October 23rd, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Google has released the source code of its Android platform, and coincidentally, I saw my first G1 in the wild yesterday.
“Android is not a single piece of hardware; it’s a complete, end-to-end software platform that can be adapted to work on any number of hardware configurations. Everything is there, from the bootloader all the way up to the applications. And with an Android device already on the market, it has proven that it has what it takes to truly compete in the mobile arena…
“Have a great idea for a new feature? Add it! As an open source project, the best part is that anyone can contribute to Android and influence its direction. And if the platform becomes as ubiquitous as I hope it will, you may end up influencing the future of mobile devices as a whole.”
With the release of Android, the open sourcing of Symbian and the gradual failure of Windows Mobile, it’s clear the mobile market will take a very different direction than the PC market two decades ago. (I expect Apple’s iPhone will flourish alongside the open source platforms as well.)
Without the negative influence of a Microsoft monopoly, mobile devices are going to be much more dynamic and innovative than the PC software industry has been for many years. (Although open source is forcing major changes there now, as well.) This should be interesting!
Posted in Free Culture, Open Source | Comments Off on Android Source Code Available
October 22nd, 2008 Benjamin Horst
The VAR Guy points out that in Dell’s netbook line, they now advertise that some models run Ubuntu:
“It’s one small step for Dell and consumer Linux — and one giant leap for Canonical’s Ubuntu Linux efforts. Specifically, Dell is spending advertising dollars to promote PCs with Ubuntu Linux preinstalled. The move has significant implications for the business world as well.”
Potential customers can see the same machine (with almost identical hardware) for sale in two versions: Ubuntu and Windows. And the clear and obvious price difference favors Ubuntu.
In the flyer the author found in his newspaper, in fact, only the Ubuntu version was shown!
As netbooks grow and Linux maintains a strong foothold in the segment, more people will become familiar and comfortable with it. This will lead to its growth in other business markets too, as users will want Linux’s power and usability on their primary work machines as well:
“If Ubuntu can impress consumer Netbook users, that positive first impression could help Canonical’s operating system push deeper into the corporate market.”
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, Open Source | Comments Off on Ubuntu Netbooks from Dell
October 21st, 2008 Benjamin Horst
North-by-South points out another country adopting ODF in its article, Venezuela Adopts ODF as National Standard:
“Speaking at the Second ODF Workshop in Pretoria, South Africa, yesterday, Carlos Gonzalez of the National Center of Information Technologies, announced that the Venezuelan government had formally adopted ODF as a standard for the ‘processing, exchange and storage of documents’.” Venezuela joins a number of other countries who have adopted this open standard, along with Brazil, Uruguay, South Africa, Belgium — overall, fourteen national and eight provincial governments.”
Many countries, provinces and cities have adopted ODF, because it is about competition on a fair playing field, and just like HTML, it will bring lots of new competitors, ideas, processes and products into a market that has long been stymied by the decadence of a monopoly. Already, ODF is supported by many companies and many products:
“It is currently implemented by office solutions such as OpenOffice, KOffice, Google Docs, Zoho, IBM Lotus Symphony and Corel Wordperfect. In May 2008, Microsoft announced that Service Pack 2 for Microsoft Office 2007 would add native support for the Open Document Format.”
With momentum like this, we can expect great things for ODF and its users in the future.
Posted in Free Culture, ODF | 1 Comment »
October 20th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
OpenOffice.org 3.0 was released one week ago today. John McCreesh writes:
“From the official announcement on Monday 13th October at 09:00 UTC, to midnight on Sunday 20th October, OpenOffice.org 3.0 recorded an astonishing three million downloads via the Bouncer. That’s:
- 221,230 GNU/Linux users (who might be considered obvious users of the world’s leading open-source office suite)
- an impressive 320,622 Mac OS X users (enjoying OpenOffice.org with a Mac “look and feel” for the first time), and
- a staggering 2,449,863 Microsoft Windows users.”
Another of John’s posts provides additional information and analysis.
“If you download OpenOffice.org from the download page, you will go via the Bouncer, and your download will be logged. These logs are the only figures we are able to quantify accurately, but they are a considerable underestimate of the actual number of downloads…”
So how many people are already using OpenOffice.org 3.0? No-one knows. We know that the Bouncer figures underestimate the number of downloads. We know the number of downloads is considerably less than the number of installed copies. So five million users already?”
The release of OOo 3.0 is definitely its biggest to date. The userbase is clearly expanding, and now Mac OS X can be a part of that, as in this first week its downloads represent a healthy piece of the total, at almost 11%.
Posted in Free Culture, Mac, OpenOffice.org, Uncategorized | 10 Comments »
October 17th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
While it’s tough to find OpenOffice books in your typical physical bookstore, I’ve just discovered the wealth of options available online from self-publisher Lulu.
I’ve long known that the great OOoAuthors handbooks have been sold on Lulu, but only today did I search more broadly and discover a great cache of books self-published by OOo-savvy authors from all over the world.
Among those on my wishlist are:
Dmitri Popov’s OpenOffice.org Basic Crash Course
OOoAuthors’ OpenOffice.org 2.x Draw Guide (the 3.x version should arrive soon)
Roberto Benitez’s Database Programming with OpenOffice.org Base & Basic
And many more.
