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- Mandriva: 2010:172: kernel
LinuxSecurity.com: Some vulnerabilities were discovered and corrected in the Linux2.6 kernel:Buffer overflow in the ecryptfs_uid_hash macro infs/ecryptfs/messaging.c in the eCryptfs subsystem in the Linux[More...]
- Debian: 2107-1: couchdb: untrusted search path
LinuxSecurity.com: Dan Rosenberg discovered that in couchdb, a distributed, fault-tolerant and schema-free document-oriented database, an insecure library search path is used; a local attacker could execute arbitrary code by first dumping a maliciously crafted shared library in some [More...]
- Ubuntu: 978-1: Thunderbird vulnerabilities
LinuxSecurity.com: Several dangling pointer vulnerabilities were discovered in Thunderbird. Anattacker could exploit this to crash Thunderbird or possibly run arbitrarycode as the user invoking the program. (CVE-2010-2760, CVE-2010-2767,CVE-2010-3167) [More...]
- WordPress Foundation gets the trademark
Matt Mullenweg has announced that theownership of the WordPress trademark has been transferred to the WordPress Foundation."Automattic might not always be under my influence, so from thebeginning I envisioned a structure where for-profit, non-profit, andnot-just-for-profit could coexist and balance each other out. It'simportant for me to know that WordPress will be protected and that thebrand will continue to be a beacon of open source freedom regardless ofwhether any company is as benevolent as Automattic has been thusfar."
- IcedTea6 1.9 and VisualVM 1.0
IcedTea6 1.9 is a major new release fromthe IcedTea project. One notable change is that VisualVM support has beenremoved from IcedTea. Instead VisualVM has been split out to allow foreasier packaging, avoiding the need for OpenJDK builds to be dependent onNetBeans platform changes leading to the release of VisualVM Harness 1.0.
- Friday's security updates
Fedora has updated phpmyadmin (F13, F12:cross-site scripting).
Mandriva has updated kernel(multiple vulnerabilities).
openSUSE has updated php5 (multiplevulnerabilities).
Slackware has updated firefox(multiple vulnerabilities), thunderbird(multiple vulnerabilities), and seamonkey(multiple vulnerabilities).
- Matthew Garrett files case with US Customs against Fusion Garage
Kernel hacker Matthew Garrett has been looking into GPL compliance on various consumer devices, and has evidently gotten fed up with responses from the Joojoo tablet maker. In the comments on the blog posting, someone purportedly from Fusion Garage asked Garrett to contact them, so maybe it will all get resolved soon. "Fusion Garage, on the other hand, are still failing to provide source and seem entirely unconcerned about it - they've failed to respond to any of my emails since the first. Augen aren't providing source because they can't, while Fusion Garage aren't providing source because they won't. Irked by this, I've decided to try Don Marti's suggestion and file a case with US Customs. I'll admit that I have absolutely no idea how seriously these cases get taken, and so I've no great expectation of any sort of interesting outcome. But even so, if you're in the US and try to buy a Joojoo then there's a chance that it'll be seized by US customs on the way in."
- How Ubuntu is Made (LinuxPlanet)
Over at LinuxPlanet, Sean Michael Kerner talks with Canonical CTO Matt Zimmerman about the tools and processes used to work with the globally distributed Canonical team. "While Zimmerman noted that he does get together face-to-face fairly regularly with his staff once a quarter, facilitating regular interaction requires a long list of common tools. For instance, Zimmerman said that Canonical engineers do a lot of work through IRC , wikis and teleconferences. The team also uses the open source Gobby tool for collaborative editing and Mumble for voice chatrooms.[...]'Mumble is sort of like IRC for voice,' Zimmerman said. 'You have a set of channels and then people come and go from one channel to another and whatever channel you're in, there is live voice between the people that are in the room.'"
- Security advisories for Thursday
CentOS has updated seamonkey (C3, C4:multiple vulnerabilities), kernel (C4:arbitrary code execution), rpm (C4:privilege escalation), firefox (C4:multiple vulnerabilities), and thunderbird (C4:multiple vulnerabilities).
Debian has updated couchdb(arbitrary code execution).
Fedora has updated libgdiplus (F12, F13:arbitrary code execution), nano (F12:multiple vulnerabilities), slim (F12, F13:arbitrary code execution), thunderbird (F12, F13:multiple vulnerabilities), sunbird (F12, F13:multiple vulnerabilities), kernel (F13:multiple vulnerabilities), libmikmod (F13:arbitrary code execution), sblim-sfcb (F13:two arbitrary code execution flaws), firefox (F12: multiple vulnerabilities), xulrunner (F12: multiple vulnerabilities), anda smaller than usual cascade of fixes for Fedora 12 from firefox/xulrunner: galeon, gnome-python2-extras, gnome-web-photo, mozvoikko, and perl-Gtk2-MozEmbed.
openSUSE has updated libpng (twoarbitrary code execution flaws).
Ubuntu has updated mountall(arbitrary code execution), firefox andxulrunner (multiple vulnerabilities), and thunderbird (multiple vulnerabilities).
- FSF responds to Oracle v. Google and the threat of software patents
The Free Software Foundation has put out a statement about Oracle's lawsuit against Google. Not surprisingly, it finds Oracle's position to be "unjustifiable", but it also comes as no surprise that it isn't completely happy with Google either. "Unfortunately, Google didn't seem particularly concerned about this problem until after the suit was filed. The company still has not taken any clear position or action against software patents. And they could have avoided all this by building Android on top of IcedTea, a GPL-covered Java implementation based on Sun's original code, instead of an independent implementation under the Apache License. The GPL is designed to protect everyone's freedom—from each individual user up to the largest corporations—and it could've provided a strong defense against Oracle's attacks. It's sad to see that Google apparently shunned those protections in order to make proprietary software development easier on Android."
- Broadcom releases an open-source driver for its wireless chipsets
Broadcom - long seen as the last big proprietary holdout in the area ofwireless networking - has announced the availability of a fully open driverfor its current 802.11n chipsets. "The driver,while still a work in progress, is released as full source and uses thenative mac80211 stack. It supports multiple current chips (BCM4313,BCM43224, BCM43225) as well as providing a framework for supportingadditional chips in the future, including mac80211-aware embeddedchips." It's going into the staging tree initially. (Thanks toLuis Rodriguez).
- Wednesday's security updates
Debian has updated typo3-src (fixregression from previous update),freetype (multiple vulnerabilities), andxulrunner (multiple vulnerabilities).
Gentoo has updated sarg (bufferoverflows - vulnerability from 2008),acroread (multiple vulnerabilities),and clamav (multiple vulnerabilities).
openSUSE has updated kernel(multiple vulnerabilities) and sudo (local privilege escalation).Red Hat has updated seamonkey (RHEL3-4: multiple vulnerabilities),firefox (RHEL4-5: multiplevulnerabilities), andthunderbird (RHEL4-5: multiplevulnerabilities).
SUSE has updated kernel (multiplevulnerabilities).
Ubuntu has updated lftp (remote filecreation).
- Mozilla Public License Alpha 2
The secondalpha version of the revised Mozilla Public License has been posted;the text has been annotated to make it relatively easy to see what has beenchanged. "The most significant change in this draft is the patentlanguage. We have made it easier to read but also, we hope, better atprotecting communities who choose to use the MPL. It should also have theside effect of making the license Apache-compatible, allowing projectslicensed under the next MPL release to include Apache-licensed code intheir code bases."
- Mozilla Labs Gaming launches
The Mozilla Labs Gaming project has announcedits existence. "Modern Open Web technologies introduced acomplete stack of technologies such as Open Video, audio, WebGL, touchevents, device orientation, geo location, and fast JavaScript engines whichmake it possible to build complex (and not so complex) games on the Web.With these technologies being delivered through modern browsers today, thetime is ripe for pushing the platform. And what better way than throughgames?" The project is starting with a competition to see who canbuild the best web-based game.
- CodePlex.com donates $25,000 to Mercurial project
Microsoft's CodePlex foundation CodePlex.com has announcedthe donation of $25,000 to support the development of the Mercurial sourcecode management system. "While Team Foundation Server is still themost used version control system on CodePlex, our users are clearlybenefiting from having access to Mercurial for their open sourceprojects. The CodePlex team is happy to be able to offer our community ofmore than 17,000 projects a choice. With Mercurial as an important featureof CodePlex, we are excited to be making this donation to help support theMercurial project."
- Broadcom Delivers Open Source WiFi Driver for Linux
Global wireless chip leader Broadcom has released an open source WiFi driver for Linux with the intention to float the driver into the mainline kernel once it's been thoroughly evaluated. The first Linux distro to make use of the driver will be Ubuntu 10.10. A kernel developer at Canonical also said there are tentative plans to retroactively add driver support to 10.04.
- Chakra Linux - Distro Review
I came across Chakra Linux on distrowatch's feed late last week. The Chakra project started off as a derivative of Arch Linux. It was a modular KDE Live CD with some extra tool sets to make setting up and using Arch Linux less of a hassle. Notice the careful usage of the word was in my last sentence...
