22 minute read
FOSSBytes
by Hiba Dweib
Powered by www.efytimes.com
Mageia 4 released
Advertisement
Following a slew of development builds, the final version of the Mageia operating system has finally drawn its first breath. Mageia 4, which started off as a fork of the Mandriva Linux distro, has arrived, and the spec sheet does boast of an impressive array of changes and improvements.
The official announcement read, “Right on time, and just in time for the first day of FOSDEM 2014, we have the great pleasure of announcing Mageia 4. We’re still having a grand time doing this together, and we hope you enjoy this release as much as we’ve enjoyed making it. And if you’re at FOSDEM, come and help us celebrate!” The ‘new' OS is a GNU/ Linux-based ‘free' operating system that is supported by a non-profit organisation of elected contributors. With Mageia 4, developers seek to keep the OS that was originally a fork of Mandriva, alive!
India-Born Satya Nadella is the new CEO of Microsoft
Microsoft has finally got a new CEO and it is none other than India-born Satya Nadella. The news from the Redmond giant came after months of speculation. “Satya Nadella is appointed as Microsoft's CEO, effective immediately,” read the company announcement. Nadella has replaced Steve Ballmer, who resigned last year. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, said, “During this time of transformation, there is no better person to lead Microsoft than Satya Nadella.” "Satya is a proven leader with hard-core engineering skills, business vision and the ability to bring people together. His vision for how technology will be used and experienced around the world is exactly what Microsoft needs,” he added.
In addition, Bill Gates, who was the chairman of the board of directors, will step down from his position and assume a new role on the board as technology advisor. John Thompson is to assume the role of chairman, according to a statement from Microsoft.
Vodafone now supports Ubuntu!
Even as the market remains clueless regarding when the first Ubuntu-powered smartphone will be available, there's good news coming for the open source community. The Vodafone Group, a popular carrier, has now become the latest to join the Ubuntu Carrier Advisor Group, something that will help Ubuntu mobile devices reach as many users as possible!
Mozilla Firefox 27 arrives
Mozilla has released Firefox 27, which comes with as many as 13 security advisories attached, and delivers an improved performance. To sum it up, the debut open source Firefox release of 2014 comes with security and performance that is notches higher than its predecessor.
Notably, four of the security advisories have been ranked as being ‘critical'. At least one of the critical updates is for a group of vulnerabilities labelled ‘Miscellaneous memory safety hazards'. PC maker Hewlett-Packard had earlier reported concerns over a use-after-free memory error that enables attackers to launch an arbitrary attack by utilising legitimate memory space. Mozilla Firefox 27 comes with a fix for the problem, while also providing a fix for a download dialogue box window issue that could potentially enable a spoofing attack.
At the same time, the release offers a fix to an issue rated as having low impact that could enable an attacker to reset a user's profile. And it now includes default support for the Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.2 specification.
Here's a CPU-Z hardware stat tool for Linux!
If you're an ardent Windows user, you will know about CPU-Z, the freeware application that caters to all your technical trivia needs, giving in-depth stats on your system hardware. Now, if you have switched to the user-friendly Linux, and you're looking for a CPU-Z like app, you can try i-Nex. i-Nex is an app similar in design and aim to the CPU-Z, but available for Linux. It can be used to get indepth stats on your system hardware, from your CPU to your sound card and more. Further, the app also returns software information on systems distribution, environment, windows manager, etc.
“Vodafone will join national and multi-national carriers in decisions that influence the development of Ubuntu for smartphones,” sources at Canonical said in an official statement. This means that Vodafone will soon make sure users all across its global network have access to Ubuntu-powered mobile devices. Ubuntu Carrier Advisor Group also includes China Unicom, Deutsche Telekom, Everything Everywhere, SK Telecom, Telecom Italia, Telstra, T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless.
