Free Republic

Here’s the latest updates to our compilation of recommended software.April and May 2021 UpdatesCategorye-book ToolsUtilitiesWeb-Based Email ClientsInternetDigital Audio WorkstationsAudioConsole Email ClientsInternetLogfile ViewersSystem AdminGraphical Email ClientsInternetDistraction-Free Compact Text EditorsDocumentsAstronomy AppsScienceInternet RadioAudioConsole MPD ClientsAudioWeb Server Performance Testing ToolsWeb AppsThe table above shows our articles updated in April and May 2021.For our entire collection, check out the categories below. This is the largest compilation of recommended software. The collection includes hundreds of articles, with comprehensive sections on internet, graphics, games, programming, science, office, utilities, and more. Almost all of the software is free and open source.DocumentsInternetEducationGraphicsVideoAudioSystem AdminDesktopProductivityScienceGamesSecurityUtilitiesDevelopmentFinanceWeb AppsOtherBooksClick the icons above to view...

The debate over whether KDE or GNOME is the better Linux desktop has been going on since before the turn of the century. Actually, it boils down to choice and what works best for you. SOURCE: Pixabay Novelist Hugh MacLennan once described Canada as “two solitudes” — an English-speaking one and a French-speaking one, neither of which had much to do with the other. The description is decades out-dated, and today a dozen solitudes might be more accurate. However, the phrase echoes in my mind whenever I think of the gulf today between GNOME technologies and KDE software compilations. Although...

NOT a photoshop. That is Beto on the left as part of the Punk Rock Band Foss. You can also see the pic in this Rolling Stone ARTICLE.

It appears as if much of the open source infrastructure we depend on is suffering from neglect. That’s the message brought to the SouthEast LinuxFest (SELF) by David Nally. Listening to his talk, “The Tragedy of Open Source,” it was hard not to think that some of our infrastructure projects are beginning to resemble some disintegrating municipal water and sewer systems, or maybe compare his examples with our crumbling roads and bridges. Nally is a South Carolina based “recovering sysadmin” who now wears many hats at Apache as well as being an employee at Citrix.The neglect he mentions has caused...

In the olden days the topic of software freedom was central to Linux and free/open source software. Software freedom needs to remain front and center. Remember Richard Stallman's Four Freedoms?"Nobody should be restricted by the software they use. There are four freedoms that every user should have: the freedom to use the software for any purpose,the freedom to change the software to suit your needs,the freedom to share the software with your friends and neighbors, andthe freedom to share the changes you make." Another way to say this is we should always have the freedom to tinker.We used to take these freedoms...

ELK CITY, Okla. – Emergency crews pulled two cars from Foss Lake in Custer County Tuesday afternoon. The Elk City Daily News reported human remains have been found in both vehicles. Investigators said one of the vehicles is connected to a cold case more than 40-years-old where three teenagers went missing Nov. 20, 1970. The 1969 Chevrolet Camaro crews pulled from Foss Lake may have belonged to 16-year-old Jimmy Allen Williams, who was last seen driving in Sayre with two friends, 18-year-old Thomas Rios and 18-year-old Leah Johnson. The three teens never returned home and have not been heard from...

Image by opensource.com Concerns are raised every once in a while in the broader free and open source software community about freeloaders. The attitude expressed is that if you're getting the benefit of FOSS, you should contribute. Building a business on a FOSS project you don't own, whether you're providing a service or product around a FOSS project should in return garner some sort of quid pro quo. In reality, freeloaders are desirable. I think we need to look through the other end of the telescope. The people most often concerned about freeloaders and the free ride are actually the ones...

A tidbit buried within an hour long video: http://youtu.be/MShbP3OpASA At about 19 minutes, he starts talking about IBM, and how there was a drive to sell Linux. And he goes on to point out how easy to use interfaces just weren't a high priority until the commercial interests came in and did a lot of the boring stuff. They did Q and A. And other things he eludes to but doesn't specifically list. I point this out because I myself have run into a lot of the total anti-commercial venom from various people over the years, and that doesn't have...

Intel's Linux graphics team is seeking any questions or feedback that Phoronix readers have concerning their open-source Linux graphics driver stack. ... Before anyone asks, this is only about the driver developed by the Intel OSTC team for hardware with true Intel integrated graphics -- Sandy Bridge, Ivy Bridge, Ironlake, i915, i945, etc -- and not the notorious Poulsbo or now the Medfield situation. This is also only about graphics and not any other area of your Intel Linux desktop/notebook/netbook/tablet. Go forth and post!

