Bonum Certa Men Certa

Links 7/1/2012: Red Hat HQ in Raleigh, Linux Mint 12 Reviews, New OLPC





GNOME bluefish

Contents





GNU/Linux

  • Replacing Proprietary Windows Software with GNU/Linux
    I've written recently about main points on migrating from Windows to GNU/Linux. Those reasons included one which pertains to the software included with the GNU/Linux distributions, and replacing those proprietary products with those on GNU/Linux that you will never need to re-buy or pay upgrades for again in the future. But how is this done? With time and patience, which not everybody has. But if you do, it will pay off dearly over the years you stay on the open source road. One warning though, migrating is not for the timid, it IS a lot of work.


  • Desktop



  • Server

    • The 7 Best Servers for Linux
      System administrators who need a Linux system will often opt to purchase a bare-metal system and install Linux on the system their way. After all, Linux folks are a rogue, radical ilk. They think differently. They administer servers differently. And, they purchase systems differently. The CXO, purchasing agent or other money-responsible party, on the other hand, has the corporate trust to buy the best available technology at the best price he can negotiate. That's a tremendous burden.






  • Kernel Space

    • Linux p-p-picks up power profiling for peripherals
      Linus Torvalds has signed off on the latest release of the Linux kernel, version 3.2, and it contains several additions aimed at power-management. The new code modules have been submitted over the past year by engineers working at Samsung and Texas Instruments, among others.


    • Weekend Project: Get to Know Btrfs
      The Butter/Better/B-tree Filesystem, Btrfs, is supposedly destined to become the default Linux filesystem. What makes it special, and what's wrong with good old tried-and-true Ext2/3/4?


    • Graphics Stack

      • Intel SNA Architecture Is Constantly Evolving
        Intel's experimental "Sandy Bridge New Acceleration" (SNA) acceleration architecture is a constant work-in-progress that even in the past two weeks over the holidays has received more than 100 changes. How though is this new 2D acceleration architecture fairing these days rather than the stock UXA configuration? In this article are our first Intel SNA benchmarks of 2012 when enabling this architecture.






  • Applications



  • Desktop Environments



    • K Desktop Environment/KDE SC)





  • Distributions



    • New Releases



      • Linux privacy distribution Tails updated to version 0.10
        Version 0.10 of Tails, the live distribution of Linux that aims to protect privacy and anonymity, has been released. Tails is essentially a Debian Linux, combined with Tor and other privacy or anonymity respecting applications, which can be booted and used from either a USB stick or CD. All internet traffic is routed through the Tor network, which should make all communications anonymous. Tails, an acronym for "The Amnesic Incognito Live System", was inspired by the now abandoned Incognito LiveCD.




    • PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandrake/Mandriva Family

      • Mandriva Linux Maker Could Face Bankruptcy in 10 Days
        “I regret to inform you that none of the recapitalization schemes that were proposed at the meeting of shareholders on December 5 was accepted,” wrote Mandriva CEO Dominic Loucougain in a letter to shareholders dated Dec. 23, 2011, and published on the Mandriva Forum on Friday.




    • Red Hat Family

      • Red Hat Moving Headquarters From NCSU To Downtown Raleigh
        The City of Raleigh announced today during a press conference hosted by Mayor Nancy McFarlane that Red Hat will move its global headquarters from NC State University’s Centennial Campus to the RBC Bank Tower in downtown Raleigh.


      • Red Hat recruiting open-source firms to Raleigh
        As Red Hat Inc. (NYSE: RHT) prepares to move its headquarters to downtown Raleigh and expand its operations, the company is also trying to build an open-source community in the city.

        Chief Executive Jim Whitehurst said Friday that he has already persuaded another open-source software development company to open a 12-person office in Raleigh, but he declined to identify the firm.


      • City, Red Hat tout Raleigh as open-source leader
        Mayor Nancy McFarlane formally welcomed Red Hat to downtown, saying Friday that the software company's presence will help Raleigh become a national hub for open-source technology.


      • Incentives Lure Red Hat Downtown: Are They Worth It?
        When Red Hat began a search to expand in fall 2009, reports indicated they were considering sites in other states as well as a site in the Tobacco District of Durham County. For the past several months, three governments have offered incentives to the open source giant Red Hat to retain its presence.


