Showing all newswire headlines

First of all, let me say that I am not a Microsoft hater. I will say that I am not fond of the majority of products I have used which bear the Microsoft label. They tend to leave me feeling as though my hands are tied and my options are limited and that I'm being "guided" by a paternalistic entity who feels that he knows what is best for me...but rarely ever really knows what is best for me. Whatever my experience, Microsoft creates products which are great for the majority of people out there. That is why Microsoft is such a successful company. Further, I believe that Microsoft has done more to push the computing world forward more than any other single company. So, I am by no means anti-Microsoft.

The K Desktop Environment (KDE) project has published a valuable list of available native KDE (and Qt, if no KDE counterpart is there) applications, sorted by task areas. The idea is to create a more informative and complete KDE-specific table of application information, the project said.

For the sake of simplicity let’s assume that you will use the computer’s entire hard disk for PCLinuxOS. Before you can boot your computer using the created PCLinuxOS disk, you have to make sure that your PC’s CD-ROM drive is set as the first boot device. Usually this can be done by changing settings in BIOS, and the exact steps depend on your computer model and BIOS version. Once this is done, you are ready to boot PCLinuxOS. Start your computer and insert the PCLinuxOS in the CD drive. During the boot, you will be asked to log in either as guest or root. Log in as root using root as both user name and password. When the system is finished booting, double-click on the Livecd-Installer shortcut on the Desktop to launch the Livecd-Installer tool.

Flashline has put together a Patterns Book for helping get Open Source projected started within an enterprise, even very demanding ones.

Read it online or download with registration

This article describes one user's experiences installing SUSE Linux 10.0 on a Gateway laptop. It describes specific issues in getting SUSE 10 to run on a laptop, including WiFi issues and power management.

REDMOND, Wash., Nov. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- CONNX Solutions, Inc., a leading provider of simplified data access management and integration software solutions, announces the release of CONNX 10. This release features a native Linux/UNIX implementation of the powerful CONNX SQL Engine, enabling Web services and Java applications to access enterprise data via a single server.

PLANO, Texas, Nov. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- UGS Corp., a leading global provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software and services, today announced it is in the final development stages for porting NX(TM) software, its comprehensive software solution for digital product development, to Linux(R) operating system on x64 technology.

This article goes over one person's experience when moving computer beginners from Windows to Linux. This is not always a smooth transition, but in this case a computer which was barely working was salvaged and there was an easy switch from one operating system to the next. Casual computer users almost always use Windows but the article observes that they could just as easily be using a Linux distribution, which would save money and extend the life of their computer, while avoiding many of the security hazards to which new users are most vulnerable.

Safe, Cost-Effective, No Waste Environment Will Speed Welder Training

Can we talk? Depends on we mean by"we". Usually it's just other people who agree with us. That's apparently the case with subjects about which opinions divide into factions.

Microsoft is once again in the race to supply government agencies in the state of Massachusetts with its Office productivity suite, the state's governor has said.

The state was threatening to disqualify Microsoft as a software supplier to state agencies because it failed to support open standards in its Office productivity suite. Starting in 2007, the state requires that all newly created documents use open standards.

[Ed: Evidently, it ain't over until it's over. I wonder which member of the GOP got to Romney on behalf of Redmond. Oh well, a Byrd in the Bush for freedom. - tadelste]

I was confronted one day by my wife that our new SuSE Linux computer could not access a website. My wife is an avid coupon clipper. She has found the internet to be a valuable source for coupons. One such place is Albertsons which uses Smartsource to host its web based coupons. Well what my wife saw was a webpage that posted "Our printing coupon technology is not supported on Linux".

The Free Software Foundation released its guidelines and process specifications this morning for the revision process that will produce version three of the GNU General Public License (GPL). The guidelines are designed to include as many people as possible in the revision process, says FSF executive director Peter Brown, but the foundation's specific ideas for changes to the license are not being released to the public just yet.

Quest Software, which has been building a cross-platform bridge between Linux and Windows systems, is expected to release early next year a tool that lets users monitor the open source operating system from their Microsoft management consoles.

[Ed- We have covered this before with mixed reactions. If this is what is needed to help Linux uptake fine -bstadil]

The download site for Firefox is performing well following the release of a widely-anticipated update of the open source web browser. Firefox version 1.5, which was released Tuesday night, features "dozens of enhancements," according to the Mozilla Corporation, including improvements in popup blocking, RSS integration and updating.

A very nice review of the tiny Linux distribution which has caught the linux users fancy. Really entertaining read.

Ruby Weekly News is a summary of the week's activity on the ruby-talk mailing list / the comp.lang.ruby newsgroup, brought to you by Anonymous. (Thanks whoever it was, this week's newsletter would have been a no-show without you.)

Epson Electronics America (EEA) launched its Web presence in 1998 with a then-typical static HTML Web site running on a Windows server. But by 1999, exorbitant licensing and maintenance costs, coupled with the company's need to create a dynamic site, led EEA's Executive Director for New Business Roy DaSilva to begin a migration to a site built with open source tools running on a Linux server.

So here we have an entire industry exerting considerable effort to exclude a whole class of customers, because we use a computing platform that they cannot control. Sure, Microsoft will be happy to screw over its end users by including all manner of DRM nastiness. But in the end it won't matter anyway- customers who choose to view their legally-purchased DVDs on Linux will easily, if illegally, find a way. What sort of madness is this?

The RIAA - Hollywood - DRM - Linux Suicide Pact

Lockheed Martin is to use Linux as the operating system for the missile defence program Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) program, dubbed 'son of Star Wars'.