- Qmail OpenLdap On Ubuntu
This guide will help you easily set up an email server on Ubuntu using Qmail as MTA, OpenLDAP as a back-end for users, and Courier IMAP for IMAP server.
- The kernel column #91 by Jon Masters
In this months kernel column John Masters discusses another eventful kernel cycle, not to mention the latest round of Linus Torvald's (justified?) rants, the Kernel Summit 2010 and some pretty intense penguin-on-penguin action…
- It’s Time to Get Behind the Semantic Web
In 2005 I dedicated an issue of Standards Today to the future of the Semantic Web. The centerpiece was a very detailed interview (over 5,700 words) with the inventor of both the Web and the Semantic Web, Tim Berners-Lee. It's now five years later, and the Semantic Web may - finally - be ready to take off. Better hope it does.
- A Performance Comparison of Mono vs .NET
Since we’re at it – we not only took the new Mono garbage collector through it’s paces regarding linear scaling but we also made some interesting measurements when it comes to query performance on the two .NET platform alternatives.
- Android Might Be Top Mobile OS Globally By 2014
Gartner has released a report predicting that by 2014, Android will be second only to Symbian in mobile operating system marketshare worldwide, with the two platforms accounting for nearly 60 percent of the mobile OS market within the next four years. The news follows numerous recent bullish reports on the state of Android in the U.S.
- 5 Things I Miss From Linux When Using OSX
Recently I purchased a MacBook Pro. Principally because I like the hardware, and can put Linux on it. However, it has also given me the opportunity to use OSX. In fact I’ve been using OSX quite a lot – given I’ve paid for it, I want to really see how it works. However, in the course of using it, I’ve come across a number of features of Linux and the KDE desktop that I greatly miss.
- T-Mobile's Android 2.2 phone launches on 4G-like HSPA+ network
T-Mobile USA announced an HTC-manufactured heir to its original G1 Android phone, touted as the first handset to support the company's new 4G-like HSPA+ network. The T-Mobile G2 runs Android 2.2 on a new 800MHz Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM7230 processor, and offers 4GB internal and 8GB external flash, dual cameras, and a 3.7-inch screen with a hinge-slider QWERTY keyboard.
- VLC Player Submitted to App Store
Software developer Applidium have developed a version of the VLC open source media player for Apple's line of iOS-enabled devices. The app, which is built entirely on open source code, was submitted to Apple's approval board today. The developers are confident that the player will be available as soon as next week.
- The HP Mini 110 Netbook: Almost One Year Later
Last October, after my third Sylvania netbook failed, I took the refund I had received and bought an HP Mini 110 netbook as a replacement. I ordered directly from HP and customized the little machine to my needs, choosing a 16GB SSD over the 160GB conventional hard drive. I also chose to upgrade the machine to 2GB RAM but did it myself with after market RAM rather than pay HP's rather inflated price for memory. My system came preloaded with Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) and HP's now defunct Mi interface. I've now had the machine for just short of 11 months and I am still completely pleased with it.
- Invitation-only Linux summit announces speakers
The Linux Foundation (LF) announced speakers for The Linux Foundation End User Summit, scheduled for Oct. 12-13 in Jersey City, New Jersey. The invitation-only event for end users and top Linux developers features keynotes from the LF's Jim Zemlin and British Telecom Chief Scientist JP Rangaswami.
- Biometric Hardware with Linux and GPL violations
Recently at work we installed a biometric access control system. I was not in charge of this buy, but I tried the Windows software that is responsible for data handling and connects to biometric terminals. Today, we were doing a few more work in our office, and drilling a hole to basement, the worker made bullseye on power cable for biometrics terminals. So I had the chance to watch one of the biometrics terminal boot. What was my surprise when I see on the small LCD a Penguin and the word LINUX.
- Manage Mail Server Connections
Manage your TCP connections with Keep-Alive settings on a Postfix mail server for better performance or increased reliability with client connections.
- Porting Perl To Python
Porting legacy Perl to Python can be a daunting task. In this article, learn some of the theory behind dealing with legacy code, including what not to do.
- Something is Drupally in the State of Denmark
Now that I am fully recovered from jet lag, I am able to reflect on how enjoyable the recent Copenhagen DrupalCon was. Before going any further, however, I have to gratefully acknowledge the team of Drupalers who organized the conference and related activities. They all did an amazing job ensuring that the event was a great success. Thank you!
- Why Facebook Geo-Targetting Could Mean The End Of The World
Checking in, location reporting, geo-status updating - call it what you like, but sharing your location with the world has become one of the most popular movements to hit social networking in recent times. Facebook is the latest application to join the party, allowing users to include their location with their status updates. "Places," as it is called, is nothing new (services like Foursquare have been allowing users to advertise where they are for quite some time now), but it does raise some interesting privacy concerns. Since users share everything about their identity and personal lives with Facebook, just how far could Places plunge us into an Orwellian dystopia where "Big Mark is always watching?"
- The 101 Best Mobile Apps
Wondering what to download for your smartphone? Trying to find high-quality apps among the many thousands available can be a challenge, no matter what phone you own. Start with this collection of the best productivity tools, utilities, reference apps, media helpers, timesavers, and games.
- 8 Amazing Things Made With 3D Printers
Movie theaters and expensive LED TVs aren’t the only tech toys going 3D these days. Lately doctors, hackers, geeks, and architects are using design software and state-of-the art 3D printers to sculpt some truly awesome stuff. 3D printers squirt molten plastic, metal, and even human tissue into shapes previously only possible through hand craftsmanship, if at all!
- Nokia replaces CEO with Microsoft exec to save itself
Nokia on Friday confirmed rumors of a search for a new CEO by replacing its long-serving chief Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo with Microsoft executive Stephen Elop. The now former head of Microsoft's business division was picked for both his experience in software and "change management" that will help reorganize the company. In the past, he had worked with Adobe and Macromedia as well as Juniper Networks.
- How an Anti-Piracy Firm Became Banned In Its Own Country
A notorious Switzerland-based anti-piracy tracking company has to stop harvesting the IP addresses of citizens using P2P networks. The Swiss High Court ruled that IP addresses constitute personal information and when Logistep collected them without the owner’s knowledge, that amounted to a breach of privacy laws. From its eDonkey Razorback beginnings, via France through to yesterday’s conclusion, here is the full story.
- Report Pins Office for Mac 2011 to October 27th
Office for Mac 2011 will ship on October 27th, a French website claims. The information is said to come direct from Microsoft France, which mentioned the information during an annual meeting held near Paris this month.
- Google Launches "Instant Search" Results
Have you noticed something different about Google recently? Yesterday, Google started rolling out a major overhaul to its familiar homepage. Now, you'll see instant search results that are generated with each key that you type. These results will be shown in addition to the search suggestions that were previously available. The new feature...
- Twitters User Streams Launching Soon
According to a recent post from Twitter infrastructure employee John Kalucki, the highly anticipated User Streams API product will be moved from a closed beta to an open beta testing period quite soon.Twitter first announced User Streams at Chirp, where Twitter Director of Platform Ryan Sarver told a crowd of eager developers about a new feature and API that would get data in real time and without rate limits. Onstage at the conference, Sarver pinged content from Twitter.com onto TweetDeck in real time. The API was made available to devs for a brief period during the conference, but any apps or features created around it were not shown to the general public.However, the company did open the API to two partners in July: TweetDeck and Echofon. At that time, Twitter also announced a new Streaming API product called Site Streams.Today, Kalucki took to Google Groups to let developers know that the User Streams product launch is moving along as planned.We havent had any downtime, and weve only had a few subtle functionality problems to refine. In short, all is going very well We intend to move this product into an open beta test period soon, and then on into full production shortly thereafter. Originally, the open beta was slated for late August; still, wed be just as happy to see a smooth launch in September.Twitters roadmap for User Streams includes an at-scale launch in Q3 or Q4 of this year.What do you think of User Streams so far? Are you excited about the potential for user applications?More About: api, twitter, User StreamsFor more Dev&Design coverage:Follow Mashable Dev&Design on TwitterBecome a Fan on FacebookSubscribe to the Dev&Design channelDownload our free apps for iPhone and iPad
- Smartphone Security Startup Lookout Crosses Two Million Users
Lookout, a company that offers security data backup services for smartphones, is growing rapidly. Less than two months after the startup surpassed one million users, the company has crossed the 2 million registered users mark. It took just over six months to reach 1 million users.
- Acer Founder: Apple is a ‘Mutant Virus’
Stan Shih sure knows how to get a party started. In an interview with Digitimes yesterday, the Acer founder went on record to say that Apple’s products are a ‘mutant virus’ for which PC makers will eventually find a ‘cure’ in the long term. Ouch.
