Mozilla has already done a lot to clean up the user interface of its successful web browser, but it would seem they're not yet done. As someone who finds the current interface a little... Chaotic and distracting, I'm quite happy with the changes they're currently proposing. They basically pointed at Chrome and said "pretty much that".

Interesting portrait of Comex over at Forbes. "Dino Dai Zovi, co-author of the Mac Hacker's Handbook, says JailbreakMe's sophistication is on par with that of Stuxnet, a worm thought to have been designed by the Israeli or U.S. government to infect Iran's nuclear facilities. He compares Allegra's skills to the state-sponsored intruders that plague corporations and governments, what the cybersecurity industry calls 'advanced-persistent threat' hackers: 'He's probably five years ahead of them', says Dai Zovi."

"Apple won an agreement from Samsung that the South Korean company won't sell the newest version of its tablet computer in Australia until a patent lawsuit in the country is resolved. sought an Australian injunction and also wants to stop Samsung from selling the tablet in other countries, Burley said without specifying where. Samsung agreed to stop advertising the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia and not to sell the device until it wins court approval or the lawsuit is resolved, according to an accord reached by lawyers during a break in the hearing. Should Apple lose its patent infringement lawsuit, it agreed to pay Samsung damages, which weren't specified." Free market and competition at work, my friends!

Phoronix notes that Mesa 7.11 has been released. The OpenGL 3.0 requirements are a whole lot closer to being met with the changes made since Mesa 7.10, but there is still work to be done. Mature Intel Sandy Bridge and preliminary support for Ivy bridge has been added. AMD Llano Fusion graphics and Radeon HD 6900 "Cayman" are now supported.

MySQL toolmaker Daniel Nichter provides a look at 10 must-have free and open source tools for MySQL. 'MySQL has attracted a vibrant community of developers who are putting out high-quality open source tools to help with the complexity, performance, and health of MySQL systems, most of which are available for free,' writes Nichter, who was named 2010 MySQL Community Member of the Year for his work on maatkit. From mydumper, to mk-query-digest, to stalk and collect, the list compiles tools to help back up MySQL data, increase performance, guard against data drift, and log pertinent troubleshooting data when problems arise, each of which is a valuable resource for anyone using MySQL, from a stand-alone instance to a multiple-node environment.

Ah yes, the MPEG-LA, the company that patent-trolled before it was cool (now every schmuck like Apple and Microsoft do it too). Remember how they once called for companies to step if they had any patents Google's VP8 might be infringing upon? After almost a decade of empty threats against Theora, the MPEG-LA finally started actually doing something. Now they claim (in an interview with streamingmedia.com) twelve companies have stepped up - but, in true MPEG-LA fashion, which patents VP8 supposedly infringes upon remains shrouded in mystery.

"Google Inc. said Friday that it has purchased technology patents from International Business Machines Corp. as the Web-search giant stocks up on intellectual property to defend itself against lawsuits." This article lists some of them. Google on the defensive. You kind of have to when you find yourself on the receiving end of the Apple-Microsoft-Oracle cartel's lawsuit stick.

Unlike Apple and Microsoft, and despite numerous demands from their users, Linux distributions have been traditionally unable to directly ship the popular Adobe Flash Player with their packages, due to the closed source nature of the software and the restrictive license chosen by Adobe. While it does seems shorter than a regular EULA made by Microsoft with all the legalese that goes with it, it does still restrict redistribution in most cases, and the FAQ seemed to be clear about that point.

Apple is now more liquid than the United States government, the Financial Post reports. As the government struggles to resolve the debt ceiling debate, the operating balance in Washington is at US$73.768 billion and falling. Meanwhile, Apple has US$75.876 billion.

"Keen observers may recall that Asus's debut of the Padfone back at Computex in May was accompanied by another, albeit less-trumpeted announcement. Specifically, the company promised a $199 netbook computer - the MeeGo-based Eee PC X101 - and this week that device took several steps closer to reality."

I've kind of painted myself in a corner with that headline, because I never anticipated I would need another preview article for this project. However, thanks to all your comments on both the site and through email, the scope of this project has grown considerably. As part of this growing scope, I'm acquiring more and more devices, and yesterday, I managed to score a phone which, while almost forgotten by most of the rest of the technology press, contained two very important firsts. Not only was this the first phone with a capacitive touch screen, it was also the first phone with an interface design from the ground-up for finger/touch input. Say hello to the LG KE850, better known as the LG Prada.

Two different graphs. Both happen to be published at Ars Technica, with one of them coming from a different source. Seemingly completely unrelated, but when you ponder the waterfall of recent lawsuit-related news, these two graphs suddenly tell all there is to tell. These two innocent little graphs illustrate why Apple is attacking Android so ferociously.

"KDE is delighted to announce its latest set of releases, providing major updates to the KDE Plasma Workspaces, KDE Applications, and the KDE Platform that provides the foundation for KDE software. Version 4.7 of these releases provide many new features and improved stability and performance."

"Earlier this morning, the Windows Phone development team officially signed off on the release to manufacturing build of 'Mango' - the latest version of the Windows Phone operating system. This marks the point in the development process where we hand code to our handset and mobile operator partners to optimize Mango for their specific phone and network configurations. Here on the Windows Phone team, we now turn to preparing for the update process. The Mango update for current Windows Phone handsets will be ready this fall, and of course will come pre-installed on new Windows Phones." Myself and those three others who use a WP7 device rejoice.