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A free Unix-like OS need not be feared as something that isn't accessible or usable on a desktop. At least that's the hope with the latest release of PC-BSD version 1.4. The release includes a long list of fixes and improvements, with a focus on making the desktop BSD OS easier to set up and use. The official codename for the release is da Vinci, but that doesn't necessarily mean the release is a masterpiece.

It is already quite well established that Novell failed to stop Red Hat’s momentum after it had signed deal with Microsoft. The figures which Red Hat included in last night’s report left little room for doubt. They were very encouraging. It is still curious to find, however, that Red Hat’s desktop endeavors are facing a barrier which is due to Microsoft licensing (for codecs). This was mentioned about a month ago and it was once again mentioned in the press yesterday.

Is software a product or a utility? Free software proponents say it's as critical to economic progress as fresh drinking water. It isn't hard to get Eben Moglen talking. We were eight minutes into our conversation before I got to ask my second question. But that really didn't matter, because Moglen was describing the future of software, and his perspective is fascinating.

Taking some tentative steps into the world of web development, James Archibald discovers the sleek power and functionality of the Web Developer extension for Firefox. Although aimed at 'real' web developers, the extension proves to be handy for the novice too.

I have watched Miro (formally known as Democracy Player) grow and mature over the last few years, and I have to admit, it's become quite the addition to my Linux desktop. But how are the users reacting to the name change, and are they offering the content that users are into? Today, we will examine this and explore how Miro could go even further.

Software maker Red Hat Inc., which had planned to introduce a new version of its Linux software for personal computers in August, said on Tuesday that the product won't be out until next month at the earliest.

I'm aware there are many open source multimedia tools that will play most audio and video formats on Linux these days but many people have come to like Windows Media player over the years. And while Xine and Mplayer will play most .WMV .WMA files, both of these players use Windows codecs that are copied into your /usr/lib/win32 directory. So if your currently happy using the closed source Windows Media codecs why not use the player as well.

Xen is a powerful new virtualization system that enables you to run multiple operating systems on one computer. Here's how you can install it on your Fedora machine, and how to get it configured to best suit your environment. This article is excerpted from the book Fedora 7 Unleashed by Andrew Hudson and Paul Hudson, SAMS Publishing, August 2007.

Can artists get away with using a PC over a Mac? When considering the fact that many art students are likely to be working inside of Mac labs at their respective schools, it does tend to make sense to follow the flow of things and use a Mac at home as well.

In early August I stated in this blog that after the OOXML JTC1 ballot closed on September 2, the sun would rise, the birds would sing, and so on. As we are now at the end of the month and about to move into October, I can state that those things all happened. Indeed, from my perspective, September was a very good month, maybe a historic month, for open standards and open source.

This posting follows up “Install Xen 3.1 Solaris domU (64 bit) at CentOS 5 dom0 (64 bit)” at Lxer.com and gives step by step instruction how to set up VNC on OpenSolaris DomU. In general , everything seems to be already told in OpenSolaris documents.However, I believe that detailed instructions won't be useless at mean time.

Don Parris discusses how to change user Access and Preferences settings in phpGroupware.

It's been a wild ride, but I have definitely not regretted my choice to make Ubuntu a major part of my life. As a full-time user, I have been charged by Windows and Linux user alike for not following their own lemming-like mindsets.

At the large school in Mexico where I'm employed as a system manager, I proposed (and got) a Linux server to replace an old Windows 2000 file server and domain controller for the alumni. I then was faced with the task of adding 3,000 users to this new CentOS 5 server. I wasn't about to add thousands of users and their passwords one by one to the new Samba primary domain controller (PDC) system. With a little help from OpenOffice.org Calc, a utility called Expect, and shell scripts, I automated the process.

Linux software maker Red Hat yesterday announced that the latest version of its operating system would be delayed for another 30 to 60 days. The latest version of Red Hat was originally expected in August.

If for any reason you need to move your /home directory to its own partition, here you will find how to do it, this will be useful in a lot of situation, because, you run out of disk space, or because you need to reinstall your system, or because you need to have a dual boot system with two Linux distros, sharing the same home directory

I call it the $0 Laptop, because that's what I paid for it. The dead Gateway Solo 1450 I got a few months back now runs. The Gateway's previous owner abandoned it because its DC power plug pretty much disintegrated -- a common problem in these machines because the plug in question is a PC-board-mounted piece of plastic. With a new power plug in place, I decided to try to get some Linux and BSD distros on it. Xubuntu 7.04 had a promising start. After booting the live CD, I even had the panels that went missing in my other installs. But the install crashed, and on subsequent tries, those panels disappeared, so I decided to move on.

A thread on the OpenBSD-misc mailing list compared the security of SELinux in the 2.6 Linux kernel to what's available in OpenBSD. The general opinion was that SELinux and its policy language are too complex, leading Damien Miller to note, "every medium to large Linux deployment that I am aware off has switched SELinux off. Once you stray from the default configurations that the system distributors ship with, the default policies no longer work and things start to break." Ted Unangst summarized, "the problem with security by policy is that the policy is always wrong."

QEMU is an open source emulator for complete PC systems. In addition to emulating a processor, QEMU permits emulation of all necessary subsystems, such as networking and video hardware. It also permits emulation of advanced concepts, such as symmetric multiprocessing systems (up to 255 CPUs) and other processor architectures, such as ARM or PowerPC. This article explores QEMU and its architecture and shows how to emulate a guest operating system on a Linux host.

One of the discrepancies in the reputation the US has as a tech innovator is the perception that it has lagged behind Europe when it comes to mobile telephony. As one critic said rather sarcastically about this lack of progress: "Ten years and all we have to show is ring tones." The first sign of change was the 31 July announcement by the FCC that licensees will be required "to allow customers, device manufacturers, third-party application developers and others to use or develop the devices and applications of their choosing." The second aspect of this change is the availability of open phones. Not only are the phones open, but their operating systems are open too, running Linux.