David Adams Archive

The first of the Release Candidate builds for FreeBSD 6.3 is now available. There is one more Release Candidate planned, which will be followed by the release unless a major show-stopper issue crops up during testing.

ES is a fairly interesting looking open source research OS created by Nintendo. Runs natively on x86 (and qemu of course), kernel is written in C++, uses an ECMAScript interpreter for all of the userland, uses Cairo for graphics, and even has a port of Squeak.

Remember those great "home of the future" demonstrations from days past? If you're not old enough to remember them from world fairs, Disneyland, or movie newsreels, you've probably seen the cartoons parodying them: Robotic maids, self-cleaning kitchens, futuristic-looking plastic furniture, dehydrated food; everything white, round, and sparkling. Well, it's the future now, and it didn't exactly turn out the way they thought it would, but thanks to ubiquitous computer technology, today's home can have capabilities that futurists 50 years ago would never have imagined.

The earliest OSNews articles and news postings have not been available online in many years, as they were mostly static HTML, and when we made the switch over to our v1 CMS, I just filed it away on my hard drive. But to celebrate our 10 year anniversary, let's take a peek at what was hot in the OS world in 1997. Visit our OSNews 1997 archive. We have some feature articles, opinion pieces, and a fascinating view of several days of daily news frozen in time (and chock full of dead links). Take some time to look it over. On an unrelated note, Read More if you are in, or have contacts in, the graphic design world and would like to help OSNews.

OS X's commercial credentials recently got a major boost from the Open Group. Thanks to the efforts of Apple's OS boss Kevin Van Vechten and his team, Leopard has cleared all of the hurdles required to attain UNIX 03 certification. Only Sun, IBM & HP are certified so OS X turns the Big Three to Big Four.

An IT Manager's Journal article tries to clear up misunderstandings about the controversial GPLv3. It discusses several common points of controversy and misunderstanding, and notes that discussion of these points is ongoing.

Red Hat is actively talking to Microsoft to improve Linux/Windows interoperability, but says it will only sign an interoperability agreement with Microsoft if it is based entirely on open standards.

Red Hat will use its annual summit to share its vision of a new paradigm for business PCs, which includes a partnership with Intel Corp. to deploy appliances in a virtual machine to bring enterprise-class management and security to the PC.

An Economist.com editorial examines the OS lay of the land on the eve of Vista's release, and makes an interesting case for why Windows "rules the world". Do you agree? We report, you decide.

For a while now, we've been trying to think of good ways to allow the readers of OSNews to find OS or tech-related jobs, or find new employees for their companies. We've partnered with CareerBuilder, for a start, so if you're looking for a job, (or want to fill one) check it out.. But what else could we do? Would you like to see a place where people can post OS-related tech jobs? Let us know in the comments of this story. On this subject, Openwave, maker of the popular mobile phone web browser, is looking for a Senior Software Engineer to work on the core of their next generation mobile browser: "Must have demonstrable, extensive, real-world experience, a deep understanding of C and a working knowledge of C++." Openwave's web browser engineering team has a long history demonstrating and testing with OSNews' mobile site (screenshot), so we thought we give them a hand by posting this.

How many times has this happened to you? You're rocking out to the latest ditty on your iPod, rocking so hard you could be one of those black silhouette people from the Apple commercials, when you feel that pressure in your bowels, and you know you've got to go. You're faced with a terrible dilemma: either endure some quiet moments alone, or risk an international terrorist incident by dropping your iPod into the toilet. Well, your long nightmare is finally over.

Talking to your computer has been a staple of science fiction since at least the 1960s, but it looks as if it's finally coming within reach. This week saw the release of the first speech recognition software capable of handling continuous speech without the user having to train it in advance, namely Nuance's Dragon Naturally Speaking (DNS) version 9. For anyone else who tried IBM ViaVoice or Dragon Dictate a few years ago, found it awkward to get the system used to your voice, and even more awkward to speak in a staccato word-by-word fashion, this is a huge leap forward.

A company called eSoft was recently granted a patent for "systems and methods for selecting, ordering, installing, managing, updating, and if necessary, uninstalling software applications." Their first step has been to sue their major competitors, but it appears that online software update systems of all kinds could be covered by this patent, which would mean that Windows Update, OS X Software Update, Redhat's up2date, and YUM, among others, would be infringing.

Fans of the classic computer game Ultima V (from the c64/Apple][e era) have re-created the game, using modern game tech, thanks to the Dungeon Siege engine. The Ultima re-make, called Lazarus, is free for download, runs on Windows or Mac, but needs the Dungeon Siege engine (commercial software) to run. More details at the Ultima5 Lazarus site. Update: URL fixed.