Monthly Archive:: January 2015

2015 roadmap for Sailfish brings many, many changes

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-18 Wireless 34 Comments

An email sent to the Sailfish developer mailing list goes into some great detail on what to expect from Sailfish over the course of 2015. It looks like they're planning to touch every part of the system.

2015 will see Sailfish OS evolve towards a display resolution and form factor independent operating system capable of running on a range of devices. It will also bring a renewed Sailfish UI. We plan to demo this evolution at the Mobile World Congress in March.

We have now started to work full speed on the new UI framework changes and are currently in the prototyping phase. Our main driver is to introduce changes that

enhance user experience on both the phone and tablet
strengthen the OS core
simplify implementation for a better managed code base

The remainder of the long email lists a whole lot of changes the Sailfish team at Jolla plans to implement - from the lower levels all the way up to the user interface.

In addition, chairman and co-founder Antti Saarnio posted on the Jolla blog with more hints about the future of Sailfish, and one thing in particular stood out to me:

The Sailfish OS is still young, and needs more stability, better connectivity, and simplification to the user experience. The small Sailfish OS native app ecosystem needs its own program, which guides and supports app developers. The amount of applications is not important, rather the most important applications for people need to be native, and of high quality. Friends, Tweetian, Sailgrande, just to mention a few, are excellent proof points of the potential of native Sailfish OS applications.

This is very good news. Improving the operating system is one thing, but the quality and availability of native applications is another. I'm glad Jolla recognises this and seems to be taking steps to do something about it.

Fedora 21 review: Linux’s sprawliest distro finds a new focus

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-17 Fedora Core 25 Comments

Like most Linux distros, Fedora is a massive, sprawling project. Frankly, it's sprawl-y to the point that it has felt unfocused and a bit lost at times. Just what is Fedora? The distro has served as a kind of showcase for GNOME 3 ever since GNOME 3 hit the beta stage. So Fedora in theory is meant to target everyday users, but at the same time the project pours tremendous energy into building developer tools like DevAssistant. Does that make Fedora a developer distro? A newbie-friendly GNOME showcase? A server distro? An obscure robotics distro?

Today, the answer to all the above questions is "yes." And the way to make sense of it all is what Fedora calls Fedora.Next.

GPLv2 and its infringement by Xiaomi

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-17 Wireless 17 Comments

Xiaomi has announced their spectacularly spec'ed Mi Note Pro, which features the latest in Qualcomm's Snapdragon processors alongside a big 2K display and 4GB of RAM for a killer price. That being said, there's something that is not-so-good about Xiaomi's offerings that is a concern to many developers, especially many found here on XDA: Xiaomi's repeated violations of the GPLv2 license for the Linux kernel which Android (and thus Xiaomi's devices), is built on.

Somehow, this doesn't surprise me.

Arch Linux on MacBook Pro Retina 2014

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-17 Linux 9 Comments

I'm going to describe steps needed to have the following system:

Dual-boot with Arch Linux / Mac OS X
Boot manager UEFI Gummiboot (simple, can handle several kernels easily)
Full disk encryption (Mac OS X and Arch Linux)
LVM support
Suspend to disk using a swapfile
Settings for a great battery life (~09h30)

I keep the Mac OS X partition, to be able to update the firmware later.

Incredibly detailed 'blog post' (I would call it a website) on how to get, well, Arch Linux running on the MacBook Pro Retina 2014. I know Arch is quite popular among OSNews readers, so I figured this would be of interest to some of you. The article is a work-in-progress, so more information is sure to follow.

FreeRTOS 8.2.0 released

Guest post by j.k. 2015-01-16 OS News 8 Comments

Version 8.2.0 of the embedded operating system FreeRTOS has just been released and is available to download. A complete list of changes is available, but personally I would highlight two of them: task notifications and some improvements of the popular ARM Cortex-M4F port.

Just a short introduction for those of you who have never heard about FreeRTOS before: it's a popular open source (released under a modified GPL license) embedded operating system (well, a multithreading library would be a more accurate description) which runs on many microcontrollers with just a few kilobytes of memory. It allows your embedded application to be split into several threads (called "tasks") with different priorities, and offers several mechanisms for synchronization/communication among tasks, dynamic allocation of memory etc.

The project officially supports quite a lot of combinations of toolchains and professional microcontrollers, however, it is not too difficult to port it to other microcontrollers. Would you like to run it on your Raspberry Pi? No problem, somebody has already ported it for you. You don't have a R.Pi? Never mind, you can try it in Qemu.

‘Video games can never be art’

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-15 Games 65 Comments

The late film critic Roger Ebert once wrote:

Nevertheless, I remain convinced that in principle, video games cannot be art. Perhaps it is foolish of me to say "never," because never, as Rick Wakeman informs us, is a long, long time. Let me just say that no video gamer now living will survive long enough to experience the medium as an art form.

