A common system task is backing up files – that is, copying files with the ability to go back in time and restore them. For example, if someone erases or overwrites a file but needs the original version, then a backup allows you to go back to a previous version of the file and restore it. In a similar case, if someone is editing code and discovers they need to go back to a version of the program from four days earlier, a backup allows you to do so. The important thing to remember is that backups are all about copies of the data at a certain point in time.

In contrast to backing up is “replication.” A replica is simply a copy of the data when the replication took place. Replication by itself does not allow you to go back in time to retrieve an earlier version of a file. However, if you have a number of replicas of your data created over time, you can sort of go back and retrieve an earlier version of a file, but you need to know when the replica was made, then you can copy the file from that replica.

This man lost nearly $87,000 for the crime of having cash on him.

Last week, Qantas operated the world’s first commercial flight between New York and Sydney, a 19-hour and 16-minute epic journey. It was part of the airline’s “Project Sunrise,” a study into the feasibility of super-long-haul flights for both machine and human.

While the 787 Dreamliner is a great aircraft to operate such ultra-long-range (ULR) flights, humans aren’t designed particularly well to be cooped up in a pressurized tube for such sustained periods. It’s made a bit better if you have a flatbed to spend the entirety of the flight in. Even in the back of the aircraft, having films to watch and being able to doze off whenever you chose helps eat up the time.

However, what about the crew who call that pressurized tube their office? Those people are working a 20-plus-hour day and have to perform at their peak, right until the end of that long slog. ULR flights pose their own challenges to those who keep you safe on board, so this is how we do it.

Last month, JetBlue launched its inaugural flight between New York-JFK and London Heathrow (LHR) on an A321LR aircraft. Narrowbody aircraft are nothing new to transatlantic travel, but JetBlue’s entry into the highly competitive New York to London route caused quite a stir.

For travelers sitting in the cabin, the experience is comparable with other transatlantic carriers, with lie-flat seats in business class and mood lighting and amenity kits for passengers in the back. But how does transatlantic flying in an A321 differ from a 787 Dreamliner for the people sitting farthest forward — the pilots?

In my career, I’ve spent just over 3,000 hours flying the A321 (7,000 hours total with the A320 family) and nearly 4,000 hours flying the 787 Dreamliner. As a result, I feel I’m in a good position to compare and contrast how it feels to fly the two aircraft, particularly on routes with longer flight times. ///

:: Boeing

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Leo Major

Leo Major’s story is so preposterous that Hollywood still hasn’t made a movie about it. A French-Canadian who saw action in the Normandy landings, Leo began his military career by full of communications equipment, providing the Allies with invaluable intelligence. He then single-handedly took out a group of elite Nazi SS troops, but lost his left eye after a dying enemy managed to ignite a phosphorus grenade. When a doctor tried to send him home, Leo reportedly replied that he to aim. He later broke several bones in his back, but again refused to be evacuated, returning to the battlefield to participate in the liberation of Holland.

During an early-morning reconnaissance mission at the Battle of the Scheldt, he spotted a German contingent in a village, most of them asleep. A typical soldier would have returned to report to a superior, but for a guy like Leo this was an opportunity. He captured the German commander, and after killing a few soldiers, the entire company of 93 men . He then escorted them back to the Allied lines. Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up.

But Leo’s greatest feat was still to come. In April 1945, the Canadians were tasked with liberating the Dutch city of Zwolle. Their plan was to bombard the German positions with artillery until they surrendered. Leo was once again sent on a reconnaissance mission, this time with a friend. His superiors really should’ve known better. Realizing that an artillery barrage would also kill innocent civilians, Leo and his buddy Willie decided to liberate the city all by themselves. Unfortunately, around midnight, Willie was shot and killed. Enraged, Leo grabbed his friend’s weapon and gunned down two Germans, with the others fleeing in terror. He then proceeded to capture a different German vehicle and forced the driver to bring him to an enemy officer at a nearby tavern. Leo then informed the surprised officer that the town was surrounded by an overwhelming Canadian force and that an attack was imminent, before strolling out of the tavern and disappearing into the night.

The next step was to convince the Germans that what he had told the officer was true. Leo spent the rest of the night racing around the town, gunning down Nazis and throwing grenades like a one-man army. After seeing their comrades gunned down by a mad Canadian in an eyepatch, most enemy soldiers made the smart choice and surrendered. As the night wore on, Leo kept appearing at the Allied lines with groups of confused German prisoners—before returning to the city. His final feat was to clear out the local SS headquarters. By 4:00 AM, the Germans had abandoned the town. The artillery attack was canceled, the city saved by a single man.

