MojoKid summarizes an article from Hot Hardware: Boston Dynamics made news recently when 80% of the company was acquired by Hyundai. The company's family of robots is always impressive and now it appears they're having some fun to celebrate the close of 2020. Boston Dynamics' robot dog, Spot and its humanoid-like Atlas bot friend, were joined by their oddball sibling Handle to shake their booties on the dance floor to "Do You Love Me" by The Contours.

The video starts off impressive enough with just a single Atlas showing its incredible dexterity while busting out some sweet moves that would leave even the late Patrick Swayze envious. However, as the routine progresses, the camera pulls back to show that another twin Atlas is dancing along with the first one as they show off their synchronized and fresh rug-cutting ways. As this robotic soul train continues to roll, Spot the dog saunters in to join in on the fun with the distinct flare that only rover can bring. The entire 3 minute clip is really a marvel to behold, and maybe even slightly unsettling for some that might not fully welcome our robot overlords.

Another service is joining the Google graveyard, for better or worse. As the latest in a long series of Google service shutdowns, Cloud Print will be terminated in just a few short hours, meaning it will no longer be accessible for ChromeOS customers or others. From a report: Most internet users have probably never used Cloud Print a single time -- it was primarily designed for ChromeOS customers who had limited or no access to traditional printers years ago. However, now that ChromeOS boasts much broader support for printing devices, Cloud Print has effectively become obsolete. It still has a few unique advantages, such as the ability to share your printers with friends, but for the most part, there's no reason for Google to keep it around.

"Edmund M. Clarke, the FORE Systems Professor of Computer Science Emeritus at Carnegie Mellon University, has died of Covid-19," writes Slashdot reader McGruber.

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Professor Clarke was best known for his work in model checking, an automated method for detecting design errors in computer hardware and software. CMU president Farnam Jahanian said the world had "lost a giant in computer science" with Mr. Clarke's death. "Ed's pioneering work in model checking applied formal computational methods to the ultimate challenge: computers checking their own correctness," Mr. Jahanian said in a statement. "As systems become ever more complex, we are just beginning to see the wide-reaching and long-term benefits of Ed's insights, which will continue to inspire researchers and practitioners for years to come."

In the early 1980s, Mr. Clarke and his Harvard University graduate student, E. Allen Emerson — as well as Joseph Sifakis of the University of Grenoble, who was working separately — developed model checking, which has helped to improve the reliability of complex computer chips, systems and networks. For their work, the Association for Computing Machinery gave the three scientists the prestigious A.M. Turing Award — computer science's Nobel Prize — in 2007.

Mr. Clark's citation on the Turing Award website said Microsoft and Intel and other companies use model checking to verify designs for computer networks and software. "It is becoming particularly important in the verification of software designed for recent generations of integrated circuits, which feature multiple processors running simultaneously," the citation page said. "Model checking has substantially improved the reliability and safety of the systems upon which modern life depends."

FrankOVD shares this report from CNET: The people were really into the GMC Hummer EV when the brand finally ripped the cloak off the electric pickup truck earlier this year. So much so that the Hummer EV Edition 1 trim sold out in 10 minutes. Now, GMC is reportedly thinking about building more of them due to overwhelming response. According to dealer sources that spoke to the Detroit Free Press in a report last Tuesday, the brand told its dealer body it could make more of the Edition 1 trucks available...

Prices for the Edition 1 trim start at a whopping $112,595 including destination, which makes it the most expensive GM vehicle the automaker sells. Going down the trim lineup, the EV3X [in 2022] will start at $99,995, the EV2X [in 2023] will ring in at $89,995 and the base model [in 2024] will launch with a $79,995 price tag. Performance and capability notch a rung down with each trim, but that's to be expected. Those that pony up six figures for the Edition 1 will be the owners of a 1,000-horsepower supertruck of sorts with an estimated range of 350 miles to a single charge.
The Detroit Free Press notes the Hummer 1 "already has 10,000 pre-orders" — and that GMC "promises to have more EVs in the lineup beyond the Hummer pickup, including a Hummer SUV version that GM will officially reveal early next year..."

