ROCK is a Distribution Build Kit. You can configure your personal build of ROCK and easily build your own distribution. Features of ROCK Linux v2.0 are build dependency auto-detection, a new binary package format, "smart optimizations", the ability to be build on a cluster and many more. ROCK Linux comes along with over 1000 package descriptions ready for compilation. Currently supported platforms include x86, AMD64, PowerPC, MIPS, Alpha, SPARC as well as SPARC64.

The article at Perl.com describes the design and implmementation of svk, a distributed version control system built on top of Subversion.

This article introduces the Runtime Spy, one of Core Tools available from Eclipse.org. The Runtime Spy is a perspective and set of views specifically designed to help you find and diagnose plug-in startup performance problems. It's considered one of best tools for understanding and diagnosing startup performance problems related to plug-in activation.

The first beta release of GNOME 2.6 is available for testing. Changelog, download location, gotchas.

This guide is aimed at CVS users who want to know more about the new features in Subversion, but it is also useful for someone familiar with source control systems who wants to find out what Subversion offers. Mike Mason is talking about the philosophy and design behind Subversion, how it improves upon CVS, and how to get started using it.

If Microsoft cannot settle an antitrust case brought by European Union regulators, the company may be ordered to remove Windows Media Player as an integrated feature of the dominant Windows operating system, at least for personal computers sold in Europe.

This article explores the concept of commodification in a historical context while also seeking to discover lessons that might be applied to contemporary open source business efforts. I also wrote a similar editorial a few weeks ago.

This whitepaper provides an changes that you may need to make to a customized or specialized Linux installation in order to use it with the Linux 2.6 kernel, building upon the configuration file and administrative updates that were touched upon in the third article in this series.

Morphos-news.de reports that MorphOS 1.4.2 is now available. To get it login to the beta2ftp server and download the boot.img to update your MorphOS 1.4.1 installation.

Aicas announced its hard realtime Java technology, JamaicaVM, for the QNX Neutrino RTOS v6.3. Additionally QNX Software Systems released a sneak peek at the QNX Momentics development suite version 6.3 and the OS behind it while they put up for download a free 89-page guide to porting legacy code to the QNX Neutrino RTOS.

FlexBeta has a quick look at the recent Longhorn Build 4053 with screenshots.

Distrowatch reports that a port of Fedora Core 1 to the AMD64 architecture has been released: "The port of Fedora Core 1 to AMD64 is now available. Everyone is encouraged to download it and participate by either submitting bugs or submitting fixes. All bugs, requests for enhancements, and fixes should be submitted via Bugzilla. Please keep up to date via the Update methods." Read the full announcement and the release notes for more information.

If the U.S. Postal Service delivered mail for free, our mailboxes would surely runneth over with more credit-card offers, sweepstakes entries, and supermarket fliers. That's why we get so much junk e-mail: It's essentially free to send. So Microsoft Corp. chairman Bill Gates, among others, is now suggesting that we start buying "stamps" for e-mail (paid in cpu cycles that we rent to others).

This document discusses operating systems that Apple has created in the past, and many that it tried to create. Through this discussion, we will come across several technologies the confluence of which eventually led to Mac OS X. An important goal of the discussion is to better understand the reasons, and if possible, the rationale behind Mac OS X and its important components. This, in turn, will be helpful in understanding and appreciating the system as it is today.