12.01.09

Contents

• GNU/Linux
  • Distributions
  • Devices/Embedded
• Free Software/Open Source
• Leftovers
• Digital Tipping Point: Clip of the Day

GNU/Linux

• Top five business technologies of the ’00s

  1. Linux. If you were going to name the ’00s after any single technology, you might as well call it the Linux decade. The first Linux kernel was released in 1991, but mainstream enterprise adoption of Linux was decidedly a ’00s thing. Not only did Linux open up a whole new role for x86 hardware, it changed the economics and development model of the software business forever.

• Server

  • IBM buys database security start-up Guardium

    The software is intended to help deal with regulatory requirements under legislation such as the European Data Protection Directive and the US federal government’s NIST 800-53 standard. In addition, it targets industry mandates, such as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).

  • IBM hoists Tivoli Monitoring onto Amazon cloud

    The 32-bit IBM Tivoli Monitoring AMI is running on Linux and available for production use.

• Google

  • A Google-eyed view of the world wide web

    Based on Linux, the Chrome OS turns the basic concept of an operating system on its head. The main interface of the system will the browser, with applications incorporated like web pages in a tab strip. Of course, Google will retain the Chrome browser’s minimalist interface, and are said to be working towards security nuts and bolts in such a way as to make viruses and other malware history.

• Instructionals

  • Linux Documentation From A User’s Viewpoint

    I’d like to put in my two cents’ worth on the matter of documentation. I’m not an expert like Carla Schroder or Bruce Byfield, the two who brought up the topic, but I’m the very sort of person who needs it most, still pretty much of a newbie, but one who learns best by reading. It’s a good thing reading is my preferred mode of learning, because as it happens I’ve not personally met a real live human who is a Linux expert, one who could give me over-the-shoulder instructions as I muddle through.

• Distributions

  • Mint 8 Screenshots

• Devices/Embedded

  • Phones

    • Android

      • Droid Nears Its Million-Device Target

        Motorola and Verizon’s $100 million marketing push seems to be paying off: The much-ballyhooed Droid smartphone made by Motorola and powered by Google’s Android 2.0 OS is inching toward its goal of a million devices sold during the fourth quarter of 2009. The two companies have thus far sold between 700,000 and 800,000 Droids, according to data collected by RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Sue.

      • HD-ready smartphone supports Linux and Android

        ZiiLabs announced a mid-range smartphone development platform supporting its Android and Linux-based “Plaszma” stacks. The Zii Trinity is based on ZiiLabs’ dual ARM9-core “ZMS-05″ SoC, and provides 1080p video output, OpenGL graphics, HSDPA, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, and a 3.1-inch, 800 x 480 OLED touchscreen, says the Creative Technology subsidiary.

      • Optus deliberately blocking Android paid apps

        Optus is blocking owners of Android mobile phones from buying paid apps from the Android store, while locking users into long service contracts.

      • Android Market On Archos 5 Internet Tablet

        Issues be gone! The folks at ArchosFans.com have figured out a way for owners of the Archos 5 to get Android Market and all of the Google Apps like Maps, Talk Calendar and more onto the the device!

    • Nokia

      • Qt adds multi-touch, supports Maemo and Symbian

        Nokia’s QT Software has upgraded its “Qt” cross-platform application and UI framework, now featuring multi-touch and gesture support. Qt 4.6 adds support for Nokia’s Symbian and Maemo platforms, and provides enhancements including new animation and state-machine frameworks, an updated Qt Creator IDE, and new OpenGL and WebKit engines.

      • Cross-platform strategy will be next step in Nokia’s transformation

        This began with the 2007 acquisition of Trolltech, which gave Nokia a cross-platform developer toolkit and serious Linux expertise. It became explicit with the launch of the most significant Nokia device for years, the N900, which propelled the Linux-based Maemo OS to center stage from its niche in enterprise mobile tablets. And the next step will be to make key Nokia weapons -Series 60, Trolltech’s tools, and the Ovi services themselves – cross-platform, to extend their reach over the whole industry. That will start with a dual Symbian/Maemo approach, mirroring Google’s for Android/Chrome, but like Google, Nokia will be aiming to see its tools and services on third party systems too.

      • Nokia To Release Linux-Based Phone Next Year

        Finnish cell phone maker Nokia is reportedly planning development of a single new Linux-based smartphone next year.

        A source told Reuters on Monday that Nokia has plans to unveil a new smartphone that would run on the Linux Maemo mobile operating system. The announcement may be troubling to some analysts who expected the firm to launch several Linux smartphones in an effort to outshine the competitors in Apple’s iPhone and Research In Motion’s Blackberry.

      • New Beta of Palm OS Emulator for Nokia Internet Tablets Released

        The most recent beta of the Palm OS emulator for Nokia Internet Tablets was set to expire, but Access Co. Ltd. has released a new one. This has no new other features, however.

Free Software/Open Source

• Sun

  • Oracle-Sun: Statements and observations

    We know they revolve around the open source MySQL database, the European Commission has said that much. But the Statement of Objections weighs in at 155 pages, and even those that have read it admit to being confused by it. Meanwhile some of the most vocal parties in the public debate have vested interests in encouraging opinions for or against the deal.

  • What if Oracle’s buyout of Sun falls through?

    With Oracle’s proposed acquisition of Sun Microsystems stalled by European Union deliberations, industry dignitaries offered mixed perspectives recently on the ultimate fate of the deal and what it could mean for Sun technologies if the deal falls through.