Electrek reports that 2021 will bring one of Tesla's fast-charging Supercharger to a state that's never had one before: Lanai Island, a former pineapple plantation that was almost entirely (98%) purchased by Oracle founder and Tesla board member Larry Ellison for $300 million in 2012, is the first in Hawaii to see a Supercharger permit filed by Tesla...

The 145-square-mile island doesn't have any traffic lights, only 30ish miles of paved roads and the 3,400 person population lives almost exclusively in the small Lana'i City. This would seem to indicate that the chargers would be of the Urban Supercharger variety and in likely service of Larry Ellison's Four Seasons Hotels, which rely on Model X vehicles to shuttle guests to and from the airport and around the island's luxury amenities.

Ellison plans to convert the island's power from diesel to solar/battery, and obviously Tesla's expertise here is likely to be tapped... Hawaii in general has been massively moving from its diesel generating past to solar power and plans to be 100% renewable before 2040.

The Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research(KSTAR), a superconducting fusion device also known as the Korean artificial sun, set the new world record as it succeeded in maintaining the high temperature plasma for 20 seconds with an ion temperature over 100 million degrees. Phys.Org reports: On November 24 (Tuesday), the KSTAR Research Center at the Korea Institute of Fusion Energy (KEF) announced that in a joint research with the Seoul National University (SNU) and Columbia University of the United States, it succeeded in continuous operation of plasma for 20 seconds with an ion-temperature higher than 100 million degrees, which is one of the core conditions of nuclear fusion in the 2020 KSTAR Plasma Campaign. It is an achievement to extend the 8 second plasma operation time during the 2019 KSTAR Plasma Campaign by more than 2 times. In its 2018 experiment, the KSTAR reached the plasma ion temperature of 100 million degrees for the first time (retention time: about 1.5 seconds)

To re-create fusion reactions that occur in the sun on Earth, hydrogen isotopes must be placed inside a fusion device like KSTAR to create a plasma state where ions and electrons are separated, and ions must be heated and maintained at high temperatures. In its 2020 experiment, the KSTAR improved the performance of the Internal Transport Barrier(ITB) mode, one of the next generation plasma operation modes developed last year and succeeded in maintaining the plasma state for a long period of time, overcoming the existing limits of the ultra-high-temperature plasma operation.

The world stocked up on laptop and desktop computers in 2020 at a level not seen since the iPhone debuted in 2007, and manufacturers still are months away from fulfilling outstanding orders, hardware industry executives and analysts said. Reuters reports: Remote learning and working has upturned the computer market during the coronavirus pandemic, zapping sales of smartphones while boosting interest in bigger devices, which had become afterthoughts to iPhones and Androids over the last decade. "The whole supply chain has been strained like never before," said Gregg Prendergast, Pan-America president at hardware maker Acer Inc.

Annual global shipments of PCs, the industry's collective term for laptops and desktops, topped out at about 300 million in 2008 and recently were sinking toward 250 million. Few expected a resurgence. But some analysts now expect 2020 will close at about 300 million shipments, up roughly 15% from a year ago. Tablets are experiencing even faster growth. By the end of 2021, installed PCs and tablets will reach 1.77 billion, up from 1.64 billion in 2019, according to research company Canalys. The virus pressed families into expanding from one PC for the house to one for each student, video gamer or homebound worker. Earlier this month, Sam Burd, president at Dell, said the industry "renaissance" would soon bring devices with AI software to simplify tasks like logging on and switching off cameras. Compared to last year, Dell's online orders from consumers surged 62% in the third quarter.

KFC unveiled what they're calling the KFConsole -- a VR-ready high-end gaming PC that comes with a built-in chicken warmer. GamesRadar reports: Back in June, just after the PS5 reveal, KFC released a ridiculous trailer for the KFConsole, but everyone just figured they were joking. Turns out, they were dead serious. KFC, the chicken place, has teamed up with Cooler Master and launched a gaming console capable of 4K and 240FPS. The joint press release doesn't mention a price or release date, but I've reached out for clarification and will update this article if I hear back.

