OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

Microsoft Manager: We Copied the Mac OS X Look-and-Feel

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-11 Windows 105 Comments

Okay, so this is new. When it comes to graphical user interfaces, everyone is copying everyone, but you'll always find supporters of platform Abc claiming platform Xyz is stealing from them - and vice versa. Mac supporters have often stated that Vista and Windows 7 were copying from Apple, and according to Microsoft's partner group manager, Simon Aldous, this is true. Wait, what?

Psystar Owners Speak Out, Deny License Violation

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-11 Hardware 48 Comments

The Miami New Times News (try saying that out loud ten times in a row really fast) has a long story on the Pedraza brothers, the two men behind Psystar, which is located in Miami. The story details the brothers' youth, and, of course, talks a lot about Psystar and Apple. There is a lot of interesting stuff in there not covered before.

Google Creates New Open Source Programming Language

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-11 Google 62 Comments

Google has invented a new programming language designed to reduce the complexity of coding without compromising the performance of applications. Called Go, the language has been tested internally at Google but is still at an experimental stage, so the company is releasing it as open-source code in the hope that it will get help with its future development.

Submitted by SReilly 2009-11-11 Gnome 84 Comments

As most of you will know, the GNOME team is hard at work on GNOME 3.0, the first major overhaul of the platform since 2002. The release of GNOME 3.0 was originally planned for March 2010, but it has now been pushed back for six months to September 2010.

Lunascape 6.0 Orion Beta Released

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-10 Internet 14 Comments

There are a number of browsers allowing you to switch between rendering engines, with Lunascape being one of them. We've covered this browser before quite extensively, and today, the Lunascape team released the first beta of Lunascape 6 ORION, the bext version of this triple-engine web browser.

Is There Room for a New Mobile OS?

David Adams 2009-11-10 Wireless 25 Comments

Just when we were starting to worry that the OS world was becoming ossified around three increasingly-competent options, making it very boring for OS enthusiasts, along comes a re-energized mobile computing market and a furious land grab among established players and new entrants. Samsung, the #2 handset maker by marketshare, is releasing a new mobile OS called Bada and will be vying to become the seventh major mobile OS in the market.

Submitted by estherschindler 2009-11-10 Windows 8 Comments

Unless you're seriously into networking (and okay, maybe you are), all the features in the new Secure Remote Connection - not to mention the pieces required to make it work - can be fairly tough to figure out. But the benefits make sense: "With this feature," writes Steven Vaughan-Nichols, "a user on any Windows 7 system can gain access to the corporate intranet's resources. In short, with the right back-end setup you can run office-only programs and get to server-based files from any Windows 7 PC." He explains it all in Accessing Office Resources from Anywhere using Secure Remote Connection.

Apple’s Mini DisplayPort Officially Adopted by VESA

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-10 Multimedia, AV 10 Comments

"The Video Electronics Standard Association officially issued its Mini DisplayPort standard Tuesday, based on the technology licensed from Apple. VESA said that all devices using the Mini DisplayPort connector must meet the specifications required by the DisplayPort 1.1a standard, and cables that support the standard must also meet specific electrical specifications. It's a formal confirmation of the news from earlier this year, when VESA announced the Mini DisplayPort connector would be included in the forthcoming DisplayPort 1.2 specification."

SFLC Finds One GPL Violating Company Per Day

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-10 Open Source 5 Comments

"I've been on a mission in recent months to establish just how common and mundane GPL violations are. Since 21 August 2009, I've been finding one new GPL violating company per day (on average) and I am still on target to find one per day for 365 days straight. When I tell this to people who are new to GPL enforcement, they are surprised and impressed. However, when I tell people who have done GPL enforcement themselves, they usually say some version of: Am I supposed to be impressed by that? Couldn't a monkey do that? Fact is, the latter are a little bit right: there are so many GPL violations that I might easily be able to go on finding one per day for two years straight."

