05.15.12

Contents

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

GNU/Linux

• The Linux Setup – Scott Merrill, Systems Engineer/Tech Writer

  Scott came to my attention when I saw a great interview he did with Linus Torvalds for TechCrunch. I was very excited Scott agreed to share his setup, and as you read it, you’ll see some sharp commentary. Like Scott, I find myself doing less and less customization. Scott attributes it to the work it takes to restore personalizations, but I wonder if it’s because interfaces like Unity and GNOME 3 are getting better and because more and more work takes place in the browser, with both factors diminishing the need to mess with the desktop too much. As you read through, you’ll see a number of interesting points from Scott.

• Innovate or Imitate? Where Linux Lags, Where Linux Leads

  In which we debunk the silly canard that Linux does not innovate, but merely imitates. And as a free bonus, suggest meaningful ways to contribute other than cranking out yet more Ubuntu respins.

• Making A Easy-To-Setup $50 Linux Multi-Seat Computer

  While it’s improved a lot recently, in the past setting up a multi-seat computer has been a pain in the ass with a lot of manual configurations needed and other peculiar steps to get the hardware/software combination working right. What if the process were a lot simpler? What if new seats could be added to a computer at a very low cost and the setup was effectively “out of the box” to the point that it’s truly plug-and-play? Well, we are now effectively at that point on the Linux desktop and there is a new Kickstarter effort to help in that initiative.

• Server

  • Calxeda demos ARM server running Ubuntu at UDS

    At the recent Ubuntu Developer Summit, manufacturer Calxeda unveiled a rack-mountable unit powered by the company’s EnergyCore chips. Calxeda is developing ARM-based SoCs (Systems-on-a-Chip) that are designed to run energy-efficient servers.

  • IBM announces Linux servers with POWER7 CPUs

• Audiocasts/Shows

  • Going Linux #172 Linux Applications-Introduction

• Kernel Space

  • Linux 3.4 approaching with “calmed” RC7

    Tux Linus Torvalds says “things have really calmed down” in the email that accompanies the release of the seventh release candidate (RC7) of Linux 3.4. He says he had considered making a release over the weekend “but felt that another week wouldn’t hurt”.

  • Linux Wins – Or Does It?

    The truth is that in the world of embedded systems applications range from electric toothbrushes and greeting cards to massive weapon systems. Linux is well-suited for some of these; a traditional RTOS is the right choice for others.

  • Stable kernel updates 3.0.30 and 3.3.4

• Applications

  • PowerTOP 2.0 Debuts for Power Management Goodness

  • Instructionals/Technical

    • Hive and Hadoop for Data Analytics on Large Web Logs

    • Weekend Project: Get to Know LocalWiki for Local Information Sites

    • Start Fine-Tuning Sudo on Linux

    • 4 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Encrypt Your Linux Partitions

      Popular Linux distributions make it pretty easy to encrypt your home folder or even entire partitions if you’d like, without many issues. This is a great option to have if you’re someone who needs their data, whether it’s the home folder or entire partitions, that need to be encrypted. In most cases, all you need to do is select a check mark, and it’ll take care of the rest.

  • Games

    • Linux and Gaming: Full Steam Ahead

      “Having another developer make games for Linux is always a good thing, but one developer will not make Linux a gaming platform,” said Mobile Raptor blogger Roberto Lim. “Left 4 Dead 2, the first game Valve plans for the Linux platform, is over two years old now. … The casual gamer on Linux will be happy to have a new game on Linux; those truly inclined for gaming will not be looking at a platform that gets games more than two years after its release.”

• Desktop Environments

  • Linux Desktops: Cinnamon vs. Unity

    In years past, we’ve offered comparisons of KDE vs GNOME, along with comparisons of other desktop environments. But what about two desktop environments based on the GNOME shell?

• Distributions

  • Archimedes-2012.05 released

  • Tails 0.11 incognito live system released

    Version 0.11 of the Tails Linux distribution designed to protect user privacy and anonymity has been released. Tails, an acronym for “The Amnesic Incognito Live System”, is a Debian-based live system which includes a number of applications, such as a web browser, email client and instant messaging client, that have been pre-configured with security in mind. All of these programs are set up to use the Tor network, thus ensuring that all outgoing connections are anonymised by bouncing internet traffic between multiple nodes.

  • PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandrake/Mandriva Family

    • Mandriva Community Planning Next Release

      While waiting for the Mandriva management to decide the future direction of the distribution, the community is taking matters into their own hands and beginning the planning stages for the next release, assumed to be Mandriva Linux 2012.

  • Red Hat Family

    • Red Hat gets common criteria approval

      This week on Federal Tech Talk, Gunnar Hellekson of Red Hat joins host John Gilroy to talk about how to make the transition to open source sofware.

      Hellekson is the chief technology strategist who helps to promote open source through an organization called the Open Source for America. This is a website that provides case studies on how open source software is the most economical way to make the key transition to the cloud.

    • New Red Hat Linux 5 version meets federal security standards

      Red Hat has released a version of its Enterprise Linux 5 operating system that is capable of running various types of software platforms thanks to a built-in, kernel-based virtual machine hypervisor. Developed to run on IBM servers, the updated version of Linux is also certified to meet internationally recognized security standards.

    • Fedora

      • Fedora 17 & GNOME 3.4: Return to a useful Linux desktop (Review)

        Fedora 16, thanks in large part to GNOME 3.2, was an awful Linux distribution. With this new version, and GNOME 3.4, Fedora 17 is back to being a useful Linux distribution.

  • Debian Family

    • Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.5 Released

      The initial download images for Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.5 were made available over the weekend. This is a “rollup” release, it forms a new installation base for the Debian 6.0 “squeeze” stable branch, it does not add major new functionality or features. If you have Debian 6.0.x already installed, it is not necessary to reinstall, you only need to install all the latest updates from your nearest mirror site.

    • Debian Project News – May 14th, 2012

    • Debian Edu interview: Jürgen Leibner

      It has been a few busy weeks for me, but I am finally back to publish another interview with the people behind Debian Edu and Skolelinux. This time it is one of our German developers, who have helped out over the years to make sure both a lot of major but also a lot of the minor details get right before release.

    • Debian Administrator’s Handbook released

    • Linux Mint Debian Edition 201204 arrives with MATE 1.2 and Cinnamon 1.4

    • Derivatives

      • Canonical/Ubuntu

        • 10 Free Must Have Apps For Ubuntu 12.04 LTS

          Ubuntu 12.04 LTS is the latest Ubuntu release. Officially named as Ubuntu 12.04 ‘Precise Pangolin’, this operating system is by far the most advanced Ubuntu version. Currently its in Beta version, by has already surprised a great percentage of people with its features.

        • Ubuntu Shootout – 10.04 LTS vs. 12.04 LTS

          Although I’m mostly writing about Slackware and Arch Linux related distributions I’ve got nothing against Ubuntu. I used it back with 5.10 ‘Breezy’ and was quite impressed. It even detected and configured all multimedia keys on the cordless Logitech keyboard, including the volume wheel, no mean feat at the time. That was when Debian Sarge was too old to be useful and X burped on my hardware, and I did not know enough to run Testing or Unstable branches.

        • Ubuntu 12.04: To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade

          Ubuntu’s latest release called Precise Pangolin has managed to please its many admirers and silence the naysayers. Unity, the most contentious part of Ubuntu so far has turned out to be a dark horse in Canonical’s race for desktop domination. With new features like the HUD, video lens and more, Ubuntu 12.04 has even had the BBC waxing eloquent about its charm. That said, not everyone is happy with the latest release. There are, as always, some criticisms regarding the lack of a new icon theme and the absence of any major game-changing feature. Of course, the overall outlook towards Ubuntu 12.04 ‘Precise Pangolin’ is positive and there is absolutely no doubt that this is the best release by Canonical so far.

        • Ubuntu Developer Summit 12.10 Recap

          The weeklong Ubuntu Developer Summit for the Ubuntu 12.10 “Quantal Quetzal” wrapped up on Friday in Oakland, California. There was a lot of interesting notes shared on Phoronix from the UDS-Q event, so here’s a summary of the most prominent happenings last week as the future of Ubuntu Linux was plotted.

        • Notes from the Ubuntu Developer Summit

          At the Ubuntu Developer Summit (UDS) in Oakland (California), Chris Kenyon, Canonical’s Vice President of OEM Services, has predicted that Ubuntu will be running on five per cent of all PCs sold next year. According to Softpedia, Phoronix and other publications, Kenyon said in his talk that Ubuntu was shipped pre-installed on eight to ten million computers worldwide last year. Canonical expects this to increase to eighteen million next year, which they calculate to be five per cent of the total market.

