Technology

After delivering the first 787-9 Dreamliner jet to Air New Zealand last week, Boeing took a victory lap on Monday, showing off exactly what the plane can do when pushed to its limits.

The plane’s maneuvers during a six and a half minute demonstration flight, at the Farnborough International Airshow outside London, were not quite as awesome as the barrel roll test pilot Tex Johnston pulled off in a Boeing 707 in 1955. They were, however, way more extreme than anything a passenger would want to sit through.

Disappointed at the lack of charging stations for his Tesla S electric car in his home province, a Guangdong-based businessman has responded in typically Chinese fashion: he built his own. And not just one, either.

According to English-language news site Caixin Online, 44-year-old Zong Yi used his own money to buy and install an entire network of e-car chargers spanning 16 cities along a 5,750km (3,573mi) indirect route between Beijing and Guangzhong.

High-density, next-generation computer memory that can store about one terabyte of data on a device the size of a postage stamp — more than 50 times the data density of current flash memory technology — is now a step closer to to mass production.

IBM is worried that the age of silicon may be drawing to a close. So it’s going to spend $3 billion over the next half-decade to try and find new ways to power the future generations of microprocessors.

If you've ever had to wear a splint on any part of your body, you'll know that not only are they uncomfortable, but they can be chunky and ugly too. That may not be the case for much longer.

A researcher from the University of Loughborough has developed a new computer software concept that will allow doctors to customize and 3D print breathable, stylish, slimline splints even if they have no experience using computer aided design software (CAD). The aim of the software is to allow those with no real knowledge of design to create wrist splints for rheumatoid arthritis sufferers.

True hardware hackers and makers in the open-source movement create for the joy of creation itself, but they probably wouldn't turn down a free trip to space as a reward for their ingenuity, either.

When we think about the connected world, we think about hardware—from Twine to Nest—that connects our household appliances to the web for a pretty penny. But according to Quartz, one firm is pioneering an alternative that's cheap, easy to make, and embeddable in nearly any product.

Philips has shown off its Ethernet-powered connected lighting for offices of the future, which can transmit data to mobile devices through light via embedded code.

Arriving in the form of LED "luminaires", Philips' connected office lighting will aim to not only save businesses money on energy costs, but also serve as a means of providing information and data about the general running of a building, transmitted through light, to improve the overall efficiency of business infrastructure.

The fifth annual HITB Security Conference in Amsterdam kicks off this week and prominent security researcher Rahul Sasi is scheduled to present a way to allow you to hijack a cable TV channel and broadcast your own content - just like in the movies! From his talk abstract:

The talk will have various small demos that will include,

Wi-Fi equipment based on the new 802.11ac standard—often called Gigabit Wi-Fi—has been on the market for nearly two years. These products offer greater bandwidth and other improvements over gear based on the older 802.11n specification, but they don’t implement one of the most impressive features of 11ac.