Exclusive: Marvel launches program for girl scientists

"Captain America: Civil War" stars Elizabeth Olsen and Emily VanCamp introduce the Marvel "Girls Reforming the Future Challenge" program. Marvel Studios

Marvel Studios is increasing its girl power on the big screen and looking for talented science-loving youngsters behind the scenes as well.

Marvel is partnering with the National Academy of Sciences' Science & Entertainment Exchange for a program in which girls ages 15 to 18 and in grades 10 through 12 can submit projects they believe can change the world with a short video that demonstrates their idea and explains its far-reaching potential.

In conjunction with the release of Captain America: Civil War (in theaters May 6), “Girls Reforming the Future Challenge” is geared toward female applicants who are interested in science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM) projects and share the same goals as the Avengers onscreen: “The commitment to safeguard humanity, protect the earth at all costs and make the world a better place for future generations,” says Civil War star Elizabeth Olsen, who plays Scarlet Witch and hosts an introductory video with co-star Emily VanCamp.

Five finalists will travel to California to present their projects to a panel of experts and be invited to hit the red carpet at the Civil War world premiere at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre on April 12. They'll also tour Walt Disney Studio and receive a $500 saving account from Synchrony Bank.

In addition, one girl will be selected for the grand prize: an internship at Marvel Studios.

“I’m really excited to meet these exceptional young women who have STEM backgrounds and who maybe also want to be part of more of a creative- and science-based world,” Olsen says. “And Marvel’s a perfect place for that.”

Entries will be accepted through March 26. For applications and more information about the program, visit CaptainAmericaChallenge.com.

Why has SQL Server come to Linux? Windows-only cloud makes no sense

Microsoft porting SQL Server to Linux is not an early April Fool's joke. The company is deadly serious about this move.

Some people are asking why. After all, with MySQL, MariaDB, postgreSQL, and Oracle Database 12c Linux, there's no shortage of RDBMS servers on Linux.

Part of the reason is simple enough. Scott Guthrie, head of Microsoft's Cloud & Enterprise business, said "This will enable SQL Server to deliver a consistent data platform across Windows Server and Linux, as well as on-premises and cloud."

The more complex answer is that Microsoft's fortune is no longer based on Windows. True, SQL Server will be available on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and Canonical's Ubuntu Linux as a standalone server applications, that's not where it's meant to run. As Ed Bott recently uncovered, Microsoft's new cash cows are Azure and server applications. In particular, "Microsoft Azure is growing rapidly and is reported in the same group as traditional server products (SQL Server is up, Windows Server is down). Collectively, that pair is at the top of the list."

And what operating systems run on Azure? Mark Russinovich, CTO of Microsoft Azure, Microsoft's cloud program, said last fall that open source and Linux make great financial and technical sense for Microsoft. "It's obvious, if we don't support Linux, we'll be Windows only and that's not practical." Then, one in four Azure operating systems instances were Linux. And that number has only been increasing.

For Microsoft to continue to grow as a cloud and services company it must become a Linux company.And, in particular, Microsoft wants to be a Linux cloud power. Today, Azure is certainly the primary way Microsoft monetizes Linux, so it's only logical that SQL Server would be added to Linux.Al Gillen, IDC's group vice president, sees this. "By taking this key product to Linux, Microsoft is proving its commitment to being a cross platform solution provider. This gives customers choice and reduces the concerns for lock-in. We would expect this will also accelerate the overall adoption of SQL Server."Linux fans are cynical as ever about this. One channeled Star Wars' Admiral Ackbar, saying, "It's a trap!"The Linux companies, however, take a far more pragmatic view.Dustin Kirkland, a member of the Canonical's Ubuntu Product and Strategy team, told me in an interview, "Microsoft has been an amazing partner to Canonical, and continues to look to Ubuntu as the leading edge of all Linux distributions "Indeed Microsoft and Canonical have gotten along well.Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth observed in a statement, "Customers are already taking advantage of Azure Data Lake services on Ubuntu, and now developers will be able to build modern applications that utilize SQL Server's enterprise capabilities." In addition, Microsoft has releasedHDInsight, Microsoft's big data Hadoop-on-Azure service for Ubuntu Linux and Ubuntu is now part of Microsoft's Azure Stack.Red Hat is newer to working with Microsoft. But, after years of negotiations, Microsoft andRed Hat made RHEL available on Azure.

Red Hat's President of Products and Technologies, Paul Cormier, certainly sees Microsoft and Red Hat getting along like bosom buddies. "SQL Server's proven enterprise experience and capabilities offer a valuable asset to enterprise Linux customers around the world. We believe our customers will welcome this news and are happy to see Microsoft further increasing its investment in Linux."

Of course, Red Hat has a long standing beef with the other major Linux and DBMS power, Oracle. So Red Hat have another reason to be glad to partner up with Microsoft.The bottom line for Microsoft though as I'd said before is that today's software development world made it impossible for Microsoft to continue in its proprietary ways. Microsoft is slowly, but surely, become an open-source company.SQL Server coming to Linux is perhaps Microsoft's most dramatic move to date, but it won't be the last one. Sources tell me that other major Microsoft enterprise server programs will be coming to Linux.Who knows, we may yet see MS-Linux as a real product rather than a joke.

Broken 2013 Java Patch Leads to Sandbox Bypass

Java’s miserable 2013 just will not go away. One of the endless parade of bugs found in the platform throughout 2013—many of which were zero-day vulnerabilities exploited in targeted attacks—apparently wasn’t closed off completely by an October 2013 patch released by Oracle.

