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I upgraded my Ubuntu VM to 8.10 just for this review (well, not "just" for this review, but mostly). Of course, Sobell's second edition of this "I-weigh-a-ton" tome covers both 8.04 and 8.10, but I run 8.04 on my production machine, so I figure I've got the book covered. Judging by the size of the book though, I'd have to assume that Sobell has it covered as well. But does he? Unlike Godzilla, size doesn't always matter. Let's have a look.

This is a guide for windows users who want to know how to use ubuntu, I'm going to describe everything you need to know to do the usual things many people do with their computer in this series. In the end of the series I will describe some of the more complicated stuff and I'll try to mix in some easy things that will help you impress your friends.

Cube was early on one of the first open-source first-person shooter games designed around its own engine. The 3D graphics for Cube were not the best, but development of this game had been going on since 2001. Based upon the Cube engine was then the Sauerbraten game that was also referred to as "Cube 2" with its engine being redesigned. Now though another game is emerging and its engine is derived from Sauerbraten. This game is called Blood Frontier and in this article we have a few screenshots of this game, which is working its way towards a stable release for the open-source community.

When asked to most of the users “How will you uninstall Linux when it is Dual Boot installed with Windows XP?” The common answers we got was “Start windows XP and format Linux Partition”. Well they were half correct, you do have to format the Linux partition but what about the grub loader? The grub loader will still be showing you the option to boot Linux during the start up and by mistake if anybody goes for booting Linux, the system will not find any Linux on your machine and it will restart. so what can you do in this situation?

This document describes how to install a Postfix mail server that is based on virtual users and domains, i.e. users and domains that are in a MySQL database. I'll also demonstrate the installation and configuration of Courier (Courier-POP3, Courier-IMAP), so that Courier can authenticate against the same MySQL database Postfix uses. The resulting Postfix server is capable of SMTP-AUTH and TLS and quota (quota is not built into Postfix by default, I'll show how to patch your Postfix appropriately). Passwords are stored in encrypted form in the database (most documents I found were dealing with plain text passwords which is a security risk). In addition to that, this tutorial covers the installation of Amavisd, SpamAssassin and ClamAV so that emails will be scanned for spam and viruses. I will also show how to install SquirrelMail as a webmail interface so that users can read and send emails and change their passwords.

It still amazes me to see storage administrators bringing the same Microsoft Windows mentality to the UNIX and Linux environments. That is, after changes to a configuration are made “reboot the console to view all changes.” Now while Microsoft Windows does a fairly decent job of updating any changes made to the SCSI Subsystem, UNIX and GNU/Linux still handle it somewhat differently. Rebooting the console should be the LAST thing anybody does. These operating systems are so modular that in most cases there is absolutely no need to reboot; unless you have made changes to the kernel.

Networking and telecom hardware giant Cisco Systems is now squarely aiming its product line at businesses that can’t afford - or don’t want to buy - the company’s proprietary, server room-to-desktop solutions, ending a long-standing, unspoken practice of ignoring the open-source software community. Cisco officials can now openly say support for open standards is a good business strategy for the company, which is not surprising given the rapidly growing use of open-source business communications software.

Nearly half of developers working on open source projects plan to offer applications as web services offerings using cloud providers, according to results of a new Evans Data open source development survey. The survey found that 40% of developers are on this track. Of these developers, 29% plan to use Google App Engine while 15% intend to use Amazon services. Cloud services from other vendors, including IBM, Microsoft, and Salesforce, were not as popular, Evans says.

Now that we're all rich and famous, this blog is going off the chain. Well, as the title of this post suggests (actually, asserts, unless it's toying with us ;) this marks our 500th post. Even though this is a momentous occasion (which most occassions composed of moments are ;) we're sticking to our guns and staying with the lazy (I mean diversified) format of the standard weekend post by showcasing other sites' humor :)

The Forge.mil site is based on SourceForge.net, a public site that hosts thousands of open-source projects. Defense Department officials have launched a new Web site where developers can work on open-source software projects specifically for DOD, David Mihelcic, the chief technology officer for the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), said today. The new site, named Forge.mil, is based on the public site SourceForge.net which hosts thousands of open-source projects, Mihelcic said at an AFCEA Washington chapter lunch in Arlington, Va.

