Porting large numbers of programs to RISC OS introduces many new problems - most notably, how to keep them all up to date. In this drobe.co.uk article I discuss the development of an autobuilder for RISC OS ports, and encourage people to contribute to it.

Keeping directories in sync on multiple machines can be difficult. Running Unison is one way to make the task easier.

"I get asked, by more junior Linux users, and people just looking to try it out, which distribution of Linux I use or recommend. It occurred to me that I never actually published an answer to this question, even though it is, by far, the question I am asked most often. I think my stock answer is maybe slightly unusual only because, unlike most of the rest of the Linux-using world, I hate every distro I've ever tried. That's right: every distribution of Linux sucks in its own special way. Some just suck less", says Brian Jones on Linux.com.

First public beta of Mandrake Linux 10.2 Beta 1 (x86-64). KDE 3.3.2 packages are built with -fvisibility=hidden -fvisibility-inlines-hidden. This reduces code size and also improves performance of the runtime. A major new feature of Mandrakelinux 10.2 for x86-64 is that you can install a great amount of 32-bit development packages alongside with 64-bit equivalents, without any conflict. NDISwrapper 1.0 now includes support for x86-64.

Take a look at this pie chart and keep in mind that these results (in german) are from 3rd quarter of 2004 only and are global results.

The Xfce Foundation Classes, a lightweight C++ binding for Xfce and GTK has made its first development release, with plans for a stable release around the time of Xfce 4.4.

Quality assurance isn’t just testing, or analysis, or wishful thinking. Although it can be boring, difficult, and tedious, QA is nonetheless essential. Ensuring that a system will work when delivered requires much planning and discipline. Convincing others that the system will function properly requires even more careful and thoughtful effort. QA is performed through all stages of the project, not just slapped on at the end. It is a way of life.

There are people who believe in the doctrine of social or historical inevitability: that, when the time is right and no earlier, several people will independently invent what turns out to be a crucial new technology. Read more of the editorial here.

The WashingtonPost has an interesting article on the matter, but registration required.

He may be the saint of the Linux community, but it sounds like Linus Torvalds - with his secret security fixes - could still be a challenge to work with.

With the beginning of 1996, Apple realized that with the next generation PC's running Windows NT to be released within the decade, they would need a new, modern operating system to run on their machines. Most in the industry were certain that Apple would choose Be, whose operating system, BeOS, already ran on Apple's newest computers. Read the (updated) article here.

The latest version of Solaris Express has been released, Alan Hargreaves and Torrey McMahon have blogged about some of the new features. Download it from here. More info here.

A program can't ever really die, but it can get old. Very old. This is a paradox millions of computer users are living with. Almost four years after the release of Windows XP and Mac OS X, they boot their machines into more senior versions of Windows or the Mac OS.

A Windows computer without the latest security patches is in big trouble. That's the conclusion from a "honey pot" experiment conducted by StillSecure, a Louisville network security firm. StillSecure attached six computers - loaded with different versions of the Windows, Linux and Apple's Macintosh operating systems - earlier this month to the Internet without anti-virus software. The results show the Internet is a very rough place.