Thom Holwerda Archive

Apple has decided to do away with its discussion support team, a group of forum hosts that have monitored and moderated its user discussion boards, a new report has confirmed. At times, the boards also became a focal point of the online and mainstream media due to questionable moderation practices. To the dismay of customers, it wasn't uncommon for staff members to close or completely remove lengthy discussion threads that brought attention to problems with Apple products that the company had yet to officially recognize. But Apple's decision to do away with its moderation staff has only added to the complaints users have about the boards.

Microsoft has submitted documents required by the European Commission in an effort to avoid further fines for breaching an antitrust ruling, a spokeswoman for the European Union regulator said on Monday. "We received the technical documentation from Microsoft. The competition services are currently analyzingit with the help of the trustee. It's too early to say whether they complied with the decision," the spokeswoman said.

The second draft of the GPL version 3 license is not even a few days old and already one of the largest Linux vendors in the world is taking issue with its content. "HP had hoped that the second draft would clarify the patent provision such as to ease concern that mere distribution of a single copy of GPL-licensed software might have significant adverse IP impact on a company," said Christine Martino, vice president of Open Source And Linux with HP, in a statement. "Unfortunately, the concern lingers in draft 2." The first draft included some contentious terms surrounding DRM and patents; those terms have softened a bit in the second draft. Apparently, not quite enough for HP.

A senior Red Hat executive today maintained the Xen open source virtualisation environment was not yet ready for enterprise use, despite "unbelievable" customer demand and the fact rival Novell has already started shipping the software. While rival Novell this month started shipping the software with version 10 of its SUSE Linux Enterprise Server environment, Red Hat continues to have a lack of confidence in the virtualisation newcomer.

Microsoft is recalling an update to its Small Business Server product because of a glitch found late in the manufacturing process. They found a problem with Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 after the product was released to computer makers but before it was made broadly available. "Recently, and during a regular audit as part of our software production process, Microsoft became aware of an issue with the final software containing nonfinal versions of a few core components," Microsoft said in a statement.

Examine how to best migrate your Linux skills to take advantage of AIX and Solaris. Linux is all the rage, but what if you have experience in Linux and need to apply it to a commercial UNIX environment? UNIX and Linux are similar, and many of the same principles exist; there is a shell, root is still all powerful, and many of the tools and applications are the same. This tutorial will show you how to cope and understand the nuances and differences.

Vista has an inbuilt undelete system based on Windows Server 2003's versioning file system, Microsoft has revealed. The technology, which is automatically switched on in Vista, will be a boon for anyone who has accidentally overwritten their PhD thesis with a BPAY receipt.

"Millions of Windows users run the OS with an administrator account because Microsoft's never made it easy to do anything different. In fact, you have to work a lot harder to run with fewer rights. Microsoft will push Vista as the solution to the ever-increasing number and ingenuity of attacks. But why wait? With our five strategies, you can give Windows XP a taste of Vista's UAC protection."

"With all the buzz around thin clients, Microsoft execs are trying to find targets for thicker installations of Windows Vista. Maybe they should take a look at how Apple has executed on its thick computing strategy, and the resulting bonanza of upgrade sales."

The Freespire team has released the first release candidate of Freespire 1.0. More information is available in the release notes. Get this release from the Freespire download page. Linux.com offers a few first looks.

SymphonyOS, one of the more refreshing Linux distributions, is in trouble, since its lead developer is in financial troubles. "Core symphony development is currently stalled as I am without electricity in my apartment. I need to raise some money this week in order to have electric restored and cover some expenses. Project donations are greatly appreciated and any referral for paying projects are greatly appreciated as well. I have really big plans for symphony in the near future that will hopefully blow some larger distros out of the water. I cant wait to share them all with you."

Opera Software is making plans to steal market share from Microsoft. Though a launch date for Opera 10 hasn't yet been set, Opera is hoping the updated application will lure users away from Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 by building on Opera 9's use of small Web applications called widgets.

Cnet did an interesting comparison: Samsung's recently released UMPC, vs. the... Apple Newton. "Fans will tell you that the Apple Newton was years ahead of its time. Ten years on we're going to put that claim to the test. We're pitting a vintage Apple Newton against the brand-new Samsung Q1 ultra-mobile PC in a head-to-head battle." What's more suprising is the winner, however.

Microsoft shares fell on Thursday after it declined to dampen rumours that its new Windows Vista operating system might face fresh delays. Its shares closed down 2% after a Microsoft executive appeared to avoid confirming the current January 2007 Vista release data for consumers. Instead, Microsoft's Kevin Johnson said Vista would be shipped "when it is available".