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NewsVac: News from around the Web
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Time to school the FCC on what "free" really means
11 hours, 17 minutes ago
It's time to get ornery again with the FCC. Fortunately, they're asking for it, by soliciting comment on this FCC rulemaking proposal for "Service Rules for Advanced Wireless Services in the 1915-1920 MHz, 1995-2000 MHz, 2020-2025 MHz and 2175-2180 MHz Bands. -
RadeonHD Driver To Use AtomBIOS
12 hours, 17 minutes ago
We've talked all too often about AtomBIOS and there being two different open-source drivers that support the same ATI Radeon hardware with the key architectural difference between the two just being the use of this video BIOS abstraction layer. From the beginning, AMD was planning to have their Novell partners use AtomBIOS when writing this new (at the time, R500/600) driver, but the developers ultimately declined. These developers have expressed their opinions on AtomBIOS, which range from it being an unbearable mess to this design being nothing more than writing open-source code to power someone else's closed-source work. However, under pressure by AMD, the developers are now preparing to use AtomBIOS to a much greater extent within the xf86-video-radeonhd driver. In this article we'll tell you more about what's gone on and where you can checkout this AtomBIOS-bearing RadeonHD driver. -
Apricot - Open-Source Blender Game
13 hours, 17 minutes ago
Apricot is the newest project from the Blender Institute with the goal to build an open-source game instead of a Blender video this time. The characters used in the game are from the Big Buck Bunny movie, the last free movie developed using Blender under the name Project Peach. -
How To Measure Linux Filesystem I/O Performance With iozone
14 hours, 17 minutes ago
This article gives you a jumpstart on performing benchmark on filesystem using iozone a free Filesystem Benchmark utility. -
Garmin Nav devices run Gnome Linux
15 hours, 17 minutes ago
Garmin has posted Linux source code for its Nuvi 8xx and Nuvi 5xxx-series GPS navigation devices. The Nuvi 8xx offers a 4.3-inch, 480x272 display, and appears to be based on a Marvell PXA-3xx processor, Gnome Mobile Linux, and GeoClue location technology. -
IBM vs PSI: Goliath slays David
16 hours, 17 minutes ago
Well, this sad little story has now come to an end. PSI is no more. IBM purchased the company this week for an undisclosed amount rumored to be in the tens of millions of dollars, thus extinguishing PSI's legal claims against it, and – more importantly – cementing a monopoly that is now more complete than at any time since Amdahl launched the first plug-compatible mainframe in 1975. But aren't antitrust laws supposed to prevent this kind of thing? Surprisingly enough, the answer might be no. According to the Wall Street Journal, IBM believes PSI's revenues are too small to trigger action by either the U.S. Department of Justice or the European Union in Brussels. In other words, IBM is saying that since they already own 99.9% of the market, squashing the one remaining competitor who has 0.1% is no big deal. -
KDE Developer Quits
17 hours, 17 minutes ago
Recently though several KDE developers came right out and asked, “Does KDE even need (certain) users?” In the end though, KDE has ended up with at least one less developer. -
Brussels to proceed with IBM antitrust review
18 hours, 17 minutes ago
European regulators are to push ahead with an antitrust inquiry into IBM’s dominance of the computer mainframe market, in spite of the computer maker’s acquisition this week of the small rival whose complaint had stirred up the review. On Wednesday, IBM announced it was buying Platform Solutions Inc, a Silicon Valley start-up which had been trying to enter the mainframe computer business. PSI had been pursuing an antitrust suit against IBM in the US and had complained to European competition regulators. It withdrew the latter objection on Wednesday, just before the IBM deal, for an unnamed sum, was disclosed. -
It's a Yankee Doodle Linux phone
19 hours, 17 minutes ago
OpenMoko will start selling its Linux-based Neo FreeRunner phone online on July 4th, says the company. Billed as a completely open source, hackable hardware platform, the Neo FreeRunner will receive updated software with new location-based applications in August, says OpenMoko. -
Low-power mini-ITX board runs Linux
23 hours, 17 minutes ago
Kontron announced a Linux-compatible mini-ITX motherboard based on a 1.6GHz Intel Centrino Atom processor. The KTUS15/miTX targets solar- or battery-powered applications, vehicle PCs, point-of-sale/interest kiosks, medical, multimedia, rugged tablets, industrial automation, and other embedded device applications. -
Mass-market WiFi router invites Linux hackers
1 day, 3 hours ago
NetGear has announced an 802.11g WiFi router and access point made to be hacked. Seemingly created in homage to LinkSys's hacker-friendly "WRT54GL," the WGR614L offers fairly generous complements of CPU power, RAM, and Flash, and supports several commercial and community-supported alternative Linux-based router distributions. -
Dell Finds a Way to Continue XP Sales
1 day, 7 hours ago
Much has been made about Windows XP fading into the sunset at the same time as co-founder Bill Gates leaves his full time position at the software giant. Microsoft has already extended the life of the aging operating system once, and will continue to offer it for ultra-mobile PCs. -
New Microsoft Bid for Yahoo Search?