The complete specs haven't been revealed, but we know it's got an Intel Nuc 9 CPU, Seagate BarraCuda 1TB SSD, and judging from the prominence of "ray tracing" in the marketing from Cooler Master, an Nvidia GPU. Cooler Master also says the KFConsole has "a first of its kind hot swappable GPU slot" for easy upgrades. But who really cares about all that when it's got a chamber to keep your fried chicken warm?

According to Reuters, Apple is moving forward with self-driving car technology and is targeting 2024 to produce a passenger vehicle that could include its own breakthrough battery technology. From the report: The iPhone maker's automotive efforts, known as Project Titan, have proceeded unevenly since 2014 when it first started to design its own vehicle from scratch. At one point, Apple drew back the effort to focus on software and reassessed its goals. Doug Field, an Apple veteran who had worked at Tesla Inc, returned to oversee the project in 2018 and laid off 190 people from the team in 2019. Since then, Apple has progressed enough that it now aims to build a vehicle for consumers, two people familiar with the effort said, asking not to be named because Apple's plans are not public. Apple's goal of building a personal vehicle for the mass market contrasts with rivals such as Alphabet Inc's Waymo, which has built robo-taxis to carry passengers for a driverless ride-hailing service.

Central to Apple's strategy is a new battery design that could "radically" reduce the cost of batteries and increase the vehicle's range, according to a third person who has seen Apple's battery design. [...] As for the car's battery, Apple plans to use a unique "monocell" design that bulks up the individual cells in the battery and frees up space inside the battery pack by eliminating pouches and modules that hold battery materials, one of the people said. Apple's design means that more active material can be packed inside the battery, giving the car a potentially longer range. Apple is also examining a chemistry for the battery called LFP, or lithium iron phosphate, the person said, which is inherently less likely to overheat and is thus safer than other types of lithium-ion batteries. [...]

Two people with knowledge of Apple's plans warned pandemic-related delays could push the start of production into 2025 or beyond. Apple has decided to tap outside partners for elements of the system, including lidar sensors, which help self-driving cars get a three-dimensional view of the road, two people familiar with the company's plans said. Apple's car might feature multiple lidar sensors for scanning different distances, another person said. Some sensors could be derived from Apple's internally developed lidar units, that person said. Apple's iPhone 12 Pro and iPad Pro models released this year both feature lidar sensors.

The Verge reports: Firefox's latest update brings native support for Macs that run on Apple's Arm-based silicon, Mozilla announced on Tuesday. Mozilla claims that native Apple silicon support brings significant performance improvements: the browser apparently launches 2.5 times faster and web apps are twice as responsive than they were on the previous version of Firefox, which wasn't native to Apple's chips...

Firefox's support of Apple's Arm-based processors follows Chrome, which added support for Apple's new chips shortly after the M1-equipped MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac mini were released in November.
Firefox 84 will also be the very last release to support Adobe Flash, notes ZDNet, calling both developments "a reminder of the influence Apple co-founder Steve Jobs has had and continues to exert on software and hardware nine years after his death." Jobs wrote off Flash in 2010 as successful Adobe software but one that was a 'closed' product "created during the PC era — for PCs and mice" and not suitable for the then-brand-new iPad, nor any of its prior iPhones. Instead, Jobs said the future of the web was HTML5, JavaScript and CSS.

At the end of this year Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Apple Safari also drop support for Flash.

Senior Apple execs recently reflected in an interview with Om Malik what the M1 would have meant to Jobs had been alive today. "Steve used to say that we make the whole widget," Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing told Malik.

