Programming News Picks: Focus on Free Software
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2014-02-16 23:26:19 UTC
- Modified: 2014-02-16 23:26:19 UTC
Summary: 2014 news picks that focus on programming and development, especially of Free software or using Free software tools
Demise of Proprietary
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HTML5 developers queried recently by tools vendor Sencha remain dedicated to building apps via Web technologies, even as doubts have been cast on how effective HTML5 is vis à vis native development. Many of those same developers, however, have dropped support for the classic Microsoft Windows platform.
Surveying 2,128 business application developers from the HTML5 development community, including users of its own tools, Sencha found that 70-plus percent of developers planned to do more with HTML5 in the 2013 timeframe than they had done the previous year. And 75 percent will work further with HTML5 in 2014. More than 60 percent of developers have migrated to HTML5 and hybrid development for primary applications. For the coming year, just 4 percent of HTML5 developers plan to cut back on HTML5.
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I still remember IBM's provocative announcement in 2001 that it was putting $1 billion toward the development and promotion of Linux. While such billion-dollar commitments from IBM are now so routine as to be unremarkable, back then a billion dollars meant a lot. I was working for an embedded Linux vendor at the time, and most of our sales cycle was spent explaining why GPL-licensed Linux wasn't the technology equivalent of terminal cancer. (Thanks in part to Microsoft's contribution.)
Google
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The second video features Jason Hibbets's full interview with Chris DiBona Open Source Director at Google. Find out how DiBona measures his performance, why he once called open source "brutal," and more on working for Google and the future of open source.
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Over 280 attendees representing 177 mentoring organizations gathered for a two-day, code-munity extravaganza celebrating the conclusion of Google Summer of Code with the annual Mentor Summit held at Google in Mountain View, California.
GitHub
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GitHub's position as the repository of choice for open source community projects is today one of dominance, most would argue.
Officially often referred to as a "web-based revision control service" (rather than simply a software code repository), this classification is an obvious nod to the site's inherent level of active community involvement as open projects are continuously developed, refined and augmented.
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So, what’s the problem? Well, that’s simple. It seems that Fox News’ technology department –run by a motley crew of half-witted quick-study-types– failed to explain GitHub, and also disregarded both spelling and punctuation in favor of adopting what I would describe as a rogue journalistic style; a style that exists far beyond the confines of traditional English language rules. It is now with great pleasure that I flog the holy-hell out of the following screen capture in an attempt to make them cry.
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I have an open source script for a specific site (I'm trying not to call anything by name here) that a few other developers and I recently moved to GitHub. We've been joined by several new developers since we moved to the new system, including one very active one in particular. However, this active one has started changing a lot of the project.
First of all, he deleted our versioning system (not like Git, but like that—we called it versions v4.1.16) and said it would be better to simply push the code to the site when we think it's ready. Now there's no centralized place to put release notes, which has become annoying.
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GitHub has become the de facto repository for open source projects. So, we were excited for the opportunity to sit down with GitHub's co-founder and CIO Scott Chacon during the All Things Open Conference in Raleigh, NC.
Python
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One year ago the Puerto Rico Python Interest Group (prPIG) was founded on one purpose; to create a sustainable user community based on software development in Puerto Rico. On February 20, 2014 we will celebrate our first anniversary with an open format meeting with lightning talks from the community.
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Programming languages are crucial to a programmer as they boosts their productivity. Keeping in mind the fact that programmers may not be comfortable with all the coding languages around, we thought of compiling a list of programming languages set to make it big in 2014.
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Python community, friends, fellow developers, we need to talk. On December 3rd, 2008 Python 3.0 was first released. At the time it was widely said that Python 3 adoption was going to be a long process, it was referred to as a five year process. We've just passed the five year mark.
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In an article entitled “Python Displacing R As The Programming Language For Data Science,” MongoDB’s Matt Asay made an argument that has been circulating for some time now. As Python has steadily improved its data science credentials, from Numpy to Pandas, with even R’s dominant ggplot2 charting library having been ported, its viability as a real data science platform improves daily. More than any other language in fact, save perhaps Java, Python is rapidly becoming a lingua franca, with footholds in every technology arena from the desktop to the server.
