ask Twitter and Facebook, two major technology companies that rely on BitTorrent technology to distribute files across their networks.

via BitTorrent Launches Private and Secure Dropbox Alternative | TorrentFreak.

I didn’t know that about facebook and twitter.  Bittorrent is a very useful protocol for certain use cases and I’m surprised other cloud storage providers haven’t adopted it yet.

Mars rover Opportunity now in 10th year

NASA’s Opportunity rover landed on Mars the night of Jan. 24, 2004 PST (just after midnight EST on Jan. 25), three weeks after its twin, Spirit, touched down. Spirit stopped operating in 2010, but Opportunity is still going strong, helping scientists better understand the Red Planet’s wetter, warmer past.

via Mars rover Opportunity now in 10th year – Technology & science – Space – Space.com | NBC News.

I love this story because the requirements for these rovers only called for 3 months operation.  That is what they call exceeding expectations!

Cisco Exits The Consumer Market As It Sells Linksys To Belkin

This should be a relatively smooth transition that won’t affect current customers: Belkin says it will honor all valid warranties for current and future Linksys products. After the transaction closes, Belkin will account for approximately 30 percent of the US retail home and small business networking market.

via Cisco Exits The Consumer Market As It Sells Linksys To Belkin.

These cheap home routers have become commodities.  As far as I know Belkin makes a decent product.  Cisco tried to require its home router users to be managed by its cloud platform and after that debacle it seemed all downhill from there for them.   If possible I prefer to use a real Linux box running real iptables as a gateway  using these wifi home routers as access points.

An Open-Source exFAT Implementation Reaches v1.0

Linus Torvalds and others in the past have characterized FUSE file-systems as being for toys and misguided people, but FUSE has been used before for bringing Sun/Oracle’s ZFS to Linux, various other creative file-system implementations, and now exFAT. ExFAT support for Linux has been talked about going back to early 2009 but the support has been crap on Linux.

via [Phoronix] An Open-Source exFAT Implementation Reaches v1.0.

I always find filesystem debates fascinating.

Fedora Looks To Replace MySQL With MariaDB

Out of fears that Oracle is making MySQL a more closed software project and not being happy with the overall direction of this widely-used database software, Fedora developers are looking at replacing MySQL with MariaDB in  Fedora 19.

via [Phoronix] Fedora Looks To Replace MySQL With MariaDB.

MySQL would still be available in the Fedora repository for at least one release as the more conservative users make the migration from MySQL to MariaDB.