Linux Archive

Linux Hits 1% Market Share Milestone

  Submitted by Luis Linux 111 Comments
Yes boys and girls, it's Net Applications time. Sure, their figures are flawed, and sure, they're misused all over the non-scientifically educated media, but that doesn't mean they do not indicate trends. One of those trends was a slowly rising popularity of Linux, which hit 0.93% market share in August 2008, only to sink back again during the following months. Well, it's April May 2009 now, and Linux has finally crossed the 1% market share line!
Read More

Getting the Lead Out of Linux

  Submitted by lemur2 Linux 13 Comments
A number of significant opportunities for performance improvements seem to be just over the horizon for Linux systems. OSNews regular lemur2 submitted an overview of the most important potential performance improvements to us.
Read More

Clear Away Destop Linux CRON Logs with Anacron

Linux 1 Comment
Linux ordinarily uses Cron to automatically perform routine system maintenance on desktop or laptop computers, however not running Cron routinely can result in monstrously large log files and other problems. You can offload most or all of your usual daily and longer-interval Cron jobs onto Anacron enabling your computer to run regular maintenance jobs whenever the computer is powered on, even if those times are unpredictable.
Read More

Intro & Benchmarks: btrfs

  Submitted by linuxmag Linux 32 Comments
"Btrfs holds the promise of giving Linux many enterprise class file system features similar to ZFS but with even more features and better performance. In fact, many Linux experts think that btrfs is one of the keys to the future of Linux. While btrfs is not quite ready to be your only file system, it is in the kernel ready for testing and is still undergoing very heavy development. In this article we will introduce the key features of btrfs find out how it compares to existing file systems."
Read More

PulseAudio 0.9.15 Released

Linux 57 Comments
PulseAudio 0.9.15 has been released with many new features. Phoronix covers the changes: "PulseAudio 0.9.15 introduces native support of Bluetooth audio devices using BlueZ, Apple Airport Express support, flat volume support (similar to Vista's audio controls), on-the-fly reconfiguration of audio devices, and native support for 24-bit samples. The on-the-fly reconfiguration of audio devices is great and as a result there is now proper S/PDIF support. With the release of PulseAudio 0.9.15 also comes an update to the PulseAudio Volume Control program. The PulseAudio Volume Control 0.9.8 update brings support for configuring sound card profiles and various other updates."
Read More

xPUD: Linux with an XUL Interface, 10 Second Boot Time

  Submitted by google_ninja Linux 28 Comments
It's rare to see some truly interesting ideas in Linux distributions, as most seem content to just remaster Ubuntu with a different theme. Therefore, we at OSNews are always interested in fresh and interesting distributions that try to add something of value to the landscape. One such distribution is xPUD, a fast-booting, kiosk-like distribution that uses the Mozilla Gecko Runtime to display a simple user interface that allows you to launch normal desktop Linux applications.
Read More

ext4 File System: Introduction and Benchmarks

  Submitted by linuxmag Linux 1 Comment
"If you have spent enough time around Linux it's almost certain you know about the file systems ext2 and ext3, and have probably heard of ext4. Get ready to hear some more. On October 11, 2008, the 'experimental' label for ext4 was removed. While this doesn't necessarily mean that you should change all of your file systems over to ext4 immediately, it does mean that you should consider using ext4 moving forward. With the 'experimental' label gone and openSUSE (among others) considering it for the default file system in a late-2009 release, it's a good time to review ext4 so you have a solid working knowledge of what it is and what features it brings to the table."
Read More

TomTom Joins Open Invention Network

Linux 4 Comments
TomTom has become a licensee of the Open Invention Network. The OIN was initially formed by Red Hat, IBM and others to protect Linux by being a clearing house for over 275 patents and patent applications. These are available, on a royalty free basis, to any member licensee. Members must agree not to use their own patent portfolio against Linux. Companies can also contribute their patents to the OIN to make them generally available. OIN is also one of the backers of Linux Defenders. It appears the recent Microsoft patent agitation against Tom Tom is the reason behind this move.
Read More

New Firewall for the Linux Kernel

  Submitted by diegocg Linux 38 Comments
The Netfilter development team's Patrick McHardy has released an alpha version of nftables, a new firewall implementation for the Linux kernel, with a user space tool for controlling the firewall. nftables introduces a fundamental distinction between the user space defined rules and network objects in the kernel: the kernel component works with generic data such as IP addresses, ports and protocols and provides some generic operations for comparing the values of a packet with constants or for discarding a packet.
Read More

Wind River Linux Reaches 3.0

Linux 2 Comments
Wind River, a device software optimization company, just announced Wind River Linux 3.0, based off of Linux kernel 2.6.27 and GCC 4.3, and reportedly it is the most feature-rich OS offering from the company thus far. It includes more than 500 packages, which is about 250 more than in previous versions. Wind River Linux is designed for specific industries including aerospace and defense, consumer, industrial, networking, and medical, and was previously segmented in different packages for different features and hardware support for each industry, but has now been consolidated into one standard system.
Read More

Linux Up in Servers, Down in Netbooks; Android to the Rescue?

Linux 36 Comments
According to a Novel-sponsored IDC survey, Linux seems to be gaining popularity among businesses implementing servers, and it has a bright outlook for both server and desktop installations in the coming future. On the other hand, netbooks have seen less and less default OEM installations of Linux. Windows now has over 90 percent of netbook sales, quashing any hopes of an open source revolution in the form of netbooks. Android, however, may be able to change things.
Read More

Why glxgears Is Slower with Kernel Mode Setting, Why It Doesn’t Matter

Linux 25 Comments
Fedora Project has been on the forefont of development and adoption of kernel mode setting to enhance the desktop linux experience by making fairly invasive infrastructure improvements that affect the interaction between Xorg and the Linux kernel. In the past, one of the common way to test Xorg performance has been to use glxgears. While that hasn't been a particular good way to do it ever, the switch to kernel mode setting for Intel drivers ahead of the Fedora 11 Beta release to be available shortly has exposed the fallacy of this. In short, don't use glxgears. There are better methods to assess performance.
Read More

Zemlin to Linux OEMs: Yer Doing it Wrong

Linux 71 Comments
Yes, it's apparently another netbook today on OSNews. Netbooks were supposed to become the major foot in the door, but as soon as Microsoft got off its fat bum and started offering Windows XP to netbook OEMs, the popularity among OEMs of Linux has dwindled; when the netbook surge started, Linux was the operating system of choice among OEMs, but now, the Windows version comes first, and the Linux version later - if at all. Linux Foundation executive director Jim Zemlin basically tells OEMs: "Yer doing it wrong".
Read More

An Introduction to Logical Volume Management

  Submitted by vijayd81 Linux 8 Comments
In Linux distros, how do you know how much space to assign for each partition? And what if you do this and then later run out of room? Well you could delete data or move it off to other partitions, but there is a much more powerful and flexible way. It's called Logical Volume Management. LVM is a way to dynamically create, delete, re-size and expand partitions on your computer. It's not just for servers, it's great for desktops too! How does it work? Instead of your partition information residing on your partition table, LVM writes its own information separately and keeps track of where partitions are, what devices are a part of them and how big they are.
Read More

Intelligent Linux ext4 Migration Design

Linux 10 Comments
Ext4 is the latest in a long line of Linux file systems, and it's likely to be as important and popular as its predecessors. As a Linux system administrator, you should be aware of the advantages, disadvantages, and basic steps for migrating to ext4. This article explains when to adopt ext4, how to adapt traditional file system maintenance tool usage to ext4, and how to get the most out of the file system.
Read More