Wireless boosts AT&T's quarterly earnings ... Cisco discloses three router security problems

HIGHLIGHTS
News: Wireless boosts AT&T's quarterly earnings
News: Nokia sales up, market share steady
News: Cisco discloses three router security problems
News: Nintendo sales, profits surging on Wii, DS Lite
Unix Tip: Shells and search order
Podcast: Today's IT news audio update
ITwhirled: Geek Comic of the Week: Indexed


NEWS UPDATES

Wireless boosts AT&T's quarterly earnings
AT&T Inc. reported a 17 percent increase in profits for its latest quarter, citing a substantial increase in new wireless subscribers and wireless service revenues.

Nokia sales up, market share steady
Nokia Corp. reported strong sales and profits for the fourth quarter and year end but had a couple of dark spots, namely continued declines in North America and a slipping average selling price of phones.

Cisco discloses three router security problems
Cisco Systems Inc. is warning of three vulnerabilities within its Internet Operating System (IOS) software that could allow a denial-of-service attack or let a hacker run arbitrary code on an affected switch router. The company has published workarounds and issued an updated version of the software.

Nintendo sales, profits surging on Wii, DS LiteSales and profits at Japanese games maker Nintendo Co. Ltd. are surging on strong sales of its new Wii console and DS handheld gaming device. The company sold 3.2 million Wii consoles in November and December, together with 17.5 million pieces of software.

Symantec storage revenue down; job cuts ahead
With sales of its storage software dropping, Symantec Corp. plans to lay off some staff as part of plans to cut $200 million in expenses.

Partners and retailers rally apps, support for Vista
With the consumer launch of Windows Vista on the horizon, Microsoft Corp.'s software and retail partners are preparing for the launch with applications and support for the new OS.


UNIX TIP

Shells and search order
By Sandra Henry-Stocker

It's easy to take the Unix command line for granted. That is, it's easy to get used to typing in commands and getting responses without thinking very much about how the system determines what command to run. Some of the commands we type are binary files that are part of the OS, some are scripts, some are shell built-ins and some are aliases that are configured into our accounts. Still others may be shell routines. The order that Unix systems use in evaluating the commands we enter is not solely dependent on our PATH variables. Instead, the search order follows a predefined order. If you happen to have a script that has the same name as a Unix command, an alias and a shell routine or built-in, for example, how do you know which one you will end up executing when you press the return key?


PODCAST

Daily IT News Audio Update
Nokia reports strong Q4 profit ... Pope criticizes violent video games ... TSMC reports weak Q4 results ... PS3 coming to Europe March 23 ... iTunes faces legal woe in Norway


ITWHIRLED

Geek Comic of the Week: Indexed
For the visually/mathematically inclined: a series of line graphs, scattergrams, and Venn diagrams on index cards, conveying information both odd and wonderful. Such as: What happens when you plot spaces in a mall parking lot against spaces in landfill? What larger set are hats, rabbits, advertising, and truth all subsets of? What category could Enron and the Brady Bunch both fall into?