Information Technology

P3P gives people more control over use of personal information on the Web

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has issued the Platform for Privacy Preferences (P3P) 1.0 as a W3C Recommendation, representing cross-industry agreement on an XML-based language for expressing Web site privacy policies. Declaring P3P a W3C Recommendation indicates that it is a stable document, contributes to Web interoperability, and has been reviewed by the W3C Membership, who favor its widespread adoption.

Every night 2.1 million newspapers are delivered to mailboxes in Finland. In order to make the delivery even more effortless, wireless data transfer will be harnessed to aid newspaper carriers.

In the three-year TLX technology programme recently completed by Tekes, the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT) has investigated methods of wireless control and monitoring of the newspaper delivery chain.

“In addition to various portable devices like mobile phones and PDA computers, i

Time is running out for the clocks that make our computers tick. Scientists have developed a new generation of hardware and software based on the simpler designs of the 1950s.

Asynchronous, or clock-free systems, promise extra speed, safety, security and miniaturisation. The new designs work well in the laboratory and are only awaiting the development of software tools so that they can be produced commercially, says Professor Alex Yakovlev and fellow researchers in the Department of Computin

New devices boost optical networks

Several technical requirements must be met until data from computers, TV stations or telephone network providers can be transported via fiber-optic cables to their destinations. Specialists from Infineon Technologies leverage their combined expertise to continuously improve the conditions for today’s and tomorrow’s fiber-optic applications with innovative chip designs. For example, the German technology foundry has developed a special device that ca

An inventive idea from Dr Chris Solomon of the School of Physical Sciences at the University of Kent at Canterbury (UKC) has beaten top International competition and won first prize in the prestigious European Digital Information Contents (DICON) competition.

Dr Solomon who has an active research programme in forensic imaging and a longstanding interest in the computational modelling, encoding and recognition of the human face said: `I was truly impressed by the quality of some of the prese

In a joint project between the Technology Foundation STW and the energy agency Novem at Utrecht University, researchers have developed new silicon layers which are more stable and cheaper than the present amorphous silicon layers. The electronic properties of the present layers in laptop screens and solar cells deteriorate if the material is under ‘stress’, for example due to sunshine or a voltage.

Flat-panel displays and solar cells have a substrate of glass or plastic, which is coated with