For all intents and purposes, this is only a minor change, and were this any other operating system or graphical environment, it would never warrant an entire news item. However, we're talking Windows, the most popular desktop operating system of all time, here. After 17 years of trusty service, Microsoft has removed the Start button from the taskbar in the upcoming Consumer Preview release of Windows 8.

"Among the treasure troves of recently released WikiLeaks cables, we find one whose significance has bypassed Swedish media. In short: every law proposal, every ordinance, and every governmental report hostile to the net, youth, and civil liberties here in Sweden in recent years have been commissioned by the US government and industry interests." How such prestigious nations with such long and proud histories, like Sweden, The Netherlands, and so on, can succumb to pressure from a former colony is beyond me. We should know better.

"Samsung, in its first acknowledgment of the European Commission's antitrust investigation of its patent licensing practices, Friday said it believed the commission would ultimately conclude the company complies with the rules. The investigation arose out of Samsung's dispute with Apple over trademarks and patents that cover smartphones and tablet computers."

There's an article making the rounds right now about how applications on iOS crash more often than applications on Android. I'm not going to detail the entire methodology - the article itself does so - but it does raise an interesting talking point about how both mobile operating systems handle application crashes and updates.

"Google has added an automated scanning process that is designed to keep malicious apps out of the Android Market , the company announced today. The new service, code-named 'Bouncer', scans apps for known malware, spyware, and Trojans, and looks for suspicious behaviors and compares them against previously analyzed apps. Every app is then run on Google's cloud infrastructure to simulate how the software would operate on an Android device, he said. Existing apps are continuously analyzed, too."

This is the kind of news just tailor-made for OSNews. After 16 years of trusty service, the venerable Windows CE will be history as far as Microsoft's mobile operating system offering goes - the next major version of Windows Phone will use the NT kernel from Windows 8. As a heavy former Windows PocketPC Mobile CE Ultimate SP2 Edition user, this makes me sad. As a fan of the NT kernel, this makes me happy.

So, this is apparently a big thing, but because of my perpetual state of total boredom with regards to social networking, I really don't have the will to turn this into a proper item. So, here you go: Facebook is doing its IPO thing. Eh. In any case, lots of new rich people. Maybe the wealth will trickle down this time.

How many N9's did Nokia sell, and how many Lumias did Nokia sell? It's an interesting thing to ponder, because estimates by Tomi T. Ahonen seem to indicate that, despite decidedly undermarketing the thing, the N9 faired considerably better in the marketplace than the Lumia did.

"The European Commission has opened a formal investigation to assess whether Samsung Electronics has abusively, and in contravention of a commitment it gave to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), used certain of its standard essential patent rights to distort competition in European mobile device markets, in breach of EU antitrust rules. The opening of proceedings means that the Commission will examine the case as a matter of priority. It does not prejudge the outcome of the investigation." Maybe Samsung should've added '...with rounded corners' to their patent applications.

InfoWorld's Rick Grehan takes an in-depth look at Opa, MLstate's attempt to provide a single language for Web app development, and one of 10 cutting-edge programming languages that could shake up the future of IT. "With Opa, you write your Web application as though it were a single-tier program, and the compiler handles the knotty details of partitioning your program and deploying the resulting components to their proper domains. The compiler also builds the communication infrastructure among application components, and that infrastructure is invisibly managed by the runtime. The security weaknesses inherent in today's Web applications are virtually eliminated."

"Barnes & Noble's claim that Microsoft is misusing patents to undermine competition from Google's Android operating system was thrown out by a U.S. trade judge. U.S. International Trade Commission Judge Theodore Essex rejected today Barnes & Noble's arguments the patents should be held unenforceable, Microsoft Deputy General Counsel David Howard said in a statement. Essex's decision is subject to review by the six-member commission, which has the power to block imports of products that violate U.S. patent rights."

This weekend at FOSDEM 2012 what Kristian Hogsberg is expected to say in Brussels will surprise many of you: Wayland 1.0 is gearing up for release as their first stable release. Wayland is supposed to be ready to take on the Linux desktop world.

ike your RHEL on your servers just the way it is? That’s fine by Red Hat, which has extended its flagship Linux operating system's lifecycle to ten years.

The first tablet computer that comes with Plasma Active pre-installed is to be named "Spark". It sports an open Linux stack on unlocked hardware and comes with an open content and services market. The user experience is, of course, Plasma Active and it will be available to the general public. The hardware is modest but compelling: 1GHz AMLogic ARM processor, Mali-400 GPU, 512 MB RAM, 4GB internal storage plus SD card slot, a 7" capacitive multi-touch screen and wifi connectivity. The retail price will be €200.