See more at: Broken 2013 Java Patch Leads to Sandbox Bypass https://wp.me/p3AjUX-unb

Researchers at Polish security company Security Explorations last week disclosed that Oracle’s patch for CVE-2013-5838, which the company privately disclosed in July 2013, could be trivially sidestepped resulting in a Java sandbox bypass. A request for comment from Oracle as to whether it has confirmed the bypass and what its plans are for an updated patch were not returned in time for publication. Security Explorations founder and CEO Adam Gowdiak said he has not been contacted by Oracle since last week’s disclosure. Gowdiak not only released his findings on the Full Disclosure mailing list, but also at the JavaLand conference; he told Threatpost that Oracle representatives were speakers at the event and hosted a booth in the expo hall. “They should [fix this], but it’s hard to speculate on whether and when this will happen,” Gowdiak said. The public disclosure, Gowdiak said, is a reflection of his company’s new policy around broken fixes. “As a result, we do not tolerate broken fixes any more,” Gowdiak wrote in an email to the Full Disclosure list. “If an instance of a broken fix for a vulnerability we already reported to the vendor is encountered, it gets disclosed by us without any prior notice.” Gowdiak said that the original vulnerability and an insecure implementation of the Reflection API that could be exploited by a class-spoofing attack against the Java virtual machine. Oracle said it backported from the Java Development Kit 8 a patched implementation of the method handles API to address the vulnerability. The researchers, however, said that a four-character change to the proof-of-concept code sent to Oracle along with the original private disclosure could bypass sandbox protections in Java. “It’s rather easy to exploit” Gowdiak said. “A malicious Java applet needs to be fetched from a custom HTTP (WWW) server. The reason for it is that the server needs to respond with a “Not found” error when a given Java class file is requested for the first time.” Gowdiak said that the new attack was verified in Java SE 7 Update 97, Java SE 8 Update 74, and Java SE 9 Early Access Build 108. Gowdiak added that the attack does not bypass updated Java security levels or Java Click2Play, which prevents the automatic execution of unsigned Java applets. Gowdiak also said that Oracle downplayed the potential impact of the vulnerability, that it could be exploited only through sandboxed Java Web Start applications and sandboxed Java applets. “This is not true,” Gowdiak said. “We verified that it could be successfully exploited in a server environment as well such as Google App Engine for Java.”

See more at: Broken 2013 Java Patch Leads to Sandbox Bypass https://wp.me/p3AjUX-unb

I Can Resurrect Bob Okala If Ghanaians Give Me The Go Ahead - Bishop Daniel Obinim

Bishop Daniel Obinim

  Founder and General Overseer of International Godsway Church, Bishop Daniel Obinim, claims he can resurrect Bishop Bob Okala if given the go ahead by Ghanaians.

According to the powerful and controversial man of God, his father Jesus has conferred on him unlimited powers to do whatever he wants and that explains why he’s able to transform into all kinds of animals and appear in people’s dreams unannounced.

Speaking to members of his church Sunday morning, Bishop Obinim said with Jesus and God by his side, it is an easy task for him to resurrect people from death.

Comedian Bob Okala is dead

One of Ghana's finest local comedians, Samuel kwadwo a.k.a Bob Okala has passed away.Okala, a veteran comedian who was a poineer of the Key Soap Concert Party in the 90's, collapsed on a stage while performing at a program organised by Joy Industries at Koforidua Jackson Park on saturday.The spokesperson and Managing Editor of Dady Media Solomon Nuwodu confirmed the news.

According to him, ‘Bishop’ Okala, as he was affectionately called, has been part of the Joy Industries’ programmes over the years, but he was never invited for this Saturday’s event due to ill-health.
“Okala pleaded to perform briefly but he realised he couldn’t continue and the bouncers had to come on stage to hold him because he began to lose stamina,” Nuwodu said.
He was confirmed dead at the hospital Sunday dawn. He died at age 59. May his soul rest in perfect peace.

Bob Okala was recently part of the selected actors and comedians who marched at the 59th Independence Day parade. 

Abraham Attah is still in Ghana-School Proprietor says

Abraham Nii Attah popularly known as Abraham Attah is currently in Ghana and in school learning towards his end of term exams

According to information gathered, there are rumours  gone viral on  various social media platforms that the young actor has relocated to the United States.As at 11:40 am on Thursday, March 10, 2016,the proprietor of the Montessori School in Cape Coast, Ghana.Mr Kumi Bruce confirmed to Kojo Dei of ATL FM that the young actor is currently in class studying towards his end of term examination.

Abraham Attah has received great attention from both local and international media platform for his performance in the "Beast of Nation."

Emmanuel Adom Quaye who acted as a stiker in the same movie with Abraham is also a student in the school

                                                                                                                        Source:atlfmonline.com

Captain America:Civil War Trailer 2 features Spider-Man

Spidey

The highly anticipated movie Captain America:Civil War features the Spidey...The trailer 2 released in less than 2 months away from first trailer features Spider-Man in an all new stunting suite.

Well the trailer doesn't feature only the new Spider-Man, but also gives us our first look at Tom Holland as the new Spider-Man.

The movie may have Cap's name in the title, but this shapes us like an ideological two-hander,a showdown between Iron Man(Robert Downey)-working alongside the government-and Captain America(Chris Evans) breaking away from the regulations to protect his friend Bucky(The Winter Soldier).The human consequences of fantastical battles are also at the forefront int the beginning montage, as Cap and Black Widow(Scarlett Johansson) watch the trail of the destruction left behind Avengers, The Winter Soldier, and Age of Ultron.

Check out some of the images Marvel released

Check out the trailer below, and for a deeper dive, click through Matt’s bevy of set visit coverage. Directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, the film also stars Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Sebastian Stan, Scarlett Johansson, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Rudd, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Pettany, Don Cheadle, Martin Freeman, and William Hurt. Captain America: Civil War opens in theaters on May 6th.