      • Red Hat picks Raleigh as global headquarters




    • Debian Family



      • Derivatives



        • Canonical/Ubuntu

          • Canonical launches Ubuntu One Files iOS app


          • Revisiting Ubuntu Design
            In 2010 I wrote about the challenge Canonical faced in revamping the design of Ubuntu, and later looked at the tough road they had ahead of them with Unity and the Community. In the past few days I’ve revisited the operating system to see how far they had progressed, and while the default look of Unity is beautiful, the system still faces significant challenges.


          • Install MPlayer2 And SMPlayer2 In Ubuntu


          • Flavours and Variants

            • Mint is fun, client-focused Linux distro
              When Ubuntu decided last year to abruptly replace the familiar Gnome UI with its own Unity interface, many users were upset. And according to the latest numbers from DistroWatch, Linux Mint has been the major beneficiary, so we decided to test Linux Mint 12.


            • Linux Mint 12 Lisa Review
              Until the release of Ubuntu 11.04, Gnome 2.x seemed to have become the standard desktop interface for Linux. It was the default for Ubuntu, Fedora and Linux Mint, three of the biggest distributions, and many others relied on it too. Of course, lots of people use KDE, but since they released version 4, things seemed to have swung in Gnome’s favour.












  • Devices/Embedded





Free Software/Open Source



Leftovers



  • PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

    • Mock commercial undermines new Vote 4 Energy oil advertisement
      Today, the American Petroleum Institute unveiled its 2012 Vote 4 Energy astroturf campaign, centered around a major election-linked CNN advertising package that PolluterWatch helped expose last month with audio recordings from inside the studio. Vote 4 Energy attempts to show 'real Americans' who are 'energy voters,' meaning they are committing to vote for whichever politicians support Big Oil's dirty agenda in this election year. Typical. API also bought the back page of the A section of the Washington Post with a Vote 4 Energy ad, space that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to normal people.




  • Privacy

    • Private agency paid to monitor protest groups
      THE federal government has outsourced law enforcement surveillance of environmental and other protest groups, with a key monitoring service operating from an inconspicuous Melbourne apartment block.




  • Civil Rights

    • Michael Hastings on war journalists
      Rolling Stone‘s Michael Hastings — whose 2010 article on Gen. Stanley McChrystal ended the Afghanistan War commander’s career by accurately reporting numerous controversial statements made in a series of interviews — embodies the pure journalistic ethos. Some of the most celebrated establishment military reporters in America attacked Hastings for that article on the ground that it violated a sacred trust between Generals and war reporters (The New York Times‘ John Burns), and even baselessly insinuated that he fabricated the quotes and then went on to impugn his patriotism when compared to The Great General (CBS News’ Lara Logan).

      Even worse, The Washington Post, ABC News and others irresponsibly published totally anonymous military sources claiming with no basis that Hastings violated ground-rule agreements for the interviews.






Recent Techrights' Posts

Like Kyndryl, Multiple Securities Fraud Investigations Into IBM
Remember what happened to Kyndryl
Who Next After IBM? (Bubbles Don't Last Forever)
the demise of companies with "ai" in their name/domain
GNU/Linux Estimated at 8% "Market Share" Today (in statCounter)
Days ago it said 7.1%, then 7.3% or 7.4%
IBM Stock Collapses and It's Only the Beginning
Will GAFAM soon follow and will any executives be arrested for the accounting fraud insiders have long cautioned about?
 
