The Unlocked iPhone
Hi-Mobile.net sent us in an unlocked iPhone for testing. We used the iPhone for almost a month now and it's time to write an editorial-type article on the... unlockiness of it all.
Monthly Archive:: October 2007
Review: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard
"OS X 10.5 Leopard is the best operating system released by Apple so far and runs neck and neck with Ubuntu's Gutsy Gibbon as my favorite operating systems to use. In the past I wanted to get an iMac, but not because of OS X but rather because of their sleek hardware. Now after using Leopard, I want to buy an iMac to run Leopard. Nice job Apple."
More here.
Microsoft Beats Street, Reports Strongest Q1 in 8 Years
Strong sales of new and old products alike led Microsoft to its fastest first-quarter growth in eight years, with the company reporting growth in all five business segments and both revenue and earnings per share that beat analyst expectations. Revenue for the fiscal quarter ended Sept. 30 was up 27 percent at USD 13.76 billion compared to USD 10.81 billion a year ago, Microsoft said Thursday. Consensus estimates from Thomson First Call analysts were for the company to generate revenue of USD 12.57 billion. Microsoft's EPS for the quarter was USD 0.45, which also soundly beat Thomson First Call consensus estimate of USD 0.39. Net income for the quarter was USD 4.29 billion, a 23 percent increase over the USD 3.48 billion reported a year ago. At USD 5.92 billion, operating income for the quarter also had double-digit percentage growth: an increase of more than 25 percent over operating income reported for the same period last year of USD 4.47 billion.
Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Released
Today, Apple is unleashing Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard onto the world. It's already available to people in Australia and New Zealand (you liking it, Kaiwai?), and Europe and the US will follow later today. There's an article on what's new for Ruby developers, while others want to figure out what Leopard means to the 'enterprise' (I love those silly business terms). Update by AS: My copy of Leopard was slated for a 10AM delivery, but didn't arrive. I called FedEx and a CSR told me that an internal memo was just released; Apple has apparently waved the shipping deadline for all packages today and requested delivery be rescheduled at the end of the business day. Update 2 by AS: Ok, we've received our copy. How about you other US'ers?
Gobe Productive Running in Haiku
Gobe Productive v2.0.1 now works in Haiku. "I've played with GoBE Productive for half an hour now, and it seems remarkedly stable. Gobe Productive is a unique piece of software, and one of the darlings of BeOS software. This will surely fill a much needed gap in the office suite department, despite the software's age! It's also testament to the vision of enabling backwards compatibility to BeOS application, and how good Haiku is at it."
The Linux-based Neuros OSD
Neuros Technology did it again: one more of their interesting media products hits the market, and this time it uses Linux. We used the Neuros OSD this past week and here's what we think about it.
‘Apple’s Leopard Leaps to New Heights’
"What's new in Leopard? A lot. From the unified interface (goodbye, brushed aluminum) to major under-the-hood changes, to wholly new apps, Leopard is a substantial, albeit evolutionary, advance for Mac OS X that builds on a solid foundation and adds a modicum of eye candy to reinforce the notion that this is something new and improved. It's also fast - especially impressive given the new graphics sprinkled throughout the OS."
‘Linux Losing Market Share to Windows Server’
Submitted by
"Experts say that migrations from Unix to Linux have slowed down because all the low-hanging fruit has now been picked. Linux growth in the U.S. x86 server market has, over the past six quarters, started to falter and reverse its positive course relative to Windows Server and the market as a whole." More here.
pt. I: Spatial Memory
This is the first article in a series on common usability and graphical user interface related terms. On the internet, and especially in forum discussions like we all have here on OSNews, it is almost certain that in any given discussion, someone will most likely bring up usability and GUI related terms - things like spatial memory, widgets, consistency, Fitts' Law, and more. The aim of this series is to explain these terms, learn something about their origins, and finally rate their importance in the field of usability and (graphical) user interface design. We start off with spatial memory - my personal favourite.
Opera 9.5 Beta Released
Submitted by
The first Beta of Opera 9.5 has been released. "Opera 9.5 adds Full Text History Search allowing you to access find pages you forgot to bookmark by simply typing just a few words into your toolbar! Opera also gives you the ability to Create Search shortcuts from any search field on the Web; and to Synchronize your Bookmarks, Speed Dial with any other Mac or PC computer, your cell phone, or the Opera-powered Nintendo Wii Internet Channel through My Opera."