Posted in OpenOffice.org | 2 Comments »
October 15th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
OpenOffice.org 3.0 was released on Monday, October 13, and download demand has been enormous since then. In fact, it’s been so strong the website is down and a temporary download-only site has been put in its place until the spike recedes.
Frank Mau announces over 350,000 downloads were initiated in the first 24 hours since OOo 3.0’s release:
“It could be more but the huge traffic on www.openoffice.org bear down the web-infrastructure on the site host. Hope the next days will bring up the service back on a stable base.”
Eike Rathke points out the release of OpenOffice 3.0 is also the project’s 8th birthday. He also provides a list of known mirrors to download 3.0 from if you cannot reach the main site.
Kazunaro Hirano writes: 3.0.0 Released! Website down but Mirrors are OK! He too provides links to mirror sites for alternate download access.
There are lots of reasons for this huge interest in OpenOffice.org 3.0, and I like to think pent-up demand from Mac users is one of them.
Posted in Free Culture, Mac, Open Source, OpenOffice.org | Comments Off on Huge Demand for OpenOffice.org 3.0
October 9th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Ian Lynch pointed out a new UK-based resource site for schools using open source software, called Open Source Schools.
“The Schools Open Source Project is an initiative to help schools with awareness, adoption, deployment, use and ongoing development of Open Source Software (OSS)…
“The project will provide an authoritative, informative and impartial website that will raise awareness of how OSS can be used to enhance teaching and school infrastructures. The project will then develop and support a community of practice that engages those who are currently using OSS and welcomes and supports new members.”
The site is very attractive, built in Drupal, and provides many community features, so I expect it to become a very useful resource as it continues to grow.
Posted in Drupal, Free Culture, Open Source | 1 Comment »
October 7th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
One of the joys of open source is its mutability. If someone has a great idea and the right experience, they can make fundamental changes for the better. With this mindset, two Linux developers from Intel modified Fedora and Moblin to boot from a solid state drive (on the Eee PC) in only five seconds.
LWN.net announces: “At the Linux Plumbers Conference Thursday, Arjan van de Ven, Linux developer at Intel and author of PowerTOP, and Auke Kok, another Linux developer at Intel’s Open Source Technology Center, demonstrated a Linux system booting in five seconds.”
Lots of further tech details in the article, but in short, it’s great to see how fast Linux can boot when developers take it upon themselves to make it happen.
Posted in Free Culture, GNU/Linux, Open Source | Comments Off on Boot Linux in 5 Seconds
October 6th, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Some time ago, Brazil announced it would adopt ODF as a national document storage standard. Now, our friends at North-by-South announce, it has begun implementing ODF within the government:
“The Brasília Protocol (now translated to English) started the process of implementation of the Open Document Format (ODF) within the Brazilian Government. The Protocol was signed during the opening of CONSEGI 2008 by Bank of Brazil, Serpro, Dataprev, Post Office and Telegraph State Company (ECT), INPE (Institute of Spacial Researches), INPI (Institute of Intellectual Property), Ministry of Exterior Relations and others. All the institutions who signed the protocol are assuming the commitment to use the ODF standard, make it available to society-at-large, exchange documents between themselves in this format and to share solutions in open format.”
The original story is posted on the ODF Alliance website, which notes: “This is no small ODF migration, as the Brazilian entities involved have a combined 500,000 desktops.”
Considering the rapid growth of Brazil’s economy (and more importantly, the ongoing rise of many of its poorer citizens into the middle class), and its growing importance on the world stage, Brazil’s implementation of ODF will create waves that travel far and help many other governments around the world to make the same choice in favor of open standards.
Posted in Free Culture, ODF | Comments Off on Brazil Now Implementing ODF
October 3rd, 2008 Benjamin Horst
Thanks to the weekly ZaReason newsletter, I found two articles pointing out how free software can help in times of economic distress.
For Linux Journal, Glyn Moody writes “Openness is the Solution to the (Double) Subprime Crisis.” He draws parallels between subprime mortgages and subprime software, and their effects on the market.
“Patents are the last refuge of proprietary software companies, which are increasingly unable to compete on a level playing field with free software. Only by introducing artificial barriers in the form of nominal patents on mathematical algorithms – software – can they hope to hobble the otherwise superior open source offerings.
“They are superior because they create real value – they have to, otherwise people will not use the code. Proprietary software, by virtue of the lock-in it imposes on users, can exact a kind of software rent through mandatory upgrades, whether or not there is any value in it for the customer (just think of the Vista fiasco).”
For DaniWeb, Ron Miller writes “What Does the Economic Crisis Mean for the Tech Sector?”
“You would think that current economic climate would bode well for open source products. When your budget is lean, free begins to look pretty good. Cloud vendors and the growing virtualization market should do well too. With less money available, it makes a lot of sense to let the vendor deal with infrastructure and to reduce investments in your own data center.”
Nevertheless, there has not yet been evidence of companies moving more quickly in this direction due to economic circumstances. For individuals, students and small businesses, however, it may be a different story.
Posted in Open Source | Comments Off on Free Software vs Economic Distress