OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

EA’s Mac Games To Be Powered by Transgaming’s Cider

Submitted by atezun 2007-06-12 Games 61 Comments

Despite what many (including myself) thought when EA announced they would support the Mac platform, the games EA will release are actually not native ports - instead, they will use Transgaming's Cider engine, a Wine-like wrapper for running Windows games on Intel Macs. This news was found in a Transgaming press release. Apart from the fact that this might negatively affect performance, it also means PowerPC Macs will not be able to play these games.

Leopard: Evolution, Not Revolution

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-12 macOS 90 Comments

As you have surely noticed by now, Apple's CEO Steve Jobs held his keynote speech yesterday at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco. So far, the responses have been mixed; I have seen a lot of excitement, but also a lot of disappointment. Personally, I am not really sure where I stand.

Submitted by AdministratorX 2007-06-12 OS News 17 Comments

VMware is pricing its upcoming new software to run Windows on a Mac similar to rival Parallels's software announced last week. VMware said that its Fusion software for Macintosh computers can be pre-ordered beginning Tuesday for USD 39.99, and USD 79.99 when it becomes generally available near the end of August. Parallels priced its Parallels Desktop version 3.0 at USD 79.99 when it became generally available Thursday, and USD 39.99 for users upgrading from a previous version of Parallels.

Editorial: The No-SDK Cheat

Eugenia Loli 2007-06-12 Apple 69 Comments

When Steve Jobs mentioned a few weeks ago that there will be "some sort of app development" for the iPhone, everyone assumed he meant widgets. Widgets are less powerful than native applications, and depending on the underlying OS hooks offered, they can be even less powerful than J2ME apps. But when Jobs came out today to outright sell us Web 2.0 and said that "no SDK required", I felt cheated.

Google Privacy ‘Worst on the Web’

Eugenia Loli 2007-06-12 Google 53 Comments

Google Inc.'s privacy practices are the worst among the Internet's top destinations, according to a watchdog group seeking to intensify the recent focus on how the online search leader handles personal information about its users. In a report released Saturday, London-based Privacy International assigned Google its lowest possible grade. The category is reserved for companies with "comprehensive consumer surveillance and entrenched hostility to privacy."

ROX-Filer 2.6.1 Released

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-11 Desktop environments 5 Comments

ROX-Filer 2.6.1 has been released. ROX-Filer is the filemanager at the core of the ROX desktop. "Some problems with session management were fixed. This makes it easier to use ROX-Filer with gnome-session and similar. When creating thumbnails, we can now use a thumbnail embedded in an Exif image, which speed things up. A couple of build problems were fixed."

Jobs Demoes Leopard, Announces Safari for Windows

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-11 Apple 182 Comments

At its Worldwide Developers Conference today in San Fransisco, Apple discussed its upcoming operating system, Mac OS X Leopard. As always, Steve held his keynote speech wearing his well-known ensemble. The keynote dealt mostly with Leopard, while keeping the most interesting part for last. Read on for the details. Update: Read more for a screenshot of Safari running on Windows... Barely.

IDC: Linux x86 Growth Outpaced by Microsoft Windows

Submitted by E. Stride 2007-06-11 In the News 48 Comments

A recent IDC report showed Linux servers continuing to increase market share for x86 architecture with a second consecutive quarter of double-digit growth, but the bigger news could be Microsoft's even bigger surge with Server 2003. The software giant's Server 2003 showed modest gains in Q1, with IDC reporting that Microsoft Windows Server revenue was USD 4.8 billion in Q1. This number represents 10.4% year-over-year growth and a gain of 1.9 points of revenue market share over the same period in 2006. Windows encompassed 38.8% of all server revenue in Q1 of 2007.

WWDC Keynote: Rumour Roundup

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-11 Apple 35 Comments

Tonight (19:00 CET), Apple's CEO Steve Jobs will deliver his keynote speech for the attendants of Apple's Worldwide Developer's Conference in San Fransisco. As always, the Mac world is buzzing with rumours. Firstly, a photo taken with a camera phone suggests Apple will release a sub-notebook, with a 10" LED widescreen, 120GB flashdrive, and a programmable LCD keyboard. Another persistent rumour is that Apple will replace its iMac line with thinner, brushed-metal 20" and 24" iMacs. Lastly, a German website claims to have an outline of the keynote speech - this outline confirms the new iMacs, but also has some interesting notes on Leopard: a unified, standard theme (this alone would make the keynote worthwhile for me), a new Finder, resolution independence, and more. As always, take these rumours with a bag of salt.

