Thom Holwerda Archive

Compiz Fork: David Reveman’s Side of the Story

Submitted by J. 2006-10-07 Wayland 32 Comments

"Compiz is the compositing window manager that works on top of Xgl or AIGLX to enable Desktop Effects. Recently, a community developer named Quinn Storm announced that she would start a Compiz-based fork project called 'Beryl', citing frustration with Novell regarding getting her code fixes accepted into the Compiz upstream source tree. We called Compiz/Xgl maintainer David Reveman to get his side of the story."

JNode 0.2.4 Released

Submitted by Martin Husted Hartvig 2006-10-07 Java 10 Comments

The JNode team announced the release of version 0.2.4 of the JNode.org operating system. JNode.org is an open source Java OS written in Java (with a very small assembler nano-kernel). This release features the first possibility of basic development under JNode. Screenshots are available, new features and improvements in this release listed are listed in the changelog.

Submitted by Rahul 2006-10-07 Red Hat 23 Comments

Jim Gettys from the OLPC team has responded in a long weblog to Theo de Raadt's concerns over the use of the Marvell chip in the OLPC. Gettys explains why the Marvell chip was chosen and how the team is working on open wireless firmware.

Windows Vista RC2 Released

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-06 Windows 72 Comments

"Today, Microsoft is excited to announce the availability of Windows Vista RC2 to Technical Beta Testers, TAP Testers, and MSDN/TechNet subscribers. This new build of Windows Vista offers users a higher level of performance and stability - improving what was established in Windows Vista RC1. We were able to also fix many of your bugs reported from RC1 and implement them for RC2. Thank you to our beta testers for the bugs and feedback you submitted for RC1."

Submitted by BluenoseJake 2006-10-06 Windows 82 Comments

One of the most innovative features coming in Windows Longhorn Server isn't really a feature as much as a whole new version of Windows. It's called Server Core, and it will only take one-sixth of the disk space of a normal Longhorn installation. It's not expected to need anywhere near as many patches and hotfixes as Windows 2000. It's a version of Windows that does not, in fact, use windows. It's breaking Microsoft's long-standing reliance on graphical interfaces and shaking things up in several of Microsoft's product groups.

Speeding up Linux: One Step Further with Pardus

Submitted by Görkem Çetin 2006-10-06 Linux 35 Comments

"For a long time, Linux has been blamed to boot slowly, compared to other modern operating systems. In this article, we are going to focus on a new init system we developed for our Pardus Linux distribution, Mudur, together with other initiatives that are worth mentioning. Mudur is written from scratch in Python with simplicity, speed and maintainability in mind. It isn't a replacement for the /sbin/init command like some other alternatives, nor just a parallel script executor. Mudur greatly simplified our boot process, making it faster and more flexible. Authors look forward for future boot process research for further improvement and optimizations."

The Streamlined Metamodel Takes Ruby on Rails Higher

Submitted by anonymous 2006-10-06 General Development 3 Comments

It was just a matter of time before someone built a more effective scaffolding system for Ruby on Rails. Streamlined is a framework with a rich metamodel that enables application generation that improves scaffolding productivity. Part 1 of this two-part series, demonstrates Ruby on Rails scaffolding, illustrating its limitations, and how Streamlined can improve it. Part 2 explores how the impressive metamodel behind Streamlined enables customizations.

Can Ignorance Put Apple’s Jobs in Clear?

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-06 Apple 19 Comments

Ignorance can be bliss, but it's not a tight defense, lawyers say. When Apple disclosed Wednesday its internal investigation had uncovered some stock-option backdating, the company said Jobs was aware of the practice but unaware of its accounting implications. The probe also did not find any misconduct by Jobs or other current officers, the company said. In a blend of semantics and general legal analysis, however, securities experts say Jobs could still face some kind of penalty over the situation.

Canonical Seeks Profit from Free Ubuntu

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-06 Ubuntu 40 Comments

Canonical is the 65-employee start-up behind a popular version of Linux called Ubuntu. The company is betting that it can win a place in the market using a strategy that dominant Linux seller Red Hat has dropped. Red Hat offers two versions of Linux: Fedora Core and Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Fedora Core is free, but relatively untested and unsupported by Red Hat, while RHEL is supported and certified, but must be purchased. With Canonical's Ubuntu, however, the free and supported versions are identical - the approach Red Hat abandoned in 2003.

ATI Open-Source vs. Closed-Source R300 Performance

Submitted by Michael Larabel 2006-10-06 3D 26 Comments

"Open-source support has appeared by default in X.Org 7.1 for R300 generation GPUs. While ATI does not officially support these R300 open-source drivers, this alternative have been gaining momentum with users largely due to the lack of GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap support in fglrx. This extension is needed for the AIGLX desktop eye-candy. These drivers do lack TV-out support and many other features found within ATI's fglrx drivers, but how does its performance compare?"

Review: Xandros Desktop 4.0

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-05 Oracle and SUN 45 Comments

Here is OSNews' review of Xandros Desktop Home Edition Premium version 4.0 (a mouthfull). Xandros Systems was so kind as to provide OSNews with the top of the line version of their product, which includes, among other things, complete copies of Versora Progression Desktop, CrossOver Office, and various non-Free drivers and utilities. Read on for the complete review.