Leo received numerous medals for his deeds in World War II, and earned even more in Korea. Leo Major died in 2008, but his memory lives on in Zwolle, where he is regarded as a hero.

The US Air Force's first ever chief software officer has quit the job after branding it "probably the most challenging and infuriating of my entire career" in a remarkably candid blog post.

Nicolas Chaillan's impressively blunt leaving note, which he posted to his LinkedIn profile, castigated USAF senior hierarchy for failing to prioritise basic IT issues, saying: "A lack of response and alignment is certainly a contributor to my accelerated exit."

Chaillan took on his chief software officer role in May 2019, having previously worked at the US Department of Defense rolling out DevSecOps practices to the American military. Before that he founded two companies.

In his missive, Chaillan also singled out a part of military culture that features in both the US and the UK: the practice of appointing mid-ranking generalist officers to run specialist projects.

"Please," he implored, "stop putting a Major or Lt Col (despite their devotion, exceptional attitude, and culture) in charge of ICAM, Zero Trust or Cloud for 1 to 4 million users when they have no previous experience in that field – we are setting up critical infrastructure to fail."

The HX-63 cipher machine is an electromechanical, rotor-based system designed and built by Crypto AG. The machine uses nine rotors [center right] to encrypt messages. A dual paper-tape printer is at the upper left. //

Growing up in New York City, I always wanted to be a spy. But when I graduated from college in January 1968, the Cold War and Vietnam War were raging, and spying seemed like a risky career choice. So I became an electrical engineer, working on real-time spectrum analyzers for a U.S. defense contractor.

In 1976, during a visit to the Polish Army Museum in Warsaw, I saw an Enigma, the famous German World War II cipher machine. I was fascinated. Some years later, I had the good fortune of visiting the huge headquarters of the cipher machine company Crypto AG (CAG), in Steinhausen, Switzerland, and befriending a high-level cryptographer there. My friend gave me an internal history of the company written by its founder, Boris Hagelin. It mentioned a 1963 cipher machine, the HX-63.

Chances are, you probably take things like stop signs and traffic circles for granted. At least, I know I’ve never sat at a stop sign and wondered, “Who on Earth decided to make us stop in situations where there may be oncoming traffic or pedestrians?” But someone had to have done it. That someone is William Phelps Eno.

Eno was born in New York City in early June of 1858 and died in December of 1945, so he was around to witness the evolution of the automobile from simply not existing to becoming an incredibly commonplace form of travel. And that also meant he witnessed those lawless early days of the road. //

So, in 1900, Eno worked to set down his thoughts on traffic safety, which he titled Reform in Our Street Traffic Urgently Needed. Three years later, he wrote a city traffic code for New York, the very first of its kind.

Among his many inventions were the stop sign, the traffic circle, one-way streets, taxi stands, and medians. He set down clear rules on passing, turning, right of way, parking, following, and backing up. Eno designed the Arc de Triomphe, Piccadilly Circus, and Rond Point on the Champs-Élysées — some of the busiest and most iconic pieces of road in the world. Basically, the whole goal was to keep traffic flowing as smoothly as possible and prevent accidents and deaths.

A Russian research expedition has rediscovered the location of the container with two damaged reactors from the Soviet navy submarine K-19, dumped in Ambrosimova Bay in 1965. //

17,000 radioactive objects
The two reactors from the K-19 submarine are not the only objects posing a risk to marine environment. In fact, no other places in the world’s oceans have more radioactive and nuclear waste than the Kara Sea.

Reactors from K-11 and K-140, plus the entire submarine K-27 and spent uranium fuel from one of the old reactors of the “Lenin” icebreaker are also dumped in the same sea. //

17,000 radioactive objects
The two reactors from the K-19 submarine are not the only objects posing a risk to marine environment. In fact, no other places in the world’s oceans have more radioactive and nuclear waste than the Kara Sea.

Reactors from K-11 and K-140, plus the entire submarine K-27 and spent uranium fuel from one of the old reactors of the “Lenin” icebreaker are also dumped in the same sea. //

While mentality in Soviet times was «out of sight, out of mind», the Kara Sea seemed logical. Ice-covered most of the year, and no commercial activities. That is changing now with rapidly retreating sea ice, drilling for oil-, and gas, and increased shipping. //

Additional to the reactors, about 17,000 objects were dumped in the Kara Sea in the period from the late 1960s to the early 1990s.