• Mozilla

  • Extend Firefox 3.5 Winners

    Extend Firefox 3.5 has wrapped up and we’re very excited to announce the winners! With so many great entries, choosing winners was difficult- and these add-ons represent some of the best thinking in add-ons today.

  • Open-Xchange Offers New Connector Tool for Thunderbird

    The Community OXtender for Thunderbird is available in two versions. The stable version contains the features mentioned above, and any necessary bugfixes. The unstable version (for Thunderbird 3 and Lightning 1.0pre only) contains additional features that are still under development and not yet fully integrated.

• CMS

  • Drupal 6.14, Introduction and Installation

    With all the great Open Source CMSes out there, it’s getting hard to make a choice as to which one to use for your site. After looking into many such CMSes, I decided to make Drupal the primary CMS for developing websites for my clients. Drupal is open-source software that is distributed under the GPL (“GNU General Public License”) and has a developer community comprised of thousands of users and developers.

• Programming

  • Rails 2.3.5 Unofficial Release Notes

    Rails 2.3.5 is out but the official release notes have not yet appeared. So I thought it might be useful to share my own notes on what’s new in this version. This list is only the highlights, but it should give you an overview.

  • Rails upgrade fixes security issues, Ruby 1.9 compatibility

    Ruby on Rails 2.3.5, featuring security boosts and compatibility improvements for version 1.9 of the Ruby language, was released over the weekend, according to a blog post on the Ruby on Rails Web site.

  • Announcing the Winners of ADC 2

    Back in May at Google I/O, we announced ADC 2 — the second Android Developer Challenge — to encourage the development of cool apps that delight mobile users. We received many interesting and high-quality applications — everything from exciting arcade games to nifty productivity utilities. We also saw apps that took advantage of openness of Android to enhance system behavior at a deep level to provide users with a greater degree of customization and utility. We were particularly pleased to see submissions from many smaller and independent developers.

Leftovers

• Scientology Charged With Slavery, Human Trafficking

• Ozark Officer Who Used Taser on Girl Fired

  Ozark – The mayor of a small Arkansas town says the police officer who used a Taser on an unruly 10-year-old girl has been fired for not using the camera attached to the stun gun.

• Finance

  • No Accountability, No Bernanke

    The Federal Reserve loaned out over $1.2 trillion and they still won’t say who got it. Here’s Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) asking about some of the unaccounted-for money:

    GRAYSON: So who got the money?

    BERNANKE: Financial institutions in Europe and other countries.

    GRAYSON: Which ones?

    BERNANKE: I don’t know.

    GRAYSON: Half-a-trillion dollars and you don’t know who got the money

  • Tough Talk Is Not Enough on Loan Modifications

    As double digit unemployment becomes the major driver of foreclosures and as the vast majority of adjustable rate mortgages have yet to trigger, the White House is finally getting the message that news footage of families being tossed to the curb during the holiday season will not help Democrats going into the 2010 election cycle.

    Tough talk is certainly welcome, but the Obama team doesn’t seem to understand that banks can’t be talked into or even shamed into doing the right thing. The majority simply don’t want to modify loans, and they will not unless they are ordered to do so by a judge.

• AstroTurf

  • Another Brick in Boral’s Wall

    A major Australian building products company, Boral, has been forced to publish a full-page apology for its role in an astroturf campaign against BGC, which was seeking government approval for a new brickworks.

  • A Little Less Work for Lobbyists

    A White House policy of encouraging U.S. government agencies to exclude registered lobbyists from sitting on government advisory boards has irked some business lobby groups. In late September, Norm Eisen, the special counsel to the president for ethics and government reform, announced the administration’s aim of ensuring that “federally-registered lobbyists not be appointed to agency advisory boards and commissions.”

  • Lobbyists pushed off advisory panels

• Internet/Censorship/Web Abuse/Rights

  • Music library disaster? How to rip songs from your iPod

    Admit it: you or someone you know has had at least one disaster in which you have lost your entire music library, didn’t have backups, and needed to rip it back off of your iPod.

    [...]

    Though gtkpod doesn’t officially support the iPhone or iPod touch, it’s one of the simplest solutions available for Linux users. The most recent version, V0.99.14, supports classic iPods (including the iPod nano, iPod shuffle, iPod mini, and iPod video models) and makes use of the shared libgpod library in order to access the iPod’s music database. (iPhone and iPod touch are experimentally supported, but only if they are jailbroken first.)

• Google

  • Shooting victim Michael Trkulja sues Google

    Michael Trkulja claims that a person putting his name into Google’s search engine will be directed to websites where his name and photograph are mixed with underworld figures and crime identities.

  • Google to limit free news access

    Newspaper publishers will now be able to set a limit on the number of free news articles people can read through Google, the company has announced.

  • Huffington: News Corp.’s Google-Free Ploy ‘Ain’t Gonna Happen’

    Count Arianna Huffington among those who doubt that Rupert Murdoch will pull News Corp’s articles from Google’s search index in favor of giving Bing exclusive access.

    “I’ll gladly wager my share of The Huffington Post that this ain’t gonna happen,” she said this morning at the Federal Trade Commission workshop “How Will Journalism Survive the Internet Age.”

  • Rupert Murdoch: Feds Should Stay Out Of News Business, Except, Of Course To Smack Down Google For Sending Me Traffic

    Rupert Murdoch stopped by at an FTC workshop on the future of journalism to say that the federal government should “stay out” of regulating the journalism business. Except, in the same speech he said exactly the opposite. What he meant was that he didn’t want the government to get in the business of funding journalism. Yet, in the very same speech he does say that the government shouldn’t allow Google to link to his news stories, calling it “theft” yet again.