Links 21/3/2012: Torvalds Secrets, Radeon HD 7000 Driver Now Free/Libre
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2012-03-22 00:15:30 UTC
- Modified: 2012-03-22 00:15:30 UTC
Contents
-
Kernel Space
-
To get the most out of your systems, you want detailed insight into what the operating system kernel is doing. A typical approach is to sample stack traces; however, the data collected can be time consuming to read or navigate. Flame Graphs are a new way to visualize sampled stack traces, and can be applied to the Linux kernel for some useful (and stunning!) visualizations.
-
Graphics Stack
-
Applications
-
The TEA Text Editor is a very handy writing tool that delivers a much different user interface. For most computer users cranking out words or program code for digital consumption, text editors are often preferable to feature-bloated word processors. TEA pours on features yet keeps from getting too steamy.
-
Instructionals/Technical
-
Games
-
You may have heard a few days ago that Dear Esther, a game built upon Valve's Source Engine, would be ported to Linux and released in the coming months. Well, here's more details about that Source-based game is getting to Linux.
-
Desktop Environments
-
GNOME Desktop
-
Users who choose between GNOME 2 and GNOME 3 are rarely making that decision on a purely rational basis. In my experience, users of GNOME 2 are often choosing what they know, while users of GNOME 3 are technophiles who enjoy anything that is new.
Neither is likely to go over the two generations of GNOME feature by feature. In many cases, the choice seems made before login.
But what happens when the two desktop environments are compared in general features? I'm a fan of neither GNOME 2 nor GNOME 3, but I decided to find out.
-
-
New Releases
-
Today sees the release of Legacy OS 4 Mini an Update / Replacement for TEENpup 2010 Mini Beta. Those updating from TEENpup 2010 Mini Beta will need to save any important documents, music etc to an external Hard Drive, USB stick etc as a full reinstall is required to update to this new version, sorry!
-
Debian Family
-
Spending a couple of days intensely running Linux Mint 12 on a very nice desktop PC sent to me for review by ZaReason (much more about that later), I probably shouldn't have been surprised by the annoying bugs in Mint that made me a lot less productive than I am in the Debian Squeeze system I've been running on my laptop since late 2010.
-
-
In this interview, Luke Kanies, CEO and founder of Puppet Labs, explains why the Puppet configuration management tool is a huge hit with sys admins, and tells us what to expect next from the popular open source project.
-
We got another reminder of how disruptive open source software is to mobile computing this week, when Linux and Android merged back together. This appears to be good news for a number of parties, but Android and Linux developers and users seem particularly likely to benefit. The inclusion of Android code in the Linux kernel and the ability for Linux developers to more easily work on the Android environment and applications also ties into some of the key topics we’ll be covering in a Webcast March 21 titled ‘Open Source, A Tale of Two Cities in the Mobile Enterprise,’ presented by 451 Research and Black Duck Software.
-
Web Browsers
Chrome
-
Ever since Google started working on its Chrome OS operating system, it has had a pronounced focus on allowing users to only work with cloud-based data and applications. This has drawn criticism from many users, and some from us here at OStatic, as seen in this post. With Chrome OS, Google placed a heavy bet on the idea that consumers and business users would have no problem storing data and using applications in the cloud, without working on the locally stored data/applications model that they're used to.
-
CMS
-
Licensing
-
Are developers actually chasing down license violations?
-
Openness/Sharing
-
There are some pretty basic things that a researcher can do to make their work into an open content project. Here are a few.
-
Programming
-
Finance
-
Censorship
-
The Obama administration has condemned Iran for trying to take control of the Internet. In addition, The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control issued guidance and licensing information to further support the free flow of information to citizens of Iran – a freedom the Iranian regime has consistently denied to its people.
-
Internet/Net Neutrality
-
They're selling us out. Just weeks after Internet users from across the globe came together to to beat SOPA, the major ISPs are cutting a deal with Big Content to restrict web access for users who are accused of piracy.
-
Intellectual Monopolies
-
Copyrights
-
ACTA
-
Concerned of the ACTA dossier many citizens contacted the press staffers of his colleague Commissioner Neelie Kroes. Commissioner Michel Barnier is right when he emphasized the need for better communications. Karel De Gucht had the opportunity to embrace the public attention to ACTA, and strengthen the institutional cohesion with the European public, help the transformation of the EU towards an “Europe of the citizens”. He didn’t exercise this opportunity, and it appears to me the reason is a fundamental disrespect to democratic principles, he doesn’t take the public seriously.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- Something to Celebrate in Gemini Protocol
- More capsules and users join in
-
- Banned evidence: Ars Technica forums censored email predicting DebConf23 death, Abraham Raji & Debian cover-up
- Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
- Intimidation, Threats, and Bullying Not Tolerated by Techrights
- When it comes to our reporting, safety always comes first
- A World Without Rules
- We're long insisted on better laws and actual enforcement of them (applicable to all, not selectively applied)
- IBM's BS (Bait, Switch) Regarding Ways to Stay Onboard
- PIPs, RTOs, and forced relocations are just an illusion of choice (or ability to recover)
- statCounter Sees Microsoft Windows Falling to New, Unprecedented Lows in Palau
- Taking Android into account, Windows is now down to an all-time low of 14%
- Google News Lost the Fight to LLM Slop (While Google Itself Sells Slop, Nowadays Under the Name "Gemini")
- Many people say that "Google is getting worse"; that's almost an understatement
- Links 28/03/2025: AirAsia Trouble Again, UMich Culls All DEI Programs
- Links for the day
- Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Alexa is for Gullible People, Rant About Feature Overload
- Links for the day
- The SLAPPs From the Microsoft Strangler (and Sidekick) No Better Than Patent Trolling
- one must never settle with trolls
- Links 28/03/2025: Last Reminder "to Delete Your 23andMe Data", "UK's First Permanent Facial Recognition Cameras Installed"
- Links for the day
- Microsoft Canonical Continues Its FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) Campaign, Reveals Google Too Sponsored It
- They're paid-for lies from a Chinese company that takes GAFAM money to write puff pieces about them
- Android Rises Above 76% in Mozambique, Leaving Windows in the Dust
- Windows may soon be measured as smaller than Apple's iOS
- IBM, Red Hat and Microsoft Probably Also Manipulate Metrics (It Helps Con the Shareholders)
- Wall Street's credibility will depend on enforcement of "checks and balances"
- Slopwatch: trendhunter.com and Other Pure Junk From "Google News"
- The need to vet sources is hardly new; anyone can spew out anything, anywhere. There's a need for vetting.
