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
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Kernel Space
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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.
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Graphics Stack
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Applications
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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.
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Instructionals/Technical
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Games
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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.
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Desktop Environments
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GNOME Desktop
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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.
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New Releases
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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!
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Debian Family
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Web Browsers
Chrome
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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.
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CMS
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Licensing
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Are developers actually chasing down license violations?
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Openness/Sharing
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There are some pretty basic things that a researcher can do to make their work into an open content project. Here are a few.
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Programming
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Finance
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Censorship
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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.
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Internet/Net Neutrality
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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.
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Intellectual Monopolies
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Copyrights
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ACTA
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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
- ITwire Became Slop and Spam
- The site still exists, but it's not what it used to be
- W3C Died 20 Years Ago, Now We Live in a Post-W3C Era. Linux Foundation is 'Slop Bros', Now Linux is Becoming Unfree.
- Torvalds is on the same side as Epsteingate
- Linux Kernel to Hide the Slop to Avoid Backlash, Suggestion Made by Former Microsoft Employee While Another Former Microsoft Employee is Worst Slopper/Culprit in Linux
- Did Torvalds listen to slop antagonists?
- Microsoft Shutdowns in Africa, Mass Layoffs Also Reported This Week
- further shutdowns
- Links 13/10/2026: More Plagiarism Lawsuit Over Slop and AirAsia Needs State Help
- Links for the day
- Intercontinental Brigading - Part II - An Outline of This Series
- What's to come
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- Microsoft Demands That Staff Keeps Silent About the Mass Layoffs
- Way to cause anger and ensure whistleblowers will go to the media
- Microsoft Has Had Mass Layoffs in Azure Every Year Since 2020 and the Bleeding Continues Because It Misreports Earnings There
- This is a bad week for Microsoft
- Microsoft's International Mass Layoffs (Asia, Europe, Africa), Now Vietnam
- A crisis that Microsoft is unable to hide
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 13, 2026
- IRC logs for Tuesday, October 13, 2026
- Gemini Links 14/10/2026: Ceiling Fan, Fascism, Democracy, and Slop Being a Huge Bubble
- Links for the day
- Reports of Stress and Layoffs at Microsoft, Some People Laid Off Under the Guise of "Ban" (Gift From the Administration) and Many Sacked in India
- "pip and gvsa" layoffs in India
- We're Way Past the Point Where Companies Announce or Declare Mass Layoffs
- Layoffs are becoming hidden
- Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Besieged by Blind Justice UK, Politicians Increasingly Involved
- "Today we have written to Members of both Houses of Parliament"
- Vance Has Helped Microsoft Implement Secret, Silent Layoffs
- Nothing excites Microsoft more than means by which to discard many employees without an obligation to tell shareholders about it
- To The Register MS, Microsoft is the Only Brand That's at the Main Menu!
- Consider that the Editor of The Register MS is a longtime faithful Microsofter
- Microsoft's Collapse Will Continue, It's Drowning in Debt Now
- Expect many more mass layoffs
- Legal Self-Sufficiency
- The more impact our work has, the more legal bullying will come our way
- Plans for Winter in Manchester and London
- From many perspectives, we're satisfied with the certainty and robustness of UK hosting, it's just that we're not yet robust/resistant enough to DDoS attacks
- Customer Support Experience in 2026
- Because the customer is never right
- Gemini Links 13/10/2026: Dopamine Nation, Planner and Fatigue, and Moderators
- Links for the day
- Links 13/10/2026: Norway Fines Microsoft and Cops Can Creep on Airbnb
- Links for the day
- When Computers "Expire" Because Certificates Expire
- People who promote Restricted Boot are liars. They lie for a living.
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 12, 2026
- IRC logs for Monday, October 12, 2026
- Gemini Links 13/10/2026: Modern Science, Joplin, Luddites, and Lots More
- Links for the day
- Mass Layoffs at Microsoft Again (October 2026), So-Called 'AI' Units Impacted Because Slop ('AI') Has No Real Future
- So much for the future of Microsoft being "hey hi" (AI)
- European Readers, Please Contact Representatives (in One's Nation) Attending the Administrative Council Meeting
- Normalising cocaine in in Europe's largest institutions (the people running these) is a slippery slope
- Network Plumbing
- We hope it'll help speed things up
- For Half a Year the European Patent Office (EPO), Europe's Second-Largest Institution, Has Had Water Problems in the Toilets
- And it's not being fixed
- Intercontinental Brigading - Part I - The Failed Attempt to 'Swat' Our Series About the Attacks and Crimes Committed Against Us
- This coincided with threats to our lives
- Links 12/10/2026: Strike on Riyadh and GOP Pays Voters ("Surprise $90 Social Security Payments")
- Links for the day
- Microsoft's XBox CEO Spoke of a "Return to Growth" Last Week, But XBox Sales Lowest in XBox History (Quarter of a Century)
- Microsoft's XBox is dying. It's a countdown to nothingness.
- Links 12/10/2026: Shopify (Slop Booster) Has Security Issues, "Russia’s Yandex Says Data Center in Vladimir Shut Down After Drone Attack"
- Links for the day
- "My Hands Are Shaking While Writing" About IBM's Mass Layoffs at Red Hat (Bluewashing)
- Shame, shame, shame on the corporate media for not covering Red Hat's layoffs this year
- Taking a Look at the Last Articles of Bob Cringely at Forbes, They Were All About IBM and Its Collapse
- It's all about IBM
- Microsoft Windows Causes Problems (and Delays) to LibreOffice and The Document Foundation
- Nothing would please Microsoft more than Windows curtailing the development of LibreOffice and adoption of ODF
- So Far This Year Microsoft Windows Lost a Lot of Ground in China, GNU/Linux Gaining at Its Expense
- GNU/Linux will soon exceed 10%
- Lessons of Margaret Hamilton (Software Engineer)
- Stop abetting men who attack women in the sciences
- RIP, Bob Cringely
- He was too young to leave us, his articles were still brilliant and his mind as lucid as ever
- What is "Computer Science"? It is What Broligarchs Reject.
- Nowadays some people call themselves informal terms or made-up titles (with terms like "AI" or "big data" or "data" tossed into the mix)
- Linus Torvalds Has a Conflict of Interest Regarding Slop
- Linus Torvalds is paid by the slop pushers
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Sunday, October 11, 2026
- IRC logs for Sunday, October 11, 2026
- Africa Sees GNU/Linux Exceeding 5% "Market Share"
- It wasn't always like this. It used to be measured at 1 or 2 percent.
- Brigading Against Women - Part XXVII - Americans and Public Executions
- "People who work for Facebook / Xitter / Bytedance's Tiktok / Microsoft / Oracle / IBM / Apple / Uber / Lyft / Wolt / DoorDash / AirBnB / Bolt / and so on are doing some world-class projection when they have the audacity to call others Bad People(tm)"