I have always seen this as a man from an older generation failing to grasp new forms of media, expression, and art. As great a film critic as Ebert was, he completely and utterly missed the point with this oft-quoted statement. There's an endless list of games - large triple A and smaller, independent titles alike - that I would most definitely consider art and that will, in the future, end up in museums and art teachers' classes.

I normally don't really care what other people think, but I was reminded of this statement these past few weeks as I played through To The Moon, the critically acclaimed 2011 indie RPG from FreeBirdGames. The game tells the tale of two people aiding in granting a dying old man his last wish - to go to the moon. The game is relatively short - between 4 and 5 hours - but in that relatively short runtime, its creators manage to tell a moving, endearing, funny, emotional, and ultimately beautiful story that rivals - and, in my view, rises above - some of the best films and books ever created.

To The Moon is available on Steam, GOG, and even Origin, and I highly suggest you play it. If it doesn't fit your budget or you only want the story, I uploaded my experience with To The Moon for all to see. Even if you have no interest in video games, I would still strongly suggest experiencing this uniquely beautiful work of art.

Google puts Nest’s Tony Fadell in charge of Glass

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-15 Google 5 Comments

The fate of Google Glass has been up in the air these past few months, as developers seem to have stopped paying attention to the new-age eyewear and Glasshole sightings have decreased significantly. But Glass isn't done yet: Google's announcing today Glass is "graduating" from the Google X experimental projects incubator to become its own independent division - a division that will report into Nest's Tony Fadell. Current Glass head Ivy Ross will retain day-to-day authority, but she'll report to Fadell. Nest itself will remain separate and independent, and Tony will still be in charge there as well.

If you can sell a thermostat and smoke detector, you can pretty much sell anything. Maybe Fadell knows what to do with Glass.

How Verizon and Turn defeat browser privacy protections

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-15 Privacy, Security 19 Comments

Verizon advertising partner Turn has been caught using Verizon Wireless's UIDH tracking header to resurrect deleted tracking cookies and share them with dozens of major websites and ad networks, forming a vast web of non-consensual online tracking. Explosive research from Stanford security expert Jonathan Mayer shows that, as we warned in November, Verizon's UIDH header is being used as an undeletable perma-cookie that makes it impossible for customers to meaningfully control their online privacy.

A virtually unchecked and unbound company with near-monopoly status in many US areas doing something scummy? I am so surprised.

Xiaomi’s iPhone 6 Plus competitor doesn’t rip off Apple

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-15 Wireless 6 Comments

Xiaomi, one of the fastest-growing tech companies in China, has announced its latest flagship device. The Mi Note is a 6.95mm-thick smartphone with a 5.7-inch 1080p display, a 13-megapixel camera, options for a Snapdragon 801 processor, 3GB of RAM, a 3000 mAh battery, and curved glass on both the front and back panels; the company refers to the front glass as "2.5D" and the rear glass as "3D."

While Xiaomi has occasionally stoked accusations of Apple mimicry with devices like its Mi Pad, the Mi Note isn't really in that vein. It might not win any awards for industrial innovation, but it appears to be an understated product without much in the way of direct design lifts.

My dislike for Xiamoi's shamelessness is no secret, but this here seems to have a little more unique identity to it than its previous offerings - save for the name, of course. If this trend persists, they may be ramping up to more unique devices for western markets governed by excessively oppressive patent regimes.

Reuters: Samsung approaches BlackBerry about buyout – source

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 Wireless 14 Comments

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd recently approached BlackBerry Ltd about buying the company for as much as $7.5 billion, looking to gain access to its patent portfolio, according to a person familiar with the matter and documents seen by Reuters.

South Korea's Samsung proposed an initial price range of $13.35 to $15.49 per share, which represents a premium of 38 percent to 60 percent over BlackBerry's current trading price, the source said.

Executives from the two companies, which are working with advisers, met last week to discuss a potential transaction, the source said, asking not to be identified because the conversations are private.

Big news, if true.

‘To beat the iPhone, you have to beat the iPhone’s camera’

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 Rumors 50 Comments

For a show overrun with various visions of smart drones and smarter homes for the future, the present of CES was remarkably uniform. I saw more iPhones in the hands of CES attendees than I did Android phones across the countless exhibitor booths. From the biggest keynote event to the smallest stall on the show floor, everything was being documented with Apple's latest smartphone, and it all looked so irritatingly easy. I don't want an iPhone, but dammit, I want the effortlessness of the iPhone's camera.

I really don't give a rat's bum about my phone's camera (does it take pictures? Yes? Okay I'm good), so I'm about as interested in this as watching grass grow, but it's a consistent iPhone strong point according to iOS and Android users alike. Since I like science: are there any proper tests concerning this?

This is Google’s latest Project Ara prototype

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 Android 9 Comments

Google's Project Ara modular smartphone project is arriving soon, at least if you're in Puerto Rico. At its Project Ara Module Developers Conference today, Google said that it plans to launch a pilot in Puerto Rico in the second half of this year, selling phone chassis and modules through local carrier partners, as well as through a fleet of small trucks.

