Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.95 Beta (Taroon) Review
The latest beta version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, has some useful updates and is significantly more polished than the last beta, according to this review. The review has lots of screenshots.
Macintosh Browser Smackdown at Arstechnica.com
For an alternative OS to be a viable desktop contender, it must have a good web browser. Mac OS X's biggest stumbling block at its introduction was its limited selection of (slow) web browsers. Things have changed. Now there are more than 9 to choose from. Ars Technica has a head-to-head comparison. Gecko-based browsers stand out in speed and functionality, but look like ports, while Safari earns the top spot for just being well put together. In a similar vein Mac P2P outlines the various P2P options for Mac users.
Websites Down Due to Patents
Multiple readers submitted this newsbit: Linux related websites all over the net are down "due to software patents. Spotted so far are: the Gnome website, the KDE website, and Knoppix homepage. All pages point a visitor to http://swpat.ffii.org. Update: This topic seems to need clarification. These sites are down in protest of a proposed patent law in the EU that many people believe is too broad and will hurt rather than protect the rights of software developers. Read the "swpat.ffii.org" site for more details.
Possible Linux 2.6.0 Release Date
As we all anxiously await the release of Linux 2.6, we hear speculations on the final date ranging from early September to late December. A fellow optimist from comhem.se has posted this graph showing predictions based on the kernel's current rate of progress. It was composed using the compile statistics from John Sherry of OSDL. This chart suggests a release date of the 12th of October.
The SCO Saga Continues
SCO's own Chris Sontag responds to the recent remarks about SCO's presentation of "stolen code." My Take: Is there an IT professional left in America who would ever consider buying SCO software again? Update: It never ends. Novell has joined the fray.
Jupiter Research: No Longhorn Until 2006
Jupiter Research analyst Joe Wilcox believes that Microsoft's upcoming major OS release will not be generally available until 2006, a year later than what Microsoft is currently predicting. He believes that the changes planned are too far-sweeping to be rolled out quickly, when you take into account that developers need time to prepare their software.
GEOS for Apple II Officially Available Again
The
GEOS operating system for the Apple II computer, once very much ahead
of its time, has been officially re-released by its current owner,
Breadbox Computer, LLC. You can now download it for free. I know it could already be downloaded from several
dark corners of the Internet but I thought it might still be worth a
note.
SciTech SNAP Graphics for Linux – 2.0-RC1 Released
SciTech SNAP Graphics for Linux is a simple to use, easy to configure alternative to XFree86 Graphics Drivers. This latest release supports 125 graphics cards on multiple Linux distributions with full 2D acceleration and adds support for the latest hardware from ATI.
1st International DotGNU Collaborative Coding Competition
The DotGNU project is holding an international competition
in the area of collaboratively implementing the
System.Windows.Forms
namespace in the C# class libraries, a GUI framework that will allow developers
and end users to run and develop applications on many different platforms,
anything from GNU/Linux, MS Windows, OS X to even handhelds. Participants will have a chance of winning one of fifteen monetary prizes totalling US$ 4500. The full anouncement
is here.
Apple switching from tcsh to bash
According to MacNN, sources are reporting that the latest developer release of Mac OS X "Panther" has changed its default shell from tcsh to bash. From ISPs using both OSX and Linux, it's kind of good news. It seem that Linux's popularity gives some kind of "prefered shell" status to bash.
PHP 4.3.3 Released
PHP developers have just released PHP 4.3.3. This release fixes a large number of bugs and all users of PHP are urged to upgrade. Full list of fixes can be found in the news file . Read the release announcement here
Report on the Future of Qt
The dot is running a piece on a recent presentation given by Matthias Ettrich, director of Qt development, author of LyX, and founder of KDE, in the annual KDE Developer's Conference in Nove Hardy, Czech Republic. He details what will be new in Qt 4.0, which will be used as a base for the next major version of KDE after 3.2. New features will include much faster startup speed and memory usage as well as a general cleanup of Qt's architecture, including the splitting of GUI and non-GUI related classes in Qt.
Interview with Xouvert’s Jonathan Walther
Interview by David Ford with Jonathan Walther, on fantasy, literature, life and
primarily Xouvert the branch of Xfree86, which he is leading.
Jobs to Speak at Apple Expo in Paris
Rumors have been flying about new 15" Powerbooks, and now we learn that Steve Jobs will be giving a keynote speech at Apple Expo 2003 in Paris on September 16. Though I'm sure it's being saved for one of Steve's "and one more thing" zingers at the end of the speech, it's pretty likely that new 15" Powerbooks (still with a G4, but with illuminated keyboard) will be released.
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Linux 2.4.22 Kernel Released
Hours ago Marcello Tosatti released Linux 2.4.22. This release marks the next version in the 2.4.x stable series of the kernel. A host of changes have been made to wireless networking, adaptec drivers and the ia64 port in addition to many other bugfixes. You can get this new release as a patch from here or as a complete package from here. Changelog here.
It’s official: FreeBSD gets native Java support
No more hours of compiling! Binary distributions of Java on FreeBSD are finally here. The FreeBSD Foundation today announced the availability of a binary distribution of the Java JDK version 1.3.1 for the widely used FreeBSD operating system.Wes Peters of the FreeBSD Core Team commented "This announcement hallmarks a new era of Java support for FreeBSD. Having easy to install binary Java packages will ensure that all users can enjoy the benefits of Java technology on the FreeBSD platform."
ATAng Merged Into FreeBSD -current
Soeren Schmidt announced this weekend that ATAng has been merged into the FreeBSD -current kernel tree. Described by the author as "rather radical changes to the ATA driver", ATAng offers a number of impovements over the old ATA driver. This includes removal of the 'GIANT' lock, an improved framework that supports newer ATA controllers, merging of ATA and ATAPI code, and the removal of numerous bugs.
Developers Get First Good Look at “Longhorn”
After months of speculation, Microsoft plans to give developers their first hard look at the next version of Windows in October.The Redmond, Wash., company expects to release a "developers preview" of the new operating system, code-named Longhorn, at its professional developers conference in Los Angeles. Although it won't be a full beta, or test, version, Microsoft executives have promised it will be more than just "slideware," software that companies haven't been using and don't know when it will be coming.
SGI, SuSE Announce OEM Alliance, Development Agreement
SGI will be bundling SuSE Enterprise Linux on its Altix 3000 64 processor servers and superclusters, beginning in October. SuSE will also provide 3rd-level support to SGI customers.