"We've been making the whole widget for all our products, from the iPhone, to the iPads, to the watch. This was the final element to making the whole widget on the Mac."
ZDNet also notes that Firefox 84 offers WebRender, "Mozilla's faster GPU-based 2D rendering engine" for MacOS Big Sur, Windows devices with Intel Gen 6 GPUs, and Intel laptops running Windows 7 and 8. "Mozilla promises it will ship an accelerated rendering pipeline for Linux/GNOME/X11 users for the first time."

Firefox now also uses "more modern techniques for allocating shared memory on Linux," writes Mozilla, "improving performance and increasing compatibility with Docker."

And Firefox 85 will include a new network partitioning feature to make it harder for companies to track your web surfing.

Forbes reports: Nuclear advocates see a vast market for reactors in carbon capture and carbon-based products, not only for the next generation of reactors in development, but also for the aging dinosaurs they evolved from...

The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant in San Luis Obispo, California, for example, is slated to shut down in 2024 and 2025. "If the waste heat from that plant was being combined with electricity production you could be removing 20 million tons per year of carbon from the atmosphere," said Kirsty Gogan, co-founder of Energy for Humanity, at an EarthX panel on Wednesday. "Right now what's happening is these big gigawatt-scale depreciating assets — they're making baseload, clean, emissions-free power, but we're just throwing away the heat, right? Those nuclear plants could be more useful, making a big contribution toward that responsibility we all have to go negative.

"We all try to be neutral, but it ain't good enough. We have to take responsibility for the carbon that's already in the atmosphere and go negative."
That's just one possibility. For example, the article also suggests nuclear energy could be used to generate sustainable aviation fuel (currently made mostly from biomass) from smokestack carbon.

Slashdot reader ogcricket notes the article is based on an hour-long EarthX panel that's now available on YouTube.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The average cost of a lithium-ion battery pack fell to $137 per kWh in 2020, according to a new industry survey from BloombergNEF. That's an inflation-adjusted decline of 13 percent since 2019. The latest figures continue the astonishing progress in battery technology over the last decade, with pack prices declining 88 percent since 2010. Large, affordable batteries will be essential to weaning the global economy off fossil fuels. Lithium-ion batteries are the key enabling technology for electric vehicles. They're also needed to smooth out the intermittent power generated by windmills and solar panels.

But until recently, batteries were simply too expensive for these applications to make financial sense without mandates and subsidies. Now, that is becoming less and less true. BloombergNEF estimates that battery-pack prices will fall to $100 per kWh by 2024. Specifically, BloombergNEF projects that battery pack prices will fall to $58 per kWh in 2030 and to $44 per kWh in 2035. That's roughly the level necessary for BEVs to be price-competitive with conventional cars without subsidies. Given that electric vehicles are cheap to charge and will likely require less maintenance than a conventional car, they will be an increasingly compelling option over the next decade.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from PCMag.com: Mark Lantz, Manager of Advanced Tape Technologies at IBM Research, explains how researchers at IBM and Fujifilm brought together more than 15 years of work to set a new world record in tape storage. What they achieved is an areal density of 317Gbpsi (gigabits per square inch), which translates to a single tape capable of storing 580 terabytes of data. In order to achieve such a high areal density, the research team had to develop a brand new tape and created Strontium Ferrite (SrFe) in the process. Existing magnetic tapes rely on Barium Ferrite (BaFe), but SrFe offers the potential for higher density storage in the same amount of tape. Alongside that, the team also "developed a family of new servo-mechanical technologies including a new servo pattern that is pre-recorded in the servo tracks, a prototype head actuator and a set of servo controllers." The end result is a very high capacity tape that can be read while moving at a speed of 15km/h (9.3mph).

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Broadband and TV providers will finally be required to stop charging "rental" fees for equipment that customers own themselves, thanks to a new US law that takes effect on Sunday. The bogus fees were outlawed by the Television Viewer Protection Act (TVPA), which was approved by Congress and signed by President Trump in December 2019. The law was originally scheduled to take effect on June 20, but Congress gave the Federal Communications Commission leeway to delay enforcement by six months if the FCC "finds that good cause exists for such an additional extension." The FCC in April granted the six-month delay to ISPs, claiming that providers needed more time to comply because of the coronavirus pandemic. That decision delayed implementation of the new requirements until December 20, 2020.