- Android Is As Open As The Clenched Fist I’d Like To Punch The Carriers With
This past weekend, I wrote a post wondering if Android was surging in the U.S. market because Apple was letting it? The main thought was that by remaining exclusively tied to AT&T, Apple was driving some users to choose Android, which is available on all the U.S. carriers. In the post, I posed a question: if it's not the iPhone/AT&T deal, why do you choose Android? Nearly 1,000 people responded, and a large percentage focused on the same idea: the idea of
- Calling all developers! FCC releases APIs for key databases
Perhaps you've been burning to build an online feature around some interesting government data source; if so, the Federal Communications Commission just made the task simpler. The agency has released the Application Programming Interface (API) specs for four of its big repositories of information: its consumer broadband test, broadband provider database, license owner storehouse, and latitude/longitude to county converter. "We want the FCC's Web presence to be larger than a single Web site," FCC Geographic Information Officer Michael Byrne posted on Tuesday. "We want the developer community to run with these APIs to make mash-ups and data calls connecting FCC data assets to other sources for creative and useful applications to the public." Although the Commission has done a fine job of making its public filings much more accessible, that's only the tip of the vast data iceberg which is the FCC. The biggest challenge is figuring out where this juicy stuff actually resides at fcc.gov. Read the comments on this post
- Why Google Isn't Pushing Android For Tablets
Brad Linder of Liliputing posted an interesting analysis today about Google's reluctance to endorse Android for tablets. Linder argues that while there may be legitimate concern that Android just isn't polished enough for devices without phone access (because some apps need it), it would be smart for Google to segregate the apps themselves, so users can simply know which apps will work on Wi-Fi-only tablets. But from Google's perspective, he observes, "pushing a version of Android that isn't exclusively for phones could be all it takes for Chrome OS to be dead on arrival."
 
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Archbishop Bans Pop Music At Funerals
pickens writes "The NY Times reports that the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne has announced a ban on the playing of pop music at funerals, which, he said, are not to be described as 'a celebration of the life of' the deceased. According to new guidelines published on Archbishop Denis Hart's Web site: 'Secular items are never to be sung or played at a Catholic funeral, such as romantic ballads, pop or rock music, political songs, football club songs.' According to a cemetery contacted by Melbourne's Herald Sun, a list of more unusual songs played at Australian funerals includes: 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' by Monty Python, 'Another One Bites the Dust' by Queen, 'Highway to Hell,' by AC/DC and 'Ding Dong the Witch is Dead' from The Wizard of Oz."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Tap Tech Brings Touch To Dumb Phones
nk497 writes "A Cambridge-based firm has come up with a way to bring touch interfaces to phones without touchscreens. According to TouchDevice, the system uses the microphone to turn any surface on a handset into a touch-sensitive input panel by analysing sound signatures. 'For example, where icons are displayed on a non-touch screen display, you could tap on there and it would activate the application,' said founder Mike Bradley. TouchDevice believes there are two markets for the technology: firstly to augment input potential in touchcreen smartphones, and secondly as a way of adding touch to 'dumb' displays. The system should be making its way into devices by early next year."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Spaceflight Formation Flying Test Bed Takes Off
coondoggie writes "Getting complicated systems onboard a single spacecraft to operate as one integrated unit can be hard enough, but some space agencies are trying to address the challenges of getting multiple spacecraft to fly in formation and operate together as one unit. Such challenges are exactly what a new European Space Agency lab in the Netherlands is set to address. The test bed addresses crucial operational factors for formation flying, including mission and vehicle management, guidance navigation, dealing with faults and communicating between satellites."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Court Says First Sale Doctrine Doesn't Apply To Licensed Software
An anonymous reader wrote to tell us a federal appeals court ruled today that the first sale doctrine is "unavailable to those who are only licensed to use their copies of copyrighted works." This reverses a 2008 decision from the Autodesk case, in which a man was selling used copies of AutoCAD that were not currently installed on any computers. Autodesk objected to the sales because their license agreement did not permit the transfer of ownership. Today's ruling (PDF) upholds Autodesk's claims: "We hold today that a software user is a licensee rather than an owner of a copy where the copyright owner (1) specifies that the user is granted a license; (2) significantly restricts the user’s ability to transfer the software; and (3) imposes notable use restrictions. Applying our holding to Autodesk’s [software license agreement], we conclude that CTA was a licensee rather than an owner of copies of Release 14 and thus was not entitled to invoke the first sale doctrine or the essential step defense. "
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Foxconn's Founder Opens Up About Making iPhones
eldavojohn writes "Bloomberg Businessweek has an article of interest resulting from a three-hour interview with Foxconn founder Terry Gou (single page), whose company manufactures 137,000 iPhones a day. The article profiles Gou's rise to Foxconn but also offers some interesting tidbits you might not know. On why he is not opening factories in the United States, Gou frankly states, 'If I can automate in the US and ship to China, cost-wise it can still be competitive. But I worry America has too many lawyers. I don't want to spend time having people sue me every day.' If you're interested in how a modern day Henry Ford thinks, you can read the rest about the man steering the ship of the world's largest producer of electronics components and China's largest exporter. This unprecedented transparency was part of an agreement Gou made with his customers during his delayed response to an increasing number of Foxconn suicides."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- How the Web Rallied To Review the P != NP Claim
An anonymous reader writes "Remember, about a month ago, when a researcher claimed he had a proof that P != NP? Well, the proof hasn't held up. But blogs and news sites helped spur a massive, open, collaborative effort on the Internet to understand the paper and to see if its ideas could be extended. This article explains what happened, how the proof was supposed to work, and why it failed."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Facebook Surpasses Google For Users' Online Time
crimeandpunishment writes "When it comes to our time online, socializing beats searching. According to new data from researchers at comScore Inc., Facebook has moved ahead of Google for the first time in Web users' minutes. In August, people spent more than 41 million minutes on Facebook, compared to just under 40 million for all of Google's sites combined. Yahoo came in third, with 37.7 million minutes."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Mega-Volcanoes Might Be Detectable On Exoplanets
astroengine writes "Could we detect a huge volcanic eruption on an exoplanet 30 light-years from Earth? Possibly, say scientists from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. What's more, there may be an opportunity for us to spot the ashy pollution ejected into the exoplanetary atmosphere when NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is launched in 2014. According to Discovery News, this would be a huge discovery if an Earth-like world was found to have active volcanoes: 'A geologically active terrestrial planet may be more suitable for life. It recycles crust, unleashes greenhouse gasses, opens new environmental niches, and generally provides a dynamic environment for advantageous life forms.'" According to a related story at the BBC, we should soon be able to detect the presence of oceans on distant worlds as well. The JWST will be able to resolve the reflection of light off an ocean's surface from 20-30 light-years away.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- PayPal Withholding Indie Game Dev's €600,000 Account
epee1221 writes "Markus Persson, a.k.a. Notch, the developer of Minecraft, posted on his development blog today that PayPal limited his account with unspecified cause on August 25th. Since then, payments for the alpha version of Minecraft have continued accumulating while Notch has been unable to withdraw them, and the account now contains over €600,000. PayPal recently told him it may take up to two more weeks for things to get sorted out and that if they conclude that there is funny business involved, they will keep the money." This unfortunate news followed an announcement a few days ago that he and a friend would be starting a studio of their own to continue development on Minecraft and start working on a new project.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- World's First Transcontinental Anesthesia
An anonymous reader writes "Medical Daily reports: 'Video conferences may be known for putting people to sleep, but never like this. Dr. Thomas Hemmerling and his team of McGill's Department of Anesthesia achieved a world first on August 30, 2010, when they treated patients undergoing thyroid gland surgery in Italy remotely from Montreal. The approach is part of new technological advancements, known as 'Teleanesthesia', and it involves a team of engineers, researchers and anesthesiologists who will ultimately apply the drugs intravenously which are then controlled remotely through an automated system.'"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- King's Dark Tower Series To Be Adapted For Film, TV
Kozz writes "Universal Pictures and NBC Universal Television Entertainment have closed a deal to turn Stephen King's mammoth novel series The Dark Tower into a feature film trilogy and a network TV series, both of which will be creatively steered by the Oscar-winning team behind A Beautiful Mind and The Da Vinci Code. 'The plan is to start with the feature film, and then create a bridge to the second feature with a season of TV episodes. That means the feature cast — and the big star who’ll play Deschain — also has to appear in the TV series before returning to the second film. After that sequel is done, the TV series picks up again, this time focusing on Deschain as a young gunslinger.'"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Apple's Developer Tools Turnaround 'Great News' For Adobe
cgriffin21 writes "Apple is being praised for loosening of some of the restrictions in its Application Developer Program license agreement that open the door for app developers to work in Flash for the Apple iPhone, iPad and other devices. And no one is happier about the change than Flash-maker Adobe itself. They wrote, 'This is great news for developers and we're hearing from our developer community that Packager apps are already being approved for the App Store. We do want to point out that Apple's restriction on Flash content running in the browser on iOS devices remains in place.'" Apple also received praise from Google over their reversal, which may have been prompted by an FTC probe. Reader Stoubalou adds that Apple shed more light on the app review process by publishing a list of guidelines (PDF) the violation of which may get an app rejected from the App Store.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Arms Regulations Damaging US Space Industry