LibreOffice 4.2 released
The Document Foundation has now come out with the latest version of LibreOffice, the popular open source office suite. LibreOffice 4.2 comes with a set of new and improved features for power and enterprise users. It will be shipped as part of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS later this year. "LibreOffice 4.2 features a large number of performance and interoperability improvements targeted at users of all kinds, but particularly appealing for power and enterprise users," the developers claim. The update has gone through what is supposedly the ‘largest' code refactoring ever, claims the Foundation. This gives it a major performance boost for big data. An optional new formula interpreter enables massively parallel calculation of formula cells using the GPU via OpenCL that works best with a Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA). The update includes improved integration with Windows.
LibreOffice 4.2 offers round-trip interoperability with Microsoft OOXML (particularly for DOCX and legacy RTF). It comes with a simplified custom install dialogue box to avoid potential mistakes. Users can now centrally manage and lock-down the configuration with Group Policy Objects via Active Directory. It also comes with a new Start screen, and a much cleaner layout.
US high school gives away 1,725 Linux-powered laptops to students!
The Penn Manor High School in the US has doled out as many as 1,725 Linuxpowered laptops to its students. The school has provided every student, from grades 9-12, an Acer TravelMate laptop preloaded with Ubuntu 13.10. Following a roughly 5-minute orientation, students were then let lose to use their creativity on the devices. “We encourage our students to install software and lift the hood of the system to better understand what makes it tick. I hope our students run local Web servers, toy with Python or simply explore graphics programs such as the GIMP. Linux offers so many opportunities to explore computing, programming and the arts," the school’s technology director, Charlie Reisinger, was quoted as saying.
“Linux allows a level of exploration and control that other closed devices don't. The cost savings in switching to all open source software is an added benefit," Reisinger added.
OpenDaylight’s first open source, software-defined network release is out
In an attempt to tackle one of IT’s toughest challenges, which is simplifying network management, OpenDaylight (an open source, software-defined networking platform) is finally out with its ‘first' release. The first release of the program, Hydrogen, “…is a great step forward and the community is already looking to build
CyanogenMod 11.0 M3 debuts for over 50 devices
The CyanogenMod team has announced the release of CM 11.0 M Snapshot builds based on Android 4.4 KitKat for as many as 50 devices and variants. The new builds come with a slew of new additions, the most prominent being the revamped Trebuchet launcher, which is now based on KitKat launcher.
“M3 includes the return of Trebuchet, now based on Kitkat’s Launcher3 code base, and has been completely rewritten by its maintainer Nebojša Cvetkovi (nebkat). Additional work has been included to provide universal icon pack support by Danesh M (devatwork),” said the CM team in a blog post. Another major addition is the Privacy Guard, which can be used to control an app from auto-starting. Further, for users updating from 10.2 or a previous 11-M build, the new version of Trebuchet will preserve your home screen data if you were previously using Launcher3 or Trebuchet. Meanwhile, the upcoming release of CM 11.0 will have left-handed navigation bar support, additional transparency in the SystemUI, icon mask support in the launcher, better themes integration, and Google Nowlike experiences in Trebuchet.
Here are some of the more popular devices getting the CM 11.0 M3 build:
Samsung Galaxy S4 and variants Nexus devices Samsung Galaxy S, S II, S III and their variants LG Optimus G, G2 and G Pro HTC One, Droid DNA, One X,
One X+ and One S Nook Color
India gets its first ‘School in the Cloud'!
The dream of Sugata Mitra, Newcastle University professor for educational technology, to bolster learning in communities where there's a lack of access to basic education, has finally come to life. In his attempt to end schooling as we know it, Mitra's ambitious ‘School in the Cloud' has opened its first branch in New Delhi. The concept here is simple: minimally invasive education that allows kids to ask and answer questions for themselves! "Working in small groups, children can competently search for answers to ‘big questions', drawing rational, logical conclusions. This is far ahead of what is expected of them in their school curriculum and is a kind of learning activated by questions, not answers," Suneeta Kulkarni, research director for the School in the Cloud project was quoted as saying. Mitra's fascination with the cloud began back in 1999 when his ‘Hole in the Wall' experiment brought computers into rural Indian villages. ‘School in the Cloud' is simply an extension of the same concept.
