Monthly Archive:: June 2009

Amazon Kindle Powered by Linux, FSF Not Impressed

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-17 Linux 46 Comments

"As my colleague Michelle Menga is reporting, Amazon is now making new source code available for its Amazon Kindle. Basically what it represents is, Amazon's responsibility to make the GPL licenced source code that is used in the Kindle available to others. That's part of the GPL license and Amazon is doing its part. Digging into the code that Amazon is now making available, provides some really interesting insight into the underlying structure of the Kindle."

Intel Unveils New Processor Brand Structure

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-17 Intel 27 Comments

Personally, I've always been very confused by Intel's processor branding. Core Duo and Core Solo were pretty straightforward, but not long after we were dealing with Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad, which is anything but marketing friendly. Apparently, Intel agrees with us and has announced a fairly massive branding overhaul.

Back Off, Android

weildish 2009-06-17 Google 25 Comments

While most people seem to be rooting for Android to make its debut and bridge the gap between phones and netbooks, apparently there are a few who, for varied reasons, think Android ought stay away from netbooks and stick to what it knows best: smartphones.

Submitted by REM2000 2009-06-17 Apple 42 Comments

Today, Apple officially released version 3.0 of its iPhone operating system, a Mac OS X derivative for the iPhone and iPod Touch. It comes packed with a whole boatload of improvements and changes, so it's sure worth it to upgrade your iPhone or Touch.

‘Botnet Trading Platform for Hacked PCs’

Guest post by Frank Harris 2009-06-17 Bugs & Viruses 2 Comments

Finjan managed to research a trading network and botnet, where compromised PCs are bought and sold for profit. Their report shows "the operations of the Golden Cash network consisting of an entire trading platform of malware-infested PCs. The trading platform utilizes all necessary components (buyer side, seller side, attack toolkit, and distribution via 'partners'). This advanced trading platform marks a new milestone in the cybercrime evolution. By turning compromised PCs from a one-time source of profit into a digital asset that can be bought and sold again and again, cybercriminals are maximizing their illegal gains."

Crossover 8.0 Available

weildish 2009-06-17 General Development 14 Comments

It's that time of year again-- the time for the latest and greatest Crossover release for both Mac and Linux platforms. Version 8.0 brings new and updated support for many applications, especially Quicken 2009, Microsoft Office 2007, and Internet Explorer 7 (why Linux or Mac users would want IE7 is beyond me, but to each his own). Also, the Wine project has, of course, benefited more from Crossover's advancements.

Submitted by somn256 2009-06-17 OS News 1 Comment

Just like last week, we feature another open source microkernel today. Jari OS is an open source microkernel operating system, licensed under the GPL. The actual microkernel is called muString, and packed on top are isolated core and system services as well as device drivers, just like you'd expect from a proper microkernel implementation. Version 0.0.1 alpha was released earlier this month.

Improving Audio Glitch Resilience in Windows 7

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-17 Windows 12 Comments

"Have you ever used your PC to play an MP3 or a DVD? If you answered yes, you're among the overwhelming majority of PC customers who use their computer for audio and video applications, encompassing everything from watching a movie to playing a game to viewing a YouTube clip. But you may have also had an experience where your audio or video wasn't quite perfect - perhaps the video was a bit choppy or the audio stuttered. We call this a 'glitch' - a perceived discontinuity in your audio or video that interrupts the playback experience. In this blog post, we'll be focusing on audio glitching: we'll examine the ecosystem challenges that can cause glitches, and we'll discuss the work we've been doing to improve the Windows 7 experience."

Sun Is Said To Cancel Big Chip

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-16 Oracle and SUN 20 Comments

Sun Microsystems may have dropped a bit of weight by the time Oracle officially acquires the company. According to two people briefed on Sun's plans, the company has cancelled its Rock chip project, putting an end to one of its biggest revitalization bets. Sun has been working on the Rock project for more than five years, hoping to create a chip with many cores that would trounce competing server chips from IBM. and Intel. The company has talked about Rock in the loftiest of terms and built it up as a game-changing product. In April 2007, Jonathan Schwartz, the chief executive of Sun, bragged about receiving the first test versions of Rock. But the two people familiar with Sun's plans say Rock has met with an unceremonious end. The people requested anonymity, as they are not authorized to speak with the press about Sun's plans. Michelle Parkinson, a Sun spokeswoman, said the company had no comment.

Guest post by snydeq 2009-06-16 Internet 27 Comments

While Adobe, Microsoft, and Sun duke it out with proprietary technologies for implementing multimedia on the Web, HTML 5 has the potential to "eat these vendors' lunches", offering Web experiences based on an industry standard. In fact, one expressed goal of the standard is to move the Web away from proprietary technologies such as Flash, Silverlight, and JavaFX. "It would be a terrible step backward if humanity's major development platform was controlled by a single vendor the way that previous platforms such as Windows have been," says HTML 5 co-editor Ian Hickson, a Google employee. But whether HTML 5 and its Canvas technology will displace proprietary plug-ins "really depends on what developers do", says Firefox technical lead Vlad Vukicevic. It also depends on Microsoft, the only company involved in the HTML 5 effort that is both a browser developer and an RIA tool developer.

