OSnews - Exploring the Future of Computing

One State Left in Microsoft fight

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-16 Legal 36 Comments

The Justice Department and 19 states have made peace with Microsoft Corp. over its monopolistic misdeeds. But Tom Reilly is still on the company’s case. The Massachusetts attorney general is the lone public sector holdout who has refused to settle with the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant over allegations that it attempted to crush competitors with monopolistic tactics.

Should your Application be on the Grid?

Submitted by Frank 2003-07-16 General Development 3 Comments

A Grid computing environment provides the virtual computing resource that will be used to execute applications. The functional components(security, resource managament, informations services, and data managament)of a grid environment, as well as non-functional considerations such as performance requirements or operating system requirements, must be well understood when considering enabling an application to execute in a grid environment. This article helps you determine whether an application is a good candidate to execute in a grid environment.

Apple Offers Premiere-Trade-In Program

Submitted by Alexei Barr 2003-07-16 Multimedia, AV 46 Comments

In response to Adobe's decision to drop the Mac version of Premiere, Apple now offers a trade-in program to entice Premiere users to move to Final Cut Pro/Express. If Adobe users trade in their disks with Apple, they will receive a free copy of Final Cut Express, or a $500 rebate for Final Cut Pro. In other Apple multimedia news, Apple released Soundtrack for $299, a music composing application.

Apple Games: Leveraging Small Market Share

Guest post by Kevin M. Arvin 2003-07-16 Apple 85 Comments

How many hardcore gamers do you know who are also avid Mac users? Probably not many. Windows users have thousands of titles to choose from, and cheap hardware to run their games on. Despite the many virtues of the Mac platform, it is not the first choice of serious gamers. Even the speedy new G5’s will not change that.

Is Unix on Borrowed Time?

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-16 Unix 34 Comments

A CA World panel of Linux luminaries that included Linus Torvalds predicted the demise of Unix over time, saying it will be replaced by Linux. Again, our recent editorial on the subject.

AOL Cuts Remaining Mozilla Hackers

Submitted by Neo Gigs 2003-07-16 Mozilla, Gecko 39 Comments

"It has been learned through public and private sources that AOL has cut or will cut the remaining team working on Mozilla in a mass firing and are dismantling what was left of Netscape (they've even pulled the logos off the buildings). Some will remain working on Mozilla during the transition, and will move to other jobs within AOL." Read the article at MozillaZine. Elsewhere, the MozillaFoundation was created. In other browser news, Epiphany 0.8 was released, and OmniWeb 4.5 beta3 too.

Introducing NeXT – The Wonders of NEXTSTEP and OpenStep

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 OpenStep, GNUstep 85 Comments

Every so often I have this urge (maybe more of an itch) to spend hours and hours on the web trying to find information about old, obsolete computers of the past. I am intrigued by the XEROX Alto and Star ('70s-'82), the Apple Lisa ('83) and, of course, CRAYs ('75-ish). These were revolutionary machines indeed, they wrote golden pages in the history of computing. In the end of the 1980s, a new innovative product was ready to ship, created by a bunch of people coming from Apple: The NeXT platform.

New YellowTAB Screenshots Posted

Submitted by Emanuele 2003-07-15 Zeta 90 Comments

Here are a few screenshots of applications on YellowTAB's Zeta: "BeTunes is coming along well, the TimeLiner management app looks promising, the Tracker configuration is easy and very useful. MeTOS, the developing tool is fully functional and will speed up your coding adventures. AbiWord is a tight word processor and for simple editing use Zedit, the enhanced text editor. As you will see, the Network configuration has dramatically improved over R5. If you develop an app that requires network settings you can add a tab to the configuration panel."

Lycoris Unveils OS For Tablet PC Platform

Submitted by david 2003-07-15 Mandriva, Mandrake, Lycoris 42 Comments

Lycoris unveiled its new OS for the tablet PC, Desktop/LX Tablet Edition, into the hands of tablet manufacturers and resellers this week. Seen as a giant step into a new market for the Linux software company. Tablet Edition gives OEMs and vertical markets access to an inexpensive operating system capable of running on the Tablet PC platform. Read the rest of the press release here.

New Advances in the Filesystem Space, PDF File

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 General Development 23 Comments

The filesystem is a database, but it has always been unsuitable as the computer's primary one. Programmers have to write specialized programs to get the functionality they need. Now, new advances in software like Plan 9, the Reiser 4 filesystem and Linux are making the improvements the filesystem needs to become viable. Plan 9 is using the filesystem as the integral system interface, and the Reiser filesystem is unifying pointlessly different but equivalent namespaces. For operating systems to improve for users (that always includes programmers), they need to incorporate these new ideas.

