http://www.osnews.com Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams Fri, 03 Jul 2009 22:54:01 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif http://www.osnews.com http://osnews.com/story/21775/AmigaForever_2009_Released http://osnews.com/story/21775/AmigaForever_2009_Released While I'm still chipping away at my AmigaOS 4.1/sam440ep review (try writing a thesis and a large review at the same time), Cloanto released AmigaForever 2009. AmigaForever is a very full-featured AmigaOS emulation tool, packed with various different ROMs and AmigaOS versions (1.3-3.x), as well as tons and tons of included games, software, and demos. This new version comes with even more stuff. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 21:32:34 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Amiga & AROS http://osnews.com/story/21774/iPhone_Hole_Found_Getting_Patched http://osnews.com/story/21774/iPhone_Hole_Found_Getting_Patched There haven't been too many iPhone exploits, it seems, despite the popularity of said devices. However, Charlie Miller, a security researcher, recently uncovered a vulnerability in the iPhone OS that could possibly "allow an attacker to run software code on the phone that is sent by SMS over a mobile operator's network. The malicious code could include commands to monitor the location of the phone using GPS, turn on the phone's microphone to eavesdrop on conversations, or make the phone join a distributed denial of service attack or a botnet." Scary, isn't it? They say it's not very likely that others will exploit it even on a small scale before Apple issues the patch, but having a hole like that just sitting there makes me glad right now that I don't own an iPhone. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 21:23:14 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Jordan Spencer Cunningham) PDAs, Cellphones, Wireless http://osnews.com/story/21773/Thoughts_of_a_Linux_Game_Porter http://osnews.com/story/21773/Thoughts_of_a_Linux_Game_Porter The folks over at Phoronix had an interesting interview with Linux game porter, Frank Earl. Despite the apparent decline in PC gaming, Earl has worked for Linux Game Publishing for several years and was seeking input from the community at large for game suggestions at Phoronix. He's also done work independently on porting various software over from Windows. The interview covers work that Earl has done, difficulties that arise in porting commercial games to Linux, successes they've had, his views on Linux in general, and his thoughts on the future of gaming in Linux. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:56:30 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Jordan Spencer Cunningham) Games http://osnews.com/story/21772/The_Bing_Thing http://osnews.com/story/21772/The_Bing_Thing Chances are that you've already heard of and even visited Bing, Microsoft's new search offering launched earlier in June, replacing the Live search of yesterday. It's new, shiny, and has pretty pictures, but does it really have much effect on the market? There have been those headlines claiming it's "taken a bite out of Google," but, looking at the statistics, it hasn't really affected the search industry at all. Fri, 03 Jul 2009 20:24:21 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Jordan Spencer Cunningham) Internet & Networking http://osnews.com/story/21771/Why_Do_We_Claim_Mac_OS_X_Is_Subsidised_at_Retail_ http://osnews.com/story/21771/Why_Do_We_Claim_Mac_OS_X_Is_Subsidised_at_Retail_ Whenever we talk about Mac clone makers such as Psystar, we all more or less accept as a fact that Apple is selling copies of its Mac OS X operating system at a price lower than it would have been if Apple did not have a hardware business. Even though we treat this statement as fact - recently, I've been wondering: where is the proof? Read more on this exclusive OSNews article... Fri, 03 Jul 2009 11:27:26 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Mac OS X http://osnews.com/story/21770/Microsoft_To_Offer_Family_Pack_for_Windows_7_Home_Premium http://osnews.com/story/21770/Microsoft_To_Offer_Family_Pack_for_Windows_7_Home_Premium The Windows 7 pricing scheme thing isn't over just yet. Microsoft announced the prices for Windows 7 last week, including a limited offer with lower prices and all that. There was no mention of a family pack, but a little digging in the latest leaked build suggests that yes, there's going to be a family pack of Windows Home Premium. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 21:25:02 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Windows http://osnews.com/story/21769/Psystar_Emerges_from_Chapter_11_Launches_New_Mac_Clone http://osnews.com/story/21769/Psystar_Emerges_from_Chapter_11_Launches_New_Mac_Clone Well, it really seems as if Psystar is committed to continue its business, no matter what. The company entered chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in May, and many wondered if this meant the end of the clone maker and the legal case between Apple and Psystar. Well, today the clone maker announced that it is emerging from chapter 11, and while they're at it, they also introduce a new "Mac". Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:54:52 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Hardware, Embedded Systems http://osnews.com/story/21768/A_Root-less_X_Server_Nears_Reality http://osnews.com/story/21768/A_Root-less_X_Server_Nears_Reality "Due to now living in a KMS-enabled world, at least on the Intel and ATI side (the NVIDIA side is still slowly but surely coming via Nouveau), it's rather easy to get the X Server running without any special rights. Intel's Jesse Barnes explains on the X.Org mailing list that only a small patch is needed for the X Server and then a trivial one to the Direct Rendering Manager in the kernel." Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:33:28 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) X11, Window Managers http://osnews.com/story/21767/Browser_Vendors_Force_W3C_To_Scrap_HTML_5_Codecs http://osnews.com/story/21767/Browser_Vendors_Force_W3C_To_Scrap_HTML_5_Codecs We here at OSNews have taken somewhat of an interest in the new HTML5 video and audio tags, which should - some day - make embedding audio and video material into web pages as easy and straightforward as embedding images, allowing the web to finally remove the shackles of dreadful Flash video. Sadly, the problem with these new tags are the codecs; as it turns out, browser makers have not reached an agreement about what codecs to choose for video, with mostly Apple throwing a spanner in the works, and Microsoft shining in absence. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:51:01 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Internet & Networking http://osnews.com/story/21766/Linux_Kernel_Patch_Works_Around_Microsoft_s_FAT_Patents http://osnews.com/story/21766/Linux_Kernel_Patch_Works_Around_Microsoft_s_FAT_Patents The FAT file system is the file system used by MS-DOS and earlier versions of Windows. It's a relatively simple and straightforward file system, supported by just about any operating system, making it the favoured file system on memory cards and the like. FAT is an ECMA and ISO standard, but these only apply for FAT12 and FAT16 without support for long file names, and therein lies a problem. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 16:17:48 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Linux http://osnews.com/story/21765/_QtWebKit_KPart_Is_Not_the_Answer_for_Konqueror_ http://osnews.com/story/21765/_QtWebKit_KPart_Is_Not_the_Answer_for_Konqueror_ Whenever I use KDE, the part I dislike the most is the rendering engine used by Konqueror, called KHTML. KHTML just doesn't render pages as smooth and as well as Gecko and the KHTML fork WebKit, up to a point where I find Konqueror unusable as a web browser. However, work is underway to replace KHTML in Konqueror with WebKit, but according to KDE developer Adam Treat, this is a futile effort: Konqueror is too KHTML API specific. Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:19:18 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) KDE http://osnews.com/story/21764/Slackware_13_0_RC1_Released http://osnews.com/story/21764/Slackware_13_0_RC1_Released Slackware 13.0 RC1 has been released. Or tagged. Or whatever you'd call it in the Slackware world. "The TODO isn't entirely empty here, but it's pretty much down to minor nits, and so we're going to call this release candidate #1 and (mostly) freeze further updates unless they happen to fix problems. Regarding the kernel, 2.6.29.x has been well tested with this userspace and seems like the best choice to ship for production use. Perhaps we can put something else (at least source and configs) in /testing, though." Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:38:22 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Slackware, Slax http://osnews.com/story/21760/Enterprise_Computing_Site http://osnews.com/story/21760/Enterprise_Computing_Site Today's a slow news day, so I thought it would be a good day to bring up an idea I've been incubating. I've been contemplating launching an OSNews-like site on the topic of Enterprise Computing. Obviously, OSNews covers the OS-related aspects of heavy-duty business, scientific, and academic computing already, and sometimes news on databases, app servers, cloud computing and other related topics too, but a lot of the kind of news that is useful to enterprise IT people falls outside of OSNews' purview, and it's appropriate to keep it that way. But I think that the enterprise IT world could use an OSNews-like site to aggregate and examine the latest news in that sphere. So my question to you, dear OSNews readers, is this: Do you agree? Would you be interested in reading and participating in a site on that topic? Would you be interested in being involved? If so, I'd like to recruit a few editors to help me launch it. Read on for more details. Update: Are there any native Korean speakers who read OSNews? If you are one, and you'd be willing to help me out with a short project, please contact me. Read more on this exclusive OSNews article... Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:30:22 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (David Adams) OSNews, Generic OSes http://osnews.com/story/21763/New_The_Pirate_Bay_Owners_Detail_Business_Plan http://osnews.com/story/21763/New_The_Pirate_Bay_Owners_Detail_Business_Plan The story around The Pirate Bay acquisition seems to be developing fast. The torrent search engine was bought by Global Gaming Factory yesterday, and they promised to build a legal P2P distribution network where content providers and copyright holders get compensated. In an exclusive interview with the BBC, GGF's Hans Pandeya detailed the business plan they have in mind for TPB. Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:28:10 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) Internet & Networking http://osnews.com/story/21762/VirtualBox_3_0_Released http://osnews.com/story/21762/VirtualBox_3_0_Released Sun has released VirtualBox 3.0. The major improvements are: "Guest SMP with up to 32 virtual CPUs (VT-x and AMD-V only); Windows guests: ability to use Direct3D 8/9 applications/games (experimental); Support for OpenGL 2.0 for Windows, Linux and Solaris guests." Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:11:06 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Thom Holwerda) SUN Microsystems