As 2005 comes to an end, both NVIDIA and ATI have fought a competitive battle not only when it comes to their hardware lineup but also display drivers for alternative operating systems. When discussing this subject matter, GNU/Linux users have been quick to criticize ATI Technologies whether it is due to poor installation support, distribution compatibility, rudimentary control panel, or simply the performance level of its drivers.

"Once upon a time, 3D for the Web promised to be as easy as building a Web page. Unfortunately, 3D - even simple 3D - is more complex than displaying scrolling text and pictures. Each VRML vendor implemented a different subset of the spec, and it never gained traction. And so 3D on the Web faded away. Or did it? It turns out that VRML lives on in its XML flavor, X3D, which has grown to encompass VRML's siblings H-Anim (Humanoid Animation) and GeoVRML."

"Fifteen years ago, the Web browser was invented on Christmas day. We look at the history of the browser, talk to its creator, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, and ponder how the software increasingly provokes users to define their own ways of consuming information online." Berners-Lee: "A lot of people really want to have an arrangement to provide them with the software that is maintained, and to pay for that support. So, there's a place for the commercial software makers. But the open-source community is absolutely essential for the development of the Web. That's very important to maintain a healthy community."

"Data validation is a common chore in programming any user interface. The Java language's regular-expression support can make data validation easier. You can define a regular expression that describes valid data and then let the Java runtime see if it matches. But certain types of data have different formats in different locales. The ResourceBundle class lets you work with locale-specific data in an elegant way. This article shows how to combine the two techniques to solve a common data-entry problem."

The Icon Bar has an interview with RISCOS Ltd's managing directory, Paul Middleton. In the podcast (no, that's not a direct link), Paul discusses the future of RISC OS Select, the issues surrounding an Iyonix version, and merging the RISC OS 4 and 5 version forks.

Ex-Amiga hacker and ex-BeOS engineer Tinic Uro, now at Macromedia, blogged about the next version of Flash Player for Linux. Apparently version 8 will be skipped and the Linux version will see some extra love on upcoming version 8.5.

Representatives at browser maker Opera denied that the company is in the process of being sold to either Google or Microsoft, and said the Norwegian firm has no other acquisition plans in the works. Opera markets an eponymous desktop Web browser as well as several mobile browser technologies. A number of published reports appeared early Friday that implied that industry giants Microsoft and Google could be engaged in a bidding war over Opera. The company called those stories mere rumors.

"It's finally arrived - the first Mac Mini clone. Our review system was supplied by Evesham, but the barebone chassis is manufactured by AOpen and has been known as the 'Pandora'. Sadly this catchy name is gone - AOpen has re-named it the Mini PC, which is just plain boring. Anyhow, name aside, this is a really cool-looking little machine - it arguably looks even better than the Mac Mini, mainly due to its aluminium case."

"This article, the first in a three-part series, introduces you to the world of GTK+. It explains what GTK+ is, why you should consider using it, and the benefits it provides. Together with the rest of the series, this installment provides enough introductory information that, if you decide to use GTK+ in your own projects, you'll know where to look for further materials."

As here in Europe Christmas eve has already begun, we, the OSNews team, both editors and site maintainers, would like to wish all of our readers a very merry Christmas. May everyone be with the ones they love-- no matter one's nationality, religion, favourite operating system, favourite desktop environment, or whatever. Let us also hope the victims of the tsunami, the earthquake in Pakistan, and Gulf Coast hurricane, and all others who have suffered this year, have found comfort. Let's have a moment of silence on the 26th for them. Merry Christmas, people (and anyone who dares to sing "Last Christmas" in the comments gets banned for a week) !

MSDN has posted a video interview with Rob Short, the MIcrosoft VP in charge of the team that "architects the foundation of Windows Vista," and members of his team. The interview goes deep into kernel development, and they even ask the question that's on everyone's mind: "do you ever wish the registry had never been developed?"

As reported in the latest free edition of LWN the Bluetooth Qualification Administrator has demanded that the Linux BlueZ project take down the Bluetooth hardware compatibility list for Linux, claiming that 'As neither of these products have been qualified using Linux it is illegal to make them available for public use'. This was apparently done at the request of a registered member of the Bluetooth SIG.

"Welcome to the MultiOS Browser Test Website. Here you will find capabilities to test your browser. You can test CSS, Document Object Model, Graphics file formats, iFrames, JavaScript, Browser plugins, SVG-Graphic, XML and XSLT." You can do these tests in English or in German.

"In this paper I will try to explain the philosophy behind the Security Enhanced Linux (SE Linux). I will however try to explain the concept with an example but to keep the length readable I will restrain myself to go into much of implementation details for e.g. commands and similar stuff."