logic involved

Getting a diff from two binary files isn’t that easy. While there are loads of tools for comparing text files, there are only a few for binaries.

A very nice – and free – utility for Windows is HxD. It’s not just a very fine hex editor, but pretty good at comparing binary files as well.

• New Java desktop UI toolkit:
  Amino brings some nice features
• Authentication != Authorization (and more):
  Diaspora has a long way to go, but there are lots of things you can learn. Things like what you should never, ever do, that is.
• Java obfuscation:
  the Android developers recommend ProGuard. It’s actually a very nice utility, but I don’t feel comfortable to apply a complicated technique to already complicated applications.
• One Time Passwords, remote logout:
  Facebook adds new security features, and some questions are crossing my mind:
  why not add add OPIE-like features, with One Time Password Lists and/or two-factor authentication (with something you know and something you have)? We got lots of smartphones out there, just use them…?
  re “remote logout”: why not just invalidate existing web sessions on the next login of the user? Can Facebook make a difference between web and API (e.g. widget, apps) sessions?

And here it is

Requires Android 2.1 or higher.

I have been playing with SUSE Studio for quite some time, and it never fails to amaze me. In short, it’s a utility that allows you to build your own SuSE-based Linux: you start with a general selection (openSUSE, SLES, KDE, Gnome, a JeOS , …), add repositories and packages. Then you add your configuration: set your locale and keyboard, add users, rig the network settings and the firewall, add custom backgrounds and logos, add license(s) that have to be accepted by the end user, add your own files and folders, add your custom post-built/post-boot/first boot scripts … and change many more things.
After that, it’s time for building: you can create USB images, live CDs (.iso files), XEN guests and VMware / VirtualBox / KVM (.vmdk) appliances. Built time is just a few minutes, and you can either download your appliance or take it for a test drive it right away, on the SUSE Studio servers. For that, you can connect to the web server of your appliance, log in via SSH, or have the desktop displayed in an applet within your web browser.
One of the most interesting features of SUSE Studio is the ability to keep the changes you make in your test drive. In other words: you don’t have to stick with the web interface for refining your appliance, but you can apply the more delicate refinements in a live system.

The SUSE Gallery hosts an impressive number of appliances that were made with SUSE Studio. Let me highlight just a few examples:

• Android Developer’s Desktop Remix – an Android development environment, based on openSUSE
• BrowserBox – 22 versions of 13 different web browsers (Android Browser, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Lynx, Opera, …)
• iFolder Server – run your own iFolder file synchronization server
• Chrome OS – well, mostly Google Chrome

Bitbucket.org, a code-hosting site, has been acquired by Atlassian (the company behind the Jira issue tracking system) and changed its pricing and hosting plans.
In short, Bitbucket offers code hosting using the distributed revision control toolMercurial, a wiki and a simple issue tracking system.With the pricing change, user may now create an unlimited number of private and public repositories and have unlimited disk space at their disposal.
On the downside, free private projects are limited to five users.

Personally, I am using the git and Subversion most of the time. Mainly because they happen to be used in the projects I am taking part in. And both systems get the job done.
But free, private and reliable source code hosting is pretty hard to find. I think Bitbucket is definitively worth a try for small teams – if you have more than five project members, you can host Mercurial yourself as well. It’s actually not that hard.
There’s a number of alternatives for hosted Mercurial as well, of course.