OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

GCC 3.4.4 released

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-23 General Development 3 Comments

The GNU project and the GCC developers have announced the release of GCC 3.4.4. This release is a bug-fix release, containing fixes for regressions in GCC 3.4.3 relative to previous releases of GCC.

Is Firefox Really More Secure than IE?

Submitted by MZ 2005-05-23 Mozilla, Gecko 72 Comments

Even though Internet Explorer is by far the most widely used browser, since 2004 it slowly began losing popularity to other browsers mainly due to security issues. Is Firefox more secure than Internet Explorer? What will the future bring? Read more in this article.

Apple Reportedly Considering Switch to Intel (Again)

Submitted by Patrick 2005-05-23 Apple 171 Comments

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Apple and Intel executives have been in discussions about Apple using Intel chips in its hardware. Apple's only official response at this point is that it's "rumor and speculation," but the Journal implies that it's nearly a done deal. No word on whether Apple would use Intel chips across its product line or just in one or two products, like the Xserve. And this could all just be maneuvering to extract a better deal out of IBM. Losing Apple would be a major blow to IBM's chip business.

Solaris 10 x86 is going to use GRUB

Submitted by Robert Milkowski 2005-05-23 Solaris 90 Comments

Solaris x86 will use GRUB as its boot manager on x86/x64 platforms. See screenshots here.

Windows Server 2003 R2 Product Overview

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-23 Windows 27 Comments

Windows Server 2003 R2 makes it easier and more cost effective to extend connectivity and control to identities, locations, data, and applications throughout and beyond your organization. Experience the difference yourself by downloading the Windows Server 2003 R2 trial software.

Application optimization with compilers for Linux on POWER

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-23 IBM 15 Comments

Interested in tuning your C/C++ applications for Linux on POWER? This article compares the optimization options for both Linux on POWER C/C++ compilers: GCC and IBM XL C/C++. This paper also reviews tactics, such as Interprocedural Analysis, Profile Directed Feedback, and High Order Transformations, which are used by one or both of the compilers to extract higher performance from the Power architecture.

C++: Throw by Value, Catch by Reference

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-22 General Development 20 Comments

Catching and Throwing in C++ can be tricky, but this chapter will help you to know when and how to use these functions effectively, as well as when you shouldn't be using them.

Performance Test Tools and Release Dates

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-22 General Development 2 Comments

Performance test tools can sometimes work better than traditional functional test tools for functional testing, Mike Kelly says.

A Virtual Shootout

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-22 Rumors 10 Comments

EMC's vitual machine software edges out Microsoft's in overall features, says Microsoft Magazine.

New Haiku newsletter Available

Submitted by jeanmarc 2005-05-22 Haiku 25 Comments

The latest issue of the Haiku's newsletter has arrived, read it here.

Eclipse Casts Shadow on Sun

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-22 Java 69 Comments

The Eclipse open-source development platform has far outdistanced Sun Microsystems Inc.'s NetBeans in terms of developer and vendor support, but Sun has vowed to continue to innovate around NetBeans while practically everybody else in the Java world is supporting Eclipse, says eWeek.

A new spin on a PalmOS palmtop (or inside it)

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-21 Wireless 22 Comments

"To save power, the hard drive stops spinning between uses. That's fine. What's not so fine, however, is that it takes six seconds to spin up again and feed its data into the palmtop's memory so you can use it. As a result, your work is frequently interrupted by maddening, six-second visits to the dead zone. Everything is frozen on the screen, no button works and your workflow comes to a crashing halt." Read the full review of PalmOne's Lifedrive at News.com.

Rise and Fall of Installation Procedures

Submitted by Raffaele 2005-05-21 Morphos 32 Comments

There is an interesting and brilliant article on Morphzone about various solutions of approaching installation procedures into Amiga-like OSes and mainly into MorphOS operating system.

System 8 and Copland

Submitted by Tom 2005-05-21 Apple 104 Comments

Apple felt threatened by the pending release of Windows 95. It had preemptive multitasking, and was heralded by many magazines as "easy to use as Mac". Apple started he Copland project to respond. It was to have had live searches, full multitasking and all of Apple's next generation technologies. The project was canned in 1996 at the behest of Gil Amelio, though many of its technologies were eventually included in the OS. Read about it at MLAgazine.

Wakefield RISC OS show report (live)

Submitted by tib 2005-05-21 RISC OS 12 Comments

The Icon Bar has got a live show report from the floor of this weekend's RISC OS show. So far seen there is the A9 Home machine, which runs RISC OS on an ARM9 processor, VirtualRiscPC for MacOS X, allowing MacOS users to run RISC OS on their Macs amongst other things.

Workstation OS Review of SGI IRIX

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-20 SGI and IRIX 63 Comments

Can a proprietary Unix be a desktop OS that competes with Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux desktops? Although it may lack the visual effects of OS X, and installation is tricky in parts, Irix is a stable desktop OS -- possibly because it runs only on SGI's own hardware. Read the rest at NewsForge.

RISC OS 5.09 beta released

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-20 RISC OS 2 Comments

Castle logoCastle have provided a beta ROM image of RISC OS 5.09 for Iyonix users, prior to an official post-Wakefield roll out of the new version. The beta release includes "updated USB" support.

OpenBSD 3.7 review

Submitted by Jem Matzan 2005-05-20 OpenBSD 13 Comments

NewsForge has a review of OpenBSD 3.7, covering some of the new features and what they do, a general overview of OpenBSD, and some suggestions for OpenBSD developers for some new features in the next release.

OpenBSD 3.7: The Wizard of OS

Submitted by BSD_User 2005-05-20 OpenBSD 31 Comments

OpenBSD 3.7 is the first release to support newer wireless chipsets, especially for 802.11g, thanks to a big activism campaign lead by project leader Theo de Raadt. It's now possible to create a portable access point with a tiny PDA using the Zaurus port, too. As usual, there are a lot of other big and small changes, such as the import of Xorg, the jump towards gcc3, and a feature to update your installed packages automagically. Discover the details behind the scenes in this interview that Federico Biancuzzi had with several OpenBSD developers.

New Wi-Fi standard takes the slow road

Eugenia Loli 2005-05-20 Internet 17 Comments

The process to establish the next-generation Wi-Fi standard, which promises to quadruple transmission speeds, has stalled as members of the working group developing the standard failed to pass the main proposal onto the next stage.