The law's implementation will "put an end to the unconscionable business practice of charging consumers a rental fee for cable modem routers even if consumers do not use them!" consumer-advocacy group Public Knowledge said in a blog post. "This common-sense correction will permit consumers to continue to use their own equipment, and not be forced to pay for something they neither asked for nor needed." [...] The new law, passed as part of a budget bill, creates a "consumer right to accurate equipment charges" that prohibits TV and broadband providers from charging for "covered equipment provided by the consumer." Covered equipment is defined as "equipment (such as a router) employed on the premises of a person... to provide [TV service] or to provide fixed broadband Internet access service." The companies may not charge rental or lease fees in cases when "the provider has not provided the equipment to the consumer; or the consumer has returned the equipment to the provider."

The law also includes a right to transparency that requires TV providers to inform customers of the total monthly charges, including all company-imposed fees and a good-faith estimate of all government-imposed fees and taxes, before they enter into a contract. This notice must specify the amount of promotional discounts and when those discounts will expire. The law also gives customers a 24-hour period in which they can cancel new TV service without penalty. The new rule won't prevent TV providers from raising prices on existing customers, even when they're under contract. But the new transparency requirement is a step in the right direction.

Microsoft is working on in-house processor designs for use in server computers that run the company's cloud services, adding to an industrywide effort to reduce reliance on Intel's chip technology, Bloomberg News reports. From the report: The world's largest software maker is using Arm designs to produce a processor that will be used in its data centers, according to people familiar with the plans. It's also exploring using another chip that would power some of its Surface line of personal computers. The people asked not to be identified discussing private initiatives.

Makers of cars and electronic devices from TVs to smartphones are sounding alarm bells about a global shortage of chips, which is causing manufacturing delays as consumer demand bounces back from the coronavirus crisis. From a report: The problem has several causes, industry executives and analysts say, including bulk-buying by U.S. sanctions-hit Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies, a fire at a chip plant in Japan, coronavirus lockdowns in Southeast Asia, and a strike in France. More fundamentally, however, there has been under-investment in 8-inch chip manufacturing plants owned mostly by Asian firms, which means they have struggled to ramp up production as demand for 5G phones, laptops and cars picked up faster than expected. "For the whole electronics industry, we've been experiencing a shortage of components," said Donny Zhang, CEO of Shenzhen-based sourcing company Sand and Wave, who said he faced delays in obtaining a microcontroller unit that was key to a smart headphone product he was working on. "We were originally planning to complete production in one month, but now it looks like we'll need to do it in two." A source at a Japanese electronics component supplier said it was seeing shortages of WiFi and Bluetooth chips and was expecting delays of more than 10 weeks.

Microsoft is rolling out an update today that brings native support for Apple's M1 chip to the Windows productivity suite. "The apps getting the updates are Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and OneNote," reports The Verge. "Notably absent, however, is Teams." From the report: The updates are making the apps universal ones -- meaning these versions will run on both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs, so any upcoming updates or features will be coming at the same time for both platforms. [...] Office users who have automatic updates turned on should have the new versions sometime today, and anyone else can update it through the Mac App Store or Microsoft's AutoUpdate software (depending on if you downloaded Office through the App Store or directly from Microsoft). Outlook users will get not only native Apple Silicon support, but support for iCloud accounts as well, allowing them to sync their email, contacts, and calendars to the app if they use Apple's service to store them. Teams isn't included in today's rollout of updates, but Microsoft says they're working on it. No timeline is available, though.

