Technology

The reign of the trophy kitchen is officially over. The dream kitchens of today aren't about the sexiest six-burner range or the most exotic countertop material. As cooking has returned to center stage and remodeling budgets have sobered, the kitchen island is nurturing family togetherness and reviving casual entertaining. In kitchens with a small footprint, glass tiles, quartz counters and dish drawers are adding sparkle and practicality. The kitchen of 2013 has soul. "That industrial, commercial style was looking a little cold," says...

Data Mining Hewlett-Packard unveils analysis tools Hewlett-Packard showed off software that knits together technology from its data-analysis acquisitions, and announced a personal computer deal with Google as it seeks to boost sales to business customers and counter slumping demand for PCs. The analysis product, called Haven, combines capabilities from the acquisitions of Autonomy, Vertica Systems and ArcSight to help customers mine...

Chris Paine is a filmmaker whose documentaries include "Who Killed the Electric Car?" ,"Charge" and "Revenge of the Electric Car. " The troubles of electric-car-maker Fisker Automotive have fueled another round of debate about whether plug-ins can live up to their promises. The California start-up, which had already halted production and laid off most of its employees, missed a federal loan payment Monday and told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that bankruptcy may be unavoidable . This is likely the end of the road...

SAN FRANCISCO — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his San Francisco counterpart, Ed Lee, said at a news conference Friday that they are sponsoring a pair of technology summits over the next year. The mayors said the "digital cities" summits — one in New York in September and another in San Francisco early next year — will seek to find ways to use technology to solve problems the cities face. The mayors made the announcement after touring the office of San Francisco-based mobile payment company Square...

The defendant was an immense man, well over 300 pounds, but in the gravity of his sorrow and shame he seemed larger still. He hunched forward in the sturdy wooden armchair that barely contained him, sobbing softly into tissue after tissue, a leg bouncing nervously under the table. In the first pew of spectators sat his wife, looking stricken, absently twisting her wedding band. The room was a sepulcher. Witnesses spoke softly of events so painful that many lost their composure. When a hospital emergency room nurse described how the defendant had behaved after the...

The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio and video chats, photographs, e-mails, documents, and connection logs that enable analysts to track foreign targets, according to a top-secret document obtained by The Washington Post. The program, code-named PRISM, has not been made public until now. It may be the first of its kind. The NSA prides itself on stealing...

We've gotten a lot of questions from readers lately about chip-and-PIN credit cards, also known as EMV cards (for Europay, MasterCard and Visa, the originators of the technology). Although they're almost universal in Europe, credit card companies have yet to widely offer them to American customers. For travelers headed around the globe, here are the basics: What is a chip-and-PIN card? A chip-and-PIN card looks pretty much like the plastic you're used to. But it's embedded with a special chip...

VIRGINIANS HAVE LONG regarded the attorney general in Richmond as the commonwealth's top law-and-order enforcer. That changed in 2010 when the incumbent, Ken Cuccinelli II (R), took office. A former state senator, Mr. Cuccinelli remade the job into a platform for ideological and social activism, launching attacks on abortion, climate-change science and the Obama administration's health-care law. The two Democrats running for their party's nomination for attorney general, in a June 11 primary, are intent on steering...

Expanded government surveillance was cast as a price of war in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Yet nearly a dozen years later, the war on terrorism is showing signs of ebbing while the surveillance systems created to fight it continue unabated. If anything, they are becoming more powerful. That's because the nation went to a war footing at a time of profound technological change that fueled an explosion of personal data. Governments and businesses have developed the ability to...

Prism, January edition As the only engineer in the Senate, Ted Kaufman (D-Del.) emphasizes the importance of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education: "Young people today, kids in middle school and high school, want to make a difference. The problem is, they don't view engineering and science as the way to make a difference. " So says Kaufman in "One in a Hundred," a profile in the most recent issue of Prism, the magazine of the American Society for Engineering Education.

HARTFORD, Conn. — Revenue growth at United Technologies Corp. this year will likely be crimped due partly to Europe's weak economy, the chief financial officer said Thursday. The Hartford, Conn., aerospace giant backed its 2013 earnings per share estimate of $5.85 to $6.15. CFO Greg Hayes told analysts that the company's forecast last December of 2013 revenue growth of 3 percent to 5 percent, not accounting for acquisitions, will be in the middle and not high end of that range.

BERLIN — A dramatic drop in the price of solar power technology last year helped the continued growth of renewable energy, according to a U.N.-backed report published Wednesday. Global energy-generating capacity from renewable sources rose by 115 gigawatts in 2012, compared with 105 gigawatts the previous year, the report by the Paris-based think tank REN21 showed. Installed renewable energy capacity rose to over 1,470 gigawatts, equivalent to about 1,500 nuclear reactors. Two...

Gigamon shares soared more than 30 percent in the company's first day of trading. THE SPARK: Gigamon, which makes equipment to monitor and control computer network traffic, went public Wednesday. It priced its shares at $19 per share, the midpoint of its expected range. By late morning, its shares were up $7.09, or 37.3 percent, to $26.09. THE BIG PICTURE: The IPO of 6.75 million shares raised about $128 million. The company sold 4.5 million shares in the offering, while shareholders...

RICHMOND, Va. — State Sen. Ralph Northam is the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, defeating the former White House technology chief Aneesh Chopra in Virginia's statewide primary. Northam claimed 51.5 percent of the vote on Tuesday. The 53-year-old Northam is a pediatric neurologist who led the Democrats' Senate charge against a Republican bill that would require intrusive ultrasound exams of women seeking abortions. He will be up against Republican E.W....

CLEVELAND — The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs accidentally deleted 464,000 electronic data files last month that contained information about home loans. No personal information was jeopardized, according to a statement from the VA released Tuesday. The agency blamed human error at its information technology center in Austin, Texas. Reports that the error was made at the VA's regional office in Cleveland were incorrect, said VA spokesman Craig Lawson. ...

WASHINGTON — After years of making money providing Internet service, cable TV companies are now tapping the power of the Internet to improve clunky program guides that are a relic of the 1990s. Over the past year or so, Comcast Corp., Cablevision Systems Corp. and other cable providers have introduced new program guides on television set-top boxes. These improved guides act more like websites, making it easier to find movies, live TV shows and on-demand video. ...

In his Jan. 28 op-ed, " Why we should work less ," Richard Schiffman made the case that we're all working too much and should consider working less. There's something to that, I think. Unfortunately, Mr. Schiffman seems to see it as a battle in the war between the haves and the have-nots. Rather, I'd suggest that the nature of work is changing. And there's a good chance that we're all working more than the generation before. But technology, not politics, is behind the shift. Many employees are expected to be reachable on vacations and...

A rmeane M. Choksi acknowledges he's a bit of a "gadget freak" in explaining his need for an uber-connected house. Whether he's sitting in his second-floor home office or vacationing out of the country, Choksi can control just about every major component of his mansion in Northwest Washington by touching the screen of his smartphone or tablet. He can preset his drapes in his dining room, living room and south side area of his family room to open at 4 p.m. and close at 10 a.m. to protect his rugs and furniture from the harsh sun....

THE FILING: Battery maker Exide Technologies said Monday it is seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as it attempts to restructure its U.S. business and strengthen its balance sheet. WHAT IT COVERS: The Milton, Ga., company said its international operations are excluded from the filing, which it made Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. ABOUT EXIDE: The company makes batteries for vehicles and also provides stored electrical energy services for industrial applications.