September 12th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Cedric Bosdonnat introduces the new version of COOoder, an OOo extension that automatically highlights programming code in OpenOffice documents. The new version brings a handful of new features to the extension.
Combining text editor functionality into a word processor sounds like it could be an awkward hybrid, but Cedric suggests its primary use is to place code snippets into word processing documents in a more readable format, and that sounds like it could be useful for a lot of programming teachers, among others.
Posted in Extensions, Open Source, OpenOffice.org | Comments Off on COOoder Extension: Syntax Highlighting in OpenOffice.org
September 11th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Laptop Magazine has an article (some months old) about design mockups for OLPC XO-2, not due for release until 2010 but already remarkably creative in its design ideas.
“Negroponte didn’t share many details about the XO-2’s hardware, but the new system has two touch-sensitive displays… The XO-2 will be much smaller than the original machine (half the size, according to the press release) and will have a foldable e-book form factor. “The next generation laptop should be a book,” Negroponte said.”
Having created a new product category (the “netbook”) and reached hundreds of thousands of children with its first generation XO, it appears OLPC is going to follow that up with an even greater impact for the world when it releases the XO-2. They’ll also continue the Give One Get One program, meaning interested geeks in the developed world will have the opportunity to acquire OLPC machines for their own use too.
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, OLPC, Open Source | Comments Off on Laptop Mag on OLPC XO-2
September 9th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
The robotics community is finding new momentum as it commits more and more to the open source ethos, as OStatic reports in “Open Source Roboticists On a Path to C3P0.”
“In the open source community, there are several efforts to develop robots that look and/or act like humans, performing interesting and useful tasks. They’re not C3PO at this stage of their development, but they show tremendous promise, especially if more open source contributions are made to the projects.”
The current state of robotics reminds me of the Homebrew Computer Club, where Woz got his start and invented the personal computer. Personal robotics will probably follow a similar trajectory from hacker playground to commercial usefulness to ubiquity in the developed world.
One of the standouts in this community is the open source group Willow Garage:
“Willow Garage is an open source robotics project that originated at Stanford University. Robots being developed with the project run ROS (Robot Operating System) software. The operating system comes complete with tutorials, a developer’s guide, and more–all at the link just provided.
“PR2 is the mobile hardware design for Willow Garage robots, featuring stereo and laser sensors… Stanford hosts a series of highly entertaining and interesting videos here, showing PR2 robots performing tasks such as tidying up a room and retrieving beer from a refrigerator.”
Personal robotics could be the next big growth industry. Keep an eye on this space!
Posted in Free Culture, Open Source, Robotics | Comments Off on Open Source Robotics
September 8th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
I’ve long been a fan of the OLPC XO, the original “$100 laptop.” It had such a broad influence that it spawned the entirely new product category of “netbooks,” and even though the XO itself still costs more than $100 (though falling), one of those it influenced has just broken that barrier.
Combine the drive to break the hundred-dollar barrier with the power of sinofacture, and the $98 Linux laptop, the HiVision miniNote, is here. (While the capitalization pattern of its name is nearly inscrutable, the machine is significant for its other aspects.)
One of the most important features of netbooks that helps them remain so low-cost is they usually run open source Linux operating systems (a retail copy of Windows is generally more expensive than these entire systems) as part of a complete stack of open source programs.
They also exclude unnecessary hardware: “HiVision makes the world’s cheapest Linux laptop at $98 using a new cheaper MIPS based processor, WiFi, 1GB flash storage, it runs Linux, has 3 USB ports, Ethernet, SDHC card reader, audio in and out, voice-chat, skype, multi-tabbed Firefox browser support and Abiword for word processing.”
Follow the link above to see a video of this new netbook as well.
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, Open Source | Comments Off on The $98 Linux Laptop
September 5th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Alan C. Baird has developed Screenwrite(R), an OpenOffice.org template for formatting screenplays, which is distributed for free on the OpenOffice extensions site.
Unlike most of the extensions on the site (which are actually extensions), this is just a formatted template you download and add to your OOo installation. I’m not sure whey it’s distributed here, but it’s pretty cool and quite useful for film folks, anyway.