        • Two Years Fly By: Ubuntu Precise Pangolin Pads Into Production

        • Azul Launches Zing 5.2 JVM With Support for Ubuntu Linux

          Azul Systems announced that its Zing 5.2 Java virtual machine now features support for the Ubuntu Linux distribution.

        • Ubuntu’s new Enhanced Menu project

• Devices/Embedded

  • Getting Started with Embedded Linux and the Yocto Project

  • Tizen reaches 1.0, ready for mobile device makers

    The Tizen project has announced that it is releasing source code and a version 1.0 SDK, code-named Larkspur. The Tizen project emerged as a replacement for the Meego project at the Linux Foundation after Nokia withdrew from active participation. Tizen involves Intel and Samsung, among others, who are creating a web application based phone with supporting native applications. This is in contrast to Mozilla’s B2G project which is implementing all of a smartphone’s functionality in a web browser view. The source code for Tizen 1.0 is described as providing a “solid baseline for device vendors and developers” and should provide all the technologies needed to create Tizen-based smartphones and tablets.

  • Phones

    • Lenovo to invest $800 million into new mobile device development facilities

    • Android

      • Lenovo LePhone S899t with ICS reportedly in the works for China Mobile

      • HTC EVO 4G LTE Lightning Review: The Phone That Would Be King (But Isn’t)

      • It’s Official: HTC’s EVO 4G LTE To Hit Sprint Shelves On May 18

      • T-Mobile to scoop Android 4.0 update to HTC Sensation 4G

      • Goodbye, Exynos: Benchmark Points To Dual-Core Processor For Verizon’s Galaxy S III

      • CTIA 2012 sees Android Ice Cream Sandwich take root

        Smartphone announcements were limited, but they signal the steady adoption of Android ICS.

      • Samsung pulling away from Apple in smartphone market

        Company scores 29.1 percent of the worldwide smartphone market last quarter and easily outpaces Apple’s 24.2 percent market share, IDC says.

      • Samsung Galaxy S3 Announced, Leaves iPhone Far Behind

        Samsung has announced the much hyped Android smartphone GALAXY S III. The phone lived up to its hype other in every department besides design and display.

      • Samsung Overtakes Nokia as the World’s Biggest Phone Manufacturer

      • Ice Cream Sandwich leak spotted on Droid Razr

Free Software/Open Source

• Open-source media player VLC tops a billion downloads

  Open-source staple VLC has reached over a billion downloads, the VideoLAN Organization announced Sunday.

• Open source software: It’s more than just free stuff

  Free software. In many ways it is an unfortunate term to describe what most people today know as open source software. Although the term is intended to convey the idea of freedom, it is often misunderstood as meaning ‘free of cost’. And while most open software is indeed available free of charge, there are still costs associated with implementing any software in a business. Open source software’s real value is not that it is cheaper than other alternatives, though that is more often than not the reality, it is that it offers a set of values that proprietary does not.

• The next generation of open source software procurement models

  One year ago, the new Swedish framework agreement for the procurement of open source became active. Five suppliers were contracted to provide software and services. Central government, the public educational sector, all twenty county councils, and 225 out of the 290 Swedish municipalities are participating. They call off mini competitions for contracts the suppliers then have to battle for. This model differs from the recommendations made in the European ‘Guideline on public procurement of Open Source Software’, aiming to overcome current barriers and increase the use of open source.

• Open source enables high-volume searches

  Twitter, Facebook, the Library of Congress — all of these institutions have mind-numbing amounts of structured and unstructured data that must be indexed and searched quickly. In Twitter’s case, that’s about 300 million new pieces of information to index every day.

• OpenMAMA Project Delivers First Release of Middleware Messaging API

  The Linux Foundation announced that the OpenMAMA project has announced version 2.1 of the technology–the first release of open-source Middleware Agnostic Messaging API, or MAMA.

• Web Browsers

  • Mozilla

    • Firefox’s four release channels explained

      By now, it should be easy to pick a browser. Most of you probably settled on a favorite ages ago, and it’s going to take some seriously cool new features — or a whole lot of crashing — to make you switch at this point. But even if you’re in love with your default you might be wondering if you’re running the right channel.

    • Is Mozilla Punting on Web Apps for Linux?