Boys and girls, it's time to dust off your Pegasos II machine, or maybe to reduce the size of your MorphOS partition, because there's a new contender coming your way: ACube Systems Srl has announced the immediate availability of AmigaOS 4.1 for the Pegasos II. It's 01:40 here, so I can't check if the sky is falling, but I'm pretty sure it is.

Their was a time when Open Source software was considered has poor man software. Now, with economy slowdown in all the industries, adoption of Open source software has increased dramatically and its common to hear from all the big entrepreneurs to adopt open source software. Open source development continues to evolve, and developers who create open source applications and open source operating systems continue to emphasize involvement in an open programmable Web, open mobile and distributed or cloud computing.

The health care system in America is on life support. It costs too much and saps economic vitality, achieves far too little return on investment and isn’t distributed equitably. As the Obama administration tries to diagnose and treat what ails the system, however, reformers shouldn’t be worried only about how to pay for it. Instead, the country needs to innovate its way toward a new health care business model — one that reduces costs yet improves both quality and accessibility.

[This article doesn't talk about FOSS directly, but it really wants too. - Scott]

Wine is one of the best known, but least understood open source projects. It is a mystic application that everyone knows about, many use, but few truly understand. Reading forum posts, blog entries and tutorials about Wine show that Wine is surrounded by many myths and half truths. In this article, we will attempt to clear up some of the misconceptions about the project.

Whenever I make a real egregious error here, like confusing FOSS with open source, I can usually count on a short e-mail from Richard Stallman, dear old RMS himself. So I hope he forgives me going all Richard Stallman on the Obama Administration. The Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank founded by Obama transition head John Podesta (right), has come out with a release calling the Administration’s stimulus proposal an open source stimulus, because it emphasizes transparency and will feature a Web site where voters can track where the money goes.

Dell will announce a high-end, customizable phone that runs either the Linux-derived Google Android or Windows Mobile operating system, says a report. The phone could ship as early as next month, and be available with or without a slide-out QWERTY keyboard, the report claims.

The first Lifehacker post hit the tubes four years ago today. Since then, we've published thousands of tips, tricks, guides, and tools to streamline your life. Here's a brief history of Lifehacker, 2005 to 2009. Below, we've taken a look back at all of our posts from 2005 to present and pulled out the five most popular posts of each year. Not all of them remain entirely relevant today, but they provide a nice overview of where we've been in the past, and hopefully may even introduce you to some older Lifehacker content that only our most dedicated readers may recognize.

It is with great pleasure that we publish this interview with Dario Freddi, the developer known as drf in the KDE community. For those who do not know, Dario dedicates his time to many aspects of KDE 4; PowerDevil for example, the power manager that has debuted in KDE 4.2, is the result of his hard work. Other projects which he contributes are Arch Linux and the Chakra Project, DeviceSync and PolicyKit-KDE! You can find much interesting information in his blog and in the various links here and there in this interview which comes from KDE Italia from last December.

The biggest bottlenecks in making efficient code today are jumps or branches. You must have always heard of people telling you to use switch-case blocks instead of cascading if-else’es. They were right, but partially.

Could Microsoft benefit from a similar business model? Does the Open Source Model work better than its commercial alternative? This post comes on the heels of one of my fellow Staff Writer's posting the story, "A Modest Idea: What If Microsoft Open Sourced Windows?" And I'm aiming this commentary at Microsoft too but it applies to any company who seeks profit over what is fundamentally correct behavior in the marketplace. I'm not against anyone making a profit. Profit is good. Forfeiting good business sense and sacrificing employees in the name of profit are bad.