"In an ideal world, whenever a program cannot perform a function it exits with a useful error message, giving you enough clues to fix the problem. Unfortunately, we do not live in an ideal world -- at least, not all the time. Sometimes when an application encounters an error, you are none the wiser." Read the article at DevChannel.org by Gerard Beekmans.

"Sun has a desktop package that can be seriously considered by IT departments planning new rollouts". First look at Java Desktop System shows it has potential, ComputerWorld says.

OpenQNX reports that Julian (a.k.a. Kinners) has ported GTK2 and family to QNX6. You can find them in his repository here. This GTK2 port uses XFree86 4.3 for QNX.

Although MS is looking to rope in Longhorn developers now, the company knows it's in for a long ride.

In this article, the author will cover both the client and server side as he describes how to create non-blocking secure connections using the Java Secure Socket Extensions (JSSE) and the Java NIO (new I/O) library, and he will explain the traditional approach to creating a non-blocking socket, as well as an alternative (and necessary) method if you want to use JSSE with NIO.

At its Professional Developers Conference this week, Microsoft is taking the wraps off its Longhorn Windows, Yukon SQL Server and Whidbey tool suite. Check back here for news from the Los Angeles event. Articles here, here here, here (lots of good info about the new Longhorn features) and here. Longhorn SDK here, screenshots and video of Longhorn from today conference here, Longhorn Tweak Guide, special access to Longhorn/Whidbey PDC release code. Even more articles here, here and here.

PCBurn.com has a review up on Vector Linux's latest release, 4.0. Find out what this slimmed-down Linux distribution has to offer.

Here is a review of Mac OS X Panther 10.3, the new offering by Apple, only a few days after its release.

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates on Monday plans to discuss the company's strategy to generate interest--and dollars--from an avalanche of Windows-oriented products over the next three years. Read the reports at News.com, eWEEK and Y!News.

SuSE Linux has enlisted the backing of server-software maker Veritas Software, an important step in supporting the needs of business computing and keeping up with top Linux seller Red Hat. In the meantime, Novell tried to buy SUSE, sources say.

K-meleon's latest beta is built on Mozilla 1.5 code and incorporates all of the changes since 0.7. Additionally, Mozilla Firebird 0.7.1 was released for Macs, Epiphany released two versions, 1.0.4-stable and 1.1.0-test, and Galeon released 1.3.10.

This version supports all known versions of glibc, including the new Native Posix Thread Library (NPTL) interface. This represents a major technical advance for Wine, as glibc instability has been a problem throughout 2003. Support for the Dreamweaver MX Studio was added. Dynamic loading of OpenGL is provided, which allows a much greater range of unsupported applications to run, especially games such as Half-Life. Miscellaneous bugfixes were made for Microsoft Office, Quicken, Visio, and Lotus Notes.

I decided to review the Libranet Distribution because there just aren't many reviews available on it, and I am sure that there are plenty of people who would like to know what Libranet is and how it works.

Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates is slated to kick off the company's Professional Developers Conference here Monday with an overview of its latest pre-beta Windows operating system and how it advances the company's .NET platform strategies. Read the reports at InternetNews and at NYTimes (free reg. required).