News (58)

Adobe bringing full-fledged Flash to phones

Inspired by a new generation of smartphones, Adobe Systems has begun a new, higher-power effort to spread its Flash technology to mobile devices. Read more »

Yahoo and Google attempt to improve the browser

A year after Google launched its Gears project, Yahoo has decided to make your browser better, too. Read more »

Windows chief opens up on '7'

Since taking over the Windows development reins from Jim Allchin, Steven Sinofsky has chosen to keep silent about new products, but now in an exclusive interview, he spills the beans on Windows 7. Read more »

Lundy: Time is right for open source in government

Open source might get a better look-in within government, says Senator Kate Lundy, if those responsible for purchasing decisions were forced by policy to evaluate all the options on the market. Read more »

DMCA makes Google kill open source project

A copyright complaint pushes Google to remove an open-source project to let Linux use proprietary video decoding software called CoreAVC. Read more »

Can Google break Microsoft's enterprise chokehold?

A tie-up with Saleforce.com sees Google pushing even further into Microsoft's businesss applications territory Read more »

Novell CEO: We made Microsoft open up

Speaking to the Novell boss at his company's annual BrainShare user conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, ZDNet.com.au's sister site, ZDNet.co.uk asked whether the Microsoft deal could actually be damaging in the long run and what effect a financial downturn could have on Novell's recent recovery. Read more »

Google: Trust us, we really do protect your data

Google described on Tuesday how it secures the mountains of data that it handles every day, saying that it has highly automated processes and employs the best and brightest in Web security. Read more »

Amazon to host Red Hat Linux online

Red Hat on Wednesday announced a significant departure from its current business plan, saying its flagship Linux product will be available on Amazon.com's Elastic Computing Cloud online service. Read more »

Negroponte: OLPC will not shun Microsoft

While the news Microsoft is making progress on developing a version of Windows for the so-called $100 laptop has caused some consternation, the head of the One Laptop Per Child Foundation says the project could not promote openness if it shunned Microsoft. Read more »

Features (44)

Microsoft plays open but patent jaws still have teeth

Despite Microsoft's claim it will not sue developers that build free open source software on Microsoft platforms, a caveat leaves a yawning space for its legal teeth to gnash those that commercialise the software. Read more »

Less painful getters and setters using properties in Python

It's a popular design guideline to require class attributes to be managed by methods, usually referred to as getter and setter methods. These methods increase the safety of your attributes, but come at a cost of simplicity and verbosity. With Python properties, you can have it both ways. Read more »

Reading zip archives in Python

Zip is the name of a popular file compression algorithm, which lets you both combine multiple files into a single archive and store them on disk using less space. We'll show you how you can open and read zip files in your Python scripts. Read more »

Interview with Dr Andrew S Tanenbaum

Nick Gibson caught up with Dr Tanembaum after his keynote address at linux.conf.au and spoke about microkernels, MINIX and what's coming up on the horizon. Read more »

10 security problems unique to IT

Organisations face a host of security concerns driven by the power of technology and the vulnerabilities inherent in its use. IT pros have to be vigilant about all these issues, from system penetration threats to hardware portability to employee turnover. Read more »

The secrets of open source security

The Linux vs. Windows security debate is a contest of examples, which stand in place of the concepts that comprise a larger, more fundamental question of what the security benefits and detriments are for the open source and closed source development models. Read more »

Ruby on Rails: The importance of being 1.0

We speak to David Heinemeier Hansson about the merits of open source, why Ruby on Rails should really be at 2.0 by now and how logic should keep out of the database. Read more »

Hunt down buggy .NET code faster

Learn how you can use continuous integration to automate the build process and provide instant feedback on .NET coding errors Read more »

Towards a Semantic Web

The ability to interpret machine semantics on the Web is becoming crucial to many industries. Can Tim Berners-Lee's vision of the Semantic Web help create a new Web order? Read more »

Making an open source living, part 1

Running a business based on open source software is possible, as we found out when we interviewed Steven Noels, a Belgian consultant and member of the Apache Software Foundation. Read more »

Video (1)

Convergence of kernel philosophies

Gernot Heiser, professor of operating systems at UNSW, explains how monolithic kernels are taking some ideas from microkernels, but never shall the two meet. Read more »

Blog (5)

Everyone wants to be agile

Staff [blogs:syslog] -- During a recent trip to China and Australia I observed that everyone wants to be agile. In a round table meeting with CIO’s, I usually ask what people are particularly interested in right now. Five years ago a common answer was we are trying to adopt the Unified Process. Now, the same question returns the answer we are trying to move to agile. Thus you would assume that people know what agile is. Read more »

Unlocking the Wii's hidden potential

Staff [blogs:syslog] -- In a collection of videos, notable for their lucid explanations, Johnny Lee, a Ph.D. graduate student from CMU's Human-Computer Interaction Institute shows exactly how versatile the "Wiimote" system can be Read more »

OS X + NFSv4 == SSHFS + open bitterness

Chris Duckett [blogs:betaliving] -- Has anyone, who isn't a die-hard Darwin fanatic, ever tried to recompile their kernel in OS X? If you answered yes then you are among a rare breed of user indeed. Read more »

Community for desktops?

Chris Duckett [blogs:betaliving] -- Are community linux distributions likely to become the target of desktop migration instead of their commercial brethren? Read more »

Web - the next frontier... again

Matt Overington [blogs:bricksandmortar] -- Web is making a comeback. But are developers ready? Read more »

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  • Staff Crying, mooning and leaving

    In this week's roundup we see that continuous whining can get results, Linux users get 64-bit Flash and Moonlight previews, the latest in the Yahoo/Microsoft relationship and Senator Conroy ducks and weave in Senate Question Time. Read more »

    -- posted by Staff

  • Brendon Chase Sun eye Web developers with Netbeans 6.5

    Despite the recent employment axe hitting Sun the company has pushed out a new release of its Netbeans open source IDE with an eye to appeal more to Web developers. Read more »

    -- posted by Brendon Chase

  • Renai LeMay BarCamp buzz: Let the hacking continue

    Attending last weekend's BarCamp in Sydney, it was hard to escape the conclusion that a certain "dot-com bust" flavour had seeped into the kool aid previously being drunk by Australia's web 2.0 and early stage start-up sector. Read more »

    -- posted by Renai LeMay

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