OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

Palm Launches New Phones, Offers Native App Development

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-07 Wireless 16 Comments

So, today at CES, Palm held its big keynote thing. Palm's CEO, Jon Rubinstein, aided by several others, had a whole lot to talk about for just one hour, and boy, is this good stuff or what. We've got a boatload of stuff to talk about: two new phones exclusive to Verizon, tethering, video support, Flash 10, native application development, the official launch of the completely open app distribution model we've talked about before, and much more.

Ballmer Talks at CES, Underwhelms with HP Slate Tablet

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-07 Microsoft 28 Comments

Microsoft's CES keynote is behind us, and before the thing even started, it was rumoured that Microsoft would unveil a tablet PC together with HP. Well, they did, but to say it was underwhelming would be an understatement. Instant update: El Reg has a nice list of figures presented during the keynote.

Guest post by snydeq 2010-01-06 Google 49 Comments

InfoWorld's Galen Gruman writes that the main potential game-changing attribute of the Nexus One - that Google is selling the device direct - does nothing to move the industry past carrier lock-in. "At first, I wanted to credit Google for making a tentative step in the direction of smartphone freedom. But that step is so tentative and ineffectual that frankly I think it's a cynical fig leaf covering the usual practices," Gruman writes. At issue is a political battle regarding walled gardens in the U.S. cellular market, a fight that will take years to result in any true consumer freedom. "The only way we'll ever get the ability to choose a smartphone and carrier independently is for the platform providers that count - Apple, Google, and RIM - to first develop only multiband 'world' smartphones and then refuse to sell their devices (or in Google's case, use its Android license to forbid the sale of devices) to carriers that block or interfere with device portability."

Microsoft Joins SVG Working Group

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-06 Internet Explorer 72 Comments

It would appear that Microsoft will finally take standards compliance in the browser world seriously, after dragging its feet for years. Back in November 2009, the Redmond giant already revealed that Internet Explorer 9 would come with CSS3 and HTML5 support, and now the cup runneth over, as Microsoft has requested to join the W3C's SVG Working Group.

Apache Ready to Unleash Another Decade of Innovation

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-06 Internet 13 Comments

The Apache Software Foundation has arguably been the leading force for open-source software over the last 10 years and promises to continue being a force in the new decade. During a visit to the organization's corporate headquarters in Forest Hill, Md., Jim Jagielski, chairman of the ASF board of directors, told eWEEK that ASF has indeed had a "huge impact" on the industry.

CES Roundup: ARM, Netbooks, Tablets

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-06 Hardware 23 Comments

Even though CES hasn't even officially started yet, the gadget news is already coming in at a very steady stream. We can't report on all of them, obviously, but we can make a selection of the most interesting ones we've seen so far.

Italy Class-Action Lawsuit Planned Over Windows OEM Copies

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-06 Legal 47 Comments

I have no inherent problem with computer makers shipping their machines with Windows pre-installed. Of course, I'd much rather see a lot more diversity when I walk into an electronics retailer, but I can't really blame OEMs for taking the safe bet and focussing on what they know customers seem to want. Still, we need better ways to return our unused OEM copies of Windows, and apparently, a lot of people in Italy agree.

Microsoft Not Planning Legal Action Against Ylmf OS

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-05 Microsoft 39 Comments

Late last year, news got out that an infamous Chinese pirate has moved beyond pirating Windows, moving on to creating an Ubuntu distribution that is almost a pixel-perfect copy of Windows XP, called Ylmf OS. Ars Technica contacted Microsoft about possible legal actions, but it seems Microsoft isn't really bothered by all this.

Microsoft Reveals Office 2010 Retail Prices

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-05 Microsoft 10 Comments

Microsoft has revealed Office 2010 pricing for Home and Student, Home and Business, Professional, and Professional Academic editions. Office will come in both boxed versions and "key card" versions that have no media.

Submitted by OSGuy 2010-01-05 Google 19 Comments

In what is probably the least surprising product launch ever, Google has launched its Nexus One phone, but it's only available in the US, the UK, Singapore, and Hong Kong. Google has all the specifications, and Engadget has a review. Update by ELQ: Let me just say quickly that I now own the Canon 5D Mark II camera that some of the wallpapers that come with the Nexus One by default were shot with (e.g. this one). These amazing Creative Commons-licensed pictures were shot by Google Android engineer Romain Guy (he wrote the "live wallpaper" engine among other projects) who's also an amazing photographer.

