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If you know a thing or two about Android, and a free trip to the next TED conference is your kind of thing, then the app developers at Snaptic may have just the contest that you've been looking for. The competition in question, Snaptic's "Move Your Apps" developer challenge, calls on Android developers to create new applications that move users to move. Co-sponsored by the non-profit HopeLab — which works to improve the quality of life for young people with chronic illness — the challenge will reward coders who come up with unique ways of promoting activity via Android apps.

While Linux has long been talked about as being a faster operating system than Microsoft Windows, in 2010 is this still the case? It seems every time we deliver new benchmarks of the EXT4 file-system it's actually getting slower, recent Linux kernel releases have not been delivering any major performance enhancements for desktop users, the open-source Linux graphics drivers are still no match to the proprietary drivers, and "bloated and huge" is how Linus Torvalds described the Linux kernel last year. This is all while Windows 7 was released last year, which many view as Microsoft's best operating system release to date. Even after using it a fair amount the past few months in preparation for this about-to-be-shared work, it is actually not too bad and is a huge improvement over Windows Vista, but is it really faster than Ubuntu Linux? We have used six uniquely different systems and ran Microsoft Windows 7 Professional x64 and Ubuntu 10.04 LTS x86_64 on each of them with a set of 55 tests (actually, more than 165 if considering that each test is usually run at least three times for accuracy) per installation.

Mark Shuttleworth just announced the plan for the empty space on the right created by moving the window buttons (controls) to the left: Window Indicators or "windicators". Window Indicators will be just like the current Panel Indicators: they will have an icon which indicates the state and clicking it brings up a menu.

This article by Kim Schulz, author of Hacking Vim 7.2, will contain recipes focusing on the following subjects: * Tips for when you develop Vim scripts * How to debug a Vim script * How to use other scripting languages when writing Vim scripts

So you have your Nagios server installed...now what. Monitoring devices on your network is typically a three step process. Once you get used to following these steps you will begin setting many new devices to monitor with this great tool Nagios.

Yet again, with Lucid Lynx, Ubuntu has shunned a much better technology for no good reason other than what appears to be NIH syndrome. Ubuntu 10.04 came out last week, and included a movie editor in the default install for the first time. The movie editor they chose: PiTiVi.

For those that do not know, Linux Against Poverty is an annual event organized by Lynn Bender that gathers some of the top tech people in the area and assembles them to evaluate, triage, repair and then install the Linux Operating System on those computers. The computers are donated by local businesses and individuals. The repaired and refurbished computers are then given to disadvantaged kids in the Central Texas area via The HeliOS Project.

This tutorial shows how to set up an Ubuntu Lucid Lynx (Ubuntu 10.04) server that offers all services needed by ISPs and hosters: Apache web server (SSL-capable), Postfix mail server with SMTP-AUTH and TLS, BIND DNS server, Proftpd FTP server, MySQL server, Courier POP3/IMAP, Quota, Firewall, etc. In the end you should have a system that works reliably, and if you like you can install the free webhosting control panel ISPConfig 2 (i.e., ISPConfig runs on it out of the box).

A proverb that often springs to mind during the day is that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. Breaking up the monotony of the daily grind (also known as work) cannot be underestimated. Computer games are a great form of entertainment, less passive that watching the TV, just as challenging as completing the Times crossword, but much more fun.

Your editor has just returned from the Linux Foundation's annual Collaboration Summit, held in San Francisco. LFCS is a unique event; despite becoming more developer-heavy over the years, it still pulls together an interesting combination of people from the wider Linux ecosystem. The following article is not intended to be a comprehensive report from the summit; it is, instead, a look at a few of the more interesting thoughts that came from there.

I really like many of the things KDE has to offer, however KDE's network manager applet (knetworkmanager) still is lacking compared to Gnome's applet.

Gnome themes by Bisigi has always been a cut above the rest. Add to it the ease of installation via dedicated repositories. And now, a stable version of Ubuntu Lucid repository is available. Follow the post to install 13 stunning themes for Ubuntu Lucid, Karmic in just two steps.

Ubuntu 10.04 [Lucid Lynx] was released a few days ago, and after seeing how well it was working on Ford's netbook, I decided I should try it out as well. My first impression of the system was a very promising one, as I saw how well polished and integrated Lucid's modified version of the GNOME 2 desktop and its default applications were.

E17 is a lightweight window manager/bundle of libraries for Unix based operating systems. E17 is designed to be both elegant and fast - two goals it succeeds at very well.

The free software community understands that free software gives the user more freedom than proprietary software. Proprietary software confines its users, prohibits them from making changes that would allow everyone to benefit, etc. Free software advocates (myself included) have a habit of claiming that using free (libre) software means the same thing as having freedom. But does the fact that someone is using free software necessarily imply that the person has as much freedom as is possible?

Less than two weeks ago we reported on the Mac OS X Steam client confirming the existence of a Linux client and then found more Linux references too. We then found the unreleased Steam Linux binaries that were under active development. Some still didn't believe the existence of a Steam client for Linux with Source Engine support, but it's something we have said for nearly two years based upon our sources and then the emergence of these binaries.

Is Steve Jobs at it again? Just days after reaffirming Apple's decision to ban Adobe's Flash from the iPhone, the company's CEO is reportedly pointing the finger at another multimedia technology he sees struggling with major shortcomings -- echoing similar comments, as it turns out, from Apple's longtime archrival, Microsoft.

I feel that all Ubuntu users, even the happy ones, who ever decide to contribute back should just directly join the Debian team. Ubuntu might not realize it, but it is best for everyone if all work is done in Debian first.

Driven by smartphone sales, the mobile phone market rebounded with 21.7 percent year-to-year growth in the first quarter of 2010, IDC says. Meanwhile, as of April 1 Android was available on 34 different devices from 12 manufacturers, with Android ad-view traffic growing at a 32 percent rate over the last year, says AdMob.

Ubuntu 10.04, Lucid Lynx, is a great desktop operating system for Facebook users. Not only is it faster and more secure than using Windows, it also has features that help integrate Facebook into the desktop experience.