Archive

Linux Feed Reader, aka "Liferea," is part of a highly specialized category of apps. It is an aggregator for online news feeds, weblogs and podcasts. As such, it provides a tool for pulling into one spot an eclectic collection of your newsfeed content so you do not have to go to each separate source....

Just when you thought it couldn't top itself -- having contributed Linux kernel code under the GPL, broadly supported Linux alongside Windows with its systems management and other software, and spun off a new subsidiary dedicated to openness, Microsoft showed yet more Linux and open source love rece...

Visual voicemail functionality is the visual element in a voicemail application that allows text to be transcribed and displayed on the phone -- or more simply, message headers, or envelopes, are displayed textually in a list. Options often include push to email and SMS. It's been around in various ...

Samsung on Tuesday deepened its involvement in the Linux ecosystem, reportedly upgrading its silver membership in The Linux Foundation to platinum and forking over the $500,000 annual membership dues its new status requires. The move will give Samsung a seat on the Foundation's board alongside six o...

Linux Mint 13, the Maya release, is an impressive upgrade that builds on the progress found in version 12. It contains few additional innovations to the operating system. But it updates numerous core elements and provides more solid performance from the two new desktop interfaces introduced in Mint ...

Microsoft may not have fully endeared itself into the FOSS rank and file with its recent attempt to hold hands with the open source community. Feelings are not unanimous regarding the commercial software giant's decision in April to front a company-owned subsidiary called "Microsoft Open Technologie...

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 Oracl...

I've been looking for an alternative to Google's Google Voice product that provides one number for all my phones -- mobiles and landline -- and includes online voicemail and discounted calling. Google Voice is a fine product, and I've had exemplary use out of it, but it has a couple of failings rela...

Few things scare me more than disk partitioning and GRUB configuration software. Both of those chores involve knowledge about hard drive operations and a good slice of luck. And both can render a computer unbootable with one slight user error. So discovering the latest version of Grub Customizer hel...

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. It ...

I've got fond memories of physical keyboards embedded in smartphones. My Palm Treos -- I had three -- were superb at composing email and SMS text responses. I even made notes for a book I was writing on one Treo. I speculate that the hardware keyboard is the principal differentiator keeping BlackBer...

Whether you are writing code or creating editorial content, a noisy computing environment often can silence your productivity. The Pyroom Text Editor gives you a quiet environment where computing noise cannot distract you from your creativity. Computing noise -- that is, computing distractions from ...

China's antitrust authorities have approved Google's purchase of Motorola Mobility, on the condition that the Android operating system remain open source and its code be made freely available to original equipment manufacturers. Android devices had nearly 74 percent of the Chinese market in Q4, 2011...

Have you ever found yourself scrolling endlessly around your phone's chronologically arranged photograph album -- called "Gallery" in Android -- looking for a photograph you've captured? If you can remember the specific place but not the date, then Scalado Album may be for you. I say "may be" becau...

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 leve...