Linux in the News: New RC, Steve Jobs' Offer to Torvalds Recalled, OpenDaylight Summit...
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2014-02-18 09:46:04 UTC
- Modified: 2014-02-18 09:46:04 UTC
Summary: Kernel-centric news items from the past few days
Kernel Space
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Linux kernel 3.14 RC3 includes several updated drivers (GPU, media, block, etc.), architecture updates (x86, ARM64, s390), filesystem improvements (Btrfs, VFS, NFS, OCFS, and kernfs fixes), as well as various mm and tooling (perf) improvements.
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Linus Torvalds, the man behind the wonderful project Linux and Git was offered job by Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple Inc. Torvalds never met Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft but he met Jobs in the year 2000 when he was working with Transmeta corporation, an American fabless semiconductor company. Jobs invited Torvalds to Cupertino Camps of Apple. Torvalds was offered thick salary and remarkable position within the organization and was supposed to do Non-Linux things at Apple. This was the point, Torvalds disagreed. Moreover Torvalds did not like the Mac Kernel, Mach.
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Earlier this month at the OpenDaylight Summit, the software defined networking project announced its first code release, called Hydrogen.
Their open source controller is now available for download, published for everyone to see and use. But the structure and culture that got the project to this point, about one year after its formation, isn't so readily available for outsiders to see and understand.
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As users everywhere begin to warm up to the benefits of running multiple operating systems in tandem, virtualization has become one of the hottest corners of the technology arena. Many open source tools are helping to drive this trend, and that is making the work of the Open Virtualization Alliance very important. The group has been up and running for years, and late last year it joined the Linux Foundation in an effort to integrate its efforts more closely with the Linux community.
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All of the code for kdbus is living within its own Git repository right now and also there's code within the systemd Git while a compile-time switch must be activated now within systemd. Developers are hoping kdbus will be reviewed and merged into the upstream Linux kernel this year. Lennart shared a couple of kdbus features out on the horizon include sandboxing support, yielding CPU time to destination, priority inheritance, and priority queues.
Graphics Stack
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This new multi-touch touch-pad implementation presents support for one / two / three finger tapping, two-finger scrolling, clickfinger, drag-n-drop on clickpads, and single-touch touch-pad support. There's also work underway in the clickpad software button support and better timeout handling. Other possible features include trackstick mode support, disable-while-tapping, pinch/rotation support, and other features.
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An SGI fan and Phoronix reader happened to have an old set of SGI tapes dating back to the 90's regarding "Tech Talk" and "KGSI Radio" on SGI wares. The Phoronix reader, Steven Hill, digitized these recordings and obtained permission to release them from SGI after formally being marked confidential.
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AMD has published a second version of their open-source Linux driver code for exposing the "VCE" video engine on modern Radeon GPUs under Linux via OpenMAX for accelerated H.264 video encoding.
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The Radeon R600 Gallium3D driver has picked up support for another OpenGL extension that's mandated by the OpenGL 4.1 specification.
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For those curious how AMD's Catalyst Linux performance is doing as we get 2014 underway with the first Catalyst 14.1 beta, here are benchmarks from nine different AMD Radeon graphics cards under Ubuntu Linux and running this latest publicly available driver when looking at both the OpenGL graphics and OpenCL compute performance.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- Obscene Contradiction in Microsoft's Layoffs Tally ("Official" Numbers Do Not Add Up)
- Notice how they treat "LinkedIn" as separate
- Confirmed: Microsoft Layoffs Come in Two Waves, Just Like Last Summer
- To us, what stands out is the admission from Microsoft that there are two (or more) waves
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- Links for the day
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- But the slop industry keeps paying the media to play along with the hype
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- SLAPP Censorship - Part 130 Out of 200: Jealousy, Envy, Hubris
- This site is primarily about Free software
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- Links for the day
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- People who want to communicate, federate and organise for effective change need to evolve
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- IBM in the 1980s is not what it is right now
- Cybershow on "Escaping Prisons For Your Mind"
- "THE CYBER SHOW: Stealing technofascism's boots, and stomping on its own face with them."