Git
LLVM
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It looks like there's finally going to be stable point releases of the LLVM compiler infrastructure for pushing out bug-fixes quicker, whether you're using the Clang C/C++ compiler or depending upon LLVM for your GPU driver compiler back-end.
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It's nearly one month late but the LLVM 3.4 compiler infrastructure is now available with the updated Clang C/C++ compiler front-end, the usual LLVM sub-projects, and also some new compiler tools.
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The release of LLVM 3.4 is imminent and with the major compiler infrastructure upgrade comes update to the Clang C/C++ compiler front-end, LLDB debugger, and other LLVM sub-projects. LLVM 3.4 is a very righteous release and in celebration of its forthcoming release, it's back into compiler benchmarking season at Phoronix.
Ruby
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Ruby 2.1 has many improvements including speedup without severe incompatibilities.
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The Ruby project has done a new major release on Christmas for their popular programming language. Ruby offers performance speed-ups but without severe incompatibilities, according to the release announcement.
Misc.
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Regular readers of this column won't be surprised to hear that I love both Ruby on Rails and PostgreSQL. Rails has been my primary server-side Web development framework for about eight years, and it has managed to provide solutions for a large number of consulting and personal projects. As for PostgreSQL, I've been using it for about 15 years, and I continue to be amazed by the functionality it has gained in that time. PostgreSQL is no longer just a relational database. It's also a platform supporting the storage and retrieval of many types of data, built on a rock-solid, ACID-compliant, transactional core.
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In the sometimes dark and mysterious world of computers, I see open source programming and community around it as a force of good. Open source sparks and kindles a connection between people that I think is hard to find elsewhere in programming. Working with open source, a programmer builds important and powerful collaboration skills. This is significant because many of us (programmers and self-proclaimed nerds) are rather antisocial. Open source programming helps us cultivate social behaviors like sharing, improved communication, and collaborating towards a common goal.
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So by the mid-1980s, programming in schools was surging...
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The Checkpoint-Restore Tool has reached version 1.0 as part of the CRIU project. Checkpoint/Restore In Userspace allows for users to freeze running applications and checkpoint it to the hard drive as a file and that checkpoint can then be restored to a running process later on. CRIU is different from suspend-and-resume with the Linux kernel in that this is a tool for handling individual programs and it is implemented in user-space.
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The development team behind the Clutter software, a library for creating compelling, portable, dynamic and fast graphical user interfaces (GUI), has announced a few days ago that the second maintenance release of the stable Clutter 1.16 branch is available for download.
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Jim Kukunas of Intel OTC published the set of 13 patches on Monday that include medium and quick deflate strategies, a faster hash function with SSE 4.2 support, PCLMULQDQ-optimized CRC folding, SSE2 hash shifting, and other changes/tuning.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- American Back Doors No Longer Trusted by Europeans
- Has the EU paid attention, for a change?
- When Energy Prices Double in About a Month the Slop Bros Won't Sleep at Night
- Unhinged leadership does not seem eager to end a conflict that it started
- Newer is Not Better, Lunar Edition
- Maybe in 57 years (2083, after all these wars) we'll managed to launch a capsule with a human and a dog above the stratosphere again
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- Ubuntu More Honest Than Microsoft Windows
- If you don't like the direction Ubuntu has taken, then try something else
- Azure is Dying, the "Entertainment" (Slop) Couldn't Lift Up Fake 'Demand' For Azure
- Azure has had mass layoffs every year since 2020 and even earlier this year
- 2026 Starting to Feel Like 2020
- Can Wall Street survive this?
