OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

Novell: Vista Will Drive Users to Linux

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-12 Novell and Ximian 136 Comments

The high costs of migrating from Windows XP to Windows Vista will be the catalyst that encourages more companies to seriously consider moving to desktop Linux, according to open source and networking company Novell on Monday.

Microsoft To Offer Windows Code

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-12 Microsoft 45 Comments

At Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles, Microsoft is planning to provide programmers with the code for an early version of Vista, as well as Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005, both of which will be released in November. Vista, the client version of the next release of Windows developed under the code name Longhorn, is expected to be released next year. Screenshots of the PDC Vista build can be found here.

KDE Conference Celebrates Success and Looks to Future

Submitted by anonymous 2005-09-12 KDE 3 Comments

"Ten days of presentations, workshops, and chaotic coding sponsored by Trolltech, Novell/SUSE, HP, the local governments of Andalucia, and Malaga can only mean one thing: aKademy 2005, the KDE community's annual conference. Held in Malaga, Spain, aKademy 2005 included a Users and Administrators Conference, a Developer Conference and a Coding Marathon. Users, developers, and local visitors with an interest in open technology were treated to a display of stable desktop software and glimpses of cutting-edge innovations to come."

Review: YellowTAB Zeta 1.0

Submitted by SilentBob4 2005-09-12 Zeta 24 Comments

"The biggest thing they have done is to add more drivers and update the look in order to bring BeOS to users who could not have installed it before and attract new users to discover what made it great. This is a good thing, but I just can't get behind this OS as of yet. There are too many problems and rough patches. If you want the best way to use BeOS, this is it. If you are looking for the best desktop OS, I cannot recommend Zeta."

NetBSD Imports Google Summer of Code Project tmpfs

Submitted by Jan Schaumann 2005-09-12 NetBSD 11 Comments

Julio M. Merino Vidal's Google Summer of Code Project, a new memory-based file system called tmpfs has been imported into the NetBSD source tree. See Julio's message to the tech-kern mailinglist for more details.

PostgreSQL SQL Syntax and Use

Eugenia Loli 2005-09-11 Databases 31 Comments

This chapter at InformIT covers the basic operation of PostgreSQL, including naming conventions, creating a database, and indexing.

TabletPC: Mobile Vista Introduction for Tablet PCs

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-11 Windows 16 Comments

"Although a relatively new platform, Tablet PC continues to revitalize and broaden its appeal to developers. By expanding existing features, adding new investments, and simplifying deployments, developing for Tablet PC becomes even more alluring with Windows Vista. There are some interesting PDFs available on what Windows Vista has in store for the Tablet PC."

Nanotech To Enable 100GB Solid State Memory?

David Adams 2005-09-11 Hardware 41 Comments

Researchers at Imperial College London claim to have developed technology that would enable the creation of three-dimensional microchips, which will dramatically increase their memory capacity. According to their press release: "by using nanotechnology it is possible to reproduce the key functions of semiconductor electronics in microchips using only the 'spin' of electrons, which is responsible for magnetism, rather than the more conventional 'charge' that traditional microchips use."

Review: Windows XP N Editions

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-11 Windows 119 Comments

More from Paul Thurrot today, as he reviews the N editions of Windows: "If you're wondering what the XP N Editions are like, wonder no more. I got my hands on both XP Home N and XP Pro N this week and gave them both a spin. The results were pretty uneventful. I can't recommend the XP N Editions per se, but I can report that you shouldn't be afraid of using these products at all. They're not crippled or broken in any way I can see."

NetBSD 2.1 RC3 Released

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-11 NetBSD 3 Comments

"On behalf of the NetBSD Release Engineering team, I'm happy to announce that the release process for NetBSD 2.1 has begun. Those of you paying close attention will notice that NetBSD 2.1 RC3 is available in the "daily builds" section of your local FTP mirror, and we encourage you to test it out and report any major bugs using send-pr(1)."

Submitted by kellym 2005-09-11 Windows 61 Comments

"Two days before the start of Professional Developers Conference 2005, I've received exclusive insider information about the product editions which Microsoft intends to create for Windows Vista." Secondly, Microsoft has made available for download a preliminary vesion of the Vista User Experience Guidelines. Lastly, Brian Proffitt thinks Vista will be free. As in beer, that is.

Using the Fluxbox Window Manager

Submitted by Jophn Deo 2005-09-10 Desktop environments 39 Comments

"If you're planning on using Fluxbox, the key is, like everything in Linux is that you learn a little something and have fun doing it. Experiment with different styles and configuration. That is one of the advantages to this type of window manager - you can make it look like you want."

Mono 1.1.9 Released

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-10 Mono 72 Comments

"We consider Mono 1.1.9 stable enough to recommend it for all users. Those upgrading from the 1.0.x series should note that these notes only contain the differences between 1.1.8 and 1.1.9."

Submitted by Saad 2005-09-10 Apple 29 Comments

Apple pinned its hopes on a project started in 1987 to provide a next generation version of Mac OS, called Pink. The operating system never shipped, but it prompted Apple's adption of the PowerPC. Read the story here.

Sun’s Niagara: Speeds and Feeds Emerge

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-10 Oracle and SUN 36 Comments

Sun plans to ship 8-core and 6-core versions of the Niagara processor in single socket servers before year end, according to sources. The decision to produce 6-core parts came as Sun tried to make best use of chip yields from its partner TI. In addition, Sun can now offer a couple of different prices with the Niagara-based systems, pitching the 6-core gear as lower-end. Based on 1.0GHz and eventually 1.2GHz chips, a Niagara server will consume on average 250 watts - versus close to four times that amount for similarly performing Xeon-based four-way servers.

Cross-Compiling for AmigaOS 4

Thom Holwerda 2005-09-10 Amiga & AROS 2 Comments

As the cross development SDK for AmigaOS 4 isn't released yet, the idea to do an unofficial guide to setting up a cross-compiler was born. This document will describe how to do just that. This document also expects you to have some knowledge of Linux or Cygwin, as these are the platforms used in this document.

Submitted by kellym 2005-09-10 Wireless 5 Comments

The sale of PalmSource may consummate the marriage of Linux and the Palm OS, but it won't kill off the operating system that helped create the PDA market. Executives of Japan's Access said the company's $324.3 million proposal, announced Friday, would not have an immediate impact on the more than 39 million Palm-powered devices made by Palm and more than 40 other manufacturers, including Japan's Sony and Kyocera, and South Korea's Samsung Electronics.

Culture-Sensitive GUI Controls and J2EE

Submitted by anonymous 2005-09-10 Java 2 Comments

Global Business Object (GBO) is a technology that provides a portable Java library enabling developers to generate culture-sensitive GUI controls in a J2EE environment. Currently, GBO includes five globalization features: Name, Address, Pop-up Calendar, Date Chooser, and Time Chooser and supports 24 languages and their corresponding locales.

Submitted by kellym 2005-09-10 Privacy, Security 28 Comments

Next week's 'Patch Tuesday' was already going to be quiet, with an update only for Windows. On Friday, Microsoft pulled that update, saying more testing is needed. In related news, officials at the Mozilla Foundation on Friday acknowledged that a potentially dangerous code execution hole exists in fully patched versions of its flagship Firefox web browser. Update: Seems like there already is a (temporary) fix available.

Submitted by Matthew Smith 2005-09-10 Qt 20 Comments

Trolltech has released version 3.3.5 of Qt, featuring new compatibility with OSX Tiger, Visual Studio 2005 and GCC4. It also features bug fixes to many of its tools and classes, and as is normal with minor-point Qt releases, features binary and source compatibility with earlier releases in the Qt 3.3 series.