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Today in Open Source: Download Ubuntu 13.10 betas. Plus: Big Data and Linux, and Back to School open source apps!

Although the latest XBMC 13 release is an alpha version, it has a couple of important features that will make its way into the next version, such as 3D support

Just what you always wanted: A malware botnet on Android devices. But you have to be really dumb to get infected.

Sharing is easy. Everyday we have faster, easier and many more ways to do it. Sharing is also important. They say happiness gets bigger when it’s shared, as sorrow gets smaller. We share everyday and we feel good about it. We share our knowledge about an issue, we share advice when needed, and we share our opinion on all sorts of things. But the best thing about sharing is when our friends also share their points of view, giving everyone a better vision of the topic and enriching each another through a new perspective. Sharing code is similar.

Less than two months ahead of the Ubuntu 13.10 launch, buzz about the new operating system (code-named Saucy Salamander) is subdued. How can Canonical crank up the energy and excitement, especially as some partners attempt to pitch Ubuntu for private and public clouds? Perhaps the answer involves a Juju contest and some new cloud moves. Here are the details.

U.K.-based car manufacturer McLaren is adding an Android-based in-vehicle infotainment (IVI) system to its 2013 MP4-12C sports car based on Parrot’s Asteroid system. The Formula One inspired racer’s updated IRIS IVI system introduces new features like Pandora radio, Bluetooth audio streaming, and voice controlled music selection.

The development team behind Rhythmbox, an integrated music management application for GNOME, originally inspired by Apple's iTunes app, proudly announced last evening, September 4, 2013, the immediate availability for download of Rhythmbox 3.0.

Today I mostly used KDE as I did yesterday. Tomorrow my desktop choice could be something different. I'll select at login prompt after selecting a distro at the GRUB menu. Isn't Linux great!! Choices+!!

For parents: Shopping for back-to-school supplies, textbooks, clothing, and other accouterments can be frustrating and expensive. To help take the sting out of this ritual, students and parents might consider turning to free, open source software and tools in preparation for a new year of study.  For students: Beyond cost savings, open source software empowers students to take ownership of their work and be free of software licensing treadmills. And, perhaps the ultimate educational opportunity is the ability to examine, analyze, and contribute to open source software and tools like these. For teachers: Turning theory to practice, students can learn by doing as they help with documentation, quality testing, bug review, or even code contributions. Teaching is not simply the delivery of content, via lecture-taxi, to passive minds. Participation and collaboration ignites powerful learning, and empowers students to engage in thoughtful, meaningful scholarship. And open source can be the catalyst. Here are five great open source applications for learning. Share this list to your favorite student or teacher!

MirrorMoon EP is a game about mystery and exploration set in outer space. These space travels begin on a red planet and its unique moon and extend across galaxies. The single player part of MirrorMoon EP blends adventure and exploration with navigation-based puzzle solving.

Yet another unfortunate patent decision has come out of the appeals court for the federal circuit. This involves a case where certain customers of Cisco products were being sued for patent infringement by TR Labs, and part of its argument was that certain Cisco equipment resulted in the infringement by those customers. In response, Cisco filed a lawsuit in federal court, asking for a declaratory judgment that TR Labs' patents were invalid. TR Labs hit back that it had not sued Cisco, had no intention of suing Cisco, and thus Cisco could not sue for declaratory judgment.

For manuals and guides, Wikis are an excellent way of organizing content. Yet, they often don't work as well for larger articles or books because individual content is spread across many pages and the reader has to click around. Additionally, when you want to read online content while in a place where you cannot get an Internet connection (like, reading on the plane), another mode of content delivery is needed.

Lenna's Inception is a top-down puzzle-action-adventure game, similar to some of the Gameboy Zelda titles, but with procedurally-generated maps and puzzles, and a post-game sandbox.

Dot Categories: KDE Official News With the upcoming Frameworks 5, the KDE Release Team will decouple the release cycles of Workspaces, Applications and Platform. While Applications will have more releases in the 4.x series, the Plasma Workspaces team has decided to focus on Workspaces 2. The recently released 4.11 version of Plasma Workspaces will have Long Term Support. Meanwhile, work on Frameworks 5 is progressing, making KDE technologies ready for the future. What does all this mean? Read on to find out!

In 2008, Facebook gave big data users a gift. The social network released Cassandra, its NoSQL, big data distributed data store to open source. Today, with the release of Cassandra 2.0, the gift is more valuable than ever.

Recently filed FCC test documents offer a sneak peek at a new device in Sony’s NSZ-series Google TV media player lineup. Although the NSZ-GU1 plugs directly into a TV’s HDMI connector, it’s considerably larger than HDMI stick-style adapters like Google’s Chromecast or Plair’s device, which eschew Google TV in favor of remote management by a computer or mobile device.

The Apache Traffic Server 4 caching proxy server release improves Web performance and stability. The open-source Apache Traffic Server is hitting a major milestone with the release of a new version and a new road map for future development. The Apache Traffic Server was originally donated to the Apache Software Foundation by Yahoo and is a caching proxy server that can speed up the delivery of Web server content. A caching proxy server stores copies of frequently accessed content, making it more rapidly accessible to users.

So, Google's (GOOG) Sundar Pichai sort of says Android 4.4 will be called KitKat. Some chocolate lovers wonder if Nestle (owner of KitKat chocolate treats) will object. But take a closer look, folks: Nestle is actually partnering with Google on the Android 4.4 KitKat name. Now, let's shift our attention to the actual launch date....

Individual elements of KDE are being split off into different development cycles, and KDE Workspaces 4.11 will make way for the (temporarily named) Plasma Workspaces 2

Today in Open Source: The Nokia deal may have killed Windows. Plus: The $45 CuBox-i Mini-PC runs Android and Linux, and should games be ported to Linux via Wine?