● 09.11.11

● Links 11/9/2011: Linux Tablets for Just $159, Sakai Open Academic Environment (OAE) Reaches 1.0.0

Posted in News Roundup at 8:07 am by Dr. Roy SchestowitzContentsGNU/LinuxGNU/Linux

Desktop

• A few weeks ago I mentioned that I had been playing around with a new distribution of Linux called Bodhi. One of the things I liked was its ability to run on minimal hardware. Its resource requirements were quite low, even to the point of enabling it to run on rather antiquated 386 machines.

Kernel Space

Graphics Stack

Applications

Instructionals/Technical

Wine

• Wine 1.3.27 brought Direct3D multi-sampling support and other features just two weeks ago, but it’s been replaced today by Wine 1.3.28. There’s some exciting changes in this release too with DirectDraw now defaulting to the OpenGL renderer, an initial version of the VBScript parser, and other changes.

Games

• Nooskewl the makers of Monster RPG2 has just released Bobby for Linux. Bobby was already available for the Mac and windows platforms. Bobby is available to purchase for $0.99 direct from their website link below or you can wait for the Ubuntu Software Centre, as it has also according to one of Nooskewl’s tweets recently been submitted to the USC.

• As a refresher, both games were turned into Universal support apps complete with Retina Display support. Also, both games saw a UI overhaul, some music tweaks, and other assorted technical brush-ups, including bug fixes.

Desktop Environments

• Dan’s setup is especially interesting to those trying to deal with audio production in Linux.

Distributions

• Package Management: Debian’s Advanced Packaging Tool, APT, is the package management framework on ALT Linux, with Synaptic Package Manager as the installed graphical interface to apt-get, the most commonly-used command line utility in APT. The version of Synaptic that ships with this version of ALT Linux is Synaptic 0.57.3, which was released in late 2005. Compare that to Synaptic 0.70, the version that comes pre-installed on Linux Mint and Ubuntu. So the graphical interface you have to use on ALT Linux 6 KDesktop is very old. It works, but if you have used Synaptic on other distributions, you feel like you have just stepped back into the last decade.

• Recently I’ve received a bunch of private correspondence from people confused/worried over the change in the default Java packaging for Linux. For many Linux distributions, the official Sun/Oracle version of Java has been packaged up as the default Java for the platform. However, due to a recent licensing change, this will no longer be the case! So, is this a positive or a negative thing for the Java and open source ecosystem? Read on for my take on it

New Releases

• 09 Sept. 2011. version 2.6 is available. make_pelican uses a new and simpler method to add non-Debian software. This latest image was made using the new method, and the image contains the updated tutorial which explains the new system.

Debian Family

Derivatives

Canonical/Ubuntu

• Here’s a quick screenshots tour for Ubuntu 11.10 Beta 1 Oneiric Ocelot, in this post we will go through new features and updated applications added lately to Oneiric Ocelot Beta 1.

Devices/Embedded

Phones

Android

• A report posted by Unwired View on Thursday revealed an unannounced new smartphone from Motorola Mobility, running without the glorious power of Google Android operating system. The site claims the phone was posted in Bluetooth’s official website where certified devices land and get the “approval” for using the technology.

• Samsung’s Galaxy S2, which is expected to reach the U.S. this month, has been released in more than 120 countries. The UK and South Korea were the first ones to receive the device.

• 3D Android phones haven’t really taken off just yet. Even with HTC’s big marketing behind the Evo 3D, and the LG Optimus 3D, we haven’t seen much adoption right out of the gate. It appears that Sharp is staying in the game, though, as they’ve just announced a 3D Android handset that’s headed for Japan’s SoftBank.

• Android seems to be having a difficult time at the moment, but, far from being a sign of increasing problems, Glyn Moody argues that the forking of the mobile operating system by the likes of Amazon and Baidu could work in Google’s favour.

Sub-notebooks/Tablets

• For those that read a previous article of mine, it shows to me why Microsoft wants to “talk up” the desktop – It knows that it won’t be able to compete in the Tablet world and if they follow their Phone legacy, then there will be the excuse of “its still in its infancy” whilst the product matures to a point to compete with others.