According to a paper published in the journal Science, researchers report they they have now hit an efficiency of 29.15 percent in the perovskite/silicon tandem solar cell category. ScienceAlert reports: For this type of panel, the long-term target of more than 30 percent is now tantalizingly within reach. The latest lab tests edge ahead of the maximum 28 percent efficiency that perovskite/silicon cells have managed up to this point. [...] In this new research, the 29.15 percent efficiency record was managed with a 1 cm x 1 cm (0.4 inch x 0.4 inch) panel, so some serious scaling up will be required. The team says that should be possible, however. After 300 hours of simulated use, the tandem cell retained 95 percent of its original efficiency, which is another promising sign.

The new record was actually first reported earlier this year, though the peer-reviewed paper detailing the feat has just been published. The scientists used specially tweaked layer compositions for both connecting the electrode layer and keeping the two types of cell together in order to reach their new record. It's another moment to celebrate, but the scientists aren't stopping: previous research suggests that tandem solar cell technology should be able to reach efficiency rates of well above 30 percent, and the team says "initial ideas for this are already under discussion."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: GameStop employees across the country were caught by surprise on Saturday when the video-game chain suddenly announced new shipments of the highly coveted PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X consoles, sending customers flocking to stores. Workers at the U.S. retailer, speaking to Bloomberg and posting on social media, said they had received little notice for the restock and that the crowds were both chaotic and a risk to their health. The latest generation devices from Sony Corp. and Microsoft Corp. have been in short supply since their release last month, leaving gamers everywhere eager for the latest restock. On Saturday afternoon, GameStop told customers that new inventory was arriving, but that it would only be available to pre-order in stores, not online, where scalpers have dominated digital queues. However, employees found out less than an hour before the public, according to GameStop staffers, which left them unprepared for the rush of customers.

One GameStop manager on the East Coast shared an email from the company, sent just a few minutes before the public announcement, saying that their store would have about 15 new consoles available for pre-order. Minutes after the announcement, the manager said, the store had a crowd of about 40 people, violating social-distancing requirements and overwhelming their clerks. GameStop said its last-minute notification to customers was meant to ensure that individuals, not resellers, were able to purchase the consoles. "We realize that in some situations our approach of notifying customers of this opportunity may have caused unintended reactions from both our associates and customers," GameStop said in a statement. "We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused."

The rush occurred as GameStop is facing widespread staffing shortages as the retailer has asked stores across the country to cut hours, the manager said. GameStop, which has been struggling in recent years amid the widespread adoption of digital games, reported a disappointing third quarter last week, sending the stock falling as much as 22%. The retailer has shuttered almost 700 stores this year and will close more locations through 2022 while it continues to cut costs, although it expects to see a sales bump this quarter thanks to the new consoles. On Reddit, GameStop employees are sharing similar complaints, telling stories of big lines and unruly crowds.

Long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 shared this article from ABC News: What if your electric vehicle could be refueled in less than 5 minutes? No plug, no outlet required. The range anxiety that's stymied sales of EVs? Forget about it.

Three EVs can meet these demands and allay concerns about owning an emissions-free vehicle. There's just one drawback. You can only find them in California.

Welcome to the world of hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs). A tiny market that includes Toyota's Mirai, Hyundai's Nexo and Honda Motor's Clarity Fuel Cell, these "plug-less" EVs are the alternative to their battery electric cousins. Drivers can refuel FCEVs at a traditional gasoline station in less than 5 minutes. The 2021 Mirai gets an EPA estimated 402 miles of range on the XLE trim with the Nexo close behind at 380 miles. Neither cold weather nor heated seats deplete the range, another added bonus.

"Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are superior driving machines compared to traditional vehicles," Jackie Birdsall, senior engineer on Toyota's fuel cell team, told ABC News... "When people hear electric they only think battery electric," Birdsall said. "The battery electric vehicle market is pretty saturated. If we want to have sustainability and longevity we need to be diverse...." Birdsall said 2021 Mirai owners will receive $15,000 in free hydrogen, or enough money to cover the first 67,000 miles. It costs about $90 to fill up the car's 5.6 kilogram tank. These giveaways could help change consumers' minds — at least in California — to try an FCEV.