● 09.15.09

● Links 15/09/2009: HP PCs to Boot Linux, gNewSense 2.3 Released

Posted in News Roundup at 7:30 am by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

• Because OpenSolaris is advertised as a desktop distribution, it’s fair to compare it with current Linux distributions. However, the first thing you notice is that the operating system is much slower than Ubuntu on the same hardware, so don’t think about installing it on older hardware. For the rest it looks like a fairly standard Gnome desktop, although NetworkManager is replaced by an application called Network Auto Magic, which does more or less the same thing but has fewer features.

• If you are thinking that Linux, and sometimes even Windows, can do multiple monitors, there is a very large problem with how some implementations work. For Windows, each monitor is it’s own separate workspace, and this has some hugely important implications. If you put two monitors on Windows, and drag a video, or something that uses overlays, so it spans two screens, half of the image or movie will not display.

• Both Envy machines will ship with Windows 7, by the way, and they come with the baby QuickWeb Linux environment that lets users open up the laptop and punch up a Web browser, email client, media player in a few seconds instead of waiting for Windows to load.

Games

• Koonsolo Games, an independent game studio that developed Mystic Mine, is amazed at the rate which Linux users are purchasing their game. We know that Linux gamers are excited for new games, but Koonsolo has released figures showing the proportion of Linux gamers to those on Windows and Mac OS X. Surprisingly, the Linux market-share is not in third, but second!

• Contrary to earlier reports stating that the forthcoming id Tech 5 engine from id Software would likely not be ported to Linux due to the involved work, cost, and lackluster Linux graphics drivers (according to John Carmack), it looks like we will end up seeing this next-generation game engine running with Linux.

Desktop

• Additional to this website (which is by no means a successful venture, but costs me nothing to support), I run a small computer business out of Casa Grande, Arizona. After dealing with dozens of clients with their own individual needs and wants, I have come to one conclusion regarding the Linux operating system. The average user LOVES Linux!

• So why is Linux different? It needed to be. The Windows way of computing is proprietary. Meaning that it can’t be replicated or improved upon unless it is done by Microsoft. Microsoft decides what features the users get, they decide how you are to use your computer and they decide when to stop supporting their purchased products, the latter also decides when you buy a new computer. Because of all these restrictions, users are trapped into having to adopt other similarly restrictive products. Since this business model is copyrighted, it can’t be modified, so a new way had to emerge.

• Not everyone is going to be as receptive to Linux as my Aunt Jean was; on the contrary, I think where Jean saw lots of opportunity for a new way of doing things, most people react with “OMG THIS IS DIFFERENT! PUT WINDOWS BACK!”, and that’s to be expected. But I think the important thing is to stick to your guns, and keep to that bargain. You’ll find that in doing so, those technically challenged friends and relatives will either be easily-supported converts, or will no longer bother you with Windows problems that need to be constantly untangled.

• Installation 1: Ubuntu for serious work

• This installation is meant to be used for actual, productive stuff, not just fun. I booted the latest Ubuntu 9.04 64-bit CD and the real fun started. Everything worked out of the box. Simply everything.

• All that being said, the move to Linux computing is becoming more noticeable now than ever before. Without the economic crisis to factor in to people’s spending decisions, people probably wouldn’t have considered the Linux option as strongly as they’re doing today. When every dollar saved counts, the decision to go Linux may be more about cost savings than anything else, but that might be what it takes to get people to try the OS computer geeks have been raving about for years. Give Linux a shot, and you might be surprised.

Kernel Space

• As Google rolls out GFS2 – a major update to the custom-built file system underpinning its online infrastructure – the company’s former infrastructure don sees no reason why the open source world can’t follow suit.

• 2) Improved desktop speed. Due to some recent changes in the kernel, when Linux systems started running out of memory, the kernel was set up so that PROT_EXEC pages, memory pages that usually belong to currently running foreground programs were being mishandled. Instead of being kept in the memory cache, they were being written to disk until they were needed. As anyone who’s ever done system optimization knows, the last place you want frequently accessed or active desktop programs is on disk. In a worst case scenario, your performance can slow down by 1000% or more. Yuck!

• But now, Linux’s memory management has been improved so that currently running programs stay on top of the list of active memory pages. Technical benchmarks show that netbook users and other people who run Linux on limited memory systems can except to see a desktop that’s up to 50% faster than it’s been in the recent past.

• Q: What are you most looking forward to at the debut year of LinuxCon?

• A: I always try to get an early sense of the vibe of a conference. Is there excitement among the participants? Are people looking forward to creating more technical innovation and greater business growth? Is the community expanding? Are there grand challenges that developers are ready to leap into? I think I’ll see, hear, and feel all that at LinuxCon. I’m also looking to meet in person many of the people involved with the Linux Foundation.

Applications

• Money Maneger Ex (MMEX) is cross platform. The developer provides editions for both Windows and Linux (Mac users are out of luck). Proceeding to the download page, the site will detect your OS. Linux users are given choices of a download for Ubuntu, OpenSuse, and Slackware. Ubuntu users have a further choice between 32 and 64 bit versions. While not covering all of us, most people will be able to use it.

