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AMD announced today that it has released new Linux drivers for its line of video cards. The new Linux Catalyst 7.10 drivers release includes several updates and new features.

Making periodic backups is a common task. Synbak can help to simplify it. Synbak brings together several different backup methods and provides a powerful reports system that provides details about all the work it does. Synbak can use rsync over Secure Shell (SSH), Server Message Block (SMB), or Common Internet File System (CIFS) and either create tar archives or burn CDs and DVDs (quaintly called laserdiscs in a throwback to old times). It can also access and back up MySQL and Oracle databases and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) servers. Finally, it can send you an email message with the backup details and create an HTML plus RSS Web page with the same information.

Mandriva CEO François Bancilhon has asked Steve Ballmer what it feels like to look at himself in the mirror. In an open letter to the Microsoft head honcho, posted to the web late last night, Bancilhon claims that the Nigerian government has somehow decided to install Windows on 17,000 brand new PCs already equipped with Mandriva Linux. And he questions whether Ballmer and company used dirty tricks to make it happen.

This guide shows how to set up an Ubuntu Studio 7.10 desktop. The result is a fast, secure and extendable system with focus on multimedia creation - the real-time (RT) kernel is installed by default. It provides all you need for daily work and entertainment, incl. codecs, Flash, Adobe Reader, VMware, Skype, TrueType fonts, Cedega, and many more.

Guardian Digital reinforces their dedication to web security with completely redesigned and updated version of their popular Web and Content Filtering solution, SurfSecure.

Everyone knows they should make regular backups of their data. But hardly anyone is as diligent with backups as they should be. So in this two-part series we're going to learn some nice simple methods for making regular backups on single PCs or small networks. Part 1 covers external backup media, and bendingudev to your will so that your backup devices will have persistent names.

With much anticipation by the OpenSolaris community, last night Sun had released their first developer preview for the binary desktop distribution that we have known over the past couple of months as Project Indiana. Ian Murdock and company are optimistic for this project that will address some of the existing Solaris adoption barriers when it comes to the installation, package management, and familiarization along with revitalizing the user experience. How does this first milestone of Project Indiana, which in fact will be named OpenSolaris, rank when it comes to meeting their objectives? In this review, we have a lot of information and screenshots on this long-awaited OpenSolaris binary distribution.

As we all know, Linux distributions are freely available over the Internet. However, prohibitive bandwidth costs, thanks mainly to Telkom's stranglehold, mean that downloading distros of several hundred megabytes or even several gigabytes can be prohibitive. It is much easier and cheaper to just get a CD burned, either at cost or for a small premium.

This Beta aimed at further polishing of the KDE codebase and we would love to start receiving feedback from testers. Besides the stabilization of the codebase, some minor features have been added, including but not limited to much work on Plasma, the KDE 4 desktop shell.

If you are running a blog (or any Web publishing system, for that matter) that relies on a database back end, you will sooner or later face the problem of backing up the content stored in the database. One way to go about it is to build a backup tool using OpenOffice.org Base. Since Base can pull data from a MySQL or any ODBC-compliant data source, you can create a simple database that connects to the blog's back end and extracts content from it, which you can then export in different formats.

LinuxSecurity.com: Security is at the forefront of everyone's mind and a firewall can be an integral part of your Linux defense. But is Michael's Rush's "Linux Firewalls," the newest release from NoStarchPress, up for the challenge? Eckie S. here at Linuxsecurity.com gives you the low-down on this newest addition to the Linux security resource library and how it's one of the best ways to crack down on attacks to your Linux network.

The New Zealand State Services Commission's (SSC) championing of open-source software in government helped its ICT (Information and Communications Technology) branch pick up an award in the government category of the inaugural New Zealand Open Source Awards, held in Wellington this month. The SSC has developed and published guidelines to government agencies that are considering open source, says the deputy commissioner and head of the ICT branch, Laurence Millar. The guidelines were published on the e-government website in 2003 and then updated, he says.

I was truly disheartened after trying out Evolution on Windows: how in the heck is this even considered anything but an Alpha? As a full-time Evolution user in Ubuntu, I have always been very happy with its PIM (personal information manager) abilities, MS Exchange support and the fact that it's easy to create a simple backup script to keep things safe in case of data loss.

The situation and rules for the Ballot Resolution Meeting (BRM) are starting to become clearer. As you may know, this is a follow-up to the September 2 vote where the Microsoft/ECMA OOXML (”Open” “XML”) specification failed on both measures to become an ISO/IEC JTC1.Given the way the system works, this means that we get to go on and try something else to make it a standard. And if that doesn’t work, try something else. Repeat until either the opposition goes away, gets bored, or no one remembers what you were trying to do in the first place (grin).

This week on Open News Turbolinux Does Deal With The Devil, Sun Fights For The Community, No More Greenphone, Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon and Anonymous Browsing With JAP.

I’ve known for a long time to stay away from the short, sweet and simple “rm -rf /” command. It deletes every file on any writable filesystem mounted by a *nix system, but what exactly happens if you do run it? Do green leprechauns jump off the screen to warn you that you shouldn’t do it? Not quite. Here’s a video with the verbose option set to make it a little bit more interesting. I’m running it in a virtual machine so I can capture video of all the “action” - it was a bit slow to complete, but I’ve gone ahead and increased how quickly it runs to not be nearly so boring. Enjoy!

So you have GNU/Linux installed, and your friends are congratulating you on being the king of your computing castle. But you quickly lose that majestic feeling when you find yourself needing a Bash prompt, and start feeling like this whole GNU/Linux thing is a royal pain. The Bash prompt need not give you the feeling of having to issue royal decrees in a foreign language you've never even heard of, let alone speak fluently.

Microsoft have listed 100 reasons why people really ought to upgrade from Windows XP. They appeal to usability, mobility, security and entertainment. Yet, looking through the list, we reckon they’re actually talking about Ubuntu Linux, not that dog Windows Vista. Lets count down the top 10 reasons from Microsoft why you should upgrade to Ubuntu.

Dear Steve, Hi, this is François, from Mandriva. I’m sure we’re way too small for you to know me. You know, we’re one of these tiny Linux company working hard for our place on the market. We recently closed a deal with the Nigerian Government. We had a good answer to their need: the Classmate PC from Intel, with a customized Mandriva Linux solution. And then, today, we hear from the customer a totally different story: “we shall pay for the Mandriva Software as agreed, but we shall replace it by Windows afterward.” How do you call what you just did Steve, in the place where you live? In my place, they give it various names, I’m sure you know them.

KDE4 edged closer to final release this week with the development team announcing the KDE4 beta 4 release, the last step before final release candidates are built. Although intended primarily as a bugfix release, beta 4 has enough cool features to impress.