1 day, 11 hours ago
Microsoft is preparing a new bid for Yahoo's search business and has approached other media companies about joining it in a deal that would effectively lead to Yahoo's breakup, The Wall Street Journal said. -
Making desktop Linux work for business
1 day, 11 hours ago
Today's IT managers face tough choices. PCs that run fine today have an uncertain upgrade path, now that Microsoft has chosen to discontinue Windows XP. Upgrade costs associated with Vista, coupled with the ever-escalating cost of application licenses, make switching to desktop Linux an increasingly attractive option. -
Which Linux Distributions Are Dying?
1 day, 12 hours ago
I just read Louis Gray’s post titled “On the Web, If You’re Not Growing, You’re Dying.” It gave me a chilling realization about web services. Like everything else, what goes up must come down. This must apply to Linux distributions too, right? So, what’s happening with Linux? Which distributions are growing? Like Louis Gray, I’m going to use data from Google Trends. People searching the name of Linux distributions on Google can be considered new users. After all, wouldn’t experienced Linux users already know where the websites of the big Linux distributions are? - More News
Linux.com : Features
Happy Independence Day
We're taking the day off to celebrate the US Independence Day holiday. We intend to reflect on traditional American values such as freedom of speech and religion, fairness, justice, respect for the rule of law, the right to pursue happiness, standing up for the underdog, and taking responsibility for one's actions. We suggest other US residents do the same, and hold their elected leaders to the same if not higher standards. Then we suggest everyone have a barbecue and watch some fireworks.
How to write a thorough review of a Linux distribution
I have never written a review of a Linux distribution, but I've read more than I can count, and many of them have been maddeningly incomplete and not worth the time it took to read them. Here's a list of items you need to talk about in order to write a thorough review, covering every aspect of the distribution from the initial download to the final recommendation and everything in between.
OpenOffice.org extension will add PDF editing
Easy PDF editing is coming to OpenOffice.org, but you'll have to be patient for a few months. Recently posted to the OpenOffice.org Extensions site, the Sun PDF Import extension (SPI) is only in beta, and only works with recent developer builds of OpenOffice.org 3.0, which is scheduled for September release. Right now, the quality of the final release is anybody's guess, but the beta's capabilities fall squarely in the middle of the available PDF import tools.
An introduction to the Kismet packet sniffer
Kismet is a wireless "detector, sniffer, and intrusion detection system," and one of the growing list of essential open source tools for computer network security professionals. Kismet runs on any POSIX-compliant platform, including Windows, Mac OS X, and BSD, but Linux is the preferred platform because it has more unencumbered RFMON-capable drivers than any of the others.
IOzone for filesystem performance benchmarking
IOzone lets you benchmark your filesystem performance, seeing how well record IO occurs for files of various sizes. With IOzone you can see more detailed information than the read, write, and rewrite figures that Bonnie++ reports. IOzone is great at detecting areas where file IO might not be performing as well as expected.
Barracuda launches reluctant legal offensive against Trend Micro
The already vicious lawsuit involving Barracuda Networks and Trend Micro that is currently in discovery in front of the American International Trade Commission (ITC) just turned nastier. Barracuda has filed its own patent infringement claim against Trend Micro, based upon three recently acquired patents. The suit is in response to Trend Micro's allegation that its patent is being infringed by Barracuda shipping Clam Antivirus (ClamAV), the popular free software application, and appears designed to pressure Trend Micro to reach a negotiated settlement.
Portrait: Louis Landry of Joomla! finds direction in FOSS
For Louis Landry, a member of the core team for the Joomla! management system, free and open source software (FOSS) is not just a hobby, nor just the technology behind Jxtended, the consulting business in which he is a partner. For Landry, FOSS is also the movement that gave him direction in life, and provides both the rationale and the outlet for his diverse interests. In fact, he is so enthusiastic about FOSS that he sounds like an evangelist for the community whenever it is mentioned.
