Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Sun Microsystems has finally released what should be the last beta of JSE6 (Java Platform, Standard Edition 6), aka “Project Mustang.” According to the Mustang Web site, this release “provides a complete stable snapshot of the final release functionality. “This beta build has undergone much more thorough testing and baking than the regular weeklies (which […]

Jonathan Schwartz, president of Sun Microsystems, announced on Feb. 14 at the Open Source Business Conference in San Francisco that Sun is releasing its UltraSPARC Architecture 2005 and HyperVisor API specifications to open source under the GPL. This new open-source project is called OpenSPARC. Sun is making this move to help jumpstart the porting of […]

Developers can use Google and other search engines to find source code, but its not easy. Krugle, a Silicon Valley startup, claims to have come up with a better alternative—a search engine for source code and code-related information. The tool, also named Krugle, is designed to deliver easy access to source code and other highly […]

Google and CodeWeavers Inc. are working together to bring Googles popular Windows Picasa photo editing and sharing program to Linux. The program is now in a limited beta test. If this program is successful, other Google applications will be following it to the Linux desktop, sources say. The Linux Picasa implementation includes the full feature […]

Put it in their copy of the Wall Street Journal. Place it between their doughnuts and coffee. Stick a copy in their organizer. Do whatever it takes to get your senior executives to read the new research report “Get the Truth on Linux Management,” co-sponsored by the OSDL (Open Source Development Labs) and Linux management […]

Well, you have to give The SCO Group credit for persistence, if nothing else. In recent weeks, SCO has expanded its search to find evidence that it might be able to use in its case against IBM. After what has seemed like an endless series of discovery motions, SCOs latest demand, dated Feb. 1, is […]

If BlackBerry maker Research in Motion has to shut down its over-the-air e-mail service because of its legal battles with intellectual property-holding company NTP, the open-source wireless e-mail company Funambol may be able to keep BlackBerries working. The latest beta version of the companys software for carriers and enterprises, Funambol 3, can push e-mail to […]

As you may know, Google is close to making a deal with Dell in which the search giant will get to preinstall its software package on Dell PCs. What you may not know is that Google may be spending a billion dollars over three years for the privilege. For cash-rich Google, its a cheap price […]

Linus Torvalds could see using the proposed GPL 3 license for Linux, but he thinks it would be very hard to do in practice and he still has concerns about the Complete Corresponding Source Code section. Not long after the first draft of the GPL 3 appeared, Torvalds, Linuxs founder, objected to GPL 3 on […]

Developers can use Google and other search engines to find source code, but its not easy. A Silicon Valley startup claims to have come up with a better alternative—a search engine for source code and code-related information. The tool, known as Krugle, is designed to deliver easy access to source code and other highly relevant […]

As expected, VMware Inc. announced on February 6th that it was releasing a no-cost version of its VMware Server line. While not open-source, this entry-level virtualization server enables users to partition x86 and x86-64 Linux and Windows servers into multiple virtual machines (VMs). Server administrators can either roll their own servers or use such pre-built […]

Photoshop? The application most people want, at this date, to be ported to Linux from Windows is Photoshop? Color me surprised! When Novell started its survey of which applications people wanted ported to Linux, both Novell CoolSolutions site editor Scott Morris and I were surprised to find Adobe Photoshop anywhere near the top of the […]