FreeBSD 5.0 RC3 Available
Terminus wrote in to tell us that FreeBSD 5.0 RC3 is now available on the FreeBSD FTP servers. He also reminds us "The final release is scheduled for January 17th 2003."
Former Red Hat Employee “Bero” Starts New Distro
Timothy R. Butler writes "Former Red Hat employee Bernhard "Bero" Rosenkraenzer has resurfaced, after leaving Red Hat last fall, with a brand new GNU/Linux distribution meant for the average user. According to the distribution's web site, "The Ark Linux distribution is based primarily upon a Red Hat Linux 7.3 / 8.0 foundation. On top of this, we have added a new easy-to-use installer (an Ark Linux installation is only four mouse clicks away!) and extensively tailored the software applications and utilities included - all in an effort to ensure that Ark Linux provides superior ease-of-use and the features and functionality end users have told us they want." Read more here." The ArkLinux home page.
Cosmoe 0.6 Released
Cosmoe 0.6 has been released. The have added new Be APIs and the APIs are more similar to the Be APIs. The built-in FreeType library has been removed, and new fonts have been added. 0.6 does not include the DirectFB-based rewrite of the appserver, that is expected to be added in release 0.7. Visit the Cosmoe website for more details.
Judge Gives Mixed Ruling in Be/Burst/Sun-Microsoft Cases
Microsoft Corp. won some and lost some on Friday in its efforts to get a federal judge to dismiss antitrust lawsuits filed by Sun Microsystems Inc., Be Inc. and Burst.com Inc. U.S. District Court Judge J. Frederick Motz denied Microsoft's motions in the Be and Burst.com case in a hearing this morning. But this afternoon, Motz granted requests to dismiss some of the counts raised by Sun, while taking others under review.
Red Hat Linux 8.1 To Ship in April, Corporate Desktop Due In Late 2003
"Linux software vendor Red Hat plans to fortify its desktop Linux lineup by shipping Red Hat Linux 8.1 in April, a 32-bit technical workstation this quarter and a full-fledged corporate desktop in the next six to 12 months, the company confirmed. While the company plans to continue to position its Red Hat Linux 8.0 as a consumer-oriented product, it is gearing up for a corporate desktop in late 2003, said Mark De Visser, Red Hat's chief marketing officer." Read the news at CRN.
Handspring Courts RIM
Infoworld is reporting that Handspring, who has been an exclusive Palm OS licensee, is interested in the RIM email software. The RIM Blackberry devices have proven very popular among business users, but the Blackberry units have limited PDA capabilities. Palm-based wireless messaging devices have been less popular. Presumably, Handspring is interested in producing a "best of both worlds" solution.
killerAudio is Coming with QNX 6.2.1
With QNX 6.2.1 there are many new features. One of them is a new multi-media system. Screenshots of one of the first apps to use this system can be found on QNXZone.
How Windows Server 2003 Stacks Up
"In any large software project the end result comes up many features short of the wish list. If you're lucky the product catches up to the wish list by the next version, and that is what seems to be the case with Windows 2000 Server and Windows Server 2003." Read the article at ZDNet.
Inside the Intel Compiler
The folks at Linux Journal used a time machine to post an article from the future about Intel's compiler for Linux, and specifically about the optimizations they used to beat gcc on benchmarks. The increasing acceptance of Linux among developers and researchers has yet to be matched by a similar increase in the number of available development tools. The recently released Intel C++ and Fortran compilers for Linux aim to bridge this gap by providing application developers with highly optimizable compilers for the Intel IA-32 and Itanium processor families.
Mandrake Linux 9.1 Beta 1 Available
The first beta of Mandrake Linux 9.1 is downsized to only one CD. A complete list of packages on this CD is available here. BTW, OSNews would be happy to host your preview. Update: Screenshots.
SCO Linux 4 – Ready for the Big Time
"SCO have taken the lead in bringing UnitedLinux consortium's UnitedLinux server operating system to the reseller market. At first glance, SCO Linux 4, SCO's version of UnitedLinux 1.0, doesn't look that much different from OpenLinux. In fact, it really just looks like a typical-albeit stripped down to the vital server basics-Linux server distribution. And, that's as it should be." Read the story at Practical-Tech.
Bare Feats Benchmarks New Powerbooks
"The Apple booth staff 'freaked' when I tried to plug my FWDepot Cutie FireWire test drive into the new 17" and 12" PowerBooks with Photoshop, Quake3, and other real world test apps. But I knew you wanted some idea of the performance, right? So since the demo units were connected to the 'Net, I downloaded Xbench beta and ran it on the two new PowerBooks... along with a few others." Take a look at the benchmarks over at Bare Feats.
Perspective: Macintosh: An Acquired Taste
"Macworld Expo in San Francisco is more than a technology convention. It is a personality litmus test, too. By contrast, Apple inspires rave reviews. And accounts for only 2.3% of the worldwide computer market, according to research firm IDC. The company blazes forth, but few answer the call." Read the editorial at C|Net.
Robots for the Masses
A start-up company says it has developed a navigation system that is cheap enough to bring robots to the mass-consumer market. Read the story at News.com.
Yoper: ‘Your Operating System’ revealed
zhopon writes "DesktopLinux.com speaks with Andreas Girardet, Founder of Yoper, a New Zealand-based Linux distribution...Girardet relates the goals of the new company, explains what makes Yoper unique, and his philosophy about the emerging desktop market" You can read the rest at desktoplinux.com.
Contexts, Timeframes and Tesseractors: Rewindable Desktops, Part II
"The purpose of this series of documents is to introduce, and explain how to build a functioning rewindable desktop. Later, in Part III, we'll get into why you'd want to build one in the first place. For now, its all theory, lacking even a single scrap of code to demonstrate a proof-of-concept model. However, that's not to say it can't be done. Below, you will find (as best as I'm able to describe) the blueprints of how a rewindable desktop can be made. Its surely not the only way, but its the best way I know how to do it after much thought." Read the article at LinuxAndMain.
MS Renames ‘Windows .NET Server’ to ‘Windows Server 2003’
"The product name Microsoft(R) Windows(R) .NET Server 2003 will be changing to Windows Server 2003. Microsoft is making an effort to clarify the naming and branding strategy for .NET." Read the report at PocketPCThoughts.
Microsoft Unveils Smart Watches, Media Players
Microsoft, which is trying to move its software from desktops to people's hands and pockets, on Wednesday unveiled plans for a portable media player and a radio-linked wristwatch. The announcements by Microsoft Chairman and founder Bill Gates come as the world's largest software company mounts a push beyond its existing market stronghold in computer operating systems toward a range of devices such as Tablet PCs, cars, monitors and even exercise bikes.
Embedded Linux Design Issues
"What is an embedded device? Is it simply a low-resource 'PC', so all you need is a scaled down Linux and off you go? Not really. In this article, a few thoughts on principal differences will be brought up that may need direct addressing by the embedded Linux community to foster the use of Linux in the embedded market." Read it at LinuxDevices.