OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

MS AntiSpyware vs Ad-Aware vs SpyBot

Submitted by Tudy 2005-01-10 Bugs & Viruses 59 Comments

Flexbeta compares Microsoft's new anti-spyware utility with the two leading spyware stoppers, Ad-Aware and SpyBot. They find that Microsoft's is actually more effective than the other choices, though with the monthly fee for the MS solution, it's not a clear winner.

The Macintosh TV

Submitted by Thomas 2005-01-10 Apple 29 Comments

Blast from the past: Apple beat Microsoft's Windows Media Center by ten years with the Macintosh TV.

Free Networking Book

Submitted by Alex Moskalyuk 2005-01-10 General Development 17 Comments

Eugene Blanchard made his Introduction to Data Communications (also known as Introduction to Networking) available for free. The book covers a broad variety of topics such as RS-232, Ethernet, RF, TCP/IP and many other topics in its 63 chapters. This is a valuable reference and read for those just starting to understand networking and data communications as well as seasoned professionals in the field.

Linux: Tuning The Kernel With A Genetic Algorithm

Submitted by Rahul Sundaram 2005-01-09 General Development 24 Comments

Kerneltrap has a discussion on the proposed patches to Linux kernel which enables Linux to use genetic algorithm for use in CPU and IO schedulers. Genetic algorthims are self optimising over time for particular kinds of workloads and this could be one way of smarter kinds of scheduling. An interesting idea though it yet remains to be seen what would turn up

SUSE 9.2 Pro Review and Comparison to Mandrakelinux

Submitted by aRTee 2005-01-09 SuSE, openSUSE 41 Comments

A Mandrake user and fan reviews SUSE 9.2 Pro and compares it to the latest release from mandrake.

Firefox Phishing Flaw

Submitted by Matt 2005-01-09 Privacy, Security 25 Comments

"A vulnerability in Firefox could expose users of the open-source browser to the risk of phishing scams, security experts have warned. " In a related note, security firm Secunia has discovered three very critical security flaws in IE.

Macworld ’05: A New Direction?

Submitted by Tudy 2005-01-09 Apple 52 Comments

Businessweek asks: Flash memory in a cheaper iPod? A $500 Mac? If the rumors about what Steve Jobs has planned for Apple are true, those moves could be just the start. Also: spy photos of headless iMac or internet hoax? you decide.

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition RC1 tested

Eugenia Loli 2005-01-08 Windows 58 Comments

Release Candidate 1 (RC1) of Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is now available (despite MS shelving its Itanium version): ZDNet has put Build 1289 through its paces.

SoftPear Mac Emulation Preview Release

Guest post by Michael Steil 2005-01-08 macOS 51 Comments

SoftPear is a user mode Mac OS X emulator for Linux. As the news on our site say, we have just released a Preview Release that can run some Mac OS X command line tools in Linux and FreeBSD. (The download includes the GPL'ed source, binaries for Linux, FreeBSD and Mac OS X, some test programs and a README.) We do this by with our Mach-O executable loader, PearPC's PowerPC interpreter core, and our libc wrapper. We hope to be able to run the complete Mac OS X "Quartz" UI on Linux, FreeBSD and Darwin/x86 one day, this way.

December Syllable Newsletter; SYL-CON date set

Submitted by Michael Saunders 2005-01-08 Syllable, AtheOS 10 Comments

The December issue of the Syllable Development Newsletter is now available, covering news and updates for the open source desktop OS. Highlights: 0.5.5 release, ABrowse updates, patches aplenty and more. Additionally, the SYL-CON user/coder meetup has been set for 19th and 20th of February in London - let them know if you're going.

Local Root Exploit on 2.4/2.6 Linux Kernels

Submitted by netscreener 2005-01-08 Linux 116 Comments

Paul Starzetz has found a serious bug in Linux kernels. By exploiting the vulnerability local attackers could gain root privilege. All recent Linux kernels affected. The bug has already been corrected in recent released 2.4.29-rc1 Linux kernel.

Using the TXSeries Encina J2EE Connector

Eugenia Loli 2005-01-08 Java No Comments

To help TXSeries Encina users leverage the J2EE environment, this article describes how to develop Web-based applications using the Encina J2EE Connector. It walks you through various programming and configuration techniques for developing and deploying applications using the Encina J2EE Connector, introduced in TXSeries V5.1.

Xen, a new, high-performance x86 virtualization system

Submitted by Rahul Sundaram 2005-01-08 General Development 14 Comments

Linux Magazine has an extensive article the technical details and motivation behind Xen by one the developers.

Getting served on Xmas

Submitted by Harve 2005-01-08 Apple 47 Comments

Interview with the man being sued by Apple for leaking a prerelease of 10.4 to the Apple torrent site and the admin of the bittorrent tracker.

SUSE Linux 9.2 Released to Mirrors

Submitted by Cameron Kenneth Knight 2005-01-08 SuSE, openSUSE 60 Comments

SUSE Linux 9.2 was released to mirrors today. Novell is providing both the traditional Net Install Disc as well as DVD ISO's for i386 and x86_64. Here's the Distrowatch Link.

Trials of Longhorn

Submitted by danjr 2005-01-08 Windows 47 Comments

News.com has a review of the struggles of Longhorn. Among other delays and setbacks noted, word from Microsoft that the WinFS file system wouldn't be released in Windows Server until 2009.

An Inexpensive Solution for Networked Computations

Guest post by Kasra Yousefi 2005-01-07 Editorial 44 Comments

Problem: Even the most powerful PC’s become non responsive during resource-intensive computations, such as graphic design, media, image rendering and manipulating. The traditional solution has been to upgrade to a faster computer and throw more computing power at the problem to lessen the wait-time. But there's a simple solution that utilizes multiple machines, but without using grid/clustering. For now, this involves a hack, but how hard would it be for an OS vendor to streamline this process?