Schmidt: Chrome OS Netbooks As Early As this Year

Google 55 Comments
Even though everyone's talking about it, fact of the matter is that Google's Chrome OS is currently nothing more than an internet announcement, with a supposed release date of somewhere in 2010. Google chief executive Eric Schmidt has now stated that netbooks running Chrome OS could appear as early as this year. In addition, Schmidt also talked about his position at Apple's board of directors.
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‘Early Linux 2.6.31 Benchmarks’

Linux 27 Comments
"The Linux 2.6.31 kernel is still under active development until it is released later this quarter, but the merge window is closed and most of the work going on is to address bugs and other regressions within this massive code-base. Some of the key additions to the Linux 2.6.31 kernel include many graphics-related advancements (merging of the TTM memory manager, Radeon kernel mode-setting, Intel DisplayPort, etc), an ALSA driver for the Creative X-Fi, initial USB 3.0 support, file-system improvements, and much more. To see how the general system performance has been impacted by the new Linux kernel that is in development, we have a few benchmarks today."
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FreeNOS 0.0.3 Released

  Submitted by poundsmack OS News 15 Comments
Captain, we've encountered another one. FreeNOS is a microkernel-based operating system written for learning purposes. "The system is very experimental, yet it currently supports virtual memory, simple task scheduling, and interprocess communication (IPC). It currently contains support for a few devices, including VGA, keyboard, i8250 serial, and PCI host controllers. FreeNOS has an experimental implementation of several filesystems, such as the virtual file system, procfs, tmpfs, and ext2fs. Current application libraries include libposix, libc, libteken (terminal emulation), and libexec (executable formats). All source code has been documented with Doxygen tags."
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Linux Mint 7 Is Glorious

Linux 32 Comments
Linux Mint 7 "Gloria" was released a little while ago, so before it became too old of news, I thought I'd take a whack at experimenting with it for the sake of netbookers everywhere (and for myself, naturally). As I type this on gedit after about two weeks' use, let's just say that the system on my EeePC 1000 HE is, for the most part, rather glorious-- pun intended. As a bonus, I also got Google's Chromium browser to run on it, so keep on reading to find the section on that.
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Quo Computer Opens Mac Clone Retail Store

Hardware 52 Comments
The number of Mac clone makers is growing by the week, so it seems. We have Psystar in the United States, a clone maker in Russia, another one in the UK, and PearC who now cover Germany, The Netherlands, France, Belgium, and Luxembourg. We can add a new one to the list, one that I personally thought was a fake, but is apparently very real. One that has a retail store. In California. Quo Computer (in case you're wondering, you use that thing on the right to navigate - it's weird).
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Recent Internet Explorer Flaw a Year Old

Internet Explorer 5 Comments
The past few days a newly discovered flaw in the Internet Explorer web browser has been making its rounds across the internet. The flaw allows people with malicious intent to install viruses or malware onto affected computers running Windows XP or Server 2003 (2000, Vista, and Server 2008 are not affected). Even though it was assumed this flaw was new, Microsoft was actually alerted of this issue a year ago.
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Richard Stallman’s Possibly Sexist Remarks at GCDS

Rumors 182 Comments
During the Gran Canaria Desktop Summit, Richard M. Stallman of the Free Software Foundation (and the Superfluous Introduction Award goes to...) gave a keynote speech. Said keynote speech raised a few eyebrows in the Free software community because of a number of questionable remarks regarding women in technology. David "Lefty" Schlesinger, member of the GNOME Advisory Board and active in the mobile open source community, took issue with RMS' remarks and decided to call him out on it. The response he got was... Less than satisfying.
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Kon-Boot: The Multi-OS Sneaker

Privacy, Security 6 Comments
Kon-Boot seems to be a similar alternative to Ophcrack that also runs on Linux as well as Windows operating systems. It doesn't crack the password but instead bypasses it and lets the user into any account. Those who are admins may want to take a gander at Kon-Boot in case someone with ulterior motives and physical access to vital computers happens to stumble across this tool. Those who have ulterior motives, enjoy. "According to the description at the tool's site, Kon-Boot alters a Linux or Windows kernel on the fly during boot up. The result is that you can login to a system as 'root' or 'administrator' without having to know the associated account password."
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Icaros Desktop 1.1.2 Released

  Submitted by paolone Amiga & AROS 1 Comment
A new update for Icaros Desktop, the leading AROS distribution, has been released. It includes some new programs and features like the Protrekkr music tracker, the DosBox emulator, but this release is mainly a "mantainance one": it includes dozens of big and small bug fixes, a better desktop environment and improved support for Amiga Forever and 68K applications. Icaros Desktop 1.1.2 is available in two formats: the whole package on a Live DVD for new installations, and an update CD for Icaros 1.1.1 users. The update can be automatically downloaded, mounted, and installed directly from Icaros using the brand new LiveUpdater program, also available on the Icaros site.
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US, South Korean Websites Under Attack, North Korea Suspected

Bugs & Viruses 19 Comments
In the past several days, it appears that at least 35 US- and South Korea-based websites were under attack by a botnet group of computers, causing the attacked domains to become very slow and unresponsive and even putting many out of commission for periods of time. Among the domains were many government websites of their respective countries. It's unconfirmed as to where exactly the attack is being launched from, but South Korean officials believe it to be North Koran forces or those sympathetic to their cause.
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