I like this project. I have no idea if it's going anywhere, but at least someone is having the guts to try and experiment with new and/or different ideas. That's science, and that's how we move forward.

Windows Phone getting even cheaper with two new phones

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 Windows 17 Comments

While one phone is a member of a new 400 series, and the other is a 500 series device, the two handsets are far more similar than they are different. Both use 1.2GHz Snapdragon processors; dual-core in the 435, quad-core in the 532. Both have 4-inch 800Ã—480 screens, with the 532 supporting the Glance feature found on many other Lumias. Both have 1GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage, and both support microSD cards up to 128GB. Both are 3G devices supporting up to 42Mbps HSDPA. Both have VGA-quality front-facing cameras. The biggest practical difference is in the rear-facing cameras: 2MP fixed focus on the 435, 5MP fixed focus on the 532.

These are basically the Nokia X devices, but with Windows Phone. They look very interesting and tempting, but I'm not exactly comfortable running Windows Phone on hardware this low-end; the operating system and its core applications will work fine, but most non-core Microsoft and third party applications are slow even on higher-end hardware, so I shiver at the thought of how they run on this hardware.

A comparative introduction to FreeBSD for Linux users

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 FreeBSD 16 Comments

This series will show you how to get started with a FreeBSD cloud server. The first article will explain some of the differences between Linux and FreeBSD. The tutorials that follow cover the basics of FreeBSD security, maintenance, and software installation. If you are new to FreeBSD, this series will help you get up and running quickly.

I'm sure many die-hard FreeBSD users will find this series of article pointless, but I think it's an interesting and useful introduction to the platform.

Samsung releases its first Tizen phone again

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-14 Wireless 4 Comments

Samsung seems to have finally really honestly for realsies released its first Tizen phone.

In terms of the hardware, the Z1 comes with a 4-inch WVGA TFT display, 1.2 GHz dual-core CPU, 768MB RAM, 4 GB internal memory, microSD card slot up to 64 GB, 3.1 MP camera at the back, VGA front shooter, dual-SIM connectivity, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS and a 1,500 mAh battery. The device is certainly underwhelming when it comes to the spec sheet, but Samsung claims that the "lightweight" Tizen OS would run without any issues on the hardware on offer. With the Z1, Samsung is looking to lure in customers with attractive content deals.

Remember - hope springs eternal.

Microsoft BASIC for 6502 original source code from 1978

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-13 Microsoft 26 Comments

This is the original 1978 source code of Microsoft BASIC for 6502 with all original comments, documentation and easter eggs:

Given all this, it is safe to assume the file with the Microsoft BASIC for 6502 source originated at Apple, and was given to David Craig together with the other source be published.

Which, coincidentally, makes it quite illegal, since this code is being published without Microsoft's or Bill Gates' permission. Still, a very interesting look at a very crucial bit of code - at least, from an industry perspective.

Is Google lost? A reflection on Android navigation

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-13 Android 20 Comments

I remember my first Android device, and how it differed to the ones I have now in one major point: navigation keys. My old Motorola XT316 (a mid-range phone for Latin American markets) came with Froyo 2.2 and featured 4 TFT capacitive navigation keys: menu, home, back, and the long gone "search". Android phones have come a long way since that OS, and since the early days of archaic UI design and choppy performance. Now we have the most beautiful and smoothest Android, and arguably one of the best Operating Systems... But there's something that I really think has not improved all that much despite all the optimizations, and that is navigation.

While there's always room for improvement, I do think Android has much, much bigger problems than this, like, you know, updates?

Guest post by Drumhellar 2015-01-13 macOS 3 Comments

For 12 years, the mDNSResponder service managed a surprisingly large part of our Mac's networking, and it managed this task well. But as of OS X 10.10, the mDNSResponder has been replaced with discoveryd, which does the same thing. Mostly.

Some of the bugs in Yosemite discussed in an article linked last week seem to have origins in moving from mDNSResponder to discoveryd. Here is an explanation of what specifically is not working, and how to fix it. However, it is not for the faint of heart: you can potentially leave your Apple in an unbootable state, and who knows what will happen when an update is installed.

Submitted by twitterfire 2015-01-13 Android 3 Comments

Android One represents Google's attempt at reaching "the next billion users" - starting today, CyanogenMod 11 (KitKat) builds are available for the 'sprout' devices. As the devices are currently setup for CM11 only (work on CM12 is in progress) these builds will trickle once a week, every Sunday.

This release represents a few firsts for us. Not only are these the first Android One devices and first official release of CM for these devices, the Android One device is the first ever officially supported Mediatek device. Mediatek (MTK) devices have been notoriously difficult for the developer community to complete fully functional bring-ups, and this marks a milestone in that effort.

Hopefully this also means good news for other Mediatek devices.

What happens when you install the top 10 Download.com apps

Thom Holwerda 2015-01-13 Windows 38 Comments

We installed the top 10 apps from Download.com, and you'll never believe what happened! Well... I guess maybe you might have a good guess. Awful things. Awful things are what happens. Join us for the fun!

Braver women and men than I.