Dabo 0.7 has been released. If you're not familiar with Dabo, it is a framework for building desktop applications in Python. Obviously, there have been a bunch of changes and bugfixes.

In comments confirming the open-source community's suspicions, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Thursday declared his belief that the Linux operating system infringes on Microsoft's intellectual property. In a question-and-answer session after his keynote speech at the Professional Association for SQL Server conference in Seattle, Ballmer said Microsoft was motivated to sign a deal with SUSE Linux distributor Novell earlier this month because Linux "uses our intellectual property" and Microsoft wanted to "get the appropriate economic return for our shareholders from our innovation."

ActiveWin reviews Office 2007, and concludes: "It's an innovative interface yes, but will the benefits outweigh the changes? That's for users to decide. My personal say is getting used to the interface should not be a problem for many since the familiar tools are organized in ways that makes it convenient for the user to access both new and previously hidden features. This makes the interface more intelligent and more aware of what the user is doing, presenting the right tools for the task at hand. I am proud to say: this is an Office release I definitely look forward to using everyday."

Some more news on the Novell-Microsoft deal (I'm starting to suspect the free publicity is all what this deal was for, but anyway). Sun boss Jonathan Schwartz has joined in criticism of the Microsoft-Novell deal, saying it is bad for the open source movement. Following Samba's criticism early this week, Schwartz said profoundly disagreed with the idea that open source software is unsafe without the 'no use' arrangements agreed between Microsoft and Novell.

"SciTech Software, Inc. today announced that it has ceased further development of its SNAP device driver technology in favor of a new line of web and business logic technologies. SciTech also announced that it would begin looking for a buyer for the company's existing core technology, SciTech SNAP."

Red Hat had planned to release RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) 5 Beta 2 on Nov. 21, but engineering finished the job early and the beta is already being released to the company's partners and customers. The release boasts the latest open-source technologies for improved performance, security, and flexibility, according to the company.

The next release of the RISC OS Firefox port will be Iyonix-only, developer Peter Naulls revealed today. Although the updated port, dubbed Firefox 2, is said to be working, Peter, pictured, will first need a further five grand in cash donations from users - even though the revised port may ship without https support, which is crucial for online banking and shopping.

After a nine-month long beta run, Microsoft on Wednesday announced the final version of Office Live, which provides a first outline of the firm's Internet services vision. Other than the name may suggest, Office Live is not an extension of Word and Excel, but a service hosting package that makes it easier for small businesses to establish their presence on the Internet.

While Microsoft is hoping to enter into a patent deal with Red Hat similar to the one it has with Novell, the software giant has not ruled out going it alone and providing some sort of indemnification for its customers who use Red Hat Linux. Bill Hilf, Microsoft's general manager of platform strategy, acknowledged that it is an awkward situation having Microsoft's customers who use Novell's SUSE Linux covered by the covenant not to sue, while those Windows users running Red Hat Linux are not.

It seems Microsoft has released the long awaited Windows Vista to a selection of its larger customers. If you're a Microsoft Volume License customer, you can now download Vista from the MVLS Volume Licensing site. Since around 10am (GMT) this morning, Vista has been properly released into the wild via MVLS - but no news yet as to when it will be available to the developer-centric MSDN community. The Inq also gives a rundown of what Aero-capable video cards you can buy if you have a machine that lacks AGP or PCIe slots. Meanwhile, the EU is threatening to fine Microsoft again.

"We might be ahead of Apple's product release cycle, and we've probably violated our Mac Pro's warranty, but we just had to see what the Apple Mac Pro could do when populated with a pair of Intel's brand-new quad-core Xeon 5355 processors," Daniel A. Begun reports for CNET. They conclude: "Unless you do work normally relegated to high-end workstations, perform massively multitasking workloads, or just want the bragging rights, eight cores is definitely overkill - at least for now."

ReactOS, the open source implementation of a Windows XP/2003 compatible operating system, is announcing a start of a series of interviews with ReactOS developers. The first published interview features the project coordinator Aleksey Bragin. The ReactOS team plans to publish interviews on a weekly basis.

Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd has secured contracts from Apple Computer for 12 million mobile handsets that also function as music players, the Commercial Times quoted industry sources as saying. Apple will launch the mobile handsets in the first half of next year, the newspaper said, without providing financial details of the contract.

There is a new scripting language in development called F3 from Sun, specifically designed for GUI programming. It allows designing Flash-like GUIs with ease and can call Java libraries directly. You can launch demos and get more information from the related blog.