athe!st writes "International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) are a major headache for companies trying to put their satellites into space, so much so that some companies are using 'ITAR-free' (aka free of US technology) as a selling point. The European Space Agency is trying to reduce its dependence on ITAR components, and the regulations are also threatening the nascent space tourism industry."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Sony Breathes New Life Into Library Books
Barence writes "Sony has launched a new range of touchscreen eBook readers — and is breathing new life into the concept of public library books. The readers offer support for free eBook loans from local authority libraries. If you're lucky enough to be a member of a local library supporting the service (50 have signed up so far in the UK) you'll be able to visit its website, tap your library card number in and borrow any book in the eBook catalog, for free, for a period of 14 or 21 days. The odd thing about this is it works in a very similar way to the good old bricks-and-mortar library. While a title is out on loan, it's unavailable to others to borrow (unless the library has purchased multiple copies); it only becomes available again once the loan period expires and the book removes itself from your reader."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Nokia Names Microsoft's Elop As New CEO
itwbennett writes "Nokia has tapped Stephen Elop, former president of Microsoft's business software group, to become its new CEO effective Sept. 21. Elop will replace Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, who loses his board seat immediately and will step down from the CEO position on Sept. 20. Microsoft said Elop will leave immediately, but the company doesn't seem to be rushing to fill the vacancy at the top of one of its largest divisions. 'I am writing to let you know that Stephen Elop has been offered and has accepted the job as CEO of Nokia and will be leaving Microsoft, effective immediately,' Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer wrote in a letter to employees late Thursday."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- WikiLeaks Set To Release Unpublished Iraq War Docs
Tootech writes with this snippet from Wired: "A massive cache of previously unpublished classified US military documents from the Iraq War is being readied for publication by WikiLeaks, a new report has confirmed. The documents constitute the 'biggest leak of military intelligence' that has ever occurred, according to Iain Overton, editor of the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, a nonprofit British organization that is working with WikiLeaks on the documents. The documents are expected to be published in several weeks. Overton, who discussed the project with Newsweek, didn't say how many documents were involved or disclose their origin, but they may be among the leaks that an imprisoned Army intelligence analyst claimed to have sent to WikiLeaks earlier this year."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Oracle, NetApp Drop ZFS Patent Suit
An anonymous reader writes "It seems Oracle and NetApp have kissed and made up over the ZFS patent lawsuit. Before Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems, NetApp sued Sun claiming ZFS infringed on its patents. Sun later sued NetApp back. From today, all is forgotten and Oracle and NetApp are friends. NetApp CEO Tom Georgens even said the two companies have shared a 'common vision' focused on providing solutions that reduce IT cost and complexity. Both companies now want collaboration between them to continue."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Wikipedia Entry Turned Into Actual Encyclopedia
Ponca City, We love you writes "If journalism is the first rough draft of history, what does that make Wikipedia? Time Magazine reports that technology writer James Bridle has created a 12-volume compendium of every edit made to the Wikipedia entry for the Iraq War between December 2004 and November 2009. 'It contains arguments over numbers, differences of opinion on relevance and political standpoints, and frequent moments when someone erases the whole thing and just writes "Saddam Hussein was a dickhead.,"' writes Bridle. 'This is historiography. This is what culture actually looks like: a process of argument, of dissenting and accreting opinion, of gradual and not always correct codification.' The books presumably only exist in one copy, so they are not for sale."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- ARM Unveils Next-Gen Processor, Claims 5x Speedup
unts writes "UK chip designer ARM [Note: check out this short history of ARM chips in mobile devices contributed by an anonymous reader] today released the first details of its latest project, codenamed 'Eagle.' It has branded the new design Cortex-A15, which ARM reckons demonstrates the jump in performance from its predecessors, the A8 and A9. ARM's new chip design can scale to 16 cores, clock up to 2.5GHz, and, the company claims, deliver a 5x performance increase over the A8: 'It's like taking a desktop and putting it in your pocket,' said [VP of processor marketing — Eric Schorn], and it was clear that he considers this new design to be a pretty major shot across the bows of Intel and AMD. In case we were in any doubt, he turned the knife further: 'The exciting place for software developer graduates to go and hunt for work is no longer the desktop.'"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- EU Surveillance Studies Disclosed By Pirate Party
Spliffster writes "The German Pirate Party has disclosed some secret documents on how the EU is planning to monitor citizens. The so called INDECT Documents describe how a seamless surveillance could (or should) be implemented across Europe. The use of CCTV cameras, the internet (social networks) and even the use of UAVs are mentioned as data sources. Two of the nine documents can be downloaded from the German Pirate Party's website (PDFs in English)."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Swedish Police Shoe Database May Tread On Copyright
An anonymous reader writes "The Swedish police, who have been instrumental in various raids against file-sharing sites, may have a bit of a piracy problem on their own hands. It seems they wanted to put together a database of shoe print information for matching crime scene shoe prints to particular shoe types. To do so, they used images found online, and some Swedish copyright experts have noted that this appears to violate Swedish copyright law. The police claim there's an exception for police investigations, but people (and some shoe companies) are pointing out that creating a database isn't about an investigation."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Australia's National Broadband Network To Go Ahead
angry tapir writes "After weeks of a hung parliament following the Australian federal election, the incumbent Labor Party has garnered enough support among independent MPs to form a minority government. Broadband was central to clinching the independents' support. Labor's victory means the $43 billion National Broadband Network will push ahead. The policy has generally been popular among ISPs and telcos — though some rebel operators preferred a policy that emphasized wireless technologies, similar to the proposals put forward by Labor's opponents. The primarily fiber-based NBN is set to offer Australians 1Gbps broadband."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Robots Taught to Deceive
An anonymous reader found a story that starts "'We have developed algorithms that allow a robot to determine whether it should deceive a human or other intelligent machine and we have designed techniques that help the robot select the best deceptive strategy to reduce its chance of being discovered,' said Ronald Arkin, a Regents professor in the Georgia Tech School of Interactive Computing."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Apple Relaxes iOS Development Tool Restrictions
An anonymous reader writes "Earlier this year Apple caused major upset among developers by updating the iPhone developer program license with clause 3.3.1. It basically stopped the use of cross-platform compilers, meaning Adobe Flash could not be used to develop an app for the App Store. The move also put into doubt which other development platforms could be used and generally caused a lot of confusion. Apple has just significantly relaxed that policy and allowed for the use of development tools, as long as 'the resulting apps do not download any code.'"
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
- Google Instant sinks raft of search controls
Suggest forever on, results locked at 10
In rolling out Google Instant – a new incarnation of its search engine that serves up results in "real-time" as you type – Mountain View has also made several peripheral changes to the way its engine traditionally operates.…
- Nokia's Canuck boss claims Arctic bond with Finland
We play ice hockey too
Nokia held a press conference today to introduce its first ever non-Finnish CEO, Stephen Elop. We learned that the outgoing predecessor's cards were marked ages ago, and that Nokia looks set to give the newcomer the chance to shake things up at the bureaucracy-bound tech giant.…
- What Adobe could learn from The Flying Wallendas
Do security safety nets make Reader less safe?
Analysis The Flying Wallendas were a legendary circus troupe that performed death-defying acts from a high wire without the use of nets or safety devices of any kind. Even when they performed their world-famous four-person, three-level pyramid act 50 feet in the air, patriarch Karl Wallenda steadfastly eschewed nets out of a belief they sapped the aerialists' concentration.…
- 'Hyperbolic map' of the internet will save it from COLLAPSE
Ark boffins say 'black hole' net events already common
International computer boffins are warning that the internet may "collapse" at some point within the next decade. They propose the use of a new routing method based on hyperbolic geometry, and have devised what they call a "hyperbolic atlas" of the entire net to aid in this plan.…
- IBM wheels and deals on servers
It's good to be your own bank
The engineers and marketeers have got the servers out and polished up their sales pitches, and now it is time for Big Blue to bring in the bankers to close the deals.…
- Now SEC piles into HP bribery probe
DoJ, SEC, OMG
HP is facing a widened bribery investigation by the Department of Justice and US financial regulators, a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reveals.…
- Ranting Ohio Republican scares interwebs
Shouty bloke SEEKS OFFICE
Vid Ohio councilman Phil Davison made an unsuccessful pitch to become his local Republican Party's nominee to run for Stark County treasurer on Wednesday, in the process scaring the living daylights out of the interwebs.…
- BT preps nationwide TV network
Signs Content Delivery System deal with Cisco
BT is upgrading its national network to reliably deliver TV on-demand, partly in preparation for the launch of Project Canvas alongside the BBC and other broadcasters.…
- Osborne plucks strange fruit from the loon tree
UK.gov to use Spending Challenge website ideas
HM Treasury has said it will implement three ideas submitted by the public to its Spending Challenge website which include a government e-auction site.…
- Every tech market loves a monopoly
Facebook. Google. Apple. Hurrah!
Open...and Shut It may not be that "Every woman adores a Fascist," as the poet Sylvia Plath once caustically penned, but it certainly seems that every market appreciates a monopolist.…
- Beeb creates new global iPlayer post
DIY meat
The Worldwide wing of the BBC has hired Mark Smith as its global iPlayer launch director, in its latest attempt to get its video-on-demand service off the ground outside the UK.…
- Shock treatment! Nokia's radical break with the past
Tackling the corporate bureaucracy
Analysis So Nokia's board has decided the company needs shock treatment: it's brought in a non-Finn for the first time in its history, and someone who carries very little baggage to boot. This should be interesting.…
- Microsoft boss waves goodbye to biz division wonder kid
Stephen Elop elopes to Nokia
Stephen Elop’s tenure at Microsoft proved to be short and sweet. He arrived in time for the Windows Vista death march, followed by the happy-clappy launch of Windows 7, and then – as a last hurrah – the retail release of Office 2010 in June.…
- 'Is this science, or literature?'
