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In computing terms, a cache is a collection of temporary data that will be required to be accessed in the future, and can be retrieved extremely quickly. The data stored within a cache may be a simple reproduction of information held elsewhere or it may have been the results of a previous computation. Where data stored in the cache is requested, this is known as a cache hit. The advantage of a cache hit is that the request will be served considerably faster. The flipside, a cache miss, occurs when information has to be recalculated or retrieved from its original location, consuming more system resources and slower access. If 20% of data is accessed 80% of the time, and a system can be utilised which reduces the cost and time of obtaining that 20%, system performance will dramatically improve. Fine tuning a system to improve the cache hit rate speeds up overall system performance.

This tutorial explains how you can integrate ClamAV into PureFTPd for virus scanning on an Ubuntu 10.10 system. In the end, whenever a file gets uploaded through PureFTPd, ClamAV will check the file and delete it if it is malware.

Faenza icon theme for Natty PPA has already been updated and now its the turn of Equinox themes for Ubuntu 11.04 to be released. And the latest Equinox theme pack, created by Tiheum(who also created beautiful Faenza icon theme) comes with 3 brand new themes - Equinox Dawn, Equinox Dusk and Equinox Midnight respectively.

Shutterbugs have found big power in understanding and manipulating digital photos in RAW formats. Linux lovers have the perfect tool for harnessing the RAW power in Digikam, via the built-in LibRaw. Want to claim the power for your own photo efforts? Read on and I'll show you how to tame RAW photos on Linux with Digikam.

So-called Web 2.0 software, with its seamless linking of applications, has made it easier to share research findings, and that in turn has led to an explosion of collaborative efforts. The researchers decided to take what at the time was a large risk, and began to develop their code as an open-source software development project, meaning that it could be freely shared by the entire biological community.

Although a jury found Google liable for patent infringement over patent claims against Linux, at least one legal expert thinks that Google has more than a fighting chance to overturn the verdict on appeal. But the more you look at this case, the uglier and more unfair it gets.

There's just twelve hours left to the Humble Indie "Frozenbyte" Bundle #3. This is a collection of games from the Frozenbyte game studio that are multi-platform (Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X), are free of any Digital Rights Management restrictions, and you simply pay whatever you want for the collection of five games...

Outsiders often criticize free software because it offers too much choice. Choice confuses people, they say, and free software would be more efficient if everyone concentrated on improving the best application in each category instead of developing alternatives. To me, this argument has always seemed conditioned by monopoly, but recently I found reason to believe that it couldn't be more wrong.

Toorox is a Gentoo-based installable live CD that features your choice of KDE or GNOME desktops. It comes with lots of useful applications including system configuration tools, easy package management, and proprietary code installers.

There are so many clever ways to share photos on the Web that the idea of creating a static HTML photo gallery may sound positively obsolete. But in certain situations, the ability to turn a bunch of photos into an HTML gallery can come in rather handy.

Texas Instruments (TI) announced a new single-core TMS320C6671 member of its multicore TMS320C66x digital signal processor (DSP) family, as well as enhancements to its TMS320C6670 radio system-on-chip (SoC). In addition, the company released a free multicore software development kit (MCSDK) update for its C66x DSPs featuring updated Linux kernel support, optimized DSP libraries, and support for the OpenMP programming model.

Just an update, Linux Fest Northwest is this weekend! If you're free and in the area be sure to come by for at least one (or part of one) of the days! For more information, see the quote below from my previous post!

In some ways, all the uproar about Apple saving location data on its iOS device users is old news. Guess what? Big Brother, or Big Google, also collects geo-location information from its mobile, Android-powered devices. It’s like anything else in computing: geo-location can provide great services and resources, but it can also be abused.

The latest and greatest release of Ubuntu — 11.04, or “Natty Narwhal” — is nearly upon us. To get a sense of how the new version situates Ubuntu and the rest of the open source community going forward, I spoke with Canonical VP Steve George. Here’s the update.

Barnes Noble announced an automatic update this week for its Nook Color e-reader that turns the device into more of a low-cost Android tablet. New features offered by the 1.2.0 update include 125 apps, an email application, and support for Adobe Flash, says the online retailer.

Biff Baxter, real name Ronald Ropp, is a technology consultant based in Portland, Oregon. He's also the developer behind wattOS, an Ubuntu derived Linux distribution (see our overview). We were quite impressed with wattOS, so we got in contact with him for some Q+A.

In the latest GNOME 3, changing the theme isn't as easy as you're used to. Using Gnome Tweak Tool you can change the GTK theme but how about the titlebar (Mutter/Metacity theme)? Read on!

It's just a few days to go until the next major release of Ubuntu and the developers have issued a final testing version. Released late last week the second Ubuntu Natty Narwhal Beta will be the final pre-release ahead of a planned 28 April final release.

If you're like me, you've got music playing all day. When you have tapped out your personal collection, want to troll for new music, or just let someone else handle the playlist — you'll find plenty of Internet radio stations and streaming services. Thankfully, Linux offers plenty of ways to tune into Internet radio stations. From Banshee to Pithos, you have a bevy of options at your fingertips.

Aside from political issues surrounding open vs. closed-source (graphics) drivers on Linux, the proprietary NVIDIA Linux driver is widely liked. The proprietary NVIDIA Linux driver is relatively bug/trouble-free, has a performance parity to the Windows driver, supports new hardware right away, and has a near feature parity to the Windows driver. There's not much more you could ask for from a closed-source driver, aside from a few missing features. One of the missing features that's been widely talked about as of late has been Optimus.