Monthly Archive:: February 2006

Phoenix Makes Compelling Case for Open Source BIOS

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-28 Hardware 30 Comments

"BIOS giant Phoenix, the company responsible for the pieces of code saved on flash memory and which initialize our computers and interfaces to the hardware at the low level - even before the OS loads, is giving us plenty of reasons to support the case of an open source BIOS."

Microsoft Sneaks Out a New Longhorn Server Build

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-28 Windows 6 Comments

While testers have been all over the newest Windows Vista CTP build, the new Longhorn Server test build, which Microsoft also delivered at the end of February, has gotten far less attention. Testers confirmed that Microsoft has posted on the Connect beta-download site the Longhorn Server Build 5308 bits for download.

Free Linux Handheld App Stack To Gain Easier Porting

Submitted by Mitarai 2006-02-28 Wireless 4 Comments

A free application environment for Linux-based handheld and mobile devices may support lots more devices in the future, including Linux mobile phones. The GPE (GPE palmtop environment) project is planning a "device abstraction" layer aimed at simplying new device ports, according to maintainer Florian Boor.

ZK 1.0 Released

Submitted by samyem 2006-02-28 General Development 12 Comments

Potix has released ZK 1.0, the XUL-Java-Ajax-Beanshell based web application framework. The framework aims to simplify developing Ajax based web development by minimizing configuration and lowering developer skill requirements. A live demo is available.

Apple Launches Intel Mac Mini

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-28 Apple 131 Comments

At a special press event today, Apple introduced various new products. Besides the usual iPod/iTunes chit-chatter, they introduced a new Mac Mini with either a dual-core or single-core Intel processor. The new Mini sports the same form factor as the old one, and comes with an improved Front Row (support for playing streamed content using Bonjour), TV-out, and more. Note: Thanks go out to iLounge, MacCentral, and Engadget for providing live feeds.

Why Windows Vista Won’t Suck

Submitted by JustThinkIt 2006-02-28 Windows 103 Comments

"There's a lot of confusion about Windows Vista these days. Many online discussion forums have a great number of users who express no desire to upgrade to Vista. Sure, we've all seen the screenshots and maybe a video or two of Vista in action, but for many it only seems like new tricks for an old dog. Yeah, it's got some fancy 3D effects in the interface, but OS X has been doing that for years now, and it's still Windows underneath, right? The sentiment seems to be that Vista is another Windows ME. Perhaps part of the problem is that people just don't know what Vista has in store for them."

Linux Is a Better Linux Than Sun Solaris 10

Submitted by Linuxfanboy 2006-02-28 Rumors 103 Comments

"Sun has purportedly gone out of its way to draw Linux developers to its hardware platform. Analysts even say that Sun has finally made peace with Linux. But if you look at their web site they appear to have a different story to tell as they attempt to build community support for Solaris10. Frankly, we believe Linux beats Sun in so many categories that we don't even have a race. While Sun wants you to 'get the facts' we notice that they persist in comparing Solaris10 to Red Hat's enterprise model. But that's not the only Linux out there."

Why Windows Needs to Go Back to Basics

Submitted by lord-storm 2006-02-28 Windows 21 Comments

"Once upon a time, operating systems managed the resources of computers, and that was about it. But after the PC revolution, most software makers started subscribing to the theory that bigger means better. But does it?"

Unix System Admin Tricks of the Trade

Submitted by anonymous 2006-02-28 Unix 8 Comments

"There are key utilities, command line chains, and scripts that are used to simplify different processes. Some of these tools come with the operating system, but a majority of the Unix tricks come through years of experience and a desire to ease the system administrator's life. The focus of this article is on getting the most from the available tools and insight across a range of different UNIX environments."

Develop Your Own Filesystem with FUSE

Submitted by anonymous 2006-02-28 Linux 5 Comments

"With Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE), you can develop a user space filesystem framework without understanding filesystem internals or learning kernel module programming. Follow this simple, step-by-step guide to install, customize, and enable FUSE and AFS, so you can create your own fully functional filesystem in user space in Linux."

Business Factors in OSS Database Companies

Guest post by Andrew Hudson 2006-02-28 Databases 10 Comments

After many years of slow and steady growth, open source software (OSS) has begun to make an impact on corporate culture. Online forums abound with discussions about how open source projects are changing the way businesses use software. Venture capital companies now look for open source projects to invest in and larger IT companies like IBM and Sun Microsystems are turning to open source to gain a competitive edge. OSS is a fast-growing influence and yet the topic of how business affects OSS companies has been rarely studied.