Techrights Was Right: Microsoft's Layoffs Tally Was False, Far More People Are Being Sacked
"The Xbox Bloodbath Is Actually Way Bigger Than It Seems"
Get Ready for Increase in PIPs and RAs at IBM, Red Hat, and Other Companies Devoured by IBM
IBM's "market cap" has just fallen to 199 billion dollars and it has about 70 billion dollars in debt
IBM Sinking to Lowest Levels Since 2024, But Will Any Executives Be Arrested for Securities Fraud?
52-week high of $332.46 and now down to $212.94
Microsoft Whistleblowers Say "The Entire Thing is Going to Fall Apart" and There Are "No Benefits" to Being Part of Microsoft
"Multiple sources, who chose to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal"
IBM's Crash Continues Today
Stocks go up and down, but they don't typically go down by over 25% in a single day
How Long Before GNU/Linux is Measured at 20% in Chad?
The main way to get people to adopt Vista 11 is to sell them a new PCs and in poor countries it happens a lot less
Making Techrights Faster Down Under (Australia and New Zealand)
there's more to life than speed
Strikes at the EPO Approved for the Rest of the Year, "€1,3 Billion Taken From Staff Income"
Intensity can be revised and increased over time
Focusing on What We Really Ought to Focus on
Today we'll focus mostly on EPO affairs
Violence is Not a Joke
"Police say Widdecombe killing was targeted but motive remains unclear"
How to Properly Measure the Performance of a Patent Office
A "contribution from staff [which] is published by SUEPO Munich."
EPO "Cocaine Communication Manager" - Part XIV - "Not One of Us" (How the Group Dubbed by EPO Insiders "Alicante Mafia" Pushes Out Talent, Replacing It With Friends)
misuses the EPO's budget like it is a fountain of money for his friends
LibreTech Collective Abandons Microsoft GitHub and All Other Proprietary Software
Each time a project eliminates control by a hostile party it stands to gain
Links 15/07/2026: US Regime "Cuts Two Utah National Monuments by More Than 90%", "Hormuz is Less Crucial Than It Was"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/07/2026: Old Computer Challenge, "Trial by Fire", LLM Slop Destroying Companies
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 14, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 14, 2026
Heshan de Silva-Weeramuni Becomes Program Manager at the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
Heshan's addition means that the FSF is growing after a solid financial year (best in years)
Michael McMahon Explains Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) Attacks on the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
The real solution is a curb on botnets. A mitigation strategy, however, would involve going static.
Matters of Public Safety
"Police say Ann Widdecombe killed in 'targeted attack' as motive investigated"
The Register MS and Its Promotional Microsoft Content
It's not too hard to see what the business model of The Register MS is
IBM: From $306 to $212 in 7 Days, IBM Won't Go Up More Than 50% to Where It Was at 'Peak Vapourware'
There's a limit to how much or how long a company can fake its performance and its potential [...] Early this morning a few insiders ("traders") cashed in on their "pump-n-dump"
Red Hat Staff Needs to Start Looking for the Next Job
Workers can conveniently lie or deny it to themselves, but waves of PIPs ("silent layoffs") will sweep over more and more units or teams as the company runs out of money to play with
IBM the Next Bear Stearns
IBM cannot recover if all it has to show is vapourware
I'll Be Extremely Difficult for Microsoft to Sell Any XBox Consoles Now
Microsoft understands this
How Software Freedom Would Benefit Everybody
A society that denies control by greedy companies would do a disservice to monopolies and improve all services to citizens
Links 14/07/2026: Harsh But Also Fair Criticism of Hey Hi (AI) Slop, 'Open' AI Shuts Down Its Own Products as Funds Run Out
Links for the day
Gemini Links 14/07/2026: Old CD Binder and AWK
Links for the day
In Defence of Physical Tickets
Tickets are not some "app" and not some "code" on some "screen"
Microsoft Layoffs Not Limited to XBox (False Narrative in the Mainstream Media)
Microsoft is becoming less relevant and workforce reductions won't end any time soon
Links 14/07/2026: Plagiarism Spun as "Training", Zelensky Announces Leadership Shuffle
Links for the day
The Register MS Has Just Published "AI" Webspam That Mentions "AI" 54 Times. It Was Paid to Do This.
Who pays for all this "AI" hype or "buzz"?
Gemini Links 14/07/2026: Self-Advocacy Online; "The Internet Is Dead: How the Web Lost Its Human Soul"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 13, 2026
IRC logs for Monday, July 13, 2026
Modern Technology Harms Women More Than Men (Because the 'Tech Bros' Who Dominate STEM Have a Poor View of Women)
“Privacy protects us from abuses by those in power, even if we're doing nothing wrong at the time of surveillance.”
Internet Relay Chat Trolls Are Not Expressing Opinions, They Are Saboteurs
For the record
Links 14/07/2026: "The Freedom of Information Act Is in Serious Trouble"; Irish Datacenters Use Up Almost 25% of Total Energy
Links for the day
The Register MS: "AI" Puff Pieces for Sale, Not Journalism at All, Just "Webspam"
The Register MS isn't the sole culprit
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 12, 2026
IRC logs for Sunday, July 12, 2026
How We Do Techrights (and What's Changing Next Week)
Many former news sites no longer yield much non-meaningless news (not anymore); there's a gap to be filled