08.23.11

Contents

• GNU/Linux
  • Distributions
  • Devices/Embedded
• Free Software/Open Source
• Leftovers

GNU/Linux

• In love with Linux again

  It’s been a while since I got to play with Linux. My Toshiba laptop is Linux-proof for some reason and the Asus EEE 701 4G has been in active duty. Now I have another netbook and it came with Windows 7 which was great. I became dependent on a lot of Windows only programs, the Rockmelt browser for example.

  Then after a couple of months Windows 7 took forever to not only boot…

• GNU/Linux Rules in Brazil

  I visited Dell’s Brazilian site. Hard to find anything Linux-like there…

• Good Luck Lincs LUG

  Over the last few days, there’s been a bit of activity of the .lug.org.uk mailing lists, regarding the rebirth/re-vamp/re-whatever of Lincs LUG.

• Audiocasts/Shows

  • Aug 22: #148 Linux Antivirus-Advanced

• Kernel Space

  • Graphics Stack

    • X.Org Developers’ Conference 2011 Approaches

      Three weeks from today, the X.Org Developers’ Conference, the annual meet-up of Linux graphics driver developers, will be taking place in Chicago. Here’s the latest developments for this conference.

      As most Phoronix readers are already aware, I am the organizer of the XDC2011 conference that is taking place in Chicago on the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology. The X.Org conference is running from the 12th to 14th of September where the future of open-source Linux graphics drivers, the X.Org Server, and possibly Wayland will be discussed.

• Applications

  • GIMP Needs a Better Name

  • GIMP 2.7.3 Released

    We are pleased to announce availability of a new development version that brings us closer to GIMP 2.8. This version is packed with important new features and improvements.

  • GIMP 2.7.3 released

    A new development version of GIMP has been released; version 2.7.3. GIMP is the GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed piece of software for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition & image authoring.

  • Remote access, share desktop and transfer files with TeamViewer

  • GIMP 2.7.3 arrives with single-window mode

  • Instructionals/Technical

    • CreBS – Create Background Slideshow (wallpaper changer) for Gnome Desktop

    • Become an ImageMagick Ninja: Resizing And Converting Images

    • Red Hat 5 STIG: Network Settings

    • Unexpected Bottle Neck: vector(bool)

    • Setting Up Network RAID1 With DRBD On Debian Squeeze

  • Games

    • It’s a Roll of the Dice for Linux Game Makers

      The big problem with Linux users is their aversion to paying for anything, said tech analyst Rob Enderle — so for Humble Bumble’s developers to get customers to voluntarily pay for Linux games is in itself pretty amazing. … The Linux derivative OS, Android, might well be the platform for change when it comes to Linux gamers parting with their cash.

    • Zatikon: Legions Is Now Available For GNU/Linux !

      Chronic logic the developers of Gish and other GNU/Linux games, released the second add-on to their freeware strategy and tactics game Zatikon.
      Despite the simple graphics the game is very deep and addictive, you can play the game and if you like it and want more units, you can buy the add-ons which add many new strategies and tactics.

    • 3 Puzzle game on Linux

      Today we’ll take a quick look at some puzzle game for Linux.

• Distributions

  • Its now time to look at Argentinian Tuqito, Indonesian Blankon Linux and visit Parsix for Linux3.7

  • Red Hat Family

    • Could Big Data Be the Next Big Move for Red Hat?

      Is Red Hat interested in joining the Big Data trend? One of the biggest trends in computing at enterprises and even small- and medium-sized businesses is Big Data crunching, using tools such as the open source Hadoop. Businesses want to slice and dice their analytics and databases in new ways, surfacing views of everything from customer behavior to support trends in new ways. According to Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst, the explosion of data and new ways to sift it is squarely on his radar.

  • Debian Family

    • Newer X for Debian Squeeze now in Backports

    • Derivatives

      • Canonical/Ubuntu

        • Ubuntu joins VMware Cloud Foundry

        • Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter Issue 229

• Devices/Embedded

  • Linux-ready camera gets dual-core AMD G-Series processor

    Ximea GmbH announced new “smart cameras” that include AMD G-Series processors and monochrome or color image sensors ranging from WVGA (752 x 480 pixels) to five megapixels. The Currera-G devices include flash storage, microSD slots, VGA and Ethernet ports, and isolated digital I/O, the company says.

  • Sub-notebooks/Tablets

    • What do you plan for your $99.99 HP TouchPad?

Free Software/Open Source

• How open source is transforming the publishing industry

  Many of you already know I am not only a writer of a technical nature, but a writer of fiction. In fact, the second in my I Zombie trilogy will hit the shelves next month. I have been working hard to produce a catalog of ebooks and paperbacks for the last three years. During that time I have discovered something that seems to be slipping through the cracks of the majority of computer-type pundits — open source is one of the major players in the new world publishing order.