MPs mull 'climate enquiries' that failed to enquire
Might the University of East Anglia now rue its handling of the Climategate affair? An MP tells us that the University has ignored instructions given to it by the House of Commons Science Committee earlier this year, and MPs were given misleading impressions.…
- MEPs try again to force ACTA transparency
Show us yer negotiation documents
The European Parliament has repeated its call for greater transparency in negotiations over an international intellectual property agreement. A majority of MEPs has signed a declaration demanding the publication of negotiation documents.…
- NHS IT juggernaut rumbles on
Coalition's conservative cuts
Analysis The major casualty of an overhaul of NHS IT has been revealed. The National Programme for IT (NPfIT) is no more - up to a point.…
- Smartbook done to death by Apple iPad
Tablet frenzy claims victim
Wondering what happened to all those ARM-based netbooks we were promised last year would be the Next Big Thing? According to the boss of chip maker Qualcomm, the iPad killed 'em.…
- eBay wins partial victory over Craigslist
This was never going to end well
eBay has won a partial victory in its long-running court case against Craigslist - a Delaware court ruled in its favour over the dilution of its shares in the free ads firm but said it did not have a right to a seat on the board.…
- Microsoft hangs head, makes apology for US cloud bust
My BPOS bleeding heart
Microsoft admitted yesterday what has been pretty clear to many of its US customers for the past few weeks – it has recently failed to match its promise of reliably providing some of its business services via the cloud.…
- iPhone finds its Google Voice
AT&T won't be amused
Apple has told a third-party developer that his Google Voice client will be approved when resubmitted, though fans may have to buy it for a third time.…
- US government recruits Paris Hilton
Voice of America - now with added celebutardiness
In what is evidently an attempt to mitigate the damage caused by Koran-burning pastors, the US government will attempt to dissuade outraged citizens of the Middle East from joining al-Qaeda by beaming Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian and Britney Spears across the Voice of America's airwaves.…
- Cinema chain bans laptops, tablets
Maybe mobile phones too, soon
Cinema chain Vue is deciding whether to ban mobile phones from its venues, having already decided that laptop computers are a no-no.…
- Microsoft hosts bring-a-bottle cloud trust code of practice party
Show me the trade body
Analysis Blighty’s cloud computing industry now has a trade body that wants to champion trust in data stored at a tech firm’s outhouse, by getting vendors to commit to certification that, by mid-2011, will be independently scrutinised. We just don't know by whom - yet.…
- All CO2-spewing kit now in existence is OK for the planet
That V8 Jag? Run it 'til it wears out, you're OK
All the carbon-spewing machinery the human race now possesses - powerplants, transportation, boilers, the lot - can be kept running for its entire designed life without any significant ill effects on the planetary ecosystem, according to new analysis. It is the new machinery to replace what we now have which will either push atmospheric carbon over the UN's red line - or not.…
- Dell resells Bridgehead software with DX6000
Integrates Enterprise Vault
Dell is reselling Bridgehead software with its DX6000 object storage array - the one using OEM'd Caringo software that competes with EMC's Centera. It's also integrating Enterprise Vault.…
- Nokia's new boss is Microsoft man
Big changes promised
Nokia has brought in Microsoft's Stephen Elop to replace its CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, who leaves the company with little more than €4.6m in severance pay and 100,000 Nokia shares.…
- Multi-touch iPod nano stripped bare
Get your heat gun and come inside
Photos Apple new sixth-generation iPod touch "is more like a Shuffle with a screen than a Nano with true multi-touch" says Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit, the parts-and-repairs website that glories in dissecting electronic devices to discover what makes them tick.…
- Budget DSLR Cameras
Five sharp shooters for budding Baileys
Group Test If we at Reg Hardware made DSLRs, we’d be looking nervously over our shoulders, as compact cameras have never been so good. The rise of APS-C EVIL (Electronic Viewfinder, Interchangeable Lens) cameras, such as the Sony NEX models, promises DSLR-quality without the bulk to carry around. Size matters and Canon now appears to be considering a compact DSLR – whether we’re headed for a new take on Pentax’s Auto 110 SLR film camera remains to be seen.…
- Google search index splits with MapReduce
Welds BigTable to file system 'Colossus'
Exclusive Google Caffeine — the remodeled search infrastructure rolled out across Google's worldwide data center network earlier this year — is not based on MapReduce, the distributed number-crunching platform that famously underpinned the company's previous indexing system. As the likes of Yahoo!, Facebook, and Microsoft work to duplicate MapReduce through the open source Hadoop project, Google is moving on.…
- Ex-Sun CEO sees rosy future in health
Synergies Ahoy!
Former Sun Microsystems chief executive Jonathan Schwartz has opted for the hard life of Silicon Valley startup rather than running another Fortune 500 mega corp into the ground.…
- Techniques for migrating legacy, untested Perl to Python
Python programmers shouldn't get too smug. While many people agree that Python is designed in a way that makes it a highly readable language, there can still be problems with legacy, untested Python code too. Porting legacy Perl to Python can be a daunting task. In this article, learn some of the theory behind dealing with legacy code, including what not to do.
- WIFI Problem in Ubuntu 10.04 SOLVED!!!
Hey all you ubuntu, openSUSE, Debian, Slackware and other open source linux OS users out there, I have a fix to a serious bug that has happened in 10.04 lucid lynx ubuntu but may have happened in other versions of this or other OS's.
I recently upgraded to 10.04 from my old jaunty distro and i love the new desktop interface!!! the only thing was that i could not connect to the internet for some reason. The wifi applet Read More...
- Wine Release 1.3.2 Now Available
The favorite wine is not emulator, which allow you to run Windows programs on Linux has a new version. In this new version of wine you can see several updates and many more bug fixing, some of the new updates are:
Update of the Gecko engine, now including a 64-bit version.
New implementation of console support on Unix terminals.
Many new functions in the C runtime dlRead More...
- The significant new AIX 7 capabilities for virtualization
The IBM AIX operating system provides a highly scalable IT infrastructure for client workloads. Learn about the latest version, AIX 7.1, an open standards-based UNIX operating system, that includes significant new capabilities for virtualization, security features, availability features, and manageability.
- system76 Pangolin Performance part 2 : First Contact
After getting the laptop out of the box and removing all the protective stickers out of it, I plugged the power cord and fired the thing up.
First contact
I was a bit surprised by Ubuntu's splash screen – it was in very low resolution and the logo was surrounded by some weird green artifacts. I was expecting grRead More...
- Windows or Apple? My Personal Journey Into Linux
As far back as I can remember, I have been a Windows user. I can clearly recall using Windows 3.0 on one of my mother's engineering computers in the early nineteen-nineties, or browsing the Internet for the first time in Internet Explorer. This pattern of Microsoft loyalty continued unabated with only minor dabbles into the world of Macintosh in secondary school into my current college career at Central Michigan University.
Microsoft Vista changed everything for me.Read More...
- openSUSE Weekly News, Issue 139 is out!
We are pleased to announce our new Issue 139 of openSUSE Weekly News.
This Week:
Jos Poortvliet: Strategy sucks
Rares Aioanei: openSUSE kernel news - 04.09.2010
IBM developer Works/Roderick W. Smith: Resizing Linux partitions, Part2: Advanced rezising
openSUSE Forums: Google Video/Chat Plugin
KDE News/Sebastian Kügler: Help Test the Next Read More...
- 2 Cent Tip - Extend (resize) a whole device partition.
Occasionally I have to resize partitions on iSCSI or Fiber-Channel attached SAN storage. Both technologies allow you to easily extend the available storage for a host by extending LUNs, or volumes. A common problem after extending the size of the LUN, or volume, is resizing partitions to fill out the new size.
For the most part, I usually fire up PartedMagic and its a snap, even with Fiber-Channel attached enterprise storage. Once the HBA's have been zoned to FiRead More...
- Easy backup with RSync, windows client configuration
Now for the latest article of this first rsync saga I'd like to share with you my current Windows clients configuration, as I've already explained, rsync is quite easy to understand and configure; in your windows client you only need these files:
rsync.exe
cygpopt-0.dll
cygwin1.dll
Copying.txt
Copying.txt is the GPL public license, it's needed only for license purpouses, the other files: 2 DLLs (cygpopt-0.dll, cygwin1.dll) and 1 EXE file (rsync.exe) are part of your Read More...
- system76 part deux coming soon!
Just a quick post to say that the second and last part of the system76 Pangolin Performance's first impressions is coming soon - I have it written down, but I need to review the whole text and add some pictures in it. You don't want to read through all this text without some pictures!