• It may be 12 months away (Windows 8 ) but I think we can add another 8 months onto that for “baking”. 2 Years for a ready competitor to Apple and Android Tablets? Yes Microsoft, you better keep talking up the Desktop, maybe you’ll convince a few of your customers.

• Unfortunately Microsoft can no longer dictate to the consumer, for the mainstream majority, I’d suggest Tablets are the future, Tablets I hasten to add that unlike the majority of Desktops, won’t force Microsoft products onto people.

• Barnes & Noble, growing increasingly serious about their Android efforts, has begun touting the benefits of their NOOK App Developer program. I recently spent some time speaking with Claudia Romanini, Director of Developer Relations and learned that NOOK Apps has been an all-around success. App downloads are already in the millions and developers are making money. According to Romanini, there are now more than 500 apps to choose from with many more on the way. The number of developers signed up for the program has eclipsed 10,000 more than doubling in the last few months. About that all-important money, I was advised that some developers have seen earnings of more than $100,000 in their first 30 days.

Free Software/Open Source

Events

Web Browsers

Mozilla

• If you’re part of the Free Software community or the Open Web community, you’re welcome to come to the Mozilla offices, take a seat, and talk to us. You’ll probably find some Mozilla volunteers hanging around.

SaaS

• Hadoop is an open-source data-management software framework. It’s useful for companies that store enormous amounts of data and have to regularly index it. That can include financial services companies that have to track previous prices and old transactions or companies like Yahoo that need to regularly access search information. Platfora aims to add a more manageable user interface to access all that and make the data easier to digest for everyday users and business professionals.

• HPCC Systems, the division of LexisNexis Risk Solutions dedicated to big data, has released the open source code of its data-processing-and-delivery software it’s positioning as a better version of Hadoop. The High Performance Computing Cluster code is available on Github, and it marks the commencement of HPCC Systems’ quest to build a community of developers underneath Hadoop’s expansive shadow.

Databases

• Open-source products, like MySQL and PostgreSQL, brought relational database functionality to the masses at a fraction of the price of a commercial Oracle, IBM or even Microsoft database. MySQL led the pack of free, or almost free, contenders — customers typically paid for support, not the database itself. Sun Microsystems bought MySQL in January 2008 and open-source fans saw Sun, which fostered many open-source projects, as a worthy caretaker.

Education

• The Sakai Open Academic Environment (OAE) steering group and project team are pleased and excited to announce that the OAE 1.0.0 is now available.

• Combining academic ideals with the prowess and resources of industry has become a reality already, as campus IT leaders move freely from one sector to the other—blending the best of academia and business to create software that is open for tinkering and supported with corporate capital.

Healthcare

• The Veterans Affairs Department is set to make its open source agent operational tomorrow and make available the software code of various applications in the electronic health records of VA and the Defense Department.

• Users of the applications will also have a method to report back to the open source agent changes to the software.

Business

• If it weren’t for open source (as covered last week), there would be no need for the term “proprietary”.

• Because from a business perspective, “proprietary” is essentially “situation normal”.

• Normal because it’s the notion of a free or community service that to business is in fact pretty unusual.

Project Releases

• Open source Java-based accounting and bookkeeping program Gnuaccounting has been enhanced with new features for cross-platform invoicing.

Public Services/Government

• In the interests of open e-government, India has widely adopted GNU/Linux in governmental organizations from the legislators to the schools. A recent draft of policy formally gives preference to FLOSS. This has been a long process over the last decade. India has lots of divides and has no need of a digital divide so standardizing on FLOSS works for them.

• Press reports have been circulating since the start of this month analysing the government’s attitude towards open source technology procurement. As we now know, the traditional approach within Whitehall has been to opt for some of the most costly proprietary technologies.

• Has this situation occurred due to perceptions of the ‘safety factor’ associated with big brand vendor products?

