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TorchCraft to build machine-learning agents from cosmic battles StarCraft could be the next battleground for AI, as researchers create an open framework that tests deep-learning methods in the real-time strategy game.…

First comes a cloud testbed so we can figure out what non-volatile memory is good for IBM has quietly revealed that in “In the second half of 2017” its Bluemix cloud will offer “a broad services suite fuelled by Intel Optane”.'…

Code.gov is live and Gitting The United States government has made good on its policy of requiring agencies to release 20 per cent of their bespoke code as open source by making code.gov live, complete with lots of code.…

Android Studio 2.2 beckons, because what choice is there? Google's lengthy deathbed vigil for its Eclipse Android Developer Tools plugin has finally ended. After announcing its intention to pull the plug on ADT at the end of 2015, the company on Wednesday found the nerve to do so.…

PCs and devices will only pull the changes you need, in theory Microsoft will begin public trials of a new update system it says will dramatically reduce the size of Windows updates.…

Meanwhile, analysts say Blackberry and Windows Phone aren't even worth measuring Android smartphones currently account for nine tenths of what analysts say is now strictly a two-brand market.…

ClusterHQ debuts information time machine for better production testing Flocker is a mouthful. It's an open-source container data volume orchestrator, which means it helps migrate data when containers shift hosts. It makes data volumes portable within clusters.…

AKA how to look like a supermodel on camera to an AI Researchers armed with some nifty algorithms and a set of paper glasses frames have found a way to trick facial recognition systems.…

As NASA warns rover's instruments are failing Pic The Curiosity rover has discovered what appears to be a partially melted meteorite and has been testing it out with its on-board laser.…

Uni eggheads discuss track-and-trace threat Black Hat EU Wi-Fi networks can tease IMSI numbers out of nearby smartphones, allowing pretty much anyone to wirelessly track and monitor people by their handsets' fingerprints.…

And there's a swanky Porsche version, too Pics Huawei's chance to seize upon Samsung's Note 7 woes has come, with a new phablet and a Porsche Design-branded sibling.…

Navinder Singh Sarao will be sent for trial in America Navinder Singh Sarao, the British trader accused of illicitly making $40m and causing a stock market "flash crash" in 2010, has lost his attempt to appeal against extradition to the US.…

CoreOS is introducing software to simplify cluster configuration CoreOS, which makes a container-oriented version of Linux and the Tectonic platform for Kubernetes, on Thursday plans to introduce software called "Operators" to make it easier to configure and manage distributed applications.…

Hundreds axed in another round of layoffs NetApp has made another round of layoffs in the USA and elsewhere.…

When did Linux start becoming like Windows? Canonical has released Ubuntu Core 16 for IoT, featuring Linux self-patching for a generation of users against future Bash or Dirty COWs.…

Former publisher Nick Denton agrees to pay Shiva Ayyadurai $750,000 Former Gawker publisher Nick Denton has agreed to pay computer scientist and biotech entrepreneur Dr Shiva Ayyadurai $750,000 in damages after the blog wrote that Ayyadurai invented claims that he invented "email" in the late 1970s.…

How the cloud data mover is faring after executing the executor Analysis How is replication software supplier WANdisco doing after the chairman fired the CEO and then the fired CEO came back and fired the chairman?…

It failed when we did it, Lenovo coughs Comment Apple has ignored a page of very recent history by introducing its "Touch Bar", Lenovo reminded us on Thursday.…

Plus: EU courts won't have any say on Brexit Interview Britain's exit from the European Union could be guaranteed by the Supreme Court if the government has the cojones to appeal Thursday's Brexit-bashing Divisional Court verdict, says barrister Greg Callus.…

Yet firm refuses to say the word DDoS. What are they hiding? Outage-hit security firm Barracuda appears to have been struck down by a DDoS – though the firm says it's still investigating and refuses to confirm or deny it.…

PC sales drop? Tick. Data centre down? Tick? Mobile? Of course With sales shrinking in every corner of the portfolio and staff losing their jobs, Lenovo said Thursday it has hired some of the industry's "top minds" – presumably to help it figure a way out of its perfect storm.…

Striim shim prevents stale data Hazelcast in-memory cache corruption There is a hot cache integration between Hazelcast and Striim that prevents an in-memory cache being out of sync with its underlying multi-application access database.…

Heavily pro-remain MPs now get a vote on whether Britain will leave EU The British government has lost a legal challenge against invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, which would be the first step towards Great Britain leaving the European Union.…

IBM and co: Data for the masses – up the workers! As a phrase, "democratisation of data" is rather glib – but it does have a serious purpose. The thinking: making use of company data should not be the preserve of just "professionals".…

