fidzu : nerd

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Conversation, written by authors Adrian R. Bell, Anne Curry, and Jason Sadler: When you picture medieval warfare, you might think of epic battles and famous monarchs. But what about the everyday soldiers who actually filled the ranks? Until recently, their stories were scattered across handwritten manuscripts in Latin or French and difficult to decipher. Now, our online database makes it possible for anyone to discover who they were and how they lived, fought and travelled. To shed light on the foundations of our armed services -- one of England's oldest professions -- we launched the Medieval Soldier Database in 2009. Today, it's the largest searchable online database of medieval nominal data in the world. It contains military service records giving names of soldiers paid by the English Crown. It covers the period from 1369 to 1453 and many different war zones. We created the database to challenge assumptions about the lack of professionalism of soldiers during the hundred years war and to show what their careers were really like. In response to the high interest from historians and the public (the database has 75,000 visitors per month), the resource has recently been updated. It is now sustainably hosted by GeoData, a University of Southampton research institute. We have recently added new records, taking the dataset back to the late 1350s, meaning it now contains almost 290,000 entries. [...] We hope the database will continue to grow and go on providing answers to questions about our shared military heritage. We are sure that it will unlock many previously untold stories of soldier ancestors.

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02 Dec 2025 3:30am GMT

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02 Dec 2025 2:35am GMT

Longtime Slashdot reader krouic shares a report from Europol: From November 24-28, 2025, Europol supported an action week conducted by law enforcement authorities from Switzerland and Germany in Zurich, Switzerland. The operation focused on taking down the illegal cryptocurrency mixing service Cryptomixer, which is suspected of facilitating cybercrime and money laundering. Three servers were seized in Switzerland, along with the cryptomixer.io domain. The operation resulted in the confiscation of over 12 terabytes of data and more than EUR 25 million worth of Bitcoin. After the illegal service was taken over and shut down, law enforcement placed a seizure banner on the website. Authorities allege that the mixing service laundered over 1.3 billion euros in bitcoin since 2016.

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02 Dec 2025 1:25am GMT

A new study from the University of Pennsylvania finds that preteens who own smartphones by age 12 have significantly higher odds of depression, obesity, and poor sleep compared to their peers. Axios reports: Kids who owned a smartphone at age 12 were found to have about 31% higher odds of depression, 40% higher odds of obesity and 62% higher odds of insufficient sleep than their peers who didn't have one. The researchers analyzed data from the National Institutes of Health-supported Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study assessments conducted between 2016 and 2022. The study included responses from 10,588 youths. Kids who had smartphones were more likely to be female, Black or Hispanic, and from lower-income households. The study has been published in the journal Pediatrics.

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02 Dec 2025 12:45am GMT

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02 Dec 2025 12:36am GMT

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02 Dec 2025 12:31am GMT

One of Vladimir Putin's favorite sabres to rattle seems to have lost its edge.

01 Dec 2025 11:36pm GMT

Justices want Cox to crack down on piracy, but question Sony's strict demands.

01 Dec 2025 10:33pm GMT

OpenAI risks increased fines after deleting pirated books datasets.

01 Dec 2025 10:16pm GMT

GStreamer 1.26.9 multimedia framework improves playback stability and enhances adaptive streaming performance across HLS and DASH.

01 Dec 2025 8:11pm GMT

UBports releases Ubuntu Touch 24.04-1.1 and OTA-11 with key fixes for notifications, media scanning, Wi-Fi hotspot issues, and security.

01 Dec 2025 4:13pm GMT

ONLYOFFICE Docs 9.2 adds AI-powered grammar and spell checks, customizable hotkeys, macro recording, enhanced PDF redaction, and improved form creation tools.

01 Dec 2025 3:55pm GMT