Apple yesterday seeded a new build of the Mac OS X 10.2.8 update, providing build 6R73 to developers. "This build addresses some issues found in the last seed," Apple told testers. 10.2.8 was released last month but was pulled quickly due to some problems it introduced to some users. Update: The new build is now available via Software Update.

BSDForums.org features the latest news about BSD: FreeBSD's Luigi Rizzo has made some changes to the ipfw code so it can forward packets also when acting as a bridge. Lennart Augustsson says that there's been a long standing problem with some USB printers running in bidirectional mode on NetBSD. An article by Miod Vallat describes how the m88k-specific backend of the GNU C compiler, gcc, was fixed, from the discovery and analysis of the problems to the real fixing work.

An influential Wall Street analyst warns that unless Sun Microsystems cuts up to 19% of its workforce and tightens its focus it will continue to decline and eventually become a takeover target for its large installed base. He recommends that Sun spin off its Java software and reign in Scott McNealy's brash tendencies.

CRUX Linux (simply CRUX for now on) is a source-based Linux distribution created by Per Liden, targeting advanced and intermediate users. As reported on CRUX Website, the main philosophy behind the distribution is to "keep it simple". Update: Screenshots added.

With SuSE's 64bit Linux OS out the door sharply on the heels of AMD's Athlon 64, Chris Schläger, Director of Distribution Development, gives us the low-down on why the 64bit SuSE Linux 9.0 Desktop operating system is the only choice for making the 64bit leap. Also on hand to offer their wisdom were Malcolm Yates, SuSE's Strategic Alliance man, and Marketing Director Jasmin Ul-Haque.

This article shows how to develop a plug-in that embeds the HSQLDB pure-Java relational database server into the Eclipse Workbench. Although not as powerful as DB2 and not as popular as MySQL, HSQLDB can satisfy the needs of a wide range of Java applications, because of its extensibility and low memory/processor requirements. NewsForge also has an article about Eclipse.

A number of Mac news sites are citing insider information and claim that Mac OS X 10.3 Panther (version 7B85 or 6) has reached Golden Master status and is heading for duplication.

Ladislav Bodnar examines the package management tools in five major binary Linux distributions (Debian, Mandrake, Red Hat, Slackware, SuSE) and provide examples of 1) installing a package not officially supplied by the distribution itself and 2) upgrading the entire distribution to a newer version.

A high-profile digital civil liberties group is criticizing a component of the "trusted computing" technology promoted by Microsoft, IBM and other tech companies, calling the feature a threat to computer users.

The world's largest embedded software company, today launched its first official support for embedded Linux. For its initial foray into the embedded Linux market, Wind River has decided to target its $4,000 visionProbe II hardware bring-up tool at embedded Linux system-level software development. Company officials say they plan a step-by-step approach toward embedded Linux, suggesting more Linux-related announcements lie ahead for the embedded software giant.

At this week's RVC Softedge 2003 conference, a group of open source developers argued over innovation, commoditization and how the work really gets done. Among the topics: How far can "open" go in a professional development setting?

Conceding that its strategy of patching Windows holes as they emerge has not worked, Microsoft plans next week to outline a new security effort focused on what the company calls "securing the perimeter," a company executive told CNET News.com.

MirBSD is a derivative of OpenBSD. It is i386-only, and has some packages removed (Kerberos etc.). Additional features include IPv6 support in Apache, ports for djb-ware, a new bootloader and more.

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