Showing all newswire headlines

Heralded by Linus Torvalds as a "huge improvement," a 233-line kernel scheduling patch written by Mike Galbraith is making the rounds to rave reviews, reports Phoronix. Due for possible inclusion into Linux kernel 2.6.38, the "sched: autogroup" patch is claimed to reduce latency by a factor of 10, with noticeable improvements in 1080p video playback, according to "before-and-after" videos run at Phoronix.

During Red Hat's official launch event for their new Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (RHEL 6) release, executives from the company focused heavily on new performance gains. While performance and scalability are key elements of RHEL 6, so too is security. With RHEL 6, Red Hat is debuting a number of new features into its enterprise Linux, including new virtual security services as well as the System Security Services Daemon. Security services aren't the only area of RHEL 6 built for security, as all RHEL 6 packages now benefit from a new 4096-bit RSA hardware signing key as well.

Recently, I decided that instead of copying video files from one computer to another when I wanted to watch something on my TV, I would setup my network to stream the videos. I had previously tried NFS and UPnP, both without very impressive results. Therefore, I decided to try Samba, even though my perception of it was that it was mainly for sharing between Linux and Windows, and I had a Linux-only house. Much to my surprise, setting up Samba in KDE was a cinch, and Boxee, the media center application on my TV, recognized the shares immediately.

Ubuntu chief Mark Shuttleworth is making some bold and potentially risky decisions about the future of Ubuntu Linux. It's been almost a year since Mark Shuttleworth relinquished the reins at Canonical, stepping down as CEO to take a more hands-on approach in the company that is the backer of the Ubuntu Linux operating system. Judging by the various sharp turns Ubuntu has taken in the past year his steerage is starting to have an effect.

Despite all the hullabaloo about Ubuntu and other desktop offerings, for most organisations, the main use of Linux is on servers. Ignore all the waffle about flashy desktops and which browser is best, because the truth is, most organisations run on Windows and tons of Windows software – perhaps with a few Macs thrown in – and they can't change OS because they need those particular apps.

To be honest, Modern web pages ain’t look pretty in CLI web browsers. Up until yesterday, the most kick-ass web browsing experience I had in Console was w3m with image viewing enabled. I was under the impression that this is best that CLI web browsers could do. However, all that changed when I stumbled upon NetSurf; a venerable independent web browser that has been around for nearly a decade and is available for many Platforms such as RISC OS, Amiga, BeOS, and UNIX-like systems (For both GTK and Framebuffer front-ends).

The Samsung Galaxy Tab is the first true contender to Apple’s tablet crown, but has Samsung bitten off more than it can chew? Russell Barnes spends a week with the Tab to find out…

We, as computer users, run applications -- all sorts of them. We browse the web with an program, send e-mail via another, write up reports, crunch numbers, listen to music, transfer files and store contacts using a long list of different applications. There are thousands upon thousands of programs floating around the digital world and there's one problem: they don't all run on your operating system.

One of the most common queries I get from our readers is regarding the availability of quality themes in Ubuntu. As you all know there are plenty of themes out there and the difficult thing is to choose good from bad. So here is our collection of 6 brilliant GNOME GTK themes you should definitely give a try in your Ubuntu.

Linux is fast. That's why 90%+ of the Top 500 fastest supercomputers run it. What some people don't realize is that Linux is much better at delivering speed for servers and supercomputers than it is on the desktop. That was by design. But over the last few years, there's been more interest in delivering fast desktop performance. Now there's a Linux kernel patch that may give you a faster, much faster, desktop experience.

This article explains how to set up (and monitor) an Active/Passive PostgreSQL Cluster, using Pacemaker with Corosync and DRBD. We use two nodes, one active (that answers requests from apps) and the other one in passive mode. If the active server is down, the passive one will automatically take its position (being the active node). We are using the CentOS 5.5 (64bits) distribution, but it will probably work on Fedora (and Red Hat, for sure) as well.

The MeeGo Conference in Dublin has attracted over a thousand attendees from all over the world. The diverse audience includes Linux hackers, engineers from prominent hardware manufacturing companies, mobile technology enthusiasts, third-party application developers, and software consultants. The conference-goers exhibit a powerful sense of optimism about MeeGo--despite the fact that the emerging platform doesn't ship on practically any mainstream devices, yet.

Jared Smith, Fedora Project Leader, has announced some personnel changes within the Fedora project that show, as Smith says, "every person in the Fedora community is a potential leader." According to Smith, Fedora's "policies of rotating leadership help ensure that everyone who is so inclined has a chance to lead and serve."

Two weeks have passed since the release of the Linux 2.6.37-rc1 kernel that finally allowed the core kernel code to built without the the Big Kernel Lock. It also brought many open-source graphics improvements and other improvements and new drivers (such as a Intel Poulsbo driver and Broadcom's WiFi driver). Now the Linux 2.6.37-rc2 kernel is available as regressions are addressed in time for the final Linux 2.6.37 kernel release several weeks down the road.

awk supports user defined variables as well as variables that are predefined. These variables do not need to be declared like they do in bash scripts. There are three types of variables.

Fuduntu is a Fedora 14 remix (remaster) designed especially for Asus Eee (but you can of course use it on other netbooks and any laptop/desktop computer) and comes with some interesting performance tweaks by default. It was created by Fewt, the Jupiter (an hardware and power management applet for netbooks and Laptops) developer.

Mandriva was recently forked into a new distribution called Mageia Linux where several Mandriva developers parted ways with this distribution once known as Mandrake due to the uncertainty of the future direction of Mandriva Linux with its corporate backer having underwent some financial hardship. While there isn't yet a release of Mageia, the Mandriva Cooker Manager has finally been permitted to release details concerning the next two releases of Mandriva Linux.

You want a good end-user live CD? Go with Knoppix. You want an admin's toolbox with minimal fluff and maximum usability? Go with grml, a Debian-based live CD/USB that packs in more than 1,700 applications and utilities. If you've only used standard Linux distros, you're going to be in for a treat with grml — and also a few surprises. Most distros default to Bash as a shell, but grml uses zsh. (One of the grml taglines is "Linux for zsh lovers," so they really must dig zsh.) Be aware that you won't get a standard desktop experience. By default grml will start at the command line with a menu of options, including starting X.

What do you get when you put together 80 to 100 hard-core database geeks from ten different open source databases for a weekend? OpenSQLCamp, which was held most recently at MIT. Begun three years ago, OpenSQLCamp is a semi-annual unconference for open source database hackers to meet and collaborate on ideas and theories in the industry. It's held at various locations alternately in Europe and the United States, and organized and run by volunteers. This year's conference was organized by Sheeri Cabral, a MySQL community leader who works for PalominoDB.

If you have ever wished for a much more faster software downloads in Ubuntu, well, apt-fast could possibly make your wishes come true. Apt-fast is a simple bash script that accelerates apt-get download speeds coinsiderably.