OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

Lindows.com, aka Lin—s

Adam Scheinberg 2004-02-17 Linspire 28 Comments

Many readers have submitted the latest news about Lindows.com. "Lindows is now also known as Lin---s (pronounced Lin-dash)" wrote Nick Stuart. The name swap, which effects only Belgium, The Netherlands, and Luxembourg, is a response to the court ruling that specified that Lindows was infriging upon the Windows trademark. The Reg is one of myriad sites reporting.

From OS/2 to Linux, Part 1; Threads, Mutexes, and Semaphores

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-17 OS/2 18 Comments

This series of three articles helps the developers involved in the tedious process of migrating/porting the OS/2 system drivers and applications to Linux. It provides a one-to-one mapping of various OS/2-to-Linux calls related to threads, IPC, memory management, timer handling, file handling, and so on. In addition, it captures the various preprocessor directives and compiler/linker options that can be mapped from OS/2 to Linux.

Mandrake 10-RC1 Released; Reverts to XFree86 4.3

Submitted by Norbert Bauer 2004-02-17 Mandriva, Mandrake, Lycoris 79 Comments

The Torrent files are out now for Mandrake Linux 10 RC1, while MandrakeSoft announced that they are reverting back to XFree86 4.3 because of the recent licensing change for XFree86 4.4.

Two Decades of the Macintosh revolution, a Reflection

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-17 Graphics 30 Comments

Red Hat & Gnome hacker Seth Nickell wrote an interesting article about the Macintosh revolution ini the human-centered UI design and the source of this revolution, the Xerox PARC innovations in the mid-70s.

Default AmigaOS4 Icon Set Revealed

Mike Bouma 2004-02-17 Amiga & AROS 46 Comments

A new screenshot showing OS4's default icon set by Martin "Mason" Merz has been revealed (not all icons shown in the shot are the new ones though). Also Q&A session 27 with Amiga's CTO Fleecy Moss is now available. Hyperion, Eyetech, AmigaWorld.net and many more exhibitors will attend the upcoming AmiGBG fair in Sweden.

Introduction to XEN

Guest post by Jayson Knight 2004-02-16 General Development 32 Comments

With the hype growing to a feverish pitch about the public announcement of Xen, I thought I would share some insight into the knowledge I've had of the language for almost a year and a half. I'm still under orders not to post the video demonstration I have back to my blog (not because the subject matter is Xen, but because apparently the demonstration is internal to Microsoft... I still don't understand this (expecially now that the cat is out of the bag), but it certainly doesn't stop me from sharing some of the information contained in it. This will be an ongoing post as the demonstration is over an hour long, with lots of code samples to boot.

Trion Operating System 0.1 Released

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 OS News 16 Comments

The Trion Object Oriented Operating system is an OS that is designed to meet the needs for the 21st century, with a kernel written in C++ and modelled in UML. The project is ran by a team of OSDev.org community members and version 0.1 was released recently.

Who’s The Fastest Growing Linux Distro?

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Linux 24 Comments

Which Linux distribution is the most popular? For many players in the open source realm, that answer depends on which part of the globe is counting, and how. By most accounts and research metrics, Red Hat (Quote, Chart) is the current market leader in distributions. IDC, for example, estimates that Red Hat's distributions cover over 60 percent of the Linux server market.

MPT on Mac OS X’s Usability and User Interface

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 macOS 75 Comments

"I got my new iBook a couple of days ago, and finally tried this “Mac OS X” thing for the first time. After doing all the software updates, this is what I found." Well-known usability hacker Mattew Thomas (mostly of Mozilla fame) gives his two cents on Mac OS X.

Windows Server 2003: Speeding Internet Experience; Overtakes NT4

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Windows 21 Comments

Don't have room in the budget for all the bandwidth you'd like? Users griping about Internet wait times? What's an IT mom to do? What parents of modest means have always done: Plug the leaks, patch the holes, and stretch the meals with bread. In the meantime, Windows Server 2003 overtakes NT4: The number of website hostnames running Microsoft's newest operating system, Windows Server 2003, overtook those running on Windows NT4 earlier this month.

Sun starts Solaris 10 Salutations

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Solaris 1 Comment

"Every couple of years, Sun Microsystems kicks off a 'new version of Solaris' celebration. This Unix fiesta, if you will, requires several months of marketing hype before the actual operating system is released. And so the party began this week with Sun's plugs for Solaris 10, which should arrive in the second half of 2004." Read the report at TheRegister.

Identity Flow, Impersonation Across Process & Machine Boundaries

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 .NET No Comments

The first and second articles in this series about .NET security covered the basics of .NET identity-based security, and showed you how to implement custom authentication and authorization schemes. In this last installment, you get the missing piece of the puzzle: Learn how to implement identity flow and identity impersonation across.NET-distributed multilayered applications.

OpenBeOS Newsletter; Issue 51 is Out

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Haiku 13 Comments

A new OBOS-Newsletter is out: In this Issue you can read about an "OBOS App_Server Overview", "How to Write a BeOS R5 Printer Driver" and "Against Directories".

Exploit based on Leaked Win2k Code; Funny Look at the Win Source

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Windows 23 Comments

Slashdot reports that a post to Bugtraq from SecurityTracker.com reports an Internet Explorer 5 exploit that has been released based on the Win2K code leak: "It is reported that a remote user can create a specially crafted bitmap file that, when loaded by IE, will trigger an integer overflow and execute arbitrary code." Elsewhere, this is a quick, superficial look at the style and content of the leaked Windows 2000 source, quoting from the comments but not the code, so this should be safe for developers to read.

SkyOS Gets Localization Support

Submitted by Gerald 2004-02-16 SkyOS 6 Comments

SkyOS is now able to handle and display text from all languages. Because of the recently introduced keyboard/UNICODE mapping and UTF8 handling in the entire GUI and applications you can type and view text from languages like English, German, Chinese and more. Check the news & shots here.

Hillel Cooperman and Tjeerd Hoek Talk Longhorn (Part 2)

Submitted by Prognathous 2004-02-16 Windows 1 Comment

The Part two of the interview with Hillel and Tjeerd focuses on Microsoft's user experience work and corporate culture, the Mac competition, balancing current products with future developments.

Oh, So That’s How A Java App Works!

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Java 4 Comments

New to Java? If you've gotten past the "Hello World" stage, this chapter from "Just Java 2" will help you understand Java application structure, the runtime internals (stack and heap), and the class "object."

A Thoroughly Different Review of Lindows

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Linspire 32 Comments

"After using LindowsOS for some time, many troublesome issues regarding the future of this particular flavour of Linux continually flood my mind whenever the subject of Lindows surfaces. I've followed both the company and its flagship product, LindowsOS, since its introduction over two years ago." Read the review at DesktopOS.

An Overview of PROMELA

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 General Development 1 Comment

PROMELA is not a programming language. PROMELA is a language for building verification models. As a result of this specialization, PROMELA contains many features that are not found in mainstream programming languages. These features are intended to facilitate the construction of high-level models of distributed systems. Gerard Holzmann provides an overview in this chapter from his book, "The SPIN Model Checker: Primer and Reference Manual."

XandrOS: User-friendly to a fault

Eugenia Loli 2004-02-16 Oracle and SUN 4 Comments

"XandrosOS is a good-looking, Debian-based Linux distro designed to lure Windows XP users. It's exceptionally easy to install and use, has good hardware and peripheral detection and good multimedia support, offers Windows networking compatibility, saves one money -- and the desktop, a tweaked version of KDE, even looks like XP to boot." Read the review at TheRegister.