Hadoop World: The executive dashboard is on the way out

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In their zeal to collect as much operational data as possible, organizations hoping to gain an advantage through the use of big data will also need to rethink how they process, analyze and present that material.

When all this information finally gets to the business, it is difficult for the business to understand what to glean out of the data, said Sharmila Shahani-Mulligan, CEO and co-founder of big-data startup ClearStory Data. We know this has been a problem for several years now.

Shahani-Mulligan was one of a number of speakers at the OReilly Strata + Hadoop World conference Thursday in New York to offer tips on making the move from data to big data. She suggested that the executive dashboard is giving way to emerging technique of interactive storytelling, which gives data more readily apparent context and meaning.

Meanwhile, organizations should watch Google closely, advised M.C. Srivas, chief technology officer of Hadoop distributor MapR Technologies. Google, with its vast and varied infrastructure, can provide us with a glimpse into the future of where computing is going, said Srivas, who worked at Google before co-founding MapR.

One of the basic rules to pick up from Google is that more data beats complex algorithms, Srivas said. This is something that Google has demonstrated again and again: The company that can process the most data will have an advantage over everybody else in the future.

A number of MapR customers are following this principle, Srivas said.

Millennial Media, a leader in the mobile advertising market, collects up to about 4TB of mobile user data each day, combining with petabytes of data on hand to build profiles of mobile users.

Cisco collects data from its firewalls worldwide, aggregating about a million events per second, all to better detect security threats. Credit agency TransHuman collects data from multiple sources to provide real-time credit scores.

But once an organization has committed to collecting more data, the question becomes what to do with it.

Visualization is a handy tool, but picking the correct visualization is vitally important, advised Miriah Meyer, an assistant professor in the University of Utahs School of Computing.

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Hadoop World: The executive dashboard is on the way out

Man caught on video stealing computer from store

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HOUSTON -

Houston police are looking for a man who they say walked into the Computer Super Store, stole a computer and then ran out. The incident was all caught on camera.

Sales manager Russell Greggory said Wednesday started out like any other day.

"Unsuspecting customer comes in from the sign and he is looking for our special," said Greggory.

In the store's surveillance video, you can see Greggory greet the man and show him around the store near Reliant Park.

"As soon as I turned my head, I heard footsteps, running, I looked and the guy is running out the door. I was in shock. My response was to run out the door behind him, but I caught myself. If this guy would do this, there is no telling he might have a gun," said Greggory.

The man bolted out the front door and jumped into a red, four-door sedan waiting for him in the parking lot. Greggory said they are now thinking about adding additional locks or adding a security guard to the front door.

"We do that holiday season, which is typically right after Thanksgiving, but it looks like we may have to do that early this year," Greggory said.

If you recognize the man in the surveillance video, you are asked to call the Houston Police Department.

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Man caught on video stealing computer from store

Embryonic Stem Cells Restore Vision In Preliminary Human Test

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Isabella Beukes, of Santa Rosa, Calif., has been legally blind for more than 40 years. An experimental treatment derived from embryonic stem cells seems to have enabled her now to see not just color but also some shapes. Tim Hussin for NPR hide caption

Isabella Beukes, of Santa Rosa, Calif., has been legally blind for more than 40 years. An experimental treatment derived from embryonic stem cells seems to have enabled her now to see not just color but also some shapes.

Scientists are reporting the first strong evidence that human embryonic stem cells may be helping patients.

The cells appear to have improved the vision in more than half of the 18 patients who had become legally blind because of two progressive, currently incurable eye diseases.

The researchers stress that the findings must be considered preliminary because the number of patients treated was relatively small and they have only been followed for an average of less than two years.

But the findings are quite promising. The patients had lost so much vision that there was no expectation that they could benefit, the researchers say.

"I'm astonished that this is working in the way that it is or seems to be working," says Steven Schwartz, a UCLA eye specialist who led the study, which was published Tuesday in the British medical journal The Lancet. "I'm very excited about it."

Other researchers agreed the work is preliminary, but also highly promising.

"It really does show for the very first time that patients can, in fact, benefit from the therapy," says Dr. Anthony Atala, a surgeon and director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest University.

What we did is put them into patients who have a disease where those particular cells are dying; and we replaced those dying tissues with new tissue that's derived from these stem cells. In a way it's a retinal transplant.

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Embryonic Stem Cells Restore Vision In Preliminary Human Test

Modern Witchcraft and Pagan Spirituality (The justBernard Show) – Video

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Modern Witchcraft and Pagan Spirituality (The justBernard Show)
( GIC Production ) Witchcraft is a pagan religion. Pagan religions worship multiple deities rather than a single god. Paganism is one of the oldest religions and includes all religions that...

By: Bernard Alvarez

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Modern Witchcraft and Pagan Spirituality (The justBernard Show) - Video

NASA Astronauts Conduct Space Walk To Make Important Repairs On International Space Station – Video

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NASA Astronauts Conduct Space Walk To Make Important Repairs On International Space Station
Outside the International Space Station, Expedition 41 Flight Engineers Reid Wiseman and Barry Wilmore of NASA replaced a voltage regulation device and relocated camera and television equipment.

By: NASA

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NASA Astronauts Conduct Space Walk To Make Important Repairs On International Space Station - Video

China Moving Forward with Big Space Station Plans

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Space travelers from around the globe recently got a firsthand sense of China's blossoming plans to explore Earth orbit and beyond.