Erlang’s Creator Speaks Candidly About Open Source

Submitted by Ryan 2009-06-16 General Development 1 Comment

Erlang, originally created by Ericsson in 1986, is a functional programming language which was released as open source around 10 years ago and flourished ever since. In this Q&A, Erlang creator Joe Armstrong talks about its beginnings as a control program for a telephone exchange, its flexibility and its modern day usage in open source programs. "In the Erlang world we have over twenty years of experience with designing and implementing parallel algorithms. What we loose in sequential processing speed we win back in parallel performance and fault-tolerance," Armstrong said. He also mentions how multi-core processors pushed the development of Erlang and the advantages of hot swapping.

Dreaming Big: Outlet Wall

weildish 2009-06-16 Humor 5 Comments

Instead of having too many appliances and devices plugged into one outlet, why not reverse the idea? In order to save ourselves from the rat's nest of wires below the entertainment center (or the computer desk), David Friedman, photographer, had the idea to have an entire wall of plugs. Just imagine. No more crowded daisy-chains, no more losing pets and small children to the mess underneath, and just think how jealous the neighbors will be with the new sort of 21st-century art you'd have on your wall-- changeable depending on your current mood, too!

McIntyre: Mono Decision “Under Discussion”

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-16 Debian 98 Comments

Last week we talked about whether or not the Debian project would include Mono in its default GNOME installation. This incited some heavy debate on OSNews, but sadly, the Mono debate also lead to some very nasty blog posts in the Debian community. Time for damage control, Debian project leader Steve McIntyre must've thought.

WWDC: “A Giant Middle Finger to iPhone Developers”

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-16 Apple 68 Comments

During last week's Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple introduced a new iPhone model, the iPhone 3GS, which comes, among other things, with a faster processor and more RAM. Since this is a developers' conference, there were also numerous sessions on iPhone development, and the last session was about publishing on the App Store. Since every session at every WWDC is always followed by an open Q&A session, you'd figure this'd be the perfect opportunity for iPhone developers to ask about Apple's App Store policies. Well, no.

Submitted by zegenie 2009-06-16 Opera 50 Comments

A few days ago Opera launched a placeholder website which said they were going to "reinvent" the web, on June 16. Well, it's June 16, and Opera has announced Opera Unite, a technology which allows individual Opera users to connect to one another, turning every machine running Opera Unite into a web server.

Linux to Be the First Support USB 3.0

weildish 2009-06-15 Hardware 12 Comments

It's not available in the latest kernel just yet, but if you just so happen to have gotten your hands on a USB 3.0 device you want to use at full spectrum (you lucky jerk) or want to do this for the sake of geekiness, it's now possible to get USB 3.0 support for Debian and Ubuntu systems. The USB 3.0 subsystem will be integrated into the Linux kernel "soon," but if you've got some time on your hands, instructions have been provided to do it yourself.

Gartner Impressed by Android on ARM; Android Ported to MIPS

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-15 Google 23 Comments

We've been talking a lot about ARM-based netbooks, and when they're going to come. We've also been talking about Android on netbooks. Well, at Computex, analyst firm Gartner took a look at ARM netbooks running Android, compared them with Atom notebooks running Windows 7, and concluded that the interface on the former felt snappier.

Apple Finally Fixes Critical Java Vulnerability

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-15 macOS 11 Comments

The critical Java vulnerability in Mac OS X which we reported on earlier has finally been fixed by Apple. "Java for Mac OS X 10.5 Update 4 delivers improved reliability, security, and compatibility for Java SE 6, J2SE 5.0 and J2SE 1.4.2 on Mac OS X 10.5.7 and later." The fix for this vulnerability is in there.

Twitter, Facebook Play Key Role for Iranian Protesters

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-15 Web 2.0 33 Comments

Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr. All demon spawn from Web 2.0, and we all love to make fun of these websites and the services they provide. However, here in the West, where everything is at arm's length and democracy is something we do not remember fighting for, it's easy to forget that what looks silly and useless to us, can be of the utmost importance somewhere else in the world. Update: I've been informed that the first casualty has fallen at the hands of armed government supporters. Hundreds of thousands of people are now on the streets all over Iran. More updates inside.

Fifteen Classic PC Design Mistakes

Thom Holwerda 2009-06-15 Hardware 16 Comments

"There's no such thing as the perfect computer, and never has been. But in the personal computer's long and varied history, some computers have been decidedly less perfect than others. Many early PCs shipped with major design flaws that either sunk platforms outright or considerably slowed down their adoption by the public. Decades later, we can still learn from these multi-million dollar mistakes. By no means is the following list exhaustive; one could probably write about the flaws of every PC ever released. But when considering past design mistakes, these examples spring to my mind."