In the mean time, I learned from my trusty RSS reader a couple of days ago that gnash 0.8.8 has been released. I've had the chance to compile it with various USE flags combinations in Gentoo to take a looRead More...
- Fedora 13 Gnome: Compiz Windows and Menu Transparency
After few forums and some hour searching on the web and divided opinion about this, I just made to have transparent Windows and Menus (main menu, dropdown menu) on Fedora 13 with Gnome. o.k. maybe it was easy for some of you, but after looking on the web, there are a lot of people who doesn't know how to accomplish this, so I decided to make a simple but Read More...
- Block crackers with 3 locks to your SSH door
Security always requires a multi-layered scheme. SSH is a good example of this. Methods range from simple sshd configuration through the use of PAM to specify who can use SSH, to application of port-knocking techniques, or to hide the fact that SSH access even exists. Applying these techniques can make life much harder for possible intruders, who will have to go past three unusual barriers.
- Build Android apps using XML and JavaScript Object Notation
Explore techniques for handling two of the most common data formats used on the Internet—XML and JavaScript Object Notation (JSON)—on the Android platform. This first part covers the basics of XML and JSON and shows you how to build an Android application that parses and displays a Twitter status-update feed provided in both formats. Part 2 examines the manner in which Webkit-hosted JavaScript code exchanges data with Java code in an Android application.
- What is "Bloat?"
When I read reviews and opinions about various Linux distributions, I have often come across the words "bloat" and "bloated" or "heavy" to describe them. I have read blogs and commentary decrying "bloat" as an evil, horrific thing to be avoided - yet "bloat" is ascribed to the best and most popular Linux distributions out there, from Ubuntu, Mepis, Mint, and PCLinuxOS to even the "lightweights" like Xubuntu!
A former WiRead More...
- openSUSE Weekly News Issue 138 is out!
p, li { white-space: pre-wrap; } We are pleased to announce our new Issue 138 of openSUSE Weekly News.
This Week:
Andreas Jaeger: Revising the Board Election Rules
Sebastian Kügler: Demystifying Akonadi
Will Stephenson: openSUSE Boosters at FrOSCon, Day 2
Rares Aioanei: openSUSE Kernel Review
Wolfgang Rosenauer: Call for testing: Firefox 4.0b4 on KDE (and in general)
- Yeah - Learn Linux: Maintain the integrity of filesystems
Learn how to check the integrity of your Linux filesystems, monitor free space, and fix simple problems. Use the material in this article to study for the Linux Professional Institute (LPI) 101 exam for Linux system administrator certification—or just to check your filesystems and keep them in good working order, especially after a system crash or power loss.
- system76 Pangolin Performance part one : Going mobile
You heard that right, I officially went mobile this week. I travel more than before, therefore I am away from my desktop (hence my files) more often. It was a tough decision, but I decided to shop for a laptop.
Shopping the thing
My brother was delighted when he heard I was considering buying a laptop - I was more afraid of the task more than anything else. I always considered laptops to be a problem. First of all, I'm a clumsy guy. I drop stuff. I sometimes put stuff in places I forgeRead More...
- Ubuntu Linux solution stack implementation Demos
Here is a 4 part demo series to show you how to implement a solution stack (Rational Application Developer, WebSphere Application Server, and DB2 Express-C) on Ubuntu Linux, as well as how to integrate them in a Java application.
- bugs fixed
Was able to take care of problem through BIOS! Enabled bug check that was disabled and everything returned to normal. Sometimes, when nothing else works you have to start from the beginning.
- Introduction to PowerHA
PowerHA for AIX is the new name for HACMP (High Availability Cluster Multiprocessing). HACMP is an application that makes system fault resilient and reduces downtime of applications. This article introduces PowerHA and provides a detailed explanation of how to configure a two node cluster. This document is very useful for understanding PowerHA and setting up a two node cluster.
- GTK+ 2.90.7 Released, Drops DirectFB Support
While GNOME 3.0 has been delayed to next March, the development releases towards version 3.0 of the GTK+ tool-kit continues in a steadfast manner. After the last GTK+ 3.0 snapshot a few weeks back that ported most of the GTK+ drawing to use Cairo, GTK+ 2.90.7 has been released...
- OpenIndiana - Another OpenSolaris Fork - Coming Next Week
While Oracle killed off OpenSolaris and the OpenSolaris Governing Board dissolved itself, the community of OpenSolaris developers have not given up but instead have begun working on their own community OpenSolaris-based operating systems to provide the world with choices beyond the upcoming Oracle Solaris 11 and Oracle Solaris Express 11. There is already the Illumos Project, which is a fork of OpenSolaris with a fully open-source code-base, that is now being used within the Nexenta and SchilliX operating systems, among others. We have just been tipped off as well that next week another new OpenSolaris derivative is being announced and it's to be called OpenIndiana...
- Is Apple Now Blocking Contributions To GCC?
Yesterday on the mailing list for GCC is was brought up if Apple's Objective-C 2.0 patches for the GNU Compiler Collection could be merged back into the upstream GCC code-base as maintained by the Free Software Foundation. Even though Apple's modified GCC sources still reflect the FSF as the copyright holder and are licensed under the GNU GPLv2+, it doesn't look like Apple wants their compiler work going back upstream any longer...
- Debian GNU/kFreeBSD Becomes More Interesting
Since last year we have been talking about Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, one of the official ports for Debian 6.0 "Squeeze" that will bring a 32-bit and 64-bit FreeBSD kernel as an option to using the Linux kernel. Debain GNU/kFreeBSD still has the Debian user-land complete with its massive package repository and apt-get support, but the FreeBSD kernel is running underneath instead of Linux. Debian GNU/kFreeBSD has matured a lot over the past year and most recently it has switched to using the FreeBSD 8.1 kernel by default and also now supports ZFS file-systems...
- New Linux Benchmarks Of SilverStone's HDDBOOST
Back in April we reviewed the SilverStone HDDBOOST, which was an innovative product from this manufacturer known for their computer cases that allows you to pair a solid-state drive and a hard drive in an attempt to experience the best of both worlds when it comes to storage performance. The purpose of the HDDBOOST is to increase the disk performance by enabling SSD speeds on the host hard drive while reducing write times to the SSD. From our Linux tests in that article we had a hard time getting this small device to provide any measurable performance gains, but in fact it caused some performance losses. In June, we then had results from SilverStone when they tested it under Ubuntu Linux with the Phoronix Test Suite. Since then we have been trying out a new HDDBOOST unit and it now seems to be working right.
- Did Hell Just Freeze Over? Here's Evergreen On Gallium3D!
The Linux community is still in awe from today's announcement that Broadcom has released an open-source WiFi driver for their newest 802.11n chipsets after not backing any Linux support for their wireless hardware in years past. In the Phoronix IRC channel the question was jokingly begged if hell has frozen over, but now we have another announcement to share today, which makes us wonder if hell has really frozen over. No, we aren't sharing more news right now on Valve's Steam/Source Linux client that's still coming, but that there is now Gallium3D support for the ATI Radeon HD 5000 "Evergreen" series!..
- Linux 2.4 Kernel May Finally Go End-Of-Life
While we are always getting excited for the next Linux 2.6 kernel release (heck, we are barely halfway through the Linux 2.6.36 kernel development and we are already getting excited for Linux 2.6.37 with its driver improvements), but sometimes it can be easy to forget that there is still a maintained Linux 2.4 kernel. The Linux 2.6 kernel has been around for nearly seven years and is used by all new Linux distribution updates, but there's lots of enterprise and embedded devices running off this old kernel. The Linux 2.4 kernel though may have just reached an end-of-life state with the just-released Linux 2.4.37.10 kernel...
- The ATI Evergreen DRM Now Has Blit Support
While just earlier today we reported that the ATI Evergreen open-source 3D code may soon move into a Gallium3D driver while for now it's rather stagnate within the classic Mesa R600 driver, there is good news today to report from the Evergreen DRM/kernel side too. AMD's Alex Deucher has just released a patch to the Radeon DRM to enable blit support using the 3D engine for ATI Radeon HD 5000 series hardware...
- Broadcom Announces Open-Source 802.11n Driver!
Broadcom wireless network adapters have long been notorious with Linux users since this hardware vendor has not provided any open-source Linux drivers or specifications for their chipsets, even though Broadcom ASICs are dominantly used within today's wireless adapters. There's long been community projects like bcm43xx and b43 to create Linux drivers and use extracted Windows firmware and such to make the 802.11 adapters work, but for Broadcom's new 802.11n chipsets they have made a radical turn and are releasing a fully open-source Linux driver!..
- ATI Evergreen 3D Code May Soon Go Into Gallium3D
AMD finally pushed out open-source 2D/3D acceleration code for Evergreen (a.k.a. the ATI Radeon HD 5000 series graphics cards) last month, but since then these drivers haven't received too much attention. AMD's few open-source developers are beginning to turn their attention to supporting the Radeon HD 6000 series more promptly in the open-source world while the community developers seem to still have their attention on the Gallium3D driver for the ATI Radeon HD 2000/3000/4000 (R600/R700) hardware...
