Articles by Jack M. Germain

Results 1241-1260 of 2148 for Jack M. Germain
LINUX PICKS AND PANS

Evolve OS Is a Clean and Light Work in Progress

Evolve OS Beta 1 needs considerable fine-tuning to get to release candidate status, but it has two innovations that distinguish it from the crowd of Linux distro newcomers. This Linux new arrival is built around a home-made desktop called "Budgie," and a custom package manager forked from Pardus Linux. I am always interested in new desktop approac...

Nextdoor Snags $110M for Community-Building Efforts

Nextdoor on Wednesday announced it has received US$110 million in venture capital to grow its neighborhood-based network of residents and vendors Redpoint Ventures and Insight Venture Partners led the funding round. Also participating were new investors Meritech and Coatue, as well as existing investors Benchmark, Greylock Partners, Tiger Global Ma...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

ChaletOS Is a Design Tweak in the Linux House

ChaletOS Linux is one of the closest Windows 7 clone interfaces I have seen. Its refreshing design makes it a good choice for transitioning to the Linux OS.Take note that ChaletOS is a very new distro and it has numerous annoyances due to its infancy. However, if you get beyond them, ChaletOS can give you a satisfying Linux experience.

The Open Source Squad at the GSA

A team of open source evangelists is working within the General Services Administration as part of a federal initiative for more transparent government use of technology 18F, a development unit within the GSA, was established a year ago to tap into the success of the United Kingdom's Government Digital Services unit by pursuing a similar strategy.

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

Pearl OS Could Be a Gem in the Making

If you favor the OS X environment, Pearl OS might be a Linux distro to feed your fancy.Pearl OS is a revival of the discontinued Pear OS distro. Pearl picks up where Pear left off in early 2014....

Court Sticks It to Apple in $533M Patent Case

Apple must pay patent licensing firm Smartflash US$532.9 million for infringing three patents U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap, who presided over the case in Tyler, Texas, ordered Apple to pay the penalty after a federal jury in Texas found that the company's iTunes software infringed Smartflash's patents. The jury took eight hours to decide App...

Google Puts Blogger Porn Under Wraps

Google will place a privacy curtain around sexually explicit images and video on its Blogger platform if users fail to remove the content of their own volition by March 23 Google on Monday started notifying Blogger subscribers about the policy change affecting adult content. The ban targets images and video that are sexually explicit or show graphi...

Open Source vs. Proprietary Firms on the IoT Battleground

Technology wars are predictable. Every new wave of gadgetry brings a fight over who will be the next king of the software hill. The next big battle is brewing over control of the Internet of Things marketplace The IoT is quietly gaining momentum as companies develop software to connect all sorts of consumer products to the Internet. Consumers see o...

Pivotal Punts Big Data Platform to Open Source

Pivotal on Wednesday announced its decision to open source all of the core components of its big data platform, becoming the first big data industry player to do so The company also announced its participation in the Open Data Platform, which seeks to encourage more enterprise collaboration, along with the adoption of modern, scalable data architec...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

Korora Comes Bursting With Extras

Korora, a Linux distro based on Fedora, the community version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), just keeps getting better.When I reviewed Korora 19, released in July 2013, I said it had the potential to grow in popularity among users looking for a better, more user-friendly Linux distro that reaches beyond Fedora's enterprise appeal. The latest ...

BitTorrent's Original Content Deal Makes Bid for Reputability

BitTorrent will begin to offer a series of original movies, dubbed "BitTorrent Originals," in a bid to enter the content entertainment space later this year BitTorrent inked a deal with Rapid Eye Studios to handle original video content for its BitTorrent Bundle platform, which launched in May 2013. That platform seeks to give artists control over ...

IT Job Seekers Back in the Driver's Seat

Fast-paced growth in the Information Technology (IT) industry and low unemployment rates for technology workers are making it difficult for corporate executives to find qualified hires Add to that a bullish frenzy of investor support and corporate acquisitions as key factors driving the continued growth of the technology industry....

'Smart Spaces' Project Seeks to Light Up Networks

Dartmouth University researchers are shining a new light on using "smart spaces" in ambient room lighting to transmit both data and human gestures The three-month-old research pushes the envelope beyond advancements already made by researchers in the UK, at the University of Edinberg....

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

HandBrake Video Transcoder Gets a Grip on Linux

Converting video files from various media sources can be a huge chore. That task can be much more manageable with HandBrake, a GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded video transcoder. It is available for MacOS X, Linux, and Windows, which makes working on more than one platform a bit more convenient. The latest version of Linux, 0.10, released on Nov. 23, has many upgrades. However, the Linux version lacks a few of the features in the Windows and Mac versions...

Good and Samsung Partner to Harden Android Security

Good Technology on Tuesday announced a merger of its app container and app ecosystem with the Samsung KNOX enterprise security platform for Android The product merger is the next step in the partnership aimed at eliminating virus and malware concerns that come with Android adoption in the enterprise. The hardened security for Android targets the OS...

Balancing Diversity and Creativity in the World of FOSS

The Linux community is filled with friction and diversity. One of the advantages of open source software is the diversity that leads to innovative approaches to improve the computing environment But can the diversity go too far? Is it a defining characteristic that kills programming creativity?...

Debian Forked: All for Devuan and Devuan for All?

A group of developers made good on their threats to fork Debian Linux late last year after the community's leadership voted to replace sysvinit with systemd, making systemd the default init boot process The Debian Technical Committee's decision spurred several key Debian developers and project maintainers to resign. Some of them formed a new commun...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

Zenwalk Linux - A Walk on the Quirky Side

Zenwalk Linux is a very usable yet uncommon Linux OS. It is more than a single distribution. The developmental path and sketchy developer website may cast an unfavorable impression about Zenwalk's trustworthiness as a serious computing platform. The ho-hum impression when first running the live edition does little to encourage users to take this Linux OS for a stroll...

Acer Designs Chromebooks for Students' Rough Handling

Acer on Wednesday announced two new ruggedized Chromebooks geared for classroom use. Both will go on sale in February The Acer Chromebook C910 and C740 have a durable design built around reinforced covers and hinges. The new models support multiple user sign-ons and offline file access....

Adobe Opens Lightroom's Door to Android

Adobe last week released an Android mobile app as a companion to its Lightroom desktop application and cloud service. Lightroom is a photo processor and image organizer developed by Adobe Systems for Windows and OS X. It is not available for the Linux desktop....

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