Archive

Docker -- the open source application container technology that has drawn broad interest from the enterprise IT industry -- recently marked its second birthday since its launch in March 2013. Judging by its growth and traction thus far, and the example set by such open source projects as Linux, Hado...

The Software Freedom Conservancy earlier this month announced that it was funding a lawsuit filed by Linux kernel developer Christoph Hellwig against VMware in the district court of Hamburg in Germany. The conservancy entered a grant agreement with Hellwig for the legal action. Its funding of the le...

Q4OS has the potential to become a new attention-getter among up and coming Linux distros. But this distro has a way to go before its development reaches full functionality. Right now it is working its way to a non-beta version 1.0 release. New beta versions are frequently released, often a few week...

Some 60 Linux kernel developers last week adopted a small "patch," called the "Code of Conflict," that attempts to set guidelines for discourse in the kernel community and outlines a path for mediation if someone feels abused or threatened. Linux creator Linus Torvalds posted the appeal for good beh...

I am always interested in new desktop approaches. That's what drew my attention to Evolve OS. Normally, infant releases are too undeveloped to be the focus of a bona fide software review. This is not a criticism, but a reality of the work-in-progress nature of developing an OS. Evolve OS Beta has tw...

Red Hat last week made Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Atomic Host generally available, following a four-month live beta test. "The beta release was very successful," said Lars Herrmann, senior director of product strategy at Red Hat. Feedback from customers and partners "helped us refine several feature...

ChaletOS began as a personal project of developer Dejan Petrovic. Its name comes from the style of the mountain houses in Switzerland. Just as the Swiss Chalet is a distinctive design, so too is the look and feel of ChaletOS. This operating system has a familiar Windows-like style, with appealing si...

Google this week confirmed that it's preparing to launch a mobile payments framework called "Android Pay." Google SVP of Product Sundar Pichai discussed the project at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. Android Pay will be an API layer of Android. Google will incorporate standard feature...

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 Dig...

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. It picks up where Pear left off in early 2014. Pearl OS has two desktop versions: XFCE and MATE. Both are based on Ubuntu Linux distro version 14.04 Mini...

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.

Marten Mickos, SVP and general manager of HP's cloud unit, preaches what at first glance may appear to be two opposing business models. One is the notion that developing open source software entails meeting a reciprocity requirement. The other is the idea that using open source software does not req...

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 ...

Korora, a Linux distro based on Fedora, the community version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, 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 bey...

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...