Want to Vote, O'Connor? Think Again

Professor aims 'to model how people make decisions'

(NEWSER) - Cheaters beware: A chess wiz has developed a program to catch you. Potential cheating has become a noted problem in chess, the New York Times reports. Alleged text messaging prompted a five-year ban on a trio of players in 2010; in 2006, a player was accused of using a computer in the bathroom in an incident dubbed Toiletgate. The controversy inspired an international chess master and University of Buffalo professor to develop a computer program to investigate cheating. More»

He created UNIX, C programming languages

(NEWSER) - Dennis Ritchie, who invented the C programming language and helped create the UNIX operating system, died last weekend at age 70. His death after a long illness was first reported by Google engineer Rob Pike . Obituaries popping up on tech sites hail his work, vision, and legacy:

• “Ritchie's contribution to computer science cannot be overstated. … His vision, innovation, and hard work shaped much of what has come in the following four decades,” writes Lawrence Latif on the Inquirer . “To this day C is arguably the fastest, most efficient, most widely deployed high level programming language."

Programmers leave screens for soldering irons

(NEWSER) - Seeking an escape from the confined world of their computer screens, programmers are applying their technological know-how to the physical world, building and tweaking an array of devices with their hands, the Boston Globe reports. “My normal job is way up in the clouds,” said a programmer at a soldering workshop. “This is so much more down to earth.” More»

Competitions, money power coder boom

(NEWSER) - A growing number of computer programmers aren’t content to be anonymous code monkeys: Today’s most talented tech nerds are paid exorbitantly well to turn out brilliant code, and can even earn a small amount of fame doing it, ComputerWorld reports. “Some developers base their careers around eventually becoming rock stars,” while others “practically worship” at their “virtual altar,” said one writer who rates programmers. More»