At the 27th Planetary Congress of the Association of Space Explorers (ASE), held in Beijing last month, China's space industry leaders extended an open invitation for other nations to take part in China's emerging space station program.

"We reserved a number of platforms that can be used for international cooperative projects in our future space station when we designed it," Yang Liwei, deputy director of China Manned Space Engineering and China's first astronaut, said at the event, which was held in China for the first time. "In addition to collaboration in applied experiments, we also designed adapters that can dock with other nations' spacecraft." [Read the latest news about China's space program]

China has initiated a multistep space station program, sending the Tiangong 1, its first space lab and still-operating spacecraft, into orbit in September 2011.

And the liftoff of China's Tiangong 2 space lab, scheduled for 2016, is intended to sharpen China's space station construction skills. A Shenzhou 11 crewed spacecraft and a Tianzhou 1 cargo spacecraft would then be launched to dock with that facility.

Yang told the ASE delegates that by about 2022, China's first space station would be fully operational.

Space travelers from around the world attended the event hosted by ASE, an international nonprofit professional and educational organization of nearly 400 astronauts from 35 nations. One of them was Charles Walker, the first industrial payload specialist that flew as a crew member on three space shuttle missions in the 1980s.

"The ASE Congress was very successful; the Chinese are energetic, welcoming, friendly and intent on exploring and developing space," Walker said.

The Chinese mythabout the beautiful young woman, Chang'e, and her jade rabbit, Yutu, going to the moon have made for a great connection with the Chinese people. All of China's lunar missions to date have been named for the Chang'e moon maiden. "They seem intent on lunar exploration and exploitation through some or all the scenarios of which we are familiar," Walker told Space.com.

And China is maintaining its momentum with missions to low-Earth orbit, Walker said. "Their human spaceflight program is maturing quickly and deliberately," he said.

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China Moving Forward with Big Space Station Plans

NASA Investigating Deep-Space Hibernation Technology

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Image Credit: 20th Century Fox

Manned missions to deep space present numerous challenges. In addition to the sheer amount of food, water and air necessary to keep a crew alive for months (or years) at a time, theres also the question of keeping them busy for the entirety of a long-duration flight. Exercise is certainly an option, but the necessary equipment will take up space and be a drain on power.

In addition, theyll need room to move around, places to sleep, eat, work, and relax during their down time. Otherwise, they will be at risk of succumbing to feelings of claustrophobia, anxiety, insomnia, and depression among other things.

NASA has been looking at a few options and one proposed solution is to put these crews into an induced state of hypothermia resulting in torpor a kind of hibernation. Rather than being awake for months or years on end, astronauts could enter a state of deep sleep at the beginning of their mission and then wake up near the end. This way, they would arrive refreshed and ready to work, rather than haggard and maybe even insane.

If this is starting to sound familiar, its probably because the concept has been explored extensively by science fiction. Though it goes by different names cryosleep, reefersleep, cryostasis, etc. the notion of space explorers preserving their bodies through cryogenic suspension has been touched upon by numerous sci-fi authors, movies and franchises.

But NASAs plan is a little different than what you might remember from 2001: A Space Odyssey or Aliens. Instead of astronauts stepping into a tube and having their temperature lowered, torpor would be induced via the RhinoChill a device that uses invasive tubes to shoot cooling liquid up the nose and into the base of the brain.

Artists concept of sleeping to Mars. Photo Credit: SpaceWorks Enterprising

To research the technology, NASA has teamed up with SpaceWorks, an Atlanta-based aerospace company that is investigating procedures for putting space crews into hibernation. During this years International Astronomical Congress which took place from Sept. 29th to Oct. 3rd in Toronto representatives from SpaceWorks shared their vision.

According to the company, inducing torpor in a crew of astronauts would eliminate the need for accommodations like galleys, exercise equipment, and large living quarters. Instead, robots could electrically stimulate key muscle groups and intravenously deliver sustenance to ensure the health and well being of the astronauts while in transit.

As Dr. Bradford,President of SpaceWorks Enterprises Inc., told Universe Today via email:

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NASA Investigating Deep-Space Hibernation Technology

Red Coach adds service to Jacksonville, Fla.

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RedCoach, a Floridian luxury motorcoach company, expanded its routes to include a direct connection from Jacksonville to Tallahassee, and from Jacksonville to Orlando.

With regional travel between Jacksonville, Tallahassee and Orlando experiencing high demand, RedCoach is offering travelers exclusive, limited-time promotional rates. Roundtrip fares from Jacksonville to Orlando start at $20, with fares from Jacksonville to Tallahassee starting at $30.

Considering all the business activity and universities in the area, Floridians need more connections to Jacksonville, says Florencia Cirigliano, who heads RedCoachs operations in the U.S. The response to our expanded service has been very positive thus far, as more people become familiar with RedCoachs superior, luxurious style of motorcoach travel.

With the average price for gasoline at $3.30 a gallon, taking a trip from Jacksonville to Orlando can cost upwards of $80 roundtrip. RedCoach is less expensive than driving, allowing travelers to save money and mileage while working or relaxing.

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Red Coach adds service to Jacksonville, Fla.

NASA astronauts’ first spacewalk after near-death spacesuit malfunction – Video

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NASA astronauts #39; first spacewalk after near-death spacesuit malfunction
Two NASA astronauts carried out repair work on a voltage regulator which shorted out in May. It was the first time NASA allowed astronauts to go outside the ISS since 2013, when an incident...

By: RT America

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NASA astronauts' first spacewalk after near-death spacesuit malfunction - Video