OpenBSD: Virtualization Security
A thread on the OpenBSD -misc mailing list began by discussing whether or not XEN had been ported to OpenBSD, "is it planned at some point to release a paravirtualized xen kernel for OpenBSD 4.3 or 4.4?" Later in the discussion it was suggested that virtualization should be a priority for security reasons, "virtualization seems to have a lot of security benefits." OpenBSD creator Theo de Raadt strongly disagreed with this assertion, "you've been smoking something really mind altering, and I think you should share it."
Reviews: Mac OS X Leopard
Three reviews of Mac OS X Leopard, to be released coming Friday. David Pogue writes: "Leopard is powerful, polished and carefully conceived. Happy surprises, and very few disappointments, lie around every corner. This Leopard has more than 300 new spots - and most of them are bright ones." Walt Mossberg concludes: "Leopard isn't a must-have for current Mac owners, but it adds a lot of value. For new Mac buyers, it makes switching even more attractive." Edward C. Baig of USA Today writes: "With Leopard, Apple's operating system widens its lead aesthetically and technologically. Whether the sixth major release of OS X in as many years puts a dent in Microsoft's dominant market share is another matter entirely." Thanks to MacWereld.nl for pointing these reviews out.
Red Hat Voices Concerns Over Microsoft Patent Model
While Red Hat welcomed Microsoft's recent decision to comply with the European Court of First Instance's antitrust ruling, Michael Cunningham, general counsel for Red Hat, stated that the company was still concerned about Microsoft's patent model. "We are reviewing the European Commission's announcement in the Microsoft abuse case and congratulate the Commission on the improvements announced," Cunningham said in a statement. "Our enthusiasm is somewhat tempered, however, by concerns that the patent arrangements may have not been made compatible with open-source licensing, especially given the pro-competitive effects to consumers of the open-source model."
Fair User Scheduling for Linux
The Completely Fair Scheduler was merged for the 2.6.23 kernel. One CFS feature which did not get in, though, was the group scheduling facility. Group scheduling makes the CFS fairness algorithm operate in a hierarchical fashion: processes are divided into groups, and, within each group, processes are scheduled fairly against one another. At the higher level, each group as a whole is given a fair share of the processor. The grouping of processes is done in user space in a highly flexible manner; the control groups (formerly 'process containers') mechanism allows a management daemon to classify processes according to almost any policy.
Ubuntu 7.10 Pragmatic Visual Presentation Critique
"The purpose of this article is not to emphasize the strengths and merits of Ubuntu user experience, but instead to shed a brighter light on areas that have been neglected due to shortage of time and resources, usability testing, and various software and artwork defects. I hope those who are sometimes overprotective of open-source software will take my recommendations with a pinch of salt and see this article for what it really tries to be: a vocal user experience report and constructive criticism."
Gimp 2.4 Released
The Gimp 2.4 was released today and it includes a number of new features, like scalable brushes, align tool, new selection tools, color Management and soft-proofing, Red Eye removal and much more. Unfortunately, there is still no 16bit per pixel support, which is useful for digital photography editing.
ZFS Puts Net App Viability at Risk?
Submitted by
In a blog post, Sun's Jonathan Schwartz has announced that Sun will counter-sue Net App, after negotiations proved to be fruitless. "So now it looks like we can't avoid responding to their litigation, as frustrated as I am by that (as I said, we have zero interest in suing them). I wanted to outline our response (even if it tips off the folks at Net App), and for everyone to know where we're headed. First, the basics. Sun indemnifies all its customers against IP claims like this. Second, Sun protects the communities using our technologies under free software licenses. Third, we file patents defensively."
Microsoft Releases Virtual Machine Additions for Linux
Submitted by
Microsoft has released its Virtual Machine Additions for Linux. "Virtual Machine Additions for Linux are designed to improve the usability and interoperability of running qualified Linux operating systems as guests or virtual machines of Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1." Red Hat and SUSE are the obvious supported guests.
Asian Linux Distributor Strikes Patent Covenant with Microsoft
Submitted by 
Turbolinux has followed Novell, Linspire, and Xandros in signing a patent and technology agreement with Microsoft. "In a deal that could lead to the creation of a unique cross-platform authentication system for heterogenous networks, Tokyo-based Linux distributor Turbolinux announced this morning, Japan time, it has reached an agreement with Microsoft for a cross-licensing of the two companies' patent portfolios."
The Helios-Labs H4000 DVD/DivX Player
Helios Labs sent us in their H4000 Upscaling DVD/DivX player for an introduction. While at OSNews we are mostly focused on system software, it is interesting to check out such devices from time to time, because of their added video features over the stock products usually found in the market.