US army uses Linux-powered rifles
In what can be termed as a notable success for the open source world, the US army has purchased smart rifles that are powered by Linux for its soldiers.
TrackingPoint, an Austin, Texasbased applied technology company, has revealed that the US military has purchased six smart rifles, priced between US$ 10,000 and US$ 27,000. With this rifle, a soldier just needs to tag a target seen on the screen found on the gun's scope. The Linux powered computer fitted within the gun will then tell the shooter how to hold the gun and when to press the trigger to hit the target accurately. This rifle is a clear example of how flexible and powerful Linux is.
Calendar of forthComing events
Name, Date and Venue Description
Enterprise CIO Summit 2014
March 21, 2014; Mumbai Around 150 CIOs, CTOs, vice presidents (IT), and heads of IT are expected to attend this summit. They will share and discuss strategies on expansion of business and the use of technology. Speakers at the summit will share their vision and the path-breaking ideas that helped them transform their business. Uma Varma, Manager-Marketing & Operations; Email: uma.varma@ thelausannegroup.com; Ph: 8884023243; http://www.enterpriseciosummit. com/
RubyConf India 2014
March 22-23, 2014 March; The LaLiT Golf & Spa Resort, Goa The event is a great opportunity for Ruby enthusiasts to brainstorm, network and learn about the latest technology changes first-hand. Gautam Rege; Email: gautam@joshsoftware.com; Ph: 91 9881395656; http://rubyconfindia.org
4th Annual Datacenter Dynamics Converged
April 24, 2014; Mumbai The event aims to assist the community in the datacentre domain in exchanging ideas, accessing market knowledge and launching new initiatives Email: info@datacenterdynamics. com; Ph: 22 6636 4332; http://www.datacenterdynamics. com/conference
9th Annual Datacenter Dynamics Converged
May 26, 2014; Dubai The event aims to assist the community in the datacentre domain by exchanging ideas, accessing market knowledge and launching new initiatives Email: info@datacenterdynamics. com; Ph: 22 6636 4332; http://www.datacenterdynamics. com/conference
2nd Annual The Global 'High on Cloud' Summit
May 28th and 29th; Mumbai
4th Annual Datacenter Dynamics Converged
September 18, 2014; Bengaluru
Open Source India, November 7-8, 2014;
NIMHANS Center, Bengaluru The summit will address the issues, concerns, latest trends, new technology and upcoming innovations on the Cloud platform. It will be a open forum, giving an opportunity to everyone in the industry to share their ideas. Email: contactus@besummits.com; Ph: 80-49637000; Website: http://www.theglobalhighoncloudsummit.com/#!about-thesummit/c24fs
The event aims to assist the community in the datacentre domain in exchanging ideas, accessing market knowledge and launching new initiatives Email: contactus@besummits.com ; Ph: 80-49637000; Website: http:// www.theglobalhighoncloudsummit. com/#!about-the-summit/c24fs
It is the premier Open Source conference in Asia that aims to nurture and promote the open source ecosystem in the sub-continent. Atul Goel-Sr.Product & Marketing Manager; Email: atul.goel@efyindia. com; Ph: 0880 009 4211
Contact Details and Website
5th Annual Datacenter Dynamics Converged;
December 9, 2014; Riyadh The event aims to assist the community in the datacentre domain by exchanging ideas, accessing market knowledge and launching new initiatives contactus@besummits.com; Ph: 80 4963 7000; Website: http:// www.theglobalhighoncloudsummit. com/#!about-the-summit/c24fs
on its work to address a variety of additional capabilities and features in subsequent releases," claim sources in OpenDaylight.
The OpenDaylight project is an open source platform meant for network programmability that will enable SDN, and create a solid foundation for Network Functions Virtualisation (NFV) for networks. Hydrogen is now available for download and subsequent evaluation, commercialisation and deployment of SDN and NFV. It includes prebuilt-versions for RPM-based Linux distros and ready-torun Hydrogen OpenDaylight virtual machines for Fedora and Ubuntu.
Hydrogen is available in three different editions: Base Edition, Virtualisation Edition and Service Provider Edition.