• How open source is transforming the publishing industry

  With the growth of social networking, blogging and the Web in general, personal privacy is becoming harder and harder to find.

  Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has argued that privacy is no longer “a social norm.” And former Google CEO Eric Schmidt once famously opined, “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”

• Events

  • Three Linux wireless summit videos

• Web Browsers

  • Mozilla

    • Community-Wide Discussion of Mozilla in the New Era

• CMS

  • Drupal Open App Standard Initiative Launched

    Two leading players have announced the Drupal Open App Standard Initiative in an effort to help create an improved user experience within the Drupal content management system and to help spur the development of the Drupal economy.

    Phase2 Technology, based in Alexandria, VA, and SubHub, based in Cardiff, United Kingdom, have been collaborating on the initiative to achieve interoperability for Drupal apps and thus make it possible for any developer to write an app that would then be deployable across multiple app market implementations.

• Licensing

  • New GPL licence touted as saviour of Linux, Android

    The Free Software Foundation reckons its new version of the General Public Licence removes the problems bedevilling version two, but not everyone is convinced the problem even exists.

    The FSF reckons that Linux developers need to move quickly to GPLv3 if they’re to avoid Android (and similar Linux-based platforms) getting tied up in legal battles, despite the fact that many are claiming such battles are no more than figments in the eyes of publicity-hungry bloggers.

    At issue is the clause in version two of the GPL which states that anyone breaching the restrictions irrevocably surrenders their rights under the licence. As just about every Android licensee has, at some point, failed to provide source code (or written notice of source code provision), then (the argument goes) they are all in breach of the GPLv2 and thus open to copyright suits from every Linux developer.

• Openness/Sharing

  • Open Hardware

    • Open hardware, or open source hardware?

      Bruce Perens (co-founder of the Open Source Initiative) has been opining about the difference between open source hardware and open hardware. People have compared the debate to the difference between open source software and free software, and are concerned that it might become as divisive. I’m not so sure. I think they are two different things, and they can co-exist peacefully.

• Programming

  • Really GUI (more on Buttons, images and handlers)

Leftovers

• Rare Strong Earthquake Hits Colorado

  The largest natural earthquake in Colorado in more than a century struck Monday night in the state’s southeast corner, but there had been no reports of damage or injuries.

  The quake, with a preliminary magnitude of 5.3 and centered about nine miles from the city of Trinidad, hit at 11:46 p.m. local time. It was felt as far away as Greeley, about 350 miles north, and into Kansas and New Mexico, said Julie Dutton, a geophysicist at the National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo.

• Earthquake rocks Washington area

  The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was 3.7 miles deep. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were evacuated. The quake was in Mineral, Va., in Louisa County.

• Justice Prosser Back in the Spotlight

  Embattled Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser is in the spotlight once again, this time for a conflict-of-interest in a pending case involving Koch-funded Tea Party groups.

• Science

  • Top scientists advise recent graduates to seek work abroad

    Science graduates should scale back their hopes of finding work in the UK and cast their net wider, according to two of the UK’s most influential scientists.

    Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell and Prof Keith Campbell said decreasing levels of funding for British research meant would-be scientists should think globally when hunting for employment.

    The pair made their comments on Sunday at an Edinburgh International Book Festival debate on the future of science.

• Security

  • Slip-Up in Chinese Military TV Show Reveals More Than Intended

    EXPOSED: A picture of the hacking software shown during the Chinese military program. The large writing at the top says “Select Attack Target.” Next, the user choose an IP address to attack from (it belongs to an American university).

• Finance

  • Can the Middle Class Be Saved?

    IN OCTOBER 2005, three Citigroup analysts released a report describing the pattern of growth in the U.S. economy. To really understand the future of the economy and the stock market, they wrote, you first needed to recognize that there was “no such animal as the U.S. consumer,” and that concepts such as “average” consumer debt and “average” consumer spending were highly misleading.

  • Insurers Deliberately Confuse Policyholders and Dump the Sick

    A couple of years ago, when Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia asked me to testify about little-known health insurance industry practices at a hearing of his Senate Commerce Committee, I initially was reluctant. I knew that if I was completely honest, my life would change forever.

    What he was asking me to do was to disclose practices that have contributed to the growing number of Americans without insurance, the even faster growing number of us who are underinsured, and the phenomenal increase in insurance industry profits over the years, even as the ranks of those without coverage swelled.

• PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

  • Andy Coulson ‘paid by Murdoch while working for PM’

  • Publicopoly: ALEC and the Bid to Make Private All That is Public