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Want to improve the integrity of your data? Place constraints in the database, as well as in your application. NoSQL, the catchall phrase for non-relational databases, is all the rage among Web developers. However, it's somewhat unfair and unhelpful to use the term NoSQL to describe them, given the variety of technologies involved. Even so, there are some fundamental differences between traditional relational databases and their NoSQL counterparts. For one, as the name implies, NoSQL databases don't use the standard SQL query language, and use either their own SQL-like language (for example, MongoDB) or an object-oriented API. Another difference is the lack of two-dimensional tables; whereas SQL databases operate solely with such tables, NoSQL databases eschew them in favor of name-value pairs or hash-like objects. And finally, NoSQL databases typically lack the features that led to the development of relational databases, namely transactions and data integrity.

LibreOffice 4.0 has been officially released one week ago. This article describes how to install LibreOffice 4.0 on Debian-based / Ubuntu-based Linux distributions, with or without replacing a previous LibreOffice version.

The Linux kernel developers have long been aware of the need for better testing of the kernel. That testing can take many forms, including testing for performance regressions and testing for build and boot regressions. As the term suggests, regression testing is concerned with detecting cases where a new kernel version causes problems in code or features that already existed in previous versions of the kernel. Of course, each new kernel release also adds new features. The Trinity fuzz tester is a tool that aims to improve testing of one class of new (and existing) features: the system call interfaces that the kernel presents to user space.

On Monday was the original "work in progress" patch to improve the DIO code in the Linux kernel. As Overstreet wrote then, "The end result is _vastly_ simpler - direct-io.c is now ~700 lines, vs. ~1300 previously. dio_submit is almost gone, I'm down to 4 things left in it. It relies heavily on my block layer patches for efficient bio splitting, and making generic_make_request() take arbitrary size bios...It also gets rid of the various differences between async and sync requests - previously, for async reads it marked pages dirty before submitting the io (in process context), then on completion punts to worqueue to redirty the pages if any need to be. This now happens for sync reads, too."

Chances are you know about the digital divide, but not about the Kramden Institute's work to help hardworking students in grades 3 - 12 who don't have a computer in their home cross it. You also might be shocked to learn that while information technology seems to be ubiquitous, a full 23% of U.S. households still don't have a computer.

Vadim Girlin has revived his "shader optimization" branch of Mesa that focuses upon improvements to the AMD R600 Gallium3D graphics driver...

Erin Robinson, the Information and Virtual Community Director for the Foundation for Earth Science, the management arm of the Federation of Earth Science Information Partners (@ESIPFed), says that earth science matters to all of us. For example, when Hurrican Sandy devastated areas of the country, responders needed information on flood zones and what hospitals were available.

Code Synthesis has released version 2.2 of their ODB C++ Object-Relational Mapping (ORM) code...

Snowlinux 4 (Cinnamon) is released. Snowlinux is a Debian-based distribution and live CD with GNOME.

Innovatio deliberately avoided targeting the actual manufacturers of Wi-Fi equipment, preferring to sue end-users. But in October, Cisco, Netgear, and Motorola teamed up to file an 81-page lawsuit [PDF] seeking to shut down Innovatio's patent-trolling project once and for all. Not only were the patents invalid, but the suit alleged Innovatio's whole campaign was a violation of the RICO anti-racketeering law. That law is more commonly used against crime families than patent holders.

The third development milestone release of Phoronix Test Suite 4.4-Forsand is now available. Incorporated into this latest development snapshot are enhancements for improving the Apple OS X benchmarking support, detection of the new Linux F2FS file-system, and other improvements...

Apple and Google have the most robust app stores, and consumers and developers alike pay attention. It will be hard for competitors to break that success cycle.

As the creator of ROS, Willow Garage, pivots into a commercial business, the open source Robot Operating System is transitioning to the foundation established for it last year, where it will continue development

The latest release of Chakra Linux brings the recently released KDE 4.10 to the users of the Arch Linux based distribution. Chakra Linux 2013.02, code-named "Benz", also includes updates to the distribution's own tools such as its installation assistant and its theme. Chakra was originally aimed at providing a live CD that allowed for easy uptake by new users but still maintained the powerful roots and extensive package selection of Arch. The distribution can be installed and provides a modern Linux desktop; although it is still based on Arch Linux, it now uses its own repositories.

These seven steps to locking down security on your Linux Desktop may be one of the smartest things you ever did. Security increasingly becomes more important as we move to global network access.

Opera has announced that it will cease development on its proprietary Presto rendering engine in favour of a switch to the open source WebKit and V8 engines. The company is also contributing to the Chromium project

Factorio is in need of help via indiegogo to build their game. The game is about building a factory on an alien planet!

The NVIDIA Tegra DRM driver has received a set of patches today that provide various enhancements to this open-source ARM SoC graphics driver...

In this edition: two competitions for open code and data, a new nginx version, Coreboot for the HP Pavilion Chromebook, a new version of the WordPress iOS app, the Dalvik VM on Xubuntu, and the NSH command line

Pidgin 2.10.7 has been released a few hours ago, Februrary 13, and it brings numerous fixes, improvements, and a few new features, especially to MSN, Gadu-Gadu, MXit, Sametime, IRC and Yahoo! protocols.