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Scraps is an awesome looking and sounding vehicle combat game that involves you building the whole thing! It's a bit like the multiplayer melee mode in Interstate ’76, except you build your vehicle from the chassis up instead of just bolting on weapons and armour. It’s kind of like how you put stuff together in Stratosphere: Conquest Of The Skies except that it’s a vehicle instead of a floating platform.

According to our “Newbie” Distro Poll, someone considering moving from Windows or Mac to Linux should consider taking Linux Mint for a spin. The poll asked the question, “What Linux distro would you be most likely to recommend to a new Linux user?” Evidently this was a subject that interested many of you, because a whopping 1,339 votes were cast in this poll, making it the most number of votes one of our polls has ever received.

Red Hat will switch the default database in its enterprise distribution, RHEL, from MySQL to MariaDB, when version 7 is released. The switch was expected to happen after Red Hat's community distribution Fedora announced earlier this year that it would be moving to MariaDB. But it will come as a major jolt to Oracle, the owner of MySQL. (openSUSE, the community distribution of SUSE, also announced a switch to MariaDB at the same time as Fedora.)

The issue, as we've noted, is that it's just not cost effective for anyone to actually stand up and challenge Warner Music, who has strong financial incentive to pretend the copyright is still valid. Well, apparently, someone is angry enough to try. The creatively named Good Morning to You Productions, a documentary film company planning a film about the song Happy Birthday, has now filed a lawsuit concerning the copyright of Happy Birthday and are seeking to force Warner/Chappell to return the millions of dollars it has collected over the years. That's going to make this an interesting case.

Here it is! The opinion in Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc. striking down patents on naturally occurring human genes, even if they've been isolated. It was unanimous! From the opinion:

Myriad did not create anything. To be sure, it found an important and useful gene, but separating that gene from its surrounding genetic material is not an act of invention.

Six vendors announced embedded Linux-ready Mini-ITX single board computers (SBCs) supporting Intel’s newly announced 4th Generation “Haswell” Core i7, i5, and i3 processors. The Aaeon EMB-QM87A, BCM MX87QD and MX81H, DFI HM100-QM87 and HD100-H81D, iBase MI980, Kontron KTQ87/mITX, and Portwell WADE-8015 are equipped with Intel QM87, Q87, or H81 chipsets.

The German Parliament, the Bundestag, has introduced a joint motion against software patents. The resolution urges the German government to take steps to limit the granting of patents on computer programs. In the resolution, the Parliament says that patents on software restrict developers from exercising their copyright privileges, including the right to distribute their programs as Free Software. They promote the creation of monopolies in the software market, and hurt innovation and job creation.

Version 4.0 of LOO still suffers from the issue of cross file compatibility to Microsoft Office. However, the good news is the pain is less than ever before and we now get the ability to open Visio and Publisher files! Personally, I have not used either of these Microsoft programs in years so I cannot attest to how well they are handled. Prior to LO V4, you just did not have the support to run the size of the operation you do. LO has given you the tools to make a solid business case.

SSH is typically used to log into a remote machine and execute commands. Server administrators find this protocol particulary useful for administering servers remotely. However, there are a wide variety of other uses for SSH. For example, it supports TCP port forwarding whereby an SSH server can secure otherwise insecure protocols, as well as X11 forwarding which offers a secure way to use graphical applications over a network. Other common uses of SSH include tunnelling and transferring files across machines using SSH file transfer (SFTP) or secure copy (SCP) protocols.

IBM officials are looking to accelerate the adoption of Linux in the data center and are taking a number of new steps to push along the effort.

The message coming out of Red Hat's annual Red Hat Summit is that while Linux is Red Hat's foundation, OpenStack is its future.

Mobile app developers can't afford the luxury of having the passion of the average Android or iOS fanboy. They follow the money. For now, Apple's App store is far ahead of Google Play in terms of developer revenue, but the trend is in Android's favor, and developers should be paying attention.

Has OpenStack, the open source cloud computing platform, come into its own? Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu Linux—which happens to be the most popular OS for OpenStack deployments—is saying so this week as it touts the rapid maturity of the software. Now, the question becomes: Does the channel agree?

At the Red Hat Summit in Boston, I have the distinct honor and privilege of being part of the Red Hat Innovation Awards proceedings. For the second time in the last 8 years, I am a judge (first time I was a judge was in 2005). Red Hat and indeed the technical world is a somewhat different place now but innovation - real innovation - that comes from real people using technology remains rooted in the same core fundamentals to me.

System76, which specializes in Ubuntu Linux laptops, desktops, and servers, is introducing two new Ubuntu laptops for gamers and office and home workers: the Galago UltraPro and the Gazelle Professional. Games have always been available on Linux, but with Steam now supporting Linux, gaming has never been bigger on Linux. To power up those games, the UltraPro comes with a 4th Generation 2GHz Intel Core i7-4750HQ processor with 4 cores. For graphics, the powerful laptop comes with Intel Iris Pro graphics backed by 128MBs of eDRAM.

Let's be clear about this: Linux isn't dividing into paid and unpaid. It's not going the freemium route (although the cynical will suggest that Canonical might be thinking about it). What we're seeing, though, is the development of a clear split. A kind of meiosis.

Beagleboard's latest offering, the Beaglebone Black, seems to be out to get one over the trendy Raspberry Pi. If you're seeking a compact board around which to construct a hardware project, you might well want to see which of these boards might best meet your needs.

New features in Red Hat Virtualization include Storage Live Migration, new third-party plug-in framework and support for new AMD and Intel chips

ClipBucket is an Open Source free Multimedia Management Script used to build your own Media sharing site like Youtube, Metacafe, Veoh and Hulu etc. Whether you are a small fan club or a big Multi Tier Network operator, Clipbucket will fulfill your video management needs. In this tutorial we build a basic Youtube like website.

Folk Tale is a sandbox fantasy city builder strategy game in which you lead a ragtag band of peasants in growing a small settlement into a thriving market town, while the dastardly Slavemaster Urzal and his minions plot your downfall.