Linux Kernel 3.13.1 released
Linux Kernel developer, Greg Kroah-Hartman has officially announced the first update for the stable Linux kernel 3.13. The update is only a small one, with minute changes and fixes. However, succeeding versions would eventually pick up pace. Greg’s announcement reads:
“I'm announcing the release of the 3.13.1 kernel. All users of the 3.13 kernel series must upgrade. The updated 3.13.y git tree can be found at: git://git.kernel.org/ pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux-stable.git linux-3.13.y and can be browsed at
the normal kernel.org GIT Web browser http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/ stable/linux-stable.git;a=summary. Users currently employing the first release in the Linux kernel 3.13.x branch should consider an update now.”
As most of us know, the Linux Kernel is responsible for resource allocation, low-level hardware interfaces, security, simple communications, and basic file system management in Linux. Created by Linus Torvalds, it aims towards POSIX and Single UNIX Specifications compliance.
This ARM mini-computer is powered by KDE!
Nitrux, the creator of the Compass and Flater icon themes, has come out with the QtBox, a small and portable device measuring just 8.8 cm x 8.8 cm x 8.3 cm, powered by KDE and supposedly quite ‘affordable'. The ARM mini-computer might be just the one the market has been waiting for!
Built on entirely open hardware, Nitrux insists the company has gone the extra mile to ensure a great build quality, while offering a mini PC that runs the Nitrux OS 1.0 operating system and uses the eye-candy of the KDE 4.12 desktop environment. The tech specifications include a quad-core 2.0 GHz Exynos 4412 CPU and a Mali 400 GPU. The device features 2 GB RAM, and comes with three internal storage options—8 GB, 16 GB and 64 GB. Connectivity options include Ethernet, 3x USB ports, a micro-HDMI port, a micro-USB port, a 3.5 mm jack and MicroSD slot.
The impressive spec sheet does not necessarily mean a hefty price tag. The QtBox mini-computer from Nitrux is rather very affordable, at US$ 200 for the 8 GB version, US$ 225 for the 16 GB model, and US$ 275 for the 64 GB option. Further, all the options come with an expandable memory of up to 64 GB via MicroSD card. The company has already started taking pre-orders.
Here's a complete ‘made in India' 3D printer!
3D printing is rapidly becoming popular all over the world, chiefly among DIYers, researchers and hobby engineers. Well, how could India be left behind? Mumbai's very own Divide By Zero Technologies has come out with the Accucraft S150, which is a totally ‘made in India' 3D printer. With this device, the company wants to take the Indian market, which is still relatively at a nascent stage in terms of the technology, by storm.
The printer ships in the form of a steel box in a sturdy design that can cater to a variety of 3D printing needs. Consuming 700 watts of power and an input of 100-230V AC, the printer is capable of a printing volume measuring 16 cm³. The
Dell's Android-based PC on a stick is now available!
It's been a long time arriving, but it's finally here! Demonstrated over a year ago at the International CES trade show in Las Vegas under the code name ‘Project Ophelia', Dell's fancy Android-based Wyse Cloud Connect is finally available. Shipped by Dell at an introductory price of US$ 129, Wyse Cloud Connect offers users a mobile virtual desktop client.
The device, slightly larger than a USB stick, simply needs a computer display or a TV via MHL or HDMI, a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, and is good to go! It is powered by a multicore ARM Cortex-A9 processor and runs Android 4.1. It offers 8 GB of integrated storage that is expandable via a MicroSD card slot. It has 1 GB RAM and supports a maximum resolution of 1080p. Connectivity options include Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
The Wyse Cloud Connect can be used to play games, watch streaming movies/TV programmes or simply for Web surfing. The advantage here is that you can do stuff you normally do on other Android-based devices with bigger screens.
Build yourself a Raspberry Pi-powered tablet crafted from wood!
An evangelist for MakerMedia, Michael Castor, has developed the PiPad—an all-in-one system that is usable, portable and Linux-based. And it uses a US$ 40 Raspberry Pi Model B, Revision 2.0 for its core. The finished product is not the slimmest or lightest of devices, but has the kind of classic, elegant design cues that aren't often associated with mobile gadgetry.