• Kanagram mixes up the letters of a word, creating an anagram. You have to guess what the mixed up word is. Kanagram is a great children’s Linux program that features several built-in word lists, hints, and a cheat feature which reveals the original word. Kanagram also has a vocabulary editor, so you can make the game be as hard as you want it to be.

• Chances are, when you’ve needed to learn something by rote memorization you’ve turned to flash cards (multiplication tables, anyone?). There are plenty of ways to learn things that require instant recall but few are as effective as flash cards. The next time you need to memorize a bunch of facts, give one of these desktop and mobile open source flash cards applications a try.

• Zoom is an essential performance analysis tool for all Linux developers and users. Version 1.5 features several enhancements to help increase programmer productivity and optimize Linux application performance. This reduces costs by making software faster and more energy efficient. Zoom is available for $199 (USD) and offers a 30-day free evaluation period.

• The Bordeaux Technology Group released Bordeaux 1.8.4 for Linux today. Bordeaux 1.8.4 fixes a critical bug in our wget implementation. If you have had problems with Bordeaux 1.8.2 not installing a application we recommend you update to 1.8.4 and the problem should now be resolved. There has also been a couple other small bug fixes and tweaks.

Desktop Environments

• Bluecurve is a desktop theme for GNOME and KDE created by the Red Hat Artwork project. The main aim of Bluecurve was to create a consistent look throughout the Linux environment, and provide support for various Freedesktop.org desktop standards. It has been used in Red Hat Linux since version 8.0, and Fedora Core. Enterprising GUI artists have created themes that emulate the Bluecurve theme on other operating systems, including Windows.

• I have mentioned a lot of console applications over the past few weeks, but usually either in conjunction with screen-vs, or with something running under X, like Musca.

• The first Open-PC survey is now finished. Over 12,000 people participated in our survey with interesting results: 48% choose KDE as the Desktop. 42% choose GNOME and 9% choose Xfce. 52% chose Amarok as mediaplayer and 88% choose Firefox as default Browser.

Distributions

• Pros: Includes free software only. Easy install. Good selection of software. Cons: Somewhat unattractive desktop theme and wallpaper. Suitable For: Beginner, intermediate or advanced Linux users. Summary: Trisquel Linux is best suited for those who prefer not to have non-free software included in their desktop distributions. Beyond that much of what it offers can already be found in other, better known distributions. Rating: 3.5/5

• The excellent Mandriva Control Center allows you to most of the above. Below are a few more MCC screen shots to show how easy it is to manage your system to graphically.

Red Hat Family

• CentOS or Community ENTerprise Operating System is often compared to Fedora in various Internet forums. CentOS is essentially a community supported free and open source operating system based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It’s targeted at people looking for enterprise-class operating system stability without the cost of certification and support. Whereas Fedora is a Red Hat sponsored, RPM based, free and open source operating system that runs the latest versions of software.When it comes to commercial use CentOS scores highly over Fedora. Let’s see 10 benefits of CentOS over Fedora.

• Laurus Technologies, Inc., a privately-held Itasca, Ill.-based consulting and technology solutions provider, announced today a partnership with Red Hat, Inc. to expand its presence in the free and open source software community. Red Hat is known in the industry as a major Linux distribution vendor and a leading purveyor of middleware, applications and management products.

Debian Family

• Karmic’s session applet icons have been updated to a new set of stylish glossy status symbols.

• wattOS is a lightweight Ubuntu based Linux distro designed to run on low power computers and recycled systems. The main goal of the project is to create a full featured operating system with low energy consumption.

• The gNewSense project is pleased to announce version 2.3 of its 100% FSF Free GNU/Linux distribution, in the form of a point update to the release codenamed ‘deltah’.

• Here is an how to for booting GnewSense from usb drive. GNewSense is a complete Free Operating System and is recommended by Free Software Foundation (FSF). It is derived from Ubuntu. The current version is 2.2 as of writing this post. Since the proprietary components are removed from the Kernel (Linux) and the OS it boots much faster.

• I installed gNewSense and have taken these screenshots to share in hopes a few users will give it a shot.

Devices/Embedded

• 6WINDPath is an easy to install and easy to use end-to-end solution. 6WINDPath ensures any existing application running on single-core architectures, using a standard Linux networking stack, can be made to seamlessly and transparently work on a multicore-based architecture.

• Control4 announced a home energy management system designed for “smart grid” interaction, and announced version 2.0 of its Linux-based Control4 Home Automation software. The Control4 Energy Management System (EMS) 100 combines an “EC-100″ home area network (HAN) controller with ZigBee-enabled “WT-100″ wireless thermostats and energy-management software, the company says.

Phones

• The Nokia N900 net tablet’s hardware is impressive enough, but its real selling point is the all new, multitasking Maemo 5 operating system. Espoo’s proud of what it can do, and to show it off, it’s launching its very own, Nokia endorsed hacking competition for crafty coders. Want to get involved? Keep reading to find out how.