New Amiga Sports Programmable Co-Processor, Dualcore PPC

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-05 Amiga & AROS 171 Comments

After days of wild speculation and ridiculously fast-growing threads on AmigaWorld.net, we finally know most of what we need to know about the new Amiga. This is not just a random PowerPC evaluation board that you can stuff in a generic case - no, this is an all-new system with a custom motherboard, and some very, very interesting innovations - like a fully customisable co-processor. Twenty-five years after the introduction of the first Amiga, this is one heck of a machine.

First Stable Enna MediaCenter Release

Submitted by Davide Cavalca 2010-01-04 Multimedia, AV 18 Comments

The GeeXboX project has announced the first stable release of Enna (version 0.4.0), an open source media center application. It features a simple user interface, based on the Enlightenment Foundations Libraries for its graphical user interface and the GeeXboX libraries for multimedia playback (libplayer) and information retrieval (libvalhalla and libnfo).

Activate Windows 7’s Hidden ‘God Mode’

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-04 Windows 29 Comments

God mode. A term usually reserved for games of all shapes and sizes, with the coolest being Rise Of The Triad's god mode, it has now found its way to the world of operating systems. Someone has discovered that Windows 7 has a god mode - but it's not what you think it is.

Submitted by poundsmack 2010-01-04 Legal 27 Comments

"Responding to Apple's vehement countersuit against Nokia, in which it leveled 13 patent infringement allegations against Nokia's 10, last December 29, Nokia added 14 more to the mix, including for concepts that may perhaps be as integral to the construction of modern telephones as power-conserving voltage-controlled oscillators, and a sensor that de-activates touchscreens while the phone is held against the ear."

‘Save MySQL’ Campaign Gains Momentum

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-04 Databases 30 Comments

A petition launched in December by MySQL creator Michael 'Monty' Widenius to 'save' the open-source database from Oracle has quickly gained momentum, collecting nearly 17,000 signatures. Widenius on Monday submitted an initial batch of 14,174 signatures to the European Commission, which is conducting an antitrust review of Oracle's acquisition of Sun Microsystems, MySQL's current owner. The petition calls for authorities to block the merger unless Oracle agrees to one of three "solutions", including spinning off MySQL to a third party and releasing all past versions and subsequent editions for the next three years under the Apache 2.0 open-source license.

Freescale Launches Tablet Reference Design

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-04 Wireless 19 Comments

Apple certainly isn't going to be the first to announce a 7-10" thing tablet computer. We already had the Joo Joo, and now Freescale has joined in on the fun with a 7" tablet reference design. Let's talk about Freescale's tablet, and as hinted at during yesterday's podcast, let's spend/waste (pick one) a few words on Apple's tablet as well.

Submitted by martini 2010-01-04 OS/2 26 Comments

For some months now, independent developers have been working on a Qt4 port for eComStation, and it's almost ready. Some Qt4 applications have been ported to eCS, as well. This project is funded by donations from the eCS-OS2 community and currently they have 82% of the needed sum.

Review: Mac Mini with Snow Leopard Server

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-04 Apple 6 Comments

"Apple's Mac mini with Snow Leopard Server is aimed squarely at small businesses that, for any number of reasons, need or prefer to host their core Internet services in-house without breaking the bank. Ars kicks the tires on the new combo to see if Apple has another hit on its hands."

Episode 30: I Wonder What the Children Would Be?

Kroc 2010-01-03 Podcasts 25 Comments

The problem with the future is that by the time you get there, everything is pretty normal. Now that we've arrived in 2010 (something I could hardly imagine 10 years ago), we're now met with the annual tradition of predicting what will happen this year. Now that Kroc, Thom and Tess have recovered enough from the new year we discuss KDE 4, desktop OSes vs. the web and the issues of privacy and government involvement in the Internet--that is, when we managed to stay on topic. More coffee!

Intel Forced to Remove “Cripple AMD” Function from Compiler?

Thom Holwerda 2010-01-03 General Development 123 Comments

Here's something you probably don't know, but really should - especially if you're a programmer, and especially especially if you're using Intel's compiler. It's a fact that's not widely known, but Intel's compiler deliberately and knowingly cripples performance for non-Intel (AMD/VIA) processors.