Thom Holwerda Archive

Red Hat and Novell, the two top Linux sellers, have only just begun building Xen virtualization software into their products. But they're already planning to add a higher-level option. Xen is a 'hypervisor' that lets a single computer run several operating systems simultaneously, using an idea called 'virtualization'. This enables companies to use a single server more efficiently - something that could save them money. Now 'containers', a higher-level virtualization approach that makes a single operating system look like many, is also getting traction.

Tim Berners-Lee is the originator of the World Wide Web and was listed byTime magazine as one of the 100 greatest minds of this century. His inspiring work on the Web set the stage for a world of changes in the way people do business, entertain themselves, exchange ideas, and socialize. In this podcast, Berners-Lee talks about his early history with the Web, opportunities and challenges at present, emerging technologies, and his current project: the semantic Web.

NetBSD 3.1-RC1 has been released. "NetBSD 3.1 is a feature update for NetBSD 3.0, and features domU support for Xen3, massive LFS stability improvements, and lots of other, smaller improvements, additions, and bug fixes." Get it here.

The upcoming OpenSUSE 10.2 will feature a new KDE start menu with favorites and integrated search and application browser. It was developed by the KDE SUSE team after doing extensive usability testing on existing start menus - there will be a talk about it at aKademy 2006 next month. Note: The 2nd link has been updated, pointing to an alternative location. It works now.

Microsoft wants to help aid in the development of Firefox. It sounds pretty scary, doesn't it? If you're still here, let me tell you that it's not as bad as it seems. Sam Ramjii, Director of Microsoft's Open Source Software Lab, has extended an invitation to the Firefox and Thunderbird developers asking them if they'd like to visit the company's open source research center. Microsoft's hopes are that, in a four-day span, the company can provide the open source developers with enough information to get the popular web browser running smoothly on Windows Vista.

"Puppy Linux is a small Linux live CD distribution that can boot from a CD, DVD, or USB drive; a hard disk is optional. According to the Puppy Linux Web site, Puppy's goals include being Linux newbie-friendly, booting and running quickly, and including all the applications typical users need. The newest version is its most usable yet."

Debian.org reports - The Debian Installer team is proud to announce the third beta release of the installer for Debian GNU/Linux Etch. Major new features introduced with this release includes the option to install using a graphical user interface on i386 and amd64. OSDir has some shots of Etch Beta 3 graphical installer in the Debian Installer Etch Beta 3 Screenshot Tour.

"There is a saying that one year in IT industries is equal to 8 years in traditional industries. One year ago I wrote an article about the workstation market, if I compare this article to the situation today, quite everything has changed in this pretty short period of time. So now it's time for an update."

"The biggest technology roadblock to building the USD 100 laptop championed by Nicholas Negroponte, founder and chairman of the One Laptop per Child organization, is close to resolution. That roadblock has been developing a display that is rugged, inexpensive and readable in a wide variety of conditions from low light to bright sunlight." A Google Summer of Code project started the porting of GTK+ to this technology, with Manu Cornet especially testing to determine the tweaking necessary to usual GUI themes, for the goals of performance and display clarity.

Mac OS X makes it easy to migrate from one computer to another; for instance when you buy a new Mac. But if you want to change the username on the new computer, the process is not quite so obvious. This quick tip shows what's involved.

ReactOS just released version 0.3.0 RC3 of their Windows compatible operating system. Their code audit is now 94.3% complete. You can get it from their download page.

ExtremeTech takes a look at Ark Linux, and concludes: "Ark Linux holds its own in most respects compared with distros such as Xandros and Ubuntu. But I got the feeling from using it for a while that Ark is not quite as polished - that it needs just a bit more development work to make its overall experience from beginning to end as slick as the other two."

"You've built a linux desktop. You've mounted the learning curve to configure the hardware (or paid someone else to do so) and you are able to do your own work on the machine. You've discovered that if you can point and click you can run a modern linux OS on your desktop. But how is it you will ever relate to the rest of the world? What do you do with the MS attachments people send you? How do you enjoy the music distributed in formats for a Windows World?"

"This week I interviewed Microsoft's Chris Wilson, the Group Program Manager for IE, to address the issue of Web standards compliance and IE7. There has been controversy about this lately, sparked by a Slashdot thread last week that claimed IE7 was basically non-compliant with CSS standards. I then repeated those claims on my ZDNet blog, but I have to admit that I (and Slashdot too) missed one vital point - it was largely based on an article Paul Thurrott wrote in August 2005, so it was outdated information. Chris Wilson was naturally sensitive to all the criticism and so he vigorously defended IE's standards compliance in his blog. I hope my interview with Chris Wilson went some way to clarify Microsoft's current position on CSS and standards support for IE7. Although I personally still prefer Firefox's features, I do think it's important not to unfairly tar IE7 with the same brush as IE6."