The credit-card sized system board uses the Broadcom BCM2835 system on chip (SoC) and an ARM1176JZF-S 700MHZ processor. It also includes an on-board HF-capable VideoCore IV GPU offering high-definition video playback, and has 512 MB of RAM. An SD card is used for booting and long-term storage. For an interface, Castor used a 25.4-cm (10-inch) capacitive touchscreen from ChalkElec.com.
Italy to use open source technology in public administration!
All public administrations in Italy will now have to first consider re-used or free software before committing to proprietary licences, according to a set of new rules issued by the government that implement a change to the country’s procurement law. Quite simply, Italy puts free software first in the public sector. Importantly, the new rules clearly include an enforcement mechanism, which deems that open source software be used first and foremost in all public sector mechanisms.
Italian public administrations are now obliged to give priority to free and open source software under the new rules. This preference, however, cannot be given without a comparative assessment. developers claim the Accucraft S150 delivers position precision of 10 microns and can print at 300 mm/sec.
The printer is fast and precise, and prints at the click of a button. It can print bigger objects in parts. All that is needed is a design in the specified format, and the Accucraft S150 prints the entire object in parts, which can then be assembled using plastic welding or engineering grade adhesives. The build platform itself can be removed, which makes taking out the printed objects easy.
Microsoft to go to ‘open access' for its researchers' publications
Even as Microsoft holds out against releasing its main products as open source, its Microsoft Research arm is moving towards open access for its researchers' publications.
“Microsoft Research is committed to disseminating the fruits of its research and scholarship as widely as possible because we recognise the benefits that accrue to scholarly enterprises from such wide dissemination, including more thorough review, consideration and critiques, and a general increase in scientific, scholarly and critical knowledge," the company’s open access policy reads.
Peter Lee, head of Microsoft Research, discussed three main motivations for basic research at Microsoft in a recent interview: "The first relates to an aspiration to advance human knowledge, the second derives from a culture that relies deeply on the ambitions of individual researchers, and the last concerns promoting open publication of all research results and encouraging deep collaborations with academic researchers."
This open source smart thermostat is an Arduino alternative to Nest
Four engineers from Spark have pooled their skills and resources to make a new open source smart thermostat based on Arduino with the use of US$ 70 worth of components. The new open source smart thermostat is created to provide an Arduino option to the Nest thermostat that was recently bought by Google for US$ 3.2 billion.
The Spark smart thermostat is derived from the team's own Spark Core Arduino compatible wireless development board, on which a humidity and temperature sensor, an IR motion detector, along with a range of Adafruit 8 x 8 LED matrices to display information to users, have been added.
The primary sensor inside the open source smart thermometer is a Honeywell HumidIcon temperature and humidity sensor, which shares the I2C bus with the displays. Here’s what the team said about its open source creation: “All in all, it took about an hour to throw together this breadboarded prototype, although we had to order the components a couple of days beforehand. It took another couple of hours to pull together working firmware. The next step was to build an enclosure. The Nest enclosure uses glass and aluminium, which are both very pretty but not very handy for prototyping. Instead, we chose acrylic and wood.”
You can shut down your PC with your Android phone!
Rebooting your PC is a fairly simple thing to do but you don’t always have the time to do so, and another alternative to complete this task would be very handy. This is where the app, Droid Remote Lite, comes in. If your PC shutdown process is holding you up, then Droid Remote Lite is definitely the answer for you.
The app aims to give you the power to remotely perform four tasks on your PC— shut it down, restart it, put it into hibernation mode, and abort it. All you have to do is install the app on your Android-powered device, install the executable file on your PC, and make sure your Android phone and PC are on the same Wi-Fi network. Open the app and choose one of four different options: shutdown, restart, hibernate, and
abort, and your job is as good as done.
