engineering

There have been recurrent calls among some on Wall Street, some shareholders -- and apparently some execs inside Microsoft -- for Microsoft to dump Bing.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer seems to be dead-set against the idea. The official Microsoft stance is Bing search is "a pretty strategic asset for the company" with benefits that "can be leveraged across our whole product set."

But privately it seems that some of Microsoft's key negotiators have floated the idea of offloading Bing to Facebook as a possible strategy. That's according to a New York Times report on April 23 … Read more

I recently chatted with mastering engineer Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound in NYC. He mastered Beyonce's "Live at Roseland: Elements of 4," Iron Maiden's "Flight 666" DVD, and James Taylor's "One Man Band," so you can see he's a pretty versatile engineer. When he was a kid the sound of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" turned him around, and the first Guns 'n' Roses album made a big impression.

My first question was simply this, "Does the process start as soon as you hear the album for the … Read more

Random strangers can change your life. So can ear, nose, and throat specialists who trained as engineers at MIT.

This is something 52-year-old Jan Christian discovered when she was in a supermarket and someone heard her attempts to talk. The stranger suggested she visit Dr. Sid M. Khosla.

"I sure wish I could remember what she looked like and knew who she is," Christian told WXIX in Cincinnati.

Khosla studied engineering at MIT and when he came to the University of Cincinnati, he received a grant to study flow in the voice box. In another random occurrence that characterizes this extraordinary story, one of the finest experts in jet noise happened to be at the same university. … Read more

There is no accounting for the chemically imbalanced ones and zeros that operate within the human head.

So please attempt to decipher what the people in this video are thinking, as they try to persuade a jet engine to blow them as far as possible in the direction of the sea.

These events are taking place -- every day, it seems -- on the island of Sint Maarten, around 190 miles east of Puerto Rico.

The Princess Juliana airport is right on the beach. Signs warn of the dangers of trying to get too close to the planes, as they … Read more

I am about to make quite a few of you feel slightly smug inside.

For all of you who happen to be reading this -- and who happen to be software engineers -- you have the best jobs in America.

This would not be my own verdict. For the idea of being a software engineer would turn my heart to molasses.

However, a company called CareerCast, which turns out to be yet another of the fine sites where one can find a lovable job, has no doubts that software engineer is where it's at.

I am grateful to the … Read more

With sweeping panoramic views of the Cascade Mountains, Puget Sound, and the Space Needle, Facebook's quickly growing Seattle team is setting up shop in its new high-rise office.

During an open house of the satellite office today, company high-ups and local politicians showed off the new digs and emphasized Facebook's plans to continue expanding past its Silicon Valley home base, according to TechFlash.

Now the social network's Northwest offices are just a stone's throw from Microsoft's and Amazon's headquarters, and eBay, Zynga, and Google's regional offices.

A former Intel engineer has pleaded guilty to stealing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of data from the chip giant before leaving the company, according to a Bloomberg report.

The worker, Biswamohan Pani, 36, of Chelmsford, Mass., stole the sensitive chip-related information "to advance his career with a competitor," according to Bloomberg. He worked at an Intel chip-manufacturing plant in Hudson, Mass.

Pani gave notice to Intel on May 29, 2008, with his last day set for June 11 and began work at Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) on June 2, "while retaining access to Intel's … Read more

Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 has powered fictional games like Gears of War 3 and Mass Effect 3, but now the technology is being used to assist real-world endeavors at government bodies like the FBI Academy through the just-launched Unreal Government Network.

Epic Games today announced a long-term Unreal 3 reseller agreement with Virtual Heroes, an interactive learning simulation company based in Raleigh, N.C.

As part of the deal, agencies and units of United States and allied governments will make use of Epic's game engine for a variety of purposes through the UGN.

Read more of "FBI using Unreal Engine 3 crime scene sim" at GameSpot. … Read more

Editors' note, March 22 at 1:14 p.m. PT: It seems the skeptics may have been right on this one. Gizmodo is now reporting that the purported birdman confessed on Dutch TV that this was indeed a hoax. Our original story follows, with some earlier updates.

If Red Bull doesn't actually give you wings, maybe this guy can.

Dutch mechanical engineer Jarno Smeets recently posted a video of what he says was his first successful flight with his homemade bird wings. Smeet's efforts take cloud computing to a (literally) whole new level, as the wings purportedly rely on an Android-powered HTC Wildfire S smartphone to process arm acceleration and compute the motor output.

The phone is connected to a microcontroller that is, in turn, connected to a Nintendo Wii Remote to measure acceleration and other flight parameters. … Read more