Monthly Archive:: October 2009

Qt4 Ported to Haiku, Developer Preview Release Available

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-27 Qt 113 Comments

The Haiku alpha is barely out the door, and we already have another important news item about the open source reimplementation of the BeOS. About 18 months ago, Evgeny Abdraimov started porting the Qt4 graphical toolkit to Haiku, and now, we ave some seriously epic screenshots showing a multitude of Qt4 applications running in Haiku, as well as a developer preview release.

How Computers Are Changing Language

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-27 Office 124 Comments

In the comments on our editorial about language purism and the Psystar case, it became quite clear that language is a subject almost everyone has an opinion on - not odd if you consider that language is at the very centre of what makes us "human". Since this appears to be a popular subject, let's talk about the influence computing has had on two very minor aspects of the Dutch language.

We Hate the Wall Wart

David Adams 2009-10-26 Hardware 43 Comments

The "wall wart" is one of humanity's worst inventions (not counting all of the inventions that are actually intended to kill and maim each other, I'll admit). AC-plug power supplies are a cheap workaround to various engineering, economic, and regulatory problems that manufacturers face, and they solve those problems by pushing them off onto end users. So what can we do about it? OSNews takes a look at an ingenious workaround to the Wall Wart problem, and some hopeful trends that might make them a thing of the past.

Submitted by poundsmack 2009-10-26 Microsoft 39 Comments

Anyone who has ever dealt with Microsoft Outlook will know the .pst file format - it's the binary, undocumented file in which all data from Outlook is stored - emails, contacts, calendar, you name it, it's in there. Microsoft has announced that it will release detailed technical documentation on the Outlook .pst data format.

Apple, Psystar: Purism & Confidence

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-25 Editorial 192 Comments

A couple of years ago, a professor at my university had a very interesting thought exchange with the class I was in. We were a small group, and I knew most of them, they were my friends. Anyway, we had a talk about language purism - not an unimportant subject if you study English in The Netherlands.

Windows 7, Macs, Apple

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-25 OS News 9 Comments

Another week has passed us by, so it's time for another Week in Review. This week was obviously dominated by the release of Windows 7, but Apple was also in the news often, reporting yet another stellar quarter, and of course updating its entire line of consumer Macs.

The Future of AmigaOS4: a Roadmap

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-23 Amiga & AROS 54 Comments

Yes, we are continuing our new-found fascination with the Amiga platform, by reporting to you straight from the floors of AmiWest and Pianeta Amiga. Chris Handley consolidated all the information from these two Amiga shows into one handy post, and the future of the AmigaOS looks bright indeed! Update: More planned features have emerged. Read on for the update.

MS Sees Stronger Earnings than Expected, Revenue Still Declined

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-23 Microsoft 14 Comments

"Microsoft announces another quarter of revenue declines, but results were still stronger than expected, thanks to what Microsoft executives referred to as 'cost discipline' and a streamlining of business divisions. With the release of Windows 7 on Oct. 22, consumers and businesses may be in the mood to buy new PCs and Microsoft products."

Apple To Add Windows 7 Support to Boot Camp Later This Year

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-23 Windows 8 Comments

Apple has stated on its website that will add support for Windows 7 to Boot Camp later this year. "Apple will support Microsoft Windows 7 (Home Premium, Professional, and Ultimate) with Boot Camp in Mac OS X Snow Leopard before the end of the year. This support will require a software update to Boot Camp."

Submitted by poundsmack 2009-10-23 macOS 95 Comments

John Siracusa, the Mac OS X guru who writes those insanely detailed and well-written Mac OS X reviews for Ars Technica, once told a story about the evolution of the HFS+ file system in Mac OS X - he said it was a struggle between the Mac guys who wanted the features found in BeOS' BFS, and the NEXT guys who didn't really like these features. In the end, the Mac guys won, and over the course of six years, Mac OS X reached feature parity - and a little more - with the BeOS (at the FS level).

Submitted by poundsmack 2009-10-23 Wireless 31 Comments

Ahead of schedule, the Symbian Foundation has released the source code to Symbian's EKA2 real-time, multitasking, SMP microkernel, under the Eclipse Public License. It comes with a complete development kit, free of charge. The Foundation's plan is to open up the entire platform, and this is of course a very important milestone in that process.

Submitted by JayDee 2009-10-23 Hardware 52 Comments

As if selling non-Apple labelled computers with Mac OS X pre-installed and licensing the technology to do so to third parties wasn't enough, Psystar has now moved ahead and has started offering its Rebel EFI package for everyone to buy and use. It makes it possible for just about anyone to install Mac OS X on a non-Apple labelled computer.

The Book of Inkscape

Eugenia Loli 2009-10-23 Graphics 12 Comments

NoStarchPress sent us in the newly released "Book of Inkscape", written by Dmitry Kirsanov, who is also one of the core developers of Inkscape.

Windows 7 Ad Campaign Kicks Off, Focuses on Features

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-22 Windows 107 Comments

I never thought it was possible, but as it turns out, Microsoft has managed to produce some pretty good commercials for its brand new operating system, Windows 7. They are quite product-oriented, and carry the slogan "I'm a PC and Windows 7 was my idea".

Submitted by google_ninja 2009-10-22 Oracle and SUN 32 Comments

"Digital civil liberties organization Open Rights Group, Knowledge Ecology International and software developer Richard Stallman tell the EC in a letter that they are concerned about Oracle's possible squashing of competition in the database market by abandoning MySQL."

CentOS 5.4 Released

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-22 Red Hat 9 Comments

The fourth update in the CentOS Linux 5 family is released. Highlights of the new release include a kernel-based virtual machine virtualization, alongside of Xen virtualization technology. The scalability of the virtualization solution has been incremented to support 192 CPUs and 1GB hugepages, GCC 4.4 and a new malloc(), clustered, high-availability filesystem etc. Grab a CD set from a mirror, and via BitTorrent 32bit, 64bit DVD. On a related note, if you are already running CentOS-5.3 or an older CentOS-5 distro, simply upgrade it over the Internet.

Interview with Hongyu Chi, of ReelDirector

Eugenia Loli 2009-10-22 Multimedia, AV No Comments

Today we feature a mini interview with Hongyu Chi, president at Nexvio Inc., the company that brought us the very first true video editor for the iPhone 3Gs, the ReelDirector. Check in for more!

Host Your Windows 7 Party Today

David Adams 2009-10-22 Humor 19 Comments

Funny Or Die has posted a video showing you how to have your very own party to celebrate today's Windows 7 release. It's strikingly similar, yet importantly different from the video that Microsoft put out a couple of weeks ago.

Nokia Sues Apple for Patent Infringment

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-22 Legal 87 Comments

Remember when Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone, and proclaimed, to much applause, that they patented the hell out of it? Well, apparently Apple likes to boast about its own patents, but when it comes to dealing with other's they're not so willing. That is, if you believe Nokia: the largest phone manufacturer in the world has sued Apple for patent infringement.

Windows 7 Hits the Shelves

Thom Holwerda 2009-10-22 Windows 102 Comments

It's October 22 today. A completely random date in the grand scheme of things (we Dutch lost a big naval battle to the Ming dynasty on October 22 1633), but it also happens to be the release date of the newest version of Windows - Windows 7. Since Windows is still the most popular desktop operating system out there, this is pretty big news.