Eugenia Loli Archive

Microsoft will not fix a serious flaw in Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition because a patch could break other applications. The security bug relates to Windows Explorer and could let an intruder commandeer a vulnerable PC, Microsoft warned in April. The software maker has made fixes available for Windows Server 2003, Windows XP and Windows 2000, but it has found that eliminating the vulnerability in Windows 98 and ME is "not feasible," it said.

As Red Hat finalized the acquisition of JBoss, senior vice president of enterprise applications Tim Yeaton said the failure to make Java completely open is a disappointment to those who rely on the technology in their products.

Most computer users interact with their workstations primarily through some form of graphical user interface (GUI). In the world of Microsoft Windows, this interface is tightly controlled. The UNIX world, by contrast, offers a veritable smorgasbord of different GUIs with varying degrees of functionality. They range from minimalist window managers, such as twm, to large, capable tools, such as GNOME and KDE (K Desktop Environment). This article shows you how the Tcl/Tk scripting language offers a simple and elegant way to code GUI widgets with minimal effort.

Microsoft released Vista Beta 2 for public consumption. It does not require a Key but will expire on June 1 2007. You can download the 3GB ISOs (or from here) for 32bit and 64bit architectures.

Objective-C/Cocoa is the dominant language/API for Apple's OS X. Java is the dominant language for Web portals and other Internet services. So wouldn't it make sense for these two technologies to talk to each other? Marcus Zarra walks you through a simple solution to get these two technologies communicating.

How do you elicit high-quality information from information sources that are subject to deletion, distortion and generalization? According to Jim Arlow, the answer is generative analysis, which is a new approach to learning object oriented analysis that teaches you how to deal with these and other real-world human issues of software engineering. Also, Mike Kelly examines a recent testing experience that should have worked: plenty of scripted test cases, plenty of time developing and testing the scripts. So what went wrong? Plenty.

The latest bug fix release of GNOME is here: GNOME 2.14.2. You can get release notes and download links from here. Please note that both libxml2 and libxslt tarballs need a patch and that the libxml2 tarball also needs a second patch.

Peter Aitken points out that text is just a graphic image and therefore can be manipulated like any other graphic. .NET provides some built-in tools for manipulating the size, shape, and orientation of text. Just be sure it remains readable!

Mother Nature likes object-oriented development! C++ programmers often can't afford the luxury of creating a universe of objects; our platforms are intrinsically limited. However, the flyweight design pattern provides an elegant means of sharing objects, with a small price in terms of storage and retrieval. Stephen Morris describes C++ code that uses the flyweight design pattern to solve a knotty problem in networking. Also on the same web site, "Mastering the Requirements Process".

Arch Linux 0.7.2 (Gimmick) is now available for download. This time, they've provided three different ISO images for you to use: an FTP-only image (13mb), a Base-only image (145mb), and our full image that contains the entire Current repository (519mb).

Objective-C and Cocoa is the predominate language/framework on the OS X operating system, but it is fairly uncommon otherwise. One way to enable an application written in this language to communicate with applications written for other platforms is via the universal XML. Marcus Zarra walks you through constructing, transmitting, and deconstructing an XML document using Objective-C and Cocoa.

Microsot just released a stand-alone emulator of Windows Mobile 5 (AKU2.0) with both PocketPC and Phone bootable images in it (screenshot). You will need the two files from here, plus this file (overall 59 MB). Elsewhere, Qtopia Phone Edition 4.1.1 is released as a bootable ISO for everyone to try out (only VoIP and video playback support is missing from that image, overall 119 MB).

As promised, Nokia announces today the 2006 OS update for the 770 Internet Tablet adding Google Talk, a full screen finger keyboard, improved memory performance, and new refreshed look. Additional applets have also been added for faster access to internet services.

Hypervisor virtualization has broken out of the software development community and is rapidly becoming part of the mainstream for Windows installations. Rick Cook talks about who's hot and who's not quite there yet.