Developers

Island Dispute Prompts Violence Against Japan's Tech Titans
September 17, 2012

Japanese electronics company Panasonic halted some of its operations in China after protesters -- apparently upset about Japan's claim to disputed islands -- attacked a pair of Panasonic factories. Protests also forced Japanese electronics company Canon to close three of its four Chinese plants.

Law and Disorder: Where Are the Tech Peers?
September 13, 2012

Well it's been a stressful few days here in the Linux blogosphere, what with the ruckus going on over in the bordering Apple territories. For such a small strip of land, you'd never think such a din could emanate from there, and all over a rectangle with rounded corners -- however "creative" and "innovative" it might be.

A Murder Is Announced, but No Corpse Can Be Found
September 04, 2012

Well, it pains Linux Girl to have to write these words, but it looks like the "Death of Desktop Linux" story is back for another round. Yes, after countless debates and discussions of the topic ad nauseum over the years -- the most recent being just a few short months ago, in fact -- it recently reared its ugly head again, like a zombie that just won't quit.

Twitter Perches on Linux Foundation's Shoulder
August 28, 2012

Twitter on Tuesday joined the Linux Foundation. However, the move comes just days after Twitter removed its find-friends feature from blogging service Tumblr. Twitter had earlier done the same to Instagram, and has imposed new restrictions on developers.

Linux and Apple: Which Is the Lemon, Which Is the Lemonade?
August 23, 2012

When life gives you lemons, everyone knows you should make lemonade. But what if life gives you Linux on a Retina MacBook Pro? That, too, has been shockingly referred to as a "lemon" in recent days, but the solution there isn't so clear. "If you are planning to buy one of the new Apple MacBook Pro notebooks with a Retina Display for use under Linux, hold off on your purchase," warned Phoronix's Michael Larabel.

GNOME's Ambitious OS Adventure
August 16, 2012

With all the ongoing debate over desktop environments here in the Linux blogosphere, there's never any shortage of discussion of the GNOME project, even on an ordinary day. Last Tuesday, however, was no ordinary day -- at least, if a certain blog post was anything to go by. "The idea of GNOME OS has been around for a couple of years," wrote GNOME UX designer Allan Day in said post.

Qt's Move Gives FOSS the Jitters
August 13, 2012

There's been much ado about Linux desktops in recent months, but few would dispute KDE's prominence among them. That, indeed, is one of the many reasons there's been so much concern over Nokia's impending sale of the Qt toolkit, upon which KDE is based.

Oh Yeah! Ouya Raises Big Money for Open Source Game Console
August 09, 2012

Ouya looked to kickstart funding of its Android-based game console, and the effort has resulted in more than nine times the amount it sought. Ouya had asked to backers to pledge $950,000 through the Kickstarter website, and the total climbed to nearly $8.6 million as of Thursday, the day the campaign was scheduled to end.

Ouya, OnLive Shaking Up Video Game World
July 27, 2012

Ouya, the recently unveiled video game system, on Friday announced a content deal that will make OnLive's cloud gaming service available on the console when it launches next year. Ouya has certainly gotten its kickstart. In fact, the company, which has been looking to Kickstarter to raise funding for the development of its open source-based console, has seen investments surpass the $5.5 million mark.

App Developers Tilt Toward iOS
July 25, 2012

A survey of more than 3,600 Appcelerator Titanium developers has revealed that they would rather develop mobile apps for iOS than for Android. iOS led Android by 16 percent in the Appcelerator/IDC Q2 2012 Mobile Developer Report. Fifty-three percent of the respondents believed that iOS was winning in enterprise app development, whereas only 37 percent believed Android was.

Enyo's Out of Beta - but Will Devs Give it Love?
July 25, 2012

HP brought Enyo -- the open source object-oriented JavaScript framework for webOS -- out of beta this week, six months after the ill-fated operating system was contributed to the open source community. Enyo 2.0 now has a community of developers, a broad set of cross-platform user interface widgets, and a layout library for building apps that work across all form factors.

Linux Gaming Begins Gathering Steam
July 17, 2012

Linux users have been mostly left out when trying to get in on the gaming action, but soon they'll be able to be "Left 4 Dead 2" instead. On Tuesday, Valve announced that it would bring its digital distribution service Steam to the Linux platform. The company reportedly formed a new team last year to work on a full-featured version of the Steam client for Ubuntu 12.04.

Ouya Lures Investors With Cheap Console, Free Games, Open Source
July 10, 2012

For the last decade, the battle for supremacy in the video game arena has been waged by three players -- Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo. These are companies with long track records, numerous successes, some setbacks and failures -- but most importantly, deep pockets and experience in the marketplace. However, an upstart called "Ouya" is looking to challenge the big three.

Andreessen Horowitz Bets Big on GitHub
July 10, 2012

Andreessen Horowitz is investing $100 million in GitHub, the San Francisco startup that provides online resources for software programmers. It's the largest investment the venture capital firm has ever made. Github's acceptance of the cash is notable. Unlike many startups, the company has been profitable since its 2008 beginnings, and it's turned down investment offers in the past.

Oracle's Java Case Takes Another Battering With API Ruling
June 04, 2012

With a ruling from United States District Judge William Alsup that application programming interfaces cannot be copyrighted, it appears Oracle's lost yet another battle against Google over Java. However, the war is not over. Oracle has indicated it will appeal, and the judge has indicated that Oracle should turn to patent laws in order to protect the Java APIs.

Enyo's End Is Not Nigh
May 29, 2012

Most of HP's webOS team, including Matt McNulty, head of the project, is moving to Google according to a report by The Verge citing several unnamed sources. The departing team is said to be almost wholly responsible for Enyo's code. Enyo replaced Mojo as webOS's software development kit in 2011.

Android: What, Me Fragmented?
May 17, 2012

There are nearly 4,000 different types of devices running Android, OpenSignalMaps has found. More than 1,300 of them have custom ROMs that tweak the android.build model. Android brands are almost as diverse as the models, OpenSignalMaps discovered. Further, the application programming interface level, meaning the Android version, has also become more fragmented over time.

Tweaks to Chrome OS Stir Up Existential Questions
April 11, 2012

A new version of Google's personal computer operating system, Chrome OS, was released for developers Tuesday. It adds design elements of more conventional offerings like Windows and OS X. The new Aura interface includes a home screen with a task bar, or shelf, from which you can launch applications.

RIM Fishes PlayBook Out of Google's 'Chaotic Cesspool'
April 09, 2012

Research In Motion is planning to restrict consumers and app developers from sideloading Android apps onto its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, according to Alec Saunders, company vice president of developer relations. "We're removing sideloading for consumers. Pretty sure we've got a solution for devs," reads a message posted on Saunders' Twitter feed.

Yahoo Serves Mojito to Liven Up the Mobile Web Party
April 03, 2012

Yahoo has offered its Mojito application framework to the open source community under the BSD license. Mojito is an MVC JavaScript Web application framework built on release 3 of Yahoo's open source JavaScript Yahoo User Interface Library. MVC is a software architecture that isolates the domain logic from the user interface.