Using Ruby on Rails for Web Development on Mac OS X

Submitted by Hakime 2006-02-28 macOS 19 Comments

"It should come as no surprise that Mac OS X is a favored platform for Rails development. Rails and its supporting cast of web servers and databases thrive on the rich Mac OS X environment. The premier text editor favored by legions of Rails programmers everywhere is TextMate, a Cocoa application. And all members of the Rails core development team work with Macs. This article introduces you to Ruby on Rails by building a trivial web application step by step."

Build Enhanced AJAX Toolkits on Linux

Submitted by anonymous 2006-02-28 General Development 4 Comments

"The AJAX Toolkit Framework is a J2EE based technology that assists in constructing Eclipse framework support for AJAX toolkits on Linux and provides enhanced DHTML/Javascript IDE features for AJAX developers. This enables support of DOM browsing and JavaScript debugging by using Mozilla XULrunner to embed the Mozilla browser component (Gecko) in the Eclipse framework."

Microsoft’s XPS: Impact and Opportunity

Submitted by snozzberry 2006-02-27 Microsoft 36 Comments

This whitepaper from a RIP vendor summarizes the technology behind Vista's XPS document format and its implementation as a print engine as compared to the current GDI in Windows XP. Will it suffer on non-Microsoft platforms, even if its specifications will be open, and how does it compare in methods and goals to Apple's PDF-based Quartz rendering engine?

OpenBSD 3.9 Needs Testing

Submitted by FreeBSDWorld.NET 2006-02-27 OpenBSD 16 Comments

"That's it for 3.9! Tree locks are upon us so unless something critical breaks, nothing will go in anymore. For me and Jordan this means to stop ACPI development until the tree is unlocked. So now it is of to test, test, test! That goes for you too; if you are reading this you should stop and install snapshots on as many machines and architectures as possible. We always appreciate test reports from folks in the field."

Deskbar Applet Howto; Gedit 2.14 Overview

Submitted by anonymous 2006-02-27 Gnome 25 Comments

Deskbar is an applet which sits in the GNOME panel and which integrates quite seamlessly with different search tools like Beagle and the Google search API to bring the same functionality of OSX's Spotlight to Linux/GNOME. This article explains how one can set up this applet to among other things, provide Google web search on the Linux/GNOME desktop. In related news, this article takes a look at the major new features of... Gedit 2.14. No kidding.

KDE at FOSDEM 2006

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-27 KDE 5 Comments

Last weekend, the Free and Open Source Software Developers' European Meeting took place in Brussels. KDE was present there with a lot of developers, a devroom and several interesting talks. Among the speakers were Jonathan Riddell from the Kubuntu distribution, Sebastian Kuegler from KDE's Marketing Working Group, Bart Coppens from the Krita development team, and Raphael Langerhorst and Sander Koning from the KOffice teams.

Libre Graphics Meeting

Submitted by Franck 2006-02-27 Graphics 23 Comments

"Libre Graphics Meeting will bring together developers and users of the best of free software graphics applications - GIMP, Inkscape, Scribus, Blender and more. It promises to be a fun ride, with tutorials and presentations of applications, and lots of time and space to chat, meet up with old friends, make new ones. Plans will be made, hacking and drawing will be done, fun will be had. The conference is free to attend, and open to all."

Triple Threat to Mac OS X Largely Academic

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-27 macOS 17 Comments

At first blush, the past two weeks have not been good for the image of Apple's Mac OS X: Public descriptions of two worms and a trivial exploit for a serious software issue in the operating system appeared on the internet. However, the three programs are hardly a threat to systems running Mac OS X, according to security professionals. CNet covers the same topic.

MS, Intel Gear up to Unveil Ultra-Mobile Tablet PC

Thom Holwerda 2006-02-27 Wireless 11 Comments

Microsoft's so-called Origami Project, due to be launched on Thursday, appears to be its early version of the ultra-mobile PC concept Intel has been touting of late, if an allegedly leaked Flash version of a promo video of the product is anything to go by. Quite apart from being a potential iPod competitor, the device could well prompt some interesting techology ownership questions.