Submitted by AdministratorX 2007-06-11 Windows 46 Comments

Early adopters of Microsoft’s new Vista operating system are reporting problems with its implementation of IPv6, a long-anticipated upgrade to the Internet’s primary protocol. "Vista is showing some serious deficiencies around IPv6 and IPv4 insofar as their compliance or the transparency of their compliance around IP behaviors," says Loki Jorgenson, chief scientist for Apparent Networks, a provider of network assessment and optimization tools.

Sun Solaris Check Tool

Submitted by David Lin 2007-06-11 Solaris 9 Comments

"It wasn't until last week during a meeting with Sun that some new light was shed on the Solaris Check Tool and as a result we decided to explore this tool further. Check Tool is a bootable CD that lets the user know whether the hardware they have installed is likely to work with Solaris or not. If a third-party driver is needed for a particular piece of hardware, the Check Tool will even provide a link to the driver needed. There are currently a few rough spots with the tool, but improvements are planned and in this article we will share more information on this program that can tell you in a matter of minutes whether you'll face a hardware compatibility nightmare or will be running Solaris/Solaris Express with ease."

Wireless Power Has Techies Beaming

Submitted by Radarz 2007-06-11 Geek stuff 27 Comments

A team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology lit a 60 watt light bulb from a power source two meters away and with no physical connections between the source and the appliance. The 'WiTricity' device - the term coined by the MIT team to describe the wireless power phenomenon - uses magnetic fields to deliver power to the gadgets remotely."

Interview: Alan Cox

Submitted by Robert Kratky 2007-06-10 Linux 55 Comments

Alan Cox talks about cooperation with hardware vendors, patent law, microkernels, and GPLv3: "I think is a bad idea and that Novell are going to get stung by the GPLv3, and rightfully so. The license is designed to keep the software free, if it fails to do this then it needs fixing, so GPLv3 hopefully will fix this flaw."

MINIX 3.1.3a Released

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-08 OS News 40 Comments

A minor extra release of MINIX 3.1.3 was done, called 3.1.3a, correcting some flaws in 3.1.3. "Found after release time and fixed in 3.1.3a: mkfs does not check for overflow of firstdatazone field in superblock; a missing check in rename caused moving directories to hang sometimes; autopart truncates new partitions at 4GB. If you want to create a larger partition, use part (expert mode) to do that first; and more."

PC Or Not PC: Ten Desktops on Test

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-08 Hardware 37 Comments

El Reg takes a look at ten desktop computers, from Apple's Mac Pro to Dell's exotic XPS M2010. The verdict: "The ten PCs we have looked at here represent a huge cross-section of the computer market and as such offer varied functionality depending on specific needs and budgets. If you're looking for an imposing combo of power and potent design then the Alienware really should be your first and only port of call. For us, if money were no object we'd opt for the Dell XPS for its sheer bling factor, but in the real world give us an Apple Mac Pro and we're happy."

First Look: Firefox 3 Alpha 5

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-08 Mozilla, Gecko 37 Comments

"The fifth public alpha build of Firefox 3 has been officially released. The new alpha build, which is codenamed Gran Paradiso, features early components of the revamped Places system, a cohesive storage framework that will unify bookmark and history storage. An earlier prototype of the Places system was tested in early Firefox 2 alpha (Bon Echo) builds but was removed because it couldn't be completed within the Firefox 2 release timeframe."

Atari’s Portfolio: the World’s First Palmtop

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-08 Wireless 6 Comments

"There's nothing new under the sun, some folk say, and that's certainly true of Palm's recently announced Foleo. It's the palmtop reborn in a slightly sexier, slightly larger form. Even its name is reminiscent of that bygone arena - it's rather like the Atari Portfolio, the world's first palmtop PC, released in June 1989."

Ion3-rc2 Released

Thom Holwerda 2007-06-08 Desktop environments 21 Comments

The second release candidate for Ion3 has been released. "This is the second 'rc' release, and contains primarily bug fixes and other minor improvements." Get it from the download page.

Submitted by Rahul 2007-06-08 Fedora Core 10 Comments

"Imagine a customized GNU/Linux distribution, built to your specifications with a minimal amount of effort on your part. If you are running Fedora 7, that dream is now a reality, thanks to Revisor, a graphical interface for building custom install images for Fedora. Taking the shape of a GNOME wizard, Revisor comes close to being an ideal desktop tool. Inexperienced users can use its default settings without much knowledge of what is happening behind the scenes, while more expert users can customize each aspect of producing an .ISO."

Anatomy of the Linux Kernel

Submitted by LinucksGirl 2007-06-08 Linux 11 Comments

"The Linux kernel is the core of a large and complex operating system, and while it's huge, it is well organized in terms of subsystems and layers. In this article, you explore the general structure of the Linux kernel and get to know its major subsystems and core interfaces."