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- 'Bloodbath' is the term insiders use
- Links 06/07/2026: At Least 20% Staff Reduction in XBox (Microsoft), Taiwan Sees Uptick in Chinese Aggression/Provocation, Senator Rodante Marcoleta Arrested
- Links for the day
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- At the moment there is a healthy discussion going on with the objective of disrupting attacks on British press
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- We predict that, provided enough whistleblowers speak out, António "the unready" won't even finish his current term
- Leaving Our Pets for Several Days
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- several high-profile stories in the news about scandals in "dating apps"
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- It was released just days after Assange had turned 53 and about two weeks after he had left the UK
- Independent Media is the Only Form of Legitimate Media
- Independent media is, indeed, what we need to demand more of
- The Story of the European Patent Office (EPO) Wagging the Dog (EU)
- The aim of the series is to properly inform the world - not just Europeans - how Europe's second-largest institution is run [...] How did a corporate hub of monopolies become so detached from the Rule of Law?
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- Hunger for revenge compels people to do overzealous, irrational things
- Quiet Week
- Many in the US are still enjoying an extended weekend
- IBM's Fall
- IBM's fate is closely connected to that of the Free software movement because of the salaries
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- What next for the EPO?
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
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- IRC logs for Sunday, July 05, 2026
- Links 05/07/2026: Shadows of the Upper Peninsula and 2026 Old Computer Challenge
- Links for the day
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- technology has become detrimental to society
- Gemini Links 05/07/2026: Eye of the Beholder and Baldur’s Gate 3 and Alhena 5.6.5
- Links for the day
- GNU/Linux Market Share is Already High
- GNU/Linux has fast become and is still becoming mainstream in recent years
- The 9-Step IBM Algorithm: Gaming Wall Street While Shedding Off Staff and Bribing the Mainstream Media to Play Along
- Any time IBM preaches manners (e.g. CoC) to the community remember that IBM works closely with and flatters the dictator
- XBox is Practically 'Dead Man Walking' at This Point
- writings on the wall
- They Could Never Kill the Ideas of Richard Stallman (RMS), But They Are Still Trying
- Killing an idea is harder than killing a person and killing a person is illegal
- Only Germany Objected to Salary Adjustment (Reduction) Procedure of "Team Campinos"
- "flash report on the Administrative Council of 30 June and 1 July 2026"
- A "Never Slop" Policy in Quibble
- "every change in the repository must be made by a human"
- Series on GNU/Linux in Japan
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- 75% of All the Patents Last Year Were Software
- The corporate media has more or less ceased to discuss this matter
- At Microsoft "the Morale of Developers is at an All-time Low"
- Numerous reports today say that after at least 5 studios got marked for shutdown (mothballing) by Microsoft there are rumours about Obsidian as well
- Links 05/07/2026: Data Breaches, Heat Waves, and Weinstein Rape Conviction Upheld
- Links for the day
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- People who continue to cheer for slop aren't just misguided fanbis and fangurls
- False Narratives of Slop "Efficiency" as Debt Climbs
- false stories about slop
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- Microsoft's grip on the market has slipped for a long time
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- SLAPP Censorship - Part 128 Out of 200: Making Laws Work for Britain, Not Oversensitive Americans Looking for 'Revenge' by Lawfare
- The SLAPPs are intended to protect corporations (employers like Microsoft)
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- New initiative
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Saturday, July 04, 2026
- IRC logs for Saturday, July 04, 2026
- Gemini Links 05/07/2026: Ragebaited and Removing Lines in Emacs
- Links for the day
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- Links for the day
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- Expect many more Microsoft layoffs in years to come
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- Microsoft Double Trouble With Slop
- What does Microsoft even sell at this point?
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- TheLayoff.com is Deleting Comments About IBM Offshoring
- Meanwhile, rage-baiting Internet trolls and sometimes trolls who paste in LLM slop are immune from censorship
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- Links for the day
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- Address changed 13 hours ago
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- The kingdom is a cross-border phenomenon, so national flags and other such symbolism overlook the core problem [...] Free Software can help lead us out of the current imbalances
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- IBM Replacing the People Who Built IBM With Cheaper and Younger Staff, According to IBM Insiders
- This is a very common sentiment in IBM
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- Many of us still adopt and champion the "workstation" mentality
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- Links for the day
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- Over at Tux Machines...
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