Chock-full of alchemy:
technica q&a: tom mcnichol (ac/dc)
technica q&a: edward belbruno (fly me to the moon)
event: the unofficial guide to windows vista
isepp lecture series
photography and digital imaging sale
brain awareness
new arrivals
history of science
dvds
doug brown's factoid
bestsellers

It's a mystery. For a week now, someone has been pushing Valentines under our front door before we open — and they're all for Fup! They reek of catnip and there's been a different one each day. We don't recognize the handwriting, and the pawprints inside are indecipherable, but it appears someone is trying to lure Fup away for a weekend in Manzanita.

TECHNICA Q&A: TOM MCNICHOL
Tom McNichol's AC/DC: The Savage Tale of the First Standards War is an intoxicating mix of technological and business history that draws clear parallels to current day standards battles in software and electronics. "Few writers explain technology as well as Tom McNichol," gushes Wired senior editor Jeffrey O'Brien. "No one's as good at finding the humor in it." Find more humor in Tom McNichol's Technica Q&A and save 30% off the cover price of AC/DC.

TECHNICA Q&A: EDWARD BELBRUNO
Edward Belbruno devised one of the most exciting concepts now being used in space flight, that of swinging through the cosmos on the subtle fluctuations of the planets' gravitational pulls. Part memoir, part scientific adventure story, Fly Me to the Moon gives a gripping insider's account of Belbruno's first rescue mission and his personal struggles with the science establishment. Read Belbruno's Technica Q&A and save 30% when you preorder Fly Me to the Moon.

Grocery stores wouldn't exist without her. Inventor Margaret Knight, born on Valentine's Day 1838, worked at a paper mill as a teenager. She designed a part that made the bottom of paper bags square instead of the envelope design of the day. A rogue colleague of hers spied on the machinist designing her machine part and filed a patent for it. She successfully sued the cheater and received her rightful patent in 1870.

THE UNOFFICIAL GUIDE TO WINDOWS VISTA
Time to break out the bubbly! The newest operating system for Windows, Windows Vista, is now out. According to Microsoft, there are hundreds of new features with this release, including an updated graphic user interface, new multimedia tools, and redesigned print, audio, networking, and display subsystems. However, learning a new Microsoft OS is always a challenge, and this is where author Derek Torres can literally save you a headache. His new book, The Unofficial Guide to Windows Vista, offers you unbiased, expert advice and time-saving tips and hacks. Instead of floundering with the user's manual, Derek Torres shows you how to customize Windows Vista, establish a network at home, handle security issues, and prevent system crashes. Come see Mr. Torres present his new book in person at Powell's Technical Books on Friday, February 23, at 7 p.m.

PHOTOGRAPHY AND DIGITAL IMAGING SALE
Yes, yes, we know — you still haven't used that camera you got for the holidays. Whether it's digital or film, you'll find the perfect book to sharpen your photography skills with our huge sale on all sorts of photography and digital imaging books from Focal Press — and save 30%! Browse our extensive selection here.

For those of you living under a proverbial Windows Vista rock, the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) and the Free Standards Group (FSG) merged late last month to form the Linux Foundation. Jim Zemlin (formally of FSG) will be the consortium's new executive director and will continue to sponsor the work of Linux creator Linus Torvalds. By combining the two organization's efforts, the Linux Foundation hopes to build a cohesive platform from which Open Source software companies can grow and to do what Torvalds says that Microsoft does well, "promote, protect, and standardize Linux."

ISEPP LECTURE SERIES
Continuing ISEPP's Linus Pauling Memorial Lecture Series: On Thursday, February 15, Florida State University Professor of Philosophy Dr. Michael Ruse asks, "Is the Darwinian paradigm outmoded?" This talk is a robust defense of Darwinism against its critics. Far from being an outmoded paradigm, Ruse insists, Darwinism is a jewel in the crown of science. Save 50% off your ticket price by using the promotional code here.

BRAIN AWARENESS
Oregon Health Science University's Brain Awareness events continue! Learn more about your amazing brain from top neuroscientists and physicians from Oregon and around the world. Don't miss guest lecturer Diane Ackerman (author of A Natural History of the Senses) on "The Brain and the Senses," Casey Eye Institute head David Wilson's "Vision and the Brain," "New Therapies for Stroke" hosted by OHSU M.D. Helmi Lutsep, and more!

Local hero Linus Pauling was born on Febrary 28, 1901; he grew up in Portland in a nice big house on SE Hawthorne Ave. He attended Washington High School but failed to get a diploma after forgetting to take a few history classes. Obviously, this technicality didn't deter Pauling's talent, genius, or ambition one jot. Years later, after he won two Nobel Prizes (one for chemistry and one for peace), his old high school finally gave him his diploma in 1962.

NEW ARRIVALS
Fall in love with our favorite new books for February. New to paperback, Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers is both an urgent warning about the dangers of climate change and a call to arms that provoked the Washington Post to praise, "[Flannery] manages the material with force, clarity and authority throughout." She's Such a Geek is a groundbreaking anthology that celebrates women who have flourished in the male-dominated realms of technical and cultural arcana. In God Created the Integers, bestselling author and physicist Stephen Hawking (A Brief History of Time) explores the masterpieces of mathematics: twenty-five landmarks spanning 2,500 years and representing the work of fifteen mathematicians, including Augustin Cauchy, Bernard Riemann, and Alan Turing.

HISTORY OF SCIENCE
Poor Pluto. Astronomer Clyde Tombaugh "discovered" Pluto on February 18, 1930. Until very recently, everyone thought that Pluto was the ninth planet from the Sun. But in August, the International Astronomical Union booted Pluto out of the grouping of eight classical planets and into a lesser group of "dwarf planets" along with Ceres and Eris. Still, Pluto is the second largest dwarf planet in the solar system. An eleven-year-old schoolgirl from Oxford, England named the planet.

DVDS
An audience and critical favorite, Al Gore's Oscar-nominated documentary An Inconvenient Truth makes the compelling case that global warming is real, man-made, and its effects will be cataclysmic if we don't act now. "You owe it to yourself to see this film," raves Roger Ebert. "If you do not, and you have grandchildren, you should explain to them why you decided not to." And all DVDs ship for free from Powells.com!

DOUG BROWN'S FACTOID
Juvenile spiders can use a method called ballooning (or parachuting) for dispersal. A small spiderling climbs to the top of something, puts its abdomen up, and starts paying out a line of silk. As soon as a breeze comes along the silk is snatched up, carrying the spider away with it. Most spiderlings don't travel very far with this method (10-100 meters or so), but some have traveled many miles, even to offshore islands. After Krakatoa erupted in 1883, the first re-colonists were spiders that ballooned in from other islands over 25 miles away.

TECH BESTSELLERS
1. Rails Cookbook by Rob Orsini (Computer Languages)
2. Stop Staring by Jason Osipa (Animation)
3. HTML, XHTML, and CSS by Elizabeth Castro (Internet)
4. This Is Your Brain on Music by Daniel J. Levitin (Physics)
5. The Golden Section by Scott Olson (Mathematics)
6. Tarascon Pocket Pharmacopoeia by Steven M. Green (Health and Medicine)
7. Starter's Guide to Verilog by Michael D. Ciletti (Engineering)
8. Search Engine Marketing, Inc. by Mike Moran (Internet)
9. Digital Restoration from Start to Finish by Ctein (Photography)
10. Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X by Aaron Hillegass (Macintosh)

Technica
By Carole R.

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