      While Mozilla is a leading light in the open source community, every so often I’m reminded that the same isn’t always true in the Linux community.

• Databases

  • Looking at the PostGIS 2.0 Release

    The PostGIS database project made its long-awaited 2.0.0 release in April, marking the culmination of more than two years of development. PostGIS is an industrial-strength geographical database that serves as the storage system for a wide range of geo-data processing systems, from map servers to analysis tools.

• Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

  • LibreOffice – Enhance desktop productivity

    LibreOffice is a comprehensive, professional-quality productivity suite that you can download and install for free. Works on all major operating systems, including Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X and GNU/Linux (Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Mandriva, Suse, etc.

• Business

  • Semi-Open Source

    • Talend updates data tools to 5.1.0

      Talend has updated all the applications that run on its Open Studio unified platform to version 5.1.0. Talend’s Open Studio is an Eclipse-based environment that hosts the company’s Data Integration, Big Data, Data Quality, MDM (Master Data Management) and ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) products. The system allows a user to, using the Data Integration as an example, use a GUI to define processes that can extract data from the web, databases, files or other resources, process that data, and feed it on to other systems. The resulting definition can then be compiled into a production application.

    • SugarCRM 6.5 Adds Just a Touch of Sweetener

• BSD

  • A look at OpenBSD 5.1

• FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

  • Richard Stallman recovers after being taken ill during speech

    Free software and GNU Linux icon Richard Stallman was taken ill at a weekend conference in Spain, reportedly being taken to hospital suffering from the symptoms of high blood pressure.

  • GIMP 2.8 Review – Who needs Photoshop?

    The premier open source image manipulation tool has been upgraded with some new and updated features. Was it worth the development time?

  • GIMP Updates with a New Interface, Layer Groups, and More

  • GIMP 2.8 Released: Watch Out Photoshop

  • MediaGoblin’s One Year Anniversary: What’s Next?

    The GNU MediaGoblin project was announced just a year ago. The project, to build a decentralized, free software media sharing tool, has been going great guns ever since. To get an idea where the project stands today, we talked with lead developer Chris Webber. Here we share Webber’s comments on the history and future of MediaGoblin, new features, and the switch away from MongoDB to SQL.

• Project Releases

  • PulseAudio 2.0 makes better use of modern hardware features

    The recently released PulseAudio 2.0 offers improved support for the jack detection feature that is available in modern sound hardware. If a user is running Linux kernels from version 3.3 and connects, for example, a second set of stereo speakers, the audio framework will detect this and offer separate volume controls along with other features. The PulseAudio developers plan to add further improvements in the future, for example to simplify the configuration of multi-channel environments.

• Public Services/Government

  • Open source adoption on the rise in the French government

    In the statement, presidential candidate François Hollande also expressed his support for open source software. He agrees with Sarkozy that open source and open standards should be cultivated, especially in government and small and medium enterprises. Hollande is also strongly opposed to software patents and said that he “will ensure that the implementation of the Community patent is not an opportunity to legitimize software patents, mathematical methods and business methods.” President Sarkozy, on the other hand, is in favour of software patents.

• Openness/Sharing

  • Open Hardware

    • Is open hardware creating a more open world?

      Just as retro ideas from a bygone era can inspire modern fashion, film, and TV trends, today’s researchers are being empowered by the revival of an innovative technology concept from the past: open-source hardware.

• Programming

  • Collaborative Classroom Computer Programming with JavaWIDE

  • Django migrates to GitHub

    Adrian Holovaty, co-founder and developer of the Python-based web application framework Django, has announced that Django will be using GitHub for collaboration from now on. Correspondingly, the project has switched its internal source code management from Subversion to Git.

  • Mercurial – Revision Control Approximated

Leftovers

• Security

  • Node.js update fixes information disclosure vulnerability

  • Microsoft finds information leak and closes critical Windows holes

    On its May Patch Tuesday, Microsoft plans to release a total of seven bulletins to close 23 holes. The company has also announced that those responsible for releasing the Microsoft demo exploit have been found and excluded from the partner programme.

• Privacy

  • Vista 8: Now with 500% more Microsoft spyware.

    I was expecting the usual. More crap that nobody asked for. More anti-competitive Microsoft tie-ins. More lock-in with Microsoft services. More EULA mess. More spyware. I found pretty much all of this.