blog dds

2007.01.12

The Perils of Naive Sorting

I wanted to compare the aggregate cited half-life of works in different scientific disciplines. This figure tracks the median age of the articles cited during the last year. The ISI Web of Knowledge offers such a tool, and allows sorting by the a field's half life. I found the first three entries in the list, mineralogy (10), orthopedics (9.7), and agriculture (9.5), slightly odd.

Continue reading "The Perils of Naive Sorting"

Last modified: Friday, January 12, 2007 10:50 am

2006.12.13

Secure Passports and IT Problems

In 2003 Greece, in response to new international requirements for secure travel documents, revised the application process and contents of its passports. From January 1st 2006 passports are no longer issued by the prefectures, but by the police, and from August 26th passports include an RFID chip. The new process has been fraught with problems; many of these difficulties stem from the IT system used for issuing the passports. On December 12th, the Greek Ombudsman (human rights section) issued a special 22-page report on the problems of the new passport issuing process. The report is based on 43 official citizen complaints.

Continue reading "Secure Passports and IT Problems"

Last modified: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 1:25 pm

2006.02.15

A Malfeasant Design for Lawful Interception

Earlier this month it was revealed that more than 100 mobile phone numbers belonging mostly to members of the Greek government and top-ranking civil servants were found to have been illegally tapped for a period of at least one year (see Wikipedia article). Apparently, the tapping was implemented by activating Ericsson's lawful interception subsystem installed at the Vodafone service provider. How could this happen?

Continue reading "A Malfeasant Design for Lawful Interception"

Last modified: Wednesday, February 15, 2006 1:45 pm

2005.04.09

Vatican's Prescient Web Masters

The Vacancy of the Apostolic See web page appears to have been prepared one day BEFORE the Pope's death.

Continue reading "Vatican's Prescient Web Masters"

Last modified: Saturday, April 9, 2005 11:34 am

2004.08.31

U.S. military sites offer a quarter million Microsoft Word documents

I was Google-searching for the Air Force Operational Test & Evaluation Center publication "Software Maintainability - Evaluation Guide". To make my search more efficient I restricted it to military (.mil) sites, using the Google keyword "site:.mil". I was not able to find the publication I was looking for, but was surprised to see a number of Microsoft Word documents in the search results.

Continue reading "U.S. military sites offer a quarter million Microsoft Word documents"

Last modified: Tuesday, August 31, 2004 2:11 pm

Creative Commons License Last update: Thursday, September 22, 2016 9:56 am
Unless otherwise expressly stated, all original material on this page created by Diomidis Spinellis is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Greece License.