Monthly Archive:: December 2012

Last month, I explained why I use generic desktops and laptops running open source software. They're reliable and inexpensive. But this presumes you can fix them. I believe that even those with no hardware training (like me), can identify and fix most hardware problems. To prove it, here's a quick guide. Feel free to add whatever I've missed.

"Whonix is an anonymous general purpose operating system based on Virtual Box, Debian GNU/Linux and Tor. By Whonix design, IP and DNS leaks are impossible. Not even malware with root rights can find out the user's real IP/location. This is because Whonix consists of two (virtual) machines. One machine solely runs Tor and acts as a gateway, which we call Whonix-Gateway. The other machine, which we call Whonix-Workstation, is on a completely isolated network. Only connections through Tor are possible."

Uzbl is a collection of tools that form a browser (based on WebKit) which adhere to the UNIX philosophy: "write programs that do one thing and do it well. Write programs to work together. Write programs to handle text streams, because that is a universal interface."

The FreeBSD project has announced the immediate release of version 9.1, featuring a new Intel GPU driver and dozens of other drivers, an optional new C+11 stack, lots of improvements to IPv6 hardware offload support, and more. You can now run a ZFS file system in a jail, and the kernel now provides support for IronLake, SandyBridge, and IvyBridge CPUs. Check out the release notes for the juicy details.

It's not exciting to talk about money, but it does often take cash to keep funding the developers that improve code. Congrats to the FreeBSD foundation then, for beating their fundraising goal of $500K by almost 40%. The $690K they raised will go to funding coders, developer conferences, and some limited travel. That bodes well for continued strong support for FreeBSD in general, soon to release version 9.1 (currently at RC3).

Engadget got to play with Salfish. "Overall, we came away reasonably impressed with Sailfish OS, despite experiencing only a fraction of its functionality. Performance was decent considering the N950's relatively modest single-core underpinnings - then again, MeeGo's no slouch either."

"We've joked about its refusal to die before, but today, finally, the console begins its march into the history books. Having sold over 150 million units since its release in 2000, the PlayStation 2 has today ceased shipping to Japanese retailers, meaning once remaining stock is gone, it's gone. The console was first released in Japan on March 4, 2000, and in those twelve years has become - by a longshot - the biggest-selling home video game console of all time." I should play Shadow of the Colossus again.

"The Chinese government issued new rules on Friday requiring Internet users to provide their real names to service providers, while assigning Internet companies greater responsibility for deleting forbidden postings and reporting them to the authorities." The crazy thing is not that China is tightening its control over the internet. No, the crazy thing is that if it were up to our own politicians, western governments should do the same.

The HTC HD2 is probably one of the most enduring mobile phones out there. While it originally shipped with Windows Mobile way back in 2009, it has become one of the most hacker-friendly devices out there, and hackers have managed to port virtually everything to the device - various versions of Android, MeeGo, Ubuntu, and Windows Phone have found their way to the HD2. Russian hacker Cotulla, responsible for many of these ports, has just announced the next big port: Windows RT is now running on the HD2.

"According to Chinese gadget news site Tech.163, Apple may be in the process of developing its own smart watch that connects to your Apple devices via Bluetooth. Based on the report, Intel will be working with Apple to create the smart watch, with a 1.5-inch PMOLED display made by RiTDisplays with ITO-coated glass." It must be the holiday lull. I'm this close to putting this in the joke category.

"Computers are ubiquitous in modern life. They offer us portals to information and entertainment, and they handle the complex tasks needed to keep many facets of modern society running smoothly. Chances are, there is not a single person in Ars' readership whose day-to-day existence doesn't rely on computers in one manner or another. Despite this, very few people know how computers actually do the things that they do. How does one go from what is really nothing more than a collection - a very large collection, mind you - of switches to the things we see powering the modern world?"

Now that the holidays are upon us (happy holidays!) and the year is about to end, we at OSNews thought it time to finally lift the veil a little bit on the next version of OSNews - OSNews 5. I've hinted at this next version of OSNews here and there in the comments, but we think it's time to make it all a little bit more official by taking in some initial feedback.

PC-BSD 9.1 has been released. "The PC-BSD team is pleased to announce that version 9.1 is now available! This release includes many exciting new features and enhancements, such as a vastly improved system installer, ZFS 'Boot Environment' support, TrueOS (a FreeBSD based server with additional power-user utilities), and much more!" PC-BSD 9.1 is based on the soon-to-be released FreeBSD 9.1-RELEASE with several enhancements, including an updated installer, better ZFS support during installation, bug fixes and new GUI configuration/administrative utilities.

"Engineers at Motorola are hard at work on a sophisticated handset, to be released next year, that parent Google hopes will provide more potent competition for devices like Apple's iPhone, said people familiar with the matter." Well, paint me red and call me a girl scout. This is more fascinating: "Motorola also ran into difficulties when it looked into using a bendable screen and materials such as ceramics that would allow the company to make the X Phone more stress resistant, use more colors and mold into different shapes, these people said." Bendable displays could be a huge turning point for mobile - and not because they allow new shapes. No, the killer 'feature' of bendable displays will be their resilience.