• Is this a case of ‘nobody ever got fired by buying Microsoft’ asks the BBC’s Rory Cellan-Jones.

• Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has said that he wants to shift mindsets and see more open source software deployment considered across a so-called “level playing field” now.

Openness/Sharing

Open Hardware

• If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ve probably seen us refer to the Arduino microcontroller on a number of occasions. This little circuit board is at the heart of many DIY projects, from robotics to art projects and just about everything in between.

• But what on Earth is Arduino, anyway? What makes it so versatile? And what can you do with it?

Programming

• Google has announced that its seventh annual Google Summer of Code (GSoC) event has come to an end. More than 1,100 university students from 68 countries participated in this year’s event by writing code for 175 open source organisations, 50 of which are new to GSoC. A total of 417 mentoring organisations, including the Blender Foundation, the Debian Project, the GNU Project, the KDE Project, LibreOffice and Mozilla, were accepted in 2011.

Leftovers

Defence/Police/Aggression

• A strikingly good piece of investigative journalism from Associated Press finds that accusations about the damage done by WikiLeaks’ latest release are — yet again — wildly overstated and without any factual basis. These most recent warnings have centered on WikiLeaks’ exposure of diplomatic sources whom the released cables indicated should be “strictly protected.” While unable to examine all of the names in the cables, AP focused on the ones “the State Department seemed to categorize as most risky.” It found that many of them are “comfortable with their names in the open and no one fearing death.”

• Khaled El-Masri was held for weeks by secret agents who missed a letter in his name

Cablegate

• Cassandra Vinograd and Bradley Klapper of the Associated Press conducted a partial review of US State Embassy cables released by WikiLeaks focusing on the sources the State Department “categorized as most risky.” The findings in the report cast further doubt on the official party line the government promotes when commenting on anything WikiLeaks and concludes, US examples of threatened sources have been “strictly theoretical.” The review found “several of them” are “comfortable with their names in the open and no one fearing death.”

• At the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, diplomatic staff routinely spoke to the rightist Chávez opposition during the Bush years. But in 2004, an odd encounter occurred between the Americans and Chávez’s former wife, Herma Marksman, who held a rather disparaging view of the Venezuelan president. Marksman, a history professor who was married to Chávez between 1984 and 1993, told U.S. diplomats that the firebrand populist was ambitious from an early age and “even thought of running the country as a 20 year-old.”

• Kashmiris knew about their leaders all along. They knew they played a many-layered game. So when whistleblower website WikiLeaks recently released cables which the then US ambassador to India David Mulford had sent to the US State Department in February 2006, the contents didn’t surprise many.

• It is a cruel coincidence that in a week in which awful revelations have been tumbling out from WikiLeaks, much of it about the filthy nature of Nigeria’s political elite, the Goodluck Jonathan government insisted on inserting a 100 Days celebration.

• I would have counseled a policy of silence, but perhaps, in their wisdom, they imagined such a celebration would deflect attention from the lamentable revelations.

• A recent interview WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange did with Sueddeutsche Zeitung in Germany features Assange’s take on what happened with the Cablegate release, how the organization has managed to withstand cyber attacks, the organization’s suspicions about OpenLeaks founder and former WikiLeaks spokesperson Daniel Domscheit-Berg and how the organization thinks it has impacted the world.

• One section that sticks out is Assange’s discussion of the denial of service (DoS) attacks the site has managed to withstand.

• Tomorrow’s edition of Sunday Monitor, Uganda’s largest independent newspaper, cites leaked diplomatic cables to report that Ugandan First Lady, Janet Museveni, was behind the Anti-Homosexuality Bill.

Copyrights

• Behind the feelgood story lines and happy endings of even the most bland Hollywood movies lurks a formidable PR machine that exerts a grip on every aspect of a film’s life. From keeping scripts secret, to vetting press interviews with stars, setting embargoes and filming on closed sets, big Hollywood studios jealously guard their projects. After all, hundreds of millions of dollars are often at stake. One slip-up can kill a movie – and a dead movie usually takes a few careers with it.

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