- Phoronix Test Suite 2.8.1 Released
For those using our Phoronix Test Suite for performance benchmarking, regression monitoring, or running other automated tests atop our open-source platform/framework, the 2.8.1 update to "Torsken" is out this morning. There's just a couple of small bug-fixes since the 2.8 release less than two weeks ago...
- ATI FirePro V9800 4GB
Earlier this year AMD rolled out the ATI FirePro V8800 workstation graphics card as their new high-end offering derived from their Evergreen architecture and to serve as the next-generation solution to the FirePro V8700 / V8750. The FirePro V8800 2GB though is no longer AMD's top workstation graphics card as this morning they are rolling out the ATI FirePro V9800 4GB.
- Unigine Betters Its Terrain Capabilities
While Unigine Corp has been busy finishing up their first in-house game, OilRush, they haven't stopped work on further refining their upstream game engine. Unigine Corp has just reported on some of the most recent advancements to the Unigine Engine, which includes many enhancements and an updated terrain system...
- A Tentative Schedule For XDS 2010
For those interested in the X Developers' Summit (XDS) that is taking place next week at a tobacco factory in France, a tentative schedule has now been published by Matthieu Herrb for the 50 or so people that will be participating in the summit...
- Cairo 1.10 Released With Lots Of New Work
Cairo, the 2D drawing API that's used extensively within GTK+, Mono, Mozilla's Gecko engine, WebKit, and many other open-source projects, is out with a new major release. Cairo 1.10 is this major release to succeed the Cairo 1.8 stable series, which was introduced back in September of 2008...
- Intel Pulls In ShadowFB Support For KMS
While Ubuntu 10.10 will have no i8xx driver fix for those with this vintage Intel hardware that's been plagued with stability problems and other issues since Intel introduced their Linux kernel mode-setting and GEM driver, there is now a workaround upstream for this issue. Originally the plan was to add back user-space mode-setting support to the Intel X.Org driver that would not use the Graphics Execution Manager (GEM) and this code-path could be enabled by i8xx customers to workaround the cache coherency issues while losing KMS support, but a new workaround was devised...
- EXT4 & Btrfs Regressions In Linux 2.6.36
Recently when benchmarking the Btrfs and EXT4 file-systems we were left surprised that the performance of the next-generation Btrfs file-system had regressed against EXT4 to the point where the evolutionary file-system is measurably faster in a greater number of disk benchmarks. In fact, even with solid-state drives and Btrfs offering an SSD optimized mode, it still conceded to EXT4. It turns out that in the Linux 2.6.35 kernel, Btrfs regressed. This regression should have been fixed with the Linux 2.6.36 kernel, but recently when benchmarking EXT4/Btrfs against ZFS-FUSE on a 2.6.36 development snapshot we found its performance to still be poor for Btrfs compared to EXT4. To confirm where these two most prominent Linux file-systems are at right now, we have new EXT4 and Btrfs performance results from the Linux 2.6.34, 2.6.35, and 2.6.36-rc3 kernels.
- NVIDIA Puts Out A Major Beta Linux Driver Update
It was just one week ago that NVIDIA released a stable Linux driver update, but today for those wishing to live on the bleeding edge of NVIDIA's proprietary Linux driver development, the first beta release in the 260.xx series is now available for testing. The NVIDIA 260.19.04 Linux driver brings a lot to the table...
- UT3 For Linux Is Laid To Rest By Epic's Mark Rein
Back in May we reported that Epic Games finally admitted that UT3 for Linux would likely never materialize. This first person shooter was released back in 2007 and was supposed to have a Linux client that was to be ported by Ryan "Icculus" Gordon. He was working on this Linux client as recent as last year, but it never was released and no other information was provided by Epic Games, Ryan, or other sources. In May we heard from Epic's Steve Polge that the Linux client would likely never materialize. Today we have been passed along a note from Mark Rein, the VP of Epic Games and creator of the Unreal Engine...
- Intel's Sandybridge Graphics On Linux
Back in February we reported on the first signs of open-source support for Intel's Sandybridge, a.k.a. their sixth-generation Intel graphics processor integrated on their upcoming CPUs that succeed the Clarkdale/Arrandale CPUs. The Sandybridge hardware still has not launched nor will it until late this year or early next year, but the open-source support has been underway for months and from time to time we see new Linux code patches related to Sandybridge...
- Well, There Is No i8xx Fix For Ubuntu 10.10
Back in July we reported on a GEM-free UMS Intel driver coming about that was targeted for owners of vintage Intel 8xx series hardware to circumvent the stability issues and other problems they commonly have encountered since switching to Intel's newer driver stack with kernel mode-setting and the Graphics Execution Manager. Canonical hoped to ship this UMS code-path in Ubuntu 10.10 that would then be enabled for those with these older Intel integrated graphics processors...
- Happy 3rd Birthday To AMD's Open-Source Strategy
It was three years ago on this day that we were the first to detail AMD's open-source strategy. Yep, it's only been three years since AMD became public with pushing out NDA-free GPU documentation and register specifications, open-source code for the xf86-video-ati and Mesa drivers, and employed a small set of developers to contribute towards their open-source Linux stack. It was also three years ago from this month that the now deceased RadeonHD driver was launched...
- Looking At The OpenCL Performance Of ATI & NVIDIA On Linux
Recently we provided the first Linux-based review of the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 graphics card. Overall, this Fermi-based graphics card was a great performer for selling around $200 USD and is complemented by great video playback capabilities with VDPAU acceleration and great proprietary driver support. In that review we primarily looked at the OpenGL performance under Linux, but with NVIDIA's Fermi architecture bringing great GPGPU advancements for CUDA and OpenCL users too, in this article we are looking more closely at the Open Computing Language performance of this GF104 graphics card as well as other NVIDIA and ATI graphics cards.
- Open-Source GPU Drivers Causing Headaches In KDE 4.5
Martin Gräßlin, the KDE developer known for working on KWin and working on advanced features like OpenGL 3.x compositing in KDE 4.7, has written a new blog post in which he details some of the driver issues currently being experienced by some users of the recently released KDE 4.5 desktop...
- More Details On Unigine's OilRush Game
A few days ago Unigine Corp announced OilRush, their first in-house game that's coming from the creators of one of the most advanced multi-platform engines. Unigine developers are also fond of Linux and properly support it with the OilRush game receiving the same level of support and there will be a Linux client on launch-day...
- XDS 2010 Has Been Moved To A Tobacco Factory
While there is Oktoberfest in two weeks, in just a week and a half there is the annual X.Org Developers' Summit. This year's summit for these developers is taking place in Toulouse, France. The event was going to be hosted at a conference room at the University of Toulouse, but due to delays in renovating that room, this X.Org summit has been moved to an ex-tobacco factory...
- Wine 1.3.2 Updates Gecko, Other Changes
Two weeks have passed since Wine 1.3.1 was released, so Wine 1.3.2 has been pushed out this Friday afternoon. Though there isn't too much to get excited about in the Wine 1.3.2 release with there only being a few noteworthy changes...
- Open source film recommendation engine from Filmaster.com
Filmaster.com, a social network for film lovers, has recently presented a new movie recommendations engine. The algorithm that generates recommendations is open source and has been released under AGPLv3 license.How does it work?The new algorithm works by fetching the current ratings from database, processing them using a teaching algorithm and then generates recommendations for each [...]
- Stefano Zacchiroli (Debian Leader): Local communities are important
Stefano Zacchiroli, a new Debian Project Leader, in an interview with Polish Debian Portal speaks about this years campaign, realase policy of the project, the Debian GNU/kFreeBSD port and other non-linux ports, and the role of local Debian communities. Thanks to azhag, were happy to publish the interview for you!Stefano Zacchirolis term began on April [...]
- Polish Internet Users Against the Censorship of the Net
Polish government wants to enforce Internet filtering to eliminate online gambling and child pornography. Everything for the benefit of our children, as this is the argument which is hard to stay against.However, a notable group of Polish lawyers, journalists, academics, enterpreneurs, politicians and bloggers think otherwise and signed a letter (written by myself, btw) to [...]
- Promise of a post-illegal copy world. Part I: History of Intellectual Property
Lots of Internet forum discussions with various people on the subject of computer piracyillegal copying and intellectual property were my inspiration for this article. Along with the discussions, a lot of inaccuracies and lacks in the image of reality presented to humanity by RIAA, MPAA, MAFIAA and other corporate lobbyists appeared. Because I hate lies and [...]
- Three ways to securely access remote internal networks and work from home
Remote access to a computer and internal networks secured resources - all of it in a simple way thats following well-known securitys best practices? Sounds impossible, but its not. How to achieve it explains Bartosz Feński aka fEnIo.A computer network with a tight security should be separated from the outside world as much, as its [...]
- KDE 4.4 dev: What’s new?
I have managed to find some time to cover the recent changes in the development version of KDE 4.4. The number of changes is not impressive but they are interesting enough to write an article.Adding appletsThere was a time when I complained about the convoluted process of adding new Plasma applets. Not anymore! Today I [...]
- Media PC on Linux
As an experiment I decided to build Media PC based on Linux. First of all I was wondering, how much did the Linux distributions evolve in the past few years (Ive used Linux since a few years only on servers). The second thing is, I was fascinated by quite new, miniaturized hardware solutions based on [...]