Sun Seeks to Lure Alpha Users

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 Oracle and SUN 19 Comments

Sun Microsystems Inc. is hoping to lure users of Hewlett-Packard Co.'s Alpha server technology with an incentive program that includes no-risk assessments of migrating to the SPARC/Solaris platform.

Bringing the Apple to the Masses — An Alternative Theory

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 Apple 176 Comments

A few days ago we published an editorial suggesting that Apple should be selling the eMac for 500 bucks or a bare-bones G3-based machine for $200-300 USD, in order to compete with the "cheap PCs" trend today. I was wrong. Creating such price differentation between the G5 and the G3 or eMac would cannibalize the sales of the high-end machines (where more margin for profit exists) and even worse, it would destroy the Apple brand name. But hey, you know me, I am as stubborn as it goes. I discussed the situation with some more people around me and we came up with an alternative plan, which in my opinion, makes more sense business-wise and it has some good potential.

Linux Took on Microsoft, and Won Big in Munich

Submitted by evilEntity 2003-07-15 Linux 70 Comments

A Linux victory in Munich would be a stunning blow. So Ballmer visited Mayor Christian Ude to assure him Microsoft would do what it takes to keep the city's business. Documents obtained by USA TODAY show Microsoft subsequently lowered its pricing to $31.9 million and then to $23.7 million -- an overall 35% price cut. The discounts were for naught.

Nearly 2 Million Active Sites Running FreeBSD

Submitted by Mike Prettejohn 2003-07-15 FreeBSD 47 Comments

Although nearly all of the public focus is geared around advocacy of Linux and Windows, there is a third Intel based operating system, which generates a tiny fraction of the publicity surrounding these operating systems, and has a much smaller user and developer community. FreeBSD secured a strong foothold with the hosting and internet services communities at the genesis of the web and has anything but gone away. Indeed it is the only other operating system that is gaining, rather than losing share of the active sites found by the Web Server Survey, Netcraft says.

New Release Expands Scope of QNX Momentics Dev. Suite

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 QNX 4 Comments

Embedded developers using QNX Momentics Professional Edition, the integrated development suite for the QNX Neutrino RTOS, can now target a broader range of hardware platforms and leverage an array of new features, including an advanced power management framework, a fault-tolerant flash file system, and Big Endian support for ARM-based processors, including network and control-plane processors from Intel. The features are all part of a new supplemental release for QNX Momentics v6.2.1.

The Wonderful World of Linux 2.6

Submitted by Matthew Baulch 2003-07-15 Linux 26 Comments

Joseph Pranevich has written a lengthy article discussing the changes to the Linux kernel for the 2.6 release. It covers topics such as scalability, responsiveness, the re-written IO subsystem, improvements to support for filesystems such as NTFS and XFS in addition to support for new technologies such as Bluetooth and much more.

IBM Advances Linux for Power Chips

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-15 Linux 18 Comments

IBM has put more muscle behind its effort to improve Linux for its Power family of processors, adding dozens of programmers to Big Blue's Linux Technology Center with plans to hire more.

Why Linux is Ready for the Desktop

Guest post by Mike Martin 2003-07-14 Linux 113 Comments

After reading yet another "why Linux is not ready for the desktop" article/discussion, I decided that, as someone who uses Linux exclusively at home, its about time I wrote my response to the attitudes expressed. I have been using Linux since January 1999 (Red Hat 5.2 off of a cover disc).

Commodore Lives?

David Adams 2003-07-14 Games 28 Comments

Tulip Computers, which bought the rights to the Commodore name in 1997, is "taking over" the main C64 web portal and will be making a vast library of old programs and games available, legally, for download.There are still a lot of C64 enthusiasts out there, some using old hardware, but probably many more using emulators to relive their youth. The downside: Tulip is planning on defending its trademarks, which may mean that fan sites might be getting harrassed. More at PC World.

Java at Center of Desktop Battle

Eugenia Loli 2003-07-14 Java 29 Comments

The latest cell phones can show you the nearest bathrooms in San Francisco or which subway to take in London. They can also help with your diet by tracking calorie intake. Behind such programs and more is the very technology at the center of an intense battle between Microsoft Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc. over control of desktop computers. Though Sun has mostly lost that fight, the beleaguered Silicon Valley icon is trying to give new life to its Java programming language with an aggressive push into mobile devices. Once again, it finds a foe in Microsoft. But this time Sun has the lead.