- Growing Awareness of Techrights' Importance
- We're not an individual's blog but a community project
- Harassment by Microsoft, Then a Cover-up
- That Microsoft relies on blackmail, bribes and harassment (even against its own people) isn't surprising given the roots of the company and its toxic, deceitful management
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 37 Out of 200: The Correct Suspicion Garrett and Graveley Were Collaborating in Overseas Litigation Against Critics
- Microsofters and back doors' boosters from America frivolously sue Brits
- Microsoft Has Lost Nearly 20% in "Desktop Operating System Market Share" Since COVID-19 Began
- Add Android and iOS, then Windows falls to 24%
- Maintenance Later This Month
- Apr 24, 2026 21:00 - Apr 25, 2026 09:00 BST
- Microsoft: Move Over, XBox, Slop is the New "Entertainment" and We Demote Our "Entertainment" CEO
- Marketers, marketers, marketers, as a CEO called Ballmer put it
- linuxbuz.com is a Slopfarm, It Depends on LLMs
- In the more distant past it could be said that linuxbuz.com was an OK site
- Links 07/04/2026: Patent Trolls Leigh M. Rothschild, Bolstered by GNOME and OIN, Continues to Attack; ‘Retaliatory Antitrust Suit’ by MElon
- Links for the day
- Gemini Links 07/04/2026: Copyleft Revisited, Killing Linux Processes With FZF
- Links for the day
- It Would be Good for Debian to Have a Female DPL, But...
- Debian isn't exactly selecting people for quality or policing bad behaviour
- IBM Insiders Say What's Wrong With IBM in Albany (and Yes, There Are Layoffs)
- promotions boil down to what insiders now call "brown-nosing" and nepotism
- After Killing OpenSource.org IBM Together With OSI Told Us It Would Carry on OpenSource.net, But the Site Has Been Essentially Dead for 9 Months (Effectively Abandoned)
- OpenSource.org has been dormant for 4 weeks already and OpenSource.net last had a new page 9 months ago (it'll be 9 months tomorrow) [...] That's IBM in a nutshell
- A Lot of What Happened to OSI is Because of Reporting by Techrights
- Half a year since Stefano Maffuli (Executive Director) "left"
- Public Presentations by RMS Hardly Interrupted Anymore
- We'll carry on covering those sorts of topics throughout the year
- Links 07/04/2026: US Wants to Put Journalists in Prison for Reporting Facts, Artist ‘Bale’ Arrested Over Rape Allegation in Social Control Media
- Links for the day
- To IBMers, IBM Has Failed and is Fast Becoming a Book of Jokes and One-Word Punchlines
- How else can one make it obvious that IBM is circling down the drain?
- "AI Revolution" Was a Lie: Microsoft CEO Admits What He Calls "AI" is Sometimes Sloppy and Microsoft Admits That Slop is for "Entertainment Purposes Only" (Not for Any Serious Work)
- if it gets "memory-holed", we can bring it up again and again
- Social Control Media is Not a Viable Business Model
- The future of the Web might not be the Web
- From Datacentres Boom to Actual Booms That Target Datacentres, Now Struggling to Justify Humongous Energy and Water Consumption
- Datacentres that are used for mindless "entertainment" (as Microsoft calls it) like slop are not a priority at this time
- Gemini Links 07/04/2026: Aircraft Lift Force, Editor History, and Consumer Hardware Stagnation
- Links for the day
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Monday, April 06, 2026
- IRC logs for Monday, April 06, 2026
- What Matters is Software Freedom, Not the Brands
- The important thing is to speak about Software Freedom
- Wikileaks is About to Turn 20
- ~2 days ago it turned 19.5
- The Cloud of Smoke
- Will 2026 be the year that "The Cloud" openly confesses the risks it brings about?