Eyeo vows Total War Ben Williams, Eyeo's comms chief, has warned Facebook that it's joined a battle it can't win.…

WileyFox's Swift 2 looks like a hit Hands On Last year a new London phone startup launched to try and tame the Shenzhen tiger. WileyFox aimed to harness the Chinese manufacturing revolution that's brought us low-cost Androids to a decent brand with local support. WileyFox sold a respectable amount – half a million devices – without becoming a household name. But that was a tweaked reference design. With its first in-house design, launched today, that's sure to change.…

Communications failure leads to zero day, late patch, natch. Millions of do-it-yourself websites built with the Wix web maker were at risk of hijack thanks to a brief zero day DOM-based cross-site scripting vulnerability.…

If you want to build code for lots of platforms, don't shoot the Message.io Taking aim at the balkanized bot ecosystem, Message.io, a Y Combinator-backed startup, on Wednesday began offering private beta access to its bot platform.…

Another crud home CCTV box Here we have yet another example of an internet-facing home security camera that is about as secure a chocolate padlock.…

'Particles up to ten billion times lighter than electrons' Boffins have calculated the mass of axions, which are a promising candidate for the mysterious dark matter loitering in our universe.…

Red Bull gives you liver disease? Don't overdo the energy drinks: even five a day can hammer the liver.…

It turns out you need to test on-premises before you send an app to the cloud Amazon Web Services is letting customers download its own artisanal Linux.…

MySQL, MariaDB, and Percona pwned. Dangerous since-patched vulnerabilities in MySQL, MariaDB, and Percona's Server and XtraDB Cluster have been found that, when chained, allow attackers in shared environments complete compromise of servers.…

We warned that 'Metapod' had trademark issues. Which is why it's now called 'Metacloud' Cisco has had to change the name of its Metapod OpenStack cloud-in-a-box, due to trademark problems.…

Zuck and Equinix create open source packet-optical switch Facebook's tipped its in-house designed Voyager packet optical switches into the Telecom Infra Project (TIP), with Equinix signing on as crash-test dummy for the switches.…

Switchzilla's also looking for any Dirty COWs in its code Service providers using Cisco' Prime to manage consumers' networks need to run in a critical patch.…

Grit your teeth, Aussie fibre fans, Kiwis are beating us again While Australia's nbn presses ahead with its Fibre-to-the-Node (FTTN) strategy, Kiwi carrier Spark wants to give up on copper entirely.…

If plane came down fast and steep, might it have crashed to the North of the search zone? The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) has published a new report (PDF) on the likely fate flight MH 370, the Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 missing since March 8th, 2014.…

NIST wants to nip message hacks in the bud. We're betting President Clinton agrees The US National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) has published a guide on how to improve email security – and it wants your feedback on it.…

Don't cheer: this is about more data sharing, so business can profit from you more easily In August, The Register called for the Australian government to put in place an independent agency to oversee use of citizens' data. In a report released today, the country's Productivity Commission (PC) has called for the same thing.…

Teenage crimes lead to adult punishments A member of the NullCrew group has been jailed for 45 months after pleading guilty to bag a reduced sentence.…

Do as we say, not as we do Facebook has shut down efforts by a car insurance company to use posts on the social network to decide discounts – over privacy concerns. No, honestly.…

Botched RIMS job leaves state with bad taste in its mouth The US state of Rhode Island is suing Hewlett Packard Enterprise over a car-crash IT project to overhaul its vehicle licensing system.…

Merger party got a bit out of hand, we take it? Network provider Level 3 Communications appears to be wrangling with a widespread outage in the US this morning.…

Dollars better flow or Chief Revenue Officer will have to go Pivot3 grew like crazy in its third quarter as the hyper-converged infrastructure boom carried on... booming.…

Teams messaging software bunged on Office 365 Microsoft has created Teams, an Office 365 chat app that is a direct competitor to Slack in the messaging sphere.…

'What's happening?' ask angry folk left with little info Security biz Barracuda is suffering an apparent failure of its email security service, according to angry customers who got in contact with El Reg.…

Featuring private cloud file sync and share Mobile phone users can access Nexsan's Unity storage array, and Nexsan has added web access apps for laptops and desktops.…

We're going to have shoulder this ourselves, admits chief exec Life could be better for data-visualisation business Tableau - today it reported weaker-than-expected Q3 revenues and placed the blame at the feet of its under-performing UK team, rather than the Brexit.…

Pride cometh despite one in three targeted attacks resulting in a security breach Overconfident security execs may be putting their organisations at greater risk, according to new research.…