Microsoft Blesses Datacenter Users with Limitless OS Copies

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-05 Windows 69 Comments

Microsoft, of all companies, continues to lead the way with free and loose licensing terms around server virtualization software and multi-core processors. As of Oct 1, Windows Server Datacenter Edition operating system customers will have the right to run "an unlimted number of virtualized Windows Server instances". This policy applies to licenses covering new servers and previous licenses upgraded with new version rights. All told, it means that you pay to run Windows Server Datacenter Edition on a server with a set number of processors and can then divvy that box up with any combination of Windows Server Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition and/or Datacenter Edition without needing to count the number of virtual machines being created or pay for extra Windows Server licenses.

Former Apple CFO Leaves Board Following Stock Option Investigation

Thom Holwerda 2006-10-05 Apple 3 Comments

Former Apple Chief Financial Officer Fred Anderson resigned Oct. 4 from the company's board of directors following a three-month investigation into alleged irregularities in the way the company distributes stock options to executives. Mr. Anderson, who served as CFO from 1996 until 2004, informed the company that he believes it is "in Apple's best interests that I resign from the board at this time". Apple Computer also announced that the special committee of its board has reported its findings from the investigation into Apple's stock-option practices.

Submitted by Eugenia Loli 2006-10-05 Ubuntu 67 Comments

"Is Ubuntu an operating system? Last week at EuroOSCON, Mark Shuttleworth gave the closing keynote outlining what he believes are the major struggles faced by the open-source/free-software community. During his talk, it became clear that Ubuntu is trying to achieve a radical shift in the software world. Ubuntu isn't trying to be a platform for mass-market application software: it is trying to be the primary provider of both the operating system and all the application software that a typical user would want to run on his machine. Most Linux distributions are like this, and I think it is a dangerous trend that will stifle innovation and usability."

De Raadt: Red Hat’s NDA with Marvell for OLPC Damages Open Source

Submitted by jasper 2006-10-05 Red Hat 63 Comments

Red Hat has an NDA cooperation with Marvell for the wireless chips that they want to use for the One Laptop per Child-project. The idea of this is that both parties think Marvell will be more open in the future, but this is absolutely not the path they should walk, according to OpenBSD's Theo de Raadt. "I am getting really tired of 'open source' people who work against the open source community. Our little group can probably take credit for having 'opened up' more wireless devices than the rest of the community, and therefore we feel we have a better grasp of the damage OLPC has done here."

An Apple for the Enterprise?

Submitted by anonymous 2006-10-05 Apple 15 Comments

"Like it or not, buyers of x86 servers, clients, and workstations face a major platform shift as the 32-bit CPUs, operating systems, and applications slowly fade into history. That historic migration will have dramatic impact. Yet one factor keeps getting pushed aside as we obsess over hardware progress: humans. Among the demands we make of new technology, raising human productivity should top the list. And although 128-bit registers have productive effect, usability has a magnitude more impact. That's why Apple's latest Macs and OS deserve a good, hard look as mainstream enterprise fare."

Using XForms with Ajax, Java, Perl, and PHP

Submitted by anonymous 2006-10-05 General Development 8 Comments

These easy to understand XForms tips show you how to get the most out of your XForms. In this XForms and Perl tip, you'll learn how to submit an XForms form using POST to a Perl script, and capture the data for later use. This tip shows you how to access the submitted XForms data using a Java servlet. This tip looks at both the XForms and Ajax versions and how to combine the two techniques and in this XForms and PHP tip, you will see how to create a PHP script that can receive and work with XML data submitted by an XForms form.

Submitted by brewin 2006-10-05 3D 83 Comments

Reuters reports that Nvidia shares climbed more than 8 percent on Wednesday amid speculation the graphics chipmaker could be acquired by Intel. "Investors have been speculating that Nvidia might be acquired since July, when AMD agreed to buy Nvidia rival ATI Technologies Inc. for USD 5.4 billion. Rumors of such a transaction resurfaced on Wednesday, spreading quickly across Wall Street trading desks, according to three options market participants."

Seven Linux Distros Fight Over One Old ThinkPad

Submitted by anonymous 2006-10-05 Linux 54 Comments

"Like most companies, my employer has a stash of old, 'obsolete' PCs and laptops that won't run the latest versions of Windows worth a darn. Naturally, this represents a great source of systems for testing the latest Linux distributions. I thought it would be interesting to find out which modern Linux distro made the best OS for a supposedly 'obsolete' old laptop. With this in mind, I requisitioned an oldie but goodie: an IBM ThinkPad 2662-35U, with a Pentium III 600MHz processor, 192MB of SDRAM, and a 20GB hard drive."

Google Launches Search Service for Computer Code

Submitted by osnewsuser 2006-10-05 Google 12 Comments

Google is introducing a new search service - strictly for computer programmers only. The Web search leader said late on Wednesday it is introducing Google Code Search, a site that simplifies how software developers search for programming code to improve existing software or create new programs. Google product manager Tom Stocky said the company is set to help programmers sift through billions of lines of computer source code using its familiar search box to uncover snippets of reusable software.