Build 68 is now available from FTP's and via the Update Wizard (fixed SVIdir in keytable init script, kdeconfig: LANG support in startkde, changed KDEDIR to /opt/kde2, ktip now shows Desktop/LX Welcome, uses viewlets profile and 48 pixel image, defattr(-, root, root), updated FAQ for helpcenter, added khtml security patch).

On Feb. 12, Norway's Trolltech formally announced its relationship with IBM, which is using Trolltech's ATopia office application suite as part of its 405LP design. LinuxPlanet caught up with the nine-year-old company's CEO Haavard Nord to ask him about the IBM deal, the latest on Trolltech's Qt libraries, the embedded device market, and about what Sun could learn from Trolltech's dual-licensing scheme.

LIUtilities's WinBackup is a backup program for Windows 98/NT/ME/2000 and XP. Despite it's low cost ($50 boxed, $30 for a downloadable version) and small size (under 2 Mb) WinBackup has a ton of features including built in CD/DVD burning support and 256-bit encryption.

Microsoft showed off some of the forthcoming programmability features of "Yukon," the next version of its SQL Server database, here at the VSLive! developer conference on Thursday. Yukon won't be an XML database, but will rather integrate support for XML data types into the relational SQL Server database.

Now that the usual round of end of year regurgitations of the past years IT events has ended we may further indulge ourselves by examining the pundits procastinations for their worthiness, or lack thereof. As ever, we were dished up a list of happenings which the IT scribes believed warranted our special attention. What our computers feel about such matters remains to be seen but some brave souls did manage to come up with various musings on what the future may hold for us, and them, (our computers that is) in this age of technical speculation. Whilst these ritualistic utterings have become a feature of the holiday silly season, why not build on this truly great and ancient tradition and comment on the level of veracity of the scribes from our much beloved land of nerds? They got it all wrong.

ExtremeTech runs a story where explains the measures Intuit has taken in its latest version of its TurboTax software in order to escape pirating. Except the DRM issues arose, the software writes on sector 33, without asking the user. On many computers, there could be partitioning information, or even important data on your alternative OS.

SciTech Software, Inc. today announced that the Open Watcom 1.0 has been released and is now available for download from the OpenWatcom.org website and for purchase on CD from SciTech's website. Read more for the press release.

There's a cool little app called Konfabulator for Mac OS X that allows you to display, build, and modify little "widgets" for your desktop, like the weather, a clock, or the OSNews top stories, updated continuously! Screenshot here. Thanks to Adam Pearson for the source sample. Additionally, we added support for a truckload of mobile devices and we would need your help testing them.

"Red Hat Linux Advanced Server is the first Linux platform to receive certification for the Defense Information Infrastructure Common Operating Environment, the company’s chief technical officer announced..." This GCN article reports that Red Hat secured Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) approval to become an official DII COE 4.x kernel next to Sun Solaris 7, Hewlett-Packard HP-UX 10.20 and Microsoft Windows NT 4.0. Read more at GCN.

Microsoft Corp. will unveil a new suite of business applications, new computer server software and new technology for 'smart' wristwatches in the coming year as part of its vision for the future of technology, co-founder and chairman Bill Gates said Tuesday. Update: News.com has a story too.

wx.NET is a .NET wrapper for the multi-platform toolkit wxWindows. Additionally, Mono Weekly News is out and Includes a new interview, software announcements and the PHP/Mono integration. Also, there is work being done to try and port Mono to MacOSX. More info on the ongoing effort, in the list.

Following the recent release of an anticipatory IO scheduler, Andrea Arcangeli started a lengthy thread in which he proposed an SFQ (Stochastic Fair Queuing) disk scheduler. The idea was picked up by Jens Axboe who had evidently worked on a similar idea earlier. Jens quickly posted two different disk schedulers utilizing "fair queuing" algorithms, more commonly used in handling network traffic. Read the full story at KernelTrap.

Microsoft on Tuesday will offer a glimpse at future versions of its Visual Studio.Net development tools and highlight a number of additions to the product line. In the meantime, support grows for .Net: A number of Microsoft partners will announce at VSLive products targeted at Microsoft's .Net. Also, Microsoft Corp. on Monday renamed its XDocs application to InfoPath, but declined to say whether this information-gathering tool would ship as part of Office 11, the code name for the next version of Office, or if it would be sold as a stand-alone product.

"There's a strong argument to be made that all the pieces needed for an effective Linux desktop system for the enterprise now exist. Less clear, however, is whether a Linux vendor can collect and package those elements into something that's ready—right out of the box—for the mainstream corporate desktop. This is what SuSE Linux Inc. set out to do with its SuSE Linux Office Desktop." Read the article at eWeek.