Linked by Thom Holwerda on Thu 2nd Aug 2007 23:01 UTC
Acer is planning to sell Linux-based PCs to the UK market, the company told ZDNet.co.uk. On Thursday Acer contacted ZDNet.co.uk with the following statement: "At this moment in time Acer UK does not have a PC available with Linux pre-loaded, but we are looking at introducing one in the future." This appears to represent a reversal of Acer's previous statements on the matter, which suggested that the manufacturer had no plans to sell PCs here with a pre-installed open-source operating system.
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RE[3]: Slowly, but surely.....
by Hands on Fri 3rd Aug 2007 13:44
in reply to "RE[2]: Slowly, but surely....."
Member since:2005-06-30
I hear that a lot, but I never see any figures. I suspect *some* Linux PCs get Windows installed over them, but in the end the thing that matters is that Linux gets more exposition. Even if only some of the PCs keep Linux, it's a positive thing.
One point that I haven't noticed among these comments is that *some* Windows PCs get Linux installed over them. I realize that the raw numbers may not be comparable, and I really doubt many people could hazard an accurate guess about the numbers. Proportionality may not even be comparable. The point is well made though that exposure is a positive thing in generally.
-OT I have to commend you for your correct usage of the word "moot" in your post. I can't remember the last time I didn't see "mute" instead. It's always sad to see how the English language seems to be deteriorating because people don't know the difference between very similar words. Another word that is often used incorrectly is "weary" (in place of "wary" or "leery").
RE[3]: Slowly, but surely.....
by wannabe geek on Fri 3rd Aug 2007 14:14
in reply to "RE[2]: Slowly, but surely....."
Member since:2006-09-27
"It is theoretically possible, yes. Most distros (including the most popular, Ubuntu) do not require the user to use superuser status."
But this doesn't mean that programs you run as a regular user have root privilege. Ubuntu and others use 'sudo' which asks you for your user password to do administrative tasks. The programs you run as a regular user don't know your password, that's why 'sudo' is about as safe as 'su'. Only Linspire does or did for some time encourage users to run everything with superuser privileges. Most distros, including Ubuntu, are reasonably secure by default.
RE[3]: Slowly, but surely.....
by kaiwai on Fri 3rd Aug 2007 14:46
in reply to "RE[2]: Slowly, but surely....."
Member since:2005-07-06
I hear that a lot, but I never see any figures. I suspect *some* Linux PCs get Windows installed over them, but in the end the thing that matters is that Linux gets more exposition. Even if only some of the PCs keep Linux, it's a positive thing.
True - lets also remember one thing - how many end users know how to install Windows? sure, there will be those who will try to take advantage of changing but for the vast majority, it'll load, there will be an office suite, browser, chat application etc. etc.
Its all about marketing - also, for the vast majority, a computer is for work - its a big thing bought, especially in regards to the third world (and developed world), and not something that should be wasted with games (I've heard that many times from parents) - so in regards to games, its a non-issue.
If for every time I saw a PC the parents bought their kids a games machine I was given a dollar, I would be the richest man on earth.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/21/13 15:53 UTC
The new WebKit Opera for Android has been released. "Opera 14 for Android is built on top of Chromium 26, with a total overhaul of the UI in native code, making it fit well with the latest Android design guidelines. Go get the build from Google Play or point your browser to m.opera.com, and give it a spin!"
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 22:43 UTC
The Verge pointed me to a blog post by Leap Motion - which reveals how their Kinect-like motion control works with Windows 8. "From the second you plug in your Leap Motion Controller, you'll be able to browse the web and interact with your computer just by moving your hands and fingers in the air. With Leap Motion technology and Windows, you can do everything that's possible with multi-touch inputs - without actually touching anything. This also means that existing applications in Windows 7 and 8 will respond to your natural hand and finger movements. Soon, we'll show you how Leap Motion will work with Mac OS X." Quite cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 21:50 UTC
PocketNow interviews Marc Dillon, and there's an interesting note about why Jolla is keeping the display properties under wraps: "We're leaving some of those details out because we do understand that there are a lot of really big players in the market and they tend to take certain components in the market and dominate them. We created the ability to actually be able to run Sailfish on multiple hardware displays and be able to swap components, so this is part of the demand and supply planning phase. We are committed to this industrial design which is a 4.5-inch display, an 8 megapixel camera on the back and a front-facing camera at the front, and the exact specs of the display we'll provide when we're close to delivery." Something you rarely hear anything about.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:15 UTC
"This is my NeXTstation Turbo Color booting the Mac System 7.1 Operating System using a hardware add-on called 'Daydream'. The Daydream has a Mac ROM and a few custom ICs in it and hooked up to the NeXTs DSP port. Turns your NeXT into a full fledged 68k powered Mac." So cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:11 UTC, submitted by Drumhellar
"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. Please note that all fixes in the prior security/bugfix updates (NetBSD 6.0.1 and 6.0.2) are also in 6.1."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 21:06 UTC
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."More News »
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Member since:
2005-07-02
I hear that a lot, but I never see any figures. I suspect *some* Linux PCs get Windows installed over them, but in the end the thing that matters is that Linux gets more exposition. Even if only some of the PCs keep Linux, it's a positive thing.
It is theoretically possible, yes. Most distros (including the most popular, Ubuntu) do not require the user to use superuser status. However, the point is rendered moot by the fact that there are currently *no* Linux viruses on the wild (with the possible exception of a worm targetting Web servers). There is, as far as I know, no spyware for Linux. When there is, maybe we can talk about this again.