Submitted by a_weber42 2009-11-10 Privacy, Security 3 Comments

"The major disadvantage of PLAIN text passwords on the server of course is that they are readable. Even if your communication with the server is encrypted it is troubling to have readable passwords on the server. You can easily change this by using the dovecotpw command and creating encrypted passwords."

Microsoft: Sophos Windows 7 Malware Test ‘Sensationalised’

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-10 Windows 108 Comments

Last week, security vendor Sophos published a blog post in which it said that Windows 7 was vulnerable to 8 our of 10 of the most common viruses. Microsoft has responded to these test results, which are a classic case of "scare 'm and they'll fall in line".

Episode 27: Future Perfect

Kroc 2009-11-10 Podcasts 14 Comments

Finally the silence is broken, a new episode is here! Thom was not available again this week, OSnews reader Mike Ferland takes his place and we discuss Windows 7 and The Perfect OS (no relation).

Mac OS X 10.6.2 Released Sans Atom Support

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-09 macOS 85 Comments

Apple has finally released Mac OS X 10.6.2, the latest version of its Snow Leopard operating system, and be prepared for a massive update for your Mac: 473MB. There's a lot of stuff in here, and among other things, it includes a fix for the guest account data loss bug.

Worm for Jailbroken iPhones with Default Root Passwords

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-09 Apple 20 Comments

The web went aflame today with headlines like "First iPhone worm discovered", and many other variants. Most of those headlines, however, left out a very important little fact which diminishes the impact of the news considerably: it only affects jailbroken iPhones with SSH installed, and with default root passwords.

Google Acquires Gizmo5?

Eugenia Loli 2009-11-09 Google 13 Comments

TechCrunch broke the news today that Google has bought Gizmo5, the popular VoIP SIP provider, for $30 mil cash (not confirmed officially yet). The company was led by Michael Robertson, known for his times on mp3.com and Lindows. What does this mean for Google Voice? Read on.

NVIDIA: We Will Not Enter x86 Processor Market

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-09 3D 36 Comments

Over the past few years, there have been persistent rumours that NVIDIA, the graphics chip maker, was working on an x86 chip to compete with Intel and AMD. Recently, these rumours gained some traction, but NVIDIA's CEO just shot them down, and denied the company will enter the x86 processor market.

Google to Acquire AdMob for $750 Million

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-09 Google 1 Comment

"Google's back on the acquisition front, spending $750 million in stock Monday to acquire mobile display ad company AdMob. AdMob is perhaps best known for serving display ads on iPhones, but it also recently started a business unit focused on ads for Android phones. The start-up would appear to fit well into Google's advertising business model, giving Google a leg up in the still-small but fast-growing world of mobile advertising."

Five Years of Firefox: A Retrospective

Kroc 2009-11-09 Editorial 64 Comments

Hands up if you use Firefox. Have used it? Know about it? Heard of it? 'Sites up and down the World Wide Web today will be celebrating five years of Firefox. When I sat down to write this I worried about having to list the history of its features and landmark events and the news of the past five years. Other sites will be comprehensively doing that, there is nothing I can add to that list that Google can't surmise. Instead I will be telling you what Google does not know, my story of Firefox and what Firefox has meant to all of us.

Earlier Report a Fake, 10.6.2 Still Doesn’t Support Atom

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-09 macOS 22 Comments

Despite reports to the contrary, current Mac OS X 10.6.2 Snow Leopard builds do not support the Intel Atom processor. The report that support had returned is a fake, and the most recent build 10C540 still does not support the Atom processor. C'est tout.

How Apple Handles App Store Infringement Complaints: Badly

Thom Holwerda 2009-11-08 Apple 41 Comments

We're all familiar with the fact that Apple has trouble managing its App Store. While it is overflowing with applications, Apple governs it willy-nilly, and the web is rife with stories from developers who had their application rejected for no apparent reason. There's now a new issue we can add to the list. Are you an iPhone developer? Do you want a similar, competing application out of the App Store? All you need to do is send an infringement claim to Apple, and they'll happily threaten to remove the competing application without a second thought. Update: And here's a similar case, about Stoneloops! vs. Luxor.