For very detailed instructions on finding and installing OpenOffice templates, check out HowtoForge’s article, “Using and Customizing Templates in OpenOffice.org.”
Posted in Extensions, Free Culture, Open Source, OpenOffice.org | Comments Off on Screenwriter “Extension” for OpenOffice
September 4th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Enschede, the 13th-largest city in the Netherlands, will cancel its annual subscription licenses of Microsoft Office and Windows to save money and better serve its 155,000 inhabitants, the Open Source Observatory announces:
“The city council was contacted by Microsoft a few months ago to renew the licence contract for MS Office and MS Windows, for which the city pays some 450,000 euro per year. According to Hans Koenders, IT-policy adviser for the city council, renewing the contract would enable the city council to migrate to the latest version of Office and Windows. “That is not very compelling, for we are not planning an overhaul of our desktop software.”
“The city’s licence ran out on Monday. However, not renewing still gives the city administration the right to continue to use its current version of Microsoft Office (2003) on all of its 2,000 desktop PCs, for the next three years.
“The city council wants to use this period to test OpenOffice… [and] to slowly increase the amount of Open Source software, reasoning that this will strengthen local IT service providers. “It is possible that migrating to Open Source ends up not being cheaper than using proprietary software. However, it is likely that this way we will be paying a local company, instead of sending our money overseas.”
Enschede is entering this project with the wisdom collected from many previous migrations, and with a deep understanding of the obvious and hidden benefits it can expect to accrue from the adoption of OpenOffice and other FOSS applications. Furthermore, paying 225 euros per year per PC, I am sure they will save money right from the start with this change. (That monopoly license cost, just for renting software, is obscene!)
Congratulations and good luck to them!
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, Open Source, OpenOffice.org | Comments Off on Dutch City of Enschede Piloting OpenOffice.org
September 2nd, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Computer users are naturally a bit hesitant to reinstall operating systems, so the strategic impact of having open source pre-installed on consumer PCs is very high. Many folks will happily use whatever comes on their new machines, so it’s a great opportunity to provide high-quality open source solutions instead of the problematic proprietary systems commonplace today.
In this vein, Hugh’s Space notices Ubuntu pre-installed on retail laptops in Poland.
He writes, “I’ve read about many companies doing this but it is the first time I’ve seen it in a shop here. I managed to snap this photo on my camera phone…”
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, Open Source | Comments Off on Ubuntu Pre-installed in Poland
August 29th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Smashing Apps publishes “19 Most Essential Open Source Applications That You Probably Want To Know.”
As the site’s audience is largely graphic design professionals, this should help promote open source programs to a new cadre of possible users.
The majority of applications in this collection are web apps, but a few desktop programs make the list, including OpenOffice.org and Mozilla Seamonkey. (Not Firefox, though. They must feel that everyone already knows it.)
Posted in Open Source, OpenOffice.org | Comments Off on Smashing Apps’ 19 Most-Essential Open Source Applications
August 28th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Mail merge has been a pain for some friends of mine using OpenOffice.org within their university administrative department, so I’ve been on the hunt for ways to make it easier. Solveig covers OpenOffice 2.x mail merge in an article from 2006 (which I’ve mentioned before), but they still have a few problems with editing the results of the merge before printing labels.
A new extension, Fast Mail Merge, was created to simplify some aspects of creating a mail merge, but I can’t really test it out since it’s not available for OOo 3.0 on Mac OS X (Linux and Windows versions are available). Nonetheless, this extension should prove useful to many OOo users out there.
Posted in Extensions, Open Source, OpenOffice.org | 1 Comment »
August 22nd, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Social networking sites and tools are one of the most fascinating areas online these days. But sharing my information with a company whose goals and intentions I just don’t know makes me somewhat nervous, hence my interest in open source social networking applications and protocols. One of the fastest-growing and best-known, Elgg, has just reached 1.0.
Elgg has already been implemented by several universities and online communities around the world, has a Packt book, and should grow even faster with the 1.0 stamp on its codebase.
See Elgg’s homepage and download the code to get started!
Posted in Free Culture, Open Source | Comments Off on Elgg 1.0 Arrives