Israel is reportedly developing a sophisticated piece of software meant to help troops make quick decisions during battle and, under the right conditions, autonomously manipulate the nation's defense systems. First reported in Defense News (subscription required), the unnamed system would primarily be used for tactical decisions during periods of heavy bombardment, although in a worst-case scenario, the complex algorithm would supposedly be capable of taking over total military control. Yes, we know what you're thinking, but don't worry: Israeli officials have already sworn up and down that "there's no way we're letting this thing go Terminator on us -- no freakin' way."

[Via Danger Room]

We haven't seen a whole lot of news come out of the annual RoboBusiness conference as of late, but it doesn't look like it's lacking for grand ambition, with a number of companies taking the opportunity to talk up various facets of the coming robot uprising. One such optimist is iRobis co-founder Peter Nordin, who claims to be well on his way to developing a "complete cognitive software system" for robots. What's more, he says that the first version of the software, dubbed "Brainstorm," will be available to researchers and developers later this year. Apparently, the software will give robots a "previously unseen level of autonomy in decision making and operation," using reasoning and problem solving to learn increasingly complex tasks. According to Nordin, the software has already seen a fair bit of success, with robots in his laboratory starting out moving like babies and eventually learning to walk, climb stairs, and manipulate objects. Not surprisingly the military (the Swedish one) has been the first to express interest in the technology. They're apparently hoping that it'll give its autonomous vehicles and robots the benefit of evolution. Yeah, that'll work out just fine.

[Thanks, Roger G]

While military installations worldwide have been pondering the launch of various communications satellites, Paradigm Secure Communications' Skynet 5A has not only been already deployed, but it's busy workin' on the weekends as well. The arrangement has been dubbed the "most expensive private finance initiative ever signed by the Ministry of Defense," but the £3.6 billion ($7.12 billion) project is currently assisting UK forces stationed in Afghanistan. The spacecraft itself was deployed in March, and has enabled a "a dramatic improvement in their communications capability." Furthermore, the next two sister sats should hit the galaxy soon to give beefed up capacity (2.5x, to be exact) to the Army, Royal Navy, and RAF, as the Skynet 5B is slated to get lit before the year's end, while Skynet 5C (the in-orbit spare) should go live in mid-2008. Ah, low ping times, clear walkie-talkie conversations, and quick downloads from remote areas of the world -- now that's a reasonable stress reliever after a hard day on the battlefield.

Mad scientist Steam-powered RC enthusiast I-Wei Huang, has posted yet another impressive creation over at his website, Crabfu. The six-wheeled RC Steam Rover was born of a decidedly retro-looking Cheddar Puffin engine and two Tamiya 4x4 chassis, using a mixture of butane and propane as fuel. The videos on his site suggest that it won't be breaking any land speed records, but we're still hoping it'll eventually play a part in protecting us from these little steam-powered robots, should they go all Skynet on us.

[Via Makezine]