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 36 Out of 200: Claim KB-2024-003529 in a Nutshell (Microsoft Employee Does Terrible Things, Then Sues the Reporter in Another Continent)
- It commences with more of an overview
- Gemini Links 06/04/2026: Solar Panel Story and Centralisation
- Links for the day
- "Free Speech, Free Press": What the World Needs to Improve
- Darkness breeds corruption
- IBM prioritises a "lot of smoke and hype and use of trending buzzwords"
- IBM can pretend all it wants things are fine
- GAFAM Paying the Price for Pursuing US Military Money (Taxpayers' Money as 'Stimulus' With Strings Attached)
- The "cloud" in cloud computing is a cloud of smoke
- Observing Slop's Demise
- If energy becomes more scarce, then one rare/side perk (or upside) will be slop companies screaming for lifeboats
- Links 06/04/2026: Crackers Breached the European Commission, Why "Old Way of Campaigning Won’t Cut It Anymore"
- Links for the day
- Enron Versus NVIDIA (the Cost of Circular Financing, or Funding Your Own Customers to Buy Your Products) - “The Inventory Paradox” or “The Vibe Revenue Admission”
- Round-tripping (finance)
- You Know "The Economy" is Fake When 6 Months After Oracle Says Debt-Saddled 'Open' 'AI' (Slop) Will Pay It $300,000,000,000 Oracle Says It Must Lay Off 30,000 Workers at 6AM
- Oracle is in deep debt, which increased at a pace of almost 4 billion dollars per month lately
- Free Software Will Outlive GAFAM
- GAFAM is overhyped
- Techrights Was Further Decentralised Three Years Ago
- In 2020 we began working on IPFS stuff
- The Military Attacks on Dubai Internet City as Reminder That GAFAM Isn't Safe (Disregard the "Nobody Gets Fired for Buying GAFAM" Mindset)
- These are all realistic and foreseeable scenarios that GAFAM sceptics have long warned about
- The Wars Aren't Ending, Now We See GAFAM Facilities Being Bombed
- This is becoming a tech issue
- Links 06/04/2026: Turning 34, Throwing Things Away, and Printing in GNU/Linux
- Links for the day
- Links 06/04/2026: Ex-Microsoft Engineer Explains Why Azure Fails, Germany Prepares for War
- Links for the day
- EPO "Cocaine Communication Manager" - Part XI - EPO Strike Enters Its Second Week, EPO Sheds Off Qualified Staff to Make Way for Nepotists
- More than six months ago the "Cocaine Communication Manager" got arrested for cocaine use
- Another Microsoft Outlook Downtime
- Microsoft has sloppy code, it's not something suitable for mission-critical things
- Week 2 of April IBM Layoffs Accelerate Based on Rumours
- "Heard about Layoff at IBM"
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Sunday, April 05, 2026
- IRC logs for Sunday, April 05, 2026
- Culture of Harassment Inside Microsoft, Says Former Director at Microsoft
- listen to Microsoft insiders
- Drone Strikes on Amazon (GAFAM) Datacentres Highlight Azure's Miniscule Share
- Azure is failing
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 35 Out of 200: How to Make ~10,000 Pound Sterling (13,220.50 United States Dollars) by Copy-Pasting and Editing 10 Pages
- Today it's Easter Sunday, so we'll keep this part relatively short
- Gemini Links 05/04/2026: Artemis II Mission Tracker, Meditation on Copyright, Alhena 5.5.5, "Gemini as the Final Frontier of Human Cognition"
- Links for the day
- Microsoft Windows Falls to All-Time Low of ~60% in Switzerland, GNU/Linux Among Top Gainers
- What will it take for mainstream media (not just geeks' site) to cover it?
- Mainstream Media on "Practical Survivalism"
- Suffice to say, panic buying begets more panic and price surges
- Cloud Computing as a Cloud of Smoke (Your Hosting Provider is a "Legitimate" Military Target)
- When a French datacentre went up in flames people joked that the "cloud" meant a cloud of smoke
- Andreas Tille Congratulates Sruthi Chandran Before the Election for Debian Project Leader (DPL) is Even Over
- Andreas Tille, the current Debian Project Leader (DPL) who has been in this role for nearly 24 months
- When You Try to Change the World for the Better and Somehow They Find a Way to Say You Are the Villain
- Don't be a fool. Don't fall for inversions of narratives.
- Slop Was a Flop and Energy Crisis Will be Slop's Final Blow
- Today we see no slopfarms in Google News
- Links 05/04/2026: "Taiwanese Airlines to Hike Fuel Surcharges 157%" and Openly Racist Voter Suppression Starts in the US
- Links for the day
- Gemini Links 05/04/2026: Playing with Hyprland and Migrating Antenna Filters
- Links for the day
- Links 05/04/2026: "Confidential Computing" as Proprietary Bundle of False Promises and "The Web Is an Antitrust Wedge"
- Links for the day
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Saturday, April 04, 2026
- IRC logs for Saturday, April 04, 2026