Back on Friday we published Mac OS X 10.6 benchmarks and found it to offer some terrific performance improvements , but at the same time, there were a few notable regressions. Apple engineers have been working hard at pushing technologies like Grand Central Dispatch (GCD), OpenCL, full 64-bit support, and other changes to their OS X stack to bolster its performance capabilities and reduce the overall footprint. Now that we have tested Mac OS X 10.6, we are seeing how its performance compares to that of Ubuntu Linux. Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" will be out in October and does have...

The White House press office announced today that Vivek Kundra, the current chief technology officer of Washington DC, will be assuming the position of Federal Chief Information Officer (CIO) at the White House. The appointment of a top CIO is another first: the position did not exist in any previous administrations. Kundra will also have final say on government technology purchases , and will have the authority to overrule his peers at subordinate agencies.

Windows users have a real problem when it comes to updates. Sure they have Microsoft Update and certainly many applications include their own update mechanisms. Yet despite that, there seems to be a problem with Windows users actually updating. So allow me to make a suggestion. Microsoft (or a really smart ISV) should build a full application manager for Windows, similar to what most Linux distributions do today. For the non-Linux users out there - what Linux distros typically do is have a package management utility of some sort that pulls updates from a package repository (or repositories). Those updates...

Published today are four programming guides to cover the VX800/820 Graphics Core & 2D (100 pages), VX800/820 3D & video (157 pages), CX700/VX700 Graphics Core & 2D (100 pages), and CX700/VX700 3D & video (91 pages). This is essentially just about 450 pages worth of register descriptions. We are still looking over this documentation to gauge its completeness. If you are a developer interested in this information, it can be found on the X.Org web-site. In addition to releasing 2D, 3D, and video register guides, VIA has also announced today it has partnered up with the OpenChrome team. A press...

Has anyone used or is anyone out Free Republica using Open Office Suite? What has your experience been like? When did it switch from free to member fee based?

The Fall of Microsoft Office By Anders Bylund (TMF Zahrim) May 27, 2008 On the same day that the state of New York published a report supporting open formats for electronic documents, mighty Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) said that it would support the open-source ODF format in Office 2007. Redmond's own Open Office XML specification may be heading for the great Recycle Bin in the sky, never to come back. What happened? The twin developments are noteworthy to astute investors for multiple rasons. While several European countries, the EU itself, and the state of Massachusetts have distanced themselves from proprietary document...

When I think about what works really well in open source development and technology, the following things stand out: Modular architectures, Programming language agnostic, Feedback-driven development, Built-for-purpose systems, Sysadmins who write code, and Standards-based communication.

The KDE Community is thrilled to announce the immediate availability of KDE 4.0. This significant release marks both the end of the long and intensive development cycle leading up to KDE 4.0 and the beginning of the KDE 4 era.

What could make the Free Software Foundation (FSF), proprietary software companies, and at least one venture capitalist into allies? The End Software Patents (ESP) coalition, a new organization poised to swing into action next month under the leadership of Ben Klemens. The campaign currently has seed funding of a quarter million dollars from sources those associated with the group won't disclose, and hopes to augment that with donations from individuals and companies for a struggle that, to judge by the usual amount of time it takes to push major changes through the US Supreme Court, could take five years or...

Fearing the restrictions it places on their work, the majority of open source software developers do not plan to publish code in the next year under a controversial new license authored by the main governing body for open source and free software, according to a survey released Wednesday. In addition, more than 40% of those surveyed said they won't ever publish their work under Version 3 of the General Public License, which was released earlier this year by the Free Software Foundation. "GPLv3 is controversial because it imposes restrictions on what you can do with programs," said John Andrews, CEO...

How is an untouchable superpower defeated? In many cases, it foolishly engages itself in an unwinnable war and simply consumes itself. Microsoft, threatened by the encroachment of competition from open source, has long waged a detached propaganda war against free software and in particular Linux, but has recently escalated its conflict into a full blown attack. Here's what's happening, and why it will greatly accelerate the company's undoing.Bill Gates' Infatuation With Software. Back in the dawn of desktop computing, Bill Gates led the ideology that software was going to be the sole currency of the new economy. Throughout the 80s...