- Gimp Tricks: Selective Colorization
Today, Im going to teach you how to first simply create a black and white image from a color photo, then to selectively colorize any portion of the photo. Im not going to directly adapt a Photoshop tutorial because this is a very simple process, but if you want to find the Photoshop way of [...]
- Google, Adobe Respond to Apple's Policy Changes
Yesterday's back-pedaling from Apple has been very well received in the industry. Two companies who were bitten pretty hard by Apple's policies - Google (through AdMob) and Adobe - have both responded to yesterday's changes, and as you can expect, they're both pretty happy.
- Firefox Build with JaegerMonkey Javascript Engine Released
"Mozilla has published the first Firefox build that integrates a new JavaScript engine that aims to match the performance in IE9 and reduces the gap to Safari, Opera and Chrome. The JavaScript performance is pretty dramatic and, at least on our test system, Firefox 4 is now faster than IE9 PP4."
- Porting Perl to Python
Python programmers shouldn't get too smug. While many people agree that Python is designed in a way that makes it a highly readable language, there can still be problems with legacy, untested Python code too. Porting legacy Perl to Python can be a daunting task. In this article, learn some of the theory behind dealing with legacy code, including what not to do.
- Nokia Replaces Its CEO, Hires Microsoft Exec
This one doesn't come as a total surprise: Nokia has replaced its CEO. Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo is on his way out, and he's being replaced by Stephen Elop, head of Microsoft's Business division. This will be the first time someone from Foreign (from Nokia's perspective) will lead the company, but some fresh, outside blood may be just what the doctor ordered.
- Android Not Open: Wait, What?
TechCrunch held a little in-promptu poll a few days ago, asking its readers why they chose to go with Android instead of something else. Most people stated they choose Android because of "openness". The author of the article calls this "a load of crap", arguing that because carriers can do with Android as they so desire, the reality now is that Android isn't open. Clearly, the author doesn't get openness.
- After Google Incident, Wi-Fi Data Collection Goes on
Four months ago, amidst a backlash from government regulators and privacy advocates, Google stopped collecting Wi-Fi data with its Street View cars. But that doesn't mean Google has stopped collecting wireless data altogether, and neither have other companies such as Apple.
- Watch Out Java, Here Comes JavaScript
Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister sees recent experiments enabling a resurgence for JavaScript on the server, one likely to dent Java's role in the data center. 'Today, projects such as CommonJS and Node.js are extending JavaScript even further, allowing it to take on Java's traditional role in the data center. In a fascinating role reversal, JavaScript is becoming the versatile, powerful, all-purpose language for the Web, while Java risks becoming a kind of modern-day Cobol," McAllister writes. And though such experiments have a ways to go, the benefits of JavaScript as a server-side language are clear and striking.
- BREAKING: BROADCOM OPEN SOURCES WIRELESS DRIVERS
Ahem. I just had to write that all-caps headline. Broadcom's wireless chips - used by just about everybody in this industry - have been a major pain in the bum for Linux users, because the company did not release open source drivers. Workarounds had to be created, lots of pain was had in the process, but now, Broadcom has finally seen the light: they have open sourced their wireless Linux drivers.
- Apple Caves, Drops Ban on iOS Third-party Development Tools
Very good news out of Cupertino just now. It took quite a bit of negative press, but Apple has finally caved in: the company is dropping its restriction on third-party development tools for iOS. Also, the company has published all its App Store review guidelines out in the open for the first time. It took a little too long, but very good news nonetheless.
- ARM Unveils Cortex-A15, Up to 2.5Ghz Quad-core
So, we have Intel and AMD. These guys are doing pretty well in laptops, servers, and of course desktops, but when it comes to mobile devices, they've so far been unable to adapt the x86 architecture to the stricter requirements that come with those devices. ARM, on the other hand, pretty much owns this market at this point. And you know what? It's time for Intel and AMD to get worried - really worried. ARM has just announced its Cortex-A15 MPCore chips - which will reach 2.5Ghz in quad-core configurations.
- European Parliament Passes Anti-ACTA Declaration
Ars Technica: "Today 377 members of the European Parliament adopted a written declaration on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) in which they demand greater transparency, assert that ISPs should not up end being liable for data sent through their networks, and say that ACTA 'should not force limitations upon judicial due process or weaken fundamental rights such as freedom of expression and the right to privacy'."
- Kno Secures Another Boatload of Funding
Remember the Kno dual-screen tablet we talked about earlier this year? The massive dualscreen tablet, aimed at the education market, is supposed to change the way students carry around textbooks - by eliminating textbooks altogether. The company behind the Kno has secured another boatload of funding, and the device will ship before year's end.
- iOS 4.1 Boot ROM Vulnerability Could Enable Jailbreaking
"Yesterday's release of iOS 4.1 was good news for iPhone gamers and iPhone 3G owners who had performance issues post-4.0, but bad news for jailbreakers, with the Dev Team themselves warning users not to upgrade to 4.1 as there was no known way to reverse the baseband post-update. As usual, though, what's true in the cat-and-mouse jailbreaking scene one day is not true the other, and now there's good news for jailbreakers, at least in theory. iPhone hacker pod2g has revealed on Twitter that he has successfully discovered a new bootrom exploit, and even better: all the new iOS hardware including the iPhone 4 and new iPod Touch is vulnerable to it."
- SiOx Memory: How it Works
"The recent announcement that Rice University grad student Jun Yao has demonstrated a new memory device has created a stir. As well it should. The new device is non-volatile, offers fast sub-100 ns switching times, can be written 10,000 times and is fully compatible with current CMOS manufacturing processes. A 1,000 bit proof-of-concept chip has been built by a private company."
- Two Popular Distributions Release Development Milestones
On Thurday, September 2 two leading Linux distributions released milestone developmental versions on the road to their next releases. OpenSUSE released Milestone 1 of 11.4 and Ubuntu released a beta of their upcoming 10.10, codenamed Maverick Meerkat, for developers and community testers.
openSUSE 11.4 Milestone 1
- What's It Like To Be A Linux Journal Blogger?
Well, first of all, it’s fun, or I wouldn’t be doing it. I work with some intelligent, talented people, like , publisher at LJ, and , our Webmistress. My job description as one of the LJ bloggers is to “write about whatever you want, as long as it is Linux related”.
- Something is Drupally in the State of Denmark
Now that I am fully recovered from jet lag, I am able to reflect on how enjoyable the recent Copenhagen DrupalCon was. Before going any further, however, I have to gratefully acknowledge the team of Drupalers who organized the conference and related activities. They all did an amazing job ensuring that the event was a great success. Thank you!
- Creating Custom Man Pages
Man pages have been the primary source for UN*x documentation for a long time. Whenever I create a script that's going to be around for a while, I create documentation in the form of a section 1 man page. This stops my cell phone from ringing on the weekends when the junior sysadmins are looking for my notes.
- Linux Mint Debian Edition Released
Linux Mint has just released their new distribution: Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE). It is a rolling distribution based off of Debian Testing instead of Ubuntu. Their goal is to have LMDE look identical to the main edition and to provide the same functionality while using Debian as a base. By being a rolling distribution, LMDE constantly receives updates instead of it being on a fixed version with set release dates. Below is the full announcement from their blog, minus links and references:
- Spotlight on Linux: Zenwalk Linux 6.4 "Live"
Zenwalk Linux is a Slackware based distribution introduced in early 2004 that aims to be fast, easy, modern. Zenwalk tends to have a very loyal user-base in addition to leaving most distro hoppers and reviewers impressed. Most agree with Zenwalk's latest tagline: It just works.
- Old Generals Never Die - They just Wear a Red Hat
The Red Hat board of directors announced a new chairman Monday, August 30, to replace outgoing Matthew Szulik. Henry Hugh Shelton, retired Special Forces general, has been serving on the board since 2003 after leaving the elite Army division.
- Alien - Use Any Package On Any Distribution
Sometimes, a utility or an application that you want to install is impossible to find in the format of your distribution. Alien is a utility that can convert one package type into another. It can get you out of a fix when you can't find a package for your distribution, and it is also useful for package maintainers who want to distribute packages for distributions that they don't run. It can work with Slackware, Debian and RPM packages as input and output types.
- Clonezilla Live
Clonezilla is a bootable CDROM designed for partition backup and restoration. Unlike SystemRescueCD, Clonezilla Live doesn't contain an array of utilities, rather, it is a single, focused tool.
- Exercising Multi-core
An opportunity to run some simple yet telling tests on a 12-core Intel Gulftown server presents itself
- Bcache Testing: IOPS
Previously we looked at the throughput performance of bcache by running IOzone on a common SATA disk, an Intel X25-E SSD, and Bcache using the SSD to cache a single drive. This article explores the IOPS performance of the same configuration hoping to find areas where bcache might shine.
- Debian at 17: As Important as Ever
It's hard to believe that Debian has 17 years under its belt, but the project celebrated its 17th birthday on August 16. Though Debian may not be quite as well hyped as other distros, it's still one of the most important FOSS projects around.
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