Sub-notebooks

• Global netbook shipments are expected to reach 25-30 million units in 2009, but opinions are divided over the outlook for 2010 with some netbook players forecasting volumes to grow, while others believe shipments will stay flat.

• The succes of Netbooks also surprised Microsoft & forced them to lower the prices of their XP Home licenses, to regain marketshare over Linux.

Free Software/Open Source

• Two things about Haiku stand in stark contrast to Linux. The first is the licensing — it’s far more liberally licensed than Linux, and so lends itself to being shaped and implemented in far broader ways. The other is how Haiku is developed — as a total desktop stack, rather than a kernel plus userland tools plus windowing system plus window manager, etc., etc. It’s already made a great deal of difference in terms of the way the whole thing feels and works. It embodies elegance, even if some of the individual windowing/UI metaphors are a bit aged and could use some slicking-up.

• Still using Thunderbird? Mozilla Thunderbird is very good for sure. but If you haven’t used Spicebird yet, You are missing too much. However its still a beta.

• Apple has opened the source code of Grand Central Dispatch, a sophisticated concurrency framework for OS X. Although this move opens the door for eventually bringing GCD to other platforms, there are still a number of licensing and technical issues that will impede efforts to adopt it on the Linux operating system.

SaaS

• The eyeOS developers have announced that eyeOS 2.0 will be available on January 1st, 2010. EyeOS, dubbed the “cloud computing operating system” by its creators, is a webtop environment where a server presents the users desktop within a web browser. The Affero GPL3 licensed project, which debuted in 2005 and was released as version 1.0 in 2007, has been developing version 2.0 for a year. The result of this development is a new desktop and new focus on collaboration.

• Much of project’s polish is due to the fact that OpenGoo is sort of a distribution of other office productivity-related open-source projects. By tapping pre-existing components, such as the widely used FCKEditor for document creation and editing, OpenGoo has managed to progress much more quickly than if the project had been built from scratch.

Programming

• The hosting of BleachBit’s web site, bug tracker, and blog has bounced between SourceForge, Google’s Blogger, Launchpad, Google App Engine, and SourceForge again. Certainly there have been some lessons learned on the strengths and weaknesses of each hosting provider. These may be useful to other open source projects choosing a web host—particularly for demanding, dynamic sites.

Leftovers

• When the Internet hit 40 years old — which, by many accounts, it did earlier this month — listing the epochal changes it has brought to the world was an easy task.

• It delivers e-mail, instant messaging, e-commerce and entertainment applications to billions of people.

Intellectual Monopolies

• None of the materials seem to recognize that technology has also changed the production, promotion and distribution of new works, and none seem to recognize that content creation can come from those outside of the big corporate entities who paid for these materials in the first place. Again, it’s worth asking: why does any educational institution or education professional use such obviously biased (and at times misleading) educational materials?

• In this case, they’re demanding hundreds of thousands of dollars from three people who helped translate a bunch of films, and run a site for more such fansubs. What a world we live in when those who do free labor for you are worthy of being sued for huge cash amounts.

• Last year, RDR books endeavored to publish an unauthorized encyclopedia of all things Harry Potter. Warner Brothers filed suit, and the resulting litigation turned out to be a fascinating fight over the precise contours of copyright law’s “derivative work” right.

• Heaping criticism and scorn on media companies has worked well for Mike Masnick, operator of the popular blog Techdirt.

• Mike Masnick thinks alternative business models for the music, film, and publishing sectors are out there. He wants to help find them.

• Masnick is the firey commentator who blasts copyright owners and anyone else he believes has failed to accept that in the Digital Age most of the control now rests with consumers. He strongly maintains, however, that there are still ways for entertainers, artists, and journalists to make money. They just have to be developed. Plenty of people disagree with him of course.

• However, when they ask him about piracy, and whether or not it makes him angry (around 2 minutes), he responds that: he sees it as a part of the marketing of a musician, because “the people who didn’t purchase the material…

• D&S: Why did you self-publish the book and not try to go the traditional publishing route?

• MH: I self-published the book for two reasons. First, I wanted the book to be accessible to as many students of Moroccan culture as possible and decided to license the book in a special way (using Creative Commons license) to allow people to make copies of it and share them or to make derivate works (like study guides or recordings) without fear of lawsuits (see the book’s license section for more information). Also, I didn’t feel that a major publisher would be interested in publishing a book that wasn’t likely to be a best seller even though the information was of high quality and worth publishing. However, by publishing myself and using a print on demand company, I can list the book on Amazon and make it available and easy to find for people with an interest in the topic (and I’m selling approximately one copy every two days, which is better than I anticipated).

Digital Tipping Point: Clip of the DayJim Hogg teaches GNU Linux to high school kids 03 (2008)Digital Tipping Point is a Free software-like project where the raw videos are code. You can assist by participating. Share in other sites/networks: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. Permalink  Send this to a friend

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