Banshee 1.0 is more than an audio player (video)
Banshee 1.0 is finally here, and the development team has added a truck load of new features; making it not only an audio player but a full blown media player and manager. This video discusses all of the new and improved features of version 1.
Expert tip: Print booklets in Scribus
Scribus, a free, open source desktop publishing application, offers a wide range of page layout features, but one thing it lacks is the ability to print booklets. Fortunately, I've come across a simple procedure that lets you work around this issue. Here's how to do it in Linux; Windows users should be able to follow along too.
A new utility for quickly interpreting multiple Bonnie++ benchmarks
Yesterday I discussed the Bonnie++ tool, which can be used to benchmark filesystem performance. When you are tweaking a RAID and filesystem combination, you generally want to see whether your changes work in a positive manner across the board, and by how much. I created a utility called bonnie-to-chart to show the results of multiple Bonnie++ runs in either absolute or relative performance terms. It's primarily a Perl script that can be used together with the Open Flash Chart component.
Open source social networking app thrives in China
The popular social networking site Facebook just announced a Chinese version, but similar Chinese-based Web sites such as Xiaonei and Hainei have been struggling there. However, since April, UCenter Home, an open source social network service based on PHP and MySQL, is pushing open social networking in China.
One live DVD, one ton of Linux games
LinuX-Gamers Live is a live DVD from Germany based on Arch Linux that includes nothing but games. Version 0.9.3 was released in June and provides an excellent means of sampling Linux games or setting up a home arcade, although a few of the games wouldn't run on my machine.
Investigating strange dialup activity with Wireshark
A controlled dial-on-demand router is a convenient tool. An uncontrolled dial-on-demand router is not. The Wireshark network protocol analyzer helped me track down the cause of some strange and unwanted dialup connections.
Using Bonnie++ for filesystem performance benchmarking
Bonnie++ allows you to benchmark how your filesystems perform various tasks, which makes it a valuable tool when you are making changes to how your RAID is set up, how your filesystems are created, or how your network filesystems perform.
Three reasons why GNU/Linux is better for Web servers than OS X
Apple's OS X, which has been an official certified Unix system for some time now, is often installed onto Internet-exposed or intranet-only Web servers for serving up dynamic content. I've worked with such configurations for a couple of years, and with GNU/Linux alternatives for even longer. There are at least three reasons why GNU/Linux systems do the job better.
Big Buck Bunny builds a better Blender
Big Buck Bunny is the colorful product of the Peach open movie project: an animated short released online and on DVD. But in addition to the 'toon itself, Peach has produced an altogether different yield: improvements to the Blender 3-D modeling application. Like its predecessor Project Orange, Peach pushed the open source tool forward with the demands of a real-world media production, in a way that hobbyist usage cannot. Could other free software projects use the same model?
Win4Lin 5.0 makes big improvements
There is no dearth of software that can help you run that indispensable Windows app over Linux. Win4Lin has managed to survive through the years as an inexpensive tool for people who like to pay for support. The recently released Win4Lin 5, available for $30 a pop, has shrugged off the shortcomings of its predecessor and delivers on its "near native-performance" promise.
Three image extensions for WordPress
Images are an important part of an attractive, eye-catching blog. Well-chosen images can highlight and capture the essence of your communication, helping your audience to better appreciate your message. Here are three WordPress extensions that help you gain more control over the photos and graphics you want to display on your blog.
Ask Linux.com: Specialty distros, startup scripts, and a whole new forum
In this week's junket through the latest and greatest from the Linux.com forums, we look at Linux distributions for security testing, gaming, and the visually impaired, writing your own startup scripts, and our new forum for job seekers.
Ten sticking points for new Ubuntu users
With Ubuntu, Canonical has had notable success in convincing people to switch from other platforms, but potential Ubuntu users are still running into trouble in several areas. Having spent some time on Canonical's forums, I've identified 10 points that seem to be common sticking points for new users -- that is, problems that have the potential to prevent a new user from adopting Ubuntu in the long term. These problems span the entire Ubuntu experience, but they all have two things in common: they are all serious enough to evoke the dreaded "I tried Linux but it didn't work" excuse, and they are all solvable.