Droid Remote Lite not only gives you an easy way to manage these four power states, it also provides you with a nifty little timer feature that allows you to set a designated time for the app to send one of the four commands to your PC. Set the timer for when you leave the house in the morning and forget about wasting electricity again.
openSUSE 12.2 bids adieu to users
The life of openSUSE 12.2 has officially ended. After as many as 748 updates for the distro, developers from the openSUSE project have stopped work on openSUSE 12.2, giving the go ahead to version 13.1. “With the release of the gnumeric on January 27, 2014, the SUSE sponsored maintenance of openSUSE 12.2 has ended. openSUSE 12.2 is now officially discontinued and out of support by SUSE. openSUSE 12.2 was released on September 5, 2012, and received 17 months of security and bugfix support,” the official announcement by the developers read. openSUSE Linux is an open project that provides users with free and easy access to the world's most usable Linux distribution: SUSE Linux. openSUSE is a Linux-based operating system that allows users to surf the Web, do office work, manage photos and e-mails, as well as play music and videos. The worldwide community program is sponsored by Novell. The OS is distributed as Live CD ISO images that come in separate GNOME and KDE editions, supporting both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures.
As per current statistics, Apple's Siri holds the distinction of being ‘almost' the right voice recognition system till date with its accuracy improving with every update. However, the slowness of computation is something that bugs us all. Chip manufacturer Intel has reportedly found a solution for this problem, which will also take on the might of Siri.
According to Mike Bell, head of wearable technology at Intel, the company is developing a voice recognition system without the cloud to localise processing so that the round-trip to the cloud is ruled out. Voice recognition systems working on any platform are normally designed to work with servers, and the device then sends compressed signals to the server and waits for a response.
To demonstrate how it works, Intel has developed a prototype of a wearable headset called Jarvis, with built-in voice recognition software. The solution will be more responsive than other ‘cloud-obsessed’ solutions in the market, claims Intel. The company has partnered with an unnamed third party to put the software on the Intel mobile processors.
Jolla’s Sailfish OS now ported to Nexus 4
Currently, there is only one phone that’s designed to ship with the Sailfish operating system. But Sailfish is based on open source software, and has now been successfully installed on the Google Nexus 4 smartphone. A YouTube user has posted a video showing the installation and set-up process.
Installation looks fairly easy. The developer uses ROM Manager to install the OS. The actual OS is not really shown. This video is more of a how-to for the installation process. You can flash Sailfish using ClockworkMod Recovery, one of several tools that also lets you flash many phones and tablets with custom Android ROMs and other software updates. Jolla further plans on porting Sailfish to the Nexus 5 and Nexus 7 as well. Sailfish OS is a Linux-based mobile OS that has a proprietary skin on it. Jolla puts its skin on it, but the operating system is developed in cooperation with Mer and is supported by the Sailfish Alliance. Jolla's aim is primarily to get Sailfish OS running on devices targeted at developing countries, in line with Firefox OS and Ubuntu Touch OS.
A wireless USB receiver for Android devices
There are quite a few solutions that allow users to expand the features of their Android device; however, most of them fall short of the InputStick. Curious? Well, InputStick is a wireless USB receiver that plugs into a computer and establishes a link between that computer and your Android device by simply running the companion app on a device running on at least Android 2.3. You can now use your mobile device as a keyboard, mouse, game controller, presentation remote, bar code scanner and even a password manager.
InputStik measures 57x19x9 mm and weighs only 8 grams. It has the USB 2.0 (full speed) interface. The range of the Bluetooth 2.1 device is up to 10 metres. The device works on Android 2.3 or later and needs at least one available USB port to function. Further, the USB host must supply at least 100 mW of power. The advantage of InputStik over other solutions lies in the fact that it is compatible with any USB-enabled hardware and works out-of-the-box.
There will be several InputStickcompatible applications available for free: Remote Controller, Password Manager, Presentation Remote, Barcode Scanner, Gamepad, etc. To use InputStick, you will have to install the InputStick Utility app on your Android device. It will guide you, step-by-step, through the pairing process, allow you to manage all your InputStick devices, upgrade firmware if necessary (via Bluetooth), and provide the background services needed for communication between apps and InputStick. The available Android API will allow you to use InputStick in your own applications.