- Gemini Links 28/03/2025: Rewatching The X-Files, Slop Concerns, and NOSTR Censorship
- Links for the day
- Links 28/03/2025: Australia at Risk, EPO Grants Illegal Patents With Illegal Effect
- Links for the day
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Thursday, March 27, 2025
- IRC logs for Thursday, March 27, 2025
- Links 27/03/2025: Obituary to a Shop, Russia Trying to Buy Time
- Links for the day
- Links 27/03/2025: Slop, Autosuggestions, and Nostr
- Links for the day
- Apparently Confirmed: IBM Layoffs in Canada Today, Hundreds Affected
- Impacting "177 people", says one person, "in Ottawa"
- When Windows Was Dominant (1990s) Browser Monopoly Meant MSIE, But Now Google Android is Dominant and the Web in a 'Webapps' Era Works With (or Is Designed for) Chrome-isms
- We've been there before
- Slopwatch: BetaNews, LinuxSecurity.com, and the Attack on Web Search Using Fake and Likely Plagiarised Pages
- Changing a few words here and there won't change the fact that it's not properly authored
- Links 27/03/2025: U.S. Honeybee Deaths Reach Record High, Legal Occupation Next in Line After War on Science
- Links for the day
- Using Courts for 'Revenge' is Always a Losing Strategy
- Trying to cause someone you dislike to spend a lot of money
- IBM CFO James Kavanaugh Refers to Firing of Almost 10,000 Americans as "Workforce Rebalancing" (Shifting IBM's Centre of Balance to Low-salary Contracts/Countries)
- The scale of IBM layoffs is getting too large to evade WARN Notices
- [Video] Dr. Richard Stallman's Keynote Speech in Kerala Finally Uploaded
- In non-free format and proprietary YouTube, but perhaps that's better than nothing
- Islands Are Leaving Microsoft Behind, According to statCounter
- Android has had a very strong year
- EPO Management Fails to Deny That the Office is Discriminating Against Women
- Europe's second-largest institution isn't just exceedingly corrupt but also immoral
- In Some Countries the Market Share of Vista 11 is Going Down, Not Up
- despite being released in 2021
- Rumour: Mass Layoffs in IBM Canada Today
- Maybe later today some people from Canada will say something firmer and maybe some media will even talk about that
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, March 26, 2025
- IRC logs for Wednesday, March 26, 2025
- Gemini Links 27/03/2025: X-Files' "Kill Switch", Orlando, and ASN (Autonomous System Number) 'Hack'
- Links for the day
- Links 26/03/2025: Healthcare Cuts and Turkey's Own "2025 Project" (Culling Opposition)
- Links for the day
- LLM Slopfarm: A Site's Last Incarnation Before Throwing in the Towel, Going Offline Permanently
- A lot of coverage that claims to be about Finland is chatbot-generated nonsense or poorly-plagiarised work
- Microsoft Canonical Pays IDG to Spread FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt)
- this seems a tad exploitative and reminds us of the time Novell kept telling companies that using anything other than SUSE was dangerous
- Gemini Links 26/03/2025: GTD, Zenshuu, and Geminispace Community
- Links for the day
- Links 26/03/2025: Media's Failures, Arrests of Journalists, Limitations of End-to-End Encryption
- Links for the day
- LLM Slop (Lots of It Spewed Out by Microsoft) Versus Linux
- Microsoft is a very, very evil company. It doesn't mind destroying the Web if there's a chance it'll make a buck in the process or mess up people's brains (in Microsoft's favour).
- Slopfarms (Sites That Only Ever Publish LLM Slop) Are Killing Google News
- pair of slopfarms still propped up by Google News
- Microsoft's Serial Strangler's Law Firm Has a Long History of Fronting for People Who Do Bad and/or Illegal Things
- Whose terrible idea was this?
- Novell and Microsoft Apologist/Booster Bruce Byfield Writing About the FSF is a Recipe for Problems
- Totally not shoehorning some agenda
- Looking Forward to the Fall of UPC and Revocation of the Unified Patent Court (UPC) Agreement, Which Was Always Illegal and Unconstitutional
- We'll try to keep abreast of any progress in this case
- Slopwatch: Google News, LinuxSecurity.com, and the General Demise of the Web
- many supposed or so-called "news" pages are just spewed out by some chatbots (or tools which help plagiarise original articles without getting caught; detection gets harder)